Curiously Enchanted (Witches of Hawthorne Grove Book 2) Read online

  She could almost hear the triumphant grin in his voice when he said, “I'll wait for you as long as it takes.”

  Her lips twisted into a wry grin. “That could be forever. I'm a notorious scatterbrain when I get busy. I bury myself in what I'm doing and tend to forget everything else until I'm done.”

  “Just think about my lips, Emma. On yours. On the soft line of your jaw. Nuzzling up against the sensitive spot on your nape right below your ear,” he murmured low, and blast him, she did.

  Biting back a groan of yearning, she whispered, “Goodbye, Sam.”

  She could still hear the sound of his knowing masculine chuckles when she pressed the button to end the call.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The following weeks passed in a magical kind of blur. From the moment she'd joined Sam at the One Shot for “a late lunch,” Emma became entrenched—in both the progress of the new construction and redesign of the cafe and in a surprisingly exhilarating and unexpectedly fulfilling, semi-personal relationship with Sam.

  The man was perfect. He was beautiful. He was solicitous but not overly adoring. He was quick to ask her opinions and obstinately firm about their importance to him every time she tried to keep them to herself. The One Shot was his cafe and this was his life and her opinions didn't really matter in the overall scheme of things.

  Sam was quick to put an end to her hesitance. Her thoughts absolutely mattered, he'd told her more than once, because she mattered. And Emma had started to believe him. For whatever reason, he had opened up his life to her, and now she felt as much a part of it as his best friends, Kaylee and Jordan must, as much a part of it as Jabez, the pup he lavished with love and affection, and at least as much a part of it as the coffee shop he loved so much.

  Sam had changed her, too, she had to admit, although the realization astounded her. With easy acceptance, he had helped her to open up, to ease past her shyness and to feel confident enough in her own abilities as a smart person with a perfectly functioning mind of her own, to interact with his friends as easily as she did with hers.

  Never once in her past had she felt comfortable enough in a relationship with a guy—any guy, even members of her own family—to simply let go and be herself without fear of eventually being shut down and possibly even humiliated, but nothing with Sam was like anything she'd ever experienced before.

  Not once in the time she had known him did he seem to look down on her accomplishments. Not once did he belittle her goals or act as if they were unworthy. Sam was the only man she had ever known who looked at her and saw who she really was and didn't try to force her to become someone else. In fact, he wasn't judgmental at all.

  As silly as it seemed in this day and age, Sam was the only man who had ever treated her like an equal. He was also the only man who pampered her and spoiled her like a princess. Sometimes when he looked at her, she interpreted his gaze as the same kind of look one might give to a long-coveted treasure finally attained.

  He was so sweetly attentive sometimes it made her blush. And yet, at the same time she was secretly thrilled. Deep down she was loving every minute of it … so much she had become a bit wary when they were together lately because she knew all too well how good things eventually came to an end. Especially things that were far too good to be true, and she was a little afraid such was the case with her and Sam.

  Any modern-day princess might have looked upon the growing relationship between them with envy, but Emma knew it could come crashing down around her any day, leaving her crushed, broken, and no longer whole.

  If she didn't know better, if she hadn't been carefully maintaining a hold on her fragile heart, she might have said they were in love—or at least falling there. The same could not be said, however, for their pets: Chloe and Jabez. Theirs was more a love-hate type thing which changed from one minute to the next, much to both Emma and Sam's amusement.

  Their pets antics when they came together were fairly amusing most days … when it wasn't raining out and miserably frigid, like tonight, and when she and Sam weren't forced to go out into the wintry mess to save a madly hissing, furry monster from the clawing branches of a tree in the dark.

