Only for a Night (Lick) (9 page)

Chapter Nine

Spending the second night in a row at her parents’ house should officially qualify Harper for spinsterhood. But, Saturday had been dinner, and tonight was for a party. Yes, all women attended, and they were gathered together to celebrate her cousin Sylvia’s engagement, but there was food and music…so maybe she wasn’t as pathetic as she seemed.

Nah. She should stop by the pet store on the way home and adopt her first cat now.

Hell. Was it possible to annoy herself?

“What’s all the sighing about, sweetheart?” Raquel Shaw bumped the refrigerator door closed with her full hip, another tray full of antipasto in her hands. “That has to be the fourth one I’ve heard since you came in here to help.” Her mother aimed a pointed look at the coconut pie she’d charged Harper with slicing…that had only one cut in it. “What’s wrong?”

Oh nothing. I just can’t figure out a way of performing an emotional lobotomy to scrub away the memories of the man I love fucking me then leaving me
. Somehow she doubted that admission would go over smooth with her mother, so Harper stuck with shaking her head.

“Sweetie.” Her mother set the tray on the butcher block island and slid an arm around Harper’s waist, squeezing. “Is this too hard for you? Being here? Sylvia worried it might be…”

“No, Mama.” Harper hugged her close. “I’m okay, I promise. Please stop worrying.”

The mother-henning could be a bit smothering at times. But Harper never doubted her mother’s love. Her and her father’s affection and protection had been a constant in her life. After Carlie and Terrance’s deaths, Harper had leaned on it. Often. They’d seen their daughter at her worst, and so now that Harper was trying to find her independence and “sea legs” again, they were there, their arms stretched out, ready to catch her if she stumbled. Even if Harper wanted to scrape her knees a few times.

“Asking me to stop worrying is like telling me to stop breathing. You’re my baby.” She cupped her cheeks and smacked a kiss on Harper’s cheek before patting it and turning back to the appetizers. “You know…”

“Oh God.” Harper groaned.

“Shush it. Don’t use the Lord’s name in vain,” her mother admonished. “Now, as I was saying. One reason I’m glad you came tonight is so you can see that even though life holds tragedies, it also brings happiness. Like your cousin. Sweetie, there will be another Terrance out there. You just have to be ready to receive him. You can’t allow grief to close your heart to love or a family.”

Harper closed her eyes, the knife hovering above the dessert, trembling. The Band-Aid she’d slapped over her heart loosened, and the cracks zig-zagged wider. “What happens when you open your heart, and the person you offer it to doesn’t want it?”

Her mother stilled, and chatter from the living room filtered into the silent kitchen. With deliberate movements, she wiped her palms on her apron and lowered to a stool. Folding her hands in her lap, she studied Harper with the dark brown gaze she’d passed down to her.

“Spill,” her mom ordered.

Cursing her wayward mouth, Harper covered the coconut pie with a sheet of plastic wrap and settled on the matching stool.

“When I told you last night that I’d spent Friday evening with friends, I wasn’t being exactly truthful,” Harper confessed.

Her mother arched a black eyebrow. “Exactly truthful? That’s like being a little pregnant. Either you lied or you didn’t.”

“Okay, I was with an old friend. Not plural,” Harper hedged.

“And is this
friend
the one who has you sighing and moody because he broke your heart?”

“Yes,” Harper murmured. “But in his defense, he doesn’t know he has my heart to break.”

“Well that’s two strikes against him already,” her mother huffed. “One, that he hurt you, and two that he doesn’t have the sense God gave a goat to realize there’s a beautiful woman right there who loves him. Who is this
friend
?”

“Mama.” Harper smiled, briefly squeezing her mother’s hands. “He’s…” She hesitated, memories of how her parents had disapproved of her friendship with Rion in the past, giving her pause. “He’s not like Terrance.”

She waved a hand. “Well, of course not. But you can’t constantly compare other men to him…”

“I’m not.” There wasn’t a comparison. “Mama, I loved Terrance. Overall, he was a good man, a provider, and he would’ve been a wonderful father. In the beginning, he made me feel safe, secure, but even if he had lived, I don’t know if we would have stayed married.”

Astonishment widened her mother’s eyes and parted her lips on a soft gasp. “Harper.”

