by Julia Kent
“What a wonderful coincidence!” Steve called out, looking like a kid wandering the streets playing Pokemon Go who found a Dragonite. “Declan McCormick! How’s it going, my friend?”
And then Steve grabbed Declan in a manbrace, the bromance version of a hug.
Suzanne had seen Gerald in combat, bullets whizzing by, IEDs destroying jeeps, body parts flying and hardened soldiers screaming for their mamas. She’d watched him during ten days without a shower, seen him struggle on a half hour of sleep a night for five days straight, and witnessed countless acts of stress-filled bravery.
Not once had she ever seen a look of utter shock on his face like this.
As she watched him, Gerald’s shoulders expanded, chest growing, arms flexing in a primal move that made it clear he was preparing to defend Declan in some physical way.
“What the hell?” Declan said, shoving Steve away. “What are you doing? I hate you!”
Declan McCormick was her new favorite client.
“Suzanne! Surely you know my friend Declan McCormick? Of Anterdec? We go back a long way. He’s such a joker!” Steve’s shit-eating grin made it clear this was spectacle. More status-by-association. Performance. Nothing but show. Steve was using Declan as some kind of status symbol, as if being seen with him bolstered Steve in her eyes.
Declan looked like he was about to deck Steve.
Then again, Steve didn’t seem to care what she thought. He only cared that the ruse of being friends with Declan happened at all.
“Declan,” she said smoothly, reaching for the man, having met him across the boardroom table once a year for his mother’s family trust. At most, she’d shaken his hand those seven times. But with a steely look that asked for his buy-in, she reached up—not much, for she was a tall woman—and planted a soft kiss on his cheek. His arms wrapped around her in a polite hug.
Her eyes met Gerald’s.
Who looked like he needed to kill both men now.
She pulled away, the smug look on Steve’s face making the decision for her. The next words out of her mouth had to happen.
Had to.
“Last time I saw you, Declan, you were naked.”
Steve gaped.
Declan played along by grinning, arching one dark eyebrow, and making a sexy sound in the back of his throat.
Voice infused with mirth and a low, sexy innuendo, she winked at him, then looked at Steve. “By the way, Steve—your Twitter stream is public.” She looked down at herself, then looked back up, and poked him in the belly. “And I am so not a 5.”
And without another word, she walked away, using the old runway model’s gait Kari taught her in college, knowing three sets of eyes were on her backside.
She only cared about one of them.
And he was the only guy she hadn’t just touched.
Chapter 5
“What just happened?” Steve said, his voice like a hot snot bubble. “I don’t understand. Naked? Suzanne’s seen you naked?” He looked at Declan, pointing an accusing finger. “Are you on a mission to sleep with every woman I’ve ever dated?”
“Shut up. And don’t you ever touch me again,” Declan snapped, making Gerald turn to Steve, blood pumping, his eyes taking in his opponent.
“But—”
“And you think she’s a 5? You tweeted that? Are you crazy?” Declan shouted.
“Hey, man, she didn’t have all that hot makeup on and that low-cut shirt at first. Now she’s a 7, maybe a—”
“Shut up!” Declan and Gerald said together.
“She’s at least an 8,” Declan argued. “And one thousand times out of your league.”
“What were you doing with her?” Gerald demanded of Steve in a low predator’s voice, not giving a shit what anyone thought, though the fact that Declan and Steve were talking about Suzanne as a number was getting old. Fast.
“I was on a date!”
“You were her date? You?” Gerald felt the animal in him flaring up, the deep, feral part of him that made rational thought splinter into thousands of slivers of himself. If he let it get the better of him, he’d lose days. Possibly a week. No way could this wasteoid fleshbag of festering ball sacs named Steve Raleigh unleash the phantom inside him that took over.
No.
Absolutely not.
Declan whipped around and looked at Gerald, eyes narrowing, sensing danger.
“Get the fuck out of here,” Declan said to Steve, who didn’t need to be told twice, skittering away like a frightened spider.
