Meeting Miss Mystic (23 page)

“Don’t get me wrong…I sort of hate it that I’m telling you to go for him when Holly’s in the picture. But I like you. And he likes you—I can tell. And more than anything, I just want him to be happy, because he’s a good man. He deserves to be happy.”

Zoë swallowed, looking down, nodding lightly.

Jane unlocked the door with Lars’s keys and placed her camera bag and tripod gently on the front seat. She turned to Zoë and Zoë gave her the caddy of art supplies and portfolio which Jane placed on the floor before closing and relocking the door.

“No regrets, Zoë,” said Jane, smiling.

“Thanks, Jane.”

“Oh!” Jane reached into her back pocket, pulled out her phone and then looked up at Zoë, grinning. “Lars says to stay put. Paul’s coming up for you.”

Zoë grinned back at her friend. “No regrets, Jane.”

***

“You’re making me look bad,” griped Lars. “Should I go up and get Jane too?”

“Don’t be an asshole. Did Jane massively mangle her leg in a car accident a couple of years ago? Oh, she didn’t? Then I guess she’s okay making her own way down.”

“Touchy.” Lars went to work spreading out the red-and-white-checked blanket on a bank beside the water and unpacking the picnic basket. “Tell Jane to call out if she needs me.”

“Think of it this way: you’ll get a few minutes alone. I’ll take my time getting back down here with Zoë. Just have all your clothes back on by the time we get here.”

Lars’s grin was wolfish. “I like the way you think, my friend.”

When Paul got to the base of the rocky hill that led to the parking area he encountered Jane. “You seen my man?”

“Thataway,” said Paul, gesturing with his head as she passed him.

“Wait. Paul.”

He turned back to find her facing him, hands on her hips.

“Zoë,” she said.

“What?”

“I like her.”

“Me too.”

Jane looked uncomfortable then added. “She likes you.”

“She told you that?”

Jane nodded, biting her lower lip. He had a fleeting thought that Jane biting her lower lip did nothing for him.

He looked down, smiling, nodding softly, feeling incredibly pleased, his whole body wanting nothing more but to go find Zoë. Now. He turned to walk away.

“Hey! Lover boy!”

Jane was still standing there in the same place.

“Holly,” she said, simply.

Paul cringed, sighing, all that feel-good euphoria leeching out of his body with a single word.

“I don’t know, Jane.” He scratched his chin, could smell the fish on his hands and wished he’d been able to wash off before collecting Zoë. “I’m in a bad place.”

“Did you make promises to Holly?”

“She’s amazing, Jane. She’s sunshine and happiness. She’s gorgeous. Funny. Super happy with her life. Close to her family. The perfect girl.”

“I don’t care about that. Did you make promises?”

“Not in so many words. But, we’ve talked about our feelings.”

“How do you feel about her?”

“I feel like…” He threw up his hands in frustration. “She’s this amazing…possibility. This beautiful idea. But, right now, she doesn’t feel
real
. She feels like a fairy tale.”

“And Zoë feels real?”

“Zoë
is
real. She’s a real person and she’s here. Right here, right now. She’s not gorgeous, but I want to touch her all the time. And she’s not sunny, but she’s strong and brave. And she’s not super happy with her life, but I get the feeling she wants to change that. And she’s not perfect, but I can’t get her out of my head. I haven’t stopped thinking about her since I met her. She’s no fairy tale, but...”

“But,” said Jane gently, reaching out to touch Paul’s arm. “Real girls aren’t fairy tales. Don’t you know that?”

“I kinda want the fairy tale, Jane.” He smiled at her, shrugging lightly. “
You
got it.”

She seemed to consider this for a moment, and then she nodded. “I guess I kinda did.”

“But hey,” she said, walking backward in the direction of their picnic. “If you haven’t made a commitment to Holly, keep your mind open. I’d hate for you to miss out on something real saving yourself for something…hypothetical, fairy tale or no fairy tale. Does that make sense?”

Paul nodded. “I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

“I think someone always gets hurt when it comes to love. I think those tough choices are part of what gives it a foundation. Someone will get hurt. You can take that to the bank. Just do your best.”

“And take your time getting down here!” she threw over her shoulder.

