Everything I Need Read online

  She looks at me. Green eyes even sadder. “I was worried about you,” she whispers.

  I sit my ass down next to her and blow out a breath. “Look, I’m sorry for how I left the other day—”

  Her left hand lifts between us, waving side to side. “I said it’s fine and I meant it. But I wanted you to know I was worried. You were fine, that smirk on your face, then it vanished right before you did.”

  I stay quiet because all I have to offer is my apology. But she doesn’t want to hear it. So I look away from her out into the empty lot before us. Letting the silence fester and grow between us. Letting my mind run wild with memories of my past. Of pigtails and blue eyes.

  Until Keelynn breaks the silence. Along with another piece of my already broken heart.

  “You said LeeLee reminded you of someone?” I swallow hard at the question then give a rough nod. My throat too thick to talk. More memories of Lila flashing through my mind.

  After a few beats I clear my mind before my throat. “She did. Déjà vu. It doesn’t excuse how I left, but that’s why.”

  She nods her understanding and thankfully doesn’t continue her line of questioning. As if she knows I’d fall off the deep end if she did.

  She’s probably right.

  “No family?” she asks carefully.

  With good fucking reason, because that one word has me breathing like a fucking bull. Family.

  “No,” I grunt. Hoping she gets the hint that the subject is fucking closed.

  “My grandparents raised me, but they died when I was in high school. My Grampy from a stroke and my Gramma of a broken heart.” Her normally cheerful and peppy disposition nowhere in sight, just like the rest of the night. “I wasn’t yet eighteen, so my older sister, Campbell, who’s four years older than me, left the out-of-state college she attended and gave up scholarship money to come back home. She enrolled in the local university so I didn’t have to be affected any more than I already was. I was sixteen.”

  It looks as if she’s in physical pain as she lifts a hand to her chest. Her eyes taking on a faraway look. I’m about to ask her if she’s all right when she clears her throat and continues on.

  “It was just the three of us then. Campbell, me, and…Trevor. He was my high school sweetheart. Got me through one of the most painful times of my life.” She swallows hard. Green eyes filling with tears. “I spent six years of my life with him. We grew up together. Made plans together. Lived good and loved even better.”

  Her pain-filled voice turns into a whisper. She takes a deep breath then turns to look into my eyes. I can see the anguish fill her eyes before a few tears fall down her cheeks. My hand itches to wipe the wetness from her face, but I keep still. Just taking her in. Wishing I could comfort her like she needs. Knowing exactly how she’s feeling. Because I feel it every day.

  “He would have been twenty-seven today.”

  I finally find my voice and ask, “Would have been?”

  A small sob passes her pink lips. But she fights her tears with a vengeance. Steeling her spine and keeping herself in check. “He died two years ago in a car accident. He was on his way home from work. Less than a mile from home when an eighteen-wheeler lost its brakes. The driver couldn’t stop and went right through the red light.” Her voice wobbles with agony but she fights to continue on. “Trevor never saw it coming and, thankfully, they say he passed quickly, painlessly.”

  Finally giving up the fight, Keelynn’s shoulders begin to shake with silent sobs of pain and loneliness. I know the feelings all too well. As if on instinct, I wrap an arm around her shoulders and pull her into my chest. One hand running a soothing trail down her arm. The other weaving into the hair at the back of her head and pulling her face into my chest. Letting her grieve and mourn and miss.

  Loss.

  Heartache.

  That’s what binds us. That’s what’s been calling me to her, besides the physical. We share the same devastation.

  Her tears seep through my shirt as her shoulders continue to shake. “Shh. It’s okay, Sunshine.” She seems to melt right there, as soon as the endearment passes my lips. I drop my lips to the top of her head, offering as much comfort as I can to this woman who has bulldozed her way into my life at a moment when I didn’t want it. But I desperately needed it, even though I didn’t know it.

  Moments later. Seconds, minutes, hours. I have no clue. Time seemed to suspend as I held her there on the cold ground under the streetlights in the dark. Her tears and our breathing the only noises to fill the quiet night.

