Mismatch (9 page)

She glanced around her nervously. “What?”

“How are you?” he asked, suddenly very serious.

There was no need for him to expand on the question, Bronwynn knew exactly what he meant. The odd thing was she didn’t wonder how it was they were so in tune. It felt natural. She took a deep breath, carefully considering her answer instead of tossing off the usual “I’m fine.” Finally she met his gaze and said, “I’m good. I don’t have all the answers yet, but I don’t have any regrets. I did the right thing.”

“What are the questions you don’t have the answers to?”

She made a frustrated face, propped her elbow on the glass-topped table, and leaned her chin on her hand. It never occurred to her not to be totally open with Wade. “I don’t understand how I could have become engaged to Ross. I knew it wasn’t the real thing. In my heart I knew. You’d understand if you’d ever met my parents. They had such a wonderful love. They really cared for each other as human beings. They were friends, but they had an incredible passion for each other too.”

“It must have hurt a lot to lose them.”

Tears sprang to her eyes. She didn’t try to hide them. “I know I couldn’t live through anything worse. We knew Mama was going. About the time the doctors had given her only a couple of months, Daddy was killed in a car accident. So sudden, so—” She paused and bit her lip. She still felt cheated when she thought about it. There had been no time for good-byes. “Mama died two days later. When we told her about Daddy she just let go.”

Wade reached across the table and slipped his hand over hers, giving her contact, support, sympathy, all without ever thinking about it. That it was needed and appreciated didn’t have to be said out loud.

“How does Ross fit in?”

“I’d known Ross casually for years. Our families were friends. After it all happened, he was there for me. Familiar, dependable—or so I thought. I went to work raising funds for the Cancer Society, and Ross was always around. He was . . .” The adjective eluded her as it had every time she’d tried to sort through her feelings.

“Safe.” Wade supplied the word, easily seeing what Bronwynn had turned around and around and was trying to come up with in frustrated confusion.

She went completely still as the word sank in. It was the missing piece to a puzzle. She didn’t understand it, but she knew she had the key. Wade had given it to her.

The colors of her eyes were startlingly clear as she settled her intense gaze on him and said, “Safe. What a terribly interesting word.”

“It’s only natural to want to hang on to something familiar and unthreatening when it seems as if the world’s being torn apart around you.”

Bronwynn knew there was much more to it than that, but it certainly was a start. “Yes,” she said. “I suppose it is.”

Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of the express delivery truck. Duty bound, Murphy had shipped the thick packet of reports Wade had requested, but true to his own conscience, he had included a note telling his boss and friend to take it easy. His suggestion that Wade read while stretched out in a hammock with a tall, cool drink at his elbow brought a smile to Wade’s lips.

Bronwynn, on the other hand, was frowning. The sheaf of papers Wade held looked like the unabridged manuscript of
War and Peace.
She didn’t think much of the invisible Murphy, who had sent his vacationing boss a mountain of work.

“I’ll get to this later,” Wade said, tossing the report on a lawn chair. “We should finish up the yard, I’m sure you’ve got other work to do today.”

“Work, work, work,” Bronwynn said, only half-teasing, hands on her hips. “That’s all you ever think about, Wade. You’re such a stuffed shirt.”

He looked astounded by her evaluation. “I am not a stuffed shirt!”

“Ha! You’ve been on vacation for days and you only just managed to stop wearing a necktie! If your shirt gets stuffed any fuller, they’ll hear the seams splitting in Cleveland.” Her gaze scanned the lawn for some way to prove her point and distract him from the report he’d temporarily set aside. “When was the last time you climbed a tree?”

“What?” By the look he gave her she might have asked him when was the last time he’d grown a second head.

“When was the last time you climbed a tree?” She repeated the question the same way she would for a half-wit.

Wade shrugged and scowled in irritation. “I don’t know. I’m a responsible man with a very important job. I don’t have time to run around climbing trees.”

Bronwynn cupped a hand to her ear. “Is that a seam I hear giving way or is it stuffing rustling?”

Wade’s expression suggested it was feathers ruffling—his. Of course he didn’t go around climbing trees. What sane person did? Even as he thought about how ridiculous it was, he set off across the lawn behind Bronwynn.