Paul grinned, starting up the rocky uneven hill before him. It was a good ten-minute climb, and when he got to the top he found Zoë leaning next to Lars’s truck. The parking lot had filled up some.

“Hey,” she said, smiling at him like she’d never seen anything as good as him walking toward her. It was all Paul could do not to grab her and kiss her.

“Hey,” he said.

“I could have come down with Jane.”

“I didn’t want you to.”

“Oh.”

“No, I—I didn’t want you to get hurt. I wanted to help you.” He glanced at her leg, then back at her face.

She swallowed, looking down for a moment, and he wondered if he’d somehow overstepped his bounds. Happily, when she looked up again, her expression was amused.

“Cute,” she said, gesturing to his waders.

He glanced down then shrugged, looking back up at her laughing brown eyes. “What? This doesn’t do it for you?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So these
do
do it for you?”

“I didn’t say that either,” she giggled and the sound was like déjà vu. He’d heard that giggle before. Definitely. Somewhere. Was there an actress that giggled the same way Zoë did? Emma Stone, maybe, with her low, breathy voice like Zoë’s? That must be it, because he could swear he’d heard it before.

“You look good,” he said softly, tucking a strand of her glossy black hair behind her ear. “You got some color.”

“A little,” she confirmed, feeling her cheeks flush deeper under his gaze.

“How’d you get so pretty?” he breathed, stepping closer to her.

“Oh, I’m—”

“Don’t say you’re not. I’m big on telling the truth.”

Her face fell, her forehead knitting in distress. He put his knuckles gently under her chin and tilted her face back up to him, surprised to see tears in her eyes.

“Did I say something wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said in a whisper. “You’re just so lovely.”

He heard the soft strain in her voice and pulled her into his arms, closing his eyes as he felt her relax against his chest. He wondered if she was thinking about the guy she’d come to Gardiner to see. He wondered if that’s who made her feel like crying. That must be it. Anger bubbled up inside of him that anyone would dare to treat Zoë as less than the amazing woman she was.

“This guy is not good for you, Zoë.” He drew back and she lifted her eyes to look at him. To his relief, she wasn’t crying, although her eyes were still a little glassy, capturing his with their uncertain, hopeful, heartbreaking depths. “If you were mine…”

Her eyes dropped to his mouth and he watched, transfixed, as she murmured, “If I was yours…”

He could tell her or he could show her.

Simple choice.

He kissed her.

***

Zoë closed her eyes as he leaned over her, claiming her lips with his. He tightened his arms around her, pulling her body flush against his, and she slid her flattened hands up his chest until they rested lightly on the throbbing pulse on either side of his throat.

She was terribly in love with him.

And it
was
terrible.

It was terrible that she had lied to him. It was terrible that she would eventually have to tell him the truth. It was terrible that she didn’t know how to make it all okay. It was terrible to love so hard. It was terrible to want this much. It was terrible to know that she would never, ever love someone as she loved Paul Johansson.

His tongue slipped through her lips and all thoughts slipped from her head. She arched her back to fit better against him, and he held on tightly to her, pressing her up against the hardness between his thighs and pillaging her mouth with his tongue. He stroked the satin muscle of her tongue then nipped at the soft skin of her lips, blowing her mind with the savage heat that they generated simply by touching.

She ran her hands through his thick blond hair as his hands moved from her back to her hips, his fingers slipping under her t-shirt to touch the soft skin underneath. Her fingers tensed in his hair momentarily from the sharp sweetness of the sensation and she moaned into his mouth, wanting more, wanting his hands all over her body. With increasing passion, she dug her hands into his—

“Excuse me! This is a public park! Oh, really. This is disgraceful!”

Paul pulled back from her abruptly and her eyes flew open. She caught his startled expression, staring at someone behind her with a mixture of surprise and chagrin sweeping across his flushed face. She dropped her hands to his shoulders and felt them lightly shaking under her fingers; with one look at his face, she realized he was chuckling inside and trying very hard not to break into gales of laughter on the outside. She held onto him, feeling herself dissolve into quiet giggles, finally resting her forehead on his chest as her shoulders shook.

“S-Sorry, ma’am,” she heard Paul say, his voice just keeping it together as his chest still trembled lightly, rippling against her with silent laughter.

