Page 25 of Don’t You Dare Marry Me (Love in Massachusetts #3)

nineteen

“Do you ever not work?”

Nicola plopped down onto the sofa and eyed Abagail over. She was glued to her phone, and she had been since they’d walked into the house on the cape. And this was so unlike Abagail—at least what Nicola had seen of her so far.

“I take many vacations throughout the year.” Abagail flipped through something else on her phone quickly, not even bothering to glance up at Nicola.

“And now?”

Abagail sighed and set her phone onto her knee. “This wasn’t a planned trip, and while I can take the days because there’s nothing urgent going on, it does mean that I need to prepare Ivy for my absence.”

Nicola pressed her lips into a thin line. She wasn’t sure she’d ever have a job like that, one where she could simply take off whenever she wanted to. She definitely wouldn’t be a boss over someone. Hell, she could barely manage to keep herself together.

“But why do you work?”

“Because I have a job.”

“Abs…” Nicola dragged out the nickname.

Abagail glanced up at her then, a curious look on her face, one that Nicola wasn’t quite sure what to do with.

“It’s clear your family has money. Warren never really talked about it much, but you don’t have to work, do you?” Nicola played with the edge of her T-shirt, not quite sure where this line of questioning was coming from. “Like, you don’t need the income.”

“No. I don’t.” Abagail wrinkled her nose and went back to her phone. “But there’s more to work than income.”

Nicola vastly disagreed. If she could spend every minute at home with Alanna, taking care of her and not working, then she absolutely would.

But unfortunately, the things of life required money, and she needed a job to pay rent on an apartment she didn’t have, to put gas in her car and maybe get insurance on it next year, and to occasionally have a full-blown meal that actually filled her belly.

“I think a hard work ethic is extremely attractive on a person, don’t you?”

Nicola shivered. She did find that attractive.

It was also a quality that Warren didn’t have but Abagail did.

Equally so, Nicola didn’t have it. And she knew it.

The list of jobs that she’d had was getting close to the triple digits, and every time she found one that was decently stable, she’d be pulled away by some drama with Alanna.

She swallowed the lump that suddenly lodged itself in her throat.

“I find work not only a distraction from the mundane, but I like to keep my hands busy.” Abagail looked over at her now, dragging her gaze from Nicola’s eyes and down her throat to her chest, over her waist to right between her legs.

Abagail lingered there, her cheeks reddening and her body tightening.

Just what exactly was she thinking now?

“Not something I think you’re unaware of.”

“No,” Nicola answered, her voice cracking on the word as her body started to react to the lingering gaze.

“Why haven’t you had a job? Truly, because I don’t think it’s because Warren told you that you couldn’t work.” Abagail put her phone down on the edge of the couch.

Nicola sucked in a sharp breath. Abagail might be distanced from her family, but she wasn’t ignorant of them. She shook her head slowly. “He did tell me I wouldn’t have to work as soon as we got engaged.”

“But you weren’t working before that.” Abagail settled her hand on Nicola’s knee and gently stroked her with her fingers. “Why?”

“Alanna,” Nicola whispered. “Well, not because of her but because of her. It’s a mess, and I’m the only one she really has.

We have an aunt, but ever since she got married—which was before our parents died—things got complicated and distanced with her, and she tries, she really does.

But she has so many issues on her own, and Alanna—she needs me. ”

Abagail shook her head quickly, gripping Nicola’s knee hard. “I didn’t say Alanna didn’t. But you also deserve to live and do the things that you want to do.”

No one had ever said that to her before. Not even Aunt Simone. Well, she had, but not so directly, and at the same time, there was an undercurrent of responsibility for Alanna in there. But that was also here now, but this felt...different. Nicola couldn’t place why exactly.

She shivered and shook her head again. “I need to take care of Alanna.”

“At the cost of your own stability and happiness?” Abagail raised that pesky eyebrow, and they both knew full well that the conversation they were having now was so different from the one that Nicola had started. This wasn’t about work anymore—it was about values.

“I’ll do anything for Alanna.”