Her purposeful stride took her around the back of the house to what she instantly recognized as a perfect tree for climbing. It had been years since she’d made use of one, but she wasn’t about to tell Wade. She grabbed hold of a low limb and swung herself up. Some skills, such as bike riding and tree climbing, never were forgotten, Bronwynn thought. As a child she had alternated regularly between being all sugar and spice and the tomboy terror of the neighborhood. The old skills came back to her with a pleasant rush of nostalgia as she scrambled into the higher branches of the tree.

Wade stared up at her with mingled disbelief, admiration, and exasperation. She had settled herself on a limb and looked down at him through the canopy of leaves, a smudge of dirt and a look of satisfaction on her face. Figuring his pride was on the line if nothing else, Wade got a firm grasp on the same low branch she’d used and hauled himself into the tree, breathing in the rich green scent and remembering long, carefree summers in Indiana.

How long had it been since he’d felt carefree? he wondered. It was in another lifetime it seemed. How long had it been since he’d indulged a boyish sense of adventure and done something that was productive only in bringing a sheen of sweat to his skin and a sense of exhilaration to his soul? Since he’d become a man, too long ago. Bronwynn had teased him into it, and he was grateful to her.

“Stuffed shirt?” he questioned, standing on a branch a few feet below her perch. They were nose to nose as he planted a steadying hand on either side of her bottom.

Bronwynn laughed, delighted. “Maybe there’s hope for you after all, Grayson.”

He leaned toward her, his gaze narrowing, focusing on her wide, soft mouth. The air around them began to heat. “Is there a kiss for me too? I think I deserve a reward for risking life and limb.”

He didn’t give her time to answer. It would have been a waste of time anyway, Bronwynn thought to herself as Wade’s lips gently captured hers. Anticipation had been simmering inside her ever since the quick kiss he’d surprised her with earlier that morning. It had never stopped simmering since the first kiss they’d shared, the kiss that had stripped pretenses and exposed needs and desires.

She dropped one hand from the limb she was holding, sliding her fingers through Wade’s hair to cup the back of his head and draw him closer. She deepened the kiss, her tongue meeting his eagerly. They tasted and tempted, and just when she was on the verge of vertigo, Wade altered the rules, upped the ante.

His mouth trailed heat down her slender throat, over the worn, faded fabric of her purple T-shirt to the hard peak of her breast. Bronwynn grasped the limb above her head, arching toward Wade as she gasped for air. He drew her nipple into his mouth, sucking at her through the cotton, his tongue teasing the hard bud. A soft moan floated up out of her from the warm, tight ache swirling deep in her belly. Her eyes drifted shut as the mists of passion blurred her vision.

Wade wanted all of her. Now. A sudden, overpowering hunger for Bronwynn hit him broadside and knocked his capacity for logical thinking out of commission. Completely forgetting where they were, he tried to take a half step closer to her. The only toehold his sneaker found was air. In the automatic attempt to catch himself, his other foot slipped on the rough bark, and he half-fell, half-sat down on the branch. A soft red haze filled his head as his breath left him on a painful “ooof.” The old tree groaned a protest, but the thick branch held.

“Wade? Are you all right?” Bronwynn held on to the tree trunk and leaned down, trying to get a closer look at his face. His eyes were squeezed shut and he was baring his teeth.

“Aarrgh . . .” He let his head fall sideways against the tree. “I may never play the whoopy cushion again.”

“I can’t imagine you ever played it before.”

“Well, now I may never get the chance.”

Bronwynn heaved an impatient sigh. “In other words, all you got is a pain in your posterior.”

“And I thought that was your job,” Wade said dryly.

“Don’t take it out on me. You brought this on yourself. You’re the one who had to go and get smoochy in a tree.”

“Smoochy?” He arched a brow at her. “And who led the way up this tree? Never mind. You’ll find a way to make that my fault too.”

“It was,” she said as she watched him descend. His hand slipped on the next to the last branch, and, with a strangled cry, he dropped to the ground, landing on his feet, but instantly keeling over with a dramatic groan.

Bronwynn scrambled down after him, her heart in her throat. He looked hurt this time. Actually, he looked dead. Never taking her eyes off him, she missed getting her hand on the last branch and dropped out of the tree, landing on Wade.

“Oooofff!”

“Oh, Wade, thank God you’re not dead!”

