1001 Dark Nights: Bundle Nine

by Carrie Ann Ryan

Curiosity + Arousal (Belly Flutters + Pulse Quickening).

  Or was I overthinking this? Maybe the plain, crazy truth was just that I was attracted to Sebastian Pryce. But he was probably one of those quiet, tortured geniuses that didn’t go for girls like me. He went to law school, for heaven’s sake! He wrote poetry!

  His lips tipped up slightly, those warm lips that had felt so good against mine. “Ah. Sure. It’s fine. Don’t feel horrible, really. You just surprised me.” He shifted in his chair.

  “I can tell.” I reached for my wine glass but it was empty. Frantically, I looked around for our server. Waiter! This is an emergency!

  “Hey.” He put his fingers over my wrist. “It’s okay.”

  “Are you sure?”

  His light green eyes were clear and his voice gentle. “I’m sure. I don’t want you to feel bad.”

  “Okay.” Since he’d been pretty forthcoming about everything tonight, I was sort of hoping he’d elaborate on his feelings, but that’s all he said.

  For the rest of the night.

  I mean, seriously, he totally shut down.

  Not in an angry way or anything, but he just stopped talking. No more jokes, no more smiles, no more stories. Was he anxious? Angry? Confused? Scared? In any case, I was so embarrassed and flustered I talked about anything and everything just to fill the silence.

  We finished our meals—I decided against the second glass of wine, especially since he just had the one beer—and he drove me back to my car. I chirped like a bird on crank about random nonsense the entire ride back, and as we pulled into the hardware store lot, I looked over and saw him laughing a little.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You. Do you ever stop talking?”

  I slapped my hands over my face. “No. I mean yes, but no. Not when I’m nervous.” Beneath my palms, my face was hot.

  “Why are you nervous?”

  “Because! I made an ass of myself by kissing you in the restaurant! And you’re all smart and silent and mysterious and I’m just…” I threw up my hands. “Obvious and silly.”

  “Is that what you think?” He put the truck in park and shifted on the seat to face me.

  “Yes.” I turned toward him. “Because before I did that, everything seemed fine. And then afterward, you kind of just…shut down.”

  Nodding slowly, he rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah. I guess I did.”

  “Why? Were you mad?”

  He looked at me strangely. “Why would I be mad?”

  “I don’t know! I can usually read people pretty well but your face was like totally impassive. Fucking stonehenge. And you weren’t talking either, so I felt crazy awkward and tried to talk for the both of us.”

  He cracked a smile. “You did it well.”

  I stared helplessly at him, finally out of words.

  “Okay look.” He put an elbow on the back of the seat and propped his head on his fingers. His expression more relaxed, amused even. “I’m sorry I shut down. I was trying to process some things.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like why you did it.”

  “I did it because I felt like it. How’d you feel about it? Be honest.”

  He smiled lazily, and I had the insane desire to trace his lips with my tongue. “Good.”

  I gaped at him. “That’s it? Good? You’ve been silent for an entire hour and a half and that’s all I get? Good?”

  “Uh huh.” His eyes glittered in the dark, and I hoped he was undressing me with them.

  “Oh, that is so mean.”

  “Sorry. I’m a man of few words.”

  “How can a lawyer be a man of a few words?”

  A beat went by. “Did I tell you I was a lawyer?”

  Oh fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. “Um, you must have, right?”

  “I don’t think I did.”

  He didn’t seem angry, but there was an edge to his tone that hadn’t been there before, a wariness, maybe. I decided to come clean. If we were going to be friends, I felt like I owed him the truth about what I’d heard. After all, he’d been honest with me about his struggle with OCD.

  Plus the silence was killing me.

  “Okay, don’t be mad. Natalie mentioned that she’d heard some women talking in the shop about you. She told me she overheard you were a lawyer in New York.”

  “Anything else?” His voice was tight.