“Hmmm.” Abagail’s lips pressed into a thin line. Nicola suspected that she was thinking something, scheming something, and while Nicola wanted to ask what it was, she was a little scared to find out just exactly what that was. “And when do you start doing things for yourself?”

“I-I don’t.” Nicola bit her lip and dropped her gaze to Abagail’s mouth. “Unless you count everything I’ve done with you in the last couple of weeks.”

Abagail chuckled, a slow seductive laugh that turned Nicola on in a second. “I think it’s a perfect way to be a bit selfish.”

Nicola’s lips quirked upward, and she moved swiftly, straddling Abagail on the couch, her knees digging into the cushions. “We’re definitely really good at being selfish together.”

“We are.” Abagail slid her hands up Nicola’s thighs to her waist, moving her palm to the center of Nicola’s chest. “I’ll have the next payment to you by the end of this week.”

“You don’t need to pay me for this week.

” Nicola bent down and brushed her lips against Abagail’s ear.

She closed her eyes, breathing in her scent, the roughness of her short hair against Nicola’s cheek.

Her heart pattered away. Was she really going to say this?

Was she really going to break the hold that Abagail potentially had on her? “You’ve already paid more than enough.”

“Nicola…” Abagail dragged out her name, curling her fingers behind Nicola’s neck and holding her close.

They breathed in each other’s scents. Nicola swore she could hear Abagail’s heart thudding wildly. Abagail’s lips pressed against her jawline once and then twice.

“It was never about paying you,” Abagail murmured.

Nicola shuddered, tension she didn’t know she carried sliding away and vanishing. What was that? Nicola turned her face into Abagail, closing her eyes and just staying in this moment. How much had that actually been weighing on her?

“But you paid so much already…” Nicola objected.

Abagail tightened her grasp. “You don’t owe me anything. Do you understand?”

Nicola’s heart trembled. She stared directly into Abagail’s eyes, seeing deep into her in a way that she never had before.

Nicola leaned in, pressing their mouths together.

Was there a soft side to the Kerrbox family that Nicola had never experienced before?

Was there a tender and caring side to Abagail?

“There are so many broken systems in our world. If a little money can ease the suffering one of those systems causes, then why not use it instead of letting it sit there?”

“Abs…” Nicola’s heart trembled.

She’d never seen this side of this woman. Any time they had encountered each other before, Abagail had a stiff upper lip and barely made a move in any direction. Brushing her fingers across Abagail’s cheek, Nicola pulled in on herself. There was so much more to Abagail than she’d anticipated.

Nicola leaned in, pressing a soft kiss to Abagail’s cheek, then her other one, then her forehead.

Abagail seemed to melt underneath her, but so did Nicola.

Melting at the hands of this woman who was so cold and icy up front but had a sizzling, burning passion underneath.

Nicola breathed in Abagail’s scent, centering herself.

“I don’t deserve someone like you,” Nicola murmured before kissing her again. “I’m not hardworking or generous. I take everything I can get and keep it.”

“Keep it?” Abagail turned Nicola’s chin upward, so they were once again looking deep into each other’s eyes. “You don’t keep it.”

Goosebumps ran up Nicola’s arms and a shiver throughout her entire body. Her breath caught in her throat, her heart skipping a beat.

“You give it away more freely than I do.” Abagail’s thumb moved from Nicola’s chin to her lips, brushing across them in the most tender moment the two of them had ever shared.

“I need…” Nicola stopped. Her heart was in her throat, making it so hard to speak. She tensed and pulled away, putting more weight on her heels than before. “I need a minute.”

Nicola scrambled off Abagail’s lap. She spared her one glance before dashing out of the room and straight up the stairs to the room that Abagail had given her.

She shut the door and pressed her fist to her chest. Her heart pounded so hard that it hurt, her shoulders tense from the pain, and her head on the verge of exploding. What the hell was wrong with her?

This was an arrangement they’d made together.

It was nothing more than that. She couldn’t possibly have found more than that in Abagail.

Could she? She couldn’t have found someone who actually challenged her, cared for her, accepted her.

Because Abagail Kerrbox was anything but that.

She was cold, distant, hateful and vengeful even.

