8 Brand-New Romance Authors

He shook his head, trying to clear his mind. “Sorry. Beef.” This was going to be a long, long night.

“I didn’t really get a chance to talk to her the other night. What’s she like? Tell me about her...”

“She’s great. She, uh...likes Neil Diamond and stuff.”

“Mmm...she sounds very interesting. Where did you guys meet?”

“The firehouse.”

“She works with you?”

“No.” What was with the twenty questions? He didn’t want to answer questions about Taylor. Mainly because he did not know the answers. And talking to Micah about other girls was just strange.

“No?”

She would not stop until he answered her questions and her curiosity was satisfied.

“We put out a fire at her parents’ house two weeks ago.”

“That’s nice.”

“Yeah, you know, we’ve had fun together so far.”

“What? Singing ‘Sweet Caroline’?”

“No, we talk and hang out.”

“Already this is sounding better than Miss Just-Changing-the-Lightbulb.”

“Actually, she turned out to be Mrs. Just-Changing-the-Lightbulb.”

“She was married? And needed help changing a lightbulb?” She tossed him a judgmental glance over her shoulder, shaking her head. “You sure know how to pick them. But let me guess, this one is different, right?”

“Well, so far this girl knows how to change a lightbulb and knows how to get herself home in a snowstorm.”

“Ouch!” He loved the way her face lit up when she laughed. “Good one.”

“I try.”

He chopped and diced the vegetables as instructed while she started cooking. When he was finished with his given tasks, he leaned against the counter and held his coffee in one hand. Micah turned and gave him a quick once-over, laughter filling her eyes.

“What?”

“Your zipper is down.”

He looked down and sure enough, it was. He looked back up at her as she giggled. “It’s been down this whole time and you’re just now telling me? My eyes are up here, Micah. Let’s try and keep yours above my waist level.”

“Ha! Whatever! I was not checking you out.” Micah swatted at him with her spatula, but he was quick enough to duck out of its path. She countered with her other hand and there was no hope of escaping that one.

“You totally were, and you know it.” This was easier. More like how it used to be between them. He zipped up his pants and went back to his coffee.

They cooked in comfortable silence—at least, that was what it was supposed to be. Josh remained on edge, though. Each time she came close or accidentally brushed up against him, he tensed. He prayed she would not notice. He kept throwing out his typical jokes to keep her off his trail. If she caught on or noticed, she showed no sign or it.

* * *

“How is it coming?” She stretched to look over his shoulder to see his progress with the dinner. He had a lot of practice cooking for the guys at the firehouse and was pretty good at it. She was impressed. He might even be better than she was with all the slicing and dicing.

“I’m almost finished with all the veggies. The meat looks like it’s just about ready for the rest of the stuff.”

“You are right. It does look like it’s ready.” Micah armed herself with a spatula and got back to work.

Josh was acting a little weird. He was trying to cover it up, trying to act like normal, but she knew him better than that. Could he tell? Was she that easy to read?

She did want to be independent from him, to be able to function without needing him in every area of her life, but she didn’t want to lose his friendship altogether.

As she worried about the state of their relationship, she mindlessly stirred the ingredients in the hot pan on the stove top. “Can you pass me that jar of minced garlic?”

“Sure.”

He handed it to her and she scooped out some to add to the pan. With the open jar of garlic in one hand and the lid in the other, she quickly turned to return it to the fridge, attempting to close it midturn. When she whipped around in the small kitchen, she collided with Josh as he also tried to get to the fridge. The minced garlic in olive oil went all over his shirt as the jar dropped to the ground, shattering and covering the floor.

“Oh. My. Gosh.” She shook her hand, trying to rid herself of the garlic clinging to her hand. It only made things worse, sending it flying in the air. “I am so sorry!”

They both lost it, laughing until they cried. It reeked around them, the smell of garlic filling the air. They began to pick up the large pieces of glass and made quick work of cleaning up the stinky mess. She washed her hands, knowing full well they would smell for days. Looking up at Josh for the first time since the incident, she was reminded of the mess she had made of his shirt.