  I took a breath. “Yes. There was something about you having some sort of…mental breakdown last year.” I decided to skip the fiancée part.

  He nodded slowly, a reaction I was starting to recognize as his I need to take this in so don’t ask right now gesture. But I was me, so I asked.

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “No.”

  “Oh. okay.” At a loss for what to say and worried I’d pushed too far, I slung my bag over my shoulder and reached for the door handle. “I should get going anyway. Thanks for dinner. I had fun.” I opened the door, and he grabbed my arm.

  “Hey.”

  I looked back at him.

  “Come here.” He tugged me toward him, and I shut the door. “I’m sorry. I just don’t want to talk about that stuff right now.”

  “It’s fine,” I said with a shrug. “Your past is none of my business. I shouldn’t have asked about it.”

  “Skylar.” Taking my hand in his, he gently rubbed his thumb across the tops of my fingers. “I’ve said more to you tonight than I’ve said to anyone but my therapist in the last year. And I don’t even remember the last time someone kissed me the way you did.”

  My heart raced with pleasure—not desire or lust or sympathy, just pleasure. It meant something to me that he’d opened up a little tonight, especially since he seemed to have built such protective walls around himself. Not that I blamed him. The more I thought about what school must have been like for him, the worse I felt. How horrible to live like that, to be so alone.

  “I’m glad you did,” I said softly. “I like listening to you, and talking to you. And kissing you.” I lifted my shoulders. “I like you, Sebastian. I want to know you better.”

  His eyes dropped to our hands. “I’m not an easy person to get to know.”

  I tipped his chin up, forcing him to look me in the eye. “I’m willing to try.”

  Chapter 11

  Sebastian

  She got out of the truck and shut the door without another word. I watched her open up her car, get in, and drive off, wishing I’d have had the nerve to say more to her.

  Of the two of us, she was the brave one, I thought. Brave enough to ask me for a drink, brave enough to trust me alone with her, brave enough to kiss me just because she felt like it. That actually made me smile. I did it because I felt like it. I could still hear her voice, guileless and sweet. And I could still see the look in her eye as she leaned toward me, daring and sexy. Then her lips on mine… I groaned aloud and put the truck in drive.

  She had no idea what she did to me. Of course I couldn’t talk after that. I was too busy trying to surreptitiously adjust my boxers and not think about my dick. But of course, since I was trying not to think about it, it was all I could think about. Could she tell?

  Maybe not, since she thought I might be mad that she’d kissed me. Mad, for fuck’s sake. The only thing that made me mad about it was that I couldn’t tell her how much I liked it, how much I wanted to do it again before she got out of the truck, how many times I’d imagined kissing her back when she barely knew I existed—and how much better the real thing was. It had taken some serious fortitude not to yell “CHECK, PLEASE,” grab her by the hand, and run out of there so I could take her back to the cabin and kiss her properly. Lavishly. Thoroughly.

  How long had it been since I’d had a woman stretched out beneath me, writhing in pleasure while I devoured every inch of her skin? And Skylar’s skin looked so delicious. I bet it would feel like satin under my tongue. Taste like cherries and vanilla ice cream.

  Fuck, I was hard again.

  And she knew. She knew
about New York, or at least the bare bones of it, and she’d still asked me out.

  As I drove the long, dark highway up the center of the peninsula, her SUV ahead of me, I found myself wishing again that things were different. No, that I was different. That I had something to offer her. Sure, there would be good days, like this one. And for a while, maybe the good days would outweigh the bad, or maybe she’d find the good days worth the bad. But that wouldn’t last.

  So when Skylar turned off 37 onto the road leading to her parents’ farm, I didn’t follow her like I wanted to. I didn’t pull up next to her in the dark, get out of the truck and wait for her to ask me what I was doing there. I didn’t grab her and crush my mouth to hers without saying a word. I didn’t hold her body close to mine and fiercely whisper how much it meant that she was willing to try.

  But I wanted to.

  So badly it hurt.

