I Saw Her Standing There (7 page)

The sap is just starting to trickle, and I’m in the sap shed turning on the vacuum pump. This pump is ten horsepower large and supplies vacuum to all of our ten thousand tubing taps. That and the reverse-osmosis machine are the reason we bring in generators during the season.

—Colton Abbott’s sugaring journal, March 1

C
ameron and Will took their time traveling across Northern Vermont, stopping around noon to buy sandwiches and drinks that they took to a park in Waterbury. They fed the dogs from the bag of dog food Will had brought with them and let them romp around in the open field while they ate. Tanner and Trevor came over to their blanket every so often to check in and nose around for smells. Will rewarded them with a potato chip each time.

“They are so spoiled,” Cameron commented after Trevor had returned a third time for another chip.

“No, they aren’t. They’re well trained and obedient.”

She snorted with laughter. “Is that what you tell yourself when they won’t stand still and let you towel them off when they come inside soaking wet?”

“That’s a rare instance of disobedience, and P.S. no one is perfect.”

You are
, she wanted to say as she took a good long look at him. The blond highlights in his honey-colored hair were particularly golden in the afternoon sunshine, his arms were tanned from shirtless hours outside and his muscles bulged from the way he sat, partially reclined on his outstretched arms. Yes, he was indeed perfect in every way that mattered to her.

“What’re you looking at over there?”

“You.”

His brows narrowed suspiciously. “What about me?”

“Everything about you.”

“That’s a pretty broad answer.”

“I love everything about you, and I particularly love looking at you. Is that better?”

He stared at her for a long moment before reaching for her hand and bringing it to his lips. “I love everything about you, too. I feel like I’m living in some sort of dream come true since you moved in with me. And then you say something like that, and it gets even better than it already was. How is that possible?”

She leaned forward and kissed him, tipping her head to delve deeper when he hooked an arm around her to keep her from getting away. Somehow she wound up reclined on the blanket as one kiss became two and two became three. Trevor’s cold wet nose between them finally interrupted the moment, making them laugh.

“Damn it, Trev.” Will scratched the dog’s ears while also pushing him back. “You need to leave me alone when I’m kissing my girl.”

Trevor whined as he always did on the rare instances when Will actually chastised him.

“It’s probably just as well that he saved us from making a spectacle of ourselves in a public park,” Cameron said.

Will gathered up their trash and put it in the brown bag their lunch had come in. “It’s your fault.”

“How is it my fault?”

“You say awesome things to me, and then you kiss me until I forget where I am.” He got up and offered her his hand to help her.

Laughing, Cameron took his outstretched hand. “I believe you were a willing participant in the kissing.”

He wrapped his arm around her and kissed her again. “You bet your ass I was.”

“I don’t want to bet my ass. I might lose it, and my boyfriend tells me he loves it.”

The low growl that came from Will made both dogs bark.

Cameron lost it laughing and took off running for the truck with the dogs in hot pursuit. A glance over her shoulder told her Will was right behind her, with the blanket tossed over his shoulder and the bag of trash in hand. Nervous giggles escaped from her lips as he caught up to her and hooked an arm around her waist from behind.

She screamed with laughter when he swung her around.

The dogs barked and frolicked at their feet.

Cameron had never felt more “herself” or at home than she did with him, especially in moments like this when they were silly together. For so long she’d affected a tough outer shell that she showed the world, which was how she grappled with the early loss of her mother and the attention deficit disorder that had marked her lonely childhood.

But with Will—and his big, rowdy family—she’d discovered the tough outer shell wasn’t necessary. She didn’t need to protect herself against him or them. She’d allowed herself to believe that his love was forever.

He put her down and kissed her neck from behind.

Cameron covered his hands with hers and leaned back against him, loving the way he surrounded her and made her feel safe in a way she’d never felt with any man before him.

After weeks of living with him and sleeping with him, she wasn’t at all surprised to feel the press of his erection against her back, just as he probably wasn’t surprised when she rubbed herself against him shamelessly.

“In the car, woman,” he said, with a playful smack to her rear end. “I’m suddenly very anxious to get to the lake.”

“Why?” She loved that he held the door to his truck for her—always. “Do you want to go swimming?” Feigning innocence, she looked up at him.

He leaned in and kissed her again, with sweeping thrusts of his tongue that had her immediately ready for anything he had in mind. “No, I don’t want to go swimming,” he said when he came up for air. “You know damned well what I want, so be ready when we get there.”

“Oh, yes, sir. Whatever you want, sir.”

“Call me ‘sir,’ and you’ll get a whole
other
side of me that you haven’t seen yet.”

She found the statement both intriguing and titillating. “All this and there’s
more
?”

He winked suggestively. “Much, much more.”

Cameron suddenly couldn’t wait to get to the lake house.

They passed much of the ride in the easy silence she’d come to appreciate in her relationship with Will. He didn’t feel the need to fill every minute with useless chatter. If he said something, it was something worth hearing. Though he was quiet, he still kept a firm grip on her hand as he drove, and that small gesture made her feel loved and treasured.

