Hitched (15 page)

“Again, I’m pretty sure that’s where the school thing comes in.” Oh, brother. Gavin never hesitated to jump into things like this. “And we’ve done some rock climbing.”

“Yes,
rock
climbing,” Gavin said. “Not
mountain
climbing.”

She rolled her eyes. “What’s with you?”

“I just don’t know if you’re up to it.”

Her eyes widened again. “I’ll take it easy.”

“You just had pneumonia.”

“I feel a lot better.”

“Maybe in a few days.”

This was completely out of character and it was freaking her out a little. She took a huge step forward and grabbed the front of his shirt as he said, “I thought we’d just—”

“What is going on?” she demanded. “I want to
do
something. I want to have some fun.”

“I thought we’d just…”

He trailed off as her eyes narrowed.

“What?” she asked. “You thought we’d what?”

“Curl up on the couch and watch a movie together. Just us. Nice and quiet.”

“Curl up on the couch,” she repeated. Her eyes narrowed further. “Will we be naked on this couch?”

Gavin cleared his throat. Nancy also coughed, but Allie thought maybe she was covering a laugh. She didn’t look away from Gavin to check.

“No. Not naked,” he said.

“Then I want to mountain climb.”

She was
not
going to lie on the couch and watch a movie. She’d go insane. There wasn’t a movie ever made that could keep her mind off of home and the disaster she’d left behind. She needed way more activity than that. Way more.

“Mountain climbing naked could be dangerous,” Nancy commented.

Gavin glared at her and Nancy covered her smile with a folder as she headed into the back room.

“I don’t think mountain climbing is a good idea.” Gavin spread his feet wide, making him look even bigger, and Allie knew it meant he wasn’t messing around.

She let go of his shirt. She wasn’t asking permission, but she also didn’t see the point in fighting with him. The mountain wasn’t going anywhere.

“How about the flights up to the glacier?” She grabbed another flyer from the board. “I’ll bet that’s pretty amazing.”

“I’m sure it is,” Gavin said.

His tone was a touch condescending, but she chose to ignore it.

“You haven’t done it?” she asked.

“No.”

“You’ve been living here, in Alaska, at the base of Mount McKinley, and you haven’t gone up and landed on a glacier even once?” She couldn’t believe it. “You’re the spontaneous guy, the one who’s always up for something new and amazing.”

“I know.”

“So…why? Why haven’t you gone up and done this?” She was honestly stunned. This was right up Gavin’s alley. She couldn’t believe
he
hadn’t suggested it to
her
. “This seems exactly like something you would—”

“I’m settling down. That’s what I want to show you. I want you to see that I can be serious. Husband material even.”

Husband material? What the—

Allie dropped the flyer and quickly backed up three big steps. “Wh…what?”

Gavin looked calm and cool as he watched her. “Husband material,” he said again. Clearly. Firmly. “I want to show you that I do regular things, can just be a typical guy. No one’s fun and crazy all the time.”

Ah, crap.

“I don’t want serious, Gavin.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “God, I’ve had serious up to my eyeballs for the past year. Longer, even. I want fun. I want to be…happy.
Not
serious.”

He still looked unruffled. “I can be serious
and
make you happy.”

“No.” She shook her head adamantly. “No serious stuff. I want to see glaciers and mountain climb and dogsled. Not watch movies on the couch. Hell, I can do that anywhere, with anyone.”

“This is part of settling down,” he said stubbornly. “Normal couple stuff.”

“Oh, for god’s sake,” she muttered. This wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted to get lost in Gavin, with Gavin, like it had always been.

Normal couple stuff was exactly what she’d left behind in Promise Harbor.

“What’s going on?” she asked, looking at him evenly. “We’ve had a really good thing going for a long time.”

“Yes. And now I want a really
great
thing
forever
.”

Forever.
That was right up there with
husband material
for giving her the heebie-jeebies. Not that she didn’t love Gavin. Not that she didn’t think she would still love him in fifty years. But loving him and wanting him in her bed were different things than wanting to live with him.

They’d never done the day-to-day, have-a-mortgage-and-combine-everything-in-their-lives thing. They’d dated. They’d had fun. They’d seen each other several times a week, and sure, they’d done a few loads of laundry and cooked dinner together from time to time. But overall, Gavin was her
escape
from reality. When the normal, everyday stuff got to be too stressful or too complicated or too boring, she turned to Gavin.

She didn’t want him to be part of the stressful, complicated, boring things.

Marriage was a great idea. For some people. But she’d seen what
for better or worse
and
in sickness and in health
and
for richer or poorer
really meant. Her dad’s accident, rehab and the residual effects had taxed her mom emotionally, physically and financially. Accidents and bills happened in life. Things like that would happen in
her
life.

She just would really love to have Gavin living in Alaska when they did.

She would really love to know that she could call him up, hop on a plane, and be wrapped up in the fun-and-hot-sex Gavin-cocoon for a few days whenever she needed it.

Not that she intended to be married to someone else and use Gavin just when she needed a break. Walking away from that altar and Josh—talk about perfect husband material—had felt so good, so freeing. She didn’t want to get married at all.

But a long-term, hot-weekend-only, get-away affair? Definitely.

“Gavin—”

“I’ve changed.”

Yeah. And there was the problem.

She closed her eyes. “I can’t handle any more change.” She needed something to be the same, something she could lean on. “I need something to be steady.”

“My feelings are the same, Al. But how I love you has to be different. I want it to be all day, every day. Not just the nights, not just the weekends. All the time, in every way.”

