A Road Through Mountains (Love's Encore Book 1) Read online

  “The storm,” Cecily repeated. “I think it’s going to hit soon. We should hurry.” She quickened her already brisk pace to a near-sprint, rendering further conversation impossible.

  The wind picked up as thick clouds covered the moon. Cecily dashed ahead while Rorie’s gait slowed in the darkness and she fell behind. Thunder clapped like a gunshot and at the same moment, somewhere just out of sight, Cecily screamed. Adrenaline pumping, Rorie raced around the curve and could make out Cecily’s shadowy outline sprawled on the ground beside a thick tree root that obstructed the path. She reached down, offering Cecily her hand, and pulled her to her feet.

  “Are you—” Rorie began, but her words were interrupted once more, this time by Cecily’s mouth covering her lips.

  “I’m sorry,” Cecily stammered a fraction of a second later, pulling away. “I don’t know why I did that.”

  Rorie stood speechless, her breath labored and heart racing. She could’ve claimed it was the lingering effects of her recent jog, but she recognized that as the big, fat lie that it was. She’d been fighting her attraction to her friend since the day they met, and now Cecily had kissed her—twice—in less than an hour. How else could her body react? She was lucky her heart hadn’t burst from her chest. But none of it made sense.

  “It’s okay,” she replied, “but I don’t understand what’s going on.”

  “Neither do I.” Her expression was hidden in the dark, but her voice reflected the same bewilderment that Rorie felt. “I’m not myself tonight.”

  “Not yourself?” A stab of disappointment radiated through her at the words. “You can stop playing your role, you know. The audience is gone.”

  “No, not like that. I thought that was the reason, at first. Why I felt like I did when we got to the party, and then when we…” Her voice trailed off. “But it’s not going away. This whole walk back, it’s still there. So I had to…try again, to see.”

  “And?”

  “Still the same. Only now I really, really want to do it again. Don’t you?”

  Rorie felt the hesitation in her touch as Cecily placed her hands gingerly on her shoulders, heard the doubt in her voice. It struck her that this version of Cecily, the confident and in-control Cecily, might be mostly an illusion, that deep down she was as afraid of being rejected as Rorie was. And even though she knew this was madness, and she should fight the impulse to do so, she wrapped her arms around Cecily and pulled her close.

  While she couldn’t see it in the darkness, she could feel the triumphant smile on Cecily’s lips as she touched her own to them, and she knew in that moment she was a goner. No matter what this woman asked for or wanted, she’d give in every time and it would probably be disastrous. But lost in the intoxication of the moment, she couldn’t care less.

  The cold, heavy plop of a raindrop landing on the bridge of her nose brought her quickly back to her senses. It was followed by another and another, hitting the center of Rorie’s head and rolling down the bare skin along her back in that shiver-inducing way that triggers the primal hunt for shelter. She held Cecily closer to her chest in an attempt to ignore it as long as she could, but there’s one simple truth about weather in the South: it won’t be ignored. Within seconds, they were drenched in an icy deluge that felt like the heavens were spraying them with a fire hose. Rorie grabbed Cecily’s hand and they raced the last fifty yards from the edge of the trees to the door of Cecily’s dormitory.

  “Come on,” Cecily said when they were safely inside, eyeing the puddle that was quickly spreading at their feet on the entryway carpet. “Let’s get to my room and dry off.”

  Rorie nodded and followed, trying not to laugh at the stiff-legged way they both were walking, as if not bending their joints would somehow make walking down a hallway in soaking clothes and squeaking shoes more bearable. As Cecily stopped in front of a door and fumbled with a key, Rorie whispered, “Will your roommates be asleep?”

  Cecily gave her an amused look. “What roommates? I have a single room.”

  “Seriously? I didn’t know they had singles. What, did your family donate the building, or something?” Rorie teased. “Did I miss the sign as we came in that said ‘Dupont Hall’?”

  “No, it’s Sinclair Hall. My mother was a Sinclair, and it’s her family that donated it, not my father’s.”

  The smile faded from Rorie’s lips as she realized that Cecily wasn’t joking. “Right. So, is the bathroom down the hall?”