“I’ve ruined your shirt!”

“It will be fine, I—”

“No. It’s not fine. You’ll never get the oil out. And the smell... Girls will stop talking to you altogether.”

“Maybe I want the girls to stop, anyway.”

“Yeah, right. I think I have one of your old Red Sox T-shirts...”

His eyebrow formed a perfect questioning arch.

“I stole it from you years ago. Get over it.”

She went in search of the T-shirt, digging through her drawers. Hopefully it wasn’t dirty. She liked sleeping in it. Thankfully, she found it clean and folded in a drawer.

She turned to head back to the kitchen only to find he had followed her into her room. He stood there just inside her doorway, ruined T-shirt in hand, chest bare.

Wow, did he fill up the place! She could not control her eyes from feasting on the expanse of tattooed skin.

She had been there when he had two of the tattoos done, but she did not remember reacting like this. Her fingers itched to trace the ink, especially the intricate design that covered the whole left side of his torso. And what a torso it was. She remembered the pain he had endured during that tattoo session, his grip tightening during moments of intense pain as she held his hand the entire time.

“Can I have the shirt or not?”

Oh, my gosh! She was still holding the T-shirt in her hand while staring at him like a desperate and starved woman. Quickly, she dropped her eyes to the floor, very much interested in the wood floors and their need of a good sweep.

She still hadn’t relinquished the shirt. This was getting embarrassing. She tossed it at him, but he still blocked the doorway. She was stuck, forced to watch him clothe himself.

What a shame to have to cover it all up, but if she wanted to keep her sanity it needed to happen.

Boy, was it hot in here! What was the thermostat on, anyway? His eyes connected with hers once more before he turned to leave the room.

“Thanks. You know what this means, though.”

“What?” She felt anxious, wondering what in the world would come from his mouth next. Had he noticed the way she had looked at him? What was he thinking? Her heart raced as she waited for his response.

“I’m taking my shirt back.”

She exhaled deeply. Giving up the shirt was easy enough; an awkward conversation about her gawking at him...not so much.

ELEVEN

Josh knew.

This was it. She was done for. She had been blatantly obvious in the way she stood there like a sex-starved crazy person when he took off his shirt earlier. How could she be so stupid?

He was acting even worse now than before. Of course, he was still trying hard to cover it up, acting so close to normal that a person watching them interact would not know something was up.

But she did.

Micah put on a movie, waiting for him to nix her choice, but he didn’t. Yup, something was up with him.

He sat at the opposite end of the couch, the farthest point away from her. He kept his focus on his plate, as if he was afraid the food would jump off or something. He was trying so hard to act normal, but it was just coming across all wrong. He didn’t want to be there with her. He didn’t want to show it, but she could see the truth.

She missed her friend. She missed how things used to be before Drew’s anniversary, before she screwed it up by getting drunk and kissing him. She had made things awkward between them. He didn’t like her like that, and didn’t know how to tell her.

Micah had hoped the funny movie would lighten things up, but half an hour into it he still hadn’t laughed or even broken a smile during any of the hilarious scenes.

If she had any hope of making it right between them, now was her chance. She had to decide now to either take a giant risk and explore these new emotions or she needed to lock them away forever and never look back.

As she chewed on her nails, contemplating this monstrous and high-stress decision, Josh lifted the remote and hit the stop button.

Her head snapped to attention. “What did you do that for?”

“You weren’t watching it.”

“Was, too.”

“Oh, stop. You weren’t and you know it. You were biting your nails and thinking about something. I can tell when something is bothering you, you know. Let’s talk.”

She gulped. “Okay...”

“What’s bothering you?”

“Nothing’s bothering me. I don’t know why you keep saying that. What’s bothering you?”

“You seriously aren’t going to talk to me about it?”

“How can I talk to you about it if I don’t even know what you are talking about?”

“Is it about Drew? You haven’t brought him up lately. Are you still having dreams about him?”

