Her Christmas Wish (The Cottages on Ocean Breeze #1)

Chapter Nineteen

T hey left before either of them had made it through half of their second drink. Sage knew he was right to call it a night. And was still sad to see the evening coming to an end.

A completely adult night.

She had so few of them.

“You feel like a walk on the beach?” Gray asked as he turned onto Ocean Breeze. Almost as though he was reading her mind.

She wasn’t dressed for beach walking, but then neither was he. “I do.” She said the words, smiling, and then almost immediately stiffened.

The words she’d been rehearsing, dreaming about saying to him, and then had been robbed of the chance.

But they fit. And she’d had closure on the past.

He pulled into Scott’s place. “This tux is on loan,” he said to her. “If you don’t mind, I’ll just run in really quick and get out of it.”

“As long as you don’t mind me overdressed.” She grinned. “At least until we make it down to my place.”

The look in his eye as he turned to her sent an instant flood down to pertinent parts. He’d opened his mouth, as if to say something, but it just hung there for a second, before closing abruptly.

“I’ve got no complaints,” he said, his back to her as he let himself out of the car. She got out, too. Could put Morgan out as he changed. And bring the dog back in. Adults only wasn’t the life she wanted for herself. At all. Fully clear on that one.

But sometimes...

Morgan completed her business and ran right back up the porch steps just as Gray came to the doorway, in swim trunks and a T-shirt.

Seriously?

After letting the corgi back in, he secured the door behind him and joined Sage on the beach. With her heels hanging from the fingers of one hand, she squished her toes in the sand, feeling the coolness of the last Saturday night in October there, too.

And shivered.

“You are not going swimming this late at night, alone, in the ocean.”

With a grin in her direction, he said, “You could always watch out for me.”

“I mean it, Gray.” She had no smiles at the moment. “You know as well as I do, with the tide, an undertow, or...who knows what in the water, hunting for food...”

“How about let’s take that walk and think about it,” he offered, heading off slowly in the direction of her house. With his hands in the pockets of his trunks he said, “I’ve actually swum regularly, at night, since I’ve been here. Not for long, just a dip in before bed. And I don’t go out far. I respect the ocean as much as anyone. It just...makes me feel good.”

His words appeased her somewhat. Enough that she relaxed again. She didn’t want anything to ruin the night.

And most certainly didn’t want it to end badly.

So she walked, uncaring that the sand was sticking to the bottom of her dress, or, for that matter, that she could only take smallish steps. She felt beautiful. Womanly. And a tad wild, too, out on the beach all dressed up.

Like some kind of worldly woman who had it all.

When they reached her cottage and Gray made no move to head up to it, her sensation of freedom escalated. Because it was momentary, not purporting any kind of change that she didn’t want, she kept walking, too.

Responsibility was important. Necessary. She’d be lost without it.

And a few minutes of time out of time, of vacation from real life, was necessary, too, she was finding.

She couldn’t drive if she didn’t refuel her tank.

Something her mother had once said to her father. Telling him he’d needed to relax a little bit. She couldn’t remember her father’s response, but also didn’t recall any time that he’d followed any advice but his own.

Or had taken a vacation.

And...oh, God...had her years with only him as a parent rubbed off on her more than she knew? Had she become him?

“Do you think I’m too much like my father?” The question burst out of her.

“No.” Gray’s answer was swift. And certain-sounding. Comfortable. “You’re nothing like him.”

“I’m responsible. All the time. I work and I come home and lots of nights, after Leigh’s in bed, I work more.” Fear engulfed her for a second.

Until Gray took her hand, pulling her to a stop. Faced her to the ocean and pointed. Then turned her around to gesture to her cottage in the distance. “Can you see your father living here?”

“Hell, no.” He’d wanted the view, but... “He hated the sand.”

“What did he enjoy?”

Standing there with him, staring at the ocean, she had to think a minute. “I’m not sure.” She couldn’t remember her father ever just hanging out and relaxing or bursting out with uncontrollable laughter. “Work, I guess. And being a father.”

He’d taken pride in his kids. Spent a lot of time with them.

And her words... She swung toward Gray, horrified at herself again. “That was in no way directed at, or intending to be, a dig at you...”

He lifted a finger, touched it to her lips. “I know.”

