Christmas To Remember Read online

  They tore at each other’s clothes, pulled off layers of shirts, shoved the material aside as quickly as possible. She was desperate to feel his skin, his strength, unable to believe the fumbling, okay experiences of their past could ever be replaced by this frantic desire to know him again. To believe the sad, hesitant voice in her head whispering that if her parents and Clay weren’t in the picture, then maybe she and Beau might have a chance because this—this was special. Passion as it was meant to be.

  “Hold on to me.” Beau buried his nose into her neck and groaned, his hands shoving her panties down. “I want you so much.” He kissed his way up to her mouth, dipped his tongue inside. After a long, drugging kiss, he pulled back slowly, smiling seductively as his teeth latched on to her lower lip.

  Gentle pain shot through her, straight to the center of her, and Marley closed her eyes with a moan. She tried to slow the galloping pace of her heart, but it didn’t work. Five years ago had been all about curiosity and hormones, freedom, but this was more. Bad timing, but—more.

  Tomorrow morning she’d deal with the regrets and the pain, mourn what might have been if her family weren’t so important to her, but not now. Not now.

  His hands tightened, pulled her closer against the cradle of his hips as he pressed her into the door. His fingers slid low, until she clung to him, her nails biting into his shoulders in an urgent bid to anchor herself and not feel so much.

  Beau sucked on her nipple until she arched her body into his, longing to get closer, inside him the way she wanted him inside of her. The need built to an unbearable degree, one he didn’t seem in any hurry to satisfy. “Beau.”

  He chuckled at her tone, groaned at the way she rolled her body against him like a wave, touching, surging. With a low murmur and a breath-catching stroke to make sure she was ready, he shifted, lifting her with an arm around her waist, lowering her and joining them with a silky-smooth glide. Tightness, need. Her head fell back against the door as Beau entered her, each nudge and push ending in a grind that maximized the experience and left her gasping. He took her mouth the same way he took her body, kissing her deeply, until she came in a breathy, teary cry of bone-melting satisfaction.

  Three strokes later, Beau’s hoarse groans filled her ear.

  THE FIRST THOUGHT that entered Marley’s head when her brain reconnected with her traitorous body was thank goodness she was on the pill. At the moment she couldn’t think about the other potential dangers of not using a condom. Those recriminations and fears would come later. Unprotected sex was like playing Russian roulette—and with Beau’s sexual history being what it was there would be five bullets instead of one.

  “I can practically hear your mind churning.” He smoothed the tense muscles of her back, drawing a sigh of pleasure from her before she could stop it. She shook her head to clear it and wound up nose-first in his neck. Despite a hard day’s work, he smelled good.

  You’re so easy.

  “We didn’t use a condom.” She felt his body tense, then relax. Not the response she’d expected.

  “Would a baby be so bad?”

  She blinked. That definitely wasn’t the response she’d expected. Marley raised her head to stare up at him, acutely conscious of the fact her feet didn’t touch the floor because he still held her pressed to the door with his body.

  “I’m on the pill, so there’s nothing to w-worry about, but yes—I mean, no, a baby isn’t a bad thing, but…right now it’s the last thing we need to be risking considering.” She tried to distance herself, but he wouldn’t let her.

  Beau framed her face in his hands and smiled gently. “Things are going to be different this time.”

  This time?

  He moved back slightly, just far enough that she could lower her legs to the floor. When her toes touched, the shock of the cold came with a truckload of fear. How could she want someone so much, knowing her family would never accept him?

  Fantasizing about the man she’d come to describe as the new and improved Beau was one thing, but she didn’t do this lightly. She hadn’t been with anyone since the last time she and Beau had been together. At eighteen, it had been a mistake. Now it was an example of her actively breaking her own heart.

  “Marley, you’re freaking me out here. Are you okay?”

  Inhaling shakily, she nodded. Things were different this time. She knew what she wanted out of life. What she needed. Tonight would only last so long and in the morning everything would look a whole lot different. “I need a shower.”

