Nobody But You (26 page)

“Don't tell anyone.”

She found a laugh and disconnected, and when she did, her laughter stuck in her throat and switched to tears. Dammit. Dammit, she still couldn't find her happy. Because her happy was leaving with Jacob, like one of those duffel bags over his shoulder.

She turned back to the grilled cheese and gasped at the black smoke billowing out from beneath the pan. And in the next second, the sandwich burst into flames. It caught the kitchen towel next to the pan, and that also burst into flames.

“Oh, my God!” She whirled, mind blank. She ran to the sink, but only a trickle of water came out.

By this time, the fire had spread to the window shades. She raced over to the table and ducked down, reaching for the fire extinguisher that she always bumped her legs on.

It was heavy and she'd never used one before, which made her mad. She always hated the stupid chick, the one who in the movies didn't know how to save herself.
Don't be the stupid chick!
She yanked harder. “Come on, you motherfu—”

It broke free with enough momentum to take her down to her butt. She scrambled back up and wasted another precious few seconds trying to figure out how to use the extinguisher. All while the flames grew around her. Finally she pulled the pin and squeezed the lever.

And nothing happened.

J
acob tossed Hud his truck keys. “She's all yours for now.”

Hud looked down at them, swore, and then tossed them back.

“That's the second damn time today my keys have been rejected,” Jacob noted far more casually than he felt.

“Maybe because the people doing the rejecting don't want you to leave,” Hud said.

Jacob shook his head. He was having a hard time controlling his emotions here. Very hard. He was on a short leash and needed to get the hell out before he broke.

The two of them were standing in his driveway, next to Jacob's truck. The cabin was locked up, and he was packed and ready to go. Hud had shown up and he'd immediately gone straight to pissed off without passing go, and had spent the past five minutes telling—
yelling
—about what a bad idea it was for Jacob to leave early.

“I was always going to have to go,” Jacob managed to say evenly.

“But you moved it up.”

Not by much, but yeah, he had. The fight with Sophie had reminded him that he wasn't fit for society. He screwed things up and was clueless on how to make them better, so leaving felt like the obvious solution.

Hud was watching him. “Some of us aren't ready.”

“Was I supposed to know that?” Jacob blew out a breath. “You've spoken more to me in the past five minutes than in the whole time I've been here.”

“Ditto.”

They stared at each other for an interminably long beat, and finally Jacob closed his eyes. “You're making this harder than it has to be. We've done this before.”

“Say good-bye? Fuck no, we haven't,” Hud said. “You left without a good-bye last time, remember?”

“How can I forget? You keep throwing it in my face.”

This time it was Hud's turn to close his eyes. “Fine. That was a shitty thing to say, and I take it back. But you're evading. Why leave before you have to?”

“That's…complicated.”

“You fucked up with Sophie when she came to apologize,” Hud said.

“I fucked up with more than Sophie.”

Hud looked at him, long and hard. “If you're talking about me,” he said, “or the others, you're wrong. You didn't fuck up at all. You came home. That was all we ever wanted.”

The words took a surprising load off Jacob's shoulders.

“At least look me in the eyes and tell me you're coming back,” Hud said.

Jacob turned his head to meet Hud's gaze and saw the smoke and flames licking out from Sophie's boat. His heart about stopped. Dropping the duffel bags, he hit the beach at a dead run. “Call nine-one-one!” he yelled back at Hud.

“On it,” Hud said right on his heels.

They hit the dock in tandem. At the boat, Hud tried to pull Jacob back from jumping on board. “It's not safe!” he yelled.

“Sophie's in there!” Jacob leapt to the deck, calling out for her.

Someone landed right next to him.

Hud.

“What the hell are you doing?” Jacob yelled at him.

Hud was tugging up the vinyl seating, and Jacob knew why. He was looking for the fire extinguisher that was hopefully on board.

“Sophie!” Jacob yelled, turning to go belowdecks. The door was open, and black smoke was pouring out.
“Sophie!”

“Here!”

She appeared in the opening holding a fire extinguisher. Hud immediately took it from her while Jacob pulled her up and off the boat to the dock.

“Are you okay?” he demanded, running his hands over her, looking for injuries. It was hard to tell. She was sooty from head to toe.

“I'm”—she stopped to cough—“fine.”

He didn't stop touching her, couldn't.

“Jacob.” She cupped his face and brought it to hers. “I'm fine. I just couldn't get the extinguisher to start and the flames were quicker than me.”

Still holding on to her, he turned to see that Hud had abandoned the extinguisher as well and had jumped lithely to the dock beside them. He immediately turned to Sophie and looked her over as Jacob had.

Sirens sounded in the distance, and in the next minute, the fire service had arrived, along with a sea of other first responders, including Aidan.

