Authors: Jen Doyle
Chapter Seven
What. The.
Fuck
had just happened?
Nate’s heart was racing so fast he was practically sweating. It made no sense. She wasn’t his type. Blondes and redheads were definitely more up his alley. And she was short. At six foot three, he tended to date women who were on the taller side. He was a professional catcher, for Christ’s sake. He spent hours out of every day crouching; the last thing he wanted to do when he came home to a woman was bend down.
Dorie was around five foot five, five foot six and she didn’t seem the type to wear Jimmy Choo shoes, yet he found himself thinking that he couldn’t care less. All he really wanted to do was lift her up, wrap her legs around him and then bury his head right there at the curve of her neck until she begged him to—
“Can I be doing something right now?”
Her voice startled him enough that he almost dropped the skillet he’d just lifted to drain.
“Uh, no,” he answered quickly, just to be safe.
He wanted to kiss her. To thrust his hands in her hair and pull her up against him and take it directly from there. But rattling around in the dark recesses of his brain was the notion that going down that road right now would be a mistake of the highest order. And, for reasons he couldn’t even begin to name, that scared him. The only thing he
did
know at the moment, in fact, was that in the past twenty-four hours he’d barely thought at all about the accident or anything that came after it. The contracts teetering on the edge of disaster, the questions about his knee, the whole damn Breathalyzer thing...
None of it.
Instead, his mind kept drifting back to her. To
here
. To this apartment and the fact that it seemed to be the one place in the entire world where the past six weeks were history. Where, in fact, he couldn’t stop smiling.
Hell.
“Almost done.” He threw in some seasoning and then turned the gas down to low. “It just needs to simmer for a few minutes, then we should be good to go.”
Although she frowned, her eyes sparkled with amusement. “Except for the part where it has to be in the oven for an hour.”
He made his shrug as casual as was humanly possible. “There is that.”
Leaning back against the counter, she folded her arms across her chest. The look in her eyes was, it seemed, utter and innocent bewilderment. “So what exactly were you planning to do to pass the time?”
Fuck her into oblivion would have been his honest-to-God answer up until about three minutes ago. He almost laughed when the words,
Get to know you
, nearly came out of his mouth instead.
With some nerves of his own—which was ridiculous; he didn’t get nervous—he reached for his beer, actively fighting the urge to down the entire thing. “Tell me how you came to have some of Aunt Laura’s casserole in the first place.”
A sad smile came to Dorie’s face as she looked away. “She thinks I’m lonely. And like any self-respecting grandmotherly type, she wants to feed me to make me feel better.”
“Are you lonely?” he asked without thinking. Whispering almost.
She looked up quickly, clearly not expecting that to be his response. Or maybe just not expecting the intensity of it. Hell, neither had he.
She gave a self-conscious laugh, but her shrug was answer enough.
He wanted to touch her again. To take her in his arms and kiss her—tell her she’d never be lonely again.
Then she shook it off and gave a huge smile. “Between the brothers and the wives-slash-girlfriends and my parents, etcetera, etcetera....” She rolled her eyes. “If it means I get to live my life and not get any grief for a little while? I’m good. Besides, I like hanging out with Mr. and Mrs. Grimes. They’re totally my speed.”
“Mine, too.” He tipped his bottle toward her in a mock toast. “I’ll be spending all day tomorrow hanging out with them in the library. Come find me there to see for yourself.”
She froze, beer halfway to her mouth. “Wha...?”
So, okay. A little bit more of a reaction than he’d expected, but whatever. He shrugged. “There’s a new librarian in town, I guess. And a lot of heavy lifting. She, uh... Dorie?”
Her gaze was focused somewhere over his shoulder and it was pretty clear she hadn’t heard a word he’d just said. Then she met his gaze. “You’re coming to my library tomorrow?” she said, partly curious, and partly, well...partly horrified. Except then she gave another one of those little laughs from the back of her throat and said, “Of course you are.”
No way. “
You’re
the librarian?” That was unexpected. Not unwelcome by any means—just...intriguing.
He turned back to the stove and went about getting the chili finished so it could go into the casserole dish, cheese and all. It was easier to talk when he wasn’t looking at her. “Then who’s Lucinda?” He was pretty sure that was the librarian’s name.
“Right,” Dorie muttered, almost to herself. “Your aunt seems to have an issue with names. I keep telling her I go by Dorie, but it doesn’t seem to stick.”
“Tell me about it,” Nate answered, laughing. “She’s only ever called me Nathan. Even my mom rarely calls me that.” So caught up in what he was doing, it wasn’t until Dorie replied that Nate realized what he’d just done.
