Truly Madly Mine

2. Wade

Chapter Two

Wade

Dani Love stared at me—her hair dusted with flour, those glorious curls bouncing around her shoulders as she shook her head. After a beat, her green eyes narrowed. Even with flour dusting her cheeks, the pink showed through. Her tongue swiped across her bottom lip.

“That was overdue,” I finally said.

Dani’s breath came out in a huff, and she put her hand on her hip and glared at me. “No, it was not.”

“Before you start screaming at me, I’ve gotta go,” I said flatly.

Dani blew out a puff of air, sending an errant curl out of her eyes. “Good,” she said. “Please go.”

For a moment, a retort was threatening to fly out. But I held back. Dani turned away, looking at the glimmer of sunrise beyond the pantry doorway through the window in the back of the kitchen. Her jaw was set, the lines of tension on her face so familiar.

I didn’t know how, but I knew she was hurting. “Dani …” I began.

Her gaze slid back to mine, her green eyes flashing. “Just go, Wade. I know the group scheduled for the hike is waiting for you because that’s why I’m here so early. They already had a quick buffet breakfast.”

I wanted to kiss her again—this woman who was covered in flour, this woman who I’d loved since she was a girl.

Well, I couldn’t say I loved her now. I wasn’t too sure. I had once upon a time. She had dumped me, and life went on. I moved away and came back. For the last few years, we’d been in this seemingly endless cycle of sniping at each other.

Leaning over, she picked up the elastic that had fallen to the floor. “Have a good hike,” she said. “I need to get cleaned up.”

With that, she brushed past me, a little zing of electricity streaking up my arm where her elbow grazed against my forearm. Turning, I watched her hurry down the hall to the bathroom, her generous hips swaying with each quick step. I took a breath as the door closed behind her and let it out slowly. With a mental shake, I turned and headed to the front of the restaurant where I would meet the group for the hike.

Hours later, I leaned against a tree, scanning the vista in front of me. I was leading a group of eight on a winding hike through a pretty section of trail in the Blue Ridge Mountains. We were on the far side of Stolen Hearts Valley now. The nip of winter was strong in the air.

Technically, it was still autumn, but snow could fly within the next few weeks. The tree branches were stark against the sky. The famous blue haze lingered over the mountains and undulated ahead of us in the view.

Dani had been on my mind all day. I’d suspected for a long time there was something I was missing when it came to her and what happened between us years ago. Yet, I didn’t know what the hell it was. I did know, with shocking clarity, that kissing Dani gave me a jolt I hadn’t experienced since the last time I kissed her. Too long ago.

“Wade!” a voice called.

Glancing back, one of the men in the group was waving from where they had paused to rest for water and trail mix snacks. Adjusting my lightweight backpack, I strode over to them. “Yeah?”

The man who called over was an athletic type who was hiking with his wife as they marked off mountain ranges in their quest to spend time in every mountain range in the United States. They were retired and by no means young, but they were energetic and so full of joy it was a pleasure to have them in the group.

“How long to get back to the lodge?” he asked.

Glancing to my watch, I replied, “Two hours, give or take. It’s usually quicker on the descent.”

The man nodded, his eyes scanning the rest of the group. “Well, I say we get going, y’all. I’m ready for a good dinner back at the lodge, and a hot shower.”

With that, we were headed back down. Along with the rest of the group, I was looking forward to a good dinner. Among the many perks of working at Stolen Hearts Lodge were the meals that came as part of the job.

Dani was the chef for the kitchen and managed the restaurant. Every night—with a few exceptions—Dani prepared a meal for employees in the staff section of the kitchen. We all usually piled in there if we had the time.

Except for that kiss this morning, the closest I felt to Dani since I returned to these mountains was when I was eating her meals. Cooking was practically spiritual for her. Everything she made was so damn good.

* * *

“Hey, mind passing me those potatoes?” I asked Dawson, who sat beside me at the crowded staff table in the back of the kitchen.