She was having difficulty swallowing around her heart lodged in her throat, the rhythmic beat of it pounding in her ears. If he only knew just what she had been dreaming about these days.

Drew still plagued her, but not as much as Josh now did. She was a work in progress, slowly working through her issues and taking it day by day. But she didn’t want to talk about Drew.

She wanted to touch him so bad it hurt. She had to go for it. There was so much to lose, but if she was going to go mad and ruin things regardless, she might at least give it a shot before that happened.

“Fine. I’ll talk.” Micah turned to face him, leaning back against the arm of the couch and extending her legs until her bare feet reached him. Her sweatpants had ridden up her legs as she slid them in his direction, exposing goose bumps that had nothing to do with the cold. She wiggled her toes against his solid thigh. She took a deep, stabilizing breath. “My feet are cold, though. Will you hand me that blanket?”

Okay, so she wasn’t very good at playing the role of seductress.

“Where are your socks? You’ve got goose bumps, crazy girl.” He took hold of her feet and lifted them onto his lap, rubbing them briskly in an effort to warm them.

This was so silly. She felt ridiculous!

He grabbed a blanket from the basket next to the couch and draped it over her legs, carefully tucking it around her feet.

A caring and brotherly move.

Argh!

This was an epic fail.

“Do you think we’ll be friends forever, or do you ever wonder if we’re heading in different directions?” Why had she asked that? She just needed to give up now. “I mean, like the group of us. Sometimes I wonder how long this will last with all of us still being friends. I want it to last, but I wonder if it will. We all seem to want such different things in life.”

She was just rambling now. Nothing that came out of her mouth made any sense.

“Just because we all want something different or are maybe heading in different directions doesn’t mean we can’t still be there for each other. I know that you’ve been struggling lately with Drew’s anniversary. And I know that it seems like none of us care anymore. It probably worries you that he was the only thing that held us all together, and if we move on from him then we all fall apart. But I don’t think that will happen. He may have brought us all together, but he isn’t what holds us together.”

“I guess you’re right.”

“I think it’s the same with any relationship. You’ve got to make the conscious decision that no matter where you are in life, you make time for the ones who matter most. You put in the effort and make it work.”

But what about us? “Will you always make time for me, Josh?”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“You promise?”

“Actually, I was contemplating a best friend upgrade, but since you’re getting all serious on me, I’ll pass and let you stick around.”

“Gee, thanks. Always knew I could count on you.”

“But seriously...” He grabbed her ankles and pulled her close to him so that her legs draped over his lap. He wrapped his arm around her and held her close. “I’ll always be here for you. No matter what.”

Temptress she was not. Best friend forever was the more appropriate title.

* * *

The moment he pulled her onto his lap he knew he had made a huge mistake. Her legs were draped over his lap, her head on his chest. He had one arm wrapped around her while the other was inching closer to dangerous territory. He let his hand relax as it hung over her upper thigh, but if he moved it a centimeter he would be touching her. It would be too easy to drag his hand up, to explore the forbidden peaks and valleys of her beautiful form.

Amid the comfort of her in his arms, his body and mind battled it out. He wanted to pull her against him, kiss her senseless, show her all that had been culminating within him. But he knew it was wrong. He knew he should push her back to her side of the couch, a safe distance between them.

He pressed play on the remote and the movie started where they had left off. Against his better judgment—which was how he did things these days, apparently—he draped the blanket over the both of them to fight off the chill of the long, cold, wintry night they had ahead of them. They remained nestled on the couch, neither of them moving from their positions, warm and snuggled together. The fierce wind blew hard and hail pinged against the windowpane, but he wasn’t paying any attention.

“Sorry for being so difficult lately.” She spoke quietly against his chest. He could almost feel her words more than he could hear them, the vibration moving through his chest. She lifted her face to look at him, her eyes bright and full of an emotion he couldn’t distinguish. She’d always been like that: felt too hard, loved too much.

