Authors: Maya Banks
He’d resorted to prowling around town looking for her, acting like a damn stalker again. But he hadn’t seen her, hadn’t seen her truck. Hadn’t even seen a single damn family member of hers.
Enough was enough. He was going to go up that mountain, and he didn’t give a shit if he had to take on the entire Colter clan, he wasn’t leaving until he talked some sense into her.
He showered, shaved and dressed just so he wouldn’t look like some escapee from prison, and then he walked out to get into his car. Right now he didn’t care if he got his ass kicked so hard he wound up in the hospital, just as long as he was able to pin Callie down in one place long enough to wipe that horrible look of pain and betrayal from her eyes.
God, he never wanted to see such a look on her face for the rest of his life. If she’d let him, if she’d just give him a chance, he’d make damn sure nothing—especially him—ever hurt her again.
Just as he was getting into his car, he glanced up and saw Lily Colter walk out of the sheriff’s department and down the sidewalk toward the small grocery store.
His pulse ratcheted up. He slammed his door and sprinted across the street to intercept Callie’s sister-in-law.
When she looked up and saw him, she took an instinctive step back. Her eyes hardened and her lips curled into a snarl. For such a small, dainty woman, she could look damn mean.
He put out a placating hand. “Lily, please. I need your help.”
Her glare froze him to the nuts.
“Look, I know you think I’m the biggest asshole on earth, but I have to talk to Callie. Is she up at her parents’?”
The anger in Lily’s eyes faded and the same raw grief he’d witnessed in Callie’s eyes now stared back at him.
“She’s gone.”
His brows furrowed. “Gone? What do you mean gone?”
Lily stepped forward, her fist balled like she’d love nothing more than to hit him. “She left. Cleaned out her bank account, all the money she’d saved for her dream house. She’s off somewhere and we don’t know where. She’s out there hurting. Devastated. And we can’t help her because she’s gone. Because of
you
. Because of what you did to her.”
His stomach fell. His chest caved in as a wave of despair nearly crippled him. He had to grip the light post to keep his knees from buckling.
“No,” he said hoarsely. “Oh God, no. I have to find her.”
Tears shimmered in Lily’s gaze. “Good luck with that. All we know is that she flew out of Denver on a nonstop flight to London. She could be anywhere right now. Callie doesn’t stay in hotels. She doesn’t travel like most people. She’ll disappear for weeks—months at a time. Then one day she’ll come home. I hope and pray she comes home this time. Her entire family is devastated.”
He stared at the woman and didn’t even try to hide the horrible grief festering inside him. “Lily, I love her. I
love
her. Do you understand that? Things happened so fast. I never had the chance to explain. But God, I love her so damn much.”
Lily gazed at him for a long moment until finally her expression softened. “Then why? If you love her so much, why?”
“I was never going to go after her meadow. I couldn’t. Not once I met her—fell in love with her—saw how much that land meant to her. But that is why I searched her out. I’m damned by my own actions, but things changed after I met her. I swear to you they did.”
Lily put her hand on Max’s arm. Her touch was so gentle that he wanted her hand to stay there. It was the only soft thing in his world right now. His only comfort where he had none.
“Then you have to find her, Max. And you have to tell her. You have to make her listen. It won’t be easy. I’m not sure she’ll listen this time.”
Max took Lily’s hand and raised it to his lips to press a brief kiss across her knuckles. “Thank you, Lily. For listening. It means more than you’ll ever know.”
She smiled ruefully. “My husbands will tell you my heart is too soft for my own good. Callie will tell you I have a vicious streak that she loves. I’ll fully admit, what I really wanted to do was kick you in the balls. But I can’t fault you for loving her. And I believe you when you say you do.”
Max smiled for the first time since everything had gone to hell. “I think you’re a very special lady, Lily.”
“Just find her and bring her home to us,” Lily said softly.
For the first three weeks after Callie’s departure, Max spared no expense in his efforts to locate her. The problem was, as Lily had said, Callie wasn’t most people. She didn’t check into hotels. She didn’t often stay in one place for more than a day. He only had London as a starting point, and all he’d been able to determine was that she took the Star to Paris. After she reached the continent, she could literally be anywhere.
He didn’t eat. Didn’t sleep. He was consumed with finding Callie so he could bring her home. Or not bring her home. He didn’t care as long as he could find her and confront her.
