by Trisha Telep
“He left because it was a good opportunity, I suppose. Case open, case closed. He didn’t owe me anything. He doesn’t owe me anything. I went on with my life—” my lonely, Troy-less life “—and it’s been full, so full, with preparations for your wedding and the making of your gown and . . .”
Vicky was looking at her with sad eyes, which was the signal for Jemma to stop babbling. “You loved your bridal gown, didn’t you?” she asked, hoping to subvert her friend’s pity.
“I can answer that question,” Michael said, as he and his best man strolled forward to join the women. “When she walked up the aisle I thought that besotted expression on her face was because she was so happy to be marrying my stellar self, but she has informed me it was because she looked in the mirror and never saw a more beautiful bride in a more beautiful bridal gown.”
“The dress is incredible, Vicky,” Troy put in. “When I saw Jemma wearing the mock-up she made of it, even a dedicated bachelor like me had to catch his breath.”
This time, Jemma couldn’t stop herself from looking at him. Staring, really. “You . . . you saw me in Vicky’s dress?” She’d made a prototype of the design she and the bride had decided on out of some inexpensive fabric. She and her friend were of like size, and so she’d tried it on a time or two herself, making adjustments here and there. She’d had it at her house a while before taking it to the dressmaking shop where she worked on what would become the actual gown. “When was that?”
Troy’s gaze slid away from her. “I don’t really remember.” Then he slapped his hands together. “Isn’t it about time you two lovebirds went on your way?”
Michael grinned at his buddy. “Troy’s convinced we should enjoy the hell out of our bliss, Vicky, since he’s assured me it’s only temporary.”
The best man looked chagrined. “Hey, nothing against Vicky or you, Mike.”
The groom slid his arm around his new wife and drew her close to kiss the top of her head. “And nothing against you either, my friend, but you don’t know what you’re talking about. I get that you’re not a leap-of-faith type – that’s what happens when you study structural engineering, you’re all about how things can break apart – but me and my lady have a love situation going on here and we’re pretty convinced the circumstance will last.”
“Love,” Troy repeated.
“That’s right,” Michael said, grinning. “Can’t see it, can’t measure it, won’t find the details on a blueprint. It’s the unexplainable that you just gotta believe in, even though it seems impossible.”
The best man’s doubtful expression was starting to make Jemma angry. This was Vicky and Michael’s big day and Troy was turning it into a big dud. She went on tiptoe to kiss the groom’s cheek. “Well your best man is right about one thing . . . you and Vicky have a flight to catch and some sun, fun and umbrella drinks in your near future.”
“And sex,” Michael added, with an exaggerated leer at his new wife. “We’re going to have a seven-day-long rollicking private party in the bedroom.”
Troy pretended to frown. “Come on, you’re embarrassing Jemma.”
Vicky scoffed. “As if she doesn’t know about rollicking private parties.”
Heat crawled over Jemma’s body. She was still in her bridesmaid’s dress, another of her own creations, which had a figure-hugging fit and a wide, U-shaped neckline. The apricot color probably clashed with the blush working its way over her throat and toward her face. When she thought of private parties in the bedroom, there was only one man who came to mind.
She could feel Troy’s gaze on her. “Really? What has our Jemma been up to while I’ve been gone?”
Vicky donned a little cat smile, but her eyes narrowed. “As you said, you’ve been gone.”
Suppressing her groan, Jemma dragged her best friend toward the car’s passenger side door. “Time for all the good brides and grooms to get on their way.” Under her breath, she murmured for Vicky’s ears only, “Please don’t bait Troy like that. He’ll guess something’s up.”
“Something is up,” Vicky whispered back. “You and I both know that you’ve been pining these past six months. You and I both know that you should have told him your feelings before he left. You should have come right out and said—”
“No.” Jemma wasn’t going to ever think or say such a thing. She had only this one night to get through alone with Troy – and without making any kind of rash confession – and then she’d steer clear of him forever after. She raised her voice. “OK, I have everything under control. I’ll gather up anything that shouldn’t be left behind—”
“And you’ll have to make do with the leftovers in the fridge,” Vicky said, sliding into her seat and shutting the door. Then she unrolled the window. “You’re stuck here until tomorrow.”
When one of the other wedding guests had a business emergency before the ceremony, they’d had to shuffle transportation, leaving the best man and the maid of honor car-less until that friend returned to retrieve them. “Eric promised to be here before ten,” Jemma said.
“And before that,” Troy added, “we’ll hand over the house keys to the undertaker.”
Michael snickered as he ducked into the driver’s side.
