House of Payne: Ice

by Stacy Gail

  “Sharper than usual. We did an online doctor visit, and she thought it might be the change in medication. It won’t stop the progression of the dementia itself, but we take what we can get.”

  “And be thankful for it.” Valiantly she tried to smile. “By the way, Matt, there’s a wineglass and a woman who loves you waiting for you in the parlor, if you’re interested.”

  “I was just coming to say that very thing, darling.” Claire appeared in the doorway with a calm smile—her game face, Sunny noted. She opened the door wider in invitation and tilted her head at Matt. “Why don’t you take a break and keep that gorgeous wife of yours company, Matt? Sunny and I will sit with Archie for a while.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” Pausing to rest a comforting hand on Sunny’s shoulder, Matt closed the door behind him, leaving them to their privacy.

  “The Christmas music isn’t playing in here,” Sunny noted as her mother pulled a chair up beside hers. The room itself was done in heavy, masculine tones of burgundies and browns—her father’s tastes—but now the once-familiar space felt like nothing more than a fancy hospital room. “Dad loves Christmas. Don’t you think he’d like it?”

  “I did, but it seemed to agitate him. When the doctor noticed it earlier today, she suggested it was over-stimulating him, so we turned it off. He calmed right down, so that was that.”

  “I see.” Another thing that would never be the same, then. Okay. “I smelled baking when I first walked in. You haven’t gone and started making cookies without me, have you?”

  “Maybe just a teensy little batch of sugar cookies, for the sake of practice.” Claire reached out and brushed Sunny’s hair back, a simple motherly gesture that nearly unraveled her. “What’s wrong, Sunny? What’s bothering you?”

  She stilled. “Bothering me?”

  “You can’t fool me, you know.” The smile her mother gave her was very different from the one she gave the rest of the world. This smile had nothing to do with her game face, and everything to do with love and understanding. “You got so worked up when you saw an extra wineglass, like you thought we should be expecting someone. Who is it you think we should be expecting?”

  “No one.” She grabbed her mother’s hand to kiss it, while automatically keeping the turmoil inside under tight wraps. Her mother didn’t need the added stress. “Seriously, no one, Mom. I just had a moment of stupidity.”

  “Care to share what was behind that moment of stupidity?”

  Tenacity. Another thing she’d inherited from her mother. “Something unexpected happened earlier in the week. I guess it rattled me more than I realized.”

  “Tell me. Maybe I can help.”

  Ugh. “I don’t know that it’s something that needs help, exactly. I, uh… I found out that Ice Eisen has moved to Chicago. He’s working at House Of Payne now.”

  If she’d expected her mother to fall off her chair in shock, she was doomed to disappointment. “I see,” Claire said, nodding while watching her face. “And?”

  “What do you mean, and? That’s astounding. He should be in his own damn state, not my state of Illinois.”

  “First, you don’t own Illinois, darling. And second, I’ve known Atticus Eisen was making a move to Chicago for some time. It’s not the end of the world. It’s a very big city, certainly big enough for the both of you.”

  That was a debatable point, but at the moment she had other fish to fry. “You knew he was moving to Chicago? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Ever since you came home, you’ve made it abundantly clear you wished to avoid all things related to the tattooing world, so I did just that. I take it you didn’t know Atticus was sinking new roots here?”

  “I had no clue until he walked into the office earlier this week.”

  “What?” Now it was Claire’s turn to be surprised. “He showed up at your office?”

  “If you think you’re stunned, imagine how I felt. I didn’t even know he was in town, much less working and living here.”

  “The nerve.” The indignant huff her mother let loose gratified Sunny immensely. When confronted with a crappy situation, it was good to know she wasn’t alone in her indignation. “My God, the absolute nerve of the man. He throws you off a show you created during the actual filming of said show, fires you from a business you made famous, and then he dares to show up at your work? What does he want to do, kiss and make up and then use you again for whatever purpose he’s got in mind?”

  “I don’t know.” But it was scary how her mother echoed her own fears.