Twenty minutes later, Sophie was sitting in the back of the ambulance, an emergency blanket wrapped around her shoulders, being looked over by a paramedic. Jacob stood hovering, especially when Lucas drove up, ran to the shore, and stared at the shell of his boat, hands in his hair. Then he turned to Sophie.

She grimaced. “I'm sorry—”

“You okay?” Lucas asked.

“Yes, but the boat isn't.”

“I know.” Lucas let out a long breath. “It might be karma.”

She stared at him. “You really believe that?”

“I'm working on it.” He started to walk off, then hesitated. Glanced at Jacob and then back at Sophie. “You need anything?” he asked her.

She shook her head.

He nodded, looking more than a little relieved. “Take care of yourself.” And then he was gone.

Hud came up next to Jacob and pulled him aside. “How is she?”

Jacob shook his head. “They were worried about shock, but she's doing well, considering what could have happened. A small burn on her arm, that's it.”

Hud let out a breath of relief and nodded. “They caught the flames pretty fast, but there's also massive soot, smoke, and water damage. Probably not salvageable.”

Jacob nodded. He'd known this. What he didn't know was how Sophie was going to feel about it. “You tried to hold me back from jumping on board,” he said.

“Yeah.”

“And yet you followed me,” Jacob said.

“Yeah, and if you're about to ask why, you're going to piss me off,” his twin said. “Don't you get it yet? Where you go, stupid or not, I go. And vice versa. I'll beat that into you if I have to. We do the right thing by each other, always—you got that yet?”

“Yeah, I got it.” Jacob paused. “Do you really not remember our handshake?” he asked, referring to the day he'd run into his brother and Hud had acted like he'd never seen it before.

Hud blew out a sigh. “You're not the only one who can be an ass. We do share DNA.”

Jacob nodded. How well he knew that. “You know I'm sorry, right? For leaving without a word. For not keeping in contact. For coming back without a word. For everything.”

“I know.” Hud paused. “Me too.”

“Yeah? What are you sorry for?”

Hud heaved out a sigh. “For letting you walk. For holding a grudge. For using being mad at you as an excuse to not take any blame on myself.”

“I hated being without you,” Jacob admitted.

“Me too,” Hud said. “It sucked.” He didn't look particularly happy at this admission. “We don't have to keep talking about our feelings, do we?”

“Hell no,” Jacob said. “I'm good now. You?”

Instead of answering, Hud held out his hand, fisted.

Throat suddenly tight, Jacob bumped it with his, and then they went through their age-old complicated handshake by rote, his body still having the muscle memory to do it without thinking.

And then they hugged.

Hud squeezed him hard. “You fucking come back this time, and I mean
right
back—you hear me?”

“I will.” He turned and sought out a view of Sophie.

Hud's gaze followed. “What are you going to do there?” his twin asked.

Jacob didn't take his eyes off of her. “The right thing.”

S
ophie felt Jacob long before she saw him. As always, that sense of awareness came in the form of a tingle at the back of her neck. She lifted her head, and her gaze locked on to his.

She was still sitting at the back of the ambulance wrapped in a blanket when he crouched at her side and put a steadying hand on her thigh.

“Hey,” he said quietly, eyes warm. “How are you holding up?”

“Great.” Even if she had to bite her lower lip and look away or lose it, because the look in his eyes said he was there for her.

But he wasn't.

He'd made that clear.

And damn. Damn if that didn't have a tear sliding down her cheek. She swiped at it angrily and stopped breathing so she wouldn't break into sobs.

But Jacob didn't back up. Instead he shook his head at her and gently ran a thumb beneath her eye. “I'm going to ask you again,” he said. “How are you holding up?”

She sucked in a breath. “You mean other than the boat is essentially gone and so are all of my things and—” She broke off before she could say the rest.
And you're no longer mine…

“You'll get insurance money and find a place you love. It's a new start.”

She stared at him, resentful. “Since when do you see the glass half full?”

“Since you taught me to.” Without warning, he rose and scooped her up with him.

She gasped. “What are you doing? I can walk!”

Ignoring her, he turned to the paramedic. “She's all good, yeah?”

“All good,” the paramedic said with a thumbs-up.

With a nod, Jacob turned and strode up the deck and toward his cabin, where some of the best memories of her life had taken place. “Jacob, put me down.”

He did. On his bed. He set the keys to the cabin on the nightstand. Then he sat on the edge of the bed, a hand on either side of her hips as he leaned over her. His shoulders eclipsed the sight of the room behind him, leaving nothing to look at but him. Dark jaw set. Dark eyes serious. “I have to go,” he said quietly.

Huh. Turned out her heart could break in two over and over again. She looked away. Or tried. But his broad shoulders took up all of her view. Stupid broad shoulders. “So you've said,” she managed.

He brought her face back to his. “I have to, Soph,” he repeated.

