What's Left Behind (16 page)

Charlie tilted his head. A smile tugged at his mouth, but he didn’t look pleased. “That doesn’t sound like Luke.”

“I knew him pretty well.” Maybe Luke wasn’t ready for marriage, but that didn’t mean he was opposed to the practice.

Lying in the dark with his head on her stomach, Luke had told Tessa that during his junior year in high school, Charlie moved into Briar Rose, and Luke thought he’d finally gotten what he’d always wanted: two parents who lived together and never bickered.

Instead, he’d gotten two parents who lived together.

That night in Tessa’s dorm room, Luke had told her he considered the day his father packed his bag and moved out of the B&B the end of his childhood. That night, he’d kissed Tessa’s belly, and shown her his broken heart. That night, Tessa had realized she and Luke weren’t so different after all.

After Charlie moved out, Luke had done some stupid things. Stolen a bottle of Johnnie Walker from his mother’s liquor cabinet and smashed it on the rocks of Head Beach. “Borrowed” Abby’s truck and driven six friends into Boston, two months before he’d earned his license. Given his virginity to an eighteen-year-old girl he didn’t love, maybe hadn’t even liked.

Not all in the same night, but still . . .

Tessa couldn’t bring Luke back to life, couldn’t undo everything she’d done wrong. But maybe she could make sure one of his childhood dreams came true. It was practically a mandate. Love never died. “Luke always wanted you and Abby to get married.”

Charlie sputtered on his water, coughed into his fist, swallowed hard. “I know that, Tessa.”

“He would’ve wanted you and Abby to raise the baby as a married couple.”

“Maybe so.” Charlie offered Tessa a sad little smile. “But did Abby seem ready to run off with me tonight?” he asked. “I don’t know. Give the lady chocolates, and she nearly clocks me.”

The baby tumbled, a slow, strong head-over-butt roll. Tessa’s hand went to her belly, the baby pressed against her hand, and she grinned like a fool. A fool in love.

“What is it? You all right?”

“Come quick if you want to feel the baby move.” Tessa laughed. “He, or she, is practicing fetal gymnastics.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice.” In a flash, Charlie was beside her, down on one knee, a hand on her belly.

Charlie scrunched his face, as though trying to listen. “I don’t know,” he said, and then a smile stretched his face.

When Tessa first met Luke at a dorm party, she’d brushed by him on the way to the keg, slowly, twice. On their first date, she’d worn skinny jeans, high-heeled boots, and a low-cut camisole that gaped whenever she leaned over.
Oops.
And even though she’d waited months to dare taking off her jeans, that hadn’t stopped her from unzipping Luke’s.

If you wanted to catch a guy and keep him interested, you had to give him a taste of how much he had to lose.

Giving the baby to single-mom Abby was a reasonable second-choice option. But if Tessa wanted to give Luke his childhood dream, she’d better convince Charlie she preferred her father’s shit-for-logic contender.

“How would
you
feel if I gave your grandchild to someone else?” Tessa asked Charlie.

Charlie’s smile fell and his jaw set. His eyes gave a single blink of panic before they blanked out. That felt even worse than Tessa had imagined.

Tessa’s thigh tingled. She pictured slicing through her flesh and red beads bubbling from the scar. She imagined never hurting another person as long as she lived. But a girl had to do what a girl had to do. For Luke. “Luke would’ve wanted you to get back with Abby,” she said. “There’s a baby to consider.”

Charlie stood up and brushed off the knees of his pants. “We’ve tried, Tessa, and it always ends up badly. Why do you think this time would be different?” His voice sounded tired, but Tessa also heard hope.

“Because this time,” Tessa said, “you’re not going to bolt.”

Any card-carrying, red-blooded male would’ve killed to be in Rob Campbell’s sneakers.

Rob parked his truck in front of Sugarcoated, grateful the bakery’s lights were out, Celeste’s Closed sign hung in the door, and the baker’s white Forester had vacated its spot for the evening. Abby and Celeste were like family to each other. And from the way Celeste watched over her kids, Rob doubted she’d let him get away with bringing Abby back from a date drunk. Besides, he really liked Celeste’s mini blueberry muffins.

He opened the passenger door for Abby. Even though summer folks wandered the street with soft-serve cones and lobster tans, Abby slid from her seat straight into his arms. Her breasts brushed his chest during descent, giving him a good idea what they’d feel like cupped in his hands—perfect—and making him wonder how they’d respond to his mouth.