  “It has a private bathroom, too.”

  Rorie was about to make another joke, but the mortified look on her friend’s face told her not to. Instead, she took the towel Cecily offered, and walked into the bathroom without a word. She shut the door and stripped off her wet clothes, cringing at the pool they’d left on the tile floor. Scooping them up, she glanced around for someplace to hang them while they dried. Her eye fell on the towel rack next to the tub, and then to the half a dozen wispy bits of ribbon and lace that currently occupied the space. A surge of heat beneath her chilled flesh caused goosebumps along both arms, and she rolled her eyes at her own reaction as she slid the bras and panties from the rack to an empty spot on the counter. A faint scent of lavender filled the air and she shivered again.

  Rorie faced herself in the mirror and took a good, long look. The rain had soaked her through and through, and she looked like a drowned wharf rat. Her hair, which had tumbled free from its scarf, was tangled and stringy, and destined to form an ungodly frizzy mess when it dried. The remaining traces of eyeliner were badly smudged, and she dabbed the last few flakes of it from her skin with the towel. The lipstick was entirely gone, though she was fairly certain the rain had nothing to do with that. She caught her reflection grinning back at her from the thought. There was a tap on the door. Rorie snatched up the towel and wrapped it around herself, mortified.

  What the hell am I doing? she chastised herself. I am completely naked, reminiscing about having the lipstick sucked off of me by the daughter of a state senator, who's richer-than-God family paid to build the damned bathroom I’m standing in. How can any of that possibly end well?

  Even if whatever Cecily felt for her turned out to be more than a passing curiosity, families like Cecily’s had rules and expectations. At some point, she’d be left behind and if her heart got broken in the process, it would be her own fault.

  “Rorie?” The tapping sounded again. “I found you something dry to wear.”

  Rorie cracked the door open an inch, just enough to bring the clothing through. She would get dressed and go home, immediately, before she did anything more monumentally stupid than she already had. She shook out the bundle of clothing and stared, perplexed. “Uh, Cici? These are pajamas.” Instead of practical clothing, she’d been handed a pair of silky striped pajama pants and a matching short sleeved top.

  “I’m pretty sure they’ll fit,” came the reply from the other side of the door.

  “But I can’t walk back to my car in pajamas.”

  “You can’t walk back anywhere tonight. The way it’s raining right now, you’d need an ark. Plus, the bayou behind the dormitory is probably already starting to flood, and there are all sorts of nasty critters that come out when that happens. One of the girls in my sorority grew up nearby and once found an alligator in her swimming pool after a storm like this!”

  “An alligator?” Rorie shook her head, still studying the pajamas and debating what to do. “I think she was pulling your leg.”

  “Maybe. But it really will flood and the water gets ankle-deep in spots. Snakes and fire ants are not an exaggeration.”

  Rorie sighed. Cecily had a point. No matter how fancy their college was, it was still built along a bayou, and Louisiana wildlife wasn’t known for being timid. She slid the silk pajamas over bare skin, resigned. She’d stay the night. She just hoped there was an extra pillow and that the floor wasn’t too uncomfortable. If she were going to keep her resolve to avoid stupidity and heartbreak, sleeping in the bed was completely out of the q
uestion.

  She opened the door and stepped into the room. Cecily was at the far end, plumping up pillows and pulling back the covers on her bed. She stretched her arm as she did so and the short night gown she wore slid upward to reveal several miles worth of bare thigh that Rorie should absolutely not be looking at. She blinked her eyes and swallowed roughly, vaguely aware that her recently towel-dried skin was becoming damp again with sweat.

  Studiously avoiding looking in Cecily’s direction again, she marched to the bed opposite of where Cecily stood. The bed was larger than any dormitory bed she’d ever seen, queen size at least. And she needn’t have worried about pillows. There were more pillows than any one person could need in a lifetime, decorative little things in pastel hues with flowers and lace.

  The surroundings weren’t Rorie’s usual style, but she found them charmingly irresistible—not unlike their owner.

  But she couldn’t think about that now. Forcing herself to focus on the task at hand she snatched up an armful of pillows and tossed them, one by one, onto the floor.

