Crash Into You (36 page)

             
Mark had cleared the pathway to the door but it was still deep enough that her boots sank in with every step.   She tromped up to the door, and heard May barking like mad inside.

             
She felt a confusing mix of joy and heartbreak.  She wanted to cry suddenly, but wouldn’t dare.  She lifted her hand and rang the bell.

             
She heard the door unlock, then it cracked open.

             
Mark
.

             
The world tilted on its axis.   Warmth bloomed through her body, like she was coming back to life.

             
He said nothing, just gazed at her.

             
His hair was a little longer, the sandy golden strands curling just over the tops of his ears.   He was a little thinner.  His eyes were shadowed, and his skin was paler, his jaw sharp.  But it was him.

             
His mouth twitched.

             
“Hi,” she said.

             
“Hi.”

             
“Can I come in?”

             
Mark opened the door for her.  She stepped inside.  The familiar space should have looked smaller, but it didn’t. It looked even bigger.  Big enough to hold them all.  It was welcomingly warm; a fire roared in the grate.  

             
May instantly jumped on her, and she hugged the dog, petting her and pressing her face into the puppy’s soft fur.   May jumped down and wiggled and whimpered with pure puppy joy.    Aimee got down on her level and let May cover her with doggy kisses.   “I missed you too, girl,” Aimee said into the thick fur of her neck.

It took all her mental discipline not to show her feelings as baldly for Mark.

              Mark’s expression remained impassive and stoic.   She remembered that expression, and it pained her at the same time it made her heart soar with joy.   It was the expression he wore when attempting to mask his deep feelings.  

             
Standing up, she asked, “How have you been?”

             
“Good.  You?”

             
“Good.”

             
He nodded as if this were a satisfactory answer.   

             
She thought her heart was going to shake out of her chest.   She couldn’t stand the politeness.  Her throat tightened in frustration. If he was going to keep it on this level, it was up to her to force them to the next one.

             
“You look… so good.”   Such an understatement.  She had no defense against it.   All those intense male vibes went straight to her core, rattling her like nothing else.

He met her eyes
with the look of a man facing the firing squad.    “Why did you come back?” he asked flatly. 

             
She blushed under his penetrating gaze. She wasn’t sure how to answer.  She struggled to think over the roar in her head.  It felt like the most important answer she would ever utter in her life, but she could not muster eloquence through her panic.   She forced the words past her trembling lips.   “I came to ask you to take me back.”

             
For a moment nothing happened.  He looked at her with neutral grey eyes, as if she’d never spoken.  Panic climbed into her throat.  Then, the rush of words was unstoppable.  “I was doing so well in Portland.  I found a cute apartment near the university.   I was enrolled in MBA classes at night and had some web design clients.  And I…  I… realized that my life was not nearly as much fun or meaningful as when I was here.  With you.”  Her voice faltered with grief.

             
Something flinched in his eyes.  Something tender.   “What about your independence?” he asked.  “You dreamed of living your own life on your own terms.   A noble objective, incidentally.”

             
“I realized that as long as I was here, you never asked anything of me.  You never tried to restrict me in any way.  You made me grow, in fact.  You taught me how to ride horses and go kayaking and make friends, all of which I was afraid to do on my own.  You encouraged me to teach yogalates at Glacier Outfitters.   Those things were on my terms.  I was so afraid that falling in love with you would mean that I was giving up myself, but I was wrong.  So wrong.”

             
“What about your life in Portland?”

             
“I gave it a whirl.  I really tried.  It wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.  And… you weren’t there.”

             
Mark began to shake his head slowly in a way that broke her heart.  Oh this was not going at all how she had hoped.  She had hoped – unrealistically – that he would have felt the same longing for her, that when she appeared at his front door, he would embrace her in his warm eyes, take her to bed, and never let her go.    Obviously, that was a very foolish dream.  There was no embrace.  Only his cold gaze that left her trembling and terrified that he really didn’t love her anymore.

             
Sudden tears filled her eyes.  

             
“Oh damn it Aimee,” Mark said softly.  “Don’t cry,  you’re going to kill me.”  Before she could stop the tears, he was gathering her into his arms.   A volcano of feeling erupted at his touch.  She burrowed her face into his warm neck, breathing in his wonderful scent, that beautiful mix of aftershave, detergent and the tang of male sweat that scrambled her senses like an electrical storm.  The smell of home.

