Reckless (Blue Collar Boyfriends Book 1) (10 page)

The stars weren’t all that made the sky bright. “Come on out,” he said. “There’s a full moon for you, tonight.”

* * * *

DG stood paralyzed in the doorway, the familiar haven
of Derek’s butter-cream yellow kitchen behind her, the rest of the dark unknown before her.

What if she floated off on the breeze the moment she stepped outside? What if she left Derek’s
house and couldn’t get back in? What if leaving his house broke some kind of rule and she moved on to wherever ghosts went when they failed miserably at whatever they were supposed to do?

Derek turned some knobs on his stainless steel, neat-as-a-pin grill. His handsome face relaxed into its usual seriousness. His shoulders made a strong, confident line. He was a man at home in his castle, trying to share his world with her. He wanted to give her an island of normal in a sea of strange. She owed it to him to at least try curbing her fear and trusting him.

Swallowing all the what-ifs, she lifted one foot and brought it down on the gray-painted planks of the deck. The wind didn’t sweep her away. No unseen mallet came swinging down from the heavens to punish her. Instead, warm humidity draped around her like a familiar blanket. She inhaled, and the scents of grass, shrubs and marinade filled her lungs.

She dared to draw up beside Derek as he used tongs to lay the steaks on the grate. A minute ago, she’d wrapped her arms around him as he stood on his threshold. Her heart had jumped with excitement as he’d remained still for several seconds, as if he’d known what she was doing. Then he’d stepped away, and the moment had been over. He’d gone outside, teasing her to follow with the promise of a full moon.

She looked up. There it was. Big and cool-white in a black sky. A scatter of stars shone like raindrops on a night-dark windshield. Melancholy stole over her. Being outside wasn’t as exciting as she’d hoped.

“Bought this place two years ago,” Derek said as the savory scent of cooking meat and spices filled the air.
“After the divorce. It’s a good place. Got good bones. Needed a little fixing up at first, but nothing I couldn’t tackle on the weekends. Haley even helped some. Kid’s a skinny thing, but she’s strong.” His voice lifted with pride. Then he hung his head and shook it slowly.

She hoped he got the chance to make up with Haley soon. “It’ll be okay,” she told him, even though she knew he couldn’t hear her. “She loves you so much, and you’re a great dad.”

“I’m a shitty father,” he said.

She swatted his muscular arm, but he didn’t flinch.

“I lost my temper with Deidre and called her a name I shouldn’t have. Haley heard.” He exhaled sharply and poked at one of the cuts with a skewer.

She wished she could do more than listen. The somber lines etched into his face made her fingers twitch to rub them smooth, to comfort him with her touch. Willing him to feel it, she rested her head on his solid shoulder.

He stilled.

For a few minutes, she did nothing but let his warmth sink into her temple.

“I love the way your hair smells.” He said it so quietly, she would have missed it if she’d been any farther away. He bent his head toward her. “Please hold me,” he said.

Her heart swelled.
“Gladly.” She wrapped her arms around him and snuggled right up under the arm he held slightly away from his side. The weight across her back was comforting, even with the awkward angle. “You’ll make it right,” she said. “I believe in you.”

But he didn’t hear. He remained silent and still, only moving to flip the steaks with the arm not around her. She relaxed against him, enjoying the peace of the moment.

Inside, the microwave beeped. Derek said, “Going to move, now, sweetheart.” Then he slowly did, giving her a chance to slide away before he put the sizzling steaks on a platter to bring inside. She watched as he fixed up their baked potatoes, and followed him back to the bedroom. The smells of medium-cooked beef, butter and sour cream made her salivate. She couldn’t wait to dig in, even if she didn’t technically feel hungry.

He set the plates and utensils on the bed, and she climbed up, careful not to disturb them.

She barely had a chance to turn to face him before his arms were around her and his lips were on hers.

“I missed you,” he said when he’d finished kissing her stupid. He was standing at the edge of the bed and had hauled her up against his chest. “Did you see the moon?”

“It was beautiful. And this smells amazing.” She waved her arm over their plates.

“I’ll be right back.” He let her back down until her knees sank into the comforter, left, and returned a few minutes later with a bottle of California merlot and two fish-bowl wine glasses with red ribbons tied around the dainty stems.

“I didn’t take you for a wine person,” she said, taking a glass from him and pulling off the bow.

“I’m not. This was a housewarming present from Deidre. It’s the only bottle of wine I own.” He pulled a corkscrew from the pocket of his apron, which read,
Kiss the chef
, only
chef
had a slash through it, and stylized writing above it read
CHIEF.
“Knowing her, it’ll be good.”

He filled her glass to an inch below the rim.

She raised her eyebrows.

“What?
Too much?”

“Not if you’re trying to get me drunk so you can have your way with me.”

“I don’t need to get you drunk to have my way with you,” he said without a trace of boasting.

To hide her blush, she sniffed the wine. The nose was bold and fruity and tight. “It needs to breathe,” she said. She must have liked wine before.

“Well, la-tee-dah,” he said with a crooked grin. “Look who’s the wine connoisseur.” He clinked glasses with her. “Where I come from, when you’ve got a glass of alcohol in your hands, you say
bottom’s up
.” He took a sip. “Hmm. Not bad.” He took another, then put his glass on the bedside table and climbed onto the bed.

She laughed, and it felt ridiculously good. The wine wasn’t bad, either. Rich, dark, grapey goodness exploded on her tongue. She rolled it around, letting every taste bud have a go at the flavors. Finally, she swallowed, and it hit her stomach with a trickle of warmth. “Delicious.” She reached for her plate.

She sat against the wall with Derek, talking, sipping wine and savoring the best meal she’d had in her life, which also happened to be the only meal she could ever remember eating.