The sound of Declan breathing hard through his nose, body tensed and ready for fight, was all Gerald heard, until Declan muttered, “What did Shannon ever see in that douchebag?”
Gerald worked on his breathing, vision turning to fire at the edges, the rush of adrenaline and the sparks in his brain zapping him into nothingness. Suzanne was on a date with that slimeball? He knew exactly who Steve Raleigh was, under specific orders when Shannon and Declan started dating that Steve was considered to be a borderline stalker.
And an unctuous twat.
Declan’s exact words.
The thought of that bastard’s hands on Suzanne made Gerald’s own hands shake in rage, his thighs tightening, knees unlocking, ready to pounce. Red rage poured through him like water at a baptism, hellfire and brimstone turning his prior calm into a distant memory.
“Hey. Hey,” Declan said, his voice firmer. “You look like you’re about to pop a vein.”
“I’m about to pop him.”
“And that would land you in jail for assault. He’s just the type to sue.”
“Dead men can’t sue.”
“And jailed chauffeurs can’t teach great art classes.”
Gerald knew Declan was methodically talking him down, and simultaneously unnerved by the situation. Years of carefully controlling his emotions under tightly calibrated work conditions meant that Declan had only seen the placid, stoic version he showed the world.
Not this self.
And this had been the side of him that had dominated ten years ago, when he’d broken up with Suzanne for her own good.
A flash of movement under a streetlight in the distance, at the nearest light, caught Gerald’s eye.
Suzanne.
Sprinting, he left Declan befuddled, calling out his name, until the light changed and he watched as Suzanne marched forward with that confident walk of hers, shoulders squared as if she were still in morning formation and wore a uniform, wiping her mouth with a tissue and muttering to herself. He knew how the curve of her spine felt under his palms when she stood like that, the supple feel of the paradox between soft skin and hard bone a delightful feast for his fingers.
“Wait!” he called out, unsure and unbidden, moving on pure instinct. He needed to touch her. Would die without making that single, simple connection. Not just in an intimate sense. The need was more than that.
Suzanne got to the curb and stopped. She did not turn around, her body poised, waiting.
Panting with the burst of exertion, his brain firing on all cylinders, he caught up to her and slowed down at the last steps, moving to her, pulled by a force that drew him in. His front settled against her back, his tight cotton t-shirt brushing against the thin linen jacket she wore, the friction erotic and full, sensual.
As his palms touched her elbows, her arms at her side, he inhaled with precision, measuring her.
She did not move.
“Suzanne,” he murmured, chin close to a stray hair that curled out from her updo, resting against the fine, creamy line of her neck. With longer hair, the sharp, jutting bones of her jaw stood out, giving her the look of a Viking princess. In heels, she was exactly his height, setting him off-kilter. He wasn’t a short man. In fatigues she was always four to five inches shorter. In service dress, her shoes gave her a two-inch lift.
He liked being equal. Liked it a lot.
“Please,” she whispered, the word spiraling off into the dark night, as if the street lights beyond them were pull
ing her voice to them.
Taking her reaction as something other than rejection, he left his hands where they were, closing the inch gap between them. She was cool and regal, his hot, thick chest pressing into her back.
“Please what?” he asked, knowing this could go either way, but not caring, because right now—as each second ticked by—he had more internal calm than he’d had in ten years.
Even as desire burned bright inside him.
“Please don’t.”
He froze.
“Don’t what?” Tempted to step back, he held strong. Her please carried a weight to it, a meaning he needed to discern before acting. All impulse and no analysis would end this in a flash. Time was his friend. Patience.
Hesitation.
He had to go against instinct.
“Don’t start something you don’t intend to finish.”
Letting go of her arms, he circled her, facing the woman he’d loved so fiercely ten years ago that he’d let her go, to protect her.
From him.
Time had been so good to her, crazy makeup excepted. He reached up, half her face in shadow, the other half lit by a nearby streetlight, the effect like a Picasso painting, a Dalí, a surreal melding of the past and present, of good and evil, of yearning and rejection.