“What are you talking about?”

“The last couple of months. You know, first with the depression. I was so needy. Then with the... Well, anyway. I’ve just been a pain. Maybe I’ve been that way for years.... I don’t know how you’ve put up with me for so long.”

“You haven’t been that bad.”

What she was going through was normal and could be justified. He, however, had no excuse for his behavior.

“You’re a liar, but thank you. I’m hoping this is the end of it, though. I think I’m finally ready to move on.”

“And are you? Moving on?”

“Sometimes I feel like I have moved on. Then other days, it seems difficult to let go. Two steps forward, one step back. And every time I feel this sense of guilt for even trying to move forward.”

“I know what you mean.” He knew exactly what she meant.

“You do?”

“Yes. It feels like you’re dishonoring him and his memory.”

“Exactly.” Her response was a whisper on his neck.

She leaned into him, her face buried in his neck. Her lips innocently came in contact with the skin just below his ear. Electricity coursed through him as his hold on her tightened. He closed his eyes, praying sanity would return.

Focus on the subject at hand. Something platonic. Focus on Drew. Or your mother!

That worked.

He thought about the important things. Micah considered him to be her safety and he took the job seriously. He would make sure she always felt secure with him. The images that ran through his mind threatened that in every way possible. He’d begun to recite it to himself, a mantra of sorts: Drew’s girl. Drew’s girl.

“I think I’ve always felt guilty for living, guilty for turning him away that night, for ignoring my instincts and letting him drive in that storm. I didn’t feel like I deserved to live life, much less a happy life.”

Her words hit too close to home. His own guilt was overwhelming. He could take hers away in an instant, but he would lose her just as fast. She would hate him if she knew the truth. She would never forgive him. “You have nothing to feel guilty about. It was just his time to go.”

“Yeah. I think I’ve finally figured that out. And that we honor his memory best by living a life he would be proud of. You know he always lived life to the fullest. He would expect the same from me.”

They watched the rest of the movie in silence, but his mind was far from quiet. He kept thinking about what she had said about Drew wanting them to live life to the fullest. Part of him wanted to believe Drew would have supported anything that made Micah happy. But what if he couldn’t make her happy?

He had never wanted anything more from a woman than a casual relationship. He’d never allowed anything deeper to happen between him and someone else. What if he wasn’t capable of a long-term commitment? What if he hurt her? Josh didn’t want to believe that he would ever intentionally do that to Micah, but why risk it?

None of it mattered, anyway. He was wasting brainpower just thinking about it. At the end of the day, Josh knew the truth about Drew’s wishes. Nothing could ever, ever happen between him and Micah. The end.

The movie credits began to roll, but Josh couldn’t move. He didn’t want to. Micah’s deep and steady breathing told him she had fallen asleep on his chest. She felt so right. He wanted to hold his breath so as not to disturb her. It felt natural to have her there, fitting so well next to him. It was as if he had been made just to hold her like this.

His emotions were running ragged. Recently, there had been times he felt so angry at her, at this situation and her inability to move on from Drew. But he loved her deeply and the moment she looked up at him with her warm coffee-colored eyes, his anger dissipated.

But more often than not, there were moments, moments he was ashamed of, moments of pure lust that should never have happened. She didn’t belong to him. She never would.

Sitting here any longer would be detrimental to his state of mind. He really should carry her to her bedroom and leave her there, safely ensconced behind a locked door.

But instead he found himself carefully readjusting them so he could slide down further into the couch. There was enough room for him to swing his legs up onto the cushion as he maneuvered himself into a lying-down position.

Micah began to move, but did not wake. Her own legs extended along his as she made herself more comfortable beside him. Her body flush against his own. He didn’t care how wrong this was. It felt too right.

As he lay there with her in his arms, his mind kept drifting back to the tattoo he had briefly seen earlier. It was covered up now and there was no way he would be able to sneak a peek without waking her. It was a mystery to him. Why couldn’t he figure it out?