It was nearly a month before he realized that his efforts were misdirected. Callie wouldn’t be found if she didn’t want to be. But eventually she’d come home, wouldn’t she? He didn’t believe for a minute that she wouldn’t return to the family she loved more than anything.
It was then he realized that he needed to focus his efforts on making her homecoming special.
And that precipitated a trip up the mountain to see her family.
With a little help on the sly from Lily, he made damn sure that the entire family would be assembled when he arrived. It was time to take the bull by the horns. It wouldn’t be pretty, but he wasn’t about to give up without one hell of a fight.
He parked by the myriad of vehicles and got out, spoiling for a fight. He strode to the front door and knocked briskly.
He didn’t have to wait long. The door opened and Adam Colter stood there unsmiling, his steady gaze brewing with anger.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Knowing he wouldn’t get through the door without a little shock value, Max thrust the document that Callie had signed at her father.
“We need to talk about this.”
Adam took the paper and scanned the contents. His expression grew darker and darker until he resembled a black cloud of fury.
“You son of a bitch,” Adam seethed. “I’ll fight you on this. It will never hold up in court. She signed this under duress and great emotional strain. When I’m through with you, the entire world will know what a calculating bastard you are.”
Max held up his hand. “I don’t give a shit what that paper says or whether it will hold up in court. I never intend to sign it or pursue ownership.”
Adam paused and then looked back up at Max, open speculation in his gaze.
“Like I said, we need to talk. Preferably without violence, although after three weeks of searching all over Europe for your daughter, I’m about ready to shed some blood. Yours will do just fine.”
Adam continued to stare at him for a long moment, and a glimmer of a smile shadowed on his lips. “You love my daughter.”
“Yeah, what was your first clue?”
“You can cut the sarcasm, son. Your actions haven’t been those of a man who loves a woman.”
“Just let me in so we can talk about this. I want things to be perfect if and when Callie comes home.”
Adam hesitated a moment. “I didn’t take advantage of your mother, Max. I can show you the letter she sent me. I can show you the bill of sale. I paid her more than a fair price. The last thing my brothers and I wanted was to take advantage of a young widow with two children to raise.”
Max swallowed and then slowly nodded his acceptance. He had to let go of his anger. These were Callie’s dads. The past couldn’t be changed. He’d been a boy when his mother had sold, and he’d viewed the transaction through the eyes of an angry child. It was time to consider that he’d been wrong. He’d been wrong about so many other things.
“I owe you and your brothers an apology,” Max said in a low voice.
“If you make my daughter happy again, that’s all the apology we need.”
“Thank you, sir. I plan to do exactly that.”
Adam stepped back and then motioned Max inside. Max walked past him and into the living room where all of Callie’s family was assembled.
Lily met his gaze and shot him a look of sympathy about the time the rest of the room exploded into chaos.
It took a full five minutes for Adam to calm everyone down. Even Holly stood to the side, her face drawn into tight lines of anger—and grief.
He went to her first, wanting to ease her fears, her worries, even when he didn’t have any information to do so.
“Have you found her?” Lily asked just as he approached Holly Colter.
Max turned to look at Lily’s hopeful face, his own drawn into an unhappy grimace. “No, I haven’t.”
Then he turned back to Callie’s mother. “I want to apologize to you for all the hurt I’ve caused. I love your daughter. I love her more than I’ve ever loved anyone else. I’ve done nothing for the last three weeks but try to find her. I’ve come to the realization that she’ll come home when she’s ready, and when she does, I want things to be…right.”
Adam handed the paper to Holly. “He brought this.”
Holly scanned the paper and then her eyes filled with tears. “No. Tell me this isn’t real.”
Max took the paper from her shaking hand and then calmly ripped it into a dozen tiny pieces. “I don’t care if it was real or not. It doesn’t matter because I won’t sign it.”
“Thank God,” Holly whispered.
“Someone want to tell us what the hell is going on?” Seth demanded from across the room.
Max turned to face the forbidding faces of the Colter men.
“Callie tried to give me her meadow. I won’t accept it. I love her. I’m not going to lose her without a fight. You need to accept that. She loves you. You love her. I love her. There has to be room for all of us in her life if she chooses it. I’m here to make my peace with you, but I’m also here because I need your help.”
Silence fell and perplexed looks replaced the anger of just moments before.
