The dock made her angry.
It was well built, sturdy, exactly what Emily had had in mind when she’d started it seven years ago. She doubted she could have made it come out this well. Not at fifteen. This dock had been built by adults, someone with construction connections who could sink proper footings. Someone had even replaced the old rope that had once hung from a branch over the water. The new rope dangled down to brush the end of the dock.
When no dock had existed, the old rope had been harder to reach, but they’d always managed, standing on shoulders or climbing the tree. Then they’d dared each other to swing out over the water and perform tricks in the air before hitting the surface, stupid and frankly dangerous somersaults and midair cartwheels. The new rope was better, thick and unfrayed, and it had knots tied at intervals to make grips for hands and summertime bare feet. No one would slide down this new rope very far if their grip slipped. No one would get a rope burn so deep it drew blood.
No one would learn a hard lesson on how to keep a good grip, either.
She sounded like a crusty old grandpa, like Mr. Schumer on a good day. Sexual frustration made her grouchy. She hadn’t known that. She hadn’t ever wanted a man the way she wanted Graham.
Emily reached up high with one hand to grip the rope and test her weight on it. With the edges of her boots standing on the bottom knot, she bounced the branch a few times. Definitely a better rope than hers had been, despite the wimpy knots. It ticked her off, this proof that her way had been the wrong way, too headstrong, inadequate.
Graham was standing at the shore, watching her in the dark. Always on alert, always the bodyguard. For some reason, he’d stopped at the edge of the lake, though, and just nodded at the dock and told her to go ahead and check it out. She supposed he was trying to give her space to indulge her memories. She would have preferred to indulge in the oblivion she’d felt in his arms, cradled to his chest, when the only thing she’d needed had been more of his touch. What would it be like to make him focus on her touch that way? What would it be like to have his body all to herself, all hers to touch and learn and love on and—
Her hand slipped down the rope.
She caught herself on a knot.
That only made her angrier. The dock was just a few inches below her feet, but the safety knot made her feel like she was in danger when she wasn’t. It was all safe now, standard rope, standard dock. She looked across the dark water, trying to remember the lake the wild way it had been at fifteen.
She remembered how she’d been at fifteen. Fearless—she’d dreamed of owning her own cattle ranch. Not a cute little hobby farm with twenty head of dairy cows, but a real cattle operation like Uncle James and Aunt Jessie owned. Of course, even at fifteen she’d known that would take millions of dollars if enough land ever came up for sale. Almost all cattle ranches were either inherited legacies or corporate holdings. Uncle James had inherited his ranch.
At fifteen, Emily had understood that Uncle James was her uncle by marriage. Her aunt had married the owner of the James Hill Ranch. Emily never had been and never would be in line to inherit anything, but it was still the family ranch. Uncle James and Aunt Jessie’s two boys were her first cousins, and she’d grown up with them, always trying to keep up with them. Considering Trey and Luke were older and bigger, she’d done pretty well just by never giving up. Stubborn since the day she was born, that was what her mother and Aunt Jessie would say.
There wasn’t another James Hill out there to inherit or purchase that she knew of, but why not dream big? At fifteen, she’d gone big on everything. If she swung high enough over the water to attempt three cartwheels, at least she’d get in two and one heck of a thrill before she plunged into the lake. Emily didn’t have to own a cattle ranch to be happy; taking steps toward that dream would still make for a great life. She could work the James Hill Ranch full-time, even become the foreman some day. She’d know how to run a ranch, should one ever come open.
She was glad her younger self couldn’t see her now. She should own at least two good working horses by now, along with all their tack, a trailer, a truck. She should’ve been able to afford all that because, at twenty-two, she should have been a ranch hand with four years of experience. With her riding and roping skills, she’d have been paid at the higher end of the scale for an experienced hand. Cowboys were never rich, but she could’ve earned enough money for all she wanted.
Instead, she was in her fourth year of college, getting a degree only her mother wanted. Emily had so naively believed if her family knew her plans, then they’d understand why she didn’t need to spend years of her life at college. Her mother, her aunt, her uncle—they’d all smiled at her with a little pity and a little kindness. Go out and see the world, sugar. Enjoy college. There are so many options, you might find a career you’d like better.
And then there’d been the death blow, the argument she hated the most: Ranching is hard enough on men, sugar. I hate to see a pretty young lady choose a hard life when she hasn’t even seen what else is out there.
Not one of the smaller ranches would hire James Waterson’s niece, not when it was common knowledge that her family wanted her to go to college. She’d pored over want ads in the ranching magazines, but the ranches in Montana and Wyoming that would be beyond the Waterson influence had all required four years of experience and a letter of recommendation to apply.
She’d applied anyway.
Nothing.
She’d had no choice but to go to college. Fifteen-year-old Emily would be so disappointed in her.
It’s not as easy as it looks. You didn’t know your whole family would be against you for trying to follow in their footsteps. I haven’t given up. I’m fighting.
But it was wearing her down. Was it any wonder she’d wanted to spend one night, just this one night, with a man who took care of her? She’d just wanted to be Jane and let Tarzan keep her close to his chest, cradled in his arms. But one little taste of that, and she was hooked.
I don’t want any hearts to break, he’d said.
Too late. Had he known how dangerously addictive it was for her to be around a man like him? Had he known the exact moment she’d made room for him in her dreams, had he read her mind when she’d thought that making him happy would make her happy?
I’m already half in love with you. She could have said that—but she hadn’t. What had she actually said? Let’s be naked this time.
She snort-laughed at her own words as she stepped off the rope and brushed off her hands. She’d never said anything like that before in her entire life. So much for being a shy and helpless Jane.
And yet Graham was still worried about breaking hearts. She’d given him no reason to think her heart was in danger, had she? She’d kept her feelings a secret. He couldn’t be talking about her heart. And if he wasn’t talking about her heart, then that left...