The heart was unique. It wasn’t what you would normally think of when considering a heart tattoo. It was the kind of heart you used when texting someone—a less-than sign with the number three. It formed a heart with textspeak, but why get it as a tattoo?

Then suddenly a thought came to mind. Could it be?

No. He quickly erased the thought from his mind. It was all just wishful thinking and nothing more.

Something caught his eye on the coffee table—a small stack of papers, nothing out of the ordinary. However, Drew’s name stuck out at the bottom of a yellowish piece of paper, half-hidden in the pile of receipts.

Curiosity drove him to reach for it, careful not to wake Micah.

The words were hard to read in the dim evening light, but he strained to make them out. It was a love letter from Drew, and just the kick he needed in order to regain some clarity.

* * *

Micah woke some time during the night, the howling wind rousing her from a deep sleep. It took a moment for the fuzziness to fade and for her to realize just where she was sleeping, or rather, on whom she was sleeping.

She lifted her head from her place of comfort on Josh’s chest. His breathing remained steady, a light snore escaping from his slightly opened mouth. Her legs were tangled with his as they lay entwined on the couch.

Having been best friends for so long, there had always been a level of comfort and physical affection between them, but never had she found herself in such an intimate position with him.

Her hand moved on its own accord down his chest and over his tight stomach, feeling the rippling of his hard muscles beneath the softness of his T-shirt. Her hands wanted to explore more, but her mind wouldn’t let them. She couldn’t accost him in his sleep. What kind of girl did something like that?

Heat warmed her cheeks, hoping he wasn’t aware of her wanton behavior as he slept peacefully. Carefully, she tried to separate herself from him without waking him, moving to the chair across from the couch.

Her eyes roamed over his sleeping form. She could see the stubble on his face in the moonlight. He typically kept a shadow of a beard, tamed but not clean-shaven. It was approaching slightly scruffy and it looked good on him. Masculine. Her fingertips yearned to reach out and feel his prickly jawline.

Micah had always wondered what stubble would feel like scraping against the softness of her own skin. Drew was so long ago, but he had always preferred a close shave. She had imagined it in her dream, but wanted to feel it for real. Just once.

His chest moved up and down in a calming rhythm as she watched, troubled by her numerous thoughts. He was such a great friend, probably even too good.

Over the years, her refusal to face her grief head-on had forced her to carry some serious baggage whether she had been aware of it or not. Her grief and pain had weighed her down like concrete set about her feet, keeping her from actually experiencing life. She had become accustomed to the weight, not fully aware of the burden it had become.

She was aware of it now. Josh had carried her the whole time, bearing the brunt of it for her. She had taken advantage of him, grown accustomed to his support. Never once had he allowed her feet to touch the ground. Never once had he insinuated that she was a burden to him. He just lovingly and willingly carried her.

Like light filling a darkened room, realization dawned on her. How could she have been so foolish? How could she have been so blind? She didn’t know when it had happened, exactly, but somewhere, at some point, something had happened. It hadn’t just escalated from friendship to lust. What she felt was far more intense.

Micah had fallen in love...with Josh. Once she faced the truth of it, it was all so clear. She was in love with Josh. Maybe she had always been in love with him. The knowledge both scared her and excited her. Overwhelmed her with the sudden thought of what happened next. Now that she had this new piece of information, it would change everything. She didn’t want anything to change. Then again...maybe she did.

What was she thinking?

There was no way she could tell Josh about this newfound discovery. She would lose him for sure. He would never feel for her what she felt for him. This love had to stay hidden. Her relationship with Josh had always been enough before. It would still be enough.

There was no way she could go back to sleep now. Looking at the clock, she knew she had at least two more hours before daylight. She leaned back in the chair and pulled a blanket around her.

It was just too easy to keep looking at Josh as he slept. She felt like a creeper, but at the moment she didn’t care. Her eyes couldn’t pull away. It seemed such an intimate moment to be alone with him in the middle of the night, to see him asleep, the moonlight caressing his face.