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As she got closer, he looked up and gestured for her to wait a moment. She stayed where she. But that was odd. What could he be saying that he didn’t want her to hear?
Probably business stuff. Honestly, why was she being so possessive of him tonight? But she knew the answer. Since the tree-trimming party when she’d realized she loved him, she’d been different. She’d funneled every action he made through a feeling of intense vulnerability. And she was tired of it. She wanted to go back to feeling safe and secure with him.
But love was making her question everything.
It also underscored the fact that she’d never really been in love before. Nothing had felt this intense. She felt the room start to feel like it was closing in and moved through the crowd out onto the patio where there were only a few people. She walked farther away from the house, down one of the cobblestoned paths through her mother’s rose garden.
Breathing in the scent of the flowers, and feeling the cool December air on her skin, helped her to calm down. Was this love? Should it feel this way?
There was no one to ask. Because she didn’t want anyone to know. What if he didn’t love her? There was a big chance he wasn’t staying in Whiskey River; after all, he hadn’t indicated that he’d changed his mind on their relationship.
Sure they felt closer than ever but then tonight it was clear to her that he had two different worlds and she was only part of one of them.
She had been baring her soul and inviting him into her entire life. Telling him the secrets she kept from everyone and giving more of herself to him than was probably wise. Unless he loved her. Unless he was going to stay. And so far she had no proof that was going to happen.
She heard the sound of boots on the cobblestone and turned, not surprised to see that it was Max. He stopped a few feet from her and she realized she was at a breaking point. As much as she was owning this holiday season and coming into herself, she hadn’t realized until this moment that she’d been afraid to ask for what she really wanted. What she really needed.
Until now.
*
As soon ashe’d finished talking to Logan he’d looked around for Angelica and hadn’t been able to find her. He’d walked through the room noticing that she wasn’t with her siblings or parents and then drifted outside where he caught her walking away from the house and down the lighted path in the garden.
He stayed where he was for a minute, gathering his thoughts. Tonight had convinced him that things could be different. Maybe he could work from Whiskey River. The private airport at Devil’s Rock made it easy to get in and out of and nearby San Antonio was convenient for commercial flights. He was starting to see a path to making his home here.
He wasn’t sure if Angelica wanted that too. He thought she did. But that was the thing with trying to guess what someone else was thinking. Ninety percent of the time, he was wrong. He had misjudged his parents on more than one occasion and had it on good authority from girlfriends past that he’d misread them.
And the stakes had never been this high before. He wanted to do things right—not just for himself but for Angelica. She’d been so clear when they’d started this relationship that she was figuring out who she was and needed time to stand on her own two feet before they moved forward.
He got that.
In his mind, he got that. In his gut, he realized he just wanted to figure out what he could say to make her stay with him.
And he’d never been in this position before. Always in his life he’d seen what he wanted, then got it. But this was a person. This was Angelica. He couldn’t bulldoze his way through her objections and make her his.
She had to want that too and it was harder than he’d thought it would be to control his impulse to just override her objections if she had any. He suspected she would. He’d scoffed at love at first sight and love after a few weeks hardly seemed much different than that.
But he did love her…so was that why he was standing at a distance, afraid to approach her?
Hell.
He’d never let fear rule him. Never. And he wasn’t going to start now. He followed her down the path and the further they got from the party, the louder his boots sounded on the cobblestone path. She stopped and turned and he caught his breath as he always did when he saw her.
She was the most beautiful woman in the world to him. It wasn’t open to debate and he didn’t care what anyone else thought about her; when he saw her, he knew she was the one.
The one.
He’d never had one. He wasn’t sure he wanted one now, but his gut had claimed her. That raw masculine part of him that he tried to keep tamped down with the manners his society mother had taught him, was busting through and not taking no for an answer.
He was seconds away from letting out some kind of primal grunt, throwing her over his shoulder and carrying her away from her family and friends so he could have her to himself.
“Sorry about that. Logan was asking me about an investment I’d made for him and I didn’t feel comfortable discussing it at the party. So I was trying to explain that to him,” Max said. Trying to be rational and cool. Reminding himself that he was unsure of what she wanted from him. Which was probably why his animal instincts were aroused and the civilized part of his brain was vying for control.
“It’s fine. You’re allowed to have conversations without me,” she said. “The party is going well, isn’t it? I just needed some air.”
He wasn’t sure that everything was fine. He could tell by the way she was holding herself with one arm around her waist. That glamorous red gown she wore was long and swept down her body, skimming her curves and making him hyper aware of the body underneath. It felt like it had been months since they’d made love instead of hours.
He’d had her before they’d come over to the party so he should be sated but he wasn’t. Could he ever be when it came to her? He always wanted her again after they’d had sex. Always wanted to keep reasserting their bond and his claim on her.