His.
She sneaked a peak at Graham. He was watching over her. If she somehow fell into the water right this second, he’d be there one second later, she had no doubt. He’d appointed himself her protector from the first moment at Keller’s. It was crazy, the chemistry that had hit them both when they’d met. Already it was more than chemistry for her. And for him?
He’d said the only woman who mattered at all called him Graham.
She was that woman. She mattered to him. Could it be his heart that was in danger?
Oh, yes, please. Fall in love with me. Fall all the way.
There was nothing dangerous about loving her. He had nothing to be cautious about. She was just a college student whose dreams kept getting delayed and delayed, just a girl who...
Emily swallowed.
Just a girl who didn’t stand up for herself.
She thought she was strong. She thought she was a fighter, but the truth was, her life wasn’t going the way she wanted it, and year after year after year after year, she’d failed to be strong enough to change it. Had she been standing in the jungle all this time, passively waiting for someone to come and show her the way out?
Maybe a man like Graham knew that it was dangerous to fall in love with a woman who didn’t really own her own life. He couldn’t fall if he didn’t think she was strong enough to catch him.
The vertigo was sudden. The rope, the dock, the wavering moonlight—the beating of her heart—scared her. She grabbed for the rope again and held on tightly to the knot, suddenly afraid to look at Graham.
Snap out of it. We don’t do helpless. Get your act together.
She took a breath. She let go of the rope, turned to face Graham and started walking toward him.
“Nice dock,” he said as she reached him, casual words from a man who was looking at her intently. “What do you think?”
“I think I could use that drink.” She walked right past him and headed for the SUV.
The six-pack was still on the floor of the passenger seat. The locally crafted beer came in an old-fashioned bottle without a screw-off bottle cap. Her pocketknife with the bottle opener was in her purse in her truck in the parking lot. It was that kind of night.
With a sigh, she kicked her foot up behind herself and smacked the beer bottle down on it, hitting the edge of the cap on the hard wooden heel of her cowboy boot. The cap flew off and she angled the bottle away, knowing a little foam would overflow because of the impact.
A whistle of male approval sounded right behind her. “Nice technique.”
“It wastes beer.” She looked over her shoulder at him. Are you falling in love with me? “That’s at least the third time tonight you’ve managed to get behind me without making any noise.”
He reached around her to take a beer for himself. “Rubber-soled boots are quiet. They won’t do me much good when it comes to opening my beer.”
“Here, I can open it for you.”
But Graham palmed the bottle cap and pried it off with his bare hand.
“Ouch,” Emily said, trying not to be impressed by such a macho trick.
“Oo-rah,” Graham said calmly.
A macho Marine trick. Even harder not to be impressed. It hit her then, that the hand that was Marine strong and apparently impervious to pain was the same hand that had touched her intimately, taken care of her—all the way to the end—with such gentleness, such finesse.
He tapped his bottle to hers and took a drink. She watched him, that amazing mouth, that sexy throat. Who is this man? What is it about him that makes him a hundred times sexier than any other man? They were the same thoughts she’d had when she’d first laid eyes on him in that dark hallway at Keller’s. Never had a first impression been so accurate.
Graham gestured toward her untouched bottle. “Is nostalgia still getting to you? You quit that dock pretty suddenly.”
She took a swallow. Despite the cold beer, she felt flushed. She looked away from Graham, the man who’d reined in his passion so easily, the man who was avoiding the possibility of breaking a heart, and looked toward the lake instead. The breeze was gone. The surface of the water was flawlessly calm. She wanted to churn it up, splash in it, disturb it so that it matched her emotions this night.
“It’s not nostalgia.” She had to answer Graham’s question, when she hardly knew how to feel or what to think at the moment. “I don’t belong here anymore.”
He looked up from the bottle in his hand. “Did you think you would? You’re on your way to getting an MBA. Profit and loss statements and power suits are a far way from a childhood pond.”
“Yeah, well...” She hugged his coat around herself more tightly, when what she wanted to do was hurl her bottle into the lake to ruffle the surface. “The MBA is my mother’s idea, not mine. I just found out yesterday that it’s expected of me. Apparently, the details were given to Mr. Schumer before me.” She sounded bitter.
She felt bitter. She couldn’t tell Graham she was bitter that he’d chosen to keep his heart safe instead of making love to her, but she could talk about the hated MBA. “I’ve taken their advice and gone for a bachelor’s degree. I’ve tried their path, but I can’t keep doing this.”
“Whose advice?”
“My family’s. They think they’re broadening my horizons. They think I’ll find some new talent or a new purpose in life or I don’t know what. But the truth is, I’ve just been a fish out of water all this time. It’s been years since I felt like I lived where I belonged.”
“Ah, Emily.” The empathy in his voice gave her chills. “So when’s the last time you felt like you belonged somewhere?”
She studied the still water. She was on the verge, on the edge—was she daring enough to put it all together and change her life? Was she brave enough to be herself, her fifteen-year-old self, her current self, her whole self? Because that woman could be strong enough for a bodyguard who was afraid to fall.
She turned her back on the lake and faced Graham.
“I felt like I belonged tonight. In the front seat of your car.”
“Ah, Emily.” The bass in his voice gave her chills.
She told herself she was strong enough to ask him the same. “When’s the last time you felt like you belonged somewhere, Ben Graham?”
He looked at her for another one of those long moments, the moments she realized were points of deliberation when he decided whether or not to touch her, or talk to her, or be silent and not risk breaking any hearts.
“Tonight, Emily. Tonight, in the front seat of my car.”
And then she was safe in his arms, his hand pressing her head into his shoulder, her arms holding him as tightly as he was holding her.