Their lips touched before he could think, restraint gone, impulse taking over and driving his body to hers, the ache of self-sacrifice finally—finally—too much to bear alone. She stepped into him, entering his orbit, and when her hands cupped his hips, pulling him close, he groaned, the sound a sigh ten years in the making.
For years, he’d shut himself off from questioning his decision. Compartmentalizing was how he survived, and Suzanne went into a little metal lockbox, a locker full of every memory, a place isolated into submission.
As she kissed him again, her mouth open, lips taking him in, his tongue finding solace and sweetness as it stroked hers, years washed away. What if that welded-shut box of emotion could be opened? What if it wasn’t Pandora’s box, but instead long-buried treasure?
Her kiss told him nothing.
And everything.
Roving fingers traced the lines of his shoulder blades, her palms riding up to cup the back of his neck. She made a sound of despair mixed with pleasure, which perfectly described his current state. She tasted so good. So real.
So forbidden.
And then she broke the kiss, stepping out of his arms, those same hands that had just played with his contours held palms out.
“Stop. Stop.” Was she talking to him, or herself?
“I stopped.” Didn’t want to, but he did.
“What is this, Gerald? You can’t just chase me down and kiss me like that.”
“You want me to kiss you a different way? Because that can be arranged.” He ran a thumb along her jawline, deeply amused and perplexed by the strange makeup.
“I want an explanation.”
“You want an explanation? You’re the one who interrupted my class and then went on a date with my ex-boss’s wife’s ex-boyfriend.”
“I need a Venn diagram to deconstruct that sentence, Gerald.”
“How about I draw you a flow chart after a drink?”
Her speculative glare gave him hope. She wasn’t saying no.
“Why now?”
“Because you found me.”
“Found you? I’ve known where you are for years. I didn’t find you. I was forced to encounter you.”
“Forced?”
“Yes,” she said with a vicious bitterness that came out as a hiss. “I’m not in the habit of tracking down men who propose to me and then walk away without explanation.”
“I would hope not. That would be a terrible hobby.”
She didn’t laugh.
“You don’t get to do this,” she said slowly, tumblers in her mind clicking with Swiss precision he could feel in his bones. “You can’t waltz back in my life, kiss me, and joke with me. Not after what you did.”
I was afraid I’d do even worse.
The thought slammed through him like a word weapon, cutting to the quick, slicing through layers of scar tissue built around his soul.
“Walking away was wrong,” he admitted. Ten years. He’d had ten years to prepare for this moment, to know what to say, except he’d never envisioned this. Not once. He’d assumed he would never see her again. That it was for the best.
Or so he’d assumed.
“Wrong? Wrong? You use these words, Gerald, like they have meaning. Do you have any idea how pathetic wrong sounds? How about walking away like that was inhumane? How about soul-crushing? How about—”
She jerked as if electrocuted, her breath a jagged series of gasps, her anger a shockwave that caught him in its path. As if gravity weighed it down, the clip in her hair dislodged, dragging the thick abundance of her blonde waves down, giving her a Greek goddess look, one curl spilling over a shoulder, the rest of her hair full around her face, eyes standing out, painted to stand out.
“No. I won’t do this. Just no. You have your papers, you can process the inheritance, and I’m done. I’ll assign a junior associate whether my boss likes it or not.” She turned to leave.
In a fit of desperation he grabbed her, the kiss unreal, less about passion and more about the unrelenting fear that he’d never, ever see her again if he didn’t try. She went with it, kissing him back with a violence that made his mouth fill with copper, the taste of her wrath the penance he had to pay. Their mouths slanted, lips softened, the kiss less a surprise and now a pleading, one they felt their way through.
“God, I’ve missed you,” he confessed, then let her go, walking away, giving her the space she wanted.
Because to stay would have been wrong, too.
Chapter 6
“Let me tell you about my crazy day,” Suzanne’s friend Kari announced as they settled on Suzanne’s couch in sweats, munching their way through a bag of chips. Blonde like Suzanne, Kari had honey-brown eyes with thick, short lashes and a permanently curious expression on her face.