Nicola had seen it for years.

But this Abagail—Abs, she corrected herself.

This woman was so different from the one she’d made herself out to be, and this woman was someone that Nicola was quickly falling very hard for.

Sliding onto the bed, Nicola threw her hand over her eyes to block out all the light.

Her brain spun in ridiculous directions, completely unable to stop the spin and turmoil and questions.

The knock was soft, but it was enough of an intrusion that Nicola jerked. She clenched her jaw hard and stared at it.

“Nicola, can we talk a minute?”

Abagail’s voice wasn’t firm and cold, but warm and imploring.

One part of Nicola told her the last thing she wanted was Abagail to come into that room and see her like this, but another part of her had such a longing to be back in Abagail’s arms and pressed against her—not sexually.

Not like they’d done so many times before, but like they’d been on that couch.

In each other’s spheres in a way that was far more intimate than anything else they’d done.

“Nicola?”

“Y-yes, come in.” Nicola pushed her hands into the bed and moved to sit, leaning against the headboard with her knees bent and her eyes glued to the door.

Abagail stepped inside slowly, almost hesitating for a brief second before she stepped to the edge of the bed. “May I sit?”

Nicola nodded, and immediately she found herself reaching for Abagail’s hand to curl their fingers together in a tight grasp.

“What did I say?” Abagail asked, genuinely curious.

Nicola’s heart snapped in two. “You didn’t say anything, I promise.

It’s not… it’s not that.” She dragged in a steadying breath.

This was it, wasn’t it? This was the decision that she had to make about whether or not to share more than they’d already shared.

“I’m not someone who experiences a whole lot of kindness.

” There. She’d said it. Nicola wasn’t even sure she could raise her gaze to look up into Abagail’s eyes and see the reaction.

“Kindness,” Abagail repeated, the word sounding somewhat odd on her tongue, like it didn’t quite belong, or perhaps that it did but that it wasn’t used often enough to be comfortable.

“The world can be a cruel place, especially for young women who are left in shambles after a death and are the sole responsible members of their family.”

Nicola’s eyes locked on Abagail’s then. Something in the way she said that… “You, too?”

Abagail gave a short curt nod. “The world isn’t built for women like us, and we have to make kindness whenever and wherever we can.”

Nicola’s eyes watered. No one had ever said something so generous to her, something that so succinctly put in place why she felt the way she did or how much she’d truly struggled over the years.

Because it wasn’t just taking care of Alanna and dealing with the grief of losing both of her parents in one fatal car accident.

It was this. The upward battle that she’d have to fight no matter what the circumstances were.

“I don’t want to tear you down, Nicola. I never want to do that.” Abagail reached up and cupped Nicola’s cheek. “I want to build you up with everything I can possibly do for you.”

Nicola surged forward and pressed their lips together.

She scraped her dull nails against the nape of Abagail’s neck.

She parted her lips and slid her tongue out, begging for Abagail to touch her in the same way.

She wanted this more than she wanted the tears that were threatening to spill down her cheeks.

She’d always wanted something like this.

Abagail hummed, leaning down and pressing Nicola heavily into the mattress. Nicola wrapped her arms around Abagail’s back and pulled her closer. She needed this—true connection and understanding. Why had it taken her so long to find it in someone? And of all people, it was Abagail.

Aunt Abagail?

No, that didn’t have the right ring to it anymore.

Nicola nipped at Abagail’s lower lip and hummed, pushing her hips up into Abagail’s body as she completely melted for this woman.

Someone who was willing to give her kindness when she didn’t deserve it.

No, maybe she did deserve it, and she just hadn’t found anyone who was willing to give it to her before.

This was Abagail, a woman who had made her own way in the world, who actually enjoyed working even though she didn’t have to. Someone who was doing her damn best to take care of the people she felt responsible for.

Not unlike Nicola.

They weren’t all that different. Despite the wealth gap, the age gap, the life-experience gap—she and Abagail were so similar.

Sliding her hand against Abagail’s back and pulling her blouse up so that she could touch skin, Nicola said the only thing she could think of because all other words escaped her.

“Make me come for you.”