Even when they’d lived in the same city, their relationship had been “after hours”—after studying, after work, after her family was taken care of.

Now he was settled.

That sounded strange even in her head. Gavin had always been restless, looking for more, working his ass off. He hated when things came too easy. He believed in hard work and sacrifice. He even played hard. He did everything with an unflinching determination.

She sighed. Why did she think he’d approach her and their relationship any differently?

“You want to watch TV and eat pot roast and play Scrabble?” she asked. That would never work. It sounded so…boring. She would have never expected to be at risk of being bored with Gavin.

“Maybe dirty-word Scrabble,” he said, moving closer.

“I still want to mountain climb.”

He glanced at the board behind her. “How about we compromise?” He leaned to take a flyer off the board. As his arm reached past her, she took a deep breath of his scent. She wanted that. All over her.

“We’ll go to Anchorage next week,” he said, leaning back.

“Anchorage?” She read the flyer he held up. “The Solstice Festival?”

“Longest day of the year. Great excuse for a party.”

Hmm. Well, it wasn’t TV and pot roast. “Drinking and dancing?” she asked, reaching for the brochure that clearly depicted people drinking and dancing.

He held it up out of her reach. “No drinking for you.”

She grimaced. “Not a bad rule. Unfortunately. But dancing?”

“If you’re good.”

Before she could come up with a sexy quip about how good she could be, Lydia said, “No fun for you until you go see Eddie. I’ve made excuses for you for two days.”

Allie leaned around Gavin to look at Lydia. Geez, the chick could be soundless when she wanted to be. She could easily sneak up and scare the crap out of someone—or set up a booby trap. Allie made a mental note to carefully survey her environment.

“Okay,” Gavin agreed. “You’re right.”

“Eddie?” Allie asked.

“He wouldn’t go while you were sleeping,” Lydia said with an exaggerated eye roll.

“Eddie lives about forty miles out. I didn’t want to be that far away while you were sick,” Gavin explained, “but I do need to check on her.” He paused and tipped his head to look at Allie. “Want to come?”

“Yes,” she answered without hesitation. She didn’t care who Eddie was or where she lived or what was wrong with her. She wanted to get out of the house, period.

“Okay, let’s go. We’ll talk about Anchorage on the way.”

Things were looking up. This was way better than Scrabble.

But as soon as Gavin helped her up into the high passenger seat of his F350 and shut the door, she realized she’d made a tactical error. She was now a captive audience. It was a forty-mile drive. That would take a while. There were no distractions, nowhere to go. That meant the potential for a lot of talking.

She groaned.

Things were looking up. Gavin resisted humming as he got behind the wheel and started the truck, but just barely.

Taking Allie with him to check up on Eddie and her pups was perfect. They could be together; she wouldn’t be fighting with Lydia, drinking tequila or mountain climbing; and, best of all, she’d be a captive audience for a talk.

And Allie was going to see some of his real life—his grown-up, responsible, serious life.

He grinned and pulled the truck out onto the road before she could realize the same thing and jump out.

Besides, he’d be forgiven as soon as she met the dogs. Allie was as much an animal lover as he was. He couldn’t wait to tell her more about the polar bears, too. In fact, that was the main reason Anchorage had appeal for him. The Solstice Festival was a typical celebration—food, drink, music, staying up all night—literally. They had nineteen hours of daylight this time of year. Not that it actually got
dark
at all. And it was the first official day of summer. But it was a great reason to take Allie to the zoo and introduce her to his girls.

Neither of them said a word for the first few miles. Allie kept her head turned, watching out the window. Finally she gasped and turned to look at him. “I’m in
Alaska
.”

He looked at her with a combination of amusement and concern. “Yes, you are.”

She covered her face with her hands and rested her head back against the seat. “Omigod.”

He reached over and put his hand on her knee. “You okay?”

“No.” Her answer was muffled by her hands.

“No?”

Her hands came down. “I might be on the verge of hyperventilating.”

“You’ve been in Alaska for almost three days now.”

“But I’ve been ignoring it. Every time I start to think about it, I make myself stop. And if I’m with you it doesn’t seem to matter. But now…” she swept her hand toward the windshield, “I’m right out in the middle of it. I can’t ignore it now. It’s everywhere.”

He squeezed her knee. “You’re okay. I’m here. This is all good.”

She started shaking her head. “No. It’s not good. What about my family, what about my
dad
? And all those people. What about Josh?”

Dammit.

Gavin swerved to the side of the road, throwing the truck into park. He turned to her and pulled her across the seat and into his lap. “Breathe,” he commanded, rubbing his hand up and down her back.

She covered her face again and he tugged her hands down to her lap.

“Breathe,” he said again.

She did.

“Now look at me.”

She did that too. There were no tears. Just something worse that tore at him—regret.

“Oh, no,” he told her firmly. “You’re not going to regret this.”

“Just…what did I
do
?”

He cradled her face between his hands. “You came to Alaska with me. Have some perspective, Allie. You didn’t steal anything, you didn’t kill anybody. You didn’t lie to anyone. You did the most honest thing you could. You did what your heart told you to.” He would never forget how it felt for her to choose
him
in front of everyone.

She’d been pressing her lips together. Now they parted as she breathed in deeply.

“Kiss me.”

That wasn’t a good idea. He was weakening anyway, the longer they were together. Out here, far from interruptions, with that look of need in her eyes, it was almost certain he’d crumble. The old Gavin would have stripped her by now. To hell with proving he was ready for serious, ready to be everything she needed.