by Julie Kenner
Except, dear god, he has. He is still perfection. Frankly, from my new thirty-something perspective, he’s even more perfect than he was before. I’d been intrigued by his older-man persona, but now I’m simply drawn to his masculinity. He’s a man, not a boy. And so help me, my pulse is pounding, my skin tingling in anticipation of his touch. And despite thirteen long years, it feels as though not a moment has passed, and the wild burn of our connection still courses through me.
A connection I crave but can no longer trust.
I swallow, realizing that those wild, golden eyes have been taking me in, and I know the man well enough to know that he has seen my reaction. My weakness.
I turn back to Whitney, certain that I am flushed.
More than that, certain that I am wet.
Fuck.
I close my hand over the clutch-style purse I’d put next to me on the bar. “I should run,” I say. “I have a meeting in the morning. Sign it to my room, okay? And I’ll call the spa tomorrow. We can plan on lunch before I go back.”
“Oh, hell,” she says. “I should have kept my mouth shut.”
“No, really. It’s okay. I just need to—” I cut myself off because I’m doing a terrible job of lying, but I really want to get out of here. I start to slide off the stool, but when I see Whitney’s face—her tiny little wince—I know that I am completely and royally screwed.
Honestly, I don’t know that I even needed to see her face. Because the moment I stop moving, I can feel him behind me. The heat of him. The way he upsets the fabric of the universe, so that the air around him seems to thrum, making my body suddenly hyperaware all over again.
Double fuck.
I draw a deep breath, then plaster on my corporate smile. I turn in the chair, planning to say something witty, though I haven’t worked out exactly what that might be yet.
Or perhaps I’ll just meet his eyes then walk away, letting him know in no uncertain terms that he is part of my past and needs to stay there.
In the end, I do none of those things.
I turn.
I see him.
And before I can stop myself, I pick up my martini and throw it in his face.
Chapter 3
I push past him, keeping my head down because looking at this man would be a very bad idea, and I don’t stop until I reach the elevator bank.
Unfortunately for me, there are no elevators waiting, and my fantasy that I will be magically whisked away from him is only that—a fantasy.
In reality, he’s walking straight toward me, his long strides eating up the ground between us. He is looking right at me, and he is moving with such bearing and confidence that for a moment I have to wonder if I imagined tossing a drink all over him.
But no, as he gets closer I see that his shirt is damp and his hair is slicked back, as if he’s used the vodka as hair tonic.
“Not the greeting I’d hoped for,” he says as he approaches. “But probably one I should have expected.”
“You walked out on me, you bastard.” I snap the words out, surprising myself. First I toss alcohol, then I verbally pounce. For a woman who prides herself on being icy calm in high-level negotiations, I am running seriously hot.
Apparently, that’s what three dirty martinis in under an hour will do to a girl.
“Yes,” he says. “I did.”
His easy acknowledgment doesn’t smooth my ruffled feathers in the least. “Not only that, but you walked away from me on the arm of another woman.”
At that, I think I see something like pain flash in his eyes. But he offers no rebuttal or explanation. He simply says¸ “It’s been a long time, Brenna. And I didn’t come to talk about the past.”
I didn’t come.
Well, that answers the question I’d been too ruffled to even raise in my own mind: This wasn’t a chance encounter, this was a full-blown surprise attack.
“You prick,” I say. “You had to know how seeing you would upset me. You couldn’t have called me? Called the hotel? Had the bellboy deliver a message while you waited in the lobby.”
“I’m sorry I hurt you. Truly. I can’t even begin to tell you how sorry I am. But I have a job for you, and time is of the essence, and—”
“You know what, Dante? Just shut the fuck up.”
His eyes actually widen and I silently applaud myself. I have balls of steel in business, but I’ve never put up much of a fight where my personal life is concerned. I tell myself that I have the alcohol to thank, but a tiny, secret part of me knows that’s not the truth—the truth is that I haven’t much cared about my personal life for the last thirteen years.
I rush on before my nerve or my buzz fades. “I thought we had something real. Six months. Christ, Dante, I was ready to marry you and have your babies. I loved you so much it fucking terrified me. And now all you say is that you’re sorry you hurt me? Well, guess what, Dante. I am over you. I am so over you it isn’t even funny. And you know what else? Fuck you.”
I spit the last two words at him, and while I should storm off, the elevator has come and gone during my tirade and there is no place to which I can storm.
Not only that, those last two words are hanging between us in giant cartoon letters in pulsating purple neon. And as I watch him watching me, a single, horrible, wonderful thought rises within me, and as much as I want to tamp it back, I can’t seem to make it go away.
Fuck you.
Fuck you, Dante.
Fuck. Me.
Oh, dear god, I must be going insane, but in that moment, I want him in my bed. I want to fuck him out of my system. I want to prove to myself that the fact that I haven’t been able to get him out of my head for thirteen freaking years is because I was young and relatively inexperienced. But I’m not anymore, and one more go between the sheets will prove that he’s nothing special. And maybe—maybe—I can move on instead of feeling the way I feel now.
