“What are you doing here, Charlie?” She tried to keep her voice light, but her gritted teeth probably gave away her consternation.
“I’m sponsoring the ballet.”
Her stomach dropped out of her body and the room started to spin. He thought he could buy her? If he did, he had another think coming and coming fast. He didn’t know her, didn’t know that the idea of a man owning any piece of her was a soft spot born of the family she’d grown up in, but he was going to know this soon.
But not now because they had an audience.
She managed not to fly across the few feet between them and wring his neck. She even managed a semi-polite response. “I didn’t know you had any interest in the arts.”
One side of his mouth quirked up, as though he knew that she was about to strike out at him like a viper. Maybe she had a vein popping out of her forehead that she couldn’t control. “Interest in the arts? I work in the arts.”
“I wouldn’t call what you do art.”
She felt Matthieu’s shock in the way he squeezed her shoulder. “She doesn’t mean that.”
“Of course I mean it.” Laura shook off her friend’s touch, and Charlie’s posture loosened immediately. “We’re friends, and we’ve already discussed how I don’t like what he does.” She stopped, her gut twisting into knots at the terrible notion that Charlie wasn’t sponsoring the piece out of the goodness of his heart, but a desire for access to the behind-the-scenes world of ballet. “He’s not going to start taping rehearsals, is he?”
“We hadn’t discussed that.” Charlie’s answer didn’t make her feel any better.
Laura turned to Matthieu. “Will you excuse us for a moment?”
Her friend opened his mouth, probably to say no for the good of his employment and his piece. But Charlie cut him off. “I get a private audience?” He put his hand over his heart, and it reminded her of how even incidental touches from this man set her whole body afire. Being alone with him was a bad idea. He was her new patron saint of bad ideas. “I would be so honored.”
His sarcastic tone burst the bubble of lust in her belly, and she grabbed him by the biceps and dragged him out of the room. She wouldn’t have been able to do it if he had resisted, and he should have resisted for the sake of his balls.
Once they got into the hallway, she rounded on him. “What the fuck are you thinking?”
“Why are you yell-whispering?” He was purely amused.
“Because anyone... Anyone could walk by, and I don’t want them knowing that I committed murder to keep you quiet.”
“What’s the big deal?”
“This is how you keep our—association—on the down low?” That one came out as a shriek.
He shrugged and smiled. The smug bastard. “I figure that this is a good cover.”
“No. It’s not.” She pointed a finger in his face, and he grabbed her whole fist in his hand.
“Watch it, gorgeous.”
“Don’t tell me what to watch.” That didn’t make any sense, but it was emphatic and got her displeasure across, which was the point right now. “You need to leave. Take it back. And I don’t want to see you again.”
“Until we have dinner with Carla and Jonah next week?”
She yanked her finger back, and tendrils of frustration disguised as rage worked their way through her. “You’re not invited to that.”
“Yes, I am.”
“Consider yourself uninvited.”
“No.”
This man was going to be the end of her. “Go grab beers with Jonah some other night.”
“No. I’m not going to see Jonah. I’m going to hang out with the baby.”
“She goes to sleep at seven. Dinner’s at eight.”
“I’m going over early.”
“Well, leave before I get there.”
“No.” He leaned down and put his mouth close to her ear. Her body, already flushed from rehearsal, nearly overheated at having him so close. “And if you put up any more of a fuss, I’m going to tell your buddy Matthieu that he needs to keep his hands off my wife.”
“You wouldn’t.”
He cocked his head in response. Before she could get any choice curses out, he ran his hand over her bare arm and cupped her elbow. It was chaste, friendly even. Nothing overtly sexual about it. But it was as though he’d run that hand between her legs and wiggled it under her leotard. Goose bumps rose all over her skin, and heat pooled in her belly so fast, she probably needed to change leotards.
“Have you even filed the papers yet?”
The answer was no. She should have sent them over to her grandfather the day after Charlie had signed them, but something kept her from doing it. Standing here, facing off against him, made her realize that this energy between them wasn’t going to go away. This heat that flared up whenever he was in her space was something more powerful than she could wrap her mind around. It was so compelling that she couldn’t bring herself to make the final step and push him away for good.
She’d never had a hard time making the logical decisions that would get her where she wanted to go. No one who knew her would guess that she ever hesitated about making the logical choice about anything. But damn her, standing here looking at Charlie and the way he filled out a suit, smelling the soap he showered with, and feeling his gaze raking over her as though she turned him on twice as much as she pissed him off, it didn’t seem logical to not want to be married to this man at all.
But she couldn’t tell Charlie that. Couldn’t let on that he had the upper hand with her, especially now that he literally had the upper hand by sponsoring the ballet.
She never wanted to see Charlie again—it was bad for her sanity—but it didn’t appear that she was going to be able to avoid it at least one last time. Unless she ovaried up and gave the papers to her grandfather.
“I hate you.”
Then, in a move likely designed to make her head blow up, he kissed her cheek. His fresh spice smell and warm dry lips were custom-made to make her nuts. As impactful as his touch was, it was gone just as quickly as it had come.
