Ever Always (7 page)

H
unter's long body sprawled out along a picnic bench on the work site, his boots propped up on the bench across from him. He stared up into the sparkling sky, wishing the sun would just burn his retinas already.

“You've gotta tell her, man,” advised Cross.

“She already knows,” said Hunter dully.

“Nah.” Cross shook his head. “She might know on the inside. But if you don't tell her exactly what's in your head and your heart, she's just gonna be confused, Hunter. Is that what you want? Or do you want Ever to be perfectly clear on where you stand, and why you're willing to do this to your brother?”

Hunter nodded slowly, beginning to understand that Cross had a point.

“You've always been in her corner, even when she didn't realize it was you,” continued Cross. “The girl needs to know. Shit, I think I'll tell her if you won't.”

“You won't tell her anything,” said Hunter. “I'll talk to her.”

“And how are you going to get the ball rolling, considering she hasn't breathed your air in a week?”

“She'll listen,” said Hunter in a determined voice. “She has to go with me to see Sam next weekend. She'll listen before then.”

The time to talk to Ever came sooner than Hunter expected. That night, after he had showered and settled onto his couch, his body utterly exhausted from the hard work he endured all week, his cell phone rang on the coffee table. Picking it up, he read Cross's name on the screen.

“I'm not going out—I already told you,” he growled in greeting.

“Get your ass down here, man,” said Cross. “If you ain't here, I'm gonna have my hands full trying to keep the masses off her.”

Hunter stood, searching the room for his shirt. “She's at the bar?”

“Yeah,” confirmed Cross. “With Rilla. I don't want her to have another wild night without you to catch her at the end of it.”

Hunter pulled on the discarded shirt and grabbed his keys. “Give me five minutes, Cross. I swear to God, if anyone touches her before I get there, they'll be scraping a dead body up off the floor.”

He disconnected the call, jogged outside, and jumped in his truck. When he arrived at the bar, his eyes found Ever and Rilla dancing
on top of
the bar to an audience of adoring admirers.

“
Fuck
, no,” he muttered as he stalked in her direction. Cross sent him a salute as he passed by his table, and when he reached the bar he called out Ever's name.

She locked eyes with him, her eyebrows lifting in surprise. He reached up for her, but she batted his hands away.

“Go home, Hunter,” she yelled above the Luke Bryan song blaring over the speakers.

“You're coming home with me!” He reached up again, this time ignoring her swats and yanking her by the waist down into his arms. She tumbled down against his chest, and he cradled her firmly against his body as he carried her from the bar.

“Son of a bitch,” she cursed. “You have no right, Hunter!”

“I know that,” he hissed in her ear, grabbing her wrist before she could smack him in the face. “You don't think I'm well aware of the fact that I have no rights when it comes to you? You're not having a repeat of last weekend. Not until I get some things off my chest. Then, if you want to go out and get wasted, I won't even try to stop you. Just don't expect me to be there to pick up the pieces.”

She stilled in his arms, and he glanced down at her, noting she wasn't totally drunk yet. She had merely scratched the surface, and he was relieved as he placed her gently in the front seat of his truck.

“We're going to my place,” he said with a grim set to his mouth.

She sat on his couch, warily watching Hunter as he paced in front of her like a hungry bear.

“Hunter—” she tried.

He held up both hands, as if to ward off whatever words would fall out of her mouth next. “No. Just listen. That's all I want you to do right now. Okay?”

She nodded, tucking her legs underneath her.

Hunter followed that movement, his eyes zeroing in on her legs, bare in her denim mini.

“No,” he said, his voice suddenly hoarse. “I can't do this with you sitting there looking…like that. Please go change.”

Her heartbeat spiked at his words and the expression in his eyes. The way he looked at her was…it was…it made her insides melt into a puddle of incoherent thoughts and feelings.

The way Hunter made her feel…it was so different than the way she felt with Sam. With Sam, she felt comfortable, and warm, and protected.

With Hunter, she felt alive. She felt sensual. She knew she didn't need protecting, but his strong body was there to catch her if she fell.

She nodded. Maybe it would be better if she changed.

Five minutes later she settled into the same spot, this time dressed in a pair of Hunter's shorts and one of his soft, long-sleeved tees. She held her breath, because if she inhaled, she'd breathe in his scent. It was all over her, and that was nearly as bad as having
him
all over her. She shuddered.

“Cold?” he asked with concern.

“No,” she said. “Go ahead. Talk.”