“What do you have in mind?” Ryan Colter asked cautiously.
“All Callie’s ever wanted is to build her dream house. She takes ridiculously low-paying, dangerous jobs and she saves. She drives a truck that’s about to fall apart, and she doesn’t even have a home of her own because she saves every penny for that dream.
“She took that money she’s been saving and she left. She gave up on that dream. I’m going to give it back to her.”
“Okay,” Ethan said slowly. “How do you propose to do that?”
“I’m going to build her house in that meadow so that she has it to come home to. Whether she takes me back or not, I want her to have that safe place—a place of her own. Something she can always come back to no matter where she travels or where her path takes her. But I can’t do it without your help.”
Again, heavy silence descended, as they seemed to grapple with what he’d said. Grudging admiration and maybe even respect entered their eyes.
Her brothers eased back into their seats. Lily smiled over at Max. He smiled back and mouthed a silent
thank you
.
Callie’s dads also settled on the couches, and Holly walked over to sit between Adam and Ethan.
“What can we do to help?” Adam asked.
“I need you to help me build her dream. She’s spoken to me some about it so I have an idea of what she wants. But I need anything you have. Any tidbit of what she’s talked about. What she likes. How she’d want it built.”
“I drew her a picture,” Lily spoke up. “I drew the outside to her specifications. I still have a copy. I can give you that.”
“That would be fantastic, Lily. Thank you.”
“You’re serious about this?” Seth asked. There was a glimmer of doubt, a look of incredulity etched on his brow. “You’re going to give up the meadow without a fight?”
“The meadow is Callie’s,” Max said in an even voice. “I’ll never fight her for it. What I won’t give up without a fight is…Callie.”
“I’m handy with tools,” Dillon said, speaking for the first time. “I built my own place. I’ll do what I can.”
“I appreciate it. I’m going to have a team of contractors up here. No expense will be spared. I can use any input or information you all have.”
“You really do love her,” Holly said in a soft voice.
Max looked from one family member to the next until finally his gaze rested on Callie’s mother. “She’s my life.”
“Well, let’s get cracking,” Ryan said. “We’ve got a house to build.”
Already there was a chill to the air that bespoke winter’s impending arrival. She turned up the heat and prayed it still worked.
The long months away had taken their toll. In some ways, it seemed she’d been gone a lifetime, but in other ways, it was just yesterday.
She missed her family and she longed to be in the middle of them again.
And Max.
How she’d wanted the passage of time to dim the hurt, but her heart was as torn as it had been the day she left.
She forced her gaze forward as she approached her meadow. No, it wasn’t hers any longer. It was Max’s. She hoped it gave him peace. It had given her none.
Her lips trembled as she passed the turnoff that would wind its way to the valley below. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw something that made her brake in the middle of the road.
She whipped her head around, her mouth falling open. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t.
Pain shredded her throat and stabbed deep into her soul. He’d built a house in the meadow. He hadn’t wasted any time taking it over and making it his.
Tears burned her eyelids and she closed her eyes, determined to look away.
It was like a train wreck. She was compelled to open her eyes and stare down at the cabin nestled on the banks of the creek.
God, it was
her
house.
Her
dream house.
Was there no end to the ways he could make her bleed?
She jammed the gearshift into reverse and accelerated until she got back to the turnoff for the meadow. She roared down the road until she reached the place where she and Max had stopped that night so many months ago. A lifetime ago.
She got out and slowly walked a few feet in front of her truck.
The old wooden fence was gone. Maybe he planned to put up a new one. A separation of Wilder land from Colter land.
She was a fool. How could she ever come back here when she’d be faced with Max at every turn? How could her parents’ house, always a haven—
home
—be a refuge when she would be forced to face so much pain and betrayal simply by looking out her window?
No, she couldn’t come back here.
“Callie.”
She froze as Max’s soft voice slid over her ears like a warm, comforting blanket. She closed her eyes and squeezed her fingers into tight balls. Not this. Anything but this. Hadn’t she bled enough?
She hadn’t heard his approach. But then she’d been too ensconced in the agony of seeing her dream belong to someone else.
“Callie, please. Look at me.”
The soft entreaty was nearly her undoing. Despite the fact that the last thing she wanted was to confront Max again, she found herself slowly turning, responding to the command layered into his quiet request.