  She lifts her head from my chest, but doesn’t move her body from mine. “I am so sorry about that. I didn’t mean to break down.” A hint of embarrassment lifts her voice.

  “You have nothing to be sorry for.” I cut her a look so she knows I’m serious.

  “Still. I must look a mess,” she replies as she frantically swipes at her cheeks and runs her fingers through her hair.

  I still her movements and stare deeply into pools of green. “You look beautiful, as always.”

  The air shifts around us.

  Then it happens.

  Her eyes crinkle. Her cheeks lift.

  Then her lips are stretching wide and the air is punched from my lungs.

  Her first smile of the night does not disappoint. I thought I missed it. I had no idea how much I truly did.

  Pink fills her cheeks as she ducks her head a touch. “Thanks,” she whispers.

  “I lost my dad when I was in college.” Her head snaps back up, her smile gone, when she hears my voice and the abrupt admission of my past. “It was quick and unexpected. Since it was just the two of us, it left me alone. No grandparents either. But college kept me busy.”

  She nods her head and a small smile is back, but it’s full of sympathetic understanding. “I’m sorry for your loss and that you had to go through that alone.”

  Her honest tone almost has me wanting to spill it all. Almost. But I don’t. I can’t. Three years isn’t long enough to heal the gaping wounds inflicted from that day. I don’t know if time will ever be enough.

  Her small, cool palm lands on my cheek before it’s gone and she’s moving in. Then her wet, warm lips are against my stubbled cheek. “Thank you, Merrick.” Her whispered words drift over my ear, causing goose bumps to rise under the sleeves of my shirt. “For helping me and for listening.” A blush stains her cheeks before she continues. “And for opening up to me.”

  I breathe deep, trying to stave off the growing emotion brewing through my chest. A curt nod is all I offer. But she gets it. Somehow she understands that’s all I can offer right now. Because she smiles a little wider before pressing those soft lips against my rough cheek once again.

  Silence descends around us again as minutes pass. Both of us sitting on the hard ground. Lost in our thoughts. Pondering our pasts. Thinking about all we’ve lost. She just doesn’t know how deep my loss really runs.

  She stands after a few silent moments, and I follow suit. My hand finding the small of her back while the other opens her driver’s side door.

  Turning, Keelynn looks up at me, causing our physical connection to sever. Until she lifts both palms to my chest, rubbing her hands up to my shoulders and back down again before taking a step back. Her hands falling away. The silence still surrounding us.

  I keep her caged in, one hand to the open door and the other leaning against the roof of her small sedan. My eyes taking her in as hers do the same to me. Our eyes conveying more than our words are ready to say.

  With one final small smile, she slides into her front seat. I shut the door behind her. She starts the engine, waves from behind the window, then drives away.

  I watch her taillights drift down the road before they disappear over the knoll. My head and my heart a clusterfuck of emotions. She laid out her hurts, her losses. Had me opening up about mine.

  I may not have been ready to move on, but it appears fate has a different plan.

  LONG BEFORE I WENT TO college th
en became an agent with the FBI, I was a small town kid from the Midwest. It was just me and my dad growing up, my mom left us when I was only a baby, deciding this wasn’t the life she wanted. I never felt the loss though, my late father more than making up for it. I always felt it was her loss anyway.

  My dad had owned his own contracting company for all of my life, right up until he passed of a sudden heart attack when I was a junior in college. At the time, losing him had been the hardest thing I’d ever gone through.

  He, of course, left the business to me, but even though I spent as many years as I can remember working for him, I had dreams of becoming an agent. And that’s what I did. He would have wanted me to follow my dreams as planned anyway.

  So when I came into town, and knew I’d be here for awhile, I put the skills I learned all those years to use and got myself a job with the local handyman, Jenson Michaels. He and his three brothers own Michaels Bros. Repairs.

