At Last

Chapter 19

Sure, chocolate has more calories than love, but it’s way more satisfying.

Amy woke up at dawn, groggy from the pain pill. Josh had put a waterproof bandage on her wound, so she was able to shower. After, she dressed and then walked out of her bedroom to start the coffee, stopping short on her way to the kitchen.

Riley was asleep on her couch.

“Hey,” Amy said in surprise.

Snapping to immediate alertness, Riley jerked upright, her hand coming up with something glinting in her fist.

A knife.

“Whoa,” Amy said, bending a little at the waist to ease the tightening on her stitches. “Just me.”

Riley’s hand vanished behind her. “Sorry. You startled me.” Her eyes narrowed in on the way Amy was favoring her side. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I got cut on the broken glass last night, needed a few stitches.”

Riley paled. “Oh, my God. Oh, my God.” She rushed off the couch and came toward Amy. “I’m so sorry. Are you all right?”

“Yes. Are you?”

“I’m fine-Forget me. How many stitches? How did I not know this?”

“Maybe because you vanished on me. Are you really okay?”

Riley blew out a breath and nodded shakily. “This shouldn’t have happened to you.”

Amy pushed a pale, shaky Riley back to the couch. She sat next to her and reached for her hand. “I’m okay, honest. And I’m glad I was there. If I hadn’t shown up when I did…”

Riley closed her eyes. “I know.” She opened her eyes, her expression fierce. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I know.”

“I mean, I’ve changed. I’m changing.”

Amy leaned in and hugged her tight. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“But it was! He was after me, not you.” Riley pulled free and stood. She picked up her backpack.

“Riley,” she said softly. “Can’t you tell me about it? I can help. I can-”

“No.” Riley shook her head violently. “I’ve screwed everything up.” Riley closed her eyes for a beat, then headed to the door.

“I know more than you think,” Amy told her. “I was the queen of screwup when I was a kid, and I only got worse as a teen. I screwed up over and over again, and then, by the time I was in real trouble, no one cared. I’d made sure of it.”

Riley turned to face her but said nothing, breaking Amy’s heart with her doubt.

“You can tell me anything,” Amy said. “Anything.”

Riley hesitated, then shook her head and reached for the door. “Sorry. I’m so sorry, but I gotta go.”

And then there was nothing but the sound of the front door shutting hard.

Amy was still sitting on the couch when her cell rang.

“I’m giving you today off,” Jan said.

“Not necessary.”

“You were stabbed on my premises last night,” Jan said. “I don’t want Lucille getting the story or pics. The negative press will kill me. Take a damn day off.”

“I wasn’t stabbed!”

“Good. Go with that.”

“But-”

But Jan was already gone.

Fine. Amy loaded her sketchpad and a few snacks into her backpack. If she couldn’t work, she’d clear her head and draw. In fact, now that she thought about it, she needed that more than anything she could think of.

Well… other than the need to be near Matt, the guy she’d promised herself she wouldn’t fall for. Except she’d broken that promise. How else could she explain parking at the North District Ranger Station? She could have gone out on her own patio to sketch, but she’d come here.

Fine. Maybe she wasn’t up for a hike or figuring out her grandma’s cryptic journey right now, but the grounds here were beautiful and peaceful, and she spent an hour sitting on a rock in front of a creek with her sketchpad, trying to clear her mind.

It refused to be cleared. Instead, it kept wandering to Matt. This distance between them was her own doing. Not a surprise, as she’d been sabotaging her own happiness for a long time. She’d known this thing with him would eventually fall apart, but she’d been secretly hoping it wouldn’t.

And if that wasn’t a terrifying thought. For the first time in her life, she wanted to ride the train to the end of the line instead jumping off before it even stopped.

You lied to him…

Worse, she’d lied to herself. All her life she’d lived with something hanging over her head. But being in Lucky Harbor this year, staying in one place, making a life for herself… she’d lost her vigilant edge.

She didn’t regret that.

She liked having a decent place to live, a job that paid the bills and allowed her the freedom to draw when she wanted. She liked making the kind of keeper friends she’d always dreamed of having.

That’s what Mallory and Grace were to her, keepers.

Matt, too, if she was being honest. Yeah, she liked him, way too much. She was going to have to face that sooner or later. The truth was, she’d long ago given up believing or trusting in others.

And then she’d come here to Lucky Harbor.

Inhaling the damp forest air, she looked up and locked eyes on Matt. He stood a football field away, on the porch of the ranger station building, his back to her as he talked to two other uniformed officers. He looked big and tough as hell, with his shirt stretched taut over his broad shoulders, the gun on his hip gleaming in the sun.