“I’ll thank God when you get your elbow out of my solar plexus,” he said, his voice a gravelly growl. This wasn’t quite what he’d had in mind when he’d staged his dramatic dismount from the tree.

Bronwynn rearranged herself on top of him, brushing his hair out of his eyes. “You scared me.”

“Did I?” he asked softly, looking up into her earnest green and blue eyes. “I’m sorry.”

Framing her face with his hands, he brought her mouth down to his and kissed her deeply, gently, marveling at her texture and taste. She was so responsive, so giving. A shaft of anger stabbed him at the thought that some man had her sweetness and openness offered to him and had carelessly abused them.

“Is this a good place to get smoochy?” he asked with a chuckle.

Bronwynn’s lips hovered just above his, ready to lower the fraction of an inch necessary to make contact. She snuggled her body on top of him, feeling his lean, hard strength. His arousal was pressed between them, reminding her of everything masculine about him and everything feminine about herself. The thoughts warmed her from the inside out until she felt as pliant and soft as bread dough. “This is a wonderful place to get smoochy.”

Taking her mouth again, Wade rolled her beneath him on the cool, shaded grass. She cradled him between her legs, hips arching instinctively against his hardness. Instantly the kiss turned wild, almost rough, almost out of control. Wade raised his head, stunned by and trembling because of the force of the feelings she unleashed in him. He’d never felt so close to the edge, so close to losing his coolheaded command of the situation.

He looked down at her with something akin to wonder in his eyes. “Oh, Bronwynn, I want to take you to bed.”

Her breath caught in her throat. The pounding of her heart knocked it loose again. She stared up at Wade, trying to decipher the look of near-frustration on his face. “Is that a problem?”

“Yes,” he said, nipping at her chin. “I don’t think I can make it that far. I want you too much.”

Her smile was naturally seductive. Her hands kneaded at the tension in his shoulders. “Then let’s not wait.”

“You want to make love here?” he asked, his hands sneaking down to the hem of her T-shirt. “In the grass?”

“Why not?” She dragged his polo shirt up his back, her fingers taking time out to explore the smooth skin that had been uncovered just above the waistband of his jeans.

“Someone might see us.” He bit his lip at the wonderful sensation of her hands on his back.

Bronwynn’s respiration had become uneven. She didn’t notice. Her attention was focused solely on the man above her. “This is Vermont, Wade, there isn’t anybody around to see us.”

“You know,” he said with a devastatingly sexy smile, “I’m growing rather fond of Vermont.”

They managed to laugh and kiss and work each other’s shirts up at the same time. Impatiently Wade yanked his over his head and tossed it aside. He kneeled over Bronwynn and his hands stilled just below her breasts. The humor left his face.

“Is this too soon for you?” He had to ask while he still had a scrap of sanity left. If she said it was too soon, that she really wasn’t ready, he would get
up and walk away. He wouldn’t be happy about it,
but he would do it. He wouldn’t take advantage of her vulnerability.

Bronwynn looked up at him. Too soon? No. She had learned time should be measured by its quality not quantity. They had shared with each other, cared for each other. She felt closer to him than she ever had felt to Ross. But it was just like Wade to ask, to give her the chance to change her mind before she had any regrets. He might have had the exterior of a world-weary cynic, but he had the soul of Lancelot—honorable, compassionate, good. Reaching up to touch his cheek, she felt something in her heart give way and turn warm.

“No, it’s not too soon.” In fact the timing was just right, she thought as Wade discarded her T-shirt.

“I thought you were swearing off men for at least a year,” he said, his hands returning to cup her breasts.

Bronwynn thought she would faint. “I guess I was mistaken,” she murmured.

Kneeling, they tried to kiss and help each other out of jeans and underwear at the same time. They ended up on the grass, giggling, tangled hopelessly in each other’s pants. Once the clothing had been dispensed with, however, play turned quickly to passion.

Bronwynn gave without reserve, without inhibition. Her hands and mouth were eager in their pursuit of places Wade liked to be touched and teased. He was ticklish in the tender crease where thigh met hip. Closing her hand around his arousal caused him to tense every muscle in his body until he quivered like a bowstring. She dragged her tongue over his flat brown nipple and trembled in anticipation as she heard him groan.