Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
After checking on Cody, Finlay practically floated down the hallway. She couldn’t wait to see Jude. During the day, they were surrounded by people, so it was only nighttime when he was all hers.
And she craved the kind of intimacy he gave. He focused on her, making her feel like the most interesting and sexy woman alive.
As she entered her room, she caught the scent of gardenias and heard the bathtub filling.
What’s going on?
She came to an almost comical stop. Because a dozen candles blazed on every dresser and nightstand.
He found my stash? She’d kept them in a box in the laundry room, not bothering to unpack since she hadn’t seen a need.
Her romantic relationship had ended, and with a houseful of guests, when would she have time alone to read or take a spa night for herself?
Curious, she peeked into the bathroom and found even more candles.
And Jude, standing there in his black jeans and boots, was pouring gardenia-scented oil into the tub. What on earth? She stepped all the way inside to see little pink rubber duckies bobbing on the water’s surface.
Rubber ducks? Could anything be more adorable? She couldn’t believe it.
No one’s ever done anything like this for me.
She pushed past him to get a closer look. “What’re you doing?”
With a startled expression, he jerked upright. “You had a busy day.” He seemed rattled. “I thought you might want to relax.”
“With rubber duckies?” She fished one out to get a closer look. It had an orange beak and was surrounded by a pattern of white hearts. “This is adorable. Where did you find them?”
“At Bazoo’s.”
“When we bought Cody’s clothes?” She remembered that first day, when she’d told him she felt like a rubber ducky floating in a bathtub.
And he bought pink ones. For me.
He calls me Ducky.
He nodded. “They were in a plastic box at the checkout counter. Grabbed a handful while I was paying.”
“You grabbed a handful of pink rubber duckies.” It wasn’t a question. It was a statement. Because she was floored. “This is the sweetest thing anyone’s ever done for me. Thank you.”
“It’s overkill, right?” He gestured to the tub. “Candles and rubber ducks? I should’ve picked one or the other.”
“No, it’s absolutely perfect.” She touched his arm. “Seriously, I love it so much.” Overloaded with her own emotions, it took her a moment to process his discomfort.
He let out a breath. “Do you even like baths?”
It struck her that he’d never had a girlfriend before. He’d never done sweet gestures like this.
But he’s doing it for me.
“I love them.” Holding his gaze, she kicked off her slippers and pulled down her sweatpants.
Seriously, sweatpants? Could she try to be less sexy?
But you know what? With his eyes all hot like that, he practically commanded her to take off her shirt and toss it aside.
As he watched, she unhooked her bra and let it drop.
And there she stood, naked in front of him.
If she had any doubts or insecurities about her body, the color flooding his cheeks banished them.
The muscles in his jaw flexed. His hands curled into fists. “I’ll let you enjoy it.” He started to go but then turned back. “Do you want your book?”
“No, thank you.” She dipped a toe into the hot water.
“I should’ve asked. How do you like your bath?”
“With a hot biker in it.” It was just the right temperature, so she sank down and let it cover her. “Aren’t you going to join me?” Flowers filled her senses, and her skin felt silky and soft.
His gaze was fixed on her nipples, now slick with oil. “Fuck, yeah.” Gripping the back of his shirt, he yanked it off. He kicked off his boots, jerked down his jeans, and then stood there watching, as if unsure what to do.
He was such a confident man, so it was hard to watch him flounder. She lifted her pink-painted toes and splashed the water. “Sit with me.”
Getting in on the opposite side, his big body sloshed water over the edge. “I’m not going to fit.” He tossed out a few rubber ducks.
“You fit just fine.” She pulled on his ankles, stretching his legs as far as they could go on either side of her. Still, his knees poked out of the water like tree trunks.
He lifted her calf and began kneading the sole of her foot. “Did you have a good day?”
It felt so delicious, she tipped her head back and moaned. “Mm hmm.”
“After that guy ruined our time at the Christmas farm, and you thought I was hooking up with someone at the bar, and Cody flipped out over a coyote, you can still say that?”