Taking a deep gulp of air and holding it, his lips moved as he counted to five. Then he began to speak.

“You're falling apart right now because you think that when Sam left, he took a piece of you with him. That might be true, Ev. But he didn't take the most important pieces. Those are still here, with me. I've loved you for just as long as Sam has. Longer, maybe. I know you better than he does. Like, I know you want to stay here in Duck Creek and make a life for yourself here. I know you want to own your own bakery one day, and that you're damn talented enough in the kitchen to do it. I know that your secret wish came true when your dad died, but that you may never forgive yourself for being the one who had to pull the trigger. I wish to God it had been me who did that. Not you.

“I know Sam stepped in when you needed him the most. But I told him way back then, when we were just barely teenagers, that I thought I was going to marry you one day. He knew that. But then you chose him, and he let you. That nearly killed me, but I stepped back.”

“Hunter—”

“No, let me finish. The gun that killed your dad? Sam asked me, and I'm the one who got it for him to give to you. I've always wanted you safe, just like he has. He was just the face of the Keep Ever Alive campaign. But we shared the responsibility fifty-fifty.”

“Oh my God,” she whispered. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“
Because you chose him.
” The anguish in his voice slapped her with a force she didn't expect. She looked down at her hands so she wouldn't have to see his pain. “God, it hurt like a motherfucker when the two of you announced that you were dating. It was like everyone else in town expected it. But it hit me like a sledgehammer. I didn't know what to do. So I didn't do anything.”

She stood, stumbling over her feet to get to where Hunter was. She stood directly in front of him, looking up.

“You love me?”

She suddenly had to hear him say it again. Her life depended on it, in that moment.

The air he held in left his chest in a rush of breath, and he nodded slowly, holding her stare.

“I love you, Ever Allen. I always have. I always will.”

The air between them became charged with a new type of energy, pulsating with the emotions churning around the two of them. Hunter cupped her face in his hands.

“Do you want me to say it again?” he murmured as he leaned down toward her lips.

“Don't,” she begged softly, all the while moving closer into his reach.

“I can't not kiss you right now.” His voice was almost nonexistent as he closed the tiniest bit of distance left between them. “I'm not capable of holding back anymore.”

His last word was a breath on his lips as they grazed against hers, and then he took her mouth fully with his own. She allowed herself to taste him this time, because this was
Hunter
and she was kissing him. He tasted sweeter than she would have imagined, like minty freshness mixed with something tangy and delicious. When his tongue teased her lips, prodding her mouth to open for him, she moaned a little into him, and she was suddenly floating somewhere up above herself, watching it all unfold.

His hands stroked her cheeks, holding her like something precious that could very possibly break. And she guessed she could break; this could rip her apart.

Or maybe it could stitch her back together again.

“Ever,” he sighed as he pulled back just far enough to stare into her eyes. His were full of wonder and fascination, as if he'd always thought about what this would be like but the real experience was so much more than he'd ever imagined. Or maybe that was just her own thoughts reflecting back at her.

In a sudden movement that stole her breath, he lifted her. One arm wrapped strongly around her shoulders while the other cradled her beneath her knees. He carried her quickly to the couch and laid her down.  

Following, her down, he leaned forward and kissed her again, intensifying the experience with more force. She whimpered against his lips, and he groaned as his hands roamed down her torso and into the waistband of her shorts.

His hands left fiery streaks of heat on her skin, and she couldn't get enough. He lifted her so she was straddling his lap with ease as he pulled his mouth away again.

The ferocity was back in his eyes. She loved his eyes, the way they looked at her as if she were the last thing he'd ever see on Earth.

“You're mine,” he whispered. “You were never really Sam's, Ev. You were always mine.”

She nodded, because somehow, someway, that statement was the God's honest truth. She could kick herself for not realizing it sooner.

She reached down for the hem of his shirt, pulling it up, and greedily took in the sight of him without feeling guilty, without wishing she could touch him. Because she
was
touching him—every hard ridge of his chest, every ripple in his stomach. And he did the same to her, his eyes roving over her now shirtless body as he threw the garment away and absorbed every inch of her bareness. They continued to undress each other this way, touching and sometimes tasting, wondering and exploring.

Exploring each other like they hadn't spent most of their lives together.

But Ever had never seen Hunter like this, had never had the right to.

She still didn't.
She put the tiny voice in a box and locked it far, far away.

His hands traveled up her bare back, drifting around her sides to cup her breasts in his big palms.

“Yes!” she gasped, throwing her head back and sinking her hips down on top of his obvious need.