  18

  “What are you doing?” Cecily asked, her head cocking to the side.

  “Fixing a spot to sleep on the floor.”

  “Why?”

  Rorie sighed. She hugged the last pillow against her chest and studied Cecily with an intensity that made her whole body tremble.

  Finally she said, “Remember in the woods, right before the storm started? I think you can figure out why.”

  “You don’t have to do that.” Cecily cringed at the sound of her own voice, timid and pleading. No wonder Rorie had no interest in her. She was attracted to bold, confident women, like her ex. Cecily was neither.

  “There’s only one bed, so one of us needs to. And I’m feeling chivalrous.”

  “Fine. But you’re the guest.” Cecily grabbed several pillows and flung them to the floor in front of her. “If one of us has to sleep down there, it should be me.” She turned off the lamp on the nightstand, plunging the room into darkness.

  The pillows rustled in her ears as she settled into her little nest on the floor. She felt agitated by feelings she couldn’t pin down or understand: irritation, rejection, desperation. They made her insides feel as scratchy as the stiff lace on the pillows beneath her head. In the dark the rain pattered and the thunder rolled from the storm. It was a lonely sound that seemed to magnify the emptiness inside her.

  Her life had made sense when she woke up that morning, and now it made no sense at all. She’d had a neat little life planned for herself, and a best friend she’d come to rely on. And now she’d managed to lose it all. She could live just fine without Chet, but she was almost certain her impulsiveness would lose her Rorie, too, and she couldn’t bear it. Before she could stop herself, a sniffling cry escaped her lips, muffled by one of the pillows.

  There was a sigh from the mattress above her, and then Rorie’s voice. “Cici? Just get up here, okay? We need to talk.”

  Cecily’s stomach tightened in equal parts relief and fear. She had no idea what Rorie would say, or even what she hoped she’d say.

  “Cici, you have to understand—”

  Rejection lurked behind the words. She could feel it. “No, I get it,” Cecily interjected. “You’re not interested. I mean, I should’ve realized it as soon as I saw your ex. I’m nothing like that, and I made it awkward for you, and—”

  “No! No, Cici, that’s not it. Not at all.”

  She drew a ragged breath. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  Cecily felt the mattress shift as Rorie rolled to face her, and she did the same. Her eyes had adjusted to the dark and she could just make out her friend’s shadowy shape beside her, though not her face. She wished she could see Rorie’s blue eyes, just to be certain what to believe.

  “Look,” Rorie continued, “this morning you woke up in a hotel room in New Orleans next to the guy you thought you were going to marry. And then you had a pretty big shock when you found out he was cheating. And just a few hours later we’re doing…whatever it is we’re doing. You haven’t really thought about it.”

  Cecily stiffened. “Of course I’ve thought about it. I thought about it the whole time you were changing in the bathroom!”

  Rorie chuckled. “Sweetie, I was in there for five minutes. You’re telling me that in five minutes' time, you managed to come to a total, nuanced understanding of your sexual identity, and figured out exactly what you wanted, and the implications it would have on your life, and—no offense, Cici, but in that amount of time, I didn’t even manage to floss.”

  “Okay, maybe not,” Cecily conceded. “But I like you. I really do. And I really liked kissing you, and I think I’d like—other things—too. So…”

  “Cici, I really like you, too. And if you had any idea of some of the things I’ve thought about you, well—I’m not going to say because it would make you blush. But I don’t want you to rush, or change your mind, and then… leave.”

  “I wouldn’t do that!” she protested, feeling defensive.

  “You don’t know, you might! You could wake up tomorrow full of regret and just disappear. It happens.”

  Something in the way she said it broke through Cecily’s defenses, bringing her back to her senses. She wasn’t the only one trying to figure out this sudden shift in their feelings for one another. Rorie had her own issues, too. There was no reason they couldn’t take the time they needed to sort this out.

  “You’re right. I’m sorry,” Cecily said gently. “I might have been rushing because I’m feeling a little crazy right now. But we should do this right. If you want to, I mean.”

  Cecily sighed as she felt Rorie’s arm wrap around her waist, pulling her closer.