  They hired me on the spot, and I’ve been working with them on small projects and call outs for the last couple of weeks. Just like the one they got this morning about a leak in a roof that I’m on my way to now.

  Pulling up to the small Cape Cod-styled home, I see the siding is a bit weathered, the shutters washed out, but besides that the home looks to be maintained well.

  I step out and slam the door, retrieving my toolbox from the bed of my truck.

  “Are you stalking me?”

  I hear from the front porch and my body freezes.

  Of course it has to be her.

  Looking up as I walk up the pathway, I see Keelynn standing there, big smile in place, arms folded across her chest. She’s wearing a navy blue summer dress that skims her knees. The Indian summer in full force as we near the beginning of October.

  “So, you’re a handyman, huh?” she asks as I make it up the stairs and stand in front of her. Her green eyes squinting in the bright morning sun.

  Lifting my toolbox, I reply, “Looks that way.”

  She remains quiet after that, just looking at me. Then she smiles. “Right then.” But she doesn’t move. She stays standing in the same spot, in the same position, with that same stunning smile gracing her gorgeous face.

  Fuck.

  I heave a deep breath, trying to compose my growing irritation. Not at the situation, but mainly at myself. “Since you called, you know I work for Michaels Bros. Now, do you want to show me to that leak you need repaired or should we just stand here all day?” My tone is harsher than I meant, but damn it, she’s unnerving. The way she just looks at me without speaking. The way she smiles. How she’s too damn beautiful for her own damn good.

  Knowing her past holds wounds and scars so deep, just like mine, that the loss is embedded in our hearts and souls, tethers us on a level I never knew existed.

  “Sure thing,” is her reply.

  Two words and she’s turning to the front door, and I’m fighting against looking down at her round ass in the blue dress.

  Fucking hell.

  Ever since the other night when he helped repair my tire, I’ve been able to think of nothing else but him. Three days have gone by. Each minute filled with thoughts wondering about him, worrying about him, thinking about him.

  Nothing—but—him.

  And the way he called me sunshine had me thinking I was going to implode right there on the spot. His deep voice rumbling that sweet endearment. Poof.

  Now here he is, and I’m as shocked as he is because I had no idea calling Michaels Bros. Repairs would result in this grumpy, beautiful piece of man meat coming to my house.

  He’s as grumpy and brooding as usual. Deep frown marring that gorgeous face of his. Almost as if the other night didn’t happen. That I didn’t break down right there in front of him. That he didn’t open up and offer a small piece of himself to me. And that he didn’t hold me in his perfectly defined arms, against his hard yet comforting chest, and protect me from the pains of my past.

  I can feel his dark eyes trailing down my back as I lead him into my house. A chill shivers its way down my spine at his attention.

  A white-hot blaze from his stone cold gaze.

  I hear the door click before his heavy booted footsteps follow. Making it into the kitchen, I spin around at the counter. He saunters through the room, walking by me where I lean against the counter, his strong, manly scent trailing him. My tummy flip-flops then takes a fierce nosedive when my eyes that were tracking him trail down to his firm ass and thighs encased in dark jeans.

  Swallowing forcefully, I take a deep breath then trail my eyes back up just as he turns around to face me. The clank of his toolbox hitting the granite the only sound besides my rapidly beating heart.

  Standing before me, Merrick wears a buttoned-up dark blue, white, and gray flannel. The top couple buttons undone to reveal golden skin and a light spattering of chest hair. The definition of his collarbone and tops of his chest muscles seemed to have been cut from stone.

  He has to be the best looking thing I have ever seen. With his olive skin tone, dark mussed hair, almost black eyes, full lips, and his lean, yet very muscular, tall body. He’s the perfect bad boy looking package. Complete with the hard glares and curt attitude.

  He’s tempting. Alluring. And gets my heart racing in ways I never knew it could.

  Snapping out of my Merrick-induced stupor I quickly get my wits about me, enough to point out the damage I called about.

