Keep On Loving you (23 page)

It might have been years since he laughed so hard when the whole lot of them turned on Brett at the same time and buried him in snowballs.

But as everyone began piling into cars to head home, he finally gave in to the clamor inside him and managed to corral one certain unsuspecting Walker. As she headed out the door toward her vehicle, he caught her by the back of her hood and towed her inside the cabin. Though the fire was almost out, the interior remained warm. With his foot, he shut them in.

“Someone will see!” she hissed.

“They're leaving. I told Poppy you and I would lock up.”

“They'll...they'll
think
something!”

“They'll be wrong unless they think we're going to be discussing telling the truth.” That was all he was after, he promised himself. Didn't it weigh on her as much as it did him?

“We shouldn't be alone together,” Mac insisted. “We don't want anyone imagining Zan and Mac as a couple again.”

“But this isn't about Zan and Mac. This is about Zan and Mac and being honest.”

“Not right now—”

“Don't you think the sooner the better? Then we can put our heads together and come up with something acceptable to all.”

“There isn't anything acceptable beyond accepting the situation, don't you get that?”

He put his hands on her shoulders. “I could—”

“No.” Her body was rigid in his grip. “We
can't
take from you. We
won't
take from you.”

He rolled his eyes skyward. “Mac, don't you see I took from all of you for years? You were my friends and as close to family as I had.”

“We don't expect payback.” Her color was high and her eyes burned with icy fire. “Please tell me you get that.”

Letting her go, he ran his fingers through his hair. “Why are you so damn stubborn?”

She turned her back on him and made for the fireplace. Staring into the burning embers, she braced one hand on the mantel. “Brett is settled now. Shay secure with Jace and London. Please let me make sure Poppy has the day of her dreams before you do anything to shake up what she sees as her future.”

“What is this?” Zan said, coming up behind her. “I've never seen this mama bear side of you.”

“In the years you've been gone, I've become the head female in this family,” she said, her voice quiet.

Oh, Mac.
Was that some of the reason she'd been engaged three times? Her effort to ensure the stability of the family? “Poppy's stronger than you think,” he said, even as he thought,
And you're more vulnerable than I knew
.

“Something's off with her, I can tell,” Mac said. “She looks tired. And I...”

“You...what?”

“I can't have anything endangering her happiness. At least not until she's safely committed in marriage to Ryan and sheltered in his arms.”

Who is there to shelter you, Mac?
With all the Walker siblings paired off, who was going to be her buffer against the cold? “Mac...” Zan took hold of her shoulders again, but he lost the thread of his thoughts when she looked up into his face, her eyes big, her expression anxious.

“Please, Zan.”

“Sweetheart.” Tightening his grip, he lowered his forehead to hers, no longer concerned with keeping distance. “What's going on with you?”

“I think... I think Poppy holds all my hope. I think if we can keep her buoyant and bright, then I might eventually be that way, too.”

He closed his eyes. “There's honesty for you,” he muttered. The killing kind, because he wanted buoyancy and brightness for Mac, too. She used to be so assured, so easy with herself. And sometime in the past ten years she'd taken on the weight of the world—and built up a thick armor to help her hold it steady.

“What am I going to do with you?” he asked, opening his eyes.

She hesitated a long moment. Then her mouth opened. “Hold me?” she whispered. “For just a minute, can you hold me?”

Oh, Mac.
No scruple could hold strong against that request. Drawing her close, he pressed his face to her hair. It smelled of snow and smoke and this winter interlude that he'd never forget. Her arms went around him and she fit her body to his.

His cock hardened, even though he told it not to, and then she pushed her face into his neck and breathed him in and there was no hope to stem his sexual reaction. No hope in the universe, when she pressed an openmouthed kiss there.

“Mac.” He groaned her name. “You've got to feel what you're doing to me.”

“I
want
to do it to you.” Her body trembled against his. “I want to do it
with
you.”

She was willing to be honest about this, at least.

“Yeah?” He brought his lips to her ear and drew her more tightly against him so he could feel her every breath. “Right now? Right here? Are we going to do it in the cabin?”