Smoochy, Suzanne’s bichon frise, wriggled a spot between them, staring at her with begging eyes.
“Sorry, Smoochy,” Kari said with great affect. “Your mommy won’t let me give you a potato chip.”
Getting a dog had been Suzanne’s latest move in her ongoing attempt to pretend to have a real life. Smoochy was a rescue, a seven-year-old whose owner had been moved into a nursing home down in Florida about eight months ago. Once a month, Suzanne dutifully sent printed pictures of Smoochy to Elizabeth, her old owner, who was slipping further into Alzheimer’s. But then once a month, so far, Smoochy received a letter from Elizabeth, which Suzanne read aloud to the dog.
Smoochy blinked and looked at Kari, giving her a tiny plea. The whining sound was so cute that Kari relented. Smoochy munched on the tiny piece like it was a feast.
“Your crazy day? Pfft. Bet mine beats yours.” Suzanne shoved her paw into the chip bag and halted. Potato chips and her low carb diet didn’t mix, damn it. Reluctantly, she left snack nirvana to Kari and walked to the kitchen, rummaging in the fridge.
“Did you have to pretend to have IBS so you could schedule a colonoscopy and inspect the cleanliness of a probe while avoiding being caught?” Kari asked pointedly. Smoochy shivered suddenly, her whole body doing a shimmy, as if she were emotionally reacting to Kari’s words.
“I would trade doing that for what I actually went through.” An anal probe vs. Steve Raleigh? No contest.
“That was a crazy date. I give you credit. But an asshole versus a guy who looks at assholes all day for a living? C’mon.”
“I saw Gerald for the first time in ten years,” Suzanne said, as if holding her place in the lineup of horrors to be shared.
Kari and Suzanne had met back in college, at freshman orientation, when Kari was a student and Suzanne the instructor. They’d been fast friends since, though their paths had diverged radically. Suzanne’s ROTC scholarship led her off to war th
e week after she’d graduated at twenty-one, while Kari had gone into fashion design, then merchandising, and finally mystery shopping management. She managed a big division for Fokused Shop-rite, one of the biggest mystery shopping and consumer optimization companies in the country.
Right now, though, she was using her breasts to catch broken potato chips, so...
“No way! Way to bury the lede, Suzanne. What happened?”
“I saw Declan McCormick naked, served Gerald with inheritance paperwork that might be worth nine figures, and went on a date with a blowhard who makes Donald Trump look like Mother Teresa.”
Kari stared at her, mouth open, like Dory the fish.
Smoochy walked out of the room, curled into a ball in her dog bed, and covered her eyes with her paws.
“I know. It’s a lot,” Suzanne said with a laugh, grabbing her bag of carrot sticks, dipping them in sour cream and crunching away.
“You saw Declan McCormick naked?” Kari gasped. “Is he as hot in the flesh as he is in a suit?”
Suzanne’s cheeks went pink. The taste of Gerald, the brush of his lips, the sweep of his tongue in her mouth and those hands, oh those hands on her back, so masterful and yearning, had completely driven the vision of Declan McCormick’s nude body out of her mind.
Okay. Mostly driven the vision of Declan McCormick’s nude body out of her mind.
There might be a tiny remnant of memory remaining.
Or not so tiny.
“Suz!” Kari whapped her arm. “Get out of your drool! Spill! Share details!”
“About Gerald’s kiss?”
Kari inhaled sharply, hands on her chest, her palms beginning to flap in overeager excitement. “He kissed you! Was this while Declan McCormick was naked?” Her eyes flew wide open. “Was this a threesome? Omigod, you had a threesome with Declan Mc—wait. He’s married. I know Shannon. We’ve worked together on an account. She’s going to be devastated!” Kari alternated between glaring at Suzanne as if she’d actually had a threesome with Declan McCormick, and processing her disappointment if Suzanne hadn’t.
“I did not have a threesome with Declan and Gerald.”
