Exhale, page 4
Laughter and noise flowed through the door as the rest of their friends came up behind Matt. He spun around before they reached the door and flew back out.
“Hey, guys! Throw your towels over the railing there. No, not there! Back that way in the sun. Gabby will have a fit if you take them into the house.”
Oh, hell. If they had all come in together, who knows what they would have thought. Or said. Anxiety churned in the pit of her stomach. They would’ve got the wrong idea, and told everyone. The whole damned town would know—and talk. Cold sweat broke out on her skin, making her clammy.
“I’m so sorry, Taka! That must have looked—I don’t even know how it looked. Your friends…”
Taka shoved his hands deep into his shorts pockets. “I can handle them. Anyway, it wasn’t as if—” He grabbed his forgotten drink, his eyes avoiding hers. “I’ll just go outside and leave you to it, okay?”
Gabby nodded, pinching the bridge of her nose as he hurried out the door.
What in hell was I thinking?
Had she lost her mind completely to get so close to him? She had been practically clinging to him. Sure, he’d given her hugs before. But not like that. Not as a man comforting an upset woman. And he was a young man now, nineteen, no longer the boy who’d followed Matt home years ago. Their relationship was changing, purely because of his age. She couldn’t let him see that his nearness affected her in any way. She didn’t want him to feel awkward around her. They were too close for that.
Gabby turned to the sound of the door latch closing.
Oh, no.
Matt looked at her over his shoulder and threw her a lopsided grin. “You okay in here? Taka’s not talking. He’s just pretending like I didn’t walk in here and see what I saw.”
Gabby’s face flamed with heat. “You didn’t see anything. It was nothing.”
Matt walked closer and raised an eyebrow. “If it was nothing, why are you blushing?” He reached up to touch her face, his expression darkening. “Have you been crying? Did he upset you?”
“Of course not. He would never…” She tried a half-hearted grin. “I told him.”
Matt sighed, his lips flattening. “I thought you might. I’ve never said anything about it to the others. I didn’t want to embarrass you, or anything.”
Gabby had a feeling he simply didn’t want to draw unwanted attention to the reality of his birth. And she couldn’t really blame him. What seventeen-year-old would?
“You wouldn’t have. It’s not like it’s a secret. People have just forgotten. They have better things to talk about than what happened all those years ago.”
“How did he take it?”
She shrugged. “As expected. He was shocked. Angry. Pretty much what you felt, just more tempered. I knew it would come up eventually.”
“Then why were you crying? You don’t usually get upset when we talk about…it.” Matt leaned back against the bench beside her and picked at a chip in the edge of the granite bench top.
Gabby’s gaze dropped to his hand. She’d have to get that repaired one day. “He hugged me. It’s been so long since anyone other than you did that. I suppose I fell apart a little. I cried all over him, the poor guy. He’s such a compassionate soul, isn’t he? We’re lucky to have him.”
Matt’s usual grin came back full force. “I’m sure he can handle a few tears. He has a real soft spot for you, always has had. He wouldn’t have liked hearing you went through that.”
“He didn’t. I’m glad the rest of them didn’t come in with you, though. Explaining would’ve been…difficult. I’d hate to have your friends embarrass him.”
“You’re somethin’. Here we are trying to protect you, and you’re more worried about Taka. He’s big enough and ugly enough to take care of himself. None of those guys would harass him, anyhow. They probably wouldn’t have even noticed.” Matt threw his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against him.
Gabby hugged him back. She looked up at her son. He was trying to make light of his own initial reaction to seeing her in his friend’s arms. But if he’d been that shocked, who knew what their friends would’ve said.
“Oh, they would have, believe me. I can only imagine the ribbing they would’ve given him. Who knows what they would’ve said to their parents just for the fun of it?”
“Yeah, maybe. They’d pay for it, though. Once they’d gotten through me, they’d have to deal with Taka. It wouldn’t have been pretty. You do realize how protective he is of you since Dad died, don’t you? You’re forgetting he saw how it affected you. You’re his personal crusade.”
Gabby’s laughter pushed away the last of her lingering sadness.
“Oh, you guys are too much. His crusade, huh? I like that. You’re full of it, but I like it. I’m going to miss the both of you so much when you leave for college. I might actually have to get a life. Have I told you how much I love you today?”
Matt’s gray eyes softened with affection. “Nope. Not today. I was wondering what was wrong.”
Chapter Six
Christmas.
Gabby loved this time of year. People were so much nicer to each other, and for no reason other than it was Christmas.
She stood back and surveyed her tree with a critical eye.
The heady scent of the fresh pine brought back memories of Christmases as a child. Gabby nodded to herself. Nice. A good balance of bows and pretty glass baubles. It was something she loved to do herself each year.
Matt wasn’t interested and slapped the ornaments anywhere just to get finished. It usually looked like a five-year-old on a sugar high had done it. The only thing he did now was place the star on top for her so she didn’t break her neck climbing on a ladder.