“Well, I should say so! Making out like the world is ending. There are children milling around!”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Paul, his voice merry under contrition, another round of trembles making Zoë giggle harder. “Poor judgment.”

“Indeed. Just…get a room. Or keep it clean.”

Zoë snorted lightly against his chest, unable to keep the giggles under control.

“Yes. A clean room. Thank you.”

Paul stepped back then, taking her hand and pulling her away from the sour-faced, grumbling grandmother behind them.

“Thanks for letting me take the fall,” he said, grinning at her when they finally got to the trail at top of the cliff.

“No problem,” she giggled, pushing a flyaway hair out of her face.

Paul caught it and tucked it behind her ear, leaning down to give her a short kiss on the nose before sighing heavily.

She drew back from him to look in his eyes.

“Don’t say you’re sorry,” she said, grinning at him, loving the way the sunshine made his hair sparkle like gold.

“I’m not,” he said, searching her eyes, his smile fading. “How come you couldn’t have come to Gardiner a month ago, Zoë?”

She shrugged.

“The guy…” he started.

“Don’t think about him,” she answered, biting her lip, loving the way it attracted his eyes like a magnet when she did. “Things have changed.”

“But you came here for him.”

“And found you.”

He put his hands on her hips, pulling her to him, resting his chin on her head.

“Zoë,” he breathed and she heard the deep emotion in his voice.

“Can we just be in the moment?” she asked softly, recklessly against his chest. “Just for today? Just pretend we’re both free to do whatever we want. Can we do that? Couldn’t we do that?”

He leaned back, smiling at her and nodding.

“We could do that.”

Then he took her hand and led her carefully back down the trail to join Jane and Lars for lunch.

***

The ride home found Jane in the front seat with Lars, playing music and trading whip-fast banter, while Zoë sat tucked up against Paul, her weary head on his shoulder, his arm around her.

Jane and Lars had been thoroughly composed by the time he and Zoë had reached them for lunch, although the careful observer might have noticed the twigs in Jane’s hair and Lars’s heavy, slightly frustrated-looking bedroom eyes.

Yup
, remembered Paul, turning to look out the window.
There had definitely been shenanigans.

Lunch had been high-spirited, with plenty of teasing, and he’d loved watching Zoë. She took it all in stride, giggling and rolling her eyes at turns, giving as good as she got, clever with a turn of phrase, her brown eyes warm and sparkling.

Lars had taken Jane’s hand and led her away on the excuse of checking out some rock formations on the other side of the falls, and Paul had turned to Zoë, happy to finally have her to himself. He lay back on the blanket and she lay down beside him, her shoulder barely brushing his, but insanely distracting all the same.

“Hey,” she said after several moments of staring up at the bright blue sky.

“What?”

“Remember this morning? You started to say something and you didn’t finish. Something about wanting…”

He knew what she was talking about, but she had already covered it for him, asking if they could just live in the moment and pretend they were free to do whatever they wanted. That’s exactly what he’d been about to ask her.

He had pressed his arm up against hers, finding her hand and lacing his fingers through her.

“I wanted to ask you over for dinner tonight,” he said.

“Oh.”

“What do you think?”

She’d brought his hand to her lips and kissed it softly before murmuring, “I think yes,” forming the words against the back of his hand, which made her lips touch lightly against his stimulated skin. Then she lowered their hands without letting go, resting them in the small space of blanket between them.

That’s the first time Paul felt it.

In his heart. In his gut. Inconvenient, and yet indisputable.

Not only was he was falling for Zoë, he was letting it happen.

The scenery flew by as they neared the Roosevelt Arch and Jane peeked back to look at them. Paul caught her mossy green eyes and gave her a lazy grin.

“She’s asleep,” Jane half whispered, half mouthed.

“I thought so,” he murmured back.

Her breathing had been deep and even for a good fifteen minutes now. The un-air-conditioned truck was warm from sitting in the sun all day and the breeze from Jane’s window was cool, creating the perfect conditions for sleep. Plus, he imagined that going up and down that hill had been challenging for Zoë. He’d noticed a more pronounced limp once they’d made it back up to the top, long after lunch.