“Nathan, huh?” The smile in her voice sent ice up through his veins. “Not D.B.?”
Shit.
Shit.
He truly hadn’t meant to deceive her. He’d just been so grateful she hadn’t recognized him—and, okay, yes, completely turned on—that he’d wanted that moment for himself. To not be someone whose face had been plastered on the news for the past two months. Not be the rich and spoiled athlete some people still insisted on believing had been driving drunk—and definitely not be the guy Courtney had cheated on.
Was D.B. the best choice? Hell, no. It had just come out. But he was pretty sure that if he’d been honest about who he was, the night would have turned out a whole lot differently.
“D.B. is a nickname,” he mumbled, concentrating really hard on putting the finishing touches on the casserole so he could put it in the oven.
“Maybe I could call you Nathan instead?” she asked, still smiling from behind him.
“Or Nate,” he said, dreading the look of recognition that was sure to come into her eyes and yet partly wanting that very thing. “Most people call me Nate.”
He finally turned around, straightened his shoulders and looked at her. She was standing there within arm’s reach. He could feel the heat coming off her skin.
“Okay,” she said, looking up at him from underneath those long, dark lashes. The smile finally reached her eyes. “Nate.”
It was like a bomb went off in Nate’s head. Chest.
Heart.
Whatever. Nothing had ever struck him the way it did when Dorie looked at him and truly smiled.
He snatched up his beer. Wanting to get to know a woman was a new thing for him. He needed something for his hands to do that wasn’t trailing up and down her skin.
“So, Dorie-not-Lucinda,” he finally said. “Any other names I should know about?”
She smiled again, and this time he managed to keep his reaction a little more subdued.
“My brothers all call me Luce,” she said, “which can be incredibly annoying...”
“Hey, what’s wrong with Luce? I like that.”
“Because I
asked
them to call me Dorie,” she said, all little-sister attitude.
Hell, he liked that, too. He grinned as she continued, “It’s short for Dorinda, my—well, one of—my middle names.”
“One of? You have more than one middle name?”
She nodded. “Five.”
“Five? You have five middle names?”
“Well...”
“You know I have to ask...” he added when she didn’t elaborate.
Rolling her eyes, she said, “Lucinda Dorinda Yaz Yaz Tommy Sue Donelli.”
Beer halfway to his mouth, he paused. “Yaz-Yaz? That counts as two?”
“Well, it’s Yaz once, then Yaz again.”
He laughed. “Is that a family name?”
She hiked herself up to the counter. “Yaz, as in Carl Yastrzemski.”
Ouch
.
“You’re a Red Sox fan?” For the first time in his life he cared more about whether or not she actually watched baseball—hoping for the
not
right now—than he did about who she rooted for.
“Well, duh,” she answered. “From Boston. Hello.” She gave a cute little frown. “Shay, my brother, was five when I was born, and he loved Yaz, so that’s the name he picked. And since Colin didn’t have a thought of his own until he was, like, fourteen, he just picked Yaz, too.”
“Wait,” Nate said, holding his hand up. “They picked your names?”
“I know, right?” she said. “When my mom went into labor my dad couldn’t get anyone to take care of my brothers so he had to bring them all to the hospital until my grandparents could come pick them up. He bribed them into behaving by promising them they could name me. It didn’t occur to him that they’d all want to pick a name of their own.”
For as exasperated as she seemed with her brothers—with the story itself—the love and affection that came through her voice as she spoke was almost overwhelming. It pulled a smile out of him even though that earned him another frown. “So, Yaz Yaz,” he said, holding back his laugh. “And the rest?”
Her glare diminishing only slightly, she answered, “Sean—he was nine and thought Lucinda sounded like a princess, so he decided on that. Jack decided that since Dorinda rhymed with Lucinda, that must be a princess, too. You know the Yaz Yaz part. Tommy was three when I was born, so the only name that came to mind when they asked was his own.”
“That’s five,” he said, catching the surprise as she looked up at him. “Sean, Jack, Shay, Colin, and Tommy.” Her eyes widened even further. Hell, yes, he was paying attention. “Who’s number six?”
“Christopher. He wasn’t really talking yet. He babbled something and they decided it was ‘Sue.’”
Nate did some quick math. “So seven kids in nine years?” He refused to acknowledge that he kind of liked the sound of that.
“Go ahead, you can say it,” Dorie said, rolling her eyes in a way that made it clear she’d had this conversation a million times. “That’s way too many kids. Overpopulation and all that,” she mumbled, peeling the label off her beer bottle. “Or you could say something about the Catholic thing. The Irish-Italian one. Or maybe even that they could have just gone for two more and gotten a baseball team out of it.”
