He regarded her incredulously. “You’re kicking me out of your bed? After I worked so hard to make sure you were totally satisfied?”
“I am,” she confirmed. “You have to pick your son up from school. I have to make at least some of those business calls. And, despite my earlier comments, I really don’t think Grandmother should come home from Castle’s and find us in my bed. It might make her happy, but I guarantee, we’d never hear the end of it. She’ll have her calendar out and the church booked before we make it downstairs.”
“Would that be so bad?” Boone asked, glancing over his shoulder as he sat on the side of the bed.
As the offhand comment sank in, Emily stared at him. “What?”
“I asked if it would be so bad if we set a wedding date.”
She had a very hard time comprehending this sudden about-face, this desire to leap into the future. “Seriously?” she asked.
For an instant he looked as if he might take it back, but then he nodded. “Seriously.”
Stunned by the out-of-the-blue suggestion, Emily yanked the sheet up to her chin. Though she tried to choose her words carefully, the ones that came out of her mouth were anything but diplomatic.
“Boone, have you suddenly lost your mind? We’ve barely started seeing each other again. Sure, it’s been good. Excellent, in fact, but we’re not ready to go to the next level, much less take a leap over the next five levels to marriage.”
He frowned at her quick-tempered response. “How do you see this progressing?”
“A lot more slowly than you do, apparently. Earlier today you didn’t even want the world to know we were together. This turnaround of yours is giving me whiplash.”
“It was just an idea,” he said defensively. “If this is the outcome we’re hoping for, why wait? Let’s just do it, then deal with the fallout.”
“Now that’s a romantic notion,” she said.
“Okay, if you’re so dead set against it, tell me your objections.”
“There are a lot of things we haven’t even begun to work out, like how our lives would fit together,” she reminded him. “That’s a biggie, don’t you think?”
“Maybe we’re making it too complicated, that’s all I’m saying.” He regarded her earnestly. “I love you, Em. I always have. I fought it when you first showed up, but that was about me being angry and guilty about holding back a piece of my heart from Jenny. Now it just seems as if we’re back where we used to be and we ought to grab this before a million other things get in the way again.”
“And how do you see this marriage working?” she asked, genuinely perplexed by this crazy idea of his. She could tell from the bewildered expression on his face that he had no clue how it might work.
“You’re being a total guy,” she accused lightly when he didn’t respond. “You want what you want when you want it, never mind that the other person hasn’t even climbed on this runaway bus of yours yet.”
He stared at her for a minute, then chuckled. “You think I’m a runaway bus?”
“Something like that. Maybe I didn’t want us hiding from the world, but I sure wasn’t suggesting we just throw caution to the wind. These issues we have are real. Jodie Farmer’s going to be a problem. B.J. has to get used to the idea. We have work schedules that are going to have to be coordinated. I could be tied up in California for a couple of months at least on this shelter project. The deadline for the ski lodge renovation is just as crazy. And a lot of my regular clients have little spruce-up jobs that they insist be done before the holidays. I have four queries about those on that list of calls I need to return.”
As her recitation went on, she saw the muscles in Boone’s shoulders visibly tighten.
“So, what?” he asked. “This was hello and goodbye all in one. You’ll be back, when? Sometime after the first of the year?”
“I’m sure it won’t be that long,” she said, though she honestly couldn’t promise how much sooner it might be. “I’m hoping to get back at least once a month. I was also thinking maybe you and B.J. could come to California, so we could take him to Disneyland, or that you could meet me in Aspen for a quick getaway, just the two of us.”
“I’m beginning to see what you meant,” Boone said, his tone filled with disappointment and resignation. “Your priorities are still all screwed up, aren’t they? You’re not willing to put this relationship ahead of much.”
“These are commitments I’ve already made, Boone.” She regarded him with frustration. “Should I slack off, not give the jobs the attention they deserve?”
“Of course not,” he said, his own frustration just as plain. “What about after these jobs? Will you slow down? Take less work? Maybe even relocate your business to North Carolina?”
“I honestly haven’t thought that far into the future,” she admitted. “There wasn’t any reason to. I thought we were just starting to test the waters, find out if we had anything left.”
“Do you at least agree that we do?” he asked.
She walked around the bed and sat down beside him. “How could I possibly deny that? The sex has been amazing.”
The frown on his face only deepened at her words. “That’s all this has been for you? Great sex? I thought we were reconnecting on a whole lot of levels.”
Now she was frowning. “Why are you deliberately misunderstanding me? Do you want this to turn into a fight? Are you hoping we’ll break up here and now, then go back to the way things were, not speaking or seeing each other? It would make your life less complicated, wouldn’t it? No problems with Jodie. No worries about B.J. getting hurt.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said irritably. “Didn’t I just suggest marriage?”
“But when I didn’t leap at the suggestion, you started