             
And yet he was holding her in a different way.   Like he was consoling an old, dear friend.  There was no urgency in it.  A cold breeze blew at the back of her neck.              “It isn’t going to work, sweetheart,” he whispered. 

             
Oh God, why did it hurt so much?
  Her heart was going to break and she was going to fall apart right here.    It was so undignified, so horrible to break apart in front of him.  She dipped her chin to try and shield herself while she recovered from the blow.   On the flight from Portland, she’d tried to remind herself that rejection was a very real possibility.  There were all kinds of bad outcomes that she should intellectually prepare herself for.  But nothing could really prepare her for the withering shock and heartbreak of the visceral pain of being told no by the man she loved.  By the only man she had ever loved, and would ever love.

             
“I don’t want any lies.  I don’t want to worry that one day I’ll find a stash of counterfeit Benjamins in my barn,” he went on tonelessly.

             
Aimee’s tight throat was burning with unshed tears.  To allow him the opportunity to speak his mind, she remained silent, though her heart was breaking.  She owed him that.  Hell, she owed him her whole life.

             
Mark cupped her face, gently forcing her to meet his gaze.   Unexpected gentleness shimmered in the mica depths.  Something shy and eager and hopeful began to throb between them.   Her breath hitched in her chest.  “So I want you to pledge to me that you will never lie to me again about anything.”

             
“Wh…what?”  Dazed, her stammering inflection mangled with hope so painful it hurt.

             
“I love you, Aimee.   Don’t ever lie to me again.  Don’t hide anything from me.  Don’t… just don’t.”

             
And then she did break open wide.  The tears she’d been holding back began to roll down her face.

             
Mark pulled her against his hard chest, wrapping her in the steely strength of his arms.   So warm.  So safe.  

             
She couldn’t stop weeping.   Ignobly, she wiped the tears on his soft cotton shirt, trying to get control of herself.    There was a lot to cry about: all the lies she’d told him, all the time wasted on trying to hide parts of herself in an effort to show herself in the most flattering light.  All the time when they were apart that she would not let herself call to see how he was, causing untold suffering to them both.  The sleepless nights, staring at the ceiling.

             
She’d tried so hard to let him go.  But she couldn’t.

             
And she wouldn’t.   The relief of giving in was so sweet, such a liberating rush of emotion, she thought for a moment she might swoon.  But Mark held her up.  He didn’t get impatient with her crying either.  He seemed glad for the excuse to hold her.  He buried his face in her hair, his body shaking against hers.   He clutched at her like he was afraid she’d be ripped away, and though she could barely breathe, she loved it.

             
The tears trailed away, leaving her transparent and cleansed.  Baptized by love.  Tilting her shin up, Mark looked into her face.  It was only then she saw he was transformed too.   The hot glow in his eyes was familiar, but the undisguised love blazed out of him, naked and raw.  That was new.

             
He bent his head to tenderly kiss her lips.   Aimee’s knees almost gave way.   This swooning Victorian maiden phase had to pass, but right now, she needed Mark’s reliable strength.

             
“No more lies?”  He said gently, with a sweet teasing smile on his lips.

             
“I promise,” she sniffled.  “But you’re not exactly innocent in that area either.”

             
“I confessed my darkness.  Not immediately.  But I came to trust you with everything I had, Aimee.   But if it makes you feel better, I promise to be transparent sooner.”  He smiled in that knee-weakening way that seemed at once sugary sweet and lethally sexy.  

             
She nodded, her heart quivering with outsized joy.  “It’s a deal.”

             
“No, it isn’t.  Not yet.  There’s more.  I want the promises, the strings attached, the wedding, children.  The whole damn thing.  If you’re going to be here, we’re going to do this right.   Give it to me, Aimee.  I’ve earned that much.”

             
She laughed, suddenly as light as air.  “Oh, Mark.   Yes, yes, yes.  Yes to all of it.”

             
“You think you can really be happy here in Spanner?”

             
“I can be happy anywhere you are.  And I love it here.  I never should have left.”

             
“You’re sure?”

             
“So sure.  Positive.  I love you.  I love May.  I don’t ever want to leave.”

             
“Not even to see the world?”

             
She shook her head.  “We can experience it all together.   But first show me what I’ve been missing these long months, Mark.  Remind me why I fell so irrevocably in love with you.”

             
He scooped her up with a graceful motion that made her squeal with delight, and made her heart beam with unbelieving joy, and headed up the stairs to the bedroom.  And on the big iron bed, he did just that.