  Emma had come home with Sam for dinner again, as she had done for two of the past three weeks, and she'd brought Chloe along with her rather than leave her alone for hours at the apartment. Usually, Chloe stayed inside, mostly preferring to sit and stare with disdain at the mortals from her transporter, but somehow tonight, between dinner and dessert, the cat had slipped out of the carrier and wandered outside to inspect the base of a big old Hawthorne tree for suitability as a royal napping place. That was where Jabez had found her and decided to say hello, which was the entire reason Emma was now soaking wet and running for the house with a sopping wet cat in her arms, Sam closing in behind, trying to cover them both with a busted and broken umbrella that wasn't helping at all.

  “There's a dish towel in one of the drawers over by the sink.” Sam said, sluicing water from his eyes as he pushed open the door and waited for her to go in before following her inside. Scrubbing his muddied boots on the mat, he waved her toward the kitchen. “Go ahead and see to Chloe. I'll find something warm to dry us off.”

  “And s-something to g-get r-rid of this c-chill!” Emma called through chattering teeth to his retreating back while trying her best to contain the now wriggling, stringy ball of fur in her arms who wanted nothing more at the moment than she wanted down. “C-chloe, you've t-turned into s-such a t-troublemaker, h-haven't you, g-girl?”

  After rummaging through a couple drawers, she found a towel and attempted to soak up the water from the cat's soaked and matted fur. “Y-you should b-be ashamed, g-going out into the y-yard like t-that without us. How d-did you g-get out of the c-carrier, anyway?”

  “She probably batted at the latch with her paw until it came free,” Sam offered as she put a now much less drenched and knotted Chloe on the floor. “Cats are smart like that, I hear.”

  Casting a glare at the cat, Emma wanted to disagree. But then, Sam draped something fluffy and warm over and around the both of them, cocooning her in warmth before wrapping his arms around her from behind. He pulled her against his chest beneath the toasty warm covering that felt like he'd just pulled it from the dryer and she immediately leaned back to snuggle in closer.

  “Mm, there. How's that? This should knock the chill right out of you,” he said, nuzzling at her neck even as he snuggled her deeper into his embrace, and without warning or reason, close was suddenly not close enough.

  Like the thundering jolt of an unexpected electrical current, desire and longing slammed through her, turning her into a quivering, needy mess of unhinged passion Emma neither understood nor tried to deny. Everywhere their bodies touched, she burned. Every spot his breath caressed, she tingled and then, she started to melt against him.

  She wanted to wind herself around him, much like Chloe might, kneading his muscles with her fingers while rubbing her body against him at every turn. No. No, she wanted more—needed more than that. She needed to sink into him, to be a part of him as he had become a part of everything that was her. The torrential, aching need flooding through her was far too powerful for her to control. There was nothing to be done but give in to it, and so she did.

  In that instant, Emma completely forgot about the cold, forgot she was drenched, soaked practically to the bone. She forgot about Chloe and Jabez and the still open kitchen door behind them. In that moment, she forgot everything but Sam. Everything but her suddenly voracious desire and the wickedly delicious feel of his perfectly sculpted hard body pressed against hers.

  Turning in his arms, she leaned in until her breasts were flush with his chest, her thighs snug against his, and threaded her fingers into his dripping wet hair. Almost purring with satisfaction from the feel of his scalp beneath her fingertips, her palms, and from the heat of his body pouring into hers, she closed her eyes.

  “Oh, Sam. I need you so much,” she whispered on a shaky, breat
hless sigh as her lips sought and found the warm pulse at the base of his throat through the opening at the front of his shirt.

  “I want you,” she whispered as her fingers left his hair to wander down and up again, this time beneath his soaked shirt, to worship the silky smooth skin of his bare chest. She pushed his shirt upward and he helped her remove it when it became caught on his chin.

  Laughing, she tossed it aside, but then grew serious when he slipped his hands beneath the hem of her sweater and then upward.

  Leaning into his touch, she murmured her pleasure against his lips, whispering encouragement all the while. Her eyes flew open and her gaze collided with his. He was watching her with an intensity that only sharpened everything she was feeling until her need became almost unbearable.

