his laughter as his chin rested on her head. “Think that’ll do it?” he asked.
“Oh. My. God,” she managed to say.
She brought her candles into the bedroom, and shut off all the other lights. They stumbled to the shower, and then to the bed. She glanced at the clock—no wonder she was so tired. That morning she’d slipped out of bed extra early to put together those blueberry muffins so he’d have a warm breakfast to wake up to. But though her body felt like polished silk ribbon, her mind was still wired. As they got under the cover, she said, “Will you sing to me?”
“I’m still finding your song,” he said, his smile surprisingly shy. “But I can give you some of my older songs. What do you want to hear?” He sat up on the bed, still shirtless, but he didn’t seem to mind the cold.
“Whatever you want to sing. I know I’ll like it.” She snuggled down under the covers, and he sang a long, slow song about a wolf chasing the moon across the hills, across a river, across the meadow, to the sea, where it beckoned on a road of light that the wolf could never reach.
It was sad and poignantly sweet, and her eyes were closing when he laid aside the guitar and slid into bed beside her. She wrapped her warm body around his cold one, and felt him relax into her with a quiet sigh.
She startled awake. “You’ll be here in the morning?”
“Do you want me to be here?”
“If you want to be here.”
“I want to be here,” he whispered into the curve of her neck.
“And I want you to be here,” she replied, then slid into sleep.
She dreamed.
Maybe it was the lonely wolf and the moon, maybe it was West looking at Kesley’s mural, but she was lost, trying to wade through rising streams, ducking past all the people she knew, including a stream of past lovers, as she searched and searched and . . .
“Hey, hey.”
She gulped, and woke, staring around wildly. She was in her room. Everything was quiet—the rain had stopped. That was it, the rain had stopped, and the light was dim from one last guttering candle. West’s arms held her tight, and she dug her fingers into his shoulder.
“It was just a dream,” he said. “I got you.”
McKenzi’s cat stirred inside her. “Don’t go.”
“I’m right here,” he whispered.
She flung her knee over him, put her head on his shoulder, and fell back to sleep.
This time her sleep was dreamless, and she woke abruptly four hours later. Though her family all had different sleep habits, it had long been a joke that McKenzi was the only cat-napper. She eased herself out of the covers, making certain no cold air got in underneath, and pulled on her bathrobe as she padded softly into the kitchen, where she spotted the apron on the floor. She picked it up, smiling with memory. Oh, yeah. The color was still toxic but she knew what she’d be thinking of every time she tied it on.
As she started toward the back door, she got an idea. She’d figured out that West only owned what he stood up in. As she picked up his things, his scent rose off them, making her toes curl. She loved his smell, masculine and musky. But maybe he’d like to wake up to warm, clean clothes.
One of the gifts Kesley’s Jameson had given her was a washer and dryer, set on the back porch between the cottages, on the other side of Kesley’s bathroom. McKenzi hopped out in the cold air, her breath clouding, and popped a load into the washer.
Before reentering her place, she glanced upward at the pure, rain-washed sky. Ordinarily that would have called for celebration, as she hated getting wet. But would clear weather make West push off?
She was aware as she moved back to her kitchen that all her usual rules had suspended, and she wondered if this weird sense of being poised between two roads, or choices, was why her cat had gone quiet inside her. It felt as if the entire world held its breath, waiting for . . . something.
Kesley’s present (as a new rich bride) to McKenzi as maid of
Louise Penny
Amy Malone
Dean Murray
Katharine Davis
Roderick Gordon
Mary Hanson
Jennifer Collins Johnson
Tamara Hogan
Aimee Agresti
Terra Wolf, Mercy May