The Ashtons: Cole, Abigail and Megan. Maureen Child
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lovely.” She stood motionless and smiling, glossed by sunshine. The breeze teased her hair and pressed her thin blue dress against a shape that was pure female.
Longing hit, a sweep of emotion that made him feel larger, lighter, full of air and dreams…then receded, leaving him mute and unsteady.
“Cole?” She tilted her head. “Is something wrong?”
“Probably.” He’d been wrong. Terribly wrong. He didn’t want a few days of friendly, keep-it-light sex from her. He wanted more. Much more.
He walked slowly up to her.
Nerves flickered in her eyes. She knew what was on his mind, oh yes. She didn’t back up—but she wanted to, he could see that. Instead she tilted her head back, frowning. “What flipped your switch?”
“You.” He put his hands on her arms and ran them up to her shoulders, letting the warmth of her seep into his palms. “You always have.”
“I don’t think this—”
“Good. Don’t think.” He crushed his mouth down on hers.
She jolted. He knew that, but only dimly—the ripe taste of her flooded him, a wine more heady than sweet. He pulled her tight against him, running his hands over her, feeding on the feel of her, the scent and taste and heat that was Dixie.
It wasn’t enough. He needed more—needed enough of her that she wouldn’t leave, couldn’t leave him again. His arms tightened around her.
And, dammit to hell, as soon as he did that, she started struggling. Pushing him away.
Cole had to drop his arms and let her go. Again. And it hurt, again.
Her mouth was wet, her hair wildly mussed and her eyes snapping with anger. “I won’t be forced.”
It was guilt that made him snap back. “Forced? It was a kiss!”
“You were going too fast. Pushing too hard.”
His mouth twisted. So did something inside, something that spilled out ugliness. “You’ve given me every reason to think you’d like to be kissed. Or was that all part of the game? Do you get a charge out of teasing men?”
“Where did that come from?” she snapped.
“You like men, don’t you? Eli, Russ, me—you flirt with us all. Am I just one of your men, Dixie?”
She spun around and started back toward the path.
“That’s right. Walk away. That’s your answer to everything.”
She paused. Slowly she turned. “People who leave aren’t exactly high on your list, are they, Cole? Or maybe they make the wrong list. Eleven years ago, I was the one to leave. We haven’t talked about that.”
“That’s right, I forgot. Talking is your other answer.”
She scowled. “I like yelling, too, sometimes.”
“I remember.” God, he did remember. Not the exact words of that last fight, but the feelings. She’d been furious, hurt—and the more angry she’d gotten, the colder he’d turned, until he’d thought he might never be warm again. “You yelled plenty when I forgot your birthday. Then you left me.”
She stared. “Tell me that isn’t the way you remember it.”
“It’s what happened! I messed up with the dates—”
“You refused to change a dinner with a client to another day!” She advanced, fists clenched at her sides. “We had a date, you and I, but you forgot and booked a dinner with a client for that night. I was hurt, yes, because you’d forgotten, but that wasn’t why I left!”
“Then why?” he demanded. “Tell me why, because I remember you screaming at me that if I wouldn’t take you out instead of my client, you were leaving—and you did!”
“You could have switched your client to another night instead of putting me off! I came last, like usual. Over and over you showed me where I stood—business came first, your family second, and I finished a poor third. Yet in spite of that, you couldn’t stand it if I so much as smiled at another man!”
His lip curled. “Half the time, you smiled at everyone but me. Is it any wonder I wasn’t sure of you?”
“You weren’t there for me to smile at! God, I’d be waiting for a phone call, then when it came you’d tell me you had to cancel lunch. Or dinner. By the last month we were together,” she finished bitterly, “you’d canceled pretty much everything except sex. That, you had time for.”
Her words struck him mute, inside and out. In the flash of mental silence that followed he heard his own words, past and present, echoing in his mind. After a moment he asked quietly, “Did you really think that? That all I wanted from you was sex?”
She gave her head a little shake, as if she were emerging from the fog, too. When she spoke there was a thread of humor in her voice. “Surely I must have screamed something along those lines.”
“By then we were accusing each other of everything short of abetting the Holocaust. I didn’t think you meant it.”
“I, on the other hand, believed you meant every word. You weren’t screaming, like me. You were deep in your chill zone, still speaking in complete, grammatically correct sentences…everything you said came out cold and deliberate.”
“I have no idea what I said. I was terrified.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “You?”
“Oh, yeah. I was losing you and I knew it.” He’d never really believed he’d be able to hold on to her, so he’d held on too tightly, letting jealousy twist its knife in him. “I’d bought a ring.”
The words just slipped out. Dammit, he’d never wanted her to know that, never wanted anyone to realize how deep and complete a fool he’d been.
Her eyes went huge. “A ring?” she whispered.
“I was going to ask you to wear it on your birthday. Or,” he added wryly, “on whatever night I managed to make time to celebrate your birthday.”
Her eyes closed. She rubbed her chest as if it hurt. “Give me a minute. You…That’s a real leveler.” She paced away a few steps, then just stood there, her hand on her chest, looking away…pretty far away, he suspected. About eleven years. “If I’d known…”
“You might not have left. And that,” he added with painful honesty, “would probably have been a mistake. I wanted to keep you, but I had no intention of changing. I didn’t know how, back then. We’d have made each other miserable.”
She looked back at him. “I was sure you’d call. I waited for weeks for you to call and say you’d been wrong and wanted me back.”
“I was waiting for you to call and apologize. I gave you a month, being big on tests back then. You mentioned that.” He remembered only too well what she’d said. “Or shouted it. You were sick of the way I kept testing you, but as usual I didn’t listen. At the end of the month I decided you’d failed the test. I pitched the ring into the deepest canyon I could find. It was all very dramatic.”
She shook her head, a sad smile touching her mouth. “God have mercy on the young.”
“Young and stupid,” he agreed. “Both of us.”
Suddenly she laughed. “Pigheaded fits, too. Both of us waiting for the other one to call—”
“Confess their sins—”
“And come crawling back.” She grinned. “Admit it. The crawling part figured in your fantasies, too.”
“Absolutely.” Right up until he threw away the ring that had meant so much…and so little. After that, he’d made up his mind to forget