I Saw Her Standing There (3 page)

After two days of below-20 temps and a nice rest for the crew, tapping resumed today. They tap only when the temp is above 20, to prevent splitting the tree in the brittle cold, and because tubing repair goes along so nicely without stiff hands and tubing. Another day or two and the sugarbush will be tapped out.

—Colton Abbott’s sugaring journal, February 19

A
fter the door clicked shut, Lucy stood in the middle of the huge bathroom and took a moment to calm her frazzled nerves. Sometimes she still wanted to pinch herself because she’d captured the attention of a sweet, funny man who also happened to be so hot he made her blood boil.

When they were together, she tried not to think about the overwhelming issues that hung over their relationship. When they were apart, the issues were all she thought about, especially after last weekend when things had taken a decidedly erotic turn.

All week, those memories had run through her mind when she was trying to concentrate at work, when she was with her friends and family, when she was trying to sleep at night while wishing he was sleeping with her.

From the beginning, she’d told him she had no interest in getting serious with someone who lived in another state. And yet here she was with him for yet another weekend—the sixth she’d spent alone with him. As she looked for the bikini he’d told her to bring for swimming in the lake, she realized her palms were sweaty and her heart was beating fast at the thought of what might transpire between them this weekend.

So much for not getting serious.

“Ugh,” she said as she quickly got changed, folded her clothes and stashed them in her bag.

More than anything, Lucy wished she could call her best friend and hash it all out with Cameron, but at the beginning, she and Colton had agreed to keep their “friendship” private for the time being. As the weeks went by, the big “secret” seemed to grow and take on a life of its own until telling Cameron would also mean confessing to having kept something rather huge from her friend for all this time.

She and Cam didn’t keep things from each other, especially not potentially life-changing things such as what was beginning to look an awful lot like a legitimate relationship with the brother of her best friend’s boyfriend. Lucy sighed, pained by how complicated something supposedly uncomplicated was getting.

“More sighs,” Colton said when he came into the bathroom wearing a pair of board shorts that left his incredibly muscular chest, shoulders, arms and belly bare to her hungry gaze. He’d told her before the muscles had resulted from the endless need for split wood to run the sugaring facility. Images of him wielding an axe had fueled many a fantasy since he’d mentioned that.

“You weren’t supposed to hear that sigh.” She glanced up at his ruggedly handsome face to discover a gaze as hungry as hers taking in the sight of her in a bikini, which naturally made her flush from head to toe. She hated her fair complexion and how it gave away her every thought and emotion.

Thankfully, he chose not to ask about the sigh he’d overheard, preferring to take her hand and lead her into the hot tub.

As she eased into the warm water that circled around her, Lucy sighed for a different reason—pure pleasure. “This feels fantastic.”

The steam from the tub made his golden-brown hair curl at the ends. She’d thought he was sexy as hell with the longer hair and furry beard. When she’d expressed an interest in knowing what he looked like without the beard, he’d shaved it off and revealed a stunningly gorgeous face that she never tired of looking at. Looks aside, however, she was even more attracted to his sweetness, irreverent humor and undeniable charm.

“Seriously fantastic,” he said of the warm water and pulsating jets. “I’ve spent all week splitting wood, and I’m sore as hell.”

“How can you be sore when you do so much of that?”

“I overdid it the last few days so I could take some time off.”

She realized he’d done that so he could spend more time with her. “I don’t want you to get hurt on my behalf.”

“I didn’t get hurt, and it was well worth the extra hours so I could relax this weekend and stay on schedule, too.” He glanced at her, the picture of innocence. “But I wouldn’t say no to a massage of my aching muscles.”

She rolled her eyes. “A little transparent much?”

Now he batted his long eyelashes, which made him even harder to resist. “I’m a hard-working guy looking for some TLC from his lady.”

“Actually, you’re a schemer trying to get my hands on you.”

“And that’s different how, exactly?”

“Come over here.”

“Oh yay!” He was like a delighted little boy who’d gotten his way, which made him downright irresistible.

She’d found him difficult to resist from the very beginning. He’d walked into the conference room at his family’s store the day Cameron was presenting the first cut of the website they’d done for the store, and Lucy had noticed him immediately. She’d never been drawn to the rugged-brawny type until she’d taken one look at Colton Abbott, and all her girl parts stood up to take notice, which had never happened before.

Then his parents invited her to join them for dinner, and he’d tagged along. Her fascination had only grown over dinner at the Abbotts’ favorite Italian restaurant, where Colton had eaten enough for two grown men. She’d begun to wonder over dinner what he’d look like under the beard that hid what appeared to be an exceptionally handsome face. She hadn’t been wrong about that.

“What’re you thinking about?” he asked as he settled between her legs and leaned back against her, sighing with pleasure as she began to knead his shoulder muscles.

“The day we met.”

“What about it?”

“I wondered what you’d look like without the beard.”

“As I recall, you said as much to me a couple of weeks later, and I ended up shaving it off.”

“After you went out to get a pair of hedge clippers.”

His laughter echoed through the spacious bathroom. “For your information, they were
not
hedge clippers. And P.S., that was a critical mistake in our attempt to keep our ‘friendship’ a secret. Everyone was suspicious after I got rid of the beard I’ve had since high school.”

“I’m not sorry. I was right about what was under all that hair.”

“Oh do tell. What was under there?”

“An exceptionally handsome face.”

“I was quite surprised by that myself. I hadn’t seen it in years.”

Laughing, Lucy poked him in the ribs. “You’re so full of yourself.”

“Hey, Luce?”

“Yeah?” she asked, immediately unnerved by the serious way he said her name.

