Page 50 of Love Walked In

The bell rang brightly, then silence settled over us. My hands were fluttering helplessly, and I clamped them on the edge of the counter so I wouldn’t fly away. “Welcome to Orchard House,” I said, my voice cracking on the last word. “Can I help you find something today?”

He hesitated for a second, then decided to play along, sauntering up to me.

He leaned against the counter and wrapped his hands around his elbows, a smile turning up one corner of his mouth.

“I’m looking for a romance, actually. I read one a few weeks ago, then immediately went to a bookshop and bought three more. ”

A hysterical giggle jumped out of my mouth. “I mean, we have so many different ones. Is there any particular trope you like?”

Instead of answering right away, he leaned over the counter and rested his hand gently on top of mine, a question in his eyes.

When I let go of the counter, he turned my hand palm up and placed a soft little kiss right in the center.

Then his index finger found a daffodil petal and traced its edges, and he said softly, “Second chances. I love those. I’d like one with a dark-haired alpha who drives away the love of his life and spends the rest of the book trying to get her back. ”

“But what if she doesn’t deserve him?” I said, my voice suddenly thick with held-back tears. “What if she loves him too, but she’s just as much of an alpha and runs away instead of talking things out?”

Long fingers touched my chin and tilted it up.

“Then they’ll fix it together.” He wiped away the salt water on my cheek with his thumb.

“Some days they’ll think they’re losing their minds, but they’ll still love each other forever.

I mean, he will if she’ll let him. And he hopes with every bit of him that she’ll love him, too.

” He sobered. “But this isn’t a story, this is both our lives and it’s all very real.

” He took a deep breath. “I’m so sorry, Mari.

I’m sorry I didn’t confide in you. You deserved my honesty and I wasn’t brave enough to give it to you.

” He looked down. “I’m not expecting anything from you.

I know I was a selfish arse, begging you to stay even after I’d hurt you, and that the distance makes everything horrendously complicated.

“But I need you to know that if you want to try again, I’ll do my best every single day to be your partner, not just your lover. Because nothing is more precious to me than your trust. Nothing.”

The relief of his words was so intense I could feel my hands shaking.

“I want to try again,” I finally said. “I want to do better for you, too. Because I held you at arm’s length the whole time, even though my heart wanted you more than anything.

” I sighed. “I don’t know how the hell this will work, but I love you, and I’ve missed you so much.

It was like everything had gone dark, no color, no warmth. ”

“Perhaps that’s a little dramatic? We can live without each other, darling. I know we can. But it’s like we can live when it’s gray and cold outside. Sunlight makes everything better, though, doesn’t it?”

I smiled at him. “It does. Though I’ve got to say, I think winter has new charms for me.”

He grinned back. “For me, too. Now,” he said, tapping the redwood, “any chance you might want to come around so I can kiss you properly?”

He reached for me as I came to him, and after one long, claiming kiss, he slowed down, gentled, but still stayed with me, his hands dallying on my waist, stroking up and down my back.

I matched him, sank into warmth and tenderness.

We didn’t have to kiss like each one would be the last. We could love each other slowly. Deliberately.

But something was missing.

I pulled away slightly, our lips coming apart reluctantly. “I need to get you some hot chocolate.”

“Cocoa sounds wonderful, even in this heat,” he whispered back, “but I suppose that’s not what you meant?”

I brushed my lips over his. “I miss the way you taste.”

He buried his face in my neck and growled softly.

“I’m so sorry, baby. I’m sorry I chickened out,” I told him, needing to atone more before I could let myself enjoy him.

He straightened a little and kissed my forehead. “Don’t be. I needed to realize just how far up my arse my head had been. I’d been buried in my own rut for so long, and you leaving made me realize that I’d been holding on to things I should have let go of ages ago.”

“How did it feel, to sell?” I asked.

“Right,” he said simply. “It still hurt, though. But that’s why I’m talking to a therapist about it.”

I sighed. “Speaking of talking, I’m seeing someone to go through all the history with Mom and Greg and Jamie. It’s going to take a while for everything to make sense, and I might try to push you away in the meantime because of my stupid avoidant brain.”

He shrugged. “Push all you like, I won’t move. I’m going to be very stubborn when it comes to you.”

“What if I hurt you?” I asked timidly.

He leaned in and rubbed his nose with mine. “You’ll make it up to me. And I’ll make it up to you, starting now.”

He was close, and smelled so good, and all of a sudden all I wanted was his skin on mine. “Am I right in thinking you’ve been busy pining for me? That there hasn’t been…” anyone else? I asked silently.

His eyebrows rose. “When I wasn’t working on getting the shop ready for sale, I only dreamed of you. The same way you’ve only wanted to work here and listen to sad lady singers and long for me?” No one else.

“Exactly.”

