Page 27 of Due North
My chin hit my chest, and I shuddered, the idea of sharing them raising joyful hope inside me but making me sick at the same time. “Those names are like stakes to the heart, Cece. If I don’t say them, I can keep putting one foot in front of the other. If I stop for even a second and think about how much I failed them, I crumble. I know that sounds stupid for a guy my age, but that’s what happens on the inside.”
She crossed the space between us in two steps and grabbed my shirt in her tiny fist. “You didn’t fail them, Caleb. Let me say that again. You didn’t fail them. Their mother failed them in the worst way. You did not. All you did was love and care for those kids. You thought of them above yourself, and you still do. You hold them in a reverence that they deserve inside you. Everyone on this ranch loves you so much, Caleb. Let them out to be held in reverence by all of us, too.”
Did she just say she loved me? Inhale, Caleb. Exhale. She didn’t mean it like that. She meant we’re all family. I slid down the wall because my leg was done holding me up. I rested my head on my knees and let out a puff of air.
She lowered herself to the floor and snugged her legs up to mine, running her hands through my hair. “You’re a good man, Caleb North. Keep following your cowboy code but remember what it meant to be their brother. God knows I talk about my sister all the time now that she’s gone. I wish like hell I had done that when she was alive. I wish I had seen the things I didn’t see when she was alive, just like I’m sure you do. We can’t go back and change anything that happened in the past, no matter how much we want to. We can change the present and the future, but you can’t forget who they were to you.”
I lifted my head and held her gaze as I unbuttoned my flannel shirt. “I can never forget them. At least twice a day, I’m faced with their memory. That is the only time I allow myself to remember,” I whispered, lifting my t-shirt. Her sharp intake of breath was loud.
“Caleb, this is gorgeous,” she whispered, her finger caressing the angel wing on my ribs. She traced each name before she spoke. “I love how their names look like part of the feathers.”
I dropped the shirt with her hand still on my ribs. It made my heart pound too hard to have her hand on my skin that way. Her touch scorched my bare skin and embedded a piece of her inside me forever. “I’ve never shown anyone that willingly before,” I admitted. “You’re the first.”
Her hand fell away from my ribs, which left me relieved and saddened at the same time. “See, you can do it, Caleb. You can share them with us in ways that help you heal.”
“It’s exhausting,” I admitted, pushing myself to a standing position now that I’d rested for a few minutes. “I’m a cowboy. I shouldn’t feel this weak all the time.”
She stood too and joined me on the couch, her hand on my back. “If I’m not mistaken,” she said, her brow tucked down to her nose. “The code of the west has four points. Live with courage, take pride in your work, finish what you started, and do what has to be done.” She ticked each one off on her fingers as she leaned forward to hold my gaze.
“And I do all of those things but one. I don’t live with courage. I live as a coward.”
Her head shook, and her eyes swirled into that mass of blue energy I was used to seeing in them. “No, that’s where you’re wrong, Caleb. Because to live with courage, you would have to live. You exist, but you don’t live. You stopped living your life the day they died. You lived, but you don’t live. That’s grief, not cowardice. Until you let the grief flow through every part of you five times over, you can’t let it flow out of you. Does that make sense?”
“I’m afraid that would kill me,” I admitted, my fist pressed against my chest. “I know you’re right, but that’s where the coward part comes in. The way I feel things means I might never fight through it once it washes over me. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you!” I exclaimed. “If that gate opens and the water rushes out, there will be no containing it, Cece. Someone could get hurt!”
She grabbed my shirt and pulled me to her, her lips landing on mine to hush me. I held her lips to mine, her body soft, warm, and pliable under my hands as I tugged her head to the left. Her tongue was wet against my lips until I opened them to see what she would do. She didn’t hesitate when she plunged hers inside my mouth, the hot tangle of tongues leaving both of our chests heaving when the kiss broke.