“Sure you don’t want to bring me back to Briar Rose?” she asked for the second time, letting Rob know she didn’t realize she’d had too much to drink. A sober Abby wouldn’t have wanted to return to her place of business sloppy-drunk, even though she also looked tastier than any of Celeste’s desserts and hot enough to take right here on the street.

He could’ve blamed his heightened interest on going without sex for longer than he cared to remember. But Rob knew better. His heightened interest was all about Abby.

“Cup of joe, then I’ll take you home,” Rob said, even though Abby had passed on Lobster House coffee and dessert. Did coffee actually sober? Or did caffeine only keep you wide-awake while you buzzed? Wasn’t the supposed coffee cure one of those myths he’d picked up in college and never bothered to debunk? Considering he couldn’t remember the last time he’d picked up a can of Folger’s, maybe a tall glass of ice water would serve to dilute the alcohol.

Abby stepped up onto the raised sidewalk and turned to face him. Her blond hair glowed in the setting sun and formed a golden nimbus around her face. She wrapped a finger around a curl. Her hand slipped slowly, slowly through her hair, fell across her collarbone, and then barely brushed her left breast. The tip of her pink tongue glossed over the swell of her bottom lip. “There’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time. Come closer.”

Rob’s face heated, which should’ve been impossible, since the lion’s share of his blood had already flowed in the opposite direction. “Abby,” he said, as if to protest, but then he stepped till his sneaker brushed the curb, his body responding to the stroke of her voice.

The heel on Abby’s sandals and the raised sidewalk evened their heights, and he found himself staring a straight line into her eyes. Blue, but different than his, more hazy and gray and prettier than the richest granite and—

Abby clasped his face between her hands, leaned forward, and pressed her lips to the scar by his right eye.

Her kiss, soft and warm against his cheekbone, had him imagining what her lips might feel like pressed against another part of his body. Her hair tickled his nose. He inhaled her lemon meringue aroma all the way to his toes, now curling in his sneakers.

“Let’s go inside,” he whispered, and then nearly tripped stepping onto the curb. Two beers with dinner hadn’t registered on his buzz meter, but he still wondered whether he could manage his key in the lock without fumbling. Circulation to his brain had ended.

The entry door to his apartment was to the right of Sugarcoated, leading to a stairway that climbed to his office.

“What’s your star from?” Abby said.

Rob paused, key in the first door. “My what?” he asked, and then he realized what she’d meant. “My
scar.
” He touched the raised skin beside his eye, chuckled. Grace used to call it his star, too. Used to say it twinkled at her, like the star in the children’s rhyme. “Jumped out of bed in the middle of the night and tripped over Bella.” The lock gave, and he gestured for Abby to go up the stairs before him.

Abby bent and slipped off her sandals. She craned her neck, looked over her shoulder. “Who’s Bella?” she asked, and her voice took on a worried tone. Either worried or jealous.

“My dog.”

“Oh, good!” Abby straightened. She dangled her sandals from one hand and scampered up the stairs, giving Rob a perfect view of her ass-hugging jeans.

For the first time in his life, he wished he were denim.

“Pooch used to sleep on the floor, right up against my side of the bed,” Rob said. “Until the night Grace woke up from a nightmare, calling for Daddy, and Daddy went flying. Ever see a tall guy topple? Smacked my head against the side of the dresser. Ever hear a head smack against a dresser?”

Campbell Landscape Design was located to the right of the staircase. Rob turned the key.

“Poor baby.” Abby rubbed his back, as though trying to soothe his old injury. “You never told me you had a dog. Why don’t you bring her around? Bring Bella
and
Grace.”

“Bella died. Had to put her down months ago. Cancer,” Rob said, thinking of his golden girl in her heyday, running back and forth on her line in the yard whenever his truck had pulled into the driveway, and he’d stepped from the cab. Then he thought of his mom, trotting out to his truck whenever he’d bring Maria and Grace by for a visit.

He didn’t want to think about that right now.

The door swung wide.

Abby hugged him from behind, her breasts pressing up against his back. “Poor baby,” she repeated. She didn’t seem to be going anywhere fast, so he twisted around, lifted her by the waist and over the threshold.

Abby let out a high-pitched squeal, letting Rob know he’d found at least one of her ticklish spots. When her feet found purchase, she quieted, took a moment to look around his office, and then slid into his desk chair.

