Land of Entrapment (24 page)

“What happened to your dad?”

She was quiet for a while, sipping her wine.

“I’m sorry. You don’t need to talk about that if you don’t want to.”

“No, it’s not that,” she assured me. “I really don’t know what happened to him. When Mom moved River and me into town, he didn’t come around anymore. I saw him maybe once after that. He was sober, for once, and he told me I look like his mom.

Whatever the hell that means. I never saw him again.”

I shifted in my chair. “Where’s your mom?”

“She lives in Cheyenne. She’s an LPN now and she works in a hospital. She wants to be an RN so she’s taking classes.”

“That’s great. And River?”

She grinned. “He’s a hunting guide in Montana.

He freakin’ loves it. He calls once a week to check on me. He’s supposed to be my baby brother but he worries about me all the time.”

I returned her grin and reached for the bottle of wine. “Uh-oh. Empty,” I announced.

She raised an eyebrow. The gesture made me weak. “So open the other one. That’ll be your hourglass. When it’s done, time for you to leave. We don’t want you turning into a pumpkin, after all.”

I laughed and went to the kitchen where I opened the second bottle and returned to the living room. She had moved to the couch with both wine glasses. Uh-oh again.

I sat down and finished what was left at the bottom of my glass then poured from the new bottle. I handed my glass to her. “First dibs. Try it.”

She took it, her fingers brushing mine. Shit. I ignored it the best I could. She sipped and nodded, handing my glass back. “This is really good, too.

Another local?”

“Of course. I’m kinda weird like that.” I placed the open bottle on the coffee table.

“I like weirdness. So why are you still a bachelor?” She had an unnerving way of getting right to something, usually without an obvious segue.

“Excuse me?”

She sat facing me, both knees drawn up to her chest, her right arm lying along the back of the couch.

“You say that to buy yourself time for your answers. I think I must make you nervous.” She flashed another grin.

And then some. “You’re right. I do. And yes, you do.”“How come?”

“Like you said earlier—sometimes you say things before you think about them.” I hoped I didn’t sound as stupid as I felt.

She laughed. “And it does get me into trouble.

You’re really polite about it, at least. And you tell me if it makes you uncomfortable. So did that last question make you uncomfortable? Or are you reading meanings into it?” She cocked an eyebrow and looked at me above the rim of her own wineglass, her lips resting against it. I really wanted to be that glass. And the realization almost knocked me off the couch.

“Yes and probably. The short answer is, I don’t know why I’m still a bachelor. I guess I like it.”

“Or you work too much.”

“Yes. But I like the work that I do. And after Melissa, I was pretty messed up for a little bit.”

“That wasn’t really about you.” Her tone was surprisingly gentle.

I waited for her to continue.

“That was about Melissa not telling you she needed you. And rather than deal with it, she got sucked into something else.”

“I worked a lot during those months that Megan was in rehab, Sage. I wasn’t available emotionally.

I’m not excusing what Melissa did. But I was part of that relationship, too. For whatever reasons, neither of us really handled it the best way.”

She handed me her empty glass. I filled it and handed it back.

“Megan told me about you right after we met,”

she said. “She told me about Melissa and about what happened with you. She said she was really messed up before you left and didn’t know what precipitated you leaving until later.” Sage took a sip of wine. “And she described you. She said you’re laid-back and really, really nice. You’re not judgmental and you’re funny. Those are fairly simplistic, superficial characteristics.” She watched me. “But sometimes the simplest things tell the most complex stories.”

I quickly took a sip of wine as she continued talking.

“I went over one day and I noticed Megan had some photos out on her coffee table in the living room.” She smiled. “I notice things like photos.

Anyway, there was one of you with Melissa at Taos Pueblo. Megan had never told me what you look like but I knew it had to be you in that picture. I could see that it was you in your eyes before Megan told me it was you. She said it was her favorite photo of you and Melissa but she didn’t like to have it out. She put that one away somewhere and I didn’t ask about it.”

I poured more wine into my glass. I knew I should get out of there right away. If I didn’t want this to go any further, I needed to leave. But I couldn’t move.

My feet felt like they were glued to the floor.

