A Journey's End Read online

“You don’t get it, do you?”

  “If by it you mean you, then n-no, I don’t get it!”

  “I don’t want anything to happen to you, Miranda.” Choked, he broke off, swiped his nose with the back of one hand and focused on her boots. “I don’t want anything to happen. To you.”

  She stilled.

  He looked up, pinning her with his turbulent gaze until a light bulb went off over her muddled head.

  “James,” she said helplessly. Sudden emotion made her throat tight and her voice raspy.

  Bright color washed over his cheeks and he turned away, holding up a hand to stop her before she went any further. And even though she had no idea what she’d been about to say, she felt frustrated. Hamstrung.

  “Forget it,” he said. “We need to get you warmed up.”

  In the ringing silence, she wrapped the blanket more tightly around her shoulders and tried to make her churning thoughts behave and maybe even form a coherent sentence. But she was frazzled and exhausted, and her frantic pulse rate had nothing to do with her near-death experience and everything to do with the man kneeling in front of her.

  With his face resolutely lowered so she couldn’t see his eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” she told him, because what else was there to say when he was right and she was an idiot? “I should have listened to you—”

  “You’re damn straight you should have listened to me.” His voice was calmer now even though he was yanking on her laces as he loosened them, breaking one of them in the process. Cursing, he tossed the frayed end to the floor.

  “I can do that,” she said. “I can take off my own boots—”

  “No, Miranda, you can’t.” He hard gaze flicked back up to her. “You’re the strongest woman I know, but you can’t do every freaking thing by yourself. Isn’t that what I told you earlier? Your feet are probably frostbitten, and I need to be careful so I don’t damage your toes, because there’s no way in hell I could get you to a hospital tonight.”

  Only one part of his speech registered. “The strongest woman you know?” she echoed faintly.

  He ignored that. “Give me your hands,” he ordered.

  “My hands?”

  Without further explanation, he reached out, took her mug and set it on the table, and took both of her frigid hands in his. Her breath hitched and stuttered as an infusion of heat coursed from his body to hers. Being near him—inhaling the same air—had always had this effect on her, physically and emotionally. It was like wrapping herself around a lightning strike and savoring the charge even while she feared the burn. She stared at him, fighting the hunger. His hands were warm and strong, with blunt-tipped fingers and neat nails. They encased hers with an exquisite gentleness that bordered on reverence. Taking all the time in the world, he examined her aching fingertips, one by one, checking for frostbite.

  And her body responded.

  Agonized by her urgent desire to twine her fingers with his, to stroke his palms, to run her hands through the rumpled brown curls on the top of his head, she submitted to his care. When he was finished, he kept her hands between his, lightly running his thumbs over her knuckles.

  “No frostbite.” He looked up into her face, his eyes bright and his expression maddeningly unreadable.

  “Thank God.”

  He stared at her. There were striations in his brown eyes, she realized, flecks of black and gold that reflected the fireplace’s crackling flames at her.

  He opened his mouth. Hesitated, his gaze dipping to her lips.

  “I’m not going to rub your hands.” He cleared his hoarse throat. “Rubbing’s bad. Don’t want to damage the skin.”

  She swallowed. Nodded. “Right.”

  Blinking, he lowered his head again. “Right. Time for the boots. It may hurt.”

  Taking a deep breath, she shored up her courage. “Okay.”

  It did hurt. She winced, biting back the stinging pain as he eased the first boot off. God, it hurt. Her face twisted involuntarily, scrunching her eyes closed. She ducked her head and bit her lip, hoping he couldn’t see how much it cost her to sit quietly when every nerve ending in her body violently protested this whole rewarming process.

  “You okay?” he asked sharply.

  “Yep.” She kept her voice upbeat.

  “Liar.”

  The affectionate tone made her look at him. He’d moved on to the other boot now, but his lips had curled into a sexy half-smile that did wonders for her body temperature.

  And that was before his gaze met hers again.

