A California Christmas (Silver Springs #7) - Brenda Novak Page 0,110

was too aroused to refuse what she was offering. He was always ready to make love to her.

“Okay,” he whispered, and his heart began to pound as her fingers curled around him. If this might possibly be their last time together, he wanted to take it slow, to make love for hours. But all his good intentions came to nothing when she pulled him on top of her. Then he couldn’t get inside her fast enough, and he didn’t even care that the bed kept hitting the wall.

“We can stay in touch, can’t we? Maybe after a few years, everything will be different,” he gasped in the middle of it all. “A little time could change everything.”

“But the opposite is also true,” she said arching into him as though trying to join them even deeper. “We could hang on—and never go anywhere.”

Despite the reality of her words, he couldn’t think of anything beyond the taste and smell of her, and the warm friction created by the movement of their bodies.

“Damn it,” he said when he came almost right away. “I couldn’t stop.”

“I didn’t want you to stop.” She kissed him and started to get up, but he pulled her back down. “No you don’t. This isn’t over yet. Give me a few minutes.”

“But I can’t stay. I’m afraid we’ll fall asleep, and I’ll forget to go back to my own bed.”

“I’ll set an alarm. Where’s your phone?”

She gave him the code as she handed it to him, and he set an alarm for five-thirty. There was no way any of his brothers would be getting up before then, and Aiyana was gone. “Now we have most of the night,” he told her.

She set her phone on the nightstand and spooned him as they fell asleep, and they made love again an hour later. This time Dallas managed to take it as slow as he wanted, and was gratified when she cried out, and he had to cover her mouth with his own so that she wouldn’t wake Seth in the next room.

“God, that was good,” she whispered as she fell back on the pillows, completely spent.

Dallas smoothed her hair off her face. “I owed you one.”

They remained entwined until they’d both recovered, at which point he curled around her but didn’t drift off. He stared into the darkness, waiting until her breathing evened out. Then he reached over to get her phone, put in her password and sent Ethan Grimes’s contact information to his own phone.

Sunday, December 20

Emery had gone back to bed in her own room after her alarm went off, so she was alone when she called her mother the next morning.

“Hi, honey. How are you?”

She propped the second pillow behind her head. Although she’d listened before getting on the phone, she couldn’t hear anyone moving around downstairs or anywhere else. Apparently the boys were sleeping in even later than she had. “Better.”

“You are?”

Emery thought about the attack by that cowboy at the Blue Suede Shoe but decided not to mention it to her mother. There wasn’t anything Connie could do about it, anyway. “I am. Definitely. And I’ve decided to come visit you for Christmas. Would you be able to pick me up at the airport tomorrow?”

“You’re coming here?” her mother said, and immediately broke into tears. “I...I didn’t want to ask you to come, but... I’m so glad you are.”

A lump rose in Emery’s own throat—along with a measure of guilt for making this decision so late and letting her mother believe they wouldn’t be together for Christmas. But she’d been coping with her own difficulties and doing the best she could. “I considered surprising you, but the flight’s going to be expensive. I decided to save the price of an Uber, if I could.”

“Of course. I’ll load your grandmother up, and we’ll both be there. She’ll be so excited.”

If Adele could even remember who she was. Emery knew this probably wouldn’t be the best Christmas she’d ever spent. She’d avoided going to Boston for a reason. But at least her mother wouldn’t be left to continue to deal with Adele’s memory loss on her own.

“What time?” Connie asked.

Emery hadn’t even arranged her flight. Christmas was only six days away; she hoped they wouldn’t be booked. “I’ll text you as soon as I get my ticket.”

They talked about the cold front that had set in back East, how much more it was going to cost to heat Grandma’s house and what they should make for Christmas