Page 36 of Flirting With Forever
She couldn’t look at him and swallowed hard to contain the tears suddenly clogging her throat. “I saw it happen. She was— She was coming up our driveway. Almost home. So close. I was waiting, watching for her because I-I needed to talk to her about something. She was almost home.”
“You saw it happen?”
Gage released a gush of air from his lungs and moved to pull her against him once more.
She knew it was highly inappropriate given he was her boss but right now? With all they’d talked about and shared?
She didn’t care.
She wouldn’t be in town long, but she needed this hug, his strength, more than she needed her next breath. So she buried her face against him once more and let him chase away the memories as the wind raged outside. Whistling through the crooks and crannies as lightning sizzled with loud, crackling bursts and thunder rumbled like boulders rolling against each other.
All the sounds she’d heard that day as she’d run from the house and down the driveway screaming for her mom.
She thought she felt Gage’s lips brush her hair, but given how thick and curly it was, she figured it was a figment of her imagination. Another secret want of hers for connection and comfort with a man she’d found attractive from the first moment she’d laid eyes on him, staring at her through the car window with a look of such concern…
“I should’ve made you evacuate. If I had, you wouldn’t have gotten hurt. Wouldn’t be so scared now and reliving what happened to your mom.”
She shook her head but didn’t lift it, every breath full of Gage-steadiness that soothed her chaotic senses and brought a comfort she couldn’t allow herself to name. “I can’t imagine being stuck on a highway somewhere in this. Or—or alone. I’d rather be here.”
Maybe it made her sound weak, but that was another thing she didn’t care about. With every blast of wind against the house, she felt it, saw it, that moment where she’d watched the one person in her home who truly understood her, die.
Gage hugged her tighter, and they stayed like that for a long while, there in the glowing shadows, side-by-side and cuddled up like two teenagers watching a scary movie.
They didn’t speak more, but it wasn’t awkward or weird. The hurricane raged outside, but with every breath and rub of his hand on her shoulder, every soothing, distracting caress of his fingers against her nape, she forgot about the storm and caught her breath at the one stirring between them.
His touch brought comfort, but also a yearning that had been growing lately. That of finding a place, a person, a life. A home. An overwhelming desire to be able to relax and not worry about whether Noah was about to appear.
Roots. Family.
For this—this right here—to be the norm. The quiet pleasure of peace and security. Safety.
She rolled her head along his upper arm and glanced up to find him studying her. Her breath caught and held in her chest when his gaze lowered to her lips. Her lungs expanded as her breathing quickened. She waited. Hoped. And watched as he lowered his head as though to kiss her only to stop and pull back with a sudden jerk.
“I should go check the door downstairs. Make sure we’re not flooding.”
She watched Gage extract himself and surge to his feet to head toward the stairway, grabbing up one of the lanterns along the way and clicking it on to take with him. His footsteps thudded against the treads, and he disappeared.
Sloane leaned her head back against the couch cushion with a soft groan, wondering what insanity had overtaken her senses.
Days. She’d been here for a matter of days, but one thing was blatantly clear.
Earning her Salt Life sticker like a coastal local might require more from her than just making it through a hurricane.
Chapter Eleven
Gage rolled onto his side and snuggled up against the warmth next to him, his mind hazy from lack of sleep and pure exhaustion.
He and Sloane hadn’t talked much after he’d come back upstairs, but the tension between them was palatable since he’d nearly crossed the line and kissed her.
He’d wanted to. Ached to know how she’d taste. How she’d feel. But they’d had some heavy conversation regarding her mother’s death, and he didn’t want to take advantage of Sloane’s fear. Like Alec had said, she was vulnerable. And he didn’t want her to ever feel as though he belonged in the same category as that former boss of hers.
He couldn’t imagine watching her mother’s car get smashed by a tree. His brother, Finn, had struggled in the aftermath of their parents’ deaths until recently, because he’d been the lone survivor of the head-on collision that had killed them.
Finn had been trapped in the backseat and had watched their parents die. Just like Sloane had been trapped behind that window, helpless, watching the worst thing happen to a woman she’d obviously loved very much.
The story brought up more questions too. Like why she ran from the family she had left. What was going on with them that pushed her to such extremes? To live in her car rather than stay near them? She was twenty-six. Hardly a child and obviously capable of providing for herself. So what drove her to run?
The winds worsened, blasting the house with such force that Sloane’s trembling became visible, though she didn’t say a word.