“Comfy.” Abby twirled in his oversized chair, like a kid at the barber. Grinning, she stood and steadied herself against the desktop. “I shouldn’t have done that. Think I need to lie down. Where’s your . . . ?” Abby’s gaze slid to the door, open to his bedroom, aka the smaller room where he housed his overflow filing cabinets and slept on a single mattress with his big feet hanging off the end.

Abby dropped her pocketbook on his desk chair and stumbled to the darkened doorway of his bedroom. She leaned against the door jamb, breasts stretching the fabric of her pink top, hair tussled and shining against the darkness. “I don’t like when things spin,” she said, but it sounded like
sin.
“You coming?”

Nearly.

If his heart were revving any louder, he would’ve had a case of the spins, too. Any red-blooded male would’ve said, “Yes, ma’am. Show me the way.” Instead, he said, “Why don’t I get you a glass of water?”

“Suit yourself,” Abby said, and dove onto his bed.

Closest thing to an out-of-body experience Rob had ever had. Because while he was pouring Abby an ice-cold glass of water from the pitcher he kept in the mini-fridge, a lucky act-first think-later Rob clone was making love to the beautiful woman languishing on his bed.

Rob had to follow his gut. And right now, despite the hell-yes firing his pants, his gut was grumbling with complaints. Funny thing was, Rob’s gut sounded a lot like his father. The weekend before Rob went away to school, Dad had sat him down and given him warnings about always doing his best work, staying away from drugs and alcohol, and treating girls right. Number one on the treat-girls-right list of instructions? Never take advantage of a girl who’d had too much to drink.

Rob had taken all of Dad’s advice to heart.

Rob sat on the edge of his bed and handed Abby the water. “Umm, that looks nice.” She pushed herself to sitting, drained the glass, set it atop a filing cabinet, and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

“I should take you home.” Rob could hustle her into the private quarters of Briar Rose, whisk her past Tessa, deliver her to her bedroom, and then run before his body realized what he was doing.

Abby edged closer. She laid her hand on his lower thigh, slid it higher. That was all it took for his body to sing,
Hallelujah!

“But you haven’t even kissed me yet,” she said.

“True,” Rob started to say, but then Abby’s moist lips were on his, her tongue playing inside his mouth. One hand raked through the back of his hair, sending tremors across his shoulders. The other hand stroked between his legs, firing him to life, and making him strain against the zipper.

“Baby,” he whispered against the curve of her ear, a move straight from his fantasy. Then he worked on her neck, kissing her pulse until she moaned.
Bingo!
He’d hit her sweet spot. Rob rolled her onto her back.

Abby gazed up at him, soft grin on her face. Across his pillow, her hair fanned out, like a mermaid’s hair floating on water. Her breasts stuck straight up, as if they too were afloat. Inside his pants, he was raring to go.

First, he should take off his sneakers.

“Hang on a sec,” Rob said, and turned from Abby to untie his sneakers and wrestle them from his feet.

When he turned back around, Abby was sitting up. Her T-shirt lay balled on the pillow. A lacy pink bra barely restrained her breasts. A bow accented one of those impossible-to-navigate center clasps. As soon as Rob met Abby’s gaze, she, one-handed, popped the clasp.

Even better than his fantasy.

Full and round, with perky tips any red-blooded male would die for.

Abby was so much more than a fantasy.

With steady hands, he reached for her breasts, took the clasps in either hand, and pressed them back together with a
snap.

The sound of the red-blooded males club retracting Rob’s membership.

Abby’s sleepy eyes flashed open. Her face went from pleasure-me pleased to mortified. “You don’t want me?”

“Baby,” he said. “I want you.
Sooo
bad.”

“But,” she said, reminding Rob of their conversation at the Lobster House that had gone down a similar road. One minute they were all lovey-dovey, the next Rob had volunteered for a dunce cap and a seat in the corner.

“But you’ve had too much to drink. I want you, but not like this. You don’t know what you’re doing. You can’t make an informed decision,” Rob said, remembering his father’s long-ago lingo. Sex with a girl, or woman, under the influence wasn’t playing fair. You needed a clear mind to make life-altering choices. That rule applied to whether a woman was too drunk to consent to sex, or whether cancer and chemo had fogged a woman’s brain so she shouldn’t have been allowed to give her oldest son power of attorney. Thing was, Mom hadn’t been foggy the day she’d signed the paperwork. Had she?