“It’s true, and it hurts me to tell you this because I know how much you and Dad loved Terrance. Even in the short amount of time we were together, we started to drift apart. It started before Carlie, but widened further after we lost her,” she said.

For the first time since the doctor had delivered the news about her baby’s death, Harper uttered her daughter’s name with ease. As if her cathartic confession and grieving with Rion the night before had ripped the scab off the wound so it could start to heal properly. Oh, the pain still existed, but now she could say her baby’s name without feeling as if shards of glass scraped her throat raw.

“Her death damaged something with us that already wasn’t strong enough to withstand a blow.” Harper forced herself to meet the dark eyes so like her own. “Terrance…hurt me.” At her mother’s soft and outraged gasp, Harper quickly covered the other woman’s hand with her own, squeezing tightly. “Not physically. He never lifted a hand toward me, but emotionally. He could be cold, distant…critical. I wanted the affection and easy love that you and Dad have, but instead I was lonely, hungry for intimacy, for…acceptance. Terrance may have provided a home, clothes, and food… He may have given me financial security and safety, but my heart wasn’t safe with him. He wounded me in a way that made me not just doubt my femininity, but ashamed of it. He
hurt
me.” Repeating the words were cathartic, an affirmation of the truth. Of the fact that he should’ve cared and loved all of her, not made her feel dirty for her desires and needs. That he’d been wrong. Not her.

“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. I thought you two were happy. I didn’t see…” her mother whispered, her voice faltering as moisture glistened in her eyes. “I’m so sorry I didn’t see.”

Harper expelled a heavy—cleansing—breath. “You have nothing to apologize for, Mama. And it’s okay;
I’m
okay. Really.” And she was. She could admit the true state of her marriage and not feel as if she’d been rubber-stamped with failure. “Also, now I can admit I married Terrance for the wrong reasons. Instead of running to him, I was running from someone else.”

Her mother studied her, understanding dawning. “You were in love with someone else,” she whispered. “But who…” Shock whipped across her expression. “Not the Ward boy.”

“His name is Rion, Mama. Rion Ward. And yes, him.”

“Oh, Harper,” she breathed, already shaking her head.

“No,” Harper said, holding her hand up. She didn’t want to be disrespectful to her mother, but she also couldn’t let her say anything negative about Rion, either. Yes, every time she dwelled on him sending her away the night before last—which occurred every three minutes—her body throbbed in pain, but he was a good man. His one, glaring flaw was that he didn’t love her. “You don’t know him. Not like I do. I understand why you and Dad didn’t approve of him. I didn’t then, but now, I do. In your shoes and with my child, I might’ve felt the same way. But he was—
is
—so much more than where he came from. He’s a protector with an artist’s heart. He wasn’t given anything in life but a hard time, but he refused to let it define him, and he is now a successful businessman. He’s honorable, kind, driven, and if you’re lucky enough to be called his friend, he’s fierce and loyal. And I’ve loved him since I was fourteen.”

Her pulse raced at her throat like a horse at the crack of a shot.

She’d loved Rion with all the angsty passion of a teen and later with the hungry desire of a woman. Even when she’d tried to put him from her mind and heart, he’d just burrowed deeper. Five years ago, she’d delivered an ultimatum, and had lost. And last night, fear had stilled her tongue again.

Trust was the biggest risk. Going to Lick had been about coming alive again. She was never more alive than when she was with Rion. Not just the sex, but him.
He
made her alive. “I don’t want to live the next five years like the last. Without him,” she murmured to herself.

“Raquel, Harper, we’re star—” her aunt Lydia chirped, sailing into the silent kitchen. She skidded to a halt, her wide gaze darting from her sister to Harper. “Uh. Everything okay in here?”

“Fine,” her mother said, not removing her quiet scrutiny from Harper. “We’re fine and will be there in just a few minutes.”

“Okay.” Another quick glance between the two of them, and her aunt backed out the kitchen entrance. Probably to regale the women in the living room with tales of tension and strife between Harper and her mother. She loved her aunt, but the woman was the biggest gossip. “I’ll see you”— she jerked her thumb over her shoulder—“in there.”

“Good Lord,” her mother grumbled, easing off the stool. “We need to get in there; otherwise, she’ll have that whole room believing we were in here rolling in the antipasto.”