Dawson glanced at me, flashing a teasing grin. With an arch of his brow, he parried, “What’ll you give me for them?”

I chuckled. “Not a damn thing.” Looking toward Evie, his girlfriend who sat on his other side, I asked, “Evie, would you mind passing me those potatoes, please?”

Evie’s brown ponytail swung as she shook her head and reached for the platter of rosemary and garlic seasoned potatoes. Ignoring Dawson, her blue eyes twinkled as she handed them to me. “Of course not,” she chirped.

Dawson’s gray gaze slipped to her. “Hey, I might as well not even be here.”

Evie leaned over, brushing a kiss on his cheek. “You’re here. It’s just, Wade must be starving because I know they hiked ten miles today.”

Dawson, easily assuaged by anything Evie said, slid an arm around her shoulders and dipped his head, pressing a lingering kiss to the side of her neck. Her cheeks were flushed pink when he lifted his head.

Dani happened to be approaching the table at that moment, and she glanced at Evie and Dawson. “You two need to get a room,” she said pointedly.

I felt my eyes rolling before I even thought about it. “Oh really? You can’t even handle a kiss,” I countered.

Dani’s eyes narrowed, and she thrust a platter of food at me. “I can handle a f*****g kiss, Wade. Plus, in case it wasn’t obvious, I wasn’t talking to you.”

I had reflexively reached for the platter and found myself holding a plate full of food while she spun around and stalked away. She walked swiftly to the front and pushed through the door into the restaurant kitchen, the hum of voices and the clatter of noise from the busy kitchen filtering through behind her.

Lucas, who happened to be sitting across from me, caught my gaze. “Well then. I’ll take one of those if you don’t mind,” he said with a nod to the plate I held in my hand.

I gladly relinquished it and promptly started eating. Although Dani and I snapped at each other and teased with frequency, there was a bite to her frustration this evening. Just as I knew there was to mine.

I focused on my food, which was delicious, of course, and listened to the easygoing chatter as it carried on around me. I couldn’t say why, but that little exchange with Dani didn’t sit well with me.

After our dinner group filtered apart, I hung around, hoping to snag a chance to talk to her. I busied myself organizing supplies for our hiking groups in the back hallway where we stored first aid kits, prepackaged snack kits, and the like.

Hell if I knew what I meant to say, but it bothered me enough that I found myself searching her out a few hours later. I walked down the back hallway, when I knew the restaurant had closed and I would likely find her in her office. It wasn’t quite as quiet as it had been this morning before sunrise, but all I could hear was the hum of the dishwasher and the low murmur of voices from the restaurant staff who’d stayed behind to clean up.

Dani’s voice reached me as I walked down the hall. “I know, I know. I know you covered the last three Saturdays, but I’m hoping you don’t mind,” she said.

When I didn’t hear the reply, I presumed she was on the phone with someone. Glancing at the clock mounted at the end of the hallway, I noted it was going on midnight. That meant Dani had been up for over eighteen hours at this point. Seeing as I was almost dead on my feet, I knew she had to be exhausted.

“Okay, that would be great,” she said.

When I heard her say goodbye, I resumed walking, stopping to rest my shoulder on the doorframe.

Dani’s back was to me where she stood, one hip leaning against her desk. Her hair was down, and she lifted her hand, smoothing it over her hair. To what end, I didn’t know. Nothing could tame her wild brown curls. Once upon a time, I had loved to bury my hands in them.

A sharp, visceral memory of our kiss this morning pierced me—when I had her curls twined around my fingers for the first time in years—and set my body on fire all over again.

Dani dropped the phone on the desk and sighed.

“Working late as usual, I see,” I said by way of greeting.

Dani turned, the ghost of a smile passing across her lips. All traces of the flour she’d spilled on herself this morning had been eliminated. She shrugged and replied, “Always. I could say the same for you.”

Pushing off the doorframe, I stepped into her office. “Touché. Mind if I come in?”