“There's nothing wrong with my hearing.”

“It's not that I want to go,” he said.

“You're the one who made the call.”

“I signed up for this. It's my job and my duty, and I'll finish it. I want to finish it.” He pulled her to him. “And then I'm coming back.”

Her gaze flew to his as she tried to pull back, but he just held on to her. With those big, warm, strong arms around her, it took her a moment to speak calmly, but even then she shoved her face into his throat first so as not have to look at him. “I'm sure that will make your family very happy,” she whispered.

With a rough sound of…regret?…he slid his fingers into her hair and pulled just enough that she had no choice but to look at him again. “My family's not the only reason I want to come back,” he said.

“What else is there?” she managed.

For a long beat he said nothing, and she thought that was it, the end of the conversation.

But then he spoke, his voice lowered to the tone that always reminded her of when he was lusciously deep inside her, whispering naughty nothings in her ear.

“Thirty seconds,” he said.

She blinked. “What?”

“I saw the flames on the boat and knew you were in there. It took thirty of the longest seconds of my life to run from my driveway down the dock to the boat and find you alive and kicking.”

Her breath caught, but she wasn't sure what to say to that, so she tried something new and kept her mouth shut.

“I keep getting these pictures of you in my head,” he said. “You lying in my bed, your hair a wild disaster all around your face.”

“Hey.”

He smiled. “I love the way it smells—”

“It smells like smoke.”

“Shh. I love how it clings to my stubble.”

She liked where this was going, but she kept still just in case she was wrong. Because it wouldn't be the first time.

“And when you're truly pissed off,” he said, “it gleams like fire. Just like you.” He pressed his face into her hair and squeezed her hard. “Christ, Soph, you scared ten years off my life today.”

“I didn't mean to.”

“I know.” He touched his forehead to hers. “I was wrong about some things.”

She didn't move. Hell, she didn't even breathe. “Were you?”

He smiled a little, not daunted in the least at her frosty tone. “A lot of things, actually. All of it regarding you and my ability to resist falling for you, and falling hard, Soph. You're always on my mind.”

How was she supposed to hold on to her anger at a guy who wasn't scared off by her mercurial moods or her temperament, a man could see through all of her BS and still love her? “Keep talking,” she said.

“I think about your eyes,” he told her. “How that deep green cuts right through me, past my armor, straight to the meat of things.”

“And by armor, you mean your stubborn obstinacy?”

He smiled, not insulted. “You see me,” he said simply, banishing the last of her resistance.

“What else?” she whispered, soft and warm now, no longer braced for rejection.

“I love how your pulse quickens when I touch you. You tremble for more and your lips part, begging for my kiss…” He leaned in, and she stopped him with a hand to his chest.

“You sure this isn't a sex dream?” she asked.

He flashed that grin she loved. “Sometimes. Lots of times,” he admitted. His fingers were loosely fisted in her hair, like he'd really missed the craziness of it. “Other times it's your laugh. And the way you have of disagreeing with everything I say—”

“I do not!”

He laughed and kissed her pouty mouth. “Okay,” he said. “But you do.” He touched her face, his own going serious. “When I first came back to Cedar Ridge, I didn't think I deserved to be loved by any of my family. By anyone,” he said. “And I sure as hell didn't deserve you. But I realized I was wrong, that I was my own worst enemy.”

She was impressed by his growth, and proud. And…envious. “When did you figure all this out?” she asked. “Was it a hammer-over-the-head moment, or was it more gradual?” She genuinely needed to know. Her entire life had been a whole bunch of clusterfuck moments until it'd all sunk in. She needed to know how it was for him. She didn't want this to be just about the boat fire, about him nearly losing her, because she didn't see it like that. Yes, the fire had been awful, and she'd be dealing with the ramifications for a long time to come, but she hadn't almost died. She would have gotten out on her own. So she didn't want him back in her arms because of a single incident. She wanted him because he couldn't live without her.

“No hammer,” he said. “Just a series of gradual moments, starting that first day when you dropped a pink vibrator at my feet.”

She narrowed her eyes. “That wasn't
my
vibrator!”

He laughed, and she knew it was because she was arguing with him again. “And,” he went on, “I really liked it when you tried to tell me why your boat should be allowed to break the rules and moor overnight on the lake.”

“It's a stupid rule!”

He was still smiling, a contagious, warm, sexy smile. “And then there was when you got trashed by the Scotch—”

“Okay, that wasn't drunk,” she said. “That was…cozily tipsy.”

“And watching you make friends with Kenna. Or when you gave Chris's name to Hud to get him here for this weekend. It was when you told me about your past and let me in. All those things added up to me loving you,” he said. “I just couldn't imagine deserving you to love me back.”

