Chapter 48 Make Her Stay
make her stay
DUKE
The light pouring through the windows is nothing compared to the light inside of me. The weight I’ve carried for ten years isn’t gone … it’s just lighter. Maybe because I have someone to help me carry it and she’s still curled into me, one leg flung across my hips, her cheek pressed to my shoulder.
Her hair’s a little wild, her lips still swollen from kissing me. She’s breathing deep and even, in that kind of sleep that only comes after being thoroughly wrecked.
Last night, not only did she rock the daylights out of me, she didn’t run when I woke up screaming from another nightmare.
She stayed.
Held me.
And she didn’t even flinch when I broke wide open.
She shifts slightly, murmuring something incoherent as I press a kiss to the crown of her head. Her sleepy eyes find mine, and a slow smile spreads across her full lips.
“Good morning, beautiful,” I say.
She turns and rests her chin on my chest. “Good morning. Were you able to fall back asleep okay?”
I turn to the clock. “Seeing as how it’s after 9 a.m. and I missed the daily runs, yes.”
“Good,” she says, leaning in for a kiss.
“You did drool on me during the night, though.”
She chuckles. “Ah, I think someone else is guilty of that.”
Jameson grunts at the foot of the bed. He’s lying on his back with his tongue touching the comforter, snoring away.
I run my fingers through the strands of her loose hair. “Thank you for last night and the early part of this morning.”
She arches a brow. “Which part?”
“All of it, letting me cry on your shoulder, not letting me scare you off.”
“I told you,” she says, shaking her head. “You don’t scare me. I’m proud of you for opening up. I know that’s not easy to do.
“It felt easier, with you.”
She smiles. “What about the other parts of last night?”
I pretend I’m thinking hard. “Oh, the part where you ripped my shirt off or the part where you bucked me like a bronco?”
She laughs, climbs on top, and lets out a startled sound when I flip us. Now she’s beneath me—warm, breathless, a gorgeous mess—and the sight of her there sends a jolt straight through me.
I kiss her, softly at first, and then with more hunger. We slowly peel out of our clothes and tumble in the sheets. We make love, but it’s not a frenzy like last night. It’s a slow burn of tangled limbs and whispered yeses.
We move through what’s left of the morning like we do this every day.
We shower together, and she tells me about parts of her childhood growing up in Colorado.
The good, the bad, and the ugly. Her father leaving to go chase Everest. Her mother trying to navigate that sudden shift with Roxanne and her brother. Living in a log cabin in Summit County.
“That’s when I stopped loving nature so much, living so remote … I hated it. I was always so jealous of school friends who had lawns and garages.”
“I never thought a garage would be a source of teen jealousy.”
She chuckles. “You don’t understand. When I’d come home late at night, I’d have to park to the side of the house in the dirt and then listen for the sounds of a bear or mountain lion creeping around. A bear chased my mother and I once when we were unloading groceries from the car.”
“Shit, that’s never even happened to me all the years I’ve lived here.”
“The feeling of loneliness was worse. There weren’t any kids on my street, hell, we didn’t even really have a street. My brother and I were alone a lot because my mother worked two jobs.”
My heart sinks hearing this.
“Every day felt like we were camping,” she continues, “and that’s why I wanted to live in the city.”
“But the city has people and people are terrible.”
She laughs and dips her head as my hands slip to her shoulders to give her a massage.
“People can be terrible, but for some reason, a city full of them versus open spaces made me feel safer. A man losing his mind on the A train is still more predictable to me than wondering if a mountain lion is stalking me in the brush. Colorado is beautiful, but it only represents the loneliness and loss from my childhood now.”
I’m glad I’m standing behind her so she can’t see my expression shift into a frown. Hearing her say this kind of ruins my plan of convincing her to move back here after she gives the pitch.
“I’m sorry,” is all I manage to say to her as I lather the shampoo in her hair while she soaps up.
She shrugs. “Don’t be.”
“At least your mother and you are close, and you have a great stepdad like I do. Lean your head back.” I take the spray nozzle of the shower head and rinse her hair.
“Yes,” she says, closing her eyes. “We’re very close.”
“Can’t wait to meet them,” I say.
Her lips part and she lifts her head back, the corner of her mouth tugging up. “Me too.”
While it seemed like showering together would save water, we don’t manage to get out of there without making each other cry out in ecstasy.
Once we are dried and clothes back on, we head downstairs where Jameson is waiting in the kitchen.
He stomps his foot in his food bowl, but I know this game very well.
“You can’t fool me, boy,” I say, grabbing the bag of coffee and getting my French press ready. “I already got up and fed you early this morning.”
Roxanne heads into the library to check her emails and once the coffee pot makes its final gurgle, I pour two mugs—one for her, one for me.