  * * * *

  When I got home, the cabin seemed particularly dark and empty. I didn’t feel like mindless television, and the internet would only depress me, so I picked up a book my dad had given me recently, sat on the couch and tried to read. But I couldn’t focus on the story—the silence was smothering me tonight. Throwing my jacket on, I walked outside and unloaded the Adirondack chairs from the back of my truck. But once I’d lugged the boxes over to the patio, I didn’t feel like putting them together. Instead, I left them there and wandered down to the dock, grateful for the nighttime noise of the crickets and owls, the water lapping softly against the rocky shore.

  What was Skylar doing right now? Sleeping? Watching TV? Or did she like to read at night like I did? Maybe she’d felt industrious when she got home and was attaching her bin pulls to the kitchen cupboards. I wish I was there to help her. I should have offered. I didn’t even have her number to call her again. Why hadn’t I asked her for it?

  After a few minutes, I went back inside and sank onto the couch, feeling so lonely and sad I did something I hadn’t done in months. I picked up my phone and called Diana.

  As always, it went to voicemail.

  “This is Diana. Leave a message, and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”

  “Hey…it’s me.” I closed my eyes. “I know it’s been a while. But I was thinking about you and thought I’d try to reach out. I guess you’re still not ready to talk to me, and that’s okay. I just wanted to let you know that you were on my mind and I hope you’re doing well. And…I’m sorry. I know I’ve said that a million times, but I am. I wish I could go back and do it all differently. Anyway. Goodnight.”

  I ended the call, feeling, as I always did after calling Diana, a mixture of guilt and disgust with myself. I should delete her number and quit bothering her.

  I was about to do just that when it vibrated in my hand.

  It was Diana’s number.

  Fuck. She’d never actually returned a call. Now what? Grimacing, I pressed Accept. I owed her at least that much.

  “Diana?”

  A long pause. “Hi.”

  “How are you?”

  “Fine. I…heard your message just now.”

  I closed my eyes. “Yeah. Sorry about that. I shouldn’t call you.”

  “No, you shouldn’t.” She sighed. “But I guess if I really wanted it to stop, I’d have changed my number by now.”

  “I’ve often wondered why you haven’t.”

  “I don’t know. I must like the reminders you’re doing okay.” She paused. “Are you?”

  I answered semi-truthfully. “Mostly. What about you?”

  “I’m okay.”

  “Still in New York?”

  “Yes.” She was silent again, and I worried she was crying. Fucking hell, had I not caused this woman enough pain? “Why did you call tonight?” she finally asked, and I heard the struggle in her voice.

  To punish myself. “To apologize, I guess.”

  “You can stop doing that. I’ve gotten all your messages.”

  “Does that mean you forgive me?”

  She didn’t answer right away. “For what, Sebastian?”

  Something twisted in my gut. “For all of it.” Proposing when I wasn’t sure. Shutting you out. Refusing sex. Not making time for therapy. Not taking the meds. Overdoing alcohol. Being late for everything. Lying to you. Calling off the wedding. Breaking your heart.

  The list was so endless I couldn’t even begin.

  “Does my forgiveness even matter anymore?”

  I swallowed. “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “Why?” I parroted, although it was a fair question. Diana and I were over, after all. But I hated the thought that she’d resent me for the rest of her life. I deserved it, but deep down inside, I felt like if she told me that she was able to let it go and move on, that she was happy again in spite of the pain I’d caused, then maybe it would mean that I deserved some happiness too. That I wouldn’t have to punish myself forever. “I don’t know. It just feels right to ask for it.”

  “God, Sebastian. That apology sucked.”

  I winced, but I also smiled a little. It reminded me of something Skylar would say. “Yeah. You know me. Not great with words.”

  “That’s not true. You just don’t trust yourself to say what’s on your mind.”

  Again, I thought of Skylar. “I suppose you’re right. Maybe I should work on that.”