Tonight she was hosting the Christmas Eve party for family and friends. Again. She was such a sucker for parties. The amount of RSVP’s she’d received defied description. It was promising to be huge. Word must have got out about how much fun the previous year’s effort had been. Plus, Matt had wangled invites for his friends, which tended to comprise of most of the senior year.
She’d thought it would be fun to go with a themed costume party. Myths and Legends was the order for the night. That gave people plenty of room to either go the whole nine yards or just do something sedate.
For herself, Gabby had bought a yellow genie outfit, complete with bejeweled bustier and curvy shoes. She couldn’t wait to use it.
She turned a full circle around her enormous family room, looking for a place to hang the mistletoe she’d bought. It would be hilarious to hang it somewhere that plenty of people would get caught. The French doors that led out onto the deck would be open to the balmy summer night air. Right in the doorway would be perfect.
I’ll pop that on Matty’s to-do list as well.
The food was being catered for by a great local business, and she had hired a barman for the night. As far as she could tell, everything was taken care of. All that was left was to wait and have some fun with the people she cared most about, although her parents wouldn’t be here for the first time in years. They’d finally decided to visit Europe, after much prodding from Gabby herself.
Wandering out onto the deck, she breathed in the early afternoon air. The sunlight shafted through patchy clouds, illuminating the dappled shade around her Cape Cod styled home. She’d fallen in love with them on a trip to the States years ago and decided she had to have one for herself.
She ran a hand over the rough-hewn red cedar siding. The radiating warmth from the hot Queensland summer sun pulsed into her hand. She loved the privacy of this place. She and David had agonized for months on the placement of the house on the five-acre lot. From the road, no one even knew there was a house there.
All she could hear was the calling of birds and the distant hum of cicadas that filled the pine trees surrounding the lake, only a few hundred feet through the trees.
The house had been too large when there was the three of them. Now that David was gone and Matt was leaving for college early in the New Year, it would be just her left.
Thinking of him leaving dampened her spirits a little. His presence was all that had kept her sane the last couple of years, and now he was going. But if she missed him that badly, she could always hop on a plane and go see him. Her job took her to the States often enough now that she would see him quite regularly.
The decorations on the deck caught her attention. Bright and festive, they cheered her flagging spirits.
They still had a week before anyone went anywhere. There was still his eighteenth birthday party the next weekend. The place would be as quiet as a tomb once both Matt and Taka left.
But they were here now.
She was so proud of them. Graduating in the top one percent of the state guaranteed their choices of medicine as careers. She shook her head to herself. They’d mapped their careers with such dedication it blew her away. The amount of effort they’d put in just to choose the college was inspiring. They spent over a year of research discussing the pros and cons of various prestigious colleges, both in Australia and the States. In the end, Cornell’s reputation as having one of the best medical programs in the world prompted their decision. Matt was determined to be the best neurosurgeon to be found. His youthful energy and exuberance fueled him through the long nights of study that the extra subjects they’d had to take for early acceptance into his pre-med course had caused.
That, and copious amounts of coffee. Perhaps that was the reason he was always so wired.
It was also the main reason Taka had been here so often this last year. They had both targeted Cornell, and their study habits had necessitated it. They had no distractions here. No noise or interruptions if they didn’t want them. And she liked the company.
It would be easy to think of him as another son—an extension of Matt. Surprisingly, he wasn’t. Gabby liked having him around. His calm personality was a perfect counterbalance to Matt’s full-throttle approach to life.
Although the boy did tend to get a little too cheeky for his own good.
Gabby shook her head at herself as she turned and went back inside. She’d really have to stop thinking of Taka as a boy. He was a man now. A young one, but a man nonetheless. He would be wounded beyond belief if he thought she still thought of him as a child. Gabby chuckled to herself, walking around the balustrade to take the stairs two at a time to the second story.
A guy with a body like that was certainly no child.
Taka glanced around the room and spotted Gabby leaning against the doorway to the deck. She held a half-full glass of red wine that she swirled around in time with the music that drifted in from outside as she watched the room with a soft smile curving her lips.
The sight of her in her harem costume sent his pulse vibrating. It was incredible how much a costume could cover but be so revealing at the same time.
And that bustier. Well, that there should be illegal. A flatter-chested woman could never have pulled it off so well, and Gabby’s curves were something that had to be seen to be believed.
Matt had already chewed out a few of their more outspoken friends on their comments about her tonight. He hadn’t been too thrilled when the conversation started getting suggestive. Taka himself had kept his mouth firmly shut, since he’d been thinking the same thing.
Thoughts of gauzy curtains and Gabby lying on huge, soft floor cushions raced through his mind. Taka shook his head to clear away the sensual images. He’d seen far too many movies for his own good. He glanced down at his own costume. White sleeves billowed around his arms, his expansive shirttails tucked into tight breeches.
They’d actually called them breeches when they picked up their costumes.
That alone had sent Matt into hysterics. Taka’s knee-high black boots and the neckerchief he’d knotted around his forehead completed his Errol Flynn reincarnation of a pirate.
Very suave, if he did say so himself.
