Fortune Found (12 page)

Why that made him smile, she didn't know.

Then he said, “What about before the first day of your senior year?”

“I had three boyfriends before Pete, but I was too young for them to be serious. I'd kissed other boys and gone through infatuations, crushes and the breakups and heartbreaks that went along with them. But for anything other than that, for anything real? Pete was
It
.”

“And now here I am,” he said, very quietly. And while he'd gone on rubbing her shin, there was something about his touch that wasn't solely comforting anymore. Something that made it more alluring and intimate.

“How do you feel about that?” he asked.

For a split second she thought he wanted to know how she felt about the way he was rubbing her leg.

Then she realized that he was asking how she felt about what was going on between them—about the kissing they'd done, about the fact that she was sitting with her legs in his lap now, letting him give her what had become a sensual massage.

“It's kind of mixing me up,” she confessed, once more
marveling at the sense of freedom she felt to even say that to him.

“In a bad way?”

“There's a little guilt—like I'm being unfaithful.”

“But?” he said the word she'd clearly left un-spoken.

She sighed. “I know Pete is gone. Nothing will bring him back. Everyone tells me it's time to go on…”

But when it came to considering that in the form of another man, she'd honestly thought she wouldn't be able to do it. That no man would measure up to Pete or what she'd felt for him. That she would never be able to have with anyone else what she'd had with him. That no relationship would ever be as effortless. That she would never be able to relax, to let her guard down so completely.

And yet here she was, with Flint, and she couldn't seem to keep herself from doing just that…

“You do need to go on,” Flint said then, adding his support of what everyone else in her life advised.

“Or maybe things just go on when they're ready, naturally,” she said, more to herself, looking at him sitting beside her, more than she seemed able to resist no matter how confused she felt.

He smiled thoughtfully. “True enough. Life moves on and there's no stopping it.”

Or him either, maybe, because he pulled her by the legs then to sit with her rear end right up against his thigh, bringing her close enough to look into her eyes.

“Seems like there are a lot of things that there's no stopping,” he said just before he kissed her.

And it was the sweetest kiss. Soft and gentle, warm
and inviting and so, so tender. So full of compassion and caring. And promise…

Jessie pressed a palm to his chest but not to push him away. In fact, though it seemed odd to her, for the first time kissing him
didn't
make her feel guilty.

Had talking about Pete, being open with Flint about her late husband, freed her in that way, too?

Maybe. Because as her lips responded to Flint's, guilt was nowhere to be found.

One of his hands came up to the side of her face, stroking her cheek while his other arm went around her back, pulling her more closely to him.

Mouths opened by degrees until there was room enough for tongues to meet, to play, to tease and cavort.

Flint repositioned them both and Jessie's arms ended up around him. Her hands roamed over his broad shoulders and muscular back as he cradled her head against the increasing blitz of a kiss that had moved from sweet to spicy. Deliciously spicy…

And away went all thoughts of other couples, of engagements and marriages and weddings-to-come. Away went even lingering thoughts of Pete, leaving just Jessie. Just Flint.

His hands were in her hair, cupped around the column of her neck, massaging her shoulders and upper arms, and then her back in a way that again made her nipples stand at attention within the built-in bra of her camisole.

She wondered if he could feel them against his chest, straining and screaming for some of what he was doing to her back, her shoulder blades.

It was impossible to feel him caressing other parts of her and not want that same caress on her aching breasts. She was nearly lying across his lap by then and she arched her spine, pressing just a bit more into him, tightening her own arms around him, just trying to find a little relief as mouths opened wide and the intensity of that kiss took another leap.

As if he were testing the waters, Flint found the hem of her shirts and slipped his hands underneath them, to just rest on the small of her back.

Warm, calloused, infinitely gentle—not even the tiniest hint of guilt came with a touch that felt so good Jessie's breath caught in her throat.

Up those hands went, splayed to her back, dragging her shirt with them and leaving cooler air to kiss her flesh in their wake.

She loosened her grip on Flint. She relaxed back ever so slightly, craving the feel of his hands everywhere…

But that craving was left to grow while he worked the tension out of her muscles as effectively as any masseur, as his tongue continue to flirt with hers, making her desires grow…

It seemed like an eternity, but it hardly took any time at all before she was putty in his hands, before all that was left in her were those desires, as one of his wondrous hands began a slow slide along the very bottom of her ribcage, coming to rest just below her left breast.

She took a deep breath, and Flint's mouth opened even wider over hers, taking that kiss into pure abandonment, almost making her forget that her nipples had turned to diamond-hard pebbles of need.

