Page 61 of Tempting as Sin
“I don’t, though. Too muddy. Changed it for tomorrow, and my body’s glad to hear it. That also might mean that you could come with me, since I hear your seat on a horse is worth watching, and I’m guessing it’s true.”
“I’d love to go riding,” she said, sounding absolutely wistful, “even though I should work on my yard instead. The lawn needs mowing, and so many other things. I’m sure there are tree limbs down, too. I need to get those stacked up for when I can use the chainsaw on them. You don’t want to help with my almost-farm. I’m not going to believe that.”
“Lily,” he said with a sigh. “Don’t tell me you only love me for my body. I’m trying to keep this on an elevated plane, even though you’re not making it easy. I’m giving you a romance, remember? Romance requires effort. That’s the definition. I’m stuck up here on the mountain, hiding out from my eager public. I can pull weeds. I can stack wood. I can feed chickens and gather eggs. I can mow a lawn, and I can use a chainsaw. It’s my day off. Get dressed, and we’ll get going.”
She was finally smiling. “Want to learn to milk a goat?”
“It’s not exactly Sir Galahad,” he said, “but it’ll do.”
Lily couldn’t figure Rafe out. He really did seem just fine with feeding and watering the chickens, not to mention mucking out the goats’ stall. When she said something, though, he answered, while pitchforking dirty straw into a wheelbarrow, “I’m from an Army family. An Aussie family. My mum keeps chooks—chickens, and she always had a veggie garden, even if it was just a patch of earth. I’m no kind of flash fella.”
“Except that you are.”
He looked at her from over his shoulder, and then he tossed another forkful of straw into the wheelbarrow and said, “Think what you like.”
“Rafe.” After that, though, she couldn’t think of what to say. She’d been right at the beginning, clearly. “I can’t afford to do this,” she finally said. “To…”
He stood up straight, set the pitchfork against the wall, and grabbed the handles of the wheelbarrow. “To fall in love. No worries. I got it. We’re friends. Nearly in-laws. And since I’m a friend who grew up with a gardening mum and chores of his own, I’m going to dump this on the compost pile and then go get some breakfast sorted.”
“Wait,” she said, and he stopped, but didn’t turn around. “Could you wait?” she asked him. “Ugh. I need to finish milking. I can’t even have a…” She was tearing up. Her stupid, oversensitive heart again. “I can’t even have a fight, or whatever this is. I need to finish this first. Goats don’t wait. I’m no good at fighting anyway, especially when I know I’m wrong. You’ll win.”
“Go on and finish,” he said. “I’ll come back. You can say what you have to say. There’s no winning and losing, not if we do it right. A fight doesn’t have to mean somebody walks away hurting.”
He was back in a minute, before she even had time to digest that, and was silent as he spread fresh straw in the stall, then picked up the egg basket and dirty milking pans and walked beside her to the house. She took her boots off at the back door while he did the same, and when they were in the kitchen, he said, “Now. Tell me.”
She didn’t want to. She wanted to rewind to last night, to the lover who’d eaten a lazy picnic in bed with her, had fed her bites of his chocolate mousse when she’d said she didn’t want a whole serving, “just a taste.” Who’d smiled at that, and hadn’t cared that she’d eaten half. Who’d kissed her with so much sweetness and made love to her with so much patience and so much hunger. She didn’t want to try to explain herself to another too-successful man who had it all, because he’d earned it.
When she didn’t go on, he said, “Maybe you could start by telling me why you didn’t want me to keep Chuck. Not yesterday when I offered, and not today.” The animal in question was banging his cone against Rafe’s leg at the moment, until he dropped to one knee and put an arm around him.
Kindness. Kindness still killed her.
She placed eggs into cartons and stacked them for the food bank, put the milk pans into the dishwasher, and tried to think about what to say. The only thing she could think of, though, was the truth.
“Having him here at night helps me,” she finally said, not looking at Rafe. “This…thing happened last year, when Paige was here. It’s been hard to sleep ever since. It comes back at night. Last night, it didn’t, because you were here. Because of the way you held me. And it’s so…” She tried to shove her hair back, but it was already in a ponytail. “Sostupid.”The tears were there again.Damnit. “Like I need a security blanket. But Chuck helps, and I don’t have to tell him why. He makes me feel safe, which is dumb, because Iknowthere’s nobody after me anymore. But he does.”
“Tell me,” Rafe said. Still on a knee beside Chuck, his hand stroking the dog’s shorn fur. Chuck clearly recognized a security blanket when he saw one, because he lay down with a loud sigh and laid his cone on Rafe’s bare foot.
“I don’t know how much you know about what happened, with Jace and Paige and me,” Lily said. “But it’s been hard for me to go into your cabin ever since, because that was where it ended, and I don’t want to go upstairs at all. That was where the scariest stuff happened, you see. I ran there in the dark, through the woods, to be safe, and I wasn’t safe at all. Every time I’m in that house, I feel it again. Waiting to…to die. Hearing that voice call out, telling me I was a coward for hiding. I knew I was a coward. I was frozen, hearing that I was dead. I was waiting to be dead.KnowingI’d be dead.”
She was shaking. Just saying the words brought it back.
Now, Rafe got up, came to her where she stood in the kitchen in her overalls, wrapped his arms around her, and said, “Shh.” His hand on her head, stroking over her hair.
She lost it. Her throat closed, and the tears came. She stood and shook and sobbed, and Rafe rocked from foot to foot, held her tight, and didn’t say a word.
“I…can’t,” she gasped. “I can’t.”
“Shh,” Rafe said. “You can. No worries, baby. No worries. Go on and cry.”
So she did.
Rafe hadn’t wanted a woman with baggage. But he wanted this one anyway.
Even Lily’s drama, though, was controlled. Curtailed. In about two minutes, she was stepping away, grabbing for a tea towel, mopping her face, and trying to laugh. “Wow. I didn’t knowthatwas happening. Sorry. Emotional, I guess. First sex in a long time, or something, letting the feelings loose. Is that a thing?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I reckon it is. Stirring those waters. I imagine the sex is part of it, too, bringing back memories of its own. Tell me about the cabin, though.”
She filled a glass of water and took a long drink, then said, “Jace didn’t tell you?”