  “Love me,” she demanded, pushing her body ever closer to his. “I want you to love me, Sam. Please. Love me now, like you did before…”

  Sam froze. His fingers gripped her arms and he held onto her even as he pushed her slightly away and shook his head as if to clear thoughts grown as muddled as her own. “Emma? Emma, do you even know what you're saying? You and I, we've never done this before.”

  Her sultry siren's chuckle should have been his undoing, but still, she followed it with words—a horrible, terrible, damning confession of what had happened between them in her dreams. “Oh, but we have, Sam. We truly have. Every single night for weeks and weeks.”

  Shrugging off his hands, she wriggled close again and pressed her fingers against the heated contours of his chest before following her questing fingertips with her lips over well-remembered paths.

  “Mm,” she hummed once in delight before glancing up to meet his confused, questioning gaze. She smiled. “Don't be afraid, Sam. You already know how this is supposed to end. We both do. But if you want to pretend you've grown a little shy...”

  Reaching for his hands, she guided them back to the sagging hem of her damp sweater that hugged the curve of her waist. “Here, let me show you.”

  A bright flash of light filled the room a split second before a peal of thunder cracked through the night, shaking Emma to her core, and then there was chaos. A streak of white zipped across the room. There was a hiss, and then a crash near the door.

  “Arfh! Arfh!”

  Jabez.

  And Chloe.

  Momentarily shaken from the thrall of her desire, Emma turned to go after Chloe but when she did, the black and white checkered quilt Sam had wrapped them in fell away and suddenly Emma knew what had happened.

  She recalled every word she had said, every thing she had done, and looking back at Sam, she knew without a doubt that all was lost because after all these weeks she saw at last the judgment she had expected from the beginning in his eyes.

  Uncovered now, she could feel the chill of damp cloth seeping into her bones, freezing her from the inside. Wrapping her arms around her middle, she closed her eyes, fighting back tears of shame over what she had done. “I-I'm sorry, Sam. It wasn't really me. Well, it was, but mostly it was whatever came with that quilt, but that's still no excuse for my behavior.”

  She couldn't look at him again, couldn't wait for him to speak. Spinning on her heel, she made a beeline for Chloe's transporter, which she grabbed along with her purse from the table beside it and hurried to the door.

  Pausing for one quick, last glimpse over her shoulder at the man she now realized she truly had begun to love, she felt lost and alone and afraid. And she was deeply humiliated by how she had acted, what she had done. But worse than either of those was the stabbing pain in the region of her breaking heart because she knew when Sam looked at her now he saw her much differently than before.

  Too much passion. Too much enthusiasm. Too much—everything. She'd behaved recklessly. Shamelessly. And in Sam's eyes she could clearly see the appalling truth, the consequences of her actions: she was well and truly condemned.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Coming out of a daze he hadn't realized he'd fallen into, Sam blinked once, shook his head, and blinked again. What in the world had just happened? Grabbing the quilt now pooled at his feet, he picked it up and tossed it onto the kitchen table. Stumbling toward the door, his still wet boots slipping on the parquet floor, he barely managed to catch Emma before she ran blindly out into the rain again. “Emma, wait.”

  Shaking her head, she peered into the downpour, one hand coming up to wipe away wetness from her cheek—wetness that made no sense. She hadn't yet stepped off the back stoop but her face was already drenched?

  “I have to find Chloe.”

  There was a thickness in her tone that had him drawing up in shocked realization. The wetness on her face was tears. With a hand on her shoulder, Sam turned her to face him. “You're crying. Why?”

  Dashing away the wetness with the back of her hand, she sniffed. “It doesn't matter.”

  Sam's brows rose so high the thought they must have disappeared into his hairline. “Doesn't matter? You just turned into the most delightful rendition ever of Aprhodite and Eve rolled into one and rather than the moment ending as it should have—with you and me waking up in each other's arms, happy smiles wreathing our faces—you're on the verge of running out into a storm with your vision so impaired by tears you can't see five feet in front of you.”