She was left standing in the hallway, shivering now that her sweat had dried and Charlie’s heat was gone, staring after him.
And, damn him, the view was just as good going as it had been coming.
Chapter 6
Laura took a deep, bracing inhale before knocking on the door to Carla and Jonah’s new house. Although she barely got to see Carla before she’d become a globe-trotting television personality, she’d missed her cousin. They were only a few months apart in age, and Laura had spent virtually all her time with Carla before she’d joined the ballet school in favor of the Catholic school they’d attended together.
She expected to see baby Layla bouncing on her mother’s hip when Carla opened the door. Instead, her cousin had both arms free to fling around Laura’s neck.
“You’re heeerreeee!”
Laura laughed at Carla’s exuberance. Her cousin was the kind of person a lot of others underestimated. Her bubbly personality and the mostly one-sided conversations that meandered from Viking death rituals to the invite list at the Met Ball threw people off. But the people who stopped at the surface didn’t know the real Carla Hernandez—Kane, now.
Laura reveled in her cousin—light to her dark, extrovert to her introvert. “Where’s the baby?”
Carla pulled back and rolled her eyes. “You think I get to hold my own kid if Uncle Charlie’s here?”
She was taken aback. Given all she knew about Charlie’s checkered past, she wouldn’t have taken him for a kid person. But his reluctance about giving her an annulment and walking out of her life quietly surprised her, too. With what she knew about his first marriage and how it had ended, she would have thought that he’d want to be rid of her and any potential for drama as quickly as possible.
�
�Are you sure you can trust him with her?”
Her cousin laughed and pulled her into the house, clinging to Laura’s arm. “You obviously don’t know him that well.” She stopped and turned, grabbing both of her shoulders and giving her a very serious face that scared the shit out of Laura. It was a look that said she wasn’t going to like the next thing that came out of her cousin’s mouth. “I actually think you should get to know Charlie better. Like a lot better.”
All the blood rushed out of Laura’s head, and she felt a little faint. She couldn’t seem to make the words of denial come out of her mouth. Instead, she shook her head, which made her even more lightheaded.
“Now, just hear me out.” She put the tip of her tongue in the corner of her lips. Before the wedding, Laura had observed Layla making a similar gesture. Right before she’d gone face first into a tower of cupcakes. “He’s nothing like he was a decade ago.”
Laura was starting to get that, but it didn’t mean that she wanted to get romantically involved with Charlie. Not for real anyway. She had the feeling that a real relationship would put her at more risk than a sham marriage.
“I’m not looking for a relationship right now.” She craned her neck, hoping that Carla’s husband, Jonah, would interrupt them. “Can we go get a drink?”
“Since when are you a boozehound?”
“I’d like a glass of wine in my hand if you’re going to throw me at a random guy.” A totally not random guy with a pretty face and pretty body and hands she was currently obsessed with. “And I don’t need you setting me up at all. I’m fine on my own.”
Carla tugged her into the kitchen. “I just want you to be happy.”
“And I’m happy.” Not true. Or not entirely true. If she were happy, would she be clinging to the New York City Ballet so much? Wouldn’t she laugh and smile with her partner instead of feel a knot in her stomach every time she went to rehearsal? A happy woman wouldn’t hesitate to end her accidental marriage—she sure as hell wouldn’t have signed annulment papers in her dresser. But she couldn’t say any of that to her cousin. Not now that Carla finally had her happy. Laura turned and grabbed two glasses from the counter. “Red or white?”
“White.” Carla opened the fridge and grabbed a bottle. “And I know that you’ve wanted to be a principal dancer since you were a little kid. But I also know why you want that, and you don’t have to be worried that you’ll turn into your mother.”
Laura took a sip of the cold sauvignon blanc to collect her thoughts. Tears pricked the back of her eyes and she got angry at how well her cousin knew her. “I’m not going to give up my own life and trail all over the world for some guy.”
Her cousin screwed up her face and stepped over to her. “Is that what you think I did?”
“No. I just—Jonah makes you happy. And that’s great. You’re equals.” She looked down into the swirling liquid as though it would give her an answer. Needing words to describe why she and her cousin were so different. “Dancing is all I have. It’s everything I know. Some guy is not going to replace that. I have to wait until dance is done with me and then figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life before I find someone.”
Carla’s shoulders relaxed. “But aren’t you, maybe, done with ballet?”
“No.” Not quite. Her stomach flipped even thinking about it. She took another sip. “I’m not done.”
“You were so happy in Bali without rehearsals and stress and backstabbing. Don’t you want that to be your life?”
“Life can’t be a vacation.” She sighed. “And even if I was done, I would have to figure something else out. I’m going to support myself. I can’t rely on someone for my own security.”
“But you can go on a few dates and have some fun, right?” Carla grabbed her free hand. “You’re here tonight, and this is fun.”
“Not right now it’s not.”
“Let’s go find the boys. That’ll be fun.”
“For you, maybe.”
“Just give Charlie a chance.”