She felt her smile fade, and she reached up and set her hands on his jaw. “Jacob,” she murmured, her heart breaking. “Jacob, I—”

He set a finger on her mouth, halting her words. “But then I realized something,” he whispered as he slowly traced her lower lip. “I couldn't expect you to return my feelings if I couldn't let you in.” He dropped his finger and replaced it with his mouth.

“You ruined me with all the openness,” she murmured against his lips. “The communication.”

He grinned. “I ruined you in all sorts of other ways too. And you liked them, every single one of them.”

She flushed and gave him a little push that didn't so much as budge him. “Full of yourself much?”

“Just optimistic.”

“How unlike you,” she said.

His grin widened, and his hold on her tightened. “I learned it from this amazing, headstrong, selfless, sexy-as-all-get-out woman I've been hanging out with lately…”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

She was laughing as she shook her head and pulled his down to hers. “Smug bastard,” she said, and kissed him.

“Does that mean you can't live without me?”

“It means that
you
can't live without
me
,” she corrected.

He let out a low laugh. “Oh, baby, don't I know it.” He cupped her face. “I love you, Soph. The forever kind of love that survives stupid fights and transcends time and place.”

Her heart kicked hard, racing, pounding in all her pulse points. “Are you asking me to wait for you?”

“Yes,” he said without hesitation.

She'd asked the question, so it was silly to suddenly need a moment, but she did. She pulled at his shirt, trying to get it over his head, but he caught her wrists in his.

“I want you to stay,” he said. “Here. In the cabin.” His eyes were fierce, his body hard. He wasn't playing.

Leaning in, she kissed his stern mouth. “I don't really know how to do this, Jacob. Just because it's hard for me to speak my feelings doesn't mean I don't feel them. Because I do. I love you.”

His eyes softened, but nothing else did. “And…?”

“And I know you have to go, but I want my good-bye.”

His gaze held hers, revealing the heat, her need. “Babe, I'm on borrowed time here,” he said regretfully.

“Then you should hurry.”

He groaned and kissed her, but it wasn't the hard, heated kiss she'd expected. It was slow, leisurely, like they had all the time in the world.

And only when she'd forgotten herself and the fact that he was indeed leaving, only when she could think of nothing but the sensual desire sliding through her belly, did he lower her to his bed and strip her piece by agonizing piece, his fingers skimming over her as he did, slow, reverent. Loving. He removed her panties last, slowly pulling them over her hips and down her legs like he had all the time in the world.

Like her pleasure was of the utmost importance to him.

Still bent over her, he looked up into her face as he brushed a kiss over her breast. And then just below her belly button.

She quivered. The things he could do to her with one look, one kiss…

Rearing up, she got to her knees and shoved his shirt up and over his head. And though she'd seen him shirtless many times, her mouth still went dry as she watched each beautifully defined muscle ripple as he pulled off the shirt.

She splayed her hands over his heart, feeling the comforting steady pound of it beneath her palms. Smiling, she slid her hands down to his ripped abs and leaned in to stroke her tongue over one of his nipples. His stomach. And southward bound—

The breath rushed out of his lungs as he toppled her to the mattress.

“Back to being in a hurry?” Sophie asked.

“You make me lose control,” he said and made her laugh breathlessly.

But then he slid inside her, filling her as only he could, making it impossible to do anything but cry out his name and wrap her arms and legs around him, desperate, hungry. Unlike him, she had no control, none at all and as he moved inside her, hungry sounds ripped from her throat, needy and desperate, and she didn't care. “Jacob.”

His muscles bunched and released under her hands as he took the both of them right to the very edge, leaving her so close that her lungs burned for air.
“Jacob.”

He pushed up on his arms, his hands braced on either side of her head to hold his weight, and she moaned at the sight of the carved muscles of his chest, shoulders and arms straining as he took her even deeper, harder, and then sent her skittering into a hard climax before following her over.

When she could breathe again, when she could open her eyes and focus, she found him propped up on an elbow at her side, watching her with an intensity that took her breath.

“I need this with you, Soph,” he said. “But more that, I need
you
. You make me laugh. You keep me in the moment and yet you also make me believe in a future. I want you to know all this before I go because life's short. Way too short to let go of something you know you want to keep forever.”

Her heart caught. “Forever?”

“Say you'll think about it,” he said. “Think about moving in here, at least until you can replace your things, until you figure out where your home is.”

“And if I figure out that my home is you?” she asked in a low whisper.

“Then that's the first thing I want you to tell me when I get back.”

She smiled. He had a way of making clear what he wanted, what he hoped for, without pressuring her for more than she could handle. “Kiss me good-bye,” she demanded. “Kiss me so I won't forget.”

He hauled her to him and held her tight before burying his hands in her hair and kissing her until they were both shaky and more than a little desperate.

She clutched at him and managed to ask, “How much longer do we have?”

He looked at the bedside clock. “An hour at most.”