Make Me Lose Control (23 page)

CHAPTER NINETEEN

J
ACE
WASN
’
T
SLEEPING
. After his daughter’s emotional upheaval, they’d packed up and returned to the lakefront house. She’d taken a shower and a nap, and then eaten dinner. After, instead of opting to hang in her room reading or playing on her computer, she’d sat in the great room and watched TV, wrapped in a throw the color of sunflowers.

Another of Shay’s additions, he supposed.

Both he and the tutor had joined London, their gazes fixed on the big screen. First it was a singing show and then a dancing show and then a cop show and then the news. He hadn’t absorbed any of it, from “Don’t Stop Believin’” to the next day’s weather forecast.

His job hadn’t been to be entertained or gain information. He’d been there to offer any support London might need.

Finally, he and Shay had traded looks. Though his daughter’s eyes were still owl-wide, he’d made the traditional noises about bed, sleep, have a good rest.

The females in his house had retired to their side of the upstairs.

He moved to his, but found himself getting up and making the rounds every twenty minutes or so, as if guarding against an enemy invasion. Ridiculous, really, because there was no way to protect London from the slings and arrows of growing up.

But if she woke up in the night, well, he’d be on alert, ready to do...something. Make her a bowl of ice cream. Wrap her in that yellow blanket again. Tell her a thousand more times she was beautiful and smart and he couldn’t believe he was lucky enough to have a daughter with her humor and resilience.

That he was proud of her.

Of course, he hadn’t said anything about his pride or good fortune. He was so goddamn new at fatherhood he felt as if there were land mines and booby traps everywhere. What if he said the wrong thing? Did the wrong thing?

Where was the fucking map to all this? People who said men wouldn’t consult such things or stop to ask directions had never known a solitary-minded bachelor who’d suddenly become a full-time father.

In cotton pajama pants and a T-shirt, he padded downstairs, wandering the first floor. There were more flowers on the kitchen countertop, a low bowl of pale blue glass—the exact shade of Shay’s eyes, he thought—centered on the dining room table, an orchid arched from a ceramic pot on the table in the foyer.

Heading back the way he’d come, he spied a stack of textbooks on the bottom stair. He hefted them into his arms on his way up the steps. In the area used as a schoolroom, he placed the books on the table.

It was then he heard it.

A moan of distress. A muffled cry.

Galvanized, Jace rushed to London’s room, but before he even had his hand on the knob, he knew it didn’t come from her. Another plaintive, almost eerie noise lifted the hairs on the back of his neck and he hurried toward it.

Toward Shay.

Her door pushed in soundlessly. It was near-dark inside, but he’d been wandering the house without lights so he easily zeroed in on her, her hair a deep shadow against the white pillowcase.

Her head thrashing back and forth, she plucked at the covers. “No...” she moaned. “No, no.”

He crossed to her, and took a seat on the edge of the mattress to brush her hair from her face. “Shay,” he whispered. “Wake up.”

But she was deep in the nightmare, her legs moving as if she were running, one hand coming up in front of her face as if to ward something off. “Don’t, don’t,
don’t
,” she cried, each iteration of the word getting louder.

“Shh,” he said in a low murmur. “Shh, shh. You’re safe.”

Her eyes popped open, the horror in them revealing that whatever she saw in the nightmare was now in the room. She opened her mouth, inhaled a breath.

Jace put his hand over her lips to prevent the imminent scream.

She thrashed as he gathered her close, pulling her free of the tangle of covers to carry her out of the room. “Shh,” he said again, his mouth against the damp hair at her temple. “It’s me. You’re safe. Let’s not wake London. Shh.”

Halfway to his room, her struggles abated, replaced by silent tears. “You’re okay,” he whispered to her. “I’m here. You’re safe. It was just a bad dream.”

Crossing the threshold, he kicked the door shut with his foot. Then he sat with her on his bed. Still shaking, she curled in his lap, her face pressed to his chest. Murmuring nonsense, he stroked her hair, her shoulder, whatever parts of her he could reach.