She heard his voice, but all she was aware of was the warmth of his touch on her lips in the Southern California chilly night air. And bare shoulders that were no longer as cold as they’d been starting out.

She burned.

And when his face came closer, haloed by moonlight, she watched. Her mind blank.

Her body filled with want.

The touch of his lips shocked her system. Like water when she was dehydrated. She recognized the sustenance, felt the desperate need, but had been without for too long.

More docile than normal, she stood there, letting him kiss her. Drinking from the sensations flowing through her, and nothing more.

He pulled back. “Sage... I... I apologize. I’m sorry.” He turned away, and she came to life.

“Don’t, Gray,” she said, not recognizing her own voice. Not sure what she was expecting from him. Or herself. “Don’t walk away from me.”

She grabbed his arm.

And held on.

Don’t walk away from me.

It was the second time in recent weeks that he’d heard the words.

Turning around, a shadow in the dark, on the long-deserted beach, Gray looked for something within himself to grasp hold of. To steer him.

Still in front of her near-acre of property, he stared at her. “I won’t,” he heard himself say. Yearning to be heard. And reeling from the possible lie he was telling. Moving in closer to her, he cupped her face with both hands. “I promise, Sage. I won’t ever walk away from you again.”

She might leave. They might both turn their backs on the friendship they were trying to build. But that promise, come hell or worse than hell, he would keep it.

Only just beginning to understand the damage he’d done to her by walking out two days before their wedding...

He’d been saving them both from love turning to hate. From disappointment. Arguments. Resentments. Walls. Inevitable divorce.

His course had been so clear to him.

And nothing was clear anymore.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, holding her face, but not moving in for more. “I’m so sorry.”

“For what?”

He wasn’t sure. All of it. “For not being what you need,” he said. “For not figuring it all out sooner.”

“Gray...” Her whisper floated away on the wind before he could hear intention in the tone.

“I’m sorry for loving you so selfishly, and for accepting your love, for letting you love me...” Maybe the stiff scotch had loosened his tongue. It hadn’t rattled his brain.

The words had been there a long time.

Needing to be said.

Sage’s hands flew up to Gray’s as he started to let go of her. She held his hands against her, staring up at him. “You didn’t let me love you, Gray. You had absolutely no say in that matter. The choice was mine.” Her words came with all the strength she had in her.

“You don’t get to take that away from me,” she said more softly, as he stared down at her.

Standing there, so close, with the rest of their bodies not touching, those seconds were everything. And not enough.

“Loving you then...helped grow me into the woman I am now.” She was staring at his lips. Didn’t want to look away.

Gray wasn’t moving. He just stood there, staring at her, his expression still holding pain. A lot of it. And she leaned forward. Doing what a woman did.

She put her lips to his, to kiss the pain away.

After that...everything was a blur. Her hands dropped Gray’s to slide around his neck. To hold him close while their lips said other things that had to be said.

And did so in ways they both seemed to need. And to understand.

Her mouth opened first. Or his did. Didn’t matter. They both had tongues reaching for each other, and when they met again, she felt Gray’s tension ease into something much more welcome.

More pleasurable.

In that kiss they bridged the pain with which they’d left each other, back into the joy they’d once found in each other, and Sage hadn’t found enough of it yet.

They fell to their knees together. And down to their sides, lips still touching. Even as top lips parted enough to gasp for air, bottom lips still touching.

Tongues continuing the conversation.

Her breasts strained for his touch, hurting to the point that she took his hand and placed it over her nipple, showing him her need. He knew exactly what to do. She’d shown him years before.

She nearly wept when she felt his touch, on first one breast then the other. Even through her dress, he made it happen. He hadn’t forgotten.

Just as she knew what his straining pelvis against her thigh meant. He was ready to explode.

Aching as much as she was, needing his touch so desperately, and finding the bliss again in his touch as he gave it to her, she couldn’t deny him the same...recognition.

The same glory.

Lifting her body enough to get her dress up, she watched him breathing hard as she yanked at her panties, and then, pulling the elastic band of his trunks, she lowered them enough to release his penis and straddled it.

He thrust as she lowered, a dance they’d perfected many years before.

One that lasted only seconds, before they were convulsing around and within the other. The final stanza, the last step.

Before reality returned.