Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
W atching Harper stroll around the house getting ready for her date almost killed me, and when she came downstairs rocking a casual but chic outfit of my favorite tight black jeans and her off-the-shoulder figure-hugging sweater, I almost growled in frustration.
Dorian had buddies down from Maine and I’d invited them over to my place for a game of poker to keep my mind from dwelling on Harper being out. As I set up the card table, I tried hard to hide my irritation at the way both Dorian and his friends checked Harper out, but I could hardly blame them. Knowing she had chosen what she wore for another man annoyed the fuck out of me.
God alone knew how I managed to play it cool, but I reasoned with myself I wasn’t emotionally ready for a knockdown, drag out fight with Harper about dating someone else. Who was I to object, when I had only recently convinced myself there could be more between us?
From how Harper behaved cordially toward me when others were present and ignored me in private, I knew there were fences to mend between us, but the way she soaked up the attention from the others I could see she wanted to make me jealous.
This had given me hope. If she hadn’t cared, she wouldn’t have gone to all the effort of trying to get a rise out of me. She was good, but not good enough to fool a guy who’d been around thousands of women who had tried every trick in the book to make me interested.
Knowing all this wasn’t enough to push past the worry of what Harper already had going with her new guy. How can I have expectations of her when I don’t know if I could give her everything she needs from me ?
Lust and raw physical attraction, friendship and trust, we already had, but did all of that equate to love? If anyone had ever told me in the past, I’d have been so indecisive about being with a woman I’d have laughed, but the future wasn’t only about me, it was Layla’s future too.
Despite Harper igniting feelings in me I thought died with Grace, I still couldn’t help wondering if staying friends would be better than any potential broken romance for the sake of Layla.
“All set, Harp?” Stuart asked from the doorway as Harper fixed a clasp on her earring and picked up the purse she’d left on the chair.
“Yeah, thanks, Stuart.” Turning to address Dorian and his friends, she flashed a beaming smile. “Nice to meet you, boys, see you tomorrow, Dor.” Glancing toward me, she bit her lip and flashed me a smaller smile. “Nice to have you home again, Cole. I’ll try not to make noise when I get back. Can you please make sure Paul doesn’t turn on the alarm? I’ll set it when I get in.”
“You can relay that message to Stuart to text Paul yourself, I won’t see him this evening, we’re going to be busy here,” I shot back curtly, picking up the deck of cards and shuffling them. For a second Harper looked unsure of herself and then turned around and left. Fuck, I hate games.
During the poker game I spent half of my time trying to keep my shirt on my back due to a lack of concentration and the other half checking the clock. Dorian pissed me off when he shared that Harper had sent him two short video clips of Ed Sheeran singing “Perfect.” I took those videos she sent him personally, even though I knew she’d sent them, knowing he’d share them with me. If I’d wanted to impress her, I could have flown her to the UK to meet Ed.
Eventually, at almost 2:00 a.m., I was three grand down because my mind had been on the wrong game all night. Dorian was all in as well and we called it a night.
Seeing the guys out of the house, I glanced down the drive in an absentminded gesture then wondered why Harper wasn’t home. With a wry smirk, I scoffed, closed the door and headed up to bed.
I had barely stripped out of my clothes when I heard the gate buzzer signal Harper’s return. For a second my body tensed, and it was only when my jaw relaxed, I realized how keyed up I’d been because she’d stayed out so late.
When I heard her coming upstairs, I almost opened my bedroom door, but decided that would be a bad idea. Changing my mind, I pulled on some sweats and sat heavily on my bed and turned on my TV. I expected her to go into her room and was surprised when she gently knocked on my door.
Eager to see what she had to say, I wandered over and opened it. Harper stood in my doorway looking very drunk and more than slightly gorgeous. “I just want you to know I had a brilliant time, and Ed Sheeran is a much better singer than you,” she said, her words slightly slurry.
“Yeah, and a good deal less drunk than you, I bet. What kind of guy have you got in tow that lets you get into this drunken state?”
“Fuck you, Cole,” she barked, swiping her hand half-heartedly in my direction. “It’s called fun.” When her hand missed me, she lost her balance and fell forward into my room. Catching her by her waist, I dragged her inebriated body up and onto my bed.
With her flopping like a rag doll, I repositioned her, sitting her on the end of the bed at my side, and I held her up by putting my arm around her back, my hand on her upper arm. I’d never seen Harper get wasted before and I even wondered for a second if her date had spiked her drink.