Her voice trailed off, which made him realize that he was staring at her again. That he was thinking about how different she was from Courtney—from any woman he’d ever known.
And it scared the ever-living shit out of him.
“I, uh...” He ran his hand through his hair. “I need to...”
Go
, he was going to say. Except he couldn’t force that final word out when she hopped to the floor, almost looking relieved, as she no doubt knew exactly what he’d been about to say. That was his moment. Where he should have grabbed his coat and gone. But his feet were rooted to the floor.
And he was so fucking glad that she didn’t push him toward the door. Instead she wrapped her arms around herself and looked down at the floor. “So.” She kind of shrugged. “I don’t suppose you’d be up for some GTA?”
It was so unexpected a segue that it threw him for a minute. “Grand Theft Auto?”
She got that prickly look, which amused him to no end, even—or maybe especially—when she said, “And by GTA, I mean GTA. All clothes are staying on.”
From the way she then immediately clamped her mouth shut, it was clear she was feeling the same push and pull he was. To his complete surprise, it made him laugh. “You’re on.”
She kicked his ass and made no bones about enjoying every minute of it.
Granted he was distracted. Not because of the way she looked, although he couldn’t deny his attraction. It was more the determination painted all over her face as she went all in. The glint in her eye when she made a move, the enthusiasm and joy as she leaped to her feet, lording it over him when she won.
By the time dinner was over and dishes were cleaned up and put away, he realized it wasn’t just that he’d made a terrible mistake—he’d made a fatal one. It wasn’t the part about him wanting so badly to get a woman out of her clothes—it was how much he wanted to be there when she got back into them.
Chapter Eight
For the second night in a row, Dorie didn’t sleep; and for the second morning in a row, she found herself sitting in her office, staring out at the street. Unlike the night before, she’d gotten past the part about whether it had all been real. Obviously it was. The problem now was that she had no idea what to do about it. She’d spent a whole lifetime building the fantasy of him up into the ideal man—what on earth was she supposed to do with the true-to-life one?
And now even her potential-one-night stand idea had become complicated. She was almost afraid to admit how much she liked him—definitely more than most of the guys she’d slept with, and that was even without the Nate Hawkins factor. In fact, she’d almost blurted out that she did know exactly who he was so that they could just get on with it.
Yes, she was resolved to do that very thing, especially since they could then acknowledge his pre-Courtney reputation for one-and-done hookups, actually do the hooking up, and then both move on. He was clearly here to lick his wounds before heading back to Chicago where he’d either go back to his old ways or be on the search for his next Courtney, so it should work out fine.
Right.
But even if he never spoke to her again, she’d deal. That she’d had the chance to hang out with him at all was a dream come true. And if against all odds he did speak to her after she’d come clean, well, she didn’t plan on doing much speaking. In fact, she would happily provide any necessary licking services whenever and wherever required.
Shaking off the completely useless tingly feeling that thought brought about, she glanced at the clock. Mrs. Grimes had said that her nephew—no name mentioned—would be here by ten, which was an hour away. And Dorie had a whole lot of things to get done: on top of the normal erasing-ten-years’-worth-of-neglect to-dos, last week’s blizzard had taken out two windows in the main reading room. The resulting four-foot snowdrift had taken out most of
Fiction
,
Do—H
and had broken Dorie’s heart. Right up until she realized what an incredible opportunity it was. She got to buy books—hundreds of them. And new furniture. New carpeting. They just had to determine what could be salvaged first.
It was half an hour later when she heard the door chimes she’d installed the previous afternoon. She’d managed to wedge herself into the area of the room with the most damage and was balanced on the bottom shelf of a bookcase that had fallen against the wall.
“Back here!” she called out loudly enough for Mrs. Grimes to hear her from the circulation area out in front. “Could you make up a few more boxes for me?”
“My pleasure,” answered someone who was very obviously
not
Mrs. Grimes. “How many do you need?”
Dorie spun around at the sound of Nate’s voice. Given how precarious everything was in the first place, that meant she very ungracefully kept going, losing her balance in the process and falling face-first into the pile of books on the floor. As if that wasn’t bad enough in itself, she was pretty sure the view he had was a direct one of her ass pointing up in the air.
Sure enough, he chuckled and said, “Can’t say I mind seeing you like that.” As he got closer, though, his voice turned to concern. “Dorie,
Jesus
—are you trying to get hurt?”
It wasn’t until he was pushing himself between her and the now-dangerously wobbly bookcase so that she could get herself out from underneath it that she realized she’d gotten herself in a little bit over her head. She made her way around the piles of books on the floor and then watched as he carefully repositioned the bookcase against the wall. “It wasn’t
that
bad.” At least it hadn’t seemed to be when she’d gotten herself started.