His day to stanch tears, he thought, as the wetness from her cheeks turned into a damp patch on his T-shirt. Eventually, her body quieted, but he continued with the soothing strokes. When her head tipped back, he looked down at her.

“Better?” he asked, smiling a little.

She nodded and made to move off of him, but he tightened his arms around her. “A little longer,” he said. “For me. I was worried about you for a while there.”

“It’s a terrible dream,” she said, her voice raspy from crying.

He cupped the back of her head with his palm and pressed his lips to one downy brow and then the other. “I could see that. Want to talk about it?”

She hesitated.

He found himself almost annoyed by her reluctance. She was holding back again and they didn’t have secrets from each other! He’d been so smug about how she’d opened up to him, and now she was resurrecting her barriers. Still, if she told him it was none of his damn business, he couldn’t very well protest.

Really, why should she share with a short-timer in her life?

But then her voice echoed in his head.
Girls can go inward. They might become quiet, and be shy about speaking of their dreams and their desires.
Sue him, he was going to press her again.

He rubbed at her damp cheek with his thumb. “Maybe the nightmare will go away if you tell me about it.”

“I’ve never told anyone...not in detail.”

“Turns out I’m becoming a good listener.” At least better than he had ever expected of himself.

She glanced up at him. “You are,” she said, her voice low.

“Let’s get more comfortable.” Before she could change her mind, he drew both of them toward the pillows, and arranged them so he was sitting up and she was curled into his side. With a gentle hand, he drew her head into the cup of his shoulder. “Look how perfectly you fit,” he whispered against her hair.

Her hand rested over his heart and she curled her fingers into her palm. He placed his own over that small fist, insinuating his thumb into its center to unfurl her digits once again. She sighed.

“How does it start?” he prompted.

“The fire at the resort,” she began.

It was a recurring dream that she’d had since childhood, she explained. She was again in the woods at the base of the ski mountain, exploring alone while her father took care of some routine tasks up at the lodge. She’d been there many times before.

“But I wandered far that day, even though Dell had told me to stay close to where he was working. I was daydreaming, lost in my own twelve-year-old little world when I smelled the fire.”

It was something all the mountain people grew up knowing to fear, she said.

“In the dream I freeze, just like I did that day. I knew I should get back to the truck, but I couldn’t figure out which direction to take.”

Jace stroked her hair, and when he felt her shiver, he pulled the covers over them. “Then I could hear the flames,” she whispered. “Greedy. Burning the forest.”

The ghostly tone of her voice triggered a chill along his spine. He hitched her closer. “How close did they come to you?”

She shrugged. “At the sound, I began to run. In real life and in the dream. It’s a monster at my back, chasing me, and I tear through branches and over rocks and I’m sure it’s going to catch me, consume me...”

“You’re safe now.” His hand returned to stroking her hair.

“In the dream I think I’m in hell, and not only is there the fiery monster at my back, but a dark demon rushing toward me, covered in ash. I can’t retreat because I’ll be burned. I can’t avoid the demon’s claws, either. Just as it grabs hold, I scream, and over that sound, the creature speaks.” Rolling away from him, she sat up. “Then I awaken.”

Shay forked her hands through her hair, and glanced over at him, clearly embarrassed. “Maybe that helped. Because it sounds pretty garden variety on the retelling.”

Having heard and seen her reaction to it, the nightmare didn’t seem garden variety to Jace in the least. “How often does it occur?”

She shrugged.

“Do you have any idea what triggers it?”

She shrugged again.

Jace rubbed his palm over his jaw, the nighttime bristles making a scratchy sound. “What does the creature say, Shay, when you scream?”

Her head turned toward the bank of windows as if seeing more than the blackness of the night beyond the glass. “In real life, it wasn’t a creature at all, of course. It was Dell, who’d seen the fire and was out looking for me. He’d been working on some machinery and he’d gotten grease on his hands and on his face. The fire had rained ash on his clothes.”

“Okay.” Jace shifted on the mattress and touched her shoulder. “What did Dell say to you?”

“He said...” Clearing her throat, Shay’s fingers clutched the sheets that were pooled at her waist. “He said, ‘Girl, you’ll be the death of me.’”