  “Well,” Claire huffed, “I don’t care who Atticus’s father is. I hope you told him to go take a flying leap.”

  “He said he was there to do some promo charity work for the local animal shelters around the city.”

  “Charity work? For animal shelters.” Her mother gave her a long look while the silence ballooned around them. “Sunny.”

  “What? That’s what he said.”

  “You don’t possibly believe that ridiculous fiction, do you, darling? There are plenty of places Atticus Eisen could have gone to for that sort of thing.”

  “I know, Mom.”

  “That man showed up at your place of work for the specific purpose of seeing you,” Claire added, clearly thinking Sunny might need crayons and puppets to grasp what was glaringly obvious. “Mark my words, he wants something from you. There’s no other reason why he would show up. None.”

  “I know all that. I swear,” she added when Claire just looked at her in that mom-like way that made her feel like she was fifteen again and trying to lie her way out of getting caught smoking her first and only cigarette. “Of course there’s no way Ice showed up at IBKC to talk about stupid freaking cat toys. I know he was there to see me. What I don’t know is why.”

  “Who cares why? Just assume he’s as poisonous as Damien Eisen ever dreamed of being, and avoid him like the plague he is.”

  “That was my intention. That’s why I left California. That was why I got so upset when I saw the fourth wineglass sitting out. For one crazy moment I thought maybe Ice had called ahead to see if he could come around later, or something.”

  “And that’s why you got upset? Or was part of you hoping he’d show up?”

  “I don’t know,” she said honestly, then gave her mother a small, sad smile. “Maybe I’m more like you than even I thought. Maybe I’m doomed to fall in love with a man who’s simply incapable of feeling the same way about me.”

  A flash of pain rippled across her mother’s expression before she reached for her hand and squeezed. “You know I love you more than my own life, Sunny. And you know I don’t have a single regret about how I chose to live my life, because that life gave me you. But darling, I would never wish a life of unrequited love on my worst enemy, much less my own daughter. Avoid Atticus Eisen, baby. Do not let your heart get broken all over again by a man who’s so shallow he can’t love anyone but himself. You deserve better.”

  A man who’s so shallow he can’t love anyone but himself.

  The words echoed through Sunny’s head as she went upstairs to change into her most comfortable pair of yoga pants and a fleecy pullover in shocking pink. It was ridiculous, how history had a way of repeating itself, Sunny thought as she tied up her sneakers. Her mother had been the proverbial girl next door to the Fairfax family, and she’d loved Archie Fairfax for as long as she could remember. It had even been an excellent match from social and political perspectives; the Dubois family came from old money, and the Fairfax family was Chicago’s version of the Kennedys. Politics had always been their bailiwick, with a hefty dose of from-the-heart public service thrown in. There was a ceaseless drive to make the world a better place in the Fairfax DNA, and it was that altruistic drive that had attracted her mother in the first place. By all accounts, both families had been thrilled when a young, twenty-something Archie had proposed. According to her mother, it had been the happiest day of her life, outside of giving birth to Sunny.

  Then
her mother had discovered her gentle, politically ambitious husband had a secret, and while he loved her deeply, he could never be in love with her.

  From the time Sunny learned why her parents slept in different bedrooms, she’d made a vow to herself that she’d never settle for being passionately in love with someone who could never return it.

  She’d be damned if she’d follow in her mother’s footsteps now.

  “We’re putting lights up outside this year, right?” Sunny reappeared in the open archway leading to the grand parlor, shrugging into her jacket. “Did we finally decide what color scheme we’re going with?”

  “I still say multi-colored,” Matt said, holding up a hand, the firelight glinting off his wire-rimmed glasses and creating golden highlights in his brown hair. “And make ‘em all flashy-like.”

  “We’ll leave the multi-colored flashy lights for all the bars and taverns around town.” Claire drawled, sliding Matt a spectacular side-eye. “Actually darling, I’ve already ordered some gorgeous evergreen garlands with white lights and a brilliant red plaid ribbon woven into it. I think around the front door and across the top of the wrought iron fencing would look lovely.”