  Reaching out, he tilted her chin upward with one hand, forcing her to meet his gaze. “You're hurting, Emma, and that hurts me. Trust me, whatever happened that has you suddenly bursting into tears definitely matters—at least to me.”

  With his thumb, he smoothed away a tear. Searching her eyes, he said, “This isn't like you, Emma. If it's me, if I've done something to hurt you, please tell me.”

  Her eyes closed and Sam thought he heard her groan. “It isn't you, Sam. It's me. Or, rather, it's me anytime I come into contact with that blasted quilt.”

  Following her accusatory gaze to the coverlet in question, Sam asked, “The quilt? What are you talking about?”

  There was indecision in her eyes. “Nothing. It's nothing.”

  “We've already decided there is definitely more than nothing going on here and I think we need to get to the bottom of this.” Catching her hand in his, he reached out with the other to close the door, then tugged her toward the table where he'd tossed the quilt. “What does your kissing me have to do with a wretched bit of bed covering?”

  Refusing to look anywhere near the table, Emma said, “I think it's cursed.”

  Cursed? Sam blinked in confusion, and then understanding dawned. “The quilt! Oh, Kaylee and Jordan are going to love this.”

  Her eyes widened instantly. “No! You can't, Sam. Don't you dare tell them a thing about how badly I lost control here tonight. I swear, I'll never speak to you again if you do.”

  “Why not?” He shrugged. “They already know every time I pick up one of those coffee cups or the pot I picked up from Seville's, or if I happen to touch the piece of that wooden puzzle I stole from your box that day, I can't seem to think of anything but you. Why should it matter if they know your enchanted item is the quilt you bought?”

  “Enchanted? You're not making sense, Sam. This has nothing to do with magic, but my—” Taking a deep breath, she shrugged and said, “My reckless enthusiasm. My uncontrollable passions and a total lack of good sense required to keep them to myself.”

  She looked up at him through a watery gaze; her bottom lip trembled, making Sam want to kiss it still again but she had more to say.

  “I saw the way you looked at me. I can guess what you were thinking. My father was right after all. Not being able to exercise even a little bit of restraint over my own emotions ruins everything for me, so just move over and let me collect Chloe so I can go home. I prefer to nurse my wounds in private.”

  “Now who's not making sense? Emma, what exactly did your father tell you and what does this have to do with you and I?”

  Gesturing wildly with her hands, she slashed them through the air, obviously taking out her frustrations on
the space in front of her. “He said I was childish, that I tried too hard to make an impression, but as the youngest of five, I've always had to work harder than all my other siblings to get them to notice me. If I hadn't, they might simply have forgotten I existed.”

  Sam started to tell her what her father had said was ridiculous but he realized at some point in time she had not only come to believe him, she had taken every hurtful word her old man had said to her to heart.

  Again, she dashed tears from her cheeks with the back of her hand. “When I told him about my idea for making furniture, he looked down his nose at me, Sam. He gave me the same look you gave me a few moments ago,” she accused. “He said I was hopelessly naive and...and reckless. He said I never took the time to think things through, and he was right.”

  Sam scowled. “Emma—”

  “That's the night I left home, Sam. I was nineteen. I sneaked out after dark and hitched a ride to the airport, and called Lindsay to beg her for money for a ticket out here. I left because my father had finally made me realize when I want something I shouldn't just jump in with both feet and hope for the best. I needed to plan, and analyze, and take a little time to think about what I wanted from life because most of the time, if I'd given any one of my hair-brained schemes a little consideration, the facts I found would easily have shown me I was wasting my time.”

  Crossing his arms over his chest, Sam guessed, “That's why you became a research specialist. You needed to work in facts?”

  “I had to show him he was wrong about me, Sam. I could make careful, measured, grown-up decisions as well as either of my brothers. I had to prove to him that I wasn't the feather-brained, recklessly abandoned, naive little girl he thought me to be.”

  “Your father is the reason you shut down?” Sam muttered darkly. “I wondered who was responsible, but I thought it would be someone else—an old love, maybe. But... your father?”