Jemma rolled her eyes. “Caretaker,” she corrected.
“Unless the reported ghost of the house drives us screaming into the night,” Troy added.
Vicky craned her head out the car window. “Oh, don’t worry about that. Didn’t you listen to the legend? Once it’s full dark, the spirit locks you inside and then there’s no escape. The ghost forces you to confess all your sins and all your secrets – unless you’re scared to death first.”
In the waning light, Jemma’s gaze jumped to Troy’s. Her secrets are what scared her. How she’d fallen for the lean, hazel-eyed man of logic. How his defection to Argentina had left her devastated.
Only one night, she reminded herself. That was all. She had to get through only this one night keeping everything she felt to herself.
With the honeymooners on their way, Jemma re-entered the house first, Troy behind. When the front door clapped shut at their backs, she couldn’t deny the nervous jolt of her heart. Ignoring it, she murmured something about changing her clothes and headed up the stairs to the room she’d shared over the weekend with another bridesmaid.
Now devoid of that woman’s overabundance of baggage and belongings crowding the space, the surroundings struck Jemma as if for the first time. Narrow beds of dark wood were placed against two walls, their headboards decorated with intricate carvings of roses and thorns. A pale mauve wallpaper in subtle contrasting stripes adorned the walls, while a border ran near the ceiling. Its design, in the same grey and black of the home’s exterior, was of Victorian-styled children’s faces. Not “children” she realized. The border depicted image after image of twin girls – one illustrated as a haloed cherub, while the other wore an evil smile and from her tousled curls peeked a pair of devilish horns.
Jemma quickly averted her gaze, and it caught on an ornate frame above a wooden washstand, which held a ceramic pitcher and bowl. The frame held double images too, but they appeared to be two separate old-time photographs of the same beautiful young woman posed in a pale muslin dress. Drawn by the lovely design of lacy flounces and narrow pin-tucks, Jemma walked closer. How she’d love to see that garment in person. The beautiful handwork she found on gowns of other eras was always inspiring.
Once her own dress was removed and put away in her garment bag, Jemma slipped into jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt and her cosy sheepskin boots. Then she reached for her book, prepared to settle in for that promised read. But those weird twins looking down on her from the wallpaper border made her nerves too jumpy for relaxation. Remembering her promise to Vicky, she decided to do a walk-through of the house to make sure nothing had been left behind.
In the bedroom beside hers she found an abandoned gauzy scarf on the dresser. In the next – her heart jumped. An amputated foot! No, she realized
, forcing air into her strangled throat. Merely a lone male sock stretched out on the rug. “Oh, brother,” she murmured to herself, bending to retrieve the thing with a trembling hand. “You’re getting punchy.”
Clamping down on her fanciful imagination, she turned the handle of the subsequent vacant room. As the door swung open, a figure spun toward her. She shrieked – then cut off the sound when she recognized Troy.
“Oh! I’m sorry, I . . .” Her mouth was dry, but she wasn’t sure if it was because of her brief fright or because the man was standing in front of her, half-naked. “I didn’t know anyone was in here.”
He shrugged into an oxford-cloth shirt, not bothering with the buttons. Apparently he’d decided to get more comfortable too. Behind him, she saw his tuxedo hanging in the closet. Now he wore jeans and a pair of battered, moccasin-styled loafers. “I switched rooms,” he explained, then gestured behind him. “Bigger bed.”
Oh, he had to bring up beds. She felt a resurgence of heat rush over her flesh. They’d burned up the sheets – at least in her opinion – when they’d been together those months before he’d taken off for Argentina. Maybe the sex hadn’t been as good as she thought? The temperature of her skin went up a couple more degrees in embarrassment. To get away from him, she started backing through the door.
“Don’t go,” Troy said, coming closer.
She could smell him. It was faint, but his signature citrus-and-soap scent. Post-orgasm, she’d adored the satisfied languor of afterglow as they spooned body to body. But almost as good was reliving the memory of what had gone before when she showered, the hot water releasing scent-of-Troy from her hair and skin.
After he’d left the country, she’d found a purloined T-shirt of his. Not that she’d ever admit it, but she’d rolled it into a ball and tucked it like a sachet under a stack of her lingerie. The memory made her feel even more foolish, and she shuffled back a few more steps.
“Don’t go,” Troy repeated.
“We’ve nothing to say,” she said, trying to sound airy, though she was afraid it came out more breathless than anything else. Stupid swathe of naked man skin. Her hand gestured toward his bare chest. “You should cover that.”
“Huh?” He glanced down, then looked back at her, his expression . . . flattered? Smug?