  “I’ll go see if we still have hooks up around the door,” Sunny said, turning away. “Also, I’ve started a list of supplies we’re going to need for our decorating weekend, like power strips and extension cords, so let me know if you think of anything else.”

  “Some Christmas spirit for my daughter would be nice,” Claire called as Sunny headed out the front door. “Put that at the top of the list.”

  “Christmas spirit,” Sunny muttered to herself as she stepped out into the rapidly falling twilight, an icy breeze biting at her cheeks as she examined the ornate frame surrounding the front door. If it wasn’t already below freezing, it had to be damn close. “I have Christmas spirit. What the hell am I supposed to do to prove it, walk around singing freaking Christmas carols all day?”

  “Are you talking to yourself, or have you picked up an invisible friend?”

  Sunny whirled around from her inspection of the doorframe to find Ice heading up the neat cement path, the well-oiled wrought iron gate swinging shut behind him.

  “Ice.” She pressed a hand to her hammering chest, then just as quickly dropped it. No way was he going to catch her looking like an overly dramatic nitwit. “You startled me. What are you doing here?”

  “In all the hubbub of getting the project off the ground, I forgot to give you this.” With his intense gaze never leaving her, he handed over a large envelope. “It’s the original artwork for the material being printed for the Cool Cat Kickers. Knowing you, you’ll want these for promo.”

  “Oh.” Automatically she looked down at the envelope before a flash of what she told herself was anger sizzled along her skin. “This weird popping-up habit you’ve got going on… It’s got to stop.”

  He shrugged. “This is how it is when we’re working together, yeah?”

  “No. You didn’t come over here for this.”

  His gaze never wavered as he watched her. “I didn’t?”

  “You could have dropped this in the mail. It’s already in an envelope, and you obviously know the address of where I work, so hand-delivering this to my house was hardly necessary.”

  “Speaking of which, you gonna invite me in? It’s cold as fuck out here, and I could do with a nice, warm fire. You got any fires going on inside?”

  Distractedly she glanced back at the door while he moved up onto the landing where she stood. “Yes, but—”

  “I like the sound of that. A crackling fire with you and me snuggled up nice and close. We used to have bonfires on the beach, remember? I loved watching the firelight play over your face. Nothing more punch-in-the-gut mesmerizing than you in firelight. That’s a fact I’d swear to under oath.”

  The sizzling along her skin intensified, and again she told herself it was anger. Had to be. “I’m not going to invite you in, because you’re not welcome here. You’re not welcome because I don’t know what you’re up to.”

  “You don’t?” With his eyes never leaving hers, he shook his head. “Gotta say, you didn’t used to be slow on the uptake, Sunny day.”

  If he called her that one more time, she wasn’t going to be responsible for her actions. “What do you mean by that?”

  “I mean you’re a smart woman. Usually.”

  Excuse me. “Mind your words. I’m always a smart woman.”

  “And yet you haven’t picked up on certain signals.”

  “Like?”

  “Like when a man crowds your space like this.” Without warning, he moved so close it was a wonder he didn’t step on her feet. “Usually you would’ve figured out by now what he’s gunning for. Or like when he makes up a slick excuse that allows him to get close to you, like bringing over artwork,” he added, tapping the envelope she now held like a shield between them, “you’d know he’s hustling to do whatever it takes just so he can get some up-close-and-personal time with you. Or like when he hangs out in freezing temperatures even though he fucking hates the cold, but he does it because at least he’s standing in the cold with you, you’d usually figure out why. But you’re not, so that’s why I say you’re being slow on the uptake. Understand?”

  No. No, she did not, because Ice Eisen would never say or do any of that for her. He never had in the past, so why would he now? “Um…”

  “Right. You’re telling me I’m still being too subtle. I can fix that.” He plucked the envelope from her hand, dropped it on the landing, framed her face with his hands and clamped his mouth over hers.