She sat regarding me and I swear I saw fireflies dancing in her eyes. “And when I met you, you were everything Megan had said but so much more.”

“Sage—”

“I’m not trying to weird you out. I’m just telling you my thoughts and feelings on the matter. So relax.

I don’t go where I’m not invited.” She took another sip of her wine. “And stop fighting yourself.”

I stared at her. “What do you mean?” I was painfully aware of the music, a slow and extremely sexy groove.

She sighed patiently but smiled. “Have you ever gone swimming in a river?”

Another one of her side trips. I followed. “Yeah.

Quite a bit.”

“Well, the Poudre River flows through this canyon in northern Colorado, outside Fort Collins. Along the way are some really great swimming holes after the spring run-off. There’s this one place where you can jump into a pool from a cliff above. It’s, like, twenty feet down and in June and July, that pool must be thirty feet deep.”

I waited. I was getting used to Sage’s digressions, since she always had a point to make.

“But in August, the drop is more like forty feet and you might really fuck yourself up if you jump.”

She held me in her gaze. I had nowhere to hide. “In other words, yes, sometimes it’s not a good idea to jump off a cliff. But there are other times when it’s the best possible thing you could do.”

I lost the ability to breathe, think, and speak. All at once.

She leaned over and set her glass on the coffee table. “I’m sorry, K.C., but I think it’s a good idea for you to go, even though we still have wine left. I know I said I’d like you to come over for dinner and we’d just talk and hang out.” She stood. “But I can’t. I can’t be this close to you and not want more.”

I couldn’t form a coherent thought, let alone a sentence. I felt completely out of control but in a strangely good way. I tried to run through the list of why I shouldn’t pursue anything with Sage, tried to remember all the bullet points I had made in that internal PowerPoint. And for the life of me, I didn’t come up with any.

She offered an apologetic smile. “Thank you for coming to dinner.”

I stood as well, on autopilot. “Thank you for cooking. That was a really, really nice thing to do.”

Oh, God. My internal hostess again. I wanted to kick myself for sounding so stupid. She bent to retrieve the wineglasses.

“Sage.” She looked up at me and I was useless in her gaze. Helen of Troy had nothing on Sage of Sheridan. “Will you dance with me?” I blurted. What am I doing? Where did that come from?

“I’d love to.” She set the wineglasses back down.

I reached out with my left hand and she took it with her right. I refused to think about how that felt because when I pulled her gently into my arms it was as if all the secrets of the universe were soon to be revealed. I carefully positioned my right hand against the small of her back and pulled her against my body.

I held her right hand against my chest. She rested her left arm on my shoulder, her fingers centimeters from my neck. She was looking into my eyes as we moved and I felt like I had eaten live coals. A force of nature.

Hurricane Sage.

We fit very well together. Too well. Like we were supposed to be doing this. I hugged her closer and she lowered her head to my shoulder so that her forehead brushed my neck. I released her hand then and slid my arm around her. I had no idea how I had the gumption to do that. She let her free hand drop to my waist and I felt the fingers of her other hand teasing my hair where it hit the back of my neck. Her fingertips brushed the skin at the nape of my neck and every nerve ending in my body screamed. I was surprised she didn’t hear it. Or maybe she did because she tightened her hold around me with her right hand and shifted her head slightly. The heat of her breath brushed my neck and it sent crazy shivers down my spine. She’s got to have some kind of magical powers, I thought. Because I have never felt anything like this. Ever. But this can’t be a good idea. Can it?

“What are you afraid of?” Her voice, low against my neck.

“I don’t know.”

Her right hand glided up my back, pressed gently on my shoulder blade. I swear heat emanated from her palm. Worse, her breasts were pressed against mine and the sensation was unbelievable. I was afraid I might hyperventilate and I hoped Sage couldn’t tell.

“Is it me?” The warmth of her breath caressed my neck and ear. I don’t know how I remained standing.

“Yes.”

She was quiet for a bit, absorbing that, I supposed.

“Explain,” she finally said. She raised her head and I was forced to look again into her eyes, reflecting mysteries on the verge of unveiling.

“I don’t know if I can.”