  Like magic, the pain receded.

  “Socks now.” His grin deepened. “So if your feet are ashy and scratchy, let me know.”

  Her sudden burst of laughter caught her by surprise, and the pain receded a little more.

  “I just had a pedicure, for your information.”

  “Color?”

  “Blue,” she said tartly, trying to look stern even as a renewed wave of shivering hit her.

  “I like blue.” He peeled off the first soaked sock, cradling her stiff red foot in his gentle hands. A careful examination followed, with him checking the tip of each toe. None of them, she was relieved to see, looked white, blue or black, which meant—

  “No frostbite,” he announced with grim satisfaction after he finished with her second foot and an ankle check. Her ankle was bruised and swollen, but she could rotate it, so they decided it wasn’t broken. “Let’s get you in some dry clothes and wrap that ankle. Then supper.”

  The promise of food made her belly rumble. A near-death experience, it turned out, did not kill or even diminish her appetite. She should’ve known. Nor did it weaken her acute sense of smell, which could probably rival Frank’s and was always on the hunt for something good to eat. Now that she was thawing out, she noticed that something delicious and homemade, with butter, onions and garlic, was cooking somewhere in James’s kitchen.

  “What’s cooking?”

  “Chili. Garlic bread.”

  Her mouth, predictably, began to water. “Are you sharing?”

  His lips twitched. “I didn’t save you from the storm just to starve you to death. I plan to see the project through.”

  “God bless you,” she said fervently.

  He chuckled, a sound she hadn’t heard nearly enough from him, and nerve endings prickled from the soles of her feet all the way up through the roots of her hair. Her face, meanwhile, burned white-hot. Alarmed by the vehemence of her reactions to him and reminding herself to focus, she scooted to the edge of the sofa and planted her feet on the floor. The pain in her ankle flared, but it was nothing she couldn’t handle.

  “Can I take a shower?”

  He cocked his head, considering. “That should be fine. As long as you don’t make the water too hot. I don’t want your body to go into shock.”

  “Great. Which way to the bathroom?” she asked, clutching the blanket with her shaky hands.

  “Hold up.” He frowned down at her feet. “You can’t walk.”

  “Sure I can,” she said. “I don’t have frostbite, so—”

  “I’m not risking it. I’ll just carry you.”

  “I don’t think so,” she said, alarmed.

  His jaw tightened, which she did not take as a good sign. Glowering, he got up, stretched to his full height, which was somewhere past intimidating, and fisted his hands on his hips. Never one to back down from a challenge, she also stood, ignoring both the annoyed light glinting in his eyes and the icy pain spearing through her beleaguered feet. Inches apart now, they faced off.

  Her silly thoughts, meanwhile, spun out of control.

  It was one thing for him to carry her when she was half-conscious and near death. It was something else again when there was no crisis and he was therefore more likely to notice that she wasn’t exactly a delicate and willowy size two.

  Plus, the thought of being snuggled up to his muscular body—which, by the way, smelled irresistibly of clean male, like wood smoke, leather and a warm musk that
was entirely James—was more than her overwrought nerves could handle right now. With her arms around his neck, her face within nuzzling distance of his smooth neck, and her lips within kissing distance of his?

  No.

  Just ...no.

  She’d crawl to the bathroom first if she had to.

  “See?” she said, taking a tentative step. “I can—”

  There was no warning. One second, he was standing in front of her, still and silent as Egypt’s great sphinx, and the next, he was scooping her up into his powerful arms, ignoring her yelped “Hey!” and swinging her toward the hallway.

  “Put me down, James!”

  “No.”

  And there was nothing she could do but smack his hard shoulder in protest and hang on for the thrilling ride.

  “It’s a good thing we didn’t work out as a couple,” she muttered, the brandy making her bold and reckless. She knew it was a dangerous combination, but that didn’t stop her from turning her head so her mouth was closer to his ear. “You need to learn to listen.”

