Chapter 10
Riley showered and changed into clean jeans and the striped sweater his mother had sent him for Christmas. He put on a little cologne and was on his way to a clean getaway when Finn emerged from the shower, towel around his waist and dripping all over the place.
“Off to see your girlfriend?”
“She’s not my girlfriend.”
“Yet.”
“Okay, see you later.” Riley was in no mood to spar with his brother tonight, not when he’d been waiting all day to see Nikki again.
“You going to Janey’s?”
“That’s the plan.”
“Are you bringing her?”
“Probably. Don’t be a dick if I do, you hear?”
“I’ll try not to be.”
“Try hard.” Riley zipped up his coat. “And mop up the puddle you made on the floor, will you?”
“Yes, Mommy.”
Rolling his eyes, Riley went out the door before Finn could say something else to irritate him.
On the drive to Eastward Look, Riley ruminated over the way his brother had been getting under his skin lately before his thoughts naturally turned to Shane.
He’d lived through a nightmare with Courtney, and now this…
Riley hadn’t known Courtney very well. He’d met her at their wedding and seen her a few times after that at family events.
He remembered how happy Shane seemed with her, how his cousin had had his arm around his wife any time she was nearby.
And he recalled how low Shane had been after it all went sideways.
The entire family had been gravely concerned about him.
Riley knew that Kevin had spent many a day trying to get through to his nephew, without success.
Only when Laura begged Shane to come help with the renovations to the Surf had his cousin seemed to rally.
Witnessing Shane’s unbearable agony had been a good reminder of the many reasons it paid to remain stubbornly single. At the time, he couldn’t have imagined giving another person the power to flatten him the way Courtney had done to Shane.
But as he pulled into the long driveway that led to Nikki, he began to understand that something had shifted in him since he met her last fall, a door had opened to the possibility of taking that kind of chance.
Then she’d disappeared before he’d gotten to know her.
And why her and not the hundreds of other women he’d known in his life?
That was a mystery he couldn’t easily solve. All he knew was that something about her made her different from everyone else, and he wanted to know her better—perhaps better than he’d ever known anyone else.
The thoughts, coming one right after the other, frightened him. This was all new territory for someone who’d gone out of his way to avoid anything that smacked of commitment or permanence.
He was still sitting in the dark staring at her front door when his phone rang, startling him. The caller ID showed his former boss’s name.
“Hey, Clint,” Riley said. “How’s it going?”
“Not so great, to be honest. I’m just coming off another shitstorm of a week in which everything that could go wrong did.”
“Wow, sorry. What happened?”
“Incompetence, negligence and downright stupidity, to name a few things. Listen, Riley… I know you and your brother are happy out there on your island, but I could sure as hell use you guys back here. I just fired another foreman, and I’ve got another one hanging by a thread.
I need people I can freaking count on, and I’m willing to double whatever you’re making now to get you back on the job. ”
“I, um… I don’t know what to say.”
“Say yes. Come back and bring your brother. I need you guys.”
Clint Davis had been very good to Riley and Finn, employing them from the time they were in college until they took vacation to come to Gansett for Laura’s wedding and ended up staying when Mac offered them jobs.
They’d also wanted to stay close to their dad in the immediate aftermath of their parents’ breakup.
A few months turned into a year, and now they were well into a second year on the island.
“Let me talk to Finn and my cousin, who we’re working for now. We’re into some pretty big things out here with a new family business in the works.”
“I’ll take whatever I can get. Let me know, okay?”
“I will. Sorry things are fucked up there.”
“Me, too. I’ll look forward to hearing from you guys.”
“Take care, Clint.”
Long after he ended the call, Riley sat in the cold, pondering the complexities of timing.
Then Nikki opened the inside door and turned on the porch light, and the sight of her cleared every thought that wasn’t about her from his mind.
He got out of the truck and jogged to the stairs, taking them two at a time in his haste to be with her again.
“Hey,” he said, smiling when she opened the storm door for him.
“Hi there. I saw your lights coming down the driveway. Were you on the phone?”
He followed her into the kitchen. “Yeah, sorry. My old boss called.”
“No worries. I knew it was you. The big yellow plow on the front of your truck is a giveaway every time.”