Almost, but not completely, and when that hand finally rose by slow, steady increments, when it finally
closed around her bare breast, she couldn't keep a tiny moan from rumbling in her throat, or from insinuating herself that much more firmly into his grip.

She'd forgotten how good that could feel!

And it did feel mind-bogglingly good as his fingers pressed into her compliant flesh, as her nipple grew even harder within his palm, as he showed her just how adept he was with a mastery she'd never known before.

But just when she was beginning to get lost in the sensations, in all that was springing to life inside of her, just when she was beginning to think of where this could go from here and wanting it to, something completely unexpected popped into her mind.

Ella.

Her unhappy eldest daughter.

Jessie didn't know where it had come from, but there it was, that thought that was suddenly torture because it reminded her that while she might have been freed of her guilt over being attracted to Flint, she still wasn't altogether free. She still had four kids to consider. And how anything she did could affect them—particularly Ella, who didn't really care for Flint.

The groan that left her throat almost silently that time wasn't solely from pleasure. There was a measure of remorse to it, too, as the fact that she couldn't let this passionate play go on sank in.

She just couldn't…

But she wanted to so much the idea of ending it, of not kissing Flint, of not having his hands on her, of losing the wonders he was working at her breast, of not letting this all go where she so desperately yearned for it to go, was actually painful.

The kids,
she reminded herself, for the first time since
she'd become a mother actually having to force herself not to lose sight of that, of them, when it would have been so easy to just give herself over to her own needs and desires at that moment.

Just another minute,
she pleaded with herself, kissing him back with a new intensity, as if to get every drop of the last drink of water she might ever have. Digging her hands into his back and fighting the longing to stroke every inch of him…

The kids…

She drew her hands up and over Flint's shoulders to his chest, meaning to push him back, to send the message that this had to end. But instead she somehow discovered herself doing some massaging of her own to his pectorals.

But this did have to end, she told herself, even as her hand clasped over his at her breast, pressing him ever more firmly there for a moment before she brought that wet and wild kiss to a conclusion and muttered an almost incoherent, “I… We… Stop…”

It took a moment for Flint to register the message and even when he seemed to, his hand stayed within hers on her breast. Chuckling slightly, he said, “I don't know if you mean that…”

She didn't. But she had to anyway. And she knew she had to let him know that.

So she said, “I don't want to mean it. But I do,” she assured in a tone of voice fraught with all of the unwillingness she felt.

But to prove she really couldn't let this go on, she finally took his hand away, hating the loss of it as her breast seemed to strain for more at the same time.

Flint took over from there, slipping out from under
her T-shirt to place that same hand along one side of her neck while he kissed the opposite side, nuzzling her and making it all the more difficult for her to stick to her guns.

But despite tipping her head to give him more access, despite closing her eyes again and losing another few minutes in the same warm sweetness of his mouth that had begun this, she whispered, “Really.”

And then she tried not to hate it so much when he complied and stopped that, too.

“Okay,” he agreed with a sigh of regret of his own.

Jessie opened her eyes as they both sat up straighter, as they leaned away from each other. But despite that separation, Flint ran his hands from her shoulders down her back to her hips before he took them away completely.

And that was when Jessie stood because to stay on that sofa with him was too much temptation.

Flint stood, too, and as he faced her he searched her eyes with his. “Are we okay?” he asked, apparently worried that he'd overstepped his bounds.

Jessie's laugh was wry. “Way, way too okay,” she said.

His smile was so endearingly sexy that it almost defeated her resolves all by itself. He took her hand in his then, grabbed his camera, brought her with him to turn off the light across the room and then turned off the light at the door as he led her out, letting her close it behind them.

He kept hold of her hand to get her to walk him to the gate, too, releasing her only when they'd reached it.

Then, facing her again, he once more looked intently
down at her and asked with complete sincerity, “I didn't make tonight worse for you, did I?”

“No,” Jessie said without hesitation because that couldn't have been farther from the truth. Then she confessed what she'd kept to herself earlier, “You got me through that party. And that…” she nodded in the direction of the garage studio but then didn't know what to say about what they'd just shared. She merely settled on, “No, you didn't make anything worse.”

Except for churning up emotions in her that she wasn't sure how to handle.

He didn't look completely convinced but didn't push her for more. After another moment of studying her with an appreciation that only made her feel better still, he bent over and kissed her chastely before he said, “I don't want to, but I guess I better let you go.”

Once again he brought his hand to rest tenderly against the side of her face. Then he took it away, kissed her forehead and went through the gate.

And Jessie had to swallow hard to keep from calling him back. To keep from saying she shouldn't have stopped what had been happening in the studio.