  “When I came home last night, after the thunderstorm that rolled through, I walked in here and noticed this,” I say as I point to the ceiling and the wall that separates the kitchen from the living room. The leak and water damage very apparent. “I just hope it didn’t get through the drywall into the framing. I don’t want it to rot.”

  Surprise flickers behind his eyes. It appears he didn’t think I’d have any clue about this stuff. My Grampy made sure Campbell and I had a clue about everything. From cars to house repairs to paying bills and everything between. He was a good man with an even better heart.

  “You shouldn’t have to worry about rot since you called so quickly.” His response has me coming back from thoughts of the man that raised me.

  “That’s good,” I offer in reply while he gets to work inspecting the damage.

  He’s quiet as he works. Intently concentrating on the task at hand. His dark eyes assessing what will need to be repaired on the interior before stepping outside to assess the roof itself.

  I fidget in my spot where he left me in the kitchen. Contemplating going outside just to be near him again. To watch him work—even if it’s just him looking around on the roof I will never climb on top of since I’m scared of heights.

  I just barely refrain.

  When he comes back inside he makes his way back into the kitchen. Eyes still as intense as before. The piercing darkest brown sweeps over me quickly, but I don’t miss his slight reaction. The flaring of his nose and the clench of his jaw; muscles working hard in his cheeks.

  My heart starts thumping in overtime, then skips a beat when his body heat penetrates my personal space as he walks by me back to his toolbox.

  Completely unaware of his effect on me, he turns to me, where I stand next to the kitchen island. “Looks to me like the whole roof should have been replaced years ago.”

  “Yeah, well, that hasn’t really been my focus in the last couple of years due to circumstances. Like Between the Pages.”

  And the fact that I lost my high school sweetheart. I don’t say it, but I know he gets it.

  He just can’t help himself and has to interject his own two cents anyway. “Well it should have been.”

  “Noted.” My dismissive and quick reply has him pursing his lips in disapproval.

  “But…” He draws out the word before continuing. “You’d be fine to have this one section patched up. I think a few new shingles outside will have you as good as new—for now.” He makes sure to eye me to convey his meaning. “And the inside just needs to be patched with a new panel of shee
trock and a new lick of paint then you’ll be good as new.”

  “All right then. I’ll make sure to put a call into Jenson to set something up.”

  “Probably a good idea,” he grunts.

  I’m dying for the man of a few days ago to come back. To take the place of this grunting and grumpy Merrick. Now that I’ve seen another side of him, I’m craving it.

  Needing it, really.

  Silence surrounds us now, as it often does.

  My eyes on him. His eyes on me.

  His chest heaving. My heart beating.

  Neither of us daring to speak, not wanting to break the connection firing off around us.

  His almost black eyes stare intently into mine. Searching for something while mine beg him for the kiss I’ve been longing for since he walked through the door.

  As if he can read my mind, he suddenly pins me against the counter at my back and takes my mouth in a searing kiss.

  His full lips are thick and soft. His tongue wet and perfect. His kiss all-consuming and utterly delicious.

  I moan against the invasion. While pushing as close to his body as I can. Feeling every inch of hard, packed muscle against my soft, plush curves.

  We step back on a gasp. His hands on my butt and mine fisting his now open flannel. I have no clue when that happened, I was so lost in his lips and tongue and mouth.

  That kiss.

  He takes a couple steps back and away from me.

  I use the distance as a reprieve. Taking deep breaths. Trying to get myself under control.

  He’s wild and untamed as he stands there in front of me. Lust prickles my skin at his dark look full of hunger and want. Unbridled passion lights fire in his eyes.

  His bare chest, with a light spattering of chest hair that’s made visible from his opened flannel shirt, glistens with sweat and need. Beckoning me.

  Stepping toward him, I get on tiptoes to run my hands up his heaving chest, across his pecs, then over his shoulders. His skin is hot to the touch and so soft pulled tight over strong muscle.

  Sliding my hands beneath the material, I slide the shirt from his body. Baring the complete, wide expanse of his chest. And what a sight it is.