“Holy fuck,” he groaned into the crook of her neck. “I want you so bad, Ever. So fucking bad.”

“What are you waiting for?” Her bold statement surprised even her. This was what she wanted. It was what they both needed.

They would both explode without it.

He pulled back, staring hard into her eyes.

“Are you sure?”

In answer, she reached down between them, grabbing his erection, squeezing just enough to show him how serious she was.

He emitted a string of curses and took control, flipping her so that she was underneath him on the couch and owning her mouth.

“I love you,” he whispered just before his lips left hers to trail along the line of her jaw and down her neck. She arched against him, her full breasts pressing against his chest. He hissed in a breath at the contact, and bent his head to take a taut nipple into his mouth.

She screamed his name. What he made her feel…the pure heat in her core that threatened to burn her up from the inside out…it was magical and new and amazing. They both cried out as their bodies finally linked in the way that made them one.

H
e's going to hate us,” she said, running her fingers gently through his hair.

Every touch from her fingers to his body still sent a shiver of pleasure through him, still sent his heart off to those races only Ever could start.

“He might,” he replied.

She looked up at him, arching an eyebrow.

“Okay,” he agreed. “He will. But he's starting a new life down there in South Carolina. And whether he realizes it yet or not, it doesn't include you. I think my brother will land on his feet. We all need to be honest here. This is what's meant to be.”

She nodded, lying back beside him in the bed, her head against his chest. She marveled at how perfect it felt. Like they'd done it a million times before. Like this spot in the crook of his arm and the warmth of his body had her name on it. He dropped a kiss on the top of her hair, and she snuggled closer into his side.

But this was still all wrong. Even when it was so very, very right.

“What the hell are we
doing
?” she asked.

“We're…we're…shit. I don't know. Do you want me to go back to acting like you belong to someone else? I'm sorry. But I can't do that, Ever. Don't ask me to.”

She sat up and leaned forward, her forehead falling against her palms. Her hair formed a thick curtain around her face.

“I'm not going to ask you to pretend,” she said, her voice muffled by her makeshift cubby. “But we've already crossed a line here, Hunter. I don't want to cross it again. I need to talk to Sam. I need to work through this with him.”

Hunter sighed, defeated. “Okay. If you want time, that's what I'll give you. I'll wait. We see Sam next weekend. Until then…”

“Until then, you and I…”

She glanced over at him, and all of her resolve nearly crumbled into a pile of fine dust in her palms. Hunter's face was a mixture of pain, and love, and determination. His face was a beautiful picture that was painted just for her, and the fact that she was going to put it away in its box until further notice made her chest feel like it was caving in.

“I'm sorry,” she whispered.

He pulled her into his bare chest, and his rapid heartbeat was pulsating through her entire body. “Don't apologize. I shouldn't have let this happen. Not until…I'm just sorry.”

She leaned her head into his chest and let the tears fall freely onto his skin.

He tilted her chin upward so she was staring into his face again. “Not sorry about being with you. Sorry about the timing. Sorry about not being as bold as Sam years ago. Sorry about not being honest with you about how I felt sooner than this. But not sorry for last night. No matter what happens after this, last night ruined me for any other experience that comes after. It was the best damn night of my life.”

She nodded, keeping her true response to herself. She couldn't tell Hunter that spending the night in his arms had been the most blissful experience of her life, too. The guilt chipping away at a large portion of her heart kept the words locked tightly inside.

It was the slowest week of his life.

The days and the nights dragged on as if he were inside a sand timer that just kept flipping over and over again. The only way to escape it was to wait idly by for time to run out, and when it finally did, he couldn't believe it had only been a week.

They both knocked off work early on Friday so that they'd be ready to drive south in the early afternoon. Hunter had spoken to Sam on the phone and assured him he'd have Ever there by evening. Sam seemed excited about their visit, about showing them everything there was to see about his new town and his new life.

Hunter tried hard not to feel bitter, but it wasn't exactly working. It was going to hurt Ever, seeing what Sam had built down there without her.

But he planned on reminding her after this trip exactly what she could build here on her own.

And with him.

“Everything still been quiet on the Sheriff Lincoln front?” he asked as he loaded her suitcase into the back of the truck bed.

She nodded, wrinkling her nose. “Yeah. Freaks me out a little. I keep expecting him to show up again and again, drilling me with more questions. Short of giving me a lie detector test, he can't prove that I know where Sam is. And you guys haven't told me the name of the town he's in, so technically I don't. Not until today, that is.” She climbed into the passenger seat.

