Thinking about it made her feel flustered. She didn’t know how she got to this point where she was here trying to convince Josh not to drink and hook up with his bed friends. The thought of both really peeved her off. “I mean you—”
Before she could say her next word he smoothed his hand across her cheek and sealed his lips to hers.
He moved so quickly that her brain barely had a chance to register that he was kissing her. His delicious lips fused to hers, sending a spark of electricity straight through her. Then something strange happened. Warmth gathered from the tips of her toes and propelled itself over her entire body. She felt it coursing through her veins like an awakened river zinging with vitality. It quenched her soul of a thirst she didn’t know she had and made her feel like she never wanted to be without him.
The kiss was brief, too brief, but it still had a powerful effect and stunned her.
He moved back a little to gaze down at her, but still touched her cheek. “No,” he said with that half smile that numbed her knees.
Her cheeks burned and her lips tingled from the heated blaze of their kiss. She narrowed her gaze, not quite sure what he meant. “No…to what?”
“No, I won’t be calling Allegra and bed friends.”
She held his gaze, trying to decide what to say next. “You just kissed me,” she breathed.
He’d kissed her and he wasn’t drunk. This was the real him.
“And you didn’t slap me.” He chuckled, running his finger along the edge of her jaw, making her skin tingle there. Tenderly his eyes melted into hers, holding her still. “Remember, it’s Saturday, we aren’t at work and I’m not your boss. Today I’m just Josh.”
“Josh.” She said his name on the edge of a whisper while he held her under his hypnotic stare.
It was like the rules had changed somewhat. The kiss had done something to her that she couldn’t quite describe and all she knew was that she craved him and the way he made her feel.
For those few moments, nothing else mattered and he really was just Josh. Josh, an incredibly handsome man that had just kissed her and made her feel better than she’d ever had.
Amy was already tilting her head up before he lowered to her lips again. She welcomed his lips and the divine ecstasy of him like pure oxygen filling her lungs. She allowed herself the indulgence of sliding her palms across the hard surface of the ridged muscles on his chest.
Blood pounded through her brain, danced frantically around her heart, and weakened her body. She enjoyed the taste of him and embraced the passion that filled her as his tongue tangled with hers. Amy kissed him back with the same strength and desire as the kiss intensified. He kept his hands at her cheek and stroked her face as if he loved the feel of her skin. But then he stopped and pulled away, leaving her lips swollen and burning with fire.
“I have to go,” he said quickly.
“Why? Just stay.”
“No.” He shook his head.
“We could just stay here and watch the sea, or catch a movie.” Or kiss.
After all the time she’d spent with him over the last few weeks she didn’t think she’d ever want to kiss him in this lifetime. But here she was, hoping he’d stay so they could kiss till the sun came up.
Josh simply looked at her and shook his head. “That sounds real nice, Amy.”
She liked the way he said her name.
“But I’m a mess. One big mess. Let’s be realistic here. It’s Saturday night, you aren’t at work, don’t waste your time on me.”
She blinked several times, feeling defeated as she watched him turn and walk away.
So that was what it felt like to kiss an angel.
Like pure energy, running through every fiber in his being and singing through his veins. When he had kissed Amy days ago it didn’t feel like tonight. For a start, the other day he’d been hyped up on alcohol and overloaded with testosterone. He’d wanted sex.
Tonight was different. He’d never experienced the kiss they shared tonight with anyone. It was the sweetness. Josh didn’t do sweet. He was downright dirty and liked his women to be the same.
Sweet was different and tapped into something he didn’t think he could feel. Not him. He’d gone through life on that wild edge of recklessness that made him who he was. Growing up he was the worst kind of guy to take home to meet the parents, and it was against him to even try to aim to be that guy.
Tonight, Amy made him see something his soul cried out for but couldn’t have.
It was a shame the kiss wasn’t powerful enough to cure his grief. He’d been sober for a whole day and just ruined it with two bottles of rum. Now as the clock stroke one minute past midnight he was wasted. Completely wasted.
“Happy Birthday, Clarissa,” he said to the empty living room. He grabbed a bottle of wine from the crate he had set on the floor in front of him. He didn’t bother to pour it into the glass. He just drank straight from the bottle.
She would have been thirty-three today. Because of him she didn’t even live to see her thirty-third birthday. How sad and cruel.
How very sad and cruel.
She and Pete would probably have been getting ready for their wedding. They wanted a summer wedding. Clarissa had asked Josh to walk her partway down the aisle, then their father would continue the march and give her away to Pete.
She’d said Josh had taken such great care of her all her life that it was important for her to have him be part of her big day. He would have been honored to walk her down the aisle. He would have been honored to do anything for her.
But now he couldn’t. Not for her, or their mother.
There was no way he could see Pete or his father. No way. He knew that now. It wasn’t even an option to contemplate. Not for him. His shame was too great.