I remember the tradition I started when I would bring her a cup of coffee with a little Post-it Note.
When I dig through my kitchen junk drawer looking for my notes, my fingers find another piece of paper instead.
It’s the consent form she gave me after one of our early conversations, back when she was still all business and I was still pretending I didn’t want her anywhere near me.
Once she decided to stop pressuring me about it, she handed it over and said, “When you’re ready.”
Well, I’m ready. I admit I didn’t trust her when she first got here. I didn’t think she cared enough, but I know now that she is looking at the story of Firebird with her whole heart.
I grab a pen, scribble my signature, fold it once, and tuck it in the back pocket of my jeans. I then decide to further impress Roxanne by drawing a picture of two stick figures holding hands on a Post-it Note.
It’s a masterpiece.
“You’ve got mail,” I say, setting the mug beside her.
She looks up, sees the note on top of the coffee cup and smiles.
“You know, I really missed these,” she says, fingers brushing the corner of the Post-it. “I think this is by far my favorite one, though.”
“Yeah?” I reach into my back pocket. “I think this note’s better.”
I set the form on the desk, and she unfolds it, her expression shifting. Her eyes flick back and forth from me to the paper. “Duke … you signed it?”
I take a sip of coffee. “Yes. I trust you’ll tell my part of the story the way it needs to be told, and as long as you protect Stedman, I’m good with it.”
I swear her eyes get a little misty when she stands and comes to me. “Thank you. This is only going to help the ranch.”
“I didn’t do it for Firebird. I did it for you.”
She plants a soft kiss on my lips and circles back to the desk. “What’s the plan for the rest of the day?”
“Need to check in with Rusty and Topper and catch up on some things since I was gone, but there’s a cookout tonight.”
“Can’t wait.”
I kiss her goodbye, load Jameson in the golf cart, and head to the main lodge where Rusty said he and Topper would be after they finish with a new hire who will be helping as a ranch hand this fall.
The drive to the main lodge isn’t long, but today it feels endless. Maybe because I can’t shut my head up.
Roxanne only has a week left.
Seven days of mornings and coffee, seven nights of falling asleep with her beside me.
It’s not enough.
I thought I could let her go when summer ended.
I can’t. I want the middle-of-the-days, the little fights about the dishwasher, the smell of her perfume in my house forever.
Hell, I’ll follow her to New York if I have to.
I’ll sit in the back of the room while she makes her pitch, but I’m not letting her walk away without a fight.
Plus, the damn turkey is not going to be the same if she leaves forever.
Thankfully, the new hire is already gone by the time I storm into the conference room while Rusty and Topper finish chatting.
“Stop what you’re doing, we have a situation,” I say, bursting in through the glass doors.
“How about ‘Good morning, stop what you’re doing, we have a situation’?” Topper says, glancing up from his paperwork.
“What’s got your feathers in a ruffle now?” Rusty asks.
“Don’t say you’re in love,” Topper says.
“I’m in love,” I reply, finally taking a seat.
“What did I just say?” Topper says.
I know he’s razzing me, but I don’t have time for games. “I love her. Mercy mild, I love her. What am I going to do? Do I … I … con her into marrying me? Lock her in a tower? Chain her to the bed so she can’t leave?”
“Hmmm.” Topper narrows his eyes and rubs his chin. “Since you’re not a medieval dungeon master, no. How about starting with a more modern approach like having a conversation with her?”
“No good,” I say, pulling out a chair.
Topper tents his eyebrows. “No good?”
“She might be fond of our boy here, but she’s not fond of Colorado,” Rusty adds.
Topper scratches his stubble. “Yeah, I’m in the same boat.”
“So, Hotshot, what are you going to do when Allie pulls up stakes?”
Topper gets quiet and the corners of his mouth fall. I know my friend, my brother, and I can tell that he’s just as torn up.
“Neither of us thought we’d be falling in love this summer, did we?” I say, patting him on the back.
“Nope, but hey, we’ve still got a week. Hopefully, we’ll figure something out by then, and if we don’t, I will chain Allie to my bed.”
“You boys better figure something out,” Rusty says. “Not sure I can do with you both being lovestruck at the same time. We’ve still got a ranch to run.”
Topper and I both exchange looks and then smile.
“For now, cheer up, sons, and enjoy the cookout tonight. Going to be lots of food, dancing, and fun. Wish my dancing partner was here, but that’s the breaks, I guess.”
I glance at my stepdad and smile as I’m reminded that he’s lovestruck too. Three grown men, all undone by women who’ve turned our worlds upside down.
“You know what?” I say, standing and clapping my hands. “We’ve got one week to figure this out. Tonight, we celebrate what we have instead of worrying about what we might lose.”
If I only have seven days left with Roxanne, I’m going to make every single one count.