He wasn’t listening, though. Instead he was looking around the room. “Did it maybe occur to you that you shouldn’t be dealing with this alone?”
“I’m sorry,” Dorie snapped. “I could have sworn I left my brothers back home.” The room looked much worse than it actually was. With the exception of this back area, actually, everything was organized and packed away. But the toppled shelves were pretty bad. And the stacks of still-soggy books were definitely taking on an unpleasant smell. Still... “I can manage the cleanup from a snowstorm.”
“Did a tree come through?” he asked, walking past her to the so-spanking-new window it still had stickers on it.
It gave her the chance to look at him, here in the light. It was hard not to. She knew his stats—hopefully she’d never have to admit that she hadn’t needed to look them up. But although the numbers told how long and lean he was, they didn’t do that body justice. Actually, she wasn’t sure anything other than a private showing could do that body justice. The only thing that came to mind was the
Vanity Fair
photo from a few years before—he was sitting in a dugout, no shirt, but the bottom half of his uniform was still on. The pinstripes emphasized the muscles in his legs, stretched out in front of him and practically begging a woman to come and straddle him.
Like he’d need to ask.
One arm rested along the back of the bench beside him, a big and obviously strong hand curled around a baseball; the other arm was relaxed at his side, his wrist resting on his thigh, catcher’s mitt positioned directly over what she suspected to be a very fine endowment. He wore his catcher’s helmet, mask flipped up, his eyes sparkling with laughter. Though not actually smiling, his lips curved just enough to extend an invitation.
“Dorie?” he asked, and she had to deliberately remind herself that it wasn’t her place to run her hands down that gorgeous chest of his, maybe rest her cheek against his abs as she took a quick nip at his skin. Still, a sound escaped from the back of her throat. And she was pretty sure she’d just licked her lips.
“
Dorie...
”
Her gaze flew up at the sound of her name being torn from his throat all needy and raw. She took a shaky step back as she saw the intent and desire in his eyes; it took everything she had not to retreat farther as he came closer. She tilted her head up just as he bent his down and...
“Nathan!
There
you are.”
Rather than pull back as his aunt came into the room—as Dorie instinctively did—Nate just watched as her whole world tilted. Then, as if nothing had happened, he walked past her and greeted his aunt and uncle.
It took Dorie a few seconds to catch her breath again, seconds during which she had to fully concentrate on keeping herself from crumpling into a boneless heap.
Holy. Hell.
She made herself turn around, plastering a smile on her face in expectation of facing Mr. and Mrs. Grimes. But instead, the gaze she met was Fitz’s. It wasn’t a happy one. And that was nothing compared to the icy daggers being sent Dorie’s way from the woman standing next to Fitz.
The woman was, like Nate, cover-model gorgeous. Her long, caramel-colored hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and she was tall and thin, yet curvy in the right places. And, God, how Dorie was hoping this was one of Nate’s sisters.
“Jules,” Nate said, his voice full of both challenge and trepidation as his hands fell to his sides. “What are you doing here?”
“Nate,” she answered, the ice transferring from her eyes to her voice as she turned to look at him. There was a flash of emotion—an aching sadness gone so quickly Dorie may have imagined it—before Jules folded her arms across her chest. “I was afraid that if I waited for you to come find me I’d be waiting another two years.”
With a brief glance at Dorie, Nate stepped forward. “Missed you, sis,” he murmured. “You come here to yell at me, or to tell me you missed me, too?”
From inside his embrace, Jules pulled her arm back, bringing it forward in a quick and very unladylike punch. Then she threw her arms around him and gave a huge hug. “Of course I missed you. Although there sure have been a lot of things to yell about lately.”
Visibly tensing, he pulled away and said, “Maybe we don’t need to go into them here.”
She glared at him but didn’t push, saying instead, “So do I get to see you at some point today, or do you have other plans?”
Trying to ignore her disappointment, Dorie almost missed the look he gave her—as though he was asking
her
permission. It surprised her enough that she turned to see if there was someone else standing behind her.
There wasn’t.
“I, uh... No,” he said. “Not after I’m done helping here.”
“And that would be when?” Jules asked, her question directed to Mrs. Grimes.
Who, despite being her Aunt Laura as well, presumably, just smiled. In an absentminded kind of way, the older woman gestured at the mess. “No earlier than dinnertime, I’m sure. But Lucinda is in charge, so it’s really up to her.”
For once Dorie didn’t bother to make the correction. “An hour, maybe? I can manage it from there.”
Nate gave an irritatingly patronizing smile. “No, you can’t.”