His eyes went dark. “Good,” he said, and his approval sent goose bumps across my skin despite the heat. “I’m glad.”

“Then I think there’s a desk in the back office with our names on it,” I teased.

A perfect devilish grin. “Lead the way.”

I took his hand and led him through the back door into the lean-to of the office.

He closed the door behind us and gently turned me around so that I was sitting on the edge of the desk.

“No bending over. I want to see your beautiful face react to everything I do to you.” He trailed his hands up under my dress and gently pushed my underwear to the side.

“You are the loveliest thing, you know that? Every time I touch you, I think I’m dreaming.

” And then his lips were on my neck in an open-mouthed kiss, and his fingertips started drawing gentle little circles exactly where I needed them.

As he stroked between my thighs, he trailed his mouth up to my ear, told me with a voice like dark chocolate and smoke that I was everything he’d ever wished for, so perfectly soft and hot and slick on his fingers, how he’d tortured himself in his lonely bed thinking of my sexy little sounds, how hard he was going to fuck me once he made me scream.

“Oh God, Leo, please, ” I begged as I pushed my hips into his hand.

He groaned. “ Yes, that’s right. Let me make you feel good, love. Let me give this to you.”

His fingers pushed, thrust, beckoned, and with one hard press of his thumb and one little bite where my neck and shoulder met, I fell into my pleasure, jerking against his hand and crying out his name.

I was about to collapse back onto the desk, but then he jammed his fingers into his mouth, sucked, moaned, and my need for him, all of him, overrode anything else.

“Fuck me now, please, now,” I chanted, opening up for him, until he’d fished out a condom from his wallet, unbuckled, unzipped, and I moaned with pleasure and relief as he pushed inside me.

“I missed your skin,” I whispered as I ran my hands under his T-shirt, up his back. “It feels so good against mine.”

A gasp cut off my words when he thrust. “This won’t be pretty,” he half laughed. “I missed you too much.”

“I don’t want pretty, I want you .” I kissed him. “I love you.”

His smile was pure sunlight. “I love you, too.”

And then there was a lot of snarling and gasping, papers and books sliding to the floor every which way, Leo’s loose belt buckle pressing into my thigh, my fingernails digging into his back as he ground against me, chasing his pleasure until he yanked my hips tight to his and groaned into my shoulder.

It wasn’t pretty, but it was us, and it was blissful. He buried his face in my neck and I tangled my fingers in his damp night-sky hair.

“My Mari,” he sighed as he pulled out. “Let me clean you up.”

Once we were zipped up and smoothed out, I moved toward the office door, but Leo gently tugged me back. “I need to hold you. It’s been so long and I missed you so much.”

He sat on the edge of the desk, and I nestled in his arms. “This feels so good,” I said softly, inhaling his spicy scent and rubbing my cheek against the soft cotton of his shirt.

“Because it’s where you live, darling. I thought that from the very beginning.” He pressed his lips to my smile.

We were quiet together for a few minutes, wrapped up in love and safety. “How long are you here for? A few days?” I finally asked.

He pulled back a little so he could see my face. “I booked to stay until August.”

I blinked. “Three months?” I said, my voice high with shock. “What the hell were you going to do if I said I couldn’t do this?”

He smiled. “I had more certainty than that, thanks to Suzanne.” He dotted a kiss on my nose. “But I figured if this didn’t work out, I’d go traveling around America. I have the summer off before my course starts in September.”

I wanted Leo to have as many adventures as he could, after the claustrophobic life he’d been living. But wait. “What course?”

“A short course in illustration at Central Saint Martins. If I do that and I love it, I’ll apply in the spring for their graduate diploma.”

I couldn’t help myself, I squeezed him, pride making my hug tight. “You’ll love it, I know it.”

He smiled. “But that’s later. For now, Suzanne has said I can help out around the shop a little, but I don’t want to be underfoot all the time.

I’ll go exploring around here, too. There are so many places I want to draw already, the mountains and the vineyards and the buildings.

” He stroked my hair gently. “But I want to go to sleep with you every night, darling, and wake up with you. I want to try being together without holding anything back from each other.” He brushed his lips over mine.

“That’s what would make me happy. Would that make you happy? ”

I let the fear out, instead of shoving it in a small box and ignoring it. “What happens to us when your vacation is over? When you have to leave?”

He sighed. “I won’t stop loving you just because you’re not in the next room.

I think I’d keep loving you even if you got on a spaceship to bloody Mars.

” He put his hand on my cheek. “In all honesty, I don’t know what will happen after.

But I want us to decide what to do together, when the time comes. Do you want that, too?”

The rush of rightness I felt was like a creek in spring. The fresh knowledge that we’d care for each other, that we’d support each other, coursed through me. “Yes,” I said, my heart flying in my chest. “Let’s do that.”