Brushing her long silky hair away from her face, I caught her chin in my free hand and tipped it up to get a better look at her face. Squinting with one eye open to focus, she raised her hand and traced my jawline affectionately with one finger.
“Anyone ever tell you what a beautiful man you are? ”
“Baby, I don’t think you’re in any kind of position to throw pickup lines at me.”
“But it did get you to call me Baby,” she responded with slurry speech, and she smiled like she’d won a small battle.
Ignoring her, I focused on her condition. “This Luke is one classy guy who lets his date get so fucking drunk she can’t stand up at the end of the night.”
“Really?” she questioned, staring vacantly at me for a few moments before she drew breath and blinked in slow motion. “Luke didn’t let me do anything. How much I drank was my choice. Unlike you, Luke doesn’t tell me what I can and can’t do. I don’t work for him.”
“All right, so you let this guy think you’re a lush?”
“You’re jealous because he’s hot and available and you’re not.”
“And now you’re talking nonsense,” I chided.
“Not nonsense,” she slurred, as she hiccupped and blinked again.
“You don’t even know what you’re saying.”
“Sure I do. Luke likes to fuck me, and you wish you were him, only you can’t allow yourself to act on what we both know you feel in here,” she told me, taking her hand off my face and poking a finger at the center of my chest. I growled that she’d let him inside her already.
Confirming she’d had sex with the guy made me want to vomit, but who was I to judge? My only hope was he hadn’t taken advantage of her while she was drunk.
“Now I know you’re way past smashed with comments like this,” I remarked in frustration, noting the tension in my jaw once I’d stopped talking.
“Oh, I know what I’m saying. And do you want to know why I’m so drunk? It’s your fault. After I slept with Luke I hated myself, because he’s a really, really nice guy. We could go somewhere if I wanted it to, but it won’t because he isn’t you,” she admitted, stroking my face again slowly.
“This isn’t fair, Cole, none of this is fair.” Tears welled in her eyes and from my perspective there was only one thing worse than a drunken female, and that was a crying drunken female.
“Look, let’s get you along to your bed,” I offered, trying to avert her becoming a sobbing mess .
“Yeah, and we know what happened the last time you did that. Anyway, don’t. I’m not finished. The injustice of the sadness in this house is heartbreaking. I’m sad for you, Grace, Layla… what happened to you guys, but this…” she shrugged, her eyes rolling to the top of her head in thought, “this chemistry...” she paused again and inhaled deeply then stared pleadingly into my eyes. “Don’t look at me like that, like you’re being fucking tortured; you know what I mean? Don’t deny what you feel about me.”
She wasn’t in any position for us to have the kind of conversation I wanted to have with her. “Go to bed, Harper. We’ll talk tomorrow—”
“No! I want to talk now,” she demanded and attempted to hold herself up. Flopping again, her head landed on my shoulder and she passed out. It was as if she’d used the last of her energy to assert herself. I sighed, wondering how to get her back to her room.
Glancing at her limp body, I knew she’d be a dead weight. Although I could carry her easily enough, I was concerned about leaving her. What if she gets sick and chokes in the night?
Moving her onto her back I gently removed her shoes and her jacket, being careful to leave her clothes on, then I picked her up and lay her on my side of my bed. Turning her onto her side, I stuffed two pillows behind her back to prevent her from rolling and pulled the comforter up to her neck.
Walking around the bed, I climbed onto Grace’s side and lay staring in the dark at Harper’s silhouette lying beside me.
Grief was exhausting and the climb to recovery steep, but the previous few weeks had taught me life was for the living. With that mindset I slid slowly into a restless sleep, deciding if I wanted Harper, I’d have to take a leap of faith and hope the rest would figure itself out in time.
Startled awake by the bed covers sliding over my body, I rose up on one arm and realized Harper had pulled them all off of me and was lightly snoring. I snickered because I’d never seen her this way… ever. I wo ndered how she’d react when she woke up and found herself in my bed. My bet was she would be mortified.
Turning to see the time and noting it was almost 6:00 a.m., I slid out of bed, quietly pulled on some jeans and a T-shirt and went down the hall to wait for Layla to wake up. The last thing I wanted to happen was for Layla to find Harper in bed with me.
Like clockwork, a few minutes later she came shuffling out of her bedroom and into her playroom.
“Hey, Baby.” Greeting her in a soft tone earned the same response from her as she mimicked my tone.