Seriously? “Yes, I can.”
Before Nate had a chance to reply, Fitz spoke, albeit reluctantly. “I have to say, I agree with Nate. I had no idea it was this bad back here. You really do need some help—more than just Nate, I think.” She reached into her bag and took out her phone, then put her hand on Jules’s arm and began to lead her out. “What do you say, Jules? Can we count on you to handle lunch?”
With the kind of aggrieved sigh Dorie had used on her own brothers more than once, Jules just nodded. Taking out her phone, she gave Nate a heated yet also forgiving glare. “It’s going on your tab,” she said as she left the room.
That clearly didn’t bother him at all. In fact, it only made him smile.
After Jules left—followed shortly by Fitz and Mr. and Mrs. Grimes—Dorie found herself facing Nate again. And as any decent person should do, she said, “You should go be with your sister, Nate. Not here.”
As his gaze went to the doorway everyone else had disappeared through, he murmured, “Yeah. Probably.”
And the walls came crashing down around her.
She recognized that look in his eyes because she’d felt it deeply for years. It was longing, plain and simple. But the urge she’d just felt to comfort him was truly terrifying. It had taken everything she had to drag herself away from the safety and comfort of home in order to get herself here. She could
not
get sucked into his drama, no matter who he was. She just couldn’t.
And yet when he looked up and grinned, all traces of turmoil gone as he said, “But I’d rather be with you. I like it a lot better when
you
yell at me.”
Oh,
damn
. She stared up into his eyes. “What would she want to yell at you about?” she asked, descending into a rabbit hole of trouble.
There was a long pause, which didn’t surprise her; and then an answer, which did. Quietly, he said, “She doesn’t like the way I live my life.”
“Do you?” she asked as the air rushed out of her lungs. She didn’t want to like him this much. Didn’t want to see the man behind the superstar, the funny, not-afraid-of-a-kitchen-loves-his-family-even-though-they-obviously-drive-him-crazy man. “Like the way you live your life?” she added even as his eyes narrowed.
He straightened up further, and she was suddenly reminded that he was a six-foot-tall hunk of muscle who regularly had other six-foot-tall hunks of muscle running with all of their might straight at him. It was quite a sight—in an awesome, breathtaking way that had nothing to do with how beautiful he was. And she knew that the smart thing would be to retreat. Quickly.
But she stood her ground.
“Do you?” she asked again, almost a whisper.
He stared at her for a minute and she was afraid she would break when he took a strand of her hair. His eyes dropped as he watched it pass through his fingers.
“You just call it like it is,” he murmured. “Don’t you?”
She wasn’t generally taken in by a pretty face. They were a dime a dozen, as far as she was concerned. Good for a fun night or two, but not really worth much beyond that. But put that pretty face on a guy who didn’t shy away from her directness—who actually seemed to appreciate it? Bam, all her lady parts were ready to go.
She had to swallow over the lump in her throat when he let his hand fall away and said, “No. Not so much these days.”
“Is there anything I can do?” she finally managed. Because, yes. She could offer sex. She was in. Her goddamn conscience could go right on out the newly repaired window.
After what seemed like forever, all the tension in his body evaporated—just like that—and he gave his easy smile. “Just keep cooking for me and I’ll be happy.” He reached down for an empty box, went over to the shelf he’d rescued her from and started packing books away.
Well
,
okay
,
then.
It took a few minutes for Dorie to catch her breath. Then she forced herself to turn back to her own books. “I only cooked for you once. And that doesn’t count, because it wasn’t really for you. It was just what I had in the freezer.”
“You made me cupcakes last night,” he corrected.
“I made
us
cupcakes.” She grinned. “You were the one who cooked.”
“Huh,” he said. “You’re right. So I guess now it’s your turn. Too bad I already have plans for tonight. So what are you doing tomorrow?”
Wait, like an actual date? With all these crazy emotions and strange
feelings
swirling around them? It was one thing to hang out. To banter and tease. To strip naked and do his bidding. “Uh... Um...”
She wanted sex with her imaginary boyfriend come to life, with the gorgeous fantasyland superstar baseball player. She did not—
could
not—allow herself to think beyond that. Not when the true-to-life man was so much more than she’d ever dreamed—so much more that she could see herself losing focus. Getting caught up and taking her eyes off her own goals. And if Courtney Knight, billionaire trust fund baby, beautiful muse for, at last count, three musicians and one painter, and brilliant morning news anchorwoman, was now primarily known as Nate Hawkins’s Ex-Fiancée, well, Dorie Donelli did not stand a chance. It was so against her New Life directive that it wasn’t even funny. “I, um...”