She’d been dubious about the microwaved potatoes, but slathered in butter, sour cream and shredded cheddar cheese, they tasted like a creamy, salty paradise. Pink in the middle and slightly charred on the outside, the steak practically melted on her tongue. She moaned in utter culinary ecstasy.

“I’m jealous,” Derek said. “I thought only I could get you to make those noises.”

Her face flamed as she swallowed the delicious mouthful.
“Yup. You and steak. My two guilty pleasures.”

“If I’m on par with grilled meat, I think I’m going to have to try harder.”

If Derek tried any harder, she’d lose her mind. He had only to glance at her with those intense eyes to rev her engine to the point of overheating. She couldn’t wait until they finished eating and got back to the kissing.

Unfortunately, Derek kept urging her to slow down.

“Easy, sweetheart. Take it slow. Small bites. Give that stomach a chance to adjust.”

She did her best to comply, even though she wanted to inhale everything on her plate.

While she chewed slowly and took tiny sips of her wine, Derek talked about Haley, his work, and his past. He touched on his marriage to Deidre, making ten years seem like a footnote.

Her chest felt empty when he encouraged her to try and remember anything personal. “It’s just
a blank,” she said, hands cupping her half-f wine glass.

“Okay, so you can’t remember anything. What about what you want, what you hope for?”

She sipped her wine. She could have said a lot of things. Family, happiness, a successful career…him. But what did it all matter? She was dead. She’d had her chance. Even if she couldn’t remember what she’d done with it, it was over. “All I want is for you to be happy.”

He kissed her forehead, his breath smelling deliciously of garlic and butter and wine. “How does it feel?”

“How does what feel?” she asked.

“Having everything you’ve ever wanted.” He surrounded her with his arms and
his scent of clean, warm, well-fed male.

“Oh.” It felt h
eart-meltingly amazing. Maybe happiness wasn’t out of the question. But she didn’t have a chance to say it, since her stomach cramped painfully. “Oh,” she said again, this time in a whimper.

She doubled over, pressing one arm across her abdomen. When the pain backed off, she reached to put the wine glass back on the bedside table, but her stomach twisted again. She cried out and let go of the glass too soon. It shattered on the floor.

“What’s wrong?” Derek’s hands were on her shoulders, guiding her to sit back against the wall. “Jesus, you look pale.”

“I think I ate too much.” Nausea joined the cramping, and she pushed away from him to jump off the bed. She needed to throw up.

“No!” He grabbed at her hand. “Don’t go.”

She was beyond words. She yanked out of his grip and launched herself across the hall to the bathroom. Waves of cold licked up her chest and face. It was coming, and the toilet lid was down. Why did he have to be a lid-down kind of guy? Desperate, she turned to the tub. The curtain was drawn. She tried to move it aside, but the fabric didn’t budge. She might as well have been shoving at steel.

Argh! She fell to her hands and knees on the tile. Time was up.

“Sweetheart?
Are you in here?” He sounded panicked. He came into the bathroom and stopped short, maybe realizing that if he rushed in, he might step on her. “I’m going to open the lid for you.”

He skirted the wall and sink until he reached the toilet too late. Her stomach squeezed like a fist. The dinner he had thoughtfully prepared for her splatted onto the floor in a wash of chunky crimson.

“Oh, God, DG!”

The clink of the lid opening punched through her haze of nausea. She dove for the toilet just in time for round two. Derek groaned behind her as her body attempted to turn itself inside out.

When she finally stopped heaving, sweat drenched her from head to toe. She was shaking and didn’t think she could stand up if her life depended on it. She rolled her head on her arm to see Derek standing by the sink, staring down at the evidence of her sickness with a stony expression.

How appalled he must be. And she couldn’t offer to c
lean up what had landed on the floor, since she couldn’t hold a towel or a dustpan. Not bothering trying to flush, she got up on her shaky legs. Leaning on the sink, she stepped close to him.

“I’m sorry,” she said, knowing he couldn’t hear her. She squeezed past him and shuffled across the distance to the bed. With each step, she began to feel better. By the time she lowered herself onto the edge of the mattress, she was almost back to normal, but she still nudged the dirty plates away. Looking at them threatened to make her sick again.

Derek was still in the bathroom, standing with his back to her like a marble column. She felt horrible. He must be worried about her, and overwhelmed with the carnage before him, maybe even upset with himself for suggesting she try to eat.

She took a breath to let him know she’d made it to the bed again and felt better, but his voice stopped her.

* * * *

Horror slammed into Derek as he watched wine-colored puke hit his bathroom floor and
splash into the toilet bowl from out of nowhere. This was his fault. It had been his stupid plan to see if DG could eat, and she could—his confidence that she couldn’t possibly be a ghost had grown with her every bite. But apparently, she couldn’t digest anything. That realization struck him deep. She might not be dead, but she wasn’t truly alive either.

He’d learned something, but at what cost?

What a shithead. He’d encouraged her to eat when he didn’t know what harm it might cause her. He might have killed her, for Christ’s sake.

The bathroom fell silent. His heartbeat thundered in his ears. He was worse than useless.

He couldn’t even lift her in his arms and carry her back to bed. He’d done this to her, and had no way to fix it.

Pressure kicked at his lungs. Hate and guilt collided like stone on flint, and something in him caught flame.

He hadn’t asked to be this woman’s tether to the world. Whatever force had thrown them together had done her an unspeakable disservice. When it came to the women in his life, he was a hopeless fuck-up. DG deserved someone smarter than him, someone gentler than him. His lungs tightened until he felt like a pressure cooker about to blow.

“Why me, goddammit?”
Pulling at his hair with his fists, he surveyed the carnage in his bathroom. “What the hell am I supposed to do with you when I can’t even take care of the real females in my life? I didn’t ask for this!”