Because, God, he was no longer capable of holding out.

“You're so easy,” she murmured in a teasing voice that might have been forced, and then she kissed him again, running her mouth along his jaw. “Do we need to discuss this? Have some rationale? Give it a name—”

“Not sex buddies,” he said, vehement about it.

“Not sex buddies,” she agreed. “For old times' sake, then?”

Zan held her away a little, just so he could look into her eyes. “Not for the sake of old times, sweetheart. But because this Mac, the present you, is beautiful and complicated and a smart-ass and... Oh, screw it. I just want to fuck you.”

Her laugh rang out, natural and easy like the girl she used to be. But the look in her eyes was mature and sultry and his dick went impossibly hard. He slid one hand into her hair at the back of her head and let the other follow the line of her spine until he breached the waistband of her jeans. There, he didn't hesitate to slide below it so he cupped her fine ass.

“God, you feel good,” he said, and took her mouth.

Consumed her with his kiss. He sunk his tongue deep inside and hers tangled with him there, her hands exploring, too, one under his flannel shirt at his back, the other crawling up his belly. His muscles twitched beneath her touch—then he took her down to the rug beside the hearth.

Mac lay on her back and he ranged over her, elbows on either side of her face. Her cheeks were flushed, her mouth already reddened by his kiss.

“We have a hell of a lot of clothes on,” he said.

She nodded. “Layers.”

“Socks and boots. Long underwear.”

“I still have on my jacket.”

Then he smiled at her. Slow. “I've got an idea. We'll race. First one naked gets—”

She already had pushed him over and was throwing off her clothes.

He had to laugh until his fingers were tangled in the laces of his snow boots. Then he was cursing and she was laughing, and then she was nude and Zan gave up on his shoes and just stared at her in the orange and gold light from the fire's dying embers.

He pulled her into his lap and began kissing her again, and it was unbelievable, all her soft, warm skin available to his touch after days of keeping his distance. Bending his head, he sucked in one of her nipples, deep, and she made a hungry sound and arched her back, pushing it farther into his mouth.

He thought the top of his head might blow.

The top of the other head, too, as she wiggled against the denim covering his dick. “I can't get enough of you,” he said, moving his mouth to her other breast. Cupping it, he fed it between his lips. Mac arched again, and he ran his free hand between her legs until he found her slick folds.

He glided into her wet inner heat with one finger. Then two.

Her thighs fell apart and he looked down at the pretty pink flesh open for him. Mac, open for him. A special gift, he thought, instinct telling him being this exposed didn't come easy for her.

He inserted another finger in her, working it in slow, and her eyes closed. “I'm not going to be able to do without you,” he said.

She made a noise somewhere between a moan and a whimper.

His fingers rotated, scissored, and she caught her lower lip with her teeth. “You hear me, baby?”

The sound she made was an affirmative one, then its note squeaked high as he dived deeper inside her. “Oh, God,” she whispered.

Oh, God
, he thought,
beautiful
. With his thumb he found her clit and she jerked in his arms at the first touch. “Yeah, not able to do without you,” he said.

Her head dropped back as he circled the bundle of nerves and started thrusting inside her in a careful rhythm. Her inner muscles clamped hard on his fingers and beneath his flannel, a drop of sweat rolled down his spine.

“While I'm here, baby, you're in my bed.” It wasn't smart, it wouldn't keep the peace, it went against the inner voice shouting warnings at him. He didn't care.

“What?” She buried her head into the side of his throat. Took hold of his skin with her teeth.

Christ, he was going to come in his jeans.

He grit his teeth, holding off the climax. “My bed. You. Me.”

When she didn't reply, he pulled his hand free of her. They both groaned. She lifted her head, her gaze hazy, her breathing heavy.

“Mac—”

“Shut up and fuck me, Zan.”

“Smart-ass,” he said with a laugh, and then he was kissing her, and she was helping him shed his remaining clothes, and when they were both naked she took the condom he handed her and slowly rolled it over him.