“Hey, Daddy, why are we being quiet?” I smiled. She was way too astute for a little kid, but I guessed this was how life was for a child in a world full of adult influences.
“We’re gonna let Harper sleep in this morning,” I informed her in the same quiet voice.
“Good, then I can have as much bacon and maple syrup on my pancakes as I like,” she replied, conspiratorially. I chuckled softly and lifted her up in my arms.
“Sounds like a plan,” I offered, and she grinned in the way kids do when they’re in cahoots with an adult who’s doing something they shouldn’t.
Taking her downstairs and into the kitchen, I saw that Matty had already set up the coffee machine, and the mixture of the smells of that and fresh pancakes made my stomach grumble.
“My goodness, you’re up early,” Matty stated, narrowing her eyes at me.
“What?” I asked pretending to be shocked by her statement. “I want to spend every minute I can with my baby. Is that okay with you, Nosey Parker?” Layla giggled, and I smoothed down her hair as we took our seats at the table.
True to her word, Layla smothered her pancakes until they were swimming in syrup and had four strips of bacon. I didn’t stop her indulgence, figuring everyone should live a little sometimes. Even children.
Strange thing was, I didn’t find Layla’s conversations trivial. I wanted to know as much as I could of her thoughts, encourage her opinions, and figure out what made her tick; but the one thing I noticed above all else was how like her mom she was.
There were these little facial expressions and mannerisms, which had nothing to do with me, but were undeniable traits of Grace, and instead of being hurt when I saw them I felt comforted.
I was thinking about this when Stuart turned up just after 8:00 a.m. and his appearance was timely as Layla was asking about Harper. Needing her to be distracted, I asked Stuart to take Layla for a morning ride, and as he told me he was going into town afterward with Peter and Diane, Layla kind of invited herself to go with them.
This couldn’t have worked out better for me, because with everyone safely off the premises I was free to have the potentially explosive conversation with Harper I knew had been long overdue.
When I opened my bedroom door, I noticed the bedding was neatly in place and Harper had vacated my room. Closing it again, I made my way down to her room and knocked on her bedroom door.
Getting no reply, I opened it slowly and stepped inside and heard water running in the bathroom. I was about to call her when she shuffled through the door. She was startled to see me, and her legs buckled in fright.
“Jesus Christ!” she exclaimed, clearly shocked. “What are you doing skulking about in my room?” Her face flushed immediately, and I knew she was embarrassed about her behavior.
“I’m skulking? I knocked, you were the one who didn’t answer. How’s your head, by the way?”
Instantly, her shoulders sagged, and her blush crept all the way up her neck, before her questioning eyes narrowed in defiance.
“You’ve never seen a drunk woman before?” she asked with a raised brow.
“Oh, yeah, I’ve met plenty of those, but I think when you told me the guy who’s fucking you was a replacement for me, I felt disappointed because I expected more from you.”
Insulted by my comment, Harper flew at me in a rage and I caught her raised hand.
“Never had you down as the violent type, Sweetheart. First you want me, then you don’t, and then you turn up at my door, rat-assed drunk. Are you unstable?”
“If ever there was a man who brought out the worst in me, it’s you,” she admitted.
“Seriously? Why, because I couldn’t be what you wanted me to be when you accosted me in the dark? You think I rejected you because you weren’t good enough? I was a mess, Harper. Parts of me still are, and I felt you deserved better than a man who’s struggling with the collateral damage of cancer.”
“Isn’t that for me to decide? Don’t I get the right to choose?”
“Yeah, of course you do, but I’m so fucking scared of hurting you… of being hurt like that again. Every word you said last night was the truth. None of this has been fair to you. You were dumped in the middle of a clusterfuck with a man so entirely broken it’s taken years of mental reasoning for me to function properly again. You’re young and beautiful and what happened in my life shouldn’t be allowed to taint yours.”
Harper’s eyes softened. “No, it doesn’t, nor was what happened my problem, but I’ve been here since it happened. I’ve seen how your wife’s death almost destroyed you, and if I may speak frankly, there were times when you were a fucked-up, stubborn pain in the ass.”
“Tell me about it, Baby,” I agreed and ran my hand through my hair.
“Sometimes you wallowed in self-pity so often I wanted to scream when I saw what you were doing to yourself. But I’ve been happy to support you and your daughter through all of that because I could never imagine the pain of losing someone like either of you had.”
My eyes softened. “Sweetheart, at first I saw you as a temptation; like you were somehow sent to test my commitment to Grace, even though she was gone. Then I wondered if you were a distraction, and at other times I considered whether this thing between us was because of what you meant to Layla. At those times I wasn’t ready to face the future with her alone.”