“Yes, because we got to cut down our own Christmas tree, my hot biker called me his wife, I got to have sex with that same man in a bar”—the naughtiest and most exciting thing she’d ever done—“and Cody got to be loved and cared for by three wonderful men. And then, to top it all off, my hot biker drew me a bath.” She snatched up a floating duck and waved it at him.
“That’s probably a better way to spin it.” Cupping his hands, he doused water on his chest and arms.
As it coursed over his skin, she realized this was the first time she could see his tattoos in the light.
“I remember these.” She sat up to run her fingers around the tribal ink circling his left biceps and covering his right shoulder.
“But you’ve got a lot of new ones.” Her fingertips traced down his chest. “Is this a chevron?’
“Yeah. My rank.” Goose bumps pebbled his skin. “Sergeant.”
“And this one?” It was an upside-down triangle. At the top, it said “First.” In the center, a sword drove through the number seven.
“Battalion and regiment.”
Almost all his ink was black except for one block divided into four squares. “Oh, I like this. Tell me about it.”
“My brothers and I have nicknames. I’m Grizz.” He tapped the bear. “Wyatt’s Honey Badger.” He moved onto the bottom row and touched the football. “Decker’s Clutch, and Boone’s—”
“Hotshot?” She rubbed the flames.
“Good guess.” One corner of his mouth hitched into a grin.
The rush of water when they shifted, the flickering candles, and his big body taking up so much space lit a fuse in her core. Boy, she’d had it all wrong, hadn’t she? Thinking shared goals meant true love.
No, it was wanting someone so badly you’d climb out of your comfort zone to make them happy. Loving them so much you’d work hard to heal your broken bits for them.
Her gaze landed on a design that didn’t fit.
“Wait, what’s that one?” Her brain tried to make sense of it within the context of his other tattoos.
She lifted his arm to get a better look at his rib cage.
“Is that a moose?” It made no sense. Every tattoo was serious, meaningful.
This was a goofy moose with antlers. “That’s so funny because it looks just like a pair of—”
“Slippers. The ones you had when you were eighteen and ran out of your apartment.”
“You remember—” Oh. It took her a moment, but it all clicked into place. “Jude.”
She’d always known there was more to him than the inked, dark, and broody badass, but she’d only seen glimmers. Tonight, he’d given her a glimpse into his soul.
And it was beautiful.
No one had seen this side of him, and he’d chosen to share it with her. “I’m the luckiest woman in the world.” She surged forward and plastered herself across his chest.
He caught her and held on tightly. With a hand cupping the back of her head, he whispered in her ear, “So the bath was a good idea?”
She turned her face into his neck and laughed.
“Very good.” But this position wasn’t comfortable for either of them, so she kissed his cheek and returned to her side of the tub.
“I had no idea you felt this way about me.” But she couldn’t waste time wondering how it would’ve changed her life if she’d known.
Everything had led to this moment. “Any others I should know about?”
“Well, there’s this one.” He twisted around to show a realistic tattoo of a compass and a map. “It’s Calamity. See? This is Wild Wolff Village.”
“I love that. It’s gorgeous.” But she caught something else. “Wait, what’s this one? A whale?”
“Yeah, that was Decker’s stuffed animal when he was a kid.”
“Why did you get that inked on your skin?”
“Just a memory. Of the night we left.” He grew contemplative, lifting his hand and watching water spill out of it. “I’ve never told anyone about it.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.” He shifted, causing a ruckus with the ducks. “It always felt like something secretive, the way we left. There was an urgency.”
“What do you remember?”
“I guess my memories are more feelings than pictures. I knew my mom was in labor. She was having Boone, and there was excitement around that. A lot of movement. Later, though, it changed to something scary. Terrifying. Mom was gone. She wasn’t coming back.”
“And no one ever sat you down and explained what happened?”
“Not really, no.”
“I mean, it’s like Cody, right? How can he make sense of all these changes if no one talks to him? It just lives like a fear inside him.”
He held her gaze for a moment, and she could tell he was letting it sink in.
“The only vivid memory I have is my dad waking me up in the middle of the night, shaking my shoulder, and whispering to go get Decker. I couldn’t tell you what my dad looked like twenty-two years ago or what color my blanket was, but I do remember the urgency. ”
“You understood the assignment.”