  She felt the satisfying catch of his breath as his chest rose and fell against hers.

  But her upper hand disappeared when he also turned his head.

  “So do you, Miranda,” he murmured in her ear.

  Need coiled inside her, pooling low in her belly.

  Startled by the raw note in his voice—it sounded like desire drenched in lust and wrapped with need—she stared him straight in the face.

  His glittering gaze leveled on hers and she saw a new emotion she hadn’t expected:

  Anger.

  She flinched.

  He blinked and the hard edge slid away from his expression, leaving a blank and impenetrable brick wall.

  This unrelenting cold shoulder of his was seriously starting to piss her off.

  “What?” she demanded.

  He stalked into the bathroom, unceremoniously plunked her down on the counter and stepped back, breaking her grip on his neck and forcing her to grip the counter’s edge or else wobble and fall over.

  “I’m not in a talking mood.”

  Shut down again. It figured. Why was he always, always shutting her down? Did he think it was easy for her to reach out to him when he kept pushing her away?

  What would it take to break through his protective shell once and for all?

  Leaning closer and tipping her face up to his, she smiled sweetly. The hot toddy was still working its magic on her body temperature and her courage level, and she was feeling no pain.

  “You never are when it comes to me, are you, James? It’s so much easier to run and hide.”

  He went utterly still, his face darkening with quiet fury.

  Riveted, she watched him watch her and did her best not to breathe because she was determined not to be the first one to blink. Not when she was right.

  Several tense seconds ticked by. In the background, she heard Frank’s low whine from the door, as though he wanted to remind them that he was still on standby, awaiting his marching orders. And she heard the frantic thud of her own heartbeat in her ears.

  But nothing mattered except James’s thinned lips, flaring nostrils and the merciless intensity with which he stared at her, as though he couldn’t decide whether to strangle her or make love to her.

  A vein appeared down the center of his forehead. Muscles throbbed in his temples and jaw line as he spoke, barely moving his lips. “I want you out of those wet clothes and into my robe—” he pointed to a red plaid fleece robe hanging on the door hook— “in the next ten seconds. I’ll be right out there.”

  Oh, so he thought he’d ignore what she’d said, did he? Her anger spiked higher.

  So did her recklessness. She didn’t care about the consequences.

  They’d entered into a game here, nearly a year in the making, and the stakes were too high.

  Something about this man affected her too strongly for either of them to ignore it.

  “Why do I scare you so much?”

  “You don’t scare me.”

  “You’re lying. It’s like you can’t run away from me fast enough. But I see the way you look at me.”

  “And how is that?”

  She hesitated, feeling wary. The silky note in his voice was at complete odds with the hard gleam in his eyes, and she wasn’t sure what he’d do if she pushed him much further. On the other hand, anything that happened to her tonight short of freezing to death had to be a vast improvement.

  With nothing else to lose, there was no reason not to go for it.

  “Like you want me as much as I want you. Like you’d do anything to be with me, if only you could figure out what the anything is. You look at me like I’m ...everything.”

  He went utterly still.

  She took a step closer to the precipice. “Am I wrong?”

  He looked away, dropping his gaze without answering.

  “James.” Her voice was raspy now, her desperation audible. She didn’t care. “We have to figure this out. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Get out of those wet clothes and take your shower. And make it quick so you don’t aggravate than ankle,” he said, striding out and shutting the door behind him.

  Chapter 6

  James stuck around, loitering outside the bathroom door until he was sure she’d gotten her clothes off without falling. Then he headed to the kitchen. Badly shaken, he helped himself to a snifter of brandy—medicinal purposes only, since the woman was clearly a menace to his mental health—and tossed it back.

  After a few seconds of moodily staring at the empty glass, he poured another one.

  A task that was made trickier by the fact that his hands were shaking.

  She’d effectively called him a coward.

  It’d been a taunt to his manhood. A spear hurled at the center of his chest. A killing blow.