But she couldn't forget who she was, she told herself as she turned away from the fence and headed for her house. She couldn't forget how many responsibilities she had, how many people were depending on her to do what was right, to do what was best for them.

She couldn't forget how much could be at stake if she gave in to passion.

Even if every ounce of her being was crying out for her to do just that.

“J
essie… Are you still awake or did you just get up?”

Jeannie came into the kitchen at 3:00 a.m. and discovered her daughter sitting at the table.

“Still awake. I guess I have a little insomnia tonight,” Jessie answered, though not in all honesty.

The truth was that she'd been having trouble sleeping since she and Flint had had their encounter on the sofa in her studio Sunday night. Since he'd left and she'd decided she should keep her distance from him because it was the only way she could be sure that things between them wouldn't get any more complicated than they already were. And she
had
kept her distance from him. But now it was three o'clock on Wednesday morning, and while she knew that eventually—usually just as the sun was
coming up—exhaustion would finally let her doze off for a few hours, she was tired to the bone.

Yet somehow still so stirred up thinking about the man, wanting to be with him, wanting
him,
that she couldn't merely lie down in her bed at a reasonable hour, close her eyes and fall asleep.

“I always wake up about now and come down for a glass of milk to help me get back to sleep,” her mother said. “But you… Are you feeling all right?”

She knew what her mother was worrying about—for months after Pete's death Jessie hadn't been able to sleep. She'd wandered the house until all hours, frequently encountering her mother on Jeannie's nightly forays to the kitchen. And even when Jessie had finally felt as if she could close her eyes, she hadn't been able to face the bed she and Pete had shared. Instead she'd just slept on the couch downstairs.

She was sure that her mother was concerned that if she wasn't sleeping again, grief had made a return visit. So she said, “I'm fine. It isn't Pete.”

“What is it, then?” Jeannie asked as she poured two small glasses full of milk.

“It's nothing,” Jessie insisted.

Jeannie brought the two glasses with her to the table and sat across from Jessie, sliding one of the glasses over to her.

“Did you have a fight with Flint or something?” her mother inquired. “Because I've heard you up the last two nights, too. And we've all noticed that you don't seem to want to be anywhere near him since the party Sunday.”

Living in the same house with her parents, living next door to her sister, didn't allow for much privacy.

“Why would Flint and I fight?” she said. “He took pictures of my rock sculptures after the party, and with the work finished on Kelsey's house there just hasn't been a reason for me to go over there as much. I thought I'd let her and Coop settle in without any more company.”

Jessie could tell by the way her mother was looking at her that Jeannie wasn't buying that.

But still she felt compelled to add, “We're nothing but acquaintances, Flint and I—he's just Kelsey's soon-to-be brother-in-law. What could we possibly
fight
about?”

“I'm not blind, Jessie,” Jeannie said.

What had her mother seen? Certainly Jeannie hadn't seen her peeking out the window in her room, secretly hoping for a glimpse of Flint next door in his. Despite the fact that she'd done a ridiculous amount of that in the last two days and nights, she'd always made sure that her bedroom door was closed.

But her mother might have seen Flint kiss her at the van after their rock hunt. Or on the back porch Saturday night. She might have seen Flint holding her hand as they'd walked to the gate Sunday night. And kissing her again then.

Everything had happened late enough for her kids to all be sound asleep. But maybe not her mother.

Jeannie smiled as if she knew the wheels of Jessie's mind were spinning and clarified for her. “I've seen you looking over at Kelsey's house every time you pass any window that faces that way. I saw you trip over the jungle gym pieces yesterday because instead of looking where you were going, you were craning your neck to spy on Coop and Flint digging that hole to plant the tree on the other side of the fence. I've seen your eyes
glued to Flint
every
time he's been outside and you catch a glimpse of him. I saw you frozen in the middle of changing the girls' sheets this morning. I called your name three times before you stopped looking out their window at Flint up on Kelsey's roof—it was as if you were in some kind of trance or something. You like that man.”

If that was all her mother had seen it wasn't so bad.

Jessie merely shrugged it off. “He's a nice guy. And he's not hard on the eyes.”

Jeannie laughed and reiterated, “And you like him. The two of you have gravitated to each other at every meal we've had together, on game night, at the housewarming. Your face just lights up the minute he comes into a room. So why stay away from him? Especially if staying away from him is making you antsy and keeping you up nights?”

“It's just not that simple…”

“Well, sure it is.”

“It was one thing when we were working on Kelsey's house—she needed the help and you'd signed on for doing more with the kids while I was there. But now that the house is finished, doing anything with Flint would take more time away from the kids. Plus Ella doesn't like him and—”

“Oh, stop!” Jeannie reprimanded. “Jessie, you're a good mother. You are. But you can't let those kids be all there is for you. You need other interests. Other outlets.”