“I’m going to need it tomorrow night, according to the weather reports.”
She opened a beer for him and put it on the counter. “What’d your old boss want?”
He noted that she’d gotten some Amstel Light for him. “Me. And my brother. Back to work in Connecticut, for double what we’re making now.”
“Oh.” She turned to the stove. “Are you going?”
Did she seem disappointed or was that wishful thinking on his part? “I don’t know. I like what I’m doing here, and I think Finn does, too.” He hadn’t intended to tell her about his ex-boss’s call, but he found himself spilling the details anyway. “Something smells good.”
“I hope you don’t mind that I cooked.”
“Trust me. I don’t mind. What’d you make?”
“Nothing fancy. Just pasta.”
“Works for me. Thanks for doing that.” With her face flushed from the heat of the stove—or at least he thought it was that—he wanted to put his arms around her.
He wanted to hold her and kiss her and show her how happy he was to see her.
But something stopped him from acting on those urges.
He’d already accepted that the first move, if there was one, would have to come from her.
He hoped that someday she’d tell him what had hurt her in the past, so he could do his best to make sure nothing ever hurt her again. Caring that much about a woman was definitely a first for him, but something about her made him want to shelter her, to protect and comfort her.
“Riley?”
He realized he’d been staring at her. “What? Sorry.”
“Is something wrong?”
“Wrong? No, definitely nothing wrong.” He took a step toward her, drawn to her like he’d never been to anyone else.
She seemed breathless as she looked up at him while standing guard over a pot of sauce.
He reached out to swipe a smudge of sauce from her cheek, smiling as he did it.
“Jordan says I’m the messiest cook ever.”
“I think you’re the sexiest cook ever.” There.
He’d done it. Thrown down a gauntlet. Changed the ballgame.
He held his breath, waiting to see if she’d meet him halfway.
Hell, he’d take a quarter of the way after months of thinking about her and days of dancing around the fact that he wanted her. Badly.
She glanced up at him, looking madly vulnerable. “You really think so?”
He took another step toward her. “I really, really do.” Running a finger over her face, he focused on the pink hue that had left her with a rosy glow.
“I… um…” She swallowed hard. “I kinda suck at this.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I really do.”
Riley shook his head and moved his hand ever so slightly to cup her cheek and tilt her face upward. It cost him tremendously to wait for some sign, any indication that she wanted him to kiss her. He thought he’d go mad in the seconds it took for her lips to part and her gaze to shift to his lips.
He took that as a green light to proceed, but he moved carefully, not wanting to spook her or ruin his chances with her by asking for too much too soon.
The last freaking thing in this world he wanted was to scare her, so he gave her the softest, sweetest, gentlest kiss he’d ever given anyone, completely unprepared for the wildfire that sweet kiss set off inside him.
With both hands now framing her face, he leaned his forehead against hers, hoping she would come back for more.
Her hand curled around his neck, and her fingers in his hair made him tremble from the effort it took to hold back, to wait for her.
Then she licked her lips, and the movement of her tongue over her bottom lip moved into first place as the single most erotic thing he’d ever seen.
Without making a conscious decision to proceed, he came down as she moved up, their lips meeting in a frenzy of need that had him pulling her closer to him, greedy for more after waiting so long to taste her.
The metal spoon she’d used to stir the sauce fell to the floor with a clatter that he ignored as her tongue met his in a sensual, desperate dance.
Holy shit. Hottest. Kiss. Ever.
With his hands on her ass, he lifted her, deposited her on the counter and leaned in for more, kissing her until his lips were numb and his dick was so hard, it ached.
Too much, too soon. The refrain echoed through his mind, reminding him he needed to take it easy with her, to respect the hesitancy he’d sensed in her from the beginning.
Though it was the last freaking thing he wanted to do, he eased out of the kiss, turning his focus to the elegant length of her neck.
“You are so sexy, so beautiful, so sweet,” he whispered, making her shiver. He loved that little shudder that rippled through her.
“Riley…”
“Hmm?”
“The pasta… It’s boiling.”
“The pasta isn’t the only thing that’s boiling.”
She laughed and eased him back from her with her hand on his chest before jumping down from her seat on the counter to tend to the stove.