Which is that I want him to touch me.
Which is pathetic after so damn long. But, dammit, I can’t seem to erase the thought from my head.
Dante, thank goodness, doesn’t seem to be able to read my mind. “I can say I’m sorry as many times as you want me to,” he says, “but when I’m done I’ll still need your help.” He takes a step toward me, and once again I can feel the universe shift and bubble. The air is thick and I’m having a little trouble breathing. I try to stand perfectly still because I don’t want him to see the effect he is having on me. For that matter, I don’t want to be affected.
So much for wishes and wants...
“This is hard for me, too, Brenna,” and there is such heated longing in his voice that I almost believe him. But I know damn well that he doesn’t want me anymore. He’s the one who walked away. I frown and rub my temples, sure that I am hearing an emotion that really isn’t there.
“But this is important,” he continues. “You acquired a piece recently for a client. I need to acquire it from you.”
I know what piece he’s talking about, of course. I charge a significant amount for my services, which means that I have the luxury of taking off between jobs. Since I’ve had only one job in the last four months, I know that he is talking about Folsom’s brooch.
“I’m afraid that’s not possible. Even if I were inclined to screw over my client and sell it to you instead of him, I don’t have it. I delivered the brooch about two hours ago. Right in that bar.”
If the news fazes Dante, he doesn’t show it. I remember that he’d worked in private security and that his emotions had always been hard to read. He was skilled at hiding them—except when we were alone and he was unguarded.
Or, at least, I’d always believed in the honesty of those unguarded moments in bed. But knowing what I know now—that he’d dumped me at the drop of a hat and left the country with another woman with no warning whatsoever—I have to wonder if those moments weren’t an act. Some sort of fantasy designed to make me believe he loved me.
But why?
What the hell was
the point, other than to torture me?
For a long moment he stays silent. Then he says, “You misunderstand. We want to hire you to acquire it. Or, at least, to smooth the way for us to arrange our own acquisition.”
I cross my arms over my chest. “I see.” I speak slowly, figuring I need time to gather my courage. But I’ve drunk three glasses of liquid courage already and have bolstered that with thirteen years’ worth of anger. So there’s not much gathering to do. On the contrary, I’m more like a roller coaster, making the slow climb to a dropping off point, and when I go over, there’ll be no stopping me.
I step toward him, and as I do I feel that frisson of desire, that slice of need. I remember the touch of his hands upon my breasts, the feel of his lips upon my skin. I hear the sweet words he whispered. Promises of eternity, of forever, of a love that would last through time.
And that is the final push—I go over and down, hurtling toward a solution that will either kill me or save me, but at this point there is no getting off the ride.
“I don’t want your money, Dante. I want you in my bed. I’ve had you in my head for thirteen years, and I just want to move on. One last fuck, Dante, and then it’s over. Give me that, and I’ll see if I can’t reacquire that damn brooch for you.”
I keep business cards in the front pocket of my purse, and I tuck one now into the breast pocket of his tailored suit. “My cell number’s on the card,” I say. “Let me know what you decide.”
Then—because finally the fates are in my favor—the elevator doors slide open and I slip inside.
But as the doors are closing, Dante thrusts his hand in, triggering the safety mechanism. The doors slide open again and he bursts inside, his eyes flaring with a violent heat. He’s in front of me in an instant, his arms caging me, and my back is pressed against the wall so that the handrail digs painfully into my lower back. I welcome it, though, because—oh, god, yes—this is the kind of primal heat I am craving. The wild, violent claiming that will melt away all the hard edges I’ve built up over the years.
This is what I want. What I need.
This is what will destroy me, but as his mouth crushes against mine, I really don’t care. In fact, I can manage only one coherent thought.
Surrender.
And so I do.
* * * *
Dear god, he’d missed this.
The touch of her. The feel of her. That fiery temper and her no-nonsense approach to life.
Being with her when she was twenty-three had been like embracing a lightning bolt, wild and vibrant, but just a little bit unfocused. Now, though, she was like the phoenix fire. Brilliant and bold and full of a magical heat that had the power to both reduce him to ashes and bring him back to life.
And oh, Christ but she was responsive. She’d been stiff at first, her body frozen with surprise by his unexpected assault. But she had soon melted under his touch, her mouth opening to him. Letting him tease and taste even as she did the same, her tongue working a kind of magic that was spreading through him, making his skin heat and his cock grow so goddamn hard that all he could think about was her words, her offer. One last fuck.
No. Dammit, he knew better. He couldn’t go there. No matter how much he might still crave her, the idea of sinking his cock into her sweet, wet heat belonged safely in the realm of fantasy.
It had killed him once to let her go.
He wouldn’t survive doing it twice.
Except this wasn’t about him. This was about Merrick. Trapped. Dying.
This was about how far he would go to save a friend.
And, yes, this was about wanting her touch, even at the cost of his sanity.