“Yeah, exactly.” He rewarded her with a smile that said he liked how well she understood him.
“Do you remember getting Decker?”
He shrugged. “Mostly, the fear in his eyes. That’s what made me go back in and grab his whale.” He tapped the tattoo. “It was his favorite stuffed animal. I have a few flashes of being in a car at night, my dad driving, but nothing else until we walked into the club. And that’s about it.”
“Did your dad tell you why you had to leave so suddenly?”
“The only thing I know is that he was getting his MBA, and he relied on my mom and student loans to handle bills and kids. So when she died, he had no childcare, no income, and four kids.”
“That’s awful.”
“Yeah. He said if the club president hadn’t taken us in—given him food, clothing, beds…childcare—he didn’t know what he’d do. He had a newborn.”
“I can’t even imagine. You know, sometimes I think you’re stuck on the idea of birth order.
That you’re supposed to be the responsible one, but given what happened, it just doesn’t apply here.
No one experienced the trauma the way you did.
Certainly not Boone, who doesn’t remember a thing.
I’ll bet if you talk to your dad, you’ll get a whole other perspective on what happened.
It might help the way you see things.” She laughed.
“Which is great advice from someone who’s all talk and no action. ”
He hooked his hands under her knees and pulled her closer. “You’ve never talked to your parents?”
She had to put her hands on his shoulders to steady herself. “Nope. I can’t think of anything worse than them showing up to something because I guilted them into it. It sucks, but I just don’t rank on their list of priorities.”
“But if you never talk to them, you’ll never know what they’re thinking.”
“Maybe. But nothing can change the fact that I was an accident.”
“What do you mean, an accident?” He sat straighter, sloshing water out of the tub. “They told you that? That’s bullshit.”
She appreciated his outrage but squeezed his hand to calm him down.
“My parents met the summer before college when they were working as ski lift operators. They hooked up a few times, and when my mom got pregnant, they made the decision to have me. They gave up college and tried to raise me together, but it didn’t work.
They’re just too different. My dad’s the life of the party, and my mom—well, you know what?
I don’t know who she’d be without the resentment and bitterness about the way her life turned out.
Bottom line, I stole their futures. And they never recovered.
” She held up a hand. “I don’t mean it like it sounds. They do love me—”
He put a finger over her lips.
She smiled. “I’m doing it again.”
He nodded. “You don’t have to justify or sugarcoat it. You can tell me exactly how it makes you feel.”
“Well, here’s the thing. It took me a long time to figure out I’m not the reason their lives didn’t work out the way they wanted.
” She pushed the damp hair off her shoulders.
“They could’ve gone back to school. If they couldn’t afford a university, they could’ve started at a community college.
They could’ve taken turns. My mom could’ve supported them while my dad got his degree, and then he could’ve returned the favor.
All I know is I’m not the reason they both work at Wild Wolff Village, and I’m not the reason neither of them married again.
It’s just not my fault their lives suck.
I might’ve been an accident, but there were a million different paths they could’ve taken. ”
“Bullshit. You’re no accident.” He rolled on top of her, knocking her back.
Waves of water crashed to the floor. “You’re a gift.
” He crushed her to his chest. “You’re my gift.
” Gripping her ass, he lifted them out of the tub.
“Because I get to kiss you.” He pressed his mouth over hers, softly, sweetly.
“Here.” He left a trail of kisses along the column of her neck.
He carried her to the bed, both of them dripping wet, and tossed her onto the mattress. His body covered hers. “Here.” He covered her breast with his mouth, his tongue swirling over the beaded tip. “And here.”
Her back arched, and she let out a shaky, “Oh.”
He kissed a path down her stomach, leaving a flurry of goose bumps in his wake.
She couldn’t believe this was happening. That this incredible man saw her, wanted her…took care of her.
What she felt was so big. It was need. It was hunger. It was…
Love.
Pure and simple.
Something she’d never truly felt before, and something she could never live without now that she had it.
But would it last? That was the thing. It was their circumstances that drew them together, made everything so intense.
She didn’t think she could bear it if, after their six weeks were up, his feelings faded.
And she was left alone with all these feelings.
It would break her.