He looked different. Haggard. He’d lost weight. There were lines of fatigue etched into his brow and dark shadows rimmed his eyes. He looked…terrible.
“Thank God you’re home.”
“How did you know?” she demanded. “How could you possibly have found me this fast? I only just got into town.”
His lip curled, and a blaze of anger flashed in his eyes.
“Because I’ve waited every goddamn day for the last three months for you to come back. I’ve had the entire goddamn town on alert. Everyone has been watching for you—waiting. I got a phone call as soon as your truck was spotted in Clyde. I came as soon as I got the call. I was only a quarter mile behind you.”
“Why?” she asked helplessly.
“Because you’re mine, Callie, and I’m not letting you go.”
She whirled around so that her back was to him and she stared out over the meadow again. “It’s beautiful,” she managed to grind out.
“I want you to see it,” he said, closer this time as he walked up behind her.
She shook her head. Even Max couldn’t be this cruel.
“Yes, Callie. You’re going to come with me and you’re going to see the house.”
He took her hand and pulled her toward the path leading down the hillside. His fingers were like iron digits around hers. No escape. No choice but to follow him.
She walked stiffly, each step making her want to cry out for him to stop.
“Why are you doing this?”
Max paused only for a moment as he turned back to stare at her. “This is yours, Callie. It’s all for you. Every last piece of wood. Every nail. Every coat of paint. Every flower planted in the boxes out front. It’s all yours. Your dream. Just the way you wanted it.”
Her mouth fell open and she stumbled after him as he continued dragging her closer to the house.
As they neared, she took in the large log cabin. Tears swam in her eyes, making the house go blurry. God, it was exactly what she’d designed in her head. How could he know? She’d told him a little about her house. Odds and ends. But how could he possibly have built something that was straight out of her heart?
They stood in front of the stone steps leading to the front door. He gestured toward the exterior. “This was taken straight from the picture that Lily drew for you. Every inch down to the planters and the species of flowers. Even the cedar porch swing and the welcome sign. Read it, Callie. Tell me what it says.”
Her gaze drifted to the words on the worn piece of wood—just as she’d imagined it—standing on an old post just beside the steps to the front porch.
“Welcome to Callie’s Meadow,” she whispered.
“That’s right, Callie. Your meadow.”
She glanced up at Max, so flabbergasted, so utterly undone, she couldn’t even form the words. “I don’t understand.”
“Come inside,” he said.
He pulled at her hand and they trudged up the steps. He unlocked the door and swung it open into a large living room with a giant stone fireplace that took up the back wall.
Everywhere she looked, she saw her dreams come to life. All the daydreams. Every detail was carefully rendered. It was her dream house.
“It’s yours, Callie. The whole thing. The land. The house. It all belongs to you.”
She swallowed the growing knot in her throat only to choke and cough as emotion swelled and took a stranglehold. How could she be happy with her dream when it wasn’t complete? How could she be happy here without the man she’d imagined at her side, in her bed, holding her in front of that gigantic fireplace on cold nights?
Tears slipped down her cheeks. Tears she hadn’t shed in months. Tears she didn’t think she had to shed anymore.
“Why, Max? Why did you do this?”
He turned to face her, his eyes so tormented that she caught her breath.
“Because I love you, Callie. I love you so damn much I can’t even breathe. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. All I can do is work on this house and hope like hell that you’ll come home and see how much I love you and give me another chance.”
He took her hands and held them so tight her fingers went numb. But she didn’t pull them away. She stared, so afraid to hope, so afraid to believe that her head hurt.
“I never got to tell you everything, Callie. I never got to explain. I told the truth—a truth that forever damned me in your eyes. But I didn’t get to tell you the rest.”
“What’s the rest?” she whispered.
“It’s true that I tracked you down in Europe. Hell, I don’t even know what my plan was. I was frustrated because I was getting nowhere with your fathers, and so I was going to go straight to the source. Meet you, let you put a face to the name, tell you my story and hope to hell you’d agree to sell. It was absolutely my intention to do whatever it took to get you to agree.”
She closed her eyes and tried to look away, but Max’s hands tightened around hers and he pulled so she’d look back at him.
“But then I met you, Callie. I met you and fell so hard for you that I never knew what hit me. I only knew I wanted to make you mine. I forgot all about the meadow. About my promise to my stepfather that I’d keep it in our family and hand it down to my children so they could hand it down to theirs. I forgot all about my honor or what I felt like my obligation was to my family.”