The sharpness she carried earlier had softened. She shook her head, her curls bouncing around her shoulders. “Of course not.”

The husky edge to her voice made my heart kick, good and hard, against my ribs. Stopping in front of her, I realized I hadn’t thought through what I meant to say. I simply knew I wanted—no, needed—to talk to her.

My eyes landed on her freckles, sprinkled across her nose and cheeks. I’d never thought much about freckles, except I loved hers. Once upon a time, I tried to count them. She had giggled when I lost count.

Damn. It was crazy how much time could change things.

“I don’t remember the last time I heard you giggle,” I heard myself saying. I hadn’t meant to speak my thoughts aloud, but there they were.

That single sentence hung in the air, bumping into everything else that crowded between us whenever Dani and I were in the same room together. Maybe it was because she was tired, but she didn’t even snap at me. She lifted one shoulder in a shrug, turning and resting both hips against the desk as she eyed me.

“I laugh,” she finally said, a familiar hint of defensiveness contained in her tone.

“I know you laugh. I said I hadn’t heard you giggle. There’s a difference.”

Hell if I knew why I was debating the finer points of laughing versus giggling, but I was.

Dani wrinkled her nose, her mouth twisting to the side as she curled her hands over the edge of the desk. “How are they different?”

“Giggling is sillier.”

She bit her lip, and I knew she was trying not to smile. “Somehow, I doubt that’s what you wanted to talk about. What’s your point, Wade?”

I took a breath, chasing down the tension building inside. “Look, I’m not sure what I said at dinner, but …”

She gave her head a quick shake, cutting into my words. “You were joking. I get it.”

Fuck it. I decided to stop dancing around the tangled history between us.

“Dani, what gives?”

“What do you mean?”

“You. Me. Us,” I explained, gesturing back and forth between us. “Look, when I moved away, you lived your life and I lived mine. I came back, and it’s like you’re pissed off at me and you have been forever. In case you forgot this detail, you’re the one who dumped me, not the other way around.”

The lingering dull ache in my heart from our breakup throbbed, and I ignored it. I hadn’t had much choice but to move on, so I had. It didn’t mean I liked it.

Something flashed in her eyes—pain, anger, frustration, maybe all of those. Her gaze slid away from mine, and I heard her swallow. I scanned her face, the lines around her eyes, the set of her jaw, and the way her shoulders lifted slightly as she held herself stiffly.

“I know there’s something there,” I heard myself saying, a corner of my mind almost marveling I was saying anything at all. I was breaking the unspoken rule between us—never talk about the past, pretend like it didn’t happen. The quickest way to get Dani to snap my head off was to keep barreling ahead when she had feelings. All kinds of feelings, from what I could ascertain.

She cleared her throat, turning back to face me. The pain flickering in her eyes for just a second took my breath away.

“I don’t know what happened, but I hate seeing you like this.” My voice came out gruff. Before I could think too hard about it, I acted on instinct, stepping closer and sliding my arms around her. For a beat, she tensed, but then she sighed and relaxed against me. Our kiss this morning in the early hours of dawn had been overdue, but somehow, holding her like this felt even more so.

Dani was warm and soft, and she smelled just like I remembered—a hint of sugar and vanilla because she was always baking. After a moment, I felt her hands loosen their grip on the desk and slide around my waist. Part of me was acutely aware this moment was as delicate as blown glass. It would shatter in a split-second if I did, or said, the wrong thing. Yet, another part of me savored it on such a bone-deep level that I couldn’t let her go.

I breathed her in, savoring the feel of her. For once, she wasn’t teasing as a way to keep me at a distance, or snapping at me to push me further away.

Dani was high-strung. Even when she was in a good mood, she didn’t relax easily. After a few moments, I felt her shift away from my chest. Much as I didn’t want to break free from her, or this moment, I wasn’t going to push my luck.

Lifting my head, my heart squeezed like a clenched fist when I saw unshed tears glistening in her eyes.