“I can make the hurt go away if you let me,” she promised, running her hand through my hair. “You just have to want to let me.”
I wrapped my hands in her fiery curls while my mind raced to decipher the look in her eyes. God, she was beautiful. Stunning, sassy, and sexy as hell. I did not deserve even a tenth of who this woman was, but for some reason, she kept coming back to me in a way I couldn’t deny.
“How about if I start by admitting I want you?” I asked, my lips almost on hers again.
“You already did that this morning,” she hissed before my lips could touch hers.
My eyes flicked upwards to gaze into hers, and the words I saw there terrified and excited me at the same time.Hope. Joy. Desire. Love. I had no doubt the last two were in mine if she looked close enough. Dammit. I was in trouble if she kept coming around because there would come a day that I couldn’t stop myself from making her mine. That day was coming, and when it happened, there would be no going back for my heart or soul.
A split-second hesitation told me I didn’t care. This woman made me feel something other than disdain and disappointment in myself. She made me feel wanted and relevant. It had been too long since I’d felt relevant in anything other than my job. I just wanted to be relevant to someone who had no reason to need me other than because they wanted me in their life.
“I meant it,” I agreed, my voice breathy as I licked my lips. “What I feel for you is a visual that’s easy to explain, Cece,” I admitted, caressing her jawline with my thumb. “You’re a magnet to something deep inside me. Whenever you’re around, I’m drawn to the life source inside you in a way I can’t fight, and I’ve tried for two years now. When I look into your eyes, what I see isn’t what everyone else sees. I see pink, white, and silver. I’ve never seen those colors with anyone else, Cece, ever.”
“Are those colors bad?”
I shook my head, a smile coming to my lips as I kissed hers once and then leaned back a hairsbreadth. “No, sweetheart. Those colors are pure. Pink is unconditional nurturing, silver is your emotional and sensual energy, and white is simply pure. That’s what I see in your eyes, Cecelia Douglas. I’m inexplicably drawn to you. And God help me, but I need you. I need to see those colors now more than ever. So much,” I whispered, right before my lips found hers again.
She pushed me back against the couch and straddled me, my need for her obvious, but I couldn’t hide the fact that she turned me on more than any woman I’d ever known. She settled herself against me, so our chests lined up perfectly. Colors exploded behind my eyes as she made love to my lips with hers and stroked my tongue in a way that had me aching for more.
Her lips fell away from mine to kiss down my jaw, where she tucked her lips into my neck. With her chest pressed to mine, I couldn’t concentrate on anything but her heartbeat. For the first time in ten years, mine beat again, not because it had to, but because it wanted to.
It wanted to.
Ten
The Wise Anchor Bar and Grill in Wellspring, Wisconsin, was hopping on the eve before All Hallows Eve. The woman I’d been hoping to kiss had disappeared from the dancefloor, so I stepped outside the overheated bar and sucked in a breath of cool October air. It was refreshing to be away from the stomp of cowboy boots on the wooden floor and the shouting from the spectators watching the line dancers.
I leaned against the side of the barn when I spied the little cowgirl I’d been looking for all night. Cecelia Douglas was a knock-out in every sense of the word. Her beautiful red locks hung in curls around her face and down her back, nearly to her waist. All I wanted to do was run my fingers through them while I buried my nose in her neck and inhaled the scent of her.
The other night I managed to hold tight to my libido and not lay her down on my couch and make love to her, but my resolve was weakening. Tonight, she’d teased my senses all night with her incredible body. She had wrapped that pair of curvy hips in a tight pair ofWranglers, left her flannel shirt open at the chest to reveal a skimpy lace tank top covering her sweet chest, and a red bandana in her hair to match the shirt. It was a challenge to pay attention to anything but the way that shirt stretched open across her chest and left less to the imagination of every guy in that bar than I’d like. She was a looker, and I’d spent the evening trying to remind myself she was a co-worker. It was becoming increasingly more difficult as the night went on.