He let out a laugh at himself. Seriousness wasn’t his strongest attribute at the best of times, let alone looking like a reject from a pirate movie. His eyes shifted to the lintel above Gabby’s head, and he couldn’t stop his smile from growing to a full-fledged grin. A spray of green blossomed there. He couldn’t believe his luck.
Gabby was having a blast.
Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves, either in here or outside with the noise. She turned her head to see Taka coming toward her, winding through the crowd. A smile widened her mouth as he walked up. She raised her glass in mock salute to him, and he clinked his beer bottle against it, grinning.
“What’s got you so chirpy?” she asked, scanning the room again.
His smile only got larger. “Nothin’.”
“Perhaps too many of those, my friend?” She gestured with her glass to his drink.
“Perhaps.” He raised it to his lips and took a mouthful. He couldn’t conceal his grin behind his drink.
Gabby laughed. “Okay, I’ll bite. What’s so funny?”
Taka turned fully toward her. His cheeky grin disappeared, leaving an odd light in his eyes. He took the drink from her hand and sat both of them on a table beside her. “Not funny. Fate, maybe.”
Gabby stared at him, confused. Taka stepped closer and took her face between his hands. Her pulse skipped as his thumb grazed her lips. Her heart clattered in her chest as he bent his head toward her, the faint, crisp scent of yeast on his exhaled breath.
What the hell is he doing?
“Look up,” he breathed as his lips brushed against hers in the barest hint of a caress.
Belatedly, she realized what he meant. The mistletoe.
Her lips parted, responding to him unintentionally. She lifted her chin toward him, her own mouth betraying her by seeking his.
It was enough to encourage him.
One hand slid behind her head, the other around her waist to press her closer as he pulled her mouth to his. Gabby’s body ignited where they touched, shivers running the length of her spine. Hunger drew itself into a tight knot deep in her belly, shocking her with the desire that exploded along her veins like silver fire.
She wanted him.
The realization floored her. She jerked back. She couldn’t want him. This was Taka, for heaven’s sake!
Taka followed her, his hand still in her hair. His tongue slid across her lips, and she opened her mouth to him without thinking. The taste of him overpowered all her senses, tinged with the faint tang of alcohol. It stripped her mind of all sane thought but the feel of his warm, soft mouth moving on hers.
Her hands slid up the front of his shirt to grasp at the crisp material covering his hard chest. His tongue thrust into her mouth, his soft moan of pleasure coiling her desire tighter and lower.
Gabby reached up and wound her hand into his hair to hold that amazing mouth to hers. His taste. So much better than she could ever have imagined. Taka slipped his hands down her hips to pull her against him, and the reality of his arousal from their kiss slammed into her, tearing an answering sound from her throat.
Taka jerked his mouth away from hers, breathing hard. He stepped back uncertainly, eyes wide.
His raw voice strangled his words. “Merry Christmas, beautiful.”
Then he turned and fled through the door.
Taka rushed across the wide deck to the stairs leading down into the garden, taking care not to look at anyone. He couldn’t talk right now. Especially if they’d seen what he’d done. He had no way to explain it to any of them, and he sure as hell wasn’t telling them the truth.
He took the steps two at a time and ran to the edge of the trees, just out of the range of the welcoming lights from above. His hands went to his knees while he bent over, trying to catch his breath.
Oh, Christ! What have I done?
Taka raised his head to gaze up toward the house. He struggled to get his body under control. He’d only meant to brush his mouth across hers. Just a small, brief meeting of lips. Just a taste. Something to keep in his memory and relive occasionally.
Well, perhaps not so occasionally.
How the hell had that kiss become a living, breathing force of its own? He’d practically assaulted her in front of everyone. And he’d pulled her against him like that…she had to know he’d wanted her.
“What the hell was that all about?” a familiar voice to his left said.
He dropped his gaze to the bottom of the wide steps that he had just charged down, a few yards away. Matt was sitting in the semi-darkness of the bottom step with his girlfriend, staring at him.
Taka straightened up and took a deep breath. He walked over and sat beside him.
“You will not believe what I just did.” He dropped his head onto his crossed arms. “You just won’t.” Taka looked up and eyed his friend. “I kissed her.”
Matt blinked, then comprehension struck. “Her, her?”
Nodding, he said, “That’s the one.” He waited, stomach tight, unsure how Matt would react to the news he’d just kissed his mother.
A huge grin lit up his friend’s face. He turned to his girlfriend and whispered in her ear. She frowned in confusion at Taka, then stood and went up the stairs.
Matt turned to him.
“Well? Are you going to tell me why you bolted down here like the hounds of hell were on your ass, or do I have to beat it out of you? How’d you pull it off?”
Taka rested his head on one hand and looked at Matt. Relief that he wasn’t going to get his ass kicked for kissing her washed over him.
“The mistletoe. She was standing right under it. I couldn’t help myself. I don’t know if she’ll ever talk to me again, though.”
“Why? What did you do?” Matt’s forehead creased in a frown.
“I was just going to peck her on the lips, you know? Make a joke. But I got a little carried away. I…I don’t know what happened. I forgot all about everyone else up there. I couldn’t stop kissing her. Hell, it was good.”