He finished off the bottle of wine and felt that buzz it usually gave him. Now he just needed the other part of his medication: a few women eager to please. He picked up the phone and went to dial Allegra’s number. As he went to press the call button, an image of Amy’s face flashed into his mind. He saw her beautiful, beautiful face, and the tentative look she’d given him as she’d asked if he’d be calling Allegra and his bed friends.
He’d told her no. Usually he wouldn’t make such a promise or even come back with such an answer, but he did for her.
Josh looked at the phone, stared at Allegra’s number for a few seconds, then tossed it across the room. Thankfully it didn’t smash like the last one.
He’d told Amy he wouldn’t and he didn’t want to add liar to the already lengthy list of unsavory things that he was.
How long had he known Amy for? Two days shy of three weeks, and yet she’d had such a massive effect on him. Big enough to let him know that, despite his drunken mind, he didn’t want Allegra and bed friends.
What he wanted was Amy.
The freaking Disney princess he’d christened Kansas. The thought of it all was just as grievous as the rest of his life. It didn’t do him any favors to want something he couldn’t have.
Amy got to Josh’s house early again. As early as she could. She didn’t have any problems at her apartment like yesterday because she’d sealed up the crack in her door, but she figured that if she could get to him early enough they could have a day like yesterday.
She also planned to do something that could make him extremely furious with her, but it was the risk she was willing to take.
The sun hadn’t even come up yet when she got there. The place stank of booze like it did before Hilda started working there.
That told her he’d hit the bottle hard, and it could mean that he’d had his bed friends and strippers around too. The thought pulled at her heart but she pushed it aside. She decided that the kiss they had was just a kiss and nothing more. It was really nice and she enjoyed being with him, but he was so wrong for her. Amy was practically shooting herself in the foot by going after a man like that.
Just yesterday she’d considered herself fortunate to not have happened
upon anyone who could potentially treat her like her father did her mother. Foolishly, she never considered the man sitting next to her.
There was, however, one thing she was hoping the kiss would help with. She hoped that when he realized that she’d emptied out all his bottles of wine and threw out the beer he’d be calm enough to remember that there must have been some part of him that liked her.
It took her awhile to find everything, but she did. The pantry was completely full of wine, vodka, and other mixtures of drink. But she got rid of it all. She hated wasting anything, especially when she knew how expensive it was, but it needed to be done. They couldn’t continue like this and his drinking would be both their downfall. He had two weeks of public appearances and promotional work booked. Then it was training. She wanted to get him to that stage.
Money had been at the forefront of her mind only days ago but things had changed.
Now there was more. Now she cared.
She cared that Josh was drinking too much. And, she cared that he grieved. Her heart went out to him and she wanted to help in whatever way she could. This was her helping.
When she was done she waited for him in the sitting room. This time she didn’t turn on the TV. She just waited, and the longer she waited the more anxious she felt. When she heard him moving around upstairs she stood up and brought her hands together. She heard him come down the stairs and go into the kitchen. Then she heard him roar like the other day when she threw the water in his face. Today was worse, though. Today he sounded like some kind of hell beast. That was undoubtedly the result of her swapping the cans of beer in the fridge with elderflower juice. He’d liked it yesterday so she thought hey, maybe this would soften the blow.
She was beginning to doubt that assumption as she heard him cursing, saying terrible things that literally burned her ears. With courage she gathered her strength and made her way through the living room and into the kitchen. He turned around when he saw her and stared her down like he would kill her.
“You.” He pointed. His face colored fiercely and his nostrils flared. His eyes blazed. “You did this,” he yelled, picking up one of the empty wine bottles near the recycling bin. The bin had been full and she planned to take that one outside.
“You are drinking too much. We won’t be able to achieve anything if you don’t stop.” She was trying to make him see her point, but he shocked her by throwing down the bottle on the marble kitchen floor. It smashed on impact and sent shards of glass everywhere.
He then went for the fridge, grabbed several bottles of elderflower juice, and smashed those too.
“What the fuck am I supposed to do with this?” he yelled.
That was when she knew no kiss on this Earth would have softened the blow.
“Josh.”
“Shut up,” he snarled and threw his fist into the wall behind her. She froze, thinking he was going to go for her next, but he backed away. “This stops now. You are my assistant. My employee. Don’t cross that line again. You don’t get paid to care. Now get out of my house and don’t come back till nine a.m. tomorrow.”
Amy pulled in a breath against the tears that stung the backs of her eyes. She looked at him and tried to find the man she spent the day with yesterday, but he wasn’t there.
The person standing before her was someone else entirely. She turned and walked out, wishing she never had to return.
Chapter 11
Josh drove to Bruce’s. It was a sports bar where he and his friends hung out a lot. Especially after a game. They always had what he wanted and the women who worked here were always hot.
He grabbed a few beers and stayed there for awhile shooting pool and watching baseball on the overhead TV. He did every and anything he could to take his mind off the day, and Amy.
