“Mr. Storm! Mr. Storm!” Hands shot up as every one of the reporters tried to get his attention.
“Yes?” he said, pointing to a freckle-faced young reporter, a young Jimmy Olsen who seemed ecstatic to be the first one picked.
“Who is the woman? Could there be a romance involved?”
Tanner was quiet for a moment. He smiled and looked out into the crowd and locked eyes with Kyla. Oh yes, there was a romance, at least if he had anything to say about it.
“I sure hope so,” he said, a huge grin splitting his face, and a gasp surged through the crowd. The reporters shouted out more and more questions, but Tanner tuned them all out and let Randy handle things. He only had eyes for one person right now and she was giving him an assessing look. He could see that she didn’t trust him, was leery of his motives. But he’d expected that. He was here to show her that his intentions were pure.
After the reporters had what they needed, he stepped down and shook hands, searching for any sign of Kyla. She was apparently long gone, but that was all right with him. He would be here a lot over the next several months. Tanner had decided to don his construction hat and work on the building himself, along with the prestigious firm he’d hired for the project. If Crew could do this kind of thing, he most certainly could, too.
Chapter Thirty-One
Two weeks dragged by, and though Tanner spotted Kyla often, she always walked past him without a word. A few times, he’d seen the way some of the crew checked her out; after a stern look from him, they’d soon backed off. He had no trouble at all with letting them know she was off limits. Even if she didn’t know it yet, she was his and he wasn’t letting her go.
It hit him like a flash flood one afternoon when he was up on a ladder and she went by him in the hall. It was like a picture show in his mind — the two of them laughing in her kitchen, holding each other on the couch, her falling asleep in his arms… He’d tumbled headfirst into love with this woman, this beautiful, tragic, compelling woman.
Everything he was doing was because she’d changed forever the way he thought about his life. She’d changed his thinking for the better. What the…? It’s a Wonderful Life was turning into his reality.
Now, he just had to persuade her to give him another chance, to let him love her. No, he had no idea how the hell he was going to manage to do that. But with new determination, he climbed down the ladder, set down his hammer, walked to her door, and pounded on it.
“Open up, Kyla,” he yelled through her door. “I have something to say and I refuse to leave until you hear me out.” He didn’t even even notice that the noise in the hall had stopped as his workers unabashedly listened in as their boss prepared to play the lovesick fool.
“Go away, Tanner. We have nothing to say to each other.”
“Dammit, if you don’t open this door, then I’m going to shout it all out for the neighbors to hear!”
“There are children here, Mr. Storm. You watch your language.”
Tanner turned to find one of the neighbors’ doors open and an older woman glaring daggers at him. But he didn’t care who listened in. He wasn’t leaving until he got what he had to say off his chest. Hell, he wasn’t leaving without carrying Kyla away in his arms.
Considering he’d lied to her and had wanted only to use her for her body, then walked away as if she meant nothing, he figured he had to perform some penance. Maybe more than a little. But whatever it took, he would do it, even if that meant groveling.
“Granted, I didn’t tell you who I was. I lied by omission, Kyla, and I admit I wanted to get you into my bed more than anything else. I was selfish, shortsighted, and a complete idiot. It took spending three or four of the most meaningful weeks of my life with you to realize how foolishly I was behaving. I should have never left you on Christmas. I should have waited on your doorstep and then held you all night as you let out your grief. I’m begging you to give me another chance to do just that.”
“Tanner…you have to stop this,” she said, sounding choked up, sounding…hopeful?
Was he actually getting through to her?
“Please, just let me prove to you that I’m a new man. I know some men say they will change when they have zero intention of doing so, but I have changed. I’m a better man for knowing you, and I want to prove to you every single day how much I care — how much I love you. I do, Kyla Ridgley. I love you so much, my heart is bursting.”
The onlookers gave out a muted awww.
But Kyla’s door stayed shut, although he kept staring at it, willing it to open.
“Please, just open the door, Kyla. Look into my eyes. You’ll see that I’m telling the truth!”
“You’re making a fool of yourself, young man,” said the woman down the hall. But the look she now gave him was far less harsh than the one she’d treated him to before. She seemed almost sympathetic to his plight.
That hurt, he had to admit. He knew things were bad when he was getting pitying looks from elderly women.
Finally, just when he thought he was going to have to pitch a tent outside Kyla’s door, he heard her undoing the locks and sliding the chain away. Then she was standing before him, looking even more beautiful than ever, with her hair in a ponytail, and wearing a tight red sweater and a pair of fitted jeans that showed off the perfect flare of her hips.
Tears were shining in her eyes as she gazed into his. He could see myriad emotions crossing her features, as if she were hoping he spoke the truth, but didn’t trust herself to be a good judge of his character.
“I’m such a fool, Kyla. But I’m a man who will only make a mistake once before I’ve learned my lesson. I know we haven’t had a lot of time together, and I know it all seems like it moved too fast, but since I’ve been away from you, you’re all I think about. I can’t concentrate on work; I can hardly sleep, or eat. I’m just surviving, not living. I need you as a part of my life — a permanent part of my life. I won’t terrify you by asking you to be my wife…at least not today…but I am asking for a chance, a real chance for us to know each other. I love you, Kyla. I’ve never before said that to a woman.”
“Oh, Tanner, I…I don’t know. My first instinct is to throw my arms around you and say yes, but this is too fast. We don’t know each other. We spent less than a month together and…” She dropped her voice briefly to a whisper. “We made love only twice. I want to believe this is real, but things like this don’t happen to somebody like me. You’re a man who has the world in the palm of his hand. I’m just a lost girl, someone who’s pretty much alone in this world, and I have nothing to bring to the relationship,” she said, hugging herself tightly.