“Try.”

I nodded, still caught in her eyes. Somehow, the words came out. “I’ve never met anyone like you. I’ve never felt so completely beyond any kind of rational thought around anyone before this. And honestly, I don’t know what to do with that.”

The fingers of her left hand stroked the line of my jaw from my chin to my ear. She studied my innermost thoughts through my eyes, unnerving and arousing me at the same time. I wanted to run up the Sandias again, run down the backside, keep running to Texas, and sling a few bales of hay. But deeper than that, I wanted to stay. I watched a very gentle smile lift the corners of her mouth.

“You’re afraid of possibility,” she said softly.

“You’re a worst-case scenario type. So you think of reasons not to do something rather than just seeing how things play out.” She moved against me as the music changed. I thought I saw a path in her eyes and I wanted to see where it led.

“I think you might be right.” My voice sounded steadier than I felt.

“And maybe you’re worried about a repeat of the past.”

“That’s a definite.”

The fingers of her left hand stroked my neck along the line of my shirt collar. “It’s not me, then.” Her fingers lifted my chin, forcing me to look at her.

“You’re afraid of you.”

“Maybe,” I finally managed.

She was right and she knew it. She lowered her head to my shoulder again and hugged me closer. I felt her completely relax against me and when I adjusted the position of my head to look at her, her eyes were closed though that damn smile continued to light up her face. This is either really bad or really good.

I tried to think, tried to access the logical part of my brain as we swayed to the music. I should go. But for the life of me, I couldn’t think of a reason to do so. My feelings had completely overridden my analytical streak. I was helpless. And somewhere within, that was okay. She felt amazing against me. I thought about what Joe Montoya had said earlier that day. “A rare spirit.” And here she was, dancing with me.

Setting my soul ablaze.

I adjusted my arms and stroked her back with my hands. Jesus. How am I able to do this? I heard her exhale with a low “Mmm.” I closed my eyes and carefully allowed my lips to graze her forehead before resting my cheek there, astonishing myself with my newfound bravery. She started playing with my hair again, her fingers burrowing deeper into it. She kept brushing the back of my neck with her thumb.

“Give me your list of cons,” she said, lips against my neck.

Oh, please don’t do that, I begged silently. Not my neck. Please. I was completely in her power. “Your age was,” I admitted. “Though now that I know what it is, I guess that’s not a factor anymore.” Did she just kiss my neck? “A friend of Megan’s—that struck me as kind of weird. But it doesn’t anymore.”

“And?”

“I live in Texas. You live here.”

“The only reason geography becomes a problem is if you make it one.”

Oh, she is definitely kissing my neck. I tried to focus.

“You’re about all out of ideas, aren’t you?” She was teasing the hell out of me.

The grin that eased across my face must’ve looked as goofy as I felt because she laughed. I shrugged sheepishly. “Yep. I am.”

She stopped dancing then and gently pushed away. “I had a wonderful time tonight. I need you to leave now,” she said, promises of secret places smoldering in her eyes.

Her statement took me aback. She saw it immediately. “I know what I want.” She pressed her palm against my cheek and I leaned into it, feeling my heart race. “But I’m patient. When you’re ready—

when your heart reaches an agreement with your head and you sort things out—I’ll show you how I feel about you.” And she pulled my head down closer to hers. She kissed me gently on the cheek, let her lips linger on my skin. “Sleep well.” She released me and gathered the wine glasses from the coffee table. How I remained standing was completely beyond me.

I ran a hand through my hair, trying desperately not to sound as bumbling as I felt. “Can I help you clean up?”

She looked up at me, still smiling. “No. Tonight, it’s my job. Next time, I might put you to work.” She allowed that damn devilish smile to spark across her face.

I smiled back at her. “Thanks, Sage. Dinner was amazing. And you—I don’t have words for how I feel about you.” I didn’t have words for much of anything at the moment.

“I know,” she said as she moved past me into the kitchen.

I followed her. “I’ll see you later,” I said softly. She set the glasses on the counter and I took her hands in mine, brought one to my lips. I kissed her knuckles before I could stop myself and before she could react and then I headed out the back door into the cool night air.