Jerk. “You don’t want to catch cold your first week back in the States.” He’d done nothing more than stash his suitcases in his condo before the wedding party had piled into cars to head toward the rural environs of Vicky and Michael’s haunted house wedding.
“About that . . .” Troy started, then his voice trailed off. He rubbed his palm over his breastbone.
“What? You’re already sick?”
He grimaced. “I haven’t been feeling myself for a long time.”
“Take two aspirin and I’ll see you in the morning,” Jemma advised.
As she turned to leave the room, he caught her arm. The touch sprinted along her skin. Her heart started punching against her ribs like the needle shaft of a sewing machine with a heavy foot on the pedal.
“We should talk,” Troy said.
A post-mortem of their relationship? She didn’t think she could take it. For the last six months, she’d done her own autopsy on a nearly nightly basis. Holding on to her dignity, Jemma stepped away from his restraining hand and thought of something innocuous to discuss. “It was a lovely wedding, wasn’t it?” There, that should do it.
“But a little weird, Jem, let’s admit it. A haunted house?”
“I think Vicky might blame that on us. We are the ones who introduced them at that Halloween party, after all.”
A little smile kicked up the corner of Troy’s mouth. “I was just trying to get rid of our two friends so I could take you into a dark corner and peel off that cat costume you were wearing.”
“What are you talking about? You went as Bond, James Bond, and I was Pussy Galore.”
“Exactly.” There was now a gleam in his wicked eyes.
He was playing with her. Toying with memories that teased up images of the two of them together. That night he had taken her to a dark corner. She’d not been dressed as a cat. Her costume had been straight out of the movie Goldfinger, a to-the-knee pencil skirt, pointed-toe high heels, which could serve as ice picks, and a wrap-style satin blouse she’d sewn for the occasion. The skirt had been too tight for panties. Underneath the shiny top she’d worn a lacy vintage bra that had lifted and separated her breasts into prominent cone shapes. The outfit had been, she admitted, a little outrageous.
What he’d done with his hand beneath her skirt was even more so. In the middle of the party – OK, their corner had been very dark and nearly isolated – he’d inched up her skirt to thigh height and then kissed the protests out of her as his hand found the wetness between her legs. She could only clutch his shoulders and hide behind his broad chest while he slid two long fingers inside her. When he’d caressed her clitoris, she’d tumbled right over the edge.
“Troy,” she whispered now, then cleared her throat to strengthen her voice. “That . . . that was in the past.” Months before he’d left for Argentina. And in all the time he’d been out of the country, he hadn’t sent a text, an email, or even a postcard.
The person with the wish-you-were-here thoughts had been Jemma and Jemma alone.
So they weren’t going to be expressed aloud, no matter what Vicky counseled. The words would not cross Jemma’s lips.
As if that last thought had telegraphed, Troy reached out and brushed his thumb along her mouth. Goosebumps tripped over Jemma’s chin to run down her neck and tighten her nipples. “Pretty girl . . .” he said, his voice hoarse.
Her heart started pounding again.
“I missed you, Jem.” His voice was as soft as that thumb caressing her lips. “I missed this and every other thing about you.”
It was her desperate willingness to believe him that sent her running. She stumbled away from Troy’s seductive touch and sprinted for her room. Inside, she braced her shoulders against the door and put her face in her hands.
You can’t fall for that, she reminded herself. He left you before, without you even seeing it coming, without you even getting a hint of things not going right. He left you. Without a backward glance.
Without a text, an email, or a postcard during the following six months.
She clunked the back of her head against the wood and let her hands fall to her sides. She stared, unseeing, at the darkness outside her window as the truth welled up.
“But I still love him,” she whispered, the words no longer containable. “I’m in love with him, but I have to let him go. He can never know how I feel.”
The lights in the room snapped out. The temperature dropped from normal to icy. Suddenly, the solid surface at her back swung inward as the door flew open. Unbalanced, Jemma stumbled into the hall. On its own, the door moved again, slamming shut.
And terrified, Jemma screamed.
Two
At the sound of Jemma’s blood-curdling yell, Troy leaped through his open doorway and into the hall. Her slender figure stood a few feet away, her body shaking, her arms wrapped in a tight self-hug. He couldn’t see what had set her off.
“Jemma?”
She whirled toward him, then seemed to fly through the air and into his embrace, her slender body slamming against his torso. Scanning the area for evidence of rodent or insect, he folded his arms around her. “What is it?”
She was pressed so close he could feel her frantic heartbeat against his ribcage. “I . . .” Then she shook her head and