He paused and then took a deep breath before continuing.
“Then I got that call from my sister that my mom was dying. I was so conflicted. How could I have allowed myself to become so distracted, so utterly involved with you that I’d ignored everything else in my life? I pulled back. I pulled way back. I didn’t call you. I didn’t return. My mom died and her last words were an apology to me and my sister for selling our legacy. She begged me to get it back, and I felt so guilty because I made her a promise I never had any intention of keeping.
“And then I knew I had to find you again. For me there was no other option. I was going to do whatever I had to in order to get you back, and I’ll be honest, I never wanted you to know the real reason we’d met. I would have never told you because I never wanted to hurt you so badly.”
He lifted her hands and looked deep into her eyes, his own blazing with sincerity.
“I never intended to coerce you or even ask you to sell the land. I had to make a choice between having you or keeping a promise I’d made to my family. I chose you, Callie. I chose
you
.”
She stared back at him, her mind in such turmoil that she didn’t even know what to say. How to respond. How could she tell him that she
wanted
to believe him? Oh God, she wanted to believe him with everything she had. But how could she? How could she risk everything…again?
Max watched the obvious conflict cross her face. How could he be blind to it? He sucked in his breath and then he lowered her hands, gently letting them go.
Then he backed away, just a few steps, enough that there was space between them. And then he slowly sank to his knees on the polished wood floor.
She stared in shock—in absolute horror—as he went to his knees in front of her, his hands turned up, resting on the tops of his thighs. He bowed his head in front of her and simply waited.
Then he spoke. His voice trembled. There was such emotion clogging his throat that she could barely hear him.
“I’m begging you, Callie. Give me another chance. I’ll never ask for more than you’re willing to give. I’ll take whatever you’re capable of giving me.”
“Oh Max. No. Oh no, no, no,” she whispered.
She fell to her knees in front of him, pushing at him with her hands, trying to force him back to his feet. Max was never a man to kneel, to submit, to
beg
. Not this man. Not her Max.
Tears streamed down her cheeks and sobs tore from her throat, the sound so anguished that it made her wince.
“Don’t do this, Max. Stand up. Please. Not on your knees. I don’t want this. Don’t do this to yourself. To us.”
He lifted his haunted gaze to meet hers. Then he reached for her shoulders and pulled her to him.
“Don’t you understand, Callie? I belong to you. Only you. You gave yourself to me before, but now I’m giving you myself. I just want you to say you can love me again. Maybe not today. Or even tomorrow. But one day. Until then, I’ll love you enough for both of us.”
She threw her arms around him, nearly knocking him to the floor. She sobbed noisily against his neck. She probably got snot and God knows what else all over his shirt. She didn’t care.
“I love you today, Max.
Today
. And tomorrow. And the next day. A year from now. A decade from now. When we’re both old and gray and toothless, I’ll still love you.”
He crushed her to him. His arms held her so tightly that she couldn’t move—she didn’t want to. His entire body shook, and he just held on to her as she cried.
“Thank God,” he whispered. “Thank God. I love you so damn much, Callie. I’m nothing without you. Please tell me that we’ll live together in your dream house. It was yours before but somehow in the building of this, of making all your daydreams a reality, it became my dream too. I want to live it with you.”
She squeezed him for a long moment because she couldn’t speak around the sobs knotting her throat. He rubbed his hands up and down her back and rocked her back and forth.
“I just want to be with you,” she whispered. “That’s my dream, Max. Not this house. Not this land. Just you.”
He pulled her away and smoothed the ragged strands of hair from her face. “And you’re my dream, Callie. Always. You loving me. Me loving you. That’s enough. It’s all I want. It’s all I’ll ever want.”
She smiled. God, it felt so good to smile and know that the world was finally right. Then she leaned forward and kissed him.
Their lips melted together like snow in the middle of a thaw. He kissed her hungrily. Breathlessly. With so much love and emotion that her chest ached with it.
Then she merely rested her forehead against his as they struggled to catch their breath. He touched her. She touched him. Two lovers reunited after a long separation.
“Your family is worried. We need to go see them,” he said.
She pulled away, startled by his statement.
He grinned. “I think you’ll find that your family and I have come to an…understanding. They love you. I love you. It’s common ground no one can argue.”