He drew in a sharp breath through his teeth, barely holding on as she knelt at his side and slowly worked the latex down his aching shaft. Then she shifted over him and he groaned, falling back, letting her guide him into her wet heat.

Once inside, she dropped to his chest, and he closed her in his arms. Her hips canted up, then down, starting a rhythm that was going to take him there in too short a time. His mouth pressed a kiss at her throat, and he thought again,
Not able to do without you
, as he tightened his hold on her.

But even knowing he might be jeopardizing the peace, even knowing that he must, eventually, do without this luscious, sexy woman, he was able to lose himself and every further thought in the beauty of Mac. In the beauty of being her shelter, if only for this winter moment.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

T
HIS
IS
ME
, giving you me.

The moment Tilda said those words to Ash, they changed the course of his life. Well, not strictly true. His course was still the same, but now he was determined to bring a companion alongside him on the journey.

When he went to London, he wanted Tilda to be with him.

He was in love with her, and every sign suggested she felt the same toward him.

Life was good. Life was fucking good when you could see your future in bright relief.

That didn't mean he expected convincing her would be easy. But as he'd always been taught by his dad, he first used his head. After considering what objections she might have, he'd concocted a strategy.

First, he had to open her world.

Then he'd open her mind to what was on his.

As he'd expected, he found her at the local branch of the library. It was a light-filled, airy space, with windows providing spectacular mountain views. Tilda was taking them in, sitting at a long table in front of her laptop, chin in hand.

He took a moment to enjoy his view: the sweet oval of her face framed by her long brown hair, the curve of her brows, the lush bow of her mouth. Certainty washed over him, and he strode forward, eager to get on with this day and the rest of his life.

Her head came up when he was three strides away. She blinked in surprise and held out her hand to him in artless welcome. Grinning, he took hold of her fingers and slid into the chair beside hers.

“What are you doing here?” she whispered.

He kissed her mouth, then pressed another to her warm hair, taking in the scent of her shampoo. It was on her pillowcase at night, on the thin pillow they shared when they were wrapped around each other in sleep. “I couldn't stay away.”

A blush turned her cheeks a soft pink. “We've only been apart a few hours.”

Enough time for him to arrange their afternoon and enough time for her to study. “Did you get what you wanted done?” Attending an online college one or two courses at a time meant her degree would take her longer than his four years, but it worked perfectly into his plans.

“Well...”

“I saw you staring out the window instead of studying,” he said. “So I won't feel guilty in the least for springing you now.”

Her brows came together over her small straight nose. “Springing me how? Springing me why?”

“The why is that you work too hard. The how is my secret.” He snapped shut her laptop.

“Hey—”

“Don't tell me conscientious Tilda Smith didn't save her work.”

Her mouth twitched. “Okay, I saved it.”

He grabbed her hand, pulled her to her feet. “We have places to go. Things to do.”

“Places to go?”

If only she knew. Without another word, he ushered her into his car. From there, he took off for a mountain town twenty-five minutes away.

“This took some research, but I think I have a new experience for you,” he said, pulling into the parking lot adjacent to a three-story cedar-shingled medical building with smoky windows and a sign reading Orthopedic Specialties.

Her expression was curious as he took her by the hand and led her toward the lobby. “Do you have some injury I'm not aware of?”

“Not me, but I think this place is in business thanks to falls while other people are skiing, boarding or climbing.”

A reception desk sat front and center. “Hello,” a young woman said. “Who are you here to see?”

Ash quickly scanned the board over the woman's head. “Uh...Dr. Szabo.”

She nodded. “Third floor. The elevators are to the right.”

He considered limping toward them but decided that was overkill. Instead, he led a wide-eyed Tilda in the indicated direction.

“Elevators?” she stage-whispered.

She'd told him, in a recent dark, late-night confession, that she'd never used one. He'd been disbelieving, until she'd pointed out that even the local hospital was one story. And he'd been unable to come up with a single building in the Blue Arrow Lake village that had an obvious need for something other than stairs to a second floor.