Laura was afraid that Charlie would run away with everything she had to give if she gave him even a little opening. He would take her time, her career, and very possibly her heart. She ached where that organ strained toward the fear. Only her brain and the logical reservations she had to getting even more involved with a man who—along with a few shots of tequila—had stolen her good sense once.
She steeled herself inside her mind as they walked out onto the lanai. Instead of giving in to the relaxing atmosphere and the good company, she prepared herself for battle.
* * * *
“Who’s my best girl?” The baby smiled and showed her four teeth when Charlie made a funny face. Layla was maybe the best thing ever. It made him sick that he’d missed this with all of his nieces and nephews. He couldn’t drop by his oldest brother’s house and grill meat. He got pictures and homemade cards every so often, but they weren’t personal.
He guessed it was weird that he’d grown attached to a kid that didn’t belong to him. But on long trips around the world, Jonah and Carla had become like family. And the feelings now extended to their daughter.
It also helped that he was something of a baby whisperer. On a shoot in Rio, the nanny had gotten sick. They hadn’t had money in the budget to extend the shoot, and the baby was too fussy for them to include her on the episode. Carla had been close to tears with frustration, and Charlie had made a face at the sobbing baby.
When she perked right up and laughed, they’d cemented their friendship, and the rest was history.
“I’ve got a front-runner right here.” Carla’s voice always had a winking quality to it. She was really amazing, and she made Jonah deliriously happy. Gorgeous and funny as hell. When he’d first met her in Havana, he’d decided that he was going to make a play for her if Jonah dropped the ball.
But when he turned and saw who she’d come out on the patio with, he couldn’t even see Carla. When Laura came into a room he couldn’t see another woman, couldn’t recall how he’d ever found another woman attractive.
She wore a strappy sundress that she couldn’t possibly have a bra on underneath. Her face, her long limbs, and the hint of a smile on her mouth. All of it together made her glow. She was his kryptonite, bracingly beautiful and twice as dangerous.
Probably not liking his attention off of her, Layla started to fuss. Jonah stepped away from the grill and grabbed his daughter. She planted her gummy smile into his shirt, likely leaving a trail of drool. For his part, Jonah rolled with it, offering up his tongs to his wife.
“Can you turn the steaks, princess?”
“I’m never going to get to hold my own kid, am I?”
“She likes me better than you.” Jonah smiled more now that he was with Carla and had Layla in a way that made Charlie sick in a good way.
“That’s one woman who likes you then.” Both of them walked over to the grill, Jonah standing back to keep Layla out of the line of fire, literally.
That left Charlie to stare at his wife. She approached him tentatively.
“Apparently, this is a set-up.” Her voice was quiet and she looked down.
He wanted to take the hair that had fallen in her face between his fingers and touch that silk. Tonight, she looked a lot like how she’d looked the night they’d met. Soft and ripe for picking. The fact that he couldn’t touch her, couldn’t kiss her without letting the cat out of the bag made him want to touch her all the more.
“Why are you just looking at me like that?” She sounded bewildered that he’d want to spend a whole lot of time looking at her. She could stop people’s breath with a hand gesture, but she didn’t realize what she did to him just by breathing.
“I like looking at you.” Maybe more than he liked anything else.
“You’re just full of lines, aren’t you?”
“Be nice,” Carla said over he
r shoulder from the grill. She’d reclaimed Layla from Jonah, but was lingering on the other side of the patio.
Charlie picked up his beer, just to keep from continuing to stare at Laura like a dolt. “It’s not a line when it’s true.”
“Why am I supposed to believe anything that comes out of your mouth?”
“Have I ever lied to you?”
She doesn’t even pause. “No.” She looked chastened.
“I’m not going to start now.” He took a step closer to her and she didn’t move away. He caught a whiff of whatever soap or lotion she used—it was floral, like lilies or something else beautiful and rare. “I will never lie to you Laura, and I’ll do whatever I have to do to convince you that I’m not the guy she said I was on that tape. She did lie about me, and I reacted badly.” He paused to let it sink in with her that every damn thing his ex had said about him was a lie, especially the parts about him being bad in bed. “I’m older and wiser. And I know what I want.”
“You don’t want me.”
“Wanna bet?”
This time, she stepped closer to him and whispered. “I maybe remember that it was a bet that got us into this.”
“Yeah, you bet me that you could go shot for shot.” Her outsized confidence had been hot. He liked that she’d sized him up and found him wanting. And that was the bitch about this whole thing. Maybe he only liked her because she didn’t want him?
She took another sip of wine. “I’m not going to make that kind of bet tonight.”
“Well, we can’t get married twice, and we’ve already established that I don’t take advantage of incapacitated women.”
“We have.” She inclined her head towards him, and something about the way her posture softened made him want to reach out and touch her even more.
“Can we just have a nice night with our friends?”
“I thought we already were.”
He didn’t struggle to find words very often. But he was at a loss. He wanted to show her nice, give her more nice. “I just—I want us to be friends.”
“I have enough friends.” She turned to him and squinted, as though everything he said aroused her suspicion. Not exactly the emotion he was aiming to arouse with her.
Before Daylight Page 6