“Stop. Please just stop. I don’t want to do this.” Stepping to the side, Harper tried to get out of my way, but I blocked her.
“No, I want you to hear me out. At that time, I wasn’t in control of my own world, so I knew I couldn’t help Layla to manage hers. If I could take back everything that’s happened between us and start again I would, but we both know that isn’t possible.”
Harper fell quiet and I could see her thinking. Her eyes searched the room without focus on any one thing in particular; then she glanced up at me, blushing again. “What did I say?”
“Wow, you really were drunk. You don’t remember?”
“Bits and pieces… mostly pieces,” she replied sheepishly. She winced and shrugged at the same time before she lowered her eyes like she was ashamed.
Taking her hand, I led her over to her bed and I sat us both down.
“Well, I know that you’ve slept with this guy,” I disclosed, my jaw tightening immediately as the words left my mouth. Her guilty eyes darted to mine; yet she had no reason to feel that way. We weren’t together.
“Like you were a saint while you were away,” she shot back. I swallowed as I considered her statement because her assumption was wrong.
“That isn’t true,” I replied honestly, and I hate that you let that guy inside you.”
“If we’d…” She wagged her finger between us. “I would never… but the way you left me…” She shrugged, helpless and lost for words until she added, “You were a dick leaving me like that without a word.”
“I know,” I admitted, feeling like a real asshole, “but I did it because the last thing in the world I had wanted to do was to use you. I’ve voiced it before, Harper; you matter to me. Maybe if it hadn’t been my last night here, and I hadn’t only just been given the letter from Grace… or if I’d made the first move…” I left the end of the sentence hanging because there were too many variables to have made the right decision. Gazing into her gorgeous trusting blue eyes I saw immediate forgiveness.
“Where does this leave us? I mean do I still have a job?” I knew she was joking, and I chuckled, then I tenderly smoothed down her hair. Holding her head in my hands, I looked into her questioning eyes as they searched mine.
“Can I take you out on a date? ”
Harper’s eyes widened, and she smiled. “Seriously? I should kick you in the nuts, Cole Harkin.”
“Yeah, I’m serious, but only if you promise not to be knockout drunk at the end of the night,” I teased.
Looking embarrassed again she laughed softly, “Depends on the company. If you become whiny and boring…” She trailed off, making a smile tug at my lips. My curious eyes ticked over her gorgeous even features for a moment and I leaned in closer.
Tracing one hand over her brow, around her cheek and down her nose, I savored the moment of being able to touch her properly for the first time without feeling riddled with guilt. My mouth watered, and I swallowed audibly at the significance of the moment. I was touching Harper intimately because I felt compelled to.
A soft sigh of relief escaped her lips, and she closed her eyes as she basked in the moment. Tipping her chin higher, I brought our lips closer and our shallow breaths quickened in anticipation of the kiss we both wanted to share. In the end it was me who took the initiative.
Pressing my lips to hers, a soft breathy moan of relief immediately passed them. “Cole,” she murmured as I pulled back and pressed another to the corner of her mouth. Pulling back to take another look at her, I smiled small, then bigger when I saw her smile in return, and then I kissed her again, really kissed her.
Unlike the raw, desperate, lust-filled, frenzied kisses we’d shared in the dark many weeks before, this one was slow and unhurried—a sensual kiss that was different from any other I’d had since Grace.
Palming the soft skin of her jawline, her cheek, I trailed my fingertips up her neck, before I buried them in her hair. Harper’s warm hands explored me in return, sliding under my T-shirt to trace the lines of my ab muscles, smoothing her palms over my pecs, and skating them around to my back. Both of us shivered; reacting to the firey chemistry igniting between us.
It wasn’t long before a burst of adrenaline bumped up my heart rate, and I tore my lips away because one small kiss between us was all I could trust myself with, deciding if we were going ahead and exploring our feelings, then there was a condition attached .
“I’d rather Layla didn’t know about this for now, and I want you to know it’s not because I don’t think we’ll go anywhere—”
“No, I get it,” Harper quickly agreed. “We shouldn’t risk disrupting her. You don’t have to worry, no matter what happens, I’ll be in Layla’s life for as long as she wants me to be.”
Relief washed through me, because although it wasn’t a very romantic start, the decision to keep our feelings a secret at least until we knew what they truly were, felt like the right thing to do.