“That's why I do the stone sculptures.”

“That's not enough,” her mother insisted.

Jessie shrugged. “Pete's and my old friends don't call anymore now that I'm not part of a couple—and it
would
be awful to see them and be alone. My old girlfriends are all married, so whenever I'm with them it always ends up a pity party with all of them feeling sorry for me and saying they don't know how I do without Pete—”

“But now there's someone right next door who you like being with,” Jeannie interrupted.

“Even if that were the case, bringing a man—especially a man like Flint who isn't interested in commitment—into the kids' lives right now is too much, too soon. It couldn't be good for them,” Jessie said softly.

“It's not too much or too soon,” Jeannie refuted. “But I'm not even talking about bringing a man into their lives,” she repeated. “I'm just saying that there's nothing wrong with—while Flint is here—the two of you spending a little time together. He's someone your own age who makes you laugh. You just seem to enjoy each other's company. So why not ask him to take a walk, or have coffee, or go out to dinner with him again?”

Because things between us have already gone so far beyond that…

That was the answer to her mother's question, but that was the last thing Jessie was going to say to her mother.

Instead she said, “I just don't think it's a good idea.”

“Taking a walk, going out to a dinner—those wouldn't even involve the kids. And your dad and I don't mind babysitting. That's part of why we're here.”

“To raise my kids while I run around with men?” Jessie joked.

Jeannie laughed, shaking her head as if she thought Jessie were hopeless. But still she said, “We're here to help, and I think it helps
you
to get out a little. It isn't
good for you—or for the kids—to put all you've got into them and their lives, and nothing into your own, Jess. You can't sacrifice
everything
for the kids. You can't. I know that seems like the way to go now—”

“And the easiest and safest thing for us all.”

“But it isn't,” her mother said firmly. “There has to be something outside of the housework and the laundry and the grocery shopping and taking care of the kids, something that's only for you, that recharges you—”

“I don't want to go to your quilting club, Mom.”

“But
I
have my quilting club. And my once-a-month poker with the girls, and my book group—they all give me time to just be me. When I come back from those visits, I'm a new woman. And unless I'm mistaken, every time you come back from being with Flint, you're a new woman, too. So I say, don't fight it. He's not going to be here forever. But while he is, where's the harm in seeing him? Especially when
not
seeing him seems to keep you up nights?”

Jessie was afraid Jeannie was beginning to understand—too much.

“It's all just weird,” Jessie confessed to keep whatever containment she could on what her mother was thinking. “For some reason I'm really comfortable with him. I have an easier time talking to him than I thought I'd ever have talking to a man who isn't Pete, an easier time being with him…”
Even in ways that I wish weren't happening so easily.
“But because he
isn't
Pete, I feel guilty. And taking time away from the kids on top of it… I don't know. I guess it's just a dilemma that's keeping me up nights right now.”

“It's only a dilemma if you make it one. If you stop fighting what you want, the dilemma is gone,” Jeannie
said conclusively as she took her now-empty glass to the sink and left Jessie's untouched one in front of her. “Flint doesn't live here. He'll be gone before you know it. And if I were you, I'd make the best of it while you can.”

Jessie couldn't suppress a grin when she thought that her mother had no idea what she was giving her permission for.

But what she said was, “That's part of the problem.”

“Maybe,” Jeannie allowed. “Or maybe that's exactly the right setup for you to get your feet wet with a man again.”

Oh, how she would have liked to do that!

But it just wasn't as simple as her mother thought it was.

Not when Jessie imagined the day Flint would pack up and leave his brother's house and go on his merry way.

Without a backward glance.

Without her.

Leaving her with what she was very much afraid might be another great big sense of loss to deal with all over again.

And the thought of that scared her so much, that after breakfast later that morning, when Kelsey came next door to invite Jessie, the kids, Jeannie and Jack to dinner that evening at her house, and also mentioned that Coop and Flint would be working on the yard all day, Jessie couldn't make herself heed her mother's advice.

Instead she made the impromptu decision that she and the kids would be going rock hunting and having their usual cookout in the woods.

Jeannie didn't give away the fact that that decision had happened on the spot and went along with Jessie's ruse that rock hunting had been preplanned. But Jeannie did give Jessie a sad sort of look and shake her head at her when no one else could see.

It didn't matter. The thought of Flint being within her sight for the entire day to come, the thought of having another meal with him while still trying to maintain some distance, some reserve, some detachment, was too much to endure.

So she rounded up her kids and essentially ran like a rabbit to keep herself away from Flint—and the temptation she was too afraid to give in to.