When he got bored he went to the supermarket, grabbed a case of beer and some wine, then headed out to Dead Man’s Gorge, so called for the jagged, sharp, rock formations that led into a deep chasm. Either jumping off or driving over would result in sure death. Not many came back. Especially the ones that planned it that way.
Josh knew a guy once that jumped. He lived two houses down from him and worked as an insurance broker. He was made redundant after his company went through a bad spell. The poor guy was unable to bounce back. Burdened with substantial debts and the damage losing his job caused his family, he thought that death was the only answer. Josh remembered how his family suffered. At the time he’d wondered how the man could have been so selfish as to take his own life and leave his family behind with no one to care for them. What he never thought of was how the man must have felt.
Josh never thought of how doomed the man must have felt for death to be his only answer. He understood it now.
Understood it all. It was that doomed, damning feeling that gripped you and made you feel like there was no way to escape it. Josh was getting tired of it. Tired of waking up every day and blaming himself. Tired of feeling guilty.
He’d been parked up in his Range Rover about a few feet away from the edge of the gorge for about an hour now, downing more drinks.
Normally he followed Bruce’s with a visit to Roam Me, his favorite strip club.
But he couldn’t today. Not only did he want to be alone, but something happened to him when he kissed Amy and he felt that if he was ever going to please himself with a woman it had to be her. That would never happen after the way he treated her this morning.
He was disgusted with himself for the way he spoke to her. Thoroughly disgusted. He was still drunk from the night before and all he knew was anger. All he knew was he’d wanted more beer, and when he discovered what she did he was so furious he couldn’t think. Josh wanted to shake her for caring, to knock some sense into her so she could see that he didn’t want anyone to care for him. He didn’t care about anything and anyone so she shouldn’t waste her time on him.
Now he was here. At the precipice of the gorge that signaled the end for a lot of people.
The depressed, who had no more to give, and those who couldn’t bear anymore pain. He fit both categories. He was depressed and he didn’t have the strength to make any more attempts at fixing his life. The pain from the grief was too much for him now and he didn’t know what the hell he was supposed to do.
So…what now?
Josh rested his head back on the seat and closed his eyes. He steadied his ragged breathing and allowed his mind to drift. It seemed to drift forever and into a hole of bottomless nothingness. Down, down deep he went trying to get to the bottom of his mind.
As his mind steadied, the image of his family home in San Francisco came forward. It felt like someone was playing a memory from one of those old-style projectors people used to play their family videos on.
He saw himself as a very young child running across the lawn with a football. His dad was chasing him. His mother was laughing and so was his sister.
“Throw me the ball, son,” his dad called out.
Josh threw the ball and his father caught it, but as Josh looked back his father looked older, the way he did now. And Josh was no longer a child. He was a man playing as a professional with his team.
In every game he played he always, always looked to where his family sat. The proud looks on their faces would always give him that strength he needed to do his best and more. To be the best at what he did and give him the edge no one else had.
The pride for him would literally glow on their faces. Every time, every game, no matter how old he got or how many games he played. He played for them, all of them. He played to make them proud.
He knew without question that they loved him and always would.
Everything shifted in his mind again but this time it was as if he was running through scenes of his life, memories of his mother and Clarissa. Memories of his happy family.
When the scenery settled he was in the living room of his family’s house. His mother and Clarissa stood by the grand piano sorting through some clothes they were boxing up for charit
y.
“I can’t believe you got Primrose to part with this bag,” Clarissa said, holding up a bag with the Gucci logo printed all over it. She and their mother laughed.
“I have my ways.”
Josh rushed up to them, hoping this was real and it wasn’t just something created by his mind.
“Mom.” He pulled his mother in for a hug.
“Josh, what are you doing here? You have a big game tomorrow.”
“Yes, we wouldn’t want to suffer the wrath of a tired Mancini Machine,” Clarissa teased, poking him in the stomach. “Hey, do I feel fat?” She continued to poke his stomach.
“Come here, you.” He hugged her too. “You’re both alive. You’re okay.”
It felt real, it felt real to him.
“Yes, are you okay? Josh, unhand me, I need air, man.” She pretended to suffocate. He released her and looked at them both.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to. I’m just happy to see you.”
“Aww, you’re so sweet. My big brother’s the best,” she said in her usual way and slipped her arm around him.
“Let’s go to Italy. Nonnina will be thrilled to see us.” His grandmother spoiled them rotten and they hadn’t been since last summer.
“Josh, how are we supposed to make time for Italy with your busy schedule? You have a game tomorrow and the season just started.” His mother gazed at him through her hazel eyes.
“Forget the game. Forget the season. I just want to spend time with you.” Josh reached out and took her hand.
“Who are you and where’s my boy?” His mother laughed.
“I’m being serious. We don’t spend enough time together. I can’t lose you again.”
She reached up and cupped his face. “You never lost me. Sweetheart, I’m so proud of you. How about you allow your mother the privilege of watching you play so I can cheer for you.”
“Me too,” Clarissa joined in. “It’s the only chance I get to give you a standing ovation. “
Shape Of My Heart Page 12