  Beau hesitated, his gaze searching. When she didn’t say anything else, when she didn’t hand him his clothes and say, Thanks, for the big-O, he smiled. “That an invitation to join you?”

  The husky timbre of his voice sent shivers through her and she told herself she deserved tonight. One night of happiness and comfort. One night to make up for the past. “If you’d like to.”

  “I’d like to.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead, her cheek. “Marley, this isn’t the time but—I’d like to try to talk to your brother, your parents. See if we can work things out.”

  She shook her head firmly back and forth. Beau was the one being gullible now. “I don’t want to talk about them. I want a shower and food a-and…you.”

  He stroked his knuckles down her cheek, the touch soothing and arousing at the same time. “Where’s the shower?”

  Inanely self-conscious, she took his hand in hers and led him through the darkened apartment to the bathroom. There she flipped on the single overhead light and avoided his gaze. She was absurdly nervous given what they’d just done, her body flushed fluorescent pink. Not a good color for a redhead.

  After turning on the taps, Marley bit her lip and stepped inside. Beau followed. He grabbed the soap first, smiling his sexy, bad-boy grin before lathering up his hands and smoothing them over her shoulders and her arms to her breasts. Washing her gave him great pleasure if his rough breathing was anything to go by. Beau turned her this way and that, letting the shower’s massaging head rinse the soap away before he grabbed her shampoo bottle. “Turn around.”

  She did as ordered, sighing when his hands rubbed the shampoo into her hair, enjoying the experience for what it was without putting too much thought into the fact it would never happen again. Beau pulled her against him so that her breasts pressed against his chest while he angled her head with his hands, careful not to let the suds run into her eyes.

  “Beautiful.”

  Smiling at his silliness, afraid to name what she thought she saw in his eyes when he looked at her because the reality was that it was only the reflection from her own gaze, she reached for the soap and slid him a glance, noting the way his body tensed in preparation.

  She rubbed the soap between her hands and set to work washing his shoulders and chest, gentling her touch over the red scar on his shoulder. Over his rock-hard abdomen. “Turn around,” she ordered, smiling when his expression of anticipation turned into a frown at the request.

  “I like the view this way.”

  “Too bad,” she countered, unused to playing the teasing games couples play.

  They weren’t a couple.

  She bit her lip, deciding it was best to stick with the moment and nothing else. “Turn around.”

  Beau followed directions. He lifted one muscled arm to brace against the shower wall and propped his forehead on his fist.

  The broad plane of his back called to her and she spread her fingers wide, touching, smoothing over his shoulders and down, down, loving the soft feel of his skin over hard muscle. Loving—

  “There’s more interesting parts you know…Marley?”

  She swallowed, frowned, her fingertips still even though she searched his back with her gaze. Where was it?

  Beau had been injured the first time she’d met him, the scar fairly big—as wide as her hand and long. Fresh. Too large and deep, the skin too damaged by the burn, to have simply faded away.

  So where was it? Wrong place? She pictured it in her mind,
dropped her hands to where it should have been.

  No. No. It wasn’t there. No scar tissue, no scar. Nothing but perfectly smooth skin. Marley jerked away from him so fast she almost fell out of the shower.

  “What the—What’s wrong?”

  Gasping, she got out of the shower as quickly as possible and grabbed a towel from the bar nearby. She held it in front of her like a shield.

  It was him. Beau. Bigger, older and more appealing. But where was the scar? “Where is it?” Her voice was shaking, almost unrecognizable. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Where is it? The scar y-you had when we met?”

  He stared at her, his brows pulled low over his eyes. “What scar? I’m covered in scars, you’ll have to be more specific.”

  A near-hysterical laugh emerged from her throat before she could squelch it. “You had a scar on your back and h-hip when we met. About four inches wide a-and all across your back! It was from gasoline, a burn. I-it wouldn’t have just faded away, where is it?”