Right now, that sanity was hanging by a thread. She was pressed against him, her breasts just as firm as he remembered, her nipples so tight he could feel the nubs through the thin material of her shirt and bra. One of her hands was on his shoulder, giving her leverage to rise up on her toes and kiss him, and oh, god, oh damn, all he wanted to do was yank up her skirt and fuck her hard, right here, right now, to hell with the security cameras and all the rest of that bullshit.
He pushed away, breaking the kiss roughly, a bit unsettled by the potency of his need.
She was breathing hard, her pale skin flushed. She reached up and dragged her fingers through her shoulder-length brown hair. It hung in waves to her shoulders, shorter than it had been in London, but the look was flattering. It accentuated those sharp cheekbones and drew the focus to her gunmetal gray eyes.
“Is that a yes?” Her voice was breathy, and he knew if he agreed they’d go to her room right now and not come out until morning.
That was just too goddamned tempting.
“I want to,” he admitted, as her eyes dipped toward his crotch where his erection was even now tenting the slacks he’d worn.
When she looked up, he met her eyes unapologetically. “I want to very much.”
She licked her lips, then nodded, as if conceding some unspoken contest.
“But only on the terms you set,” he continued. He drew in a breath because this was the part he didn’t want to say, but knew that he had to. “Because I will walk away again. So think long and hard about what you want. I hurt you once. I don’t relish the idea of doing it again.”
“I told you what I want.” Her voice was cold now, without a trace of the heat he’d just felt in her touch. “You don’t have to worry about me. I’m not going to get a taste of your magical cock and then fall head over heels for you again. I’m not twenty-three anymore, and I no longer believe in fairy tales. At least not the kind that come with happy endings.”
Her words twisted inside him because he knew damn well he was the one who stole that from her. But before he could think what to say, she continued.
“I told you the truth, Dante. All I want is a fuck.” She met his eyes, hers as hard as steel. “I don’t want you.”
He didn’t flinch, even though her words cut him more than he had anticipated. “All right,” he said. “But I want you to think about it, anyway. You can have your fee—whatever amount you want—or you can have me. Tell me tomorrow morning. Money or me.” He drew out a business card of his own, this one with his home address. “I’ll expect you by eight. Time is of the essence, baby.”
“Maybe I don’t want the job at all,” she said.
“You want it,” he said. And when the elevator doors opened again on her floor, he slipped out. Then he walked down the hall to the stairwell, not bothering to look back. He didn’t need to; he knew that she was watching him go.
* * * *
Are you still in the bar?
My room in the Algonquin is small, and it takes little time for me to pace the length of it and back again. I’ve done three laps before Whitney answers my text.
I am. After that show, I had to have another drink. So? Tell????
I start to give her my room number and tell her to come on up, but honestly, I need another drink, too. I may have been humming on three martinis, but Dante burned them right out of my system.
Order me a dirty martini. I’ll be down in five.
I arrive right as the martini does, and I take a long swallow even before climbing onto the barstool. Then I take another five minutes to explain what he needs and what I offered.
Then I have to wait three more minutes for her to quit laughing and high-fiving me. Apparently, I have just become a role model to women everywhere.
Except I don’t much feel like a role model. Now that the alcohol has mostly faded from my veins, I feel just the opposite, actually. I feel a bit like an idiot.
“This is stupid,” I say. “I say over and over that he won’t break my heart, but that’s a lie. Or maybe it’s not. Because how do you break something that’s already shattered?”
I put my elbows on the bar and bury my head in my hands. “I’m pathetic, you know. Thirteen years, and he can still wound me.”
“Which begs the question of why you propositioned the guy,” Whitney says, then
cringes when I lift my head and scowl at her. “Okay, the reason he can still hurt you is because you loved him. You thought you were going to ride off into the sunset together.” She shrugs. “Simple as that.”
Which, of course, isn’t simple at all.
“It scared me,” I admit. “What he and I had. Did I tell you that back then? That it really, really terrified me.”
She shakes her head. “No, but I get that. He was older and settled in a career and you were just starting out.”
“True, but it was more than that. I felt—I don’t know, I guess I felt so alive, so right that I didn’t trust it. I mean, I was just this normal girl from a normal life. How could I suddenly be in the middle of this epic love? I was afraid it was all going to be ripped away.”
She rolled her eyes. “You always did over-analyze everything. You should have told me. I would have smacked some sense into you.”
“Except I was right,” I say, and she makes a face.
“Not because you were normal. It didn’t work because he was an asshole. Not because you didn’t deserve him.”
But I’m not really listening anymore. “I tested it on my own.” I half-smile, remembering my own stupidity. “Remember Rob? The guy who worked at that museum in Prague? He took me out to dinner one night, and I could tell he was interested, and I just wanted to know—”
“You slept with him? Oh my god, Brenna!”
“No! I just—I just let him kiss me. I guess I wanted to see if it would sweep me away the way Dante’s kisses did.”
“Did it?”
I shake my head. “Not at all. And afterward, all I could think of was how horrible I was because Dante was my everything.”
I stifle a shudder as I remember the rest. Because less than a week later, Dante walked away. And even though it’s foolish, ever since, I’ve felt like I broke a spell that day. Or that I brought on a curse.