“Tell me again why we thought it was such a great idea to keep this a big secret from everyone.”

“You know why.”

“Tell me anyway. I keep forgetting.”

“Since I don’t believe that for a minute, are you asking me because you want to change our status?”

He ran his hand back and forth through the water, sending waves across the wide tub. “Maybe.”

Lucy swallowed hard. “We kept it a secret because we didn’t want everyone involved in it. And because Cameron and Will had just gotten together, and we didn’t want to steal their spotlight.”

“Will and Cameron have been together for months now.”

“I know.”

“So how long are we going to continue to sneak around? I can’t even remember anymore why we’re doing that.”

“Because,” Lucy said, feeling more anxious by the second. “We’re just having fun. We aren’t like them, so we don’t need to involve everyone. It’s just us, and we like it that way.” After a long pause, she said, “Don’t we?”

“Sure.” He linked their fingers under the water and turned to face her, floating in front of her. “Well, no. I don’t think I like it that way. Not anymore.”

“Colton—”

“Hear me out, honey.”

He made her feel swoony when he called her that.

“I’ll admit that I’ve enjoyed the fact that everyone in my life wants to know what I’m up to and who I’m up to it with, but underneath it all, I’m not much of a mystery man. I’m more of a what-you-see-is-what-you-get sort of guy. And I want to share this, what we have together, with the people I love. I want to bring you to my home on the mountain, to my parents’ home for Sunday dinner, to my siblings’ homes. I want you to come to my sister’s wedding with me. I want us to be a real couple.”

Lucy was taken by surprise when she realized how badly she wanted all the things he wanted. Except none of it was feasible. “We agreed. At the beginning. We set rules.”

“Screw the rules, Lucy. That was back when we thought we might hang out for a while and it wouldn’t go anywhere. Six weekends later, it’s gone somewhere, and I want it to continue to go places. Don’t you?”

“Where can it go?” she asked softly.

“I don’t know. But don’t you want to find out?”

“I don’t know. I’m afraid.”

“What’re you afraid of?”

He looked up at her with clear blue eyes and an open, honest expression that made it easier for her to confess her fears. “Of getting in too deep and not being able to get out. Of getting hurt.”

“Aw, Lucy. I’m not asking for a lifetime commitment.” He brought her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss over her knuckles. “I’d just like to be able to tell my family about you.”

She bit her lip as she thought about that. “If you tell your family, I’d have to tell Cameron.”

“And that would be bad?”

“No. Of course it wouldn’t. I’m just . . . I don’t think I’m ready to go public.” She couldn’t bear the disappointment she saw on his face. “That doesn’t mean I’ll never be ready. I’m just not there
yet
. Is that okay?”

“Sure. Whatever you want. Are you starting to get wrinkly?”

“A little.”

“Let’s get out of here and move on to the next part of tonight’s program.”

“There’s a program?”

“Damn straight there is. Next up is ice cream in bed.”

“Oh, I like ice cream in bed.”

“Excellent.” He helped her out of the tub, kissed her nose and then her lips and wrapped a towel around her. “I’ll bring it in.”

When he left the room, Lucy let out a deep breath and leaned her hands on the countertop, trying to get her emotions under control. She’d never in her life felt as much for any guy as she did for him. And it had been immediate. She couldn’t deny that, as much as she’d tried. That immediate attraction was what had her spending six weekends with him. She didn’t do things like that, well . . . ever.

Lucy Mulvaney didn’t do serious. It wasn’t in her DNA. Or it never had been until Colton Abbott walked into a conference room and put her DNA into a blender and mixed it all up. The result had been someone all new, someone she barely recognized, someone who drove six hours to spend four days with a guy she couldn’t stop thinking about between visits. And now he wanted to go public. He wanted to tell people about them. He wanted to change their status.

As long as no one knew, Lucy could delude herself into believing that what was happening between them wasn’t serious. It was a weekend fling. If people knew, then it wouldn’t be just a fling anymore. It would be a
thing
. And Lucy didn’t do
things
. She dated. Here and there. She’d had more first dates than anyone she knew. Her friends teased her about her first-date track record, which Lucy embraced. It kept her from having to deal with things she didn’t seem equipped to handle the way other women did.

Sometimes she thought there was something missing in her because she didn’t want the same things most people did. She didn’t dream of the big white wedding, the house in the burbs, the kids, the dogs. She couldn’t picture that life for herself no matter how hard she tried. Work made sense to her, or it had until Cameron left and everything changed.

Now nothing made sense, and she found herself floundering at work like a ship that’d come loose from its anchor, not to mention she was embroiled in a
thing
with Colton Abbott, who lived six hours from her.

How had she let that happen?

“I thought you were going to meet me in bed,” Colton said from the doorway, where he stood holding a pint of Ben & Jerry’s and a spoon and wearing a smile that made her want to give him anything he wanted. That smile was one of many reasons she was embroiled in the
thing
.

“What kind is that?”

“Coffee Toffee.”

“My favorite.”

“I know. You told me.” He scooped a spoonful and offered it to her.

Lucy put the towel on the counter and went to him. He’d changed out of the wet bathing suit into basketball shorts that clung to his narrow hips. He sure was beautiful to look at. Placing her hands on his chest, she opened her mouth to let him feed her a bite. As the flavor of the ice cream exploded on her tongue, she couldn’t look away from him.

He leaned in to kiss her, his cold lips sending a shiver through her that had more to do with heat than it did with cold. “Why don’t you get out of that wet suit and come help me eat the rest of this?”

“Okay.”

Kissing her again, he said, “You’d better hurry up. I can eat a pint of Ben & Jerry’s in about five minutes by myself.”