  “If by this you mean figure out if we could be more to each other than friends, then yeah. I would really like that. Or even if you just need to work through the craziness and you end up back where you were, I'll be here then, too, okay? It’s not like I haven’t been through a lot of the same crazy feelings myself,” Rorie assured her. “We’ll figure it out. There’s plenty of time.”

  Cecily snuggled sleepily against her friend, this one person who meant more than anything else to her right now. She felt drained from her emotions, but enveloped in warmth and reassurance. She drifted off to the sound of the storm outside, filled with hope. They had their whole lives ahead of them.

  * * *

  A trail of discarded clothing marked the path they’d taken through the house; a few hairpins tossed aside in the sitting room, a tank top dangling by one strap from a drawer pull in the kitchen, a shirt crumpled beside the sofa in the living room with one button popped off in the process and resting wherever it had landed. They’d made it to the top of the stairs without toppling over, but barely, and one of Cecily’s shoes was flung atop a step halfway up like a prop from a very unorthodox retelling of Cinderella. They rested momentarily, breathless and panting, propping each other up in the middle of the second floor landing.

  “Not to sound too impatient,” Cecily said between breaths, “but could you go a little faster?” The strap of her bra had slid off her shoulder and the feel of it constraining her bicep was extremely annoying. It either needed to be pushed back up or pulled off before it drove her mad. Off was preferable.

  “The last hook’s stuck,” Rorie mumbled, disengaging her lips from where they were teasing the hollow of Cecily’s neck just long enough to explain.

  “Just rip it, then,” Cecily snapped, surprised at her own testiness.

  Apparently it surprised Rorie, too, because she stopped suckling Cecily’s neck and stared at her, which was basically the exact opposite of what Cecily had been trying to accomplish. Cecily whimpered in frustration.

  “Knowing you, this bra cost a thousand dollars. I’m not ripping it.”

  “I don’t care. I have others.”

  Cecily wriggled closer to Rorie, trying to reconnect her neck with Rorie’s lips, but failing as Rorie straightened up an
d her hands slid from the back of Cecily’s bra to her shoulders. Damn it! Rorie had her infamous 'we should talk about this' face on. This is exactly what she’d been trying to avoid. Stupid bra hook. For the price she’d paid for the thing, she should have demanded one guaranteed to be malfunction-free.

  “Come on,” Cecily urged, leaning backward in the direction of her bedroom door and hoping Rorie would follow. “We’re almost there,” she cajoled. “Time’s a-wastin’!”

  But Rorie didn’t budge, and instead looked steadily into Cecily’s eyes, which was intensely unsettling. Despite the seriousness of her expression, Cecily felt her body tingle under her gaze, her brain buzzing with the thought that all that stood between them and total, glorious nakedness were a couple pairs of panties and one highly mischievous bra.

  The fact that Rorie’s own bra had been dispensed with a few moments before, possibly having landed on a branch of a potted palm at the base of the stairs, was most distracting. The way Rorie’s hands were clamped on her shoulders was putting a serious damper in Cecily’s ability to reach out and touch the peaks of her nipples, something she very much wanted to do.

  “Cici, what are we doing?”

  Cecily groaned. “I think it's fairly obvious. You can't possibly be as out of practice at this as me. You must know what this is, unless I'm more out of practice than I thought.” She bit her bottom lip as a sudden wave of insecurity washed over her.

  “What I know is that we haven’t seen each other in eighteen years, and now all of a sudden we’re standing in front of your bedroom door, completely naked.”

  “No, not completely naked,” Cecily quipped. “But we could be.”

  She reached behind her back and popped the last bra hook free, letting both straps slide down her arms and then tossing it aside. Cecily watched as it flew over the railing, its final resting place a mystery to be solved another day. When she looked back, Rorie had stopped talking. Her eyes were fixed on Cecily’s bare breasts, which had been her somewhat obvious but generally fool-proof plan all along. Gently, she twined her fingers with Rorie’s and shifted Rorie's hands from her shoulders down to the swell of her breast, leaning in to kiss her as she did. For a moment things were back on track, until Cecily took a step toward the bedroom door and Rorie pulled away again.