Then she looked at Jace. “And I was, you know. I was.”

He frowned. “What are you talking about?”

“If I’d stayed near like he told me to, we would have been able to get help sooner. The resort would have been saved. The stress of losing it is what killed him.”

“Shay...” He had to think of how to put this. “The words that were spoken, you have to know he was just expressing his worry. It was an utterance of the moment.”

“It’s what I remember. And relive in my dreams.”

“You were a blameless little girl. Surely you can see that? Nobody holds you responsible for what happened at the resort.”

She stared down at her lap. “Part of me understands that, I suppose. Then I remember... There are no adoption papers.”

Ah, he thought. That was the crux of the matter.

“Words have power,” Shay murmured.

And the lack of them had power, too.

She lifted her hands to her face, scrubbed. “I’ll go back to my room now. I appreciate you pulling me out of that.”

What else could he do but watch her climb from the bed? In a sleeveless, light cotton gown that floated about her knees as she walked toward the door, she appeared fragile and beautiful and he wanted to shelter her forever. But if he held her again he might not ever let her go and she deserved someone who could give her all she needed.

The security of family and belonging that was a hole in her that needed filling.

A man who had the temperament and experience to provide both.

She paused, her hand on the doorknob, and glanced at him over her shoulder. “Thanks, again. I owe you one.”

“Shay,” he said, before she could leave him.

“Yes?”

“Your parents? Did they tell you they loved you?”

“My mother—”

“Remember those words. Treasure them.”

She frowned. “I—”

“They’re special. I know, because no one’s ever said them to me.”

Shay’s eyes widened. Her mouth opened. She started to speak, then apparently decided against it. With a tight nod, she was gone.

Jace had yet to move when he saw the door swing open again. Shay stood in the entry and he could sense emotions waving off of her: uncertainty, determination and something else he couldn’t name.

He sat up straighter. “Shay?”

“You should know...” She shook her head, began again. “I need to tell you something. There’s something you need to hear.”

“What?”

On slow feet she came toward the bed. In the light-colored gown, she looked like a ghost—no, an angel. She halted at his bedside and he could see she was trembling.

“Shay,” he said, worried. He caught her hand. It was icy.

“What I’m going to say...I know it won’t change anything.”

He nodded, though he couldn’t guess what she was talking about.

“My last day with you and London...it’s tomorrow.”

“That’s what you wanted to tell me?”

“No, it’s something different.”

Frowning, he tightened his hold on her fingers. “Well, tomorrow’s too soon. I’m not taking her to school until next week.”

“Nonetheless, I’ve decided tomorrow’s my final day. I have a last assignment to go over with London in the morning. Then—”

“We had plans to return to the cabins in the afternoon. I need another hour or so to finish repairing that mudroom roof. And I’ll need your help.”

She hesitated. “Okay, the cabins.
Then
I’ll be moving out.”

“There’s no need—”

“In a minute, you’ll know it’s the right decision.” She slipped her hand from his and perched on the edge of the mattress. Her shoulders rose on a deep breath.

“You’re scaring me,” he said, trying to lighten the mood. “Is this where you confess—”

“I’m in love with you.”

He’d heard wrong. “What?”

“I fell in love with you,” she said quickly. “Sometime between my birthday and watching you beginning to bond with your daughter, I fell in love.”

“Shay—”

“I love you, Jace. I wanted you to hear that. I wanted you to know it.”

Dumbfounded, he stared at her.
I fell in love with you. I love you.

A wild feeling surged from his toes, through his heart, all the way to the top of his head. It was...triumph. With something else beneath it, that felt like the push of powerful wings. Awe.

I love you.

He reached for her, but she scooted away and rose to her feet. “It’s a goodbye gift. Now that it’s given, I’ll go.”

Go?
She thought she could share that with him and then
go
?

He had her in his arms before she made the door. With his foot, he kicked it closed once again even as he bent his head and took her mouth in a searing kiss. Her hands pushed against his chest and he thought he might have to let her leave, after all, but then she slid them up to wind her arms around his neck. She opened her mouth, welcomed his tongue, pressed her nubile body against his.