She’d had no idea this kind of happiness was even possible until she crashed into Fred the moose and found Will Abbott in the dark of Vermont mud season. At first she’d worried he might be a chain saw murderer, a thought that now made her giggle softly.

“What’s so funny?”

“I was thinking about the night we met and how I worried you might be a chain saw murderer.”

“Your fertile imagination never ceases to entertain me.” He brought her hand to his mouth and nibbled on her fingers. “Why would I want to cut you up with a chain saw when I’d much rather tie you to my bed and have my way with you?”

Cameron swallowed hard. “Tie me to your bed?” she asked in a squeaky voice. “Since when did my beta boyfriend become an alpha?”

“Since he found the perfect woman for him and let his imagination run wild.”

“Personally speaking, I thought his imagination was already pretty wild.”

“Oh, babe, his imagination is almost as fertile as yours.”

“I’m a little scared of what goes on at this lake house of yours.”

That made him laugh.

Cameron loved to make him laugh and to watch him laugh. He was so damned sexy all the time, but when he laughed . . . She really loved that. And his amazing smile . . . She’d fallen in love with that first. Who was she kidding? She was crazy in love with everything about him, and if he wanted to—gulp—tie her to his bed and have his way with her, who was she to get in the way of his fantasies?

She cleared her throat and swallowed the nervous lump that threatened to choke her. “I’d do it, you know.”

“Do what?”

“Anything you wanted.”

He took his eyes off the road to glance over at her as his jaw throbbed with tension. “Cameron . . . You can’t say stuff like that to me when I’m driving. It’s not fair or safe.”

“What? We’re just having a conversation.”

“Right,” he said with a laugh. “That’s all we’re doing. How about we table this
conversation
until we get to where I can do something about it.”

At the thought of him “doing something about it” Cameron swallowed again, her heart fluttering with nerves and desire and love. She’d meant what she’d said—there was almost nothing he could ask of her that she wouldn’t give him. She wanted to be everything to him and make his every fantasy come true.

“I can hear you thinking about it, and that’s also not safe when I’m driving.”

“What kind of crazy logic is that? I’m not even allowed to think?”

“Not about that. Not while I’m driving.”

As she was about to further state how ridiculous he was being, one of the dogs let out a loud snore from the backseat that made them both laugh. Cameron felt the tightness in her chest ease, which she knew was only temporary. The moment they were alone at the house, she had no doubt they’d pick right up where they’d left off. His kind of tension was the very best she’d ever experienced.

Forty-five minutes later, they drove through the picturesque town of Burlington, home of the University of Vermont.

“I want you to show me where you went to school,” Cameron said.

“I will. Tomorrow.”

“Did Max live at the lake house when he was in school?” she asked of Will’s youngest brother, who had recently graduated from college.

“No, he was in a fraternity, much to my mother’s dismay. He lived at the frat house—also known as the pigsty.”

“Were you in a frat?” she asked, fairly certain she knew the answer before she asked the question.

“Hell no. Max is the only one of us to go Greek.”

He was also going to produce the first Abbott grandchild later this year, an event that had once seemed far off in the future but was getting closer all the time. Max’s adorable girlfriend, Chloe, had begun to show rather significantly in the last few weeks.

After a few more turns that took them closer to Lake Champlain, Will pulled onto a long, winding dirt road that led to one of the most extraordinary houses Cameron had ever seen. As the daughter of a wildly successful businessman, she’d seen her share of amazing homes, but this was exceptional. “
This
is the lake house?” she asked, incredulous as she took in the glass and stone and wood that made up the house.

“Yep. What’d you have in mind?”

“Not this, that’s for sure.”

Will drove past the house to the driveway, bringing the truck to an abrupt stop when they saw Colton’s truck. “What’s he doing here? And who does he know from Pennsylvania?”

A second smaller car with Pennsylvania plates was parked next to the truck.

“Oh my God,” Will said in a scandalized whisper. “He’s here with the mystery woman! That sneaky bastard!”

“What should we do? If he’s here with someone, maybe we shouldn’t bother him.”

“The hell with that. My dad gave
me
the keys. He shouldn’t even be here.”

“You know, most people in the twenty-first century would pick up the phone and call the other person to say, ‘Hey, what’s up? Why are you at the lake house when Dad said I could use it this weekend?’ But in Abbott land, you don’t have a phone, and neither does he. Is it too much to hope there might be a landline in there?”

“No landline. My dad didn’t want to be reachable at the lake.”

“Well, then our choice is to either go in there and interrupt what he’s got going on or stay somewhere else.”

Will shifted the truck into park. “We’re not staying somewhere else, and it’s high time one of us got to see this mystery woman he’s been running off to meet the last few weekends.”

The dogs were up and whimpering to get out after the long ride, and apparently they recognized where they were.

“I’m scared to go in there,” Cameron said. “What if they’re doing it in the kitchen or something?”

“Eww. He’d better not be doing that.”

“But what if he is?”

“I’ll kill him before you see anything. I promise.”

They got out and met in front of the truck, the dogs dancing around in circles at their feet. Will reached for her hand and pulled the key out of his pocket with his other hand as they walked to the front porch. “Here goes nothing.” He opened the door and yelled inside. “Put your pants on, bro! I’m coming in!”