“Not today, either,” he said sheepishly when he slid into the driver's seat and started the truck. “I'm gonna blindfold you when we get close. The less you know, the better.” He eased the truck out onto the bumpy road.

Her sigh was exaggerated. “Still protecting me? Both of you are ridiculous. I'm a big girl.”

Hunter was painfully aware of that. “You don't need the stress.”

She glanced over at him as he guided the truck onto the interstate, then leaned her head back into her seat and took a deep breath.

“You know I've never been out of Virginia, right?” she said softly, staring out her window as the scenery rushed by in a blur of green and blue.

His hand stretched toward where hers was resting on the console. She glanced down at it and pulled hers quickly into her lap, looking back out the window again as she did so. It was such a quick, subtle move that he could have talked himself into believing it was a coincidence, that she wasn't purposefully pulling her hand away from his.

Hunter had graduated from high school somewhere in the middle of his class. He wasn't a scholar; he was never going to be the kind of guy who moved on to a higher education down the road. But none of that made him an idiot, and he wasn't going to fool himself into believing things that weren't actually there.

The sharp sting of rejection hit his rapidly beating heart more painfully than he'd expected, and he clenched his hand into a fist before bringing it back to the steering wheel.

“Yeah,” he finally said. Somehow, his voice remained level when what he really wanted to do was cry like a bitch.

“Have you?” she asked.

He nodded. “Just a couple of times. Cross and I took a road trip down to Asheville last winter. Skied for the first time. And once, my mom took me with her to West Virginia to meet up with her sister. That whole trip pissed me off, though, because she left Sam here with a neighbor. I hated how she treated him different from how she treated me. It burned me up inside every time I saw it.”

“And now you can't even stand to be around her, can you?” asked Ever gently.

“Nope. I know Sam gives her money—at least he used to when he was still here. His heart has always been a little bigger than mine, I guess. I can't forgive the way she raised us. Or lack thereof.”

So quickly he thought he'd imagined it, he felt the fiery contact of her skin on his leg through his jeans. She squeezed reassuringly just once, but when he looked down, her hand was back in her lap. He gritted his teeth.

“Your heart is plenty big,” she said, her voice pensive and soft. “I wish you knew that, Hunter. Sam is an amazing person, and he's good at a lot of things. But so are you. You're smart—smarter than you give yourself credit for. Just ask all the guys who work under you at the lumberyard. And you're strong. Strong enough to hold up a friend when they aren't able to stand on their own two feet.”

Despite the fact that his heart was growing larger and fuller with each word that exited her mouth, he didn't miss the magical
f
word she included in that sentence. That hurt. That shit hurt bad.

“Your heart is plenty big,” she stated again, finally turning her head to meet his eyes. He wished he could lose himself in hers, but he had to turn swiftly back to the road.

“You think you can't forgive your mom for the way she brought you two up, and for the way she made Sam feel inadequate because of the way his father hurt her. But one day, you will forgive her, Hunter. It won't be the same way Sam did, because you two are different. I want you to stop trying to hold yourself to some Sam standard, because he's not better than you. He's just different. And you're not lacking in any way compared to your brother.”

The meaning behind her words socked him in the gut as he continued to drive them closer to his waiting brother. She was saying that he was good enough. He was good enough for her.

Even though he had always wanted Ever, a part of him always knew that Sam was a wiser choice. Sam was more outgoing; Sam was sweeter. He had a bigger capacity for forgiveness and love, and Sam was a blatant hero of huge proportions. Ever deserved all of that and more.

Maybe, on some level, he'd just allowed Sam to swoop in and scoop Ever up off her feet when they were teenagers because he knew Sam deserved her love so much more than he did. When Ever had chosen Sam, it had sliced him up inside, but he'd also felt
relieved.
Because finally, Sam had been given the love he deserved.

And after all these years, here Ever was telling him flat out that he was wrong.

He wanted to wrench the truck over to the side of the road and throw it into park. He wanted to pull her over the console and into his lap. He wanted his lips to land on hers and he wanted his hands to creep up her body until he was showing her with his lips and his fingers and his heart exactly how much her words meant to him.

Instead, he drove her a little further into his brother's waiting arms.

He could lose her, taking her to see Sam in a beautiful beach town somewhere on the coast, where his brother had begun forging a new life for both Ever and himself.

He could definitely lose her to his brother all over again this weekend.

God, he hoped with his entire being that this time, she'd choose him.