Some of the more luxury residences around the lake might have the convenience, but not one that he—and apparently, she—had visited.

“Press the button right there,” he said, pointing toward the faux-paneled wall.

And with a small smile curling the corners of her mouth, she did.

They stepped inside when the doors slid open. “I can't believe you found this!” she said.

Ash pushed the button for the third floor.

Her eyes went wide. “We're really going to visit Dr. Szabo?”

“No, we're just going to ride this thing up and down until you've had enough or a half hour passes. Because
then
we have someplace else to go.”

To his gratification, they went up and down for twenty minutes. When they were alone she wore a broad smile on her face. If other people stepped inside, she'd look down at her feet and, God, it was so cute because he could tell she was trying to play it cool, even on her twenty-fourth trip.

At the twenty-fifth, she said she was getting a little woozy, so they walked back through the lobby on legs that felt as if they'd been at sea.

Ensconced in his car again, she looked at him with alert expectation. “Next?”

“Another surprise.”

He figured she got it when he made a turn at the sign indicating Airport. She twitched and her gaze slid his way. “Um...”

“You've never flown before, either, right?”

“Right.” Her fingers clutched each other in her lap. “I'm not sure...”

“You'll like it,” he said, hoping.

Her hand was cold as he guided her across the tarmac. “A helicopter?” she asked, as she saw the aircraft up ahead.

“For a bird's-eye view. They fly slow and low.”

“How did you arrange this?” Her fingers squeezed his.

“It's a charter. This is their business. Tours.”

Her eyes went wide. “It must cost so much. Too much!”

“Don't think about that. I don't want you worrying about anything.”

Even the pilot could tell she felt apprehensive. He smiled and shook their hands with a sturdy grip. “Welcome aboard,” he said. “Most everyone is nervous their first time on a bird.”

“This is her first time in the air,” Ash told him.

“Then I'll make sure our flight is smooth and extra special.”

He helped Tilda climb into the backseat and put on a headset with a flexible attached mic. Ash settled in beside her and slipped on his own. Then he laced his fingers with hers and smiled. “Relax,” he said. “I've done this before with my family. Wait until you see the view.”

Her hold tightened on him as they took off and he elbowed her when he saw her eyes closed tight. “You shouldn't miss this, pretty girl.”

With a deep breath, she opened them, and then they went wider as she took in the scenery. Below was the small-and-getting-smaller airport and its vicinity. Around them were the mountains, draped in white and dotted by dark green trees. Their trip took them over several small lakes and above ski runs busy with tiny ant-like figures moving down the wide slopes. They saw narrow ravines and broader valleys and then they were above Blue Arrow Lake, the homes along its borders looking like Monopoly game pieces, the village something from a child's toy set.

They left that familiar setting for a sweep nearer the tallest peaks of the mountain range, where they spied a fire lookout but not any other sign of human life. The mountains were awe-inspiring from this vantage point. Unspoiled and unpopulated, they stood like sober, imposing sentinels.

“Beautiful,” Tilda murmured.

“They're the walls of your world,” Ash said, then pointed beyond to a sky so blue it almost hurt to look at it. “But there's more to see and do and discover outside the gates.”

She gave him a strange look and slipped her hand from his hold to tuck it around her waist. He let her have her silence but not her hand, and taking it back, he cradled it firmly in both of his for the rest of the flight.

Back on the ground, she remained quiet as they returned to his car.

“What's on your mind?” he asked, worried about her mood.

Her mouth turned down. “I'm thinking how you're going to get on a plane and leave in a couple of weeks.”

Relief nearly made him spill his plans. But it was too early for that, so he silenced them both by taking her into his arms and kissing her until her fingers clutched the back of his jacket and her face was flushed.

“Time to feed you,” he said, opening the passenger door and gently pushing her inside.

She glared at him, an expression of thwarted passion on her face. He laughed and took in deep breaths as he made his way around the car. So far, so good.

If all the rest went as planned, next time he flew he'd be holding her close all the way across the Atlantic.