  The man standing before her looked at her as if she’d lost her mind, but no amount of time, especially not a few years, could’ve changed his appearance. Not like that.

  He turned off the water with two flips of the knobs, looking around for something to dry off with. She grabbed a towel from a stack on the shelf and threw it at him.

  He caught it with one hand. “Marley, calm down.”

  “You got it riding motocross. You were practicing and weren’t wearing your full g-gear. You said you crashed and the bike came down on you. It burned you and…it was on your back,” she repeated, desperate for him to smack his forehead and say, Oh, yeah, that one, but he didn’t.

  His eyes stared into hers with complete confusion, the color fading from his skin. “You’re serious.”

  You think? She clamped a hand over her mouth, but a whimper escaped. High and shrill and borderline hysterical. “Dear God, what have I done?” She shook her head. “Who are you?”

  “Marley—”

  She ran for the bedroom, grabbing the robe at the foot of her bed and shrugging it on as she went, her hands shaking so badly she barely managed to tie the belt. She focused on the details, searching her memories for clues. Answers. Oh, God.

  “You’re not Beau.”

  “Marley, look at me. Of course, I’m—”

  “You’re not Beau!”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  HE STEPPED FORWARD, grasping her shoulders lightly. “That’s ridiculous. Calm down and—”

  She lunged to the side, desperate for distance, for the ability to think straight. Explanations. She needed a rational explanation. If he could give her that—

  What had she done? What had she done?

  Panicked, she held up her hands to ward him off. Surprisingly, he stopped. Marley backed to the door of the bedroom and flipped the light switch, taking in every minute detail of his appearance.

  Sixteen days total. That’s all she’d had with Beau and that was five years ago. She hadn’t even seen him every one of those days. Could anyone remember specific details about a man who was basically a stranger?

  “You’re not Beau.”

  He swore, the sound full of anger and disgust. “Enough with that, Marley, I get it. You’re having second thoughts, right? It was fun, but what I said about working things out with your family got to you, didn’t it? Let’s get dressed and we’ll—”

  “You’re not Beau.”

  “Of course, I am!”

  “You’re not!” Shaking her head she ran for the living room, throwing open a closet door and grabbing her only means of self-defense. An old golf putter of Clay’s in hand, she turned just as B—

  Her knees nearly buckled when she realized she didn’t even know his name. “Get out!”

  “What the—Put that down.”

  He looked pale. But of course he was. The only thing worse than someone actually being Beau Buchanan was someone trying to pretend he was Beau. She almost snickered at the thought. If it acted like a duck and looked like a duck…

  Swearing, he grabbed the ID tags around his neck. “Look. Look! Right there. See?”

  Marley didn’t bother looking. She knew what she knew. She wasn’t sure how it was possible, but she knew. Question was why would he do such a thing? In the book, Sommersby had wanted his stepbrother’s plantation, his wife, his life, but she didn’t have anything. A business barely in the black, but nothing else.

  She’d slept with him thinking he was Beau, which was bad enough after the way Beau had treated her, but…This was all a lie. “Stay away from me.” She raised the putter higher and kicked his discarded clothes toward him. “Get dressed and g-get out.”

  Shaking his head and glaring at her, he dropped the towel, grabbed his underwear and yanked it on, all the while maintaining eye contact with her. “Own up to it, Marley. You’re having second thoughts, but there’s no need to pull a stunt like this. I thought after everything we’ve been through that we had a chance. Why are you doing this to us?”

  “There is no us! You’re not even you!” She was rational enough to realize that last statement didn’t make sense, but nothing made sense at the moment. She’d traded one jerk for another and fallen for lies again. Again!

  The sexy smile, the crooked grin and the dimple that—

  This Beau—this person—didn’t have a dimple.

  She choked on a sob. “Was this some sort of sick joke?”

  “Sweetheart—”

  “Who are you? Why would you do this to me?”