Flustered to find herself aroused just looking at him, she glanced down at her sketch and then up again, insistently drawn to him.

He was gone.

She forced herself to sit there another few moments. He hadn’t seen her, she told herself. Because if he had, he’d have come over. He wasn’t a coward like her. She inhaled a deep breath, found her backbone, packed up her things, and headed to the building. “Is Matt Bowers busy?” she asked the ranger at the front desk.

The guy laughed. “Always. But his office is the last on the right, go on back.”

She found him standing before his desk, hands on hips, jaw dark with stubble, looking down at a mountain of paperwork like he was facing a firing squad. He seemed impossibly imposing, and a little pissed off. His eyes tracked directly to her and though nothing in his tough-guy stance changed, his eyes warmed.

In response, everything within her warmed. She didn’t really understand that, how it could still be this way, how it felt stronger each and every time she saw him. He’d hurt her. She’d hurt him-though he didn’t even know it yet. And still, she wanted him. She wanted his hands on her, his mouth on her, him on her, making her forget everything in the way only he could. “Am I interrupting?” she asked.

“Not even a little bit.”

Given the stacks on his desk, this was an obvious lie. His gaze roamed over her. “How are you?”

“Fine.”

“Truth, Amy.”

Truth… The truth was that his shoulders were so wide they practically blocked out the light, plenty wide enough for her to set her head down and lose herself in him for a few. Only a few.

Not that she would. “I’m managing.”

“I drove by your place last night. Everything looked dark and quiet. You sleep okay?”

“Yeah.”

“I came by again about an hour ago to talk to Riley. She wasn’t there.”

“She had things to do.”

Their eyes met and held for a long beat.

“You’re not okay,” he finally said. “You’re flushed.”

“Sunburn. I forgot sunscreen.”

He didn’t say anything to that, and the silence just about did her in. “It’s not just sex,” she said. “Not to me.”

He still didn’t speak, but she knew by his absolute stillness that she had his undivided attention.

“I’m sorry I let you think it,” she said. “And okay, maybe some of it is about the sex, but that’s because it’s the best sex that I’ve ever had. But it’s not all about the sex.”

Matt might be laid-back and easygoing but he wasn’t slow. In three steps he closed the distance between them and pulled her in, right up against him. He felt so good she actually moaned, a sound he silenced with a kiss.

She had no idea how a man could be so terrifyingly gentle in the way he held her and yet at the same time plunder her mouth so roughly. But that’s exactly what he was, both gentle and rough.

It was exactly what she needed.

“Don’t let me hurt you,” he said, lips on her jaw, making their way to her ear.

Too late, far too late. To share the pain, she turned her head and nipped his lower lip. Sucking in a breath, he laughed softly. “Tough girl,” he murmured, and cupping her face, kissed her again. There was nothing controlled about him now as his tongue tangled with hers, his hands wandering madly from her face to her hips, ending up back in her hair to hold her head still. She pressed even closer, needing him in a way she couldn’t even fathom. She wanted him, wanted him to pull off her clothes, wanted to pull off his, now. She glanced at his overloaded desk.

Matt followed her gaze, his own darkening. “I like the way you think,” he said, and shoved all the stacks of paperwork to the floor. “Lock the door.”

Her nipples tightened into two ball bearings. “Will anyone hear us?” she whispered.

His smile was lethal and filled with nefarious, bad boy intent. “Us?”

She flushed, and he laughed softly. “You’re going to have to be quiet. Very quiet,” he said.

She quivered and went damp. “I can do quiet.”

“The door, Amy.”

She turned to do just that, but it opened before she could and Ty strode in. He had a bag from Eat Me in one hand and two long-necked soda bottles dangling from the other. He wore dark, reflective sunglasses and the navy blue coverall of a paramedic with FLIGHT CARE across his back in white letters.

He dipped his head and eyeballed them over the top of his glasses, taking in Matt’s hair standing up on end from Amy’s fingers and then her disheveled appearance as well. His lips quirked. “I take it you forgot I was bringing lunch,” he said. “Since it looks like you’re already in the middle of yours.”

“It’s not what you think,” Amy said.

“No?” Ty asked, amused. “What do I think?”

Amy opened her mouth, then sighed. It was exactly what he thought.

Matt came forward, grabbed the bag and both drinks from Ty, then pushed his friend backward over the threshold and shut the door in his face. “I’m going to pay for that in the gym in the morning,” Matt said, handing Amy the sodas and food. “So we should probably enjoy this.”