  “Are you going to therapy?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. And you’re back in Michigan?”

  “Yes. I built a cabin on the property I own. Where I tried to make you go camping that time, remember?”

  “Oh, God. That experience still haunts me.”

  I imagined her shuddering, the shake of her narrow shoulders. “Yes, city girl. You’d hate it.”

  “Well, that doesn’t matter anymore. You can camp out in the woods all you want now. I’ll be here in my apartment with my doorman out front. And if I feel like flying off to Rome or Paris for a romantic vacation with my boyfriend, I can do it.”

  There it was—the dig at me for being scared to fly. She never missed an opportunity. “Sounds perfect for you.”

  “It is.” She was quiet a moment. “Are you dating?”

  I paused. “No.”

  “Why the hesitation?”

  “I don’t know. It feels weird to talk about it with you. And I’m not really dating anyone. I met someone recently, but—“

  “Who is she?” she asked quickly.

  “No one you’d know. Just someone I went to school with. But we weren’t really friends.”

  “Oh. She’s from there?”

  “Yeah.” On the off chance that Diana knew Skylar from that reality show, I decided to change the subject. “Anyway, it’s nothing. I barely know her.” The conversation was starting to feel a little strange, so I decided to end it. “Well, thanks for calling me back. I appreciate it. And…it’s good to talk to you.” That was true. Her low, smoky voice didn’t have the power over me it once had, but I felt relief that we were finally able to have a civil conversation. And I was glad she seemed well. Maybe I hadn’t done irreparable harm.

  But she didn’t hang up. “Can I ask you a question, Sebastian?”

  Oh god. “Okay.”

  “Why did you propose? We could have just broken up if you didn’t love me enough.”

  I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. Fuck. I never should have said that to her. “I told you. I was trying to be the person you wanted me to be.”

  “So it was my fault.” A hard edge to her tone now.

  “No. None of it was. I’ve told you that too. I’ll take all the blame.”

  “I loved you. I was willing to put up with all your shit. And you gave up on me. On us. You humiliated me.”

  “I know.” That thought haunted me. Diana had loved me, even with all the strange quirks. What if I never had that again? Even if I hadn’t been madly in love with her, maybe I should have tried harder to make it work. “You deserved better.”

  “Damn
right I did,” she said bitterly. “We had a perfect wedding planned, Sebastian. A perfect life.”

  No, we didn’t. Not for me. That life in New York…the pace of it, the crowds, the social scene, the pressure to constantly work more, earn more, have more. You loved all that. But it was tearing me apart.

  “I should go.” I ended the call without saying anything else and went to bed, upset that I’d made the call in the first place. What the hell did I expect? I’d called off the wedding with six months to go, told her she wasn’t the one—why should she forgive me?

  She shouldn’t. You don’t deserve it. You’ll never deserve it. And that’s why you’re alone right now.

  Sometimes I wondered if I’d made the wrong decision…maybe I had loved her enough and didn’t know it. Maybe I should have tried harder to live with the doubt. Maybe I should be married to her right now.

  But it wasn’t Diana I missed when I got between the sheets that night. It wasn’t her body I wanted next to me. It wasn’t her smile or her voice or her laugh or her kiss I dreamed about.

  It was Skylar's.

  And even though I knew I was no good for her, I also knew I wanted her too much to stay away.

  Chapter 12

  Skylar

  I had the following day off from Coffee Darling, and I went to bed relishing the thought of sleeping in. But, wouldn’t you know it, my body clock was used to waking up early now, and my eyes opened at six and refused to stay closed again. Oh well, I thought, swinging my legs over the side of my bed. Maybe I’ll get a nap in later. Might as well get up and get some things done.

  By nine, I’d attached all the bin pulls to the kitchen cupboards—laughing to myself when I recalled all the screw jokes from last night—taped off and primed a bathroom, and thought about Sebastian approximately one million times. Despite the slightly awkward ending, the spontaneous date had been a lot of fun.