  Footsteps sounded in the hall and a split second later the door to her apartment burst open. Angel took one look at his half-dressed state and her eyes went wide. “Oh, I should’ve known.”

  “He won’t leave.” The statement came out as a whimper.

  Angel put herself between them. “You’ve got two seconds.” Her normally sexy, sultry voice was drawn and tight. “You said you wouldn’t hurt her. How could you do this to her again? Clay’s on his way here and if he doesn’t kill you, I will.”

  Marley sucked in a sharp breath at the news. If her brother walked in on this—“Get out!”

  He swore, pulled his pants up his long legs and tugged his shirt over his head. “I’m the one who got played in all of this, didn’t I? I can’t remember what happened so what better time to get even and treat me like I treated you, is that it?” He stared at her, his gaze boiling with anger.

  “No.”

  A raw burst of frustration escaped his lips. “No? You think accusing me of—If I’m not Beau, who the hell am I?”

  “I don’t know—I don’t care! Th-think whatever you like but don’t you ever, ever come back.”

  He stood there, his jaw flexing with his anger, his hair messed from the shower and his hurry to dress. Then with a look of utter bitterness and pain and too many emotions to name, he walked out and took her heart with him. She was a fool. She was such a fool!

  “Are you okay?”

  “No.” She wouldn’t ever be okay again. The sound of the Hemi engine roared to life and faded away with a squeal of tires.

  “Come sit down.”

  “I need to—Clay’s coming. You need to go and—and tell him I’m sick. A cold or s-something.”

  “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “You have to. I can’t—Why are you here?”

  Angel helped her over to the couch and made her sit. “You’ve been working so hard and been so down lately, we wanted to take you out for some fun. Clay said he’d meet me here before I started my show tonight.”

  “You can’t tell him about this.”

  “Marley—”

  “You can’t. Angel, what did I do? I knew better than to believe. To do this again. Why did I think he was different? Why didn’t I see the changes before—” She pulled the sleeves of her robe down to cover her hands and buried her face in the folds. “If they find out what I did…”

  “Shh. It’ll be fine. It’s okay. Just take a deep breath and start from the beg
inning. What happened?”

  The scene replayed in her mind, and she turned into Angel’s comforting embrace and told her the unbelievable tale. “Please, Angel,” she finished. “Please, you have to promise me. You can’t tell Clay about this.”

  “She can’t tell me about what?”

  HE DROVE PAST Marley’s Winter Festival display on the way home. The lights were on, making it the quintessential Christmas scene. The design showcased her skills and imagination.

  What an imagination it was.

  It wasn’t true. He couldn’t consider the possibility because it wasn’t true. If it was—

  The look on Marley’s face.

  He held on to the wheel so tightly his knuckles cracked. Most of the houses he passed were lit as brightly as Marley’s display, a blur of color as he raced by. If he wasn’t Beau…

  “She’s lying.” His head started to pound and he willed away the pain. Christmas was less than two weeks away. Pop had said he hadn’t made it home last Christmas and even though it had probably meant frozen dinners or a meal at Chang’s like they’d done for Thanksgiving, he’d been looking forward to it.

  “Dammit. She was mistaken. Upset.” Under a lot of stress with preparing for the competition and keeping her business afloat, the job site and most definitely her family. They hated him and she knew it. Marley regretted making love with him; that’s why she’d freaked out.

  But the look on her face.

  He banged his hand against the steering wheel until his palm ached. It wasn’t true. What kind of woman played games with a guy who couldn’t remember?

  The kind that wanted revenge.

  That was the only answer. He’d hurt her and her family. Badly. So much so she didn’t want to be seen with him. He thought back to the times he’d talked to her, how she’d step around to the side of the houses out of clear view and at her shop—She didn’t even let him introduce himself to that lady. She’d sat beside him under the tree but that was only because he’d guilted her into it. They’d been virtually out of sight there, too.