Page 26 of Spark of Attraction

Still no answer.

With the storm coming in across the light, even though the sun wouldn’t set for another hour, the clouds turned the house gloomy so I switched on the hallway chandelier. Light blazed, hundreds of prisms sparkling across the hall, into the living room, and up the stairs. The ornate Victorian chandelier had turned out to be original to the house, with 24 bulbs and too many Baccarat crystals to count. After Malcolm had taken the fixture down to update the wiring and I’d realized it was in desperate need of a cleaning so made it my mission to clean each individual crystal and had tried counting them but lost track. I also discovered it was worth several thousand dollars, according to an appraiser. Josh had encouraged me to accept their offer and buy something more energy efficient. As if.

Its light made the newly sanded and stained floor shine too, and highlighted the new paint on all the walls and ceilings.

I wandered to our brand-new country kitchen with its gleaming quartz countertop, double built-in ovens, and the island I’d dreamed off since I was a teen. But no Malcolm.

I peered out the window to the back yard, to see if he was doing yard work or maybe grilling dinner. Which would be dangerous with the oncoming storm. Maybe he was putting away the lawn furniture to stop it from being picked up by the winds that were now fiercely whipping the trees. But no joy there either.

“Malcolm?” I called again. Worry started to niggle at me. What if he’d fallen or something? I opened the basement door but there were no lights on down there. Malcolm hated that basement and never went down without turning on the lights, and usually kept a flashlight on hand “just in case.” I flicked on the lights—he’d added one at the top and the bottom of the stairs in addition to changing out the single swinging lightbulb that had been the lone source of light down there. I blew out a breath when I didn’t see him lying unresponsive at the base of the stairs.

Maybe he was having a shower and fell? I hurried up the stairs to our bedroom and the massive new ensuite we’d had installed. Empty.

Then I heard something, a small sound, a scuff like a footstep directly overhead. Ah. He must be up in the turret room we’d fitted out to be my office. I went back out into the hallway and opened the small wooden door that revealed the narrow staircase leading upstairs. Malcolm was there, standing in front of one of the windows, overlooking the bay.

I leaned against the doorframe, watching him, admiring him. His hair was longer now, almost touching his shoulders. His beard was longer too—at my urging.

A jagged flash of fork lightning backlit him as it struck something on the island in the middle of Hawkeshead Lake. On its heels, a loud roll of thunder boomed across the water, shaking the window panes.

I must have made a sound because Malcolm turned and noticed me, a smile melting his face. “Hey, Ell. Done for the day?”

“Yup.” I took another step into the room, finally noticing the dozens of candles he’d set out on the mantel of the fireplace we’d had restored to keep the room warm in the winter, along with the massive barrel chair I’d pointed out to him six months before. He’d placed it in the curve of the windows, facing out over the lake, exactly where I would have chosen.

He followed my gaze and his grin broadened. “Surprise.”

I walked to the chair, running a hand across the back, over the pillows. It was exactly the color and fabric choice I’d wanted. “How did you get this up the stairs?”

He shrugged in his usual aw-shucks manner. “You said you always wanted to be able to curl up here with a good book or to watch the thunderstorms roll across the lake. More than once. So I figured it would be a nice Welcome Home gift for you.”

I started to tell him that hadn’t answered my question but another lightning bolt struck, causing the lights to flicker. I held my breath, counting—this time I didn’t even get to two before the thunder rattled the windows.

Malcolm stepped behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling him against him as we watched the sheet of rain crawl across the lake, obscuring the island, and head straight for us.

“Good thing you got some candles lit already,” I muttered.

“Power won’t go out, remember? We’ve got the generator installed. Besides the sun won’t set for another hour so it won’t get that dark even if the lights do go out.”

“Spoilsport,” I muttered.

“What?” He tilted his head so he could see me better. “The generator was your idea. And it was a good one, especially in the winter.”

I turned in his arms until I faced him, then hooked my arms around his neck. “I like the idea of being stuck up here with you, alone in the candlelight.”

The heat in his eyes, the love filling his expression, overwhelmed me. After a year of being with him, I should be used to it by now. But every time he looked at me that way—and he looked at me like that from the moment he woke up until we fell asleep in each other’s arms, plus a billion times in between—I found myself in awe.

Oh sure, we’ve had our arguments in the past year—like how he didn’t agree with my choice in bathroom tiles or I had a different vision for the front hallway, but nothing major. I said my side. He said his. No yelling, no silent treatment, just talking until we came to an agreement. Sometimes he was right, sometimes I was, and sometimes it turned out neither of us were.

This, this was what love was supposed to be like.

I pressed against his groin and felt his immediate and gratifying hardness in response.

His lips twitched. “Ell? Are you trying to seduce me?”

I pointedly glanced around the room. “I’m not the one who lit all these candles.” Or placed the handful of condoms on the blanket I spied beside the barrel chair. “I’d say you have some plans of your own, Mr. Walsh.”

I jumped when a sizzling bolt of lightning struck something on this side of the lake with no time between the flash and the boom of thunder that made my floors shake along with the windows. “Maybe we should go down stairs.”

“We’re safe here.” Though he tightened his grip on me and pressed a kiss to my forehead. “Don’t worry.”

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