Snickering, Harper followed suit, tugged back the wrap on the pie, and quickly finished cutting the dessert into slices. As she lifted the platter, a gentle hand on her arm stopped her.

“I love you, Harper. And all your father and I ever wanted was your happiness.” Not waiting for her reply, she picked up the tray of appetizers and headed into the party. Harper stared after her mother, but then after several seconds, smiled. And joined the party.

An hour later, when the trays of food had been plowed through, the games had been played, and Sylvia wore a veil of tissue paper, ribbons, and bows from the gifts, the doorbell rang. With the raucous laughter filling the room—courtesy of Lydia’s “special punch”—Harper almost missed it. Before she could make a move to answer it, one of her cousins had already leaped up—a pretty impressive feat considering she’d drunk at least three cups of the punch—and disappeared down the hall.

Moments later, she reappeared in the living room entrance, wearing a shell-shocked expression.

“Um, Harper. It’s for you.”

“What are you…” She slowly straightened, the bingo cards from the Meet the Bride and Groom game tumbling from her fingers as a tall figure stepped from behind her cousin.

Rion.

His gray gaze scanned the room, and she waited, breath trapped in her throat, for the moment he found her. And when he did…

God.

The heat. It turned his eyes molten, and from the amount of gasps and sighs in the room, she wasn’t the only one who noticed it.

Uncaring if her family later called her a shameless hussy, she drank him in. Thick, black hair waved back from the sharp, clean lines of his face, drawing attention to his masculine beauty. The dark hair shadowing his jaw and surrounding the sinful curves of his mouth only added to the aura of strength and sensuality that clung to him.

It’d been two days since she’d stroked that powerful, lean body. Since he’d kissed her. Made her body scream. Hell, made her scream.

Those days might as well have been years. Need rolled through her like a steam engine. Her arms ached to wrap themselves around him. She longed to inhale his earthy scent. But the memory of rejection, of the pain he’d inflicted, held her frozen. Glued her feet to the floor.

“Excuse me, ladies, and please forgive me for intruding,” he said, his deep, sex-and-sin voice like a physical caress.

“It’s okay,” one of her cousin’s bridesmaids purred.

Harper shot a glare in the woman’s direction. It would be a shame if Sylvia’s bridal party was down one person.

“Harper.” He held a hand out to her, and another chorus of sighs rose in the air. “Can I speak with you, please?”

She stared at his upturned palm, shock still not ready to turn her loose. Rion stood in her parents’ home. Looking for her. Surely if she pinched herself, she would wake up in her bedroom, shivering, some paid program droning away on the television.

So don’t pinch yourself. Keep your hands to yourself
, a voice urged. Because if this was a dream, she didn’t want to wake up.

“Harper?” he pressed.

“Yes,” she breathed. Wending a path through the enthralled women, she approached Rion. And, after a moment’s hesitation, slid her hand over his. Long, elegant fingers enclosed around hers, and she trembled. Remembering. Wanting. Just what she’d wanted to avoid. Yes, she’d admitted to herself that she loved him. But that didn’t make her a doormat. She wanted all or nothing with Rion. And if he couldn’t give that to her—wouldn’t give that to her—then after he said whatever he’d come here to say, she’d still love him, but she’d also walk away.

Silently, she followed him back down the hallway and out the front door. The warm September night air wrapped around her like a comforting blanket, but did nothing for the somersaults transforming her belly into a trampoline.

Speak. Say something
. But she couldn’t force a word past the emotional noose strangling her. Why was he here? Why had he come after her when the last thing he’d said to her was something about sticking to their one-night agreement?

“Thank you for seeing me, Harper.” He slid his hands in the pockets of his black pants. “I wouldn’t have blamed you if you refused.”

“How did you know where to find me?” Out of all the questions brewing and whirling in her head, this wasn’t by far the most important but the first one that popped out of her mouth.

He studied her, a faint smile quirking a corner of his mouth. “We have an investigator on staff. Finding your home address wasn’t hard. I went there first, but when you weren’t home, I remembered where your parents lived and chanced coming here.”

“An investigator?” She shook her head. “That could be considered stalking in some states.”

His smile deepened. “Probably.” His lips firmed, straightened. “I needed to see you.” He studied her, silent for a long moment. “Harper, I’m sorry about how I let you leave.”