  What…?

  The disbelief that birthed that one word in her head flooded her until she was drowning in it. Ice couldn’t possibly be kissing her. After that one kiss they’d shared so long ago, he’d slammed the door on it ever happening again. She’d been friend-zoned, permanently. For God’s sake, he’d told her he freaking admired her for her brain. She wasn’t sexy enough, or fascinating enough, or whatever enough for the magnificence that was Atticus Eisen. Acceptable to run his business, sure. But this? She’d never been acceptable for this.

  So…

  Why was his tongue in her mouth?

  That question focused what little strength she had left to push him away. As soon as she did, reality snapped back into place.

  Holy crap.

  Ice. In Chicago. Kissing her like he had every right to, with hunger and need and an edgy, awesome lust. And oh dear God, that tongue…

  “Damn, Sunny.” To her dismay he sounded totally unruffled, while she was struck dumb and scrambling to put her brain back in gear. “My memory might be faulty because it’s been a while, but I don’t remember you being that bad of a kisser. You forget how to do it, or what?”

  Oh no, he didn’t. “What did you just say to me?”

  “Maybe it’s because everything else you do is so impressive that I just had this expectation that you’d be a winner at this, too. My bad. Nothing to be ashamed of, though. Being total crap at kissing, I mean. I’m sure you tried—”

  “Shut the hell up, you ass.” Furious, she grabbed him by the front of his coat and hauled him in for a kiss that was going to blow his mind and various other parts of his body. Not once did it cross her mind to follow her mother’s advice and avoid him like the trouble he was. The only thing that mattered was to knock him for a loop, and then kick him out of her life forever.

  And she would kick him out. It’d be a kick he’d never forget. A kick for the ages.

  It was totally going to happen.

  Right after this kiss.

  As revenge kisses went, it was a doozy. With all the fury in her heart she wanted to show him what he’d been missing, so she melded her lips to his, keeping the pressure bold and firm to entice his mouth to open and invite her in. The moment he did, she let him have it, determined to make this the one kiss he’d remember on his damn deathbed. She delved deep, her fingers moving to thread through his hair while her
tongue danced sensually with his. The grind of her lips on his gave an added heat to the kiss, and suddenly it didn’t seem like a kiss at all. It was sex with clothes on, a world-changing ravishment, only she was no longer sure who was doing the ravishing.

  Danger, danger.

  Like a dash of cold water hitting her nervous system, Sunny crash-landed back to reality. It was a reality where she would never find happiness with a shallow man like Ice. That sucked, of course. But knowing reality was better than living in a fantasyland where kissing him was part of life. It wasn’t a part of her life, and it didn’t matter that she was freaking great at it. She wouldn’t do it again. She wouldn’t end up like her mother, by God.

  She wouldn’t.

  So, that was that.

  Abruptly she pulled away. Through sheer strength of will, she kept her gaze cool and steady as she backed up out of reach. “There we go.” Grimly she patted herself on the back for how blasé she sounded. It wasn’t anywhere near the truth, but she wasn’t about to tell him that. “Now look me in the eye and tell me I’m a bad kisser.”

  “Jesus, baby. If telling you you’re a bad kisser gets me kisses like the kind you just laid on me, I’ll tell you that fifty fucking times a day.” Half-smiling, he touched a thumb to his lower lip while looking at her intently, and for some reason that one gesture got her just as hot as their kiss. “In fact, let’s get on that right now. You’re such a bad kisser I think you’d better practice on me over and over again just so you can eventually get it right. Ready? Pucker up.”

  “I hate you,” she said quietly. “I mean it, Ice. I really hate you.”

  Something dangerous crossed his expression before he nodded once, then glanced up at the dark gray sky as tiny snowflakes began to fall. “I know you do. But that’s fine by me. In fact it’s more than fine. It’s a relief.”

  She stared at him, weirdly devastated by his reaction. If their roles had been reversed, she would have been crushed. “It’s a relief I hate you?”