  Probably because it was true.

  Frank, who was sitting at his feet and studying him with his head tilted and ears cocked, yipped derisively at him.

  James lowered his glass long enough to snort down at him. “Don’t judge me. I’ve caught you eating dead flies.”

  Frank whined and looked over his furry shoulder, to the bathroom James had designated for Miranda.

  Which, in point of fact, was in the master bedroom. Which made it—

  “Yeah, I put her in my bathroom,” he told Frank. “So what?”

  Frank gave three sharp barks.

  James frowned at him. “Yeah? Well, it’s not your personal life on the line, here, is it?”

  Frank flopped down, rolled over with his paws in the air and groaned.

  “Dumb canine,” James muttered, finishing off his second glass of brandy. Since he liked the good stuff, it went down hot and smooth, warming him on a cellular level, which was great.

  If only he could get his hands to stop shaking.

  Focus on dinner. Yeah. That’s what he needed to do. He needed to...Wait, dinner? Yeah...dinner. He put the snifter down, glanced around the kitchen and saw the pots on the stove. He’d made chili what seemed like a thousand years ago, earlier this evening. Way back before Miranda nearly got herself killed and nearly scared him to death in the process.

  Shit.

  Shit, shit, SHIT.

  Hit by a renewed wave of the shakes, he laid his palms flat on the counter and leaned into it for support.

  If a couple of factors had turned out just slightly differently tonight, she’d be dead by now.

  If he hadn’t kept one eye on his front window since he arrived home earlier, waiting in vain for her decrepit car to pass by on its way up the hill like it did every other night . . .

  If he hadn’t had that knotted feeling of unease in his gut, or if he’d ignored it . . .If he hadn’t been an accomplished outdoorsman with a dog who was good with his nose . . .

  If Frank had been off his game tonight . . .

  If he’d talked himself into waiting, just a bit longer, to see if Miranda’s car appeared out of the darkness and s
cooted its way up the hill like always, just a little later than normal . . .

  The knot in his heart tightened, sitting like an iceberg in his chest. He rubbed it, trying to regulate his breathing. It didn’t help.

  The bottom line was: if any one of those events had gone in another direction tonight, even marginally, Miranda would be dead of hypothermia right now. There was no doubt whatsoever in his mind. And he and Frank would be part of the recovery party sent out in the morning to find her frozen body.

  Ironic, eh?

  This whole time, ever since their date—the best date of his life, frankly--he’d been boxed inside the numb fear of letting another woman get too close, ever again.

  But now his fear of losing Miranda without ever even kissing her trumped all the other fears he’d been nursing since Joy died.

  Joy. His wife.

  After a year of missing her, pining for her, wishing he’d died, too, but not having the balls to take one of his rifles to his head and finish the job properly, he’d slowly begun to rejoin the living world. Thrown himself back into his store and made the outfitter a huge success. Become a scout troop leader and had the time of his life teaching kids to pitch tents and start campfires. Started eating and sleeping again.

  That was about the time folks in town started buzzing about the new coffeehouse and its owner.

  Even his mother had gotten in on the action.

  “Have you been to Java Nectar yet?” she’d asked him when she "just happened” to pop in to Open Sky one day, a speculative gleam in her eye.

  He’d been behind the counter, unpacking a new shipment of walking sticks, and hadn’t been too interested in the topic. “No time,” he said. “Why?”

  His mother, he remembered, had given him the kind of enigmatic woman’s smile that always put men on their guard. “They have great coffee. I really think you’ll love it there.”

  “Yeah?” He went back to his box and his inventory list, checking tracking numbers.

  “Yeah,” Mama said firmly. “In fact, I’ll buy you a cuppa right now. Let’s go.”

  James waved a hand. “Just bring me back something.”

  “I will not. I’m going to share a nice cup of coffee with my son.”

  James looked up, exasperated. “You’ve got ten or fifteen sons, Ma—”