He found the fish-and-chips place he'd located not far from the airport. As he nosed into a parking space, she cast a curious look at him. He tried to hide his sudden nervousness with a smile. Had she guessed?

“Here they serve, uh, the favorite thing I ate in London.” He had no idea if the restaurant was any good, but he'd thought it might be a fun way to bring up the topic. “Have you had fish-and-chips?”

“I've had fish sticks and French fries, does that count?”

“You'll have to tell me if you taste the difference,” he said. His stupid nerves were doing something to his stomach and he hoped he could eat. As they walked across the parking lot, he reviewed his talking points.

His posting in London was for six months. She could stay with him there for that time with nothing more than a passport—which she could apply for at the Blue Arrow Lake post office.

He knew from experience that the generous stipend his company offered for living expenses would cover them both. She could continue with her online classes, and without having to pay for rent or food or gas for her car, she could afford tuition to take more of them if she'd like.

He'd be happy to cover that cost, too, but he didn't think she'd agree.

Most important of all, they'd be together. Together, building a life. Building a future.

Ash settled her into a booth, then went up to the counter to order a beer for each of them to enjoy while they studied the offerings. The place wasn't busy, it was just after five, but it smelled delicious, and if he could just get his jumpy belly under control he guessed the food would be great.

“Are you all right?” she asked, over her plastic-coated menu as he slid a beer her way.

He must look as apprehensive as he felt. “Terrific,” he said, playing over in his head how he planned to begin.
I'm in love with you, Tilda. Come away with me. Trust me to create something good between us.

They made their selections and Ash returned to the counter to place their orders. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Tilda's back, her head bent over her phone.

“Son,” a voice said.

Ash nearly leaped out of his skin. He glanced over, saw his father right beside him. The man wore his usual retirement-wear of khakis and a golf sweater, but the garment was buttoned wrong and there was what looked to be a coffee stain on one sleeve. “Jeez, Dad, I think I lost a life.” He took in his father's grim expression. “Are you all right?”

His father didn't blink his bloodshot eyes. “What are you doing, Ash?”

“What are
you
doing? I thought you and Mom were staying at the Palm Springs house for another few days.”

“I brought your mother back up here, but I've decided to leave her the car and I'm taking a private flight back to the Springs place in about an hour.”

Odd, that, as well as the tense set to the man's shoulders. “Is there a problem?”

His father's intensity didn't abate. “Son,” he said again. “What are you doing?”

When Ash opened his mouth, his dad didn't give him a chance to speak.

“What are you doing,” he continued, his gaze jumping past Ash, “with
her
?”

“You mean with Tilda?” Okay, he hadn't told his parents about her or about the progression of things between them. One, because his parents had been out of the mountains since the relationship ramped up, and two, because he wasn't thirteen years old with an eighth-grade crush. Ash glanced back, saw she was still in their booth, her back to the two of them.

“I'd like you to meet her—” he began.

“Not a good idea,” his father replied.

Huh? “I'm seeing her, Dad, and it's serious.”

Pain contorted his father's even features. “Shit, Ash.”

His father rarely swore, and only while watching football.

“Shit, Ash, what?” He didn't understand this. “She's great. And I'm—”

“She's not the right kind of girl for you.”

His eyes widened. “She's twenty-one. A woman. And what ‘kind' is the right kind?” He couldn't believe his father was a snob.

“I misspoke, then,” the other man ground out. “I only mean you shouldn't be with that woman.”

Ash stared. This couldn't be the man who'd raised him not to prejudge anyone. “You don't even know her,” he pointed out. “How can you—”

Then his father interrupted him again, another surprise in itself. “Look, Ash, I'd like to save this for another time, but you've backed me into a corner here—”

“
I've
backed
you
into a corner?” He'd respected his father his entire life and always strove to earn his dad's respect in return. But this was nuts. What could he possibly have against Tilda?

“The fact is, I have a plane to catch.” His father wiped his hand over his mouth and Ash noticed the gray cast to his skin. “And there isn't a good way to say this anyhow, I suppose.”