“What if he’s hungry?”

“He’s always hungry. And on second thought, so am I.” Matt took the stuff back out of her hands and set them on a chair, then hauled her up against him. “Where were we?”

Amy slid her fingers back into his hair. “You had your tongue down my throat. And your hands up my shirt.”

He nodded and slid his hands up her shirt again, fingertips resting just beneath her breasts, which were tingling from his touch.

“And you?” he asked, voice husky. His bedroom voice. “Where were you?”

She bit her lower lip. They both knew exactly where she’d been. Her fingers had been heading for his zipper.

He laughed softly at her, kissed her long and deep, then tore his mouth from hers. Grabbing her hand, he tugged her to the door. “Change of plans. I’ve got fifty-five minutes left on my lunch break.”

“That’s enough for lunch and dessert.”

He smiled. “Yeah, and we’re going to have dessert first. But not here. It’s not nearly private enough for what I want to do to you.”

Her knees wobbled as she followed him out, having no idea where they were going and not caring. She’d probably follow him anywhere.

And if that wasn’t unsettling, he walked them down the hallway past several coworkers, moving with unconscious confidence that spoke of a man on a mission. And he was on a mission-to do her. At the thought, she cracked up, and he looked back questioningly.

“Nothing,” she said.

As if he could read her naughty thoughts, he gave her a heated look. “We’re doing this.”

“Yes, please.”

He smiled. “I like the ‘please.’ More of that.”

And she laughed again. It wasn’t often that she wanted to laugh and jump someone’s bones in the space of a few seconds. But then again, it wasn’t often that she wanted to both run like hell from someone and hold on tight to him either.

Normally Matt could make the drive from work to home in eleven minutes, allowing for the occasional deer crossing or traffic if he got behind someone not used to the narrow, two-lane, curvy highway.

Today, with Amy next to him practically vibrating with sexual tension, he made it in seven. He pulled up to his cabin with a screech of tires, then turned to her with some half-baked, Neanderthal idea of dragging her into his house. But she beat him to it, crawling over the console to straddle him before covering his mouth with hers.

His first response was a resounding oh, hell yeah. This was what he’d needed. Amy in his arms like a tempting, forbidden treat, her dark eyes full of wanting.

And then there was her mouth. God, that mouth, it could give a full-grown man a wet dream. He staggered out of his truck, pulling her out with him, careful to protect her injury.

At his front porch, they stopped to kiss. “Matt,” she whispered, and God, how he loved the sound of his name on her lips. He pressed her against his door. Take, his body demanded. Instead, forcing himself to be gentle, he leaned in and nibbled at her throat.

With a moan, her head thunked back to give him access. Trusting… that was new, and tenderness swamped him as he kissed her softly now, a sweet brush of his lips over her skin.

She moaned again, and damn if all his good intentions didn’t go up in smoke, the kiss quickly deepening into a hot, hungry intense tangle of tongues.

Tearing her mouth free, she rained kisses down his jaw, her small hands very busy at the buttons of his shirt, her expression one of such fierce intent that he groaned. “Amy-”

She gave up on his buttons and went for his belt and zipper, having some trouble working around his gun and utility belt. And then he was in her hands. Literally.

“Not here,” he heard himself say roughly, though he was gentle as he lifted her up, still aware enough to be careful of her stitches. She wrapped her legs around him, and he cupped her ass in one palm, supporting her as he unlocked the door with his free hand. Kicking it closed, he strode with her through his house, ignoring the couch, the fireplace rug, everything except his big bed. By the time she’d begun working off her clothes, he’d stripped naked and was reaching for her.

She’d toed off her kick-ass boots but was still struggling out of her jeans. He tugged them off and the rest of her clothes as well. His arms glided up hers, taking her hands in his above her head. Palm to palm, chest to chest, thigh to thigh, he looked into her beautiful face and lost his breath. But as he knew she would, she tugged to free her hands. “Amy.” He nuzzled at her throat but then made eye contact. “Let’s try it my way this time.”

She went still. In fact, she appeared to stop breathing. “What way is that?”

“The way where you trust me.”

Her eyes met his, heartbreakingly wild. He steeled himself against the surge of unexpected emotion and held her gaze, willing her to look deep and see what he was finally starting to get about himself. He could be trusted. She could trust him.

“Matt-”

“I would never hurt you,” he breathed, lowering his head to kiss her softly. “Trust me.”

She closed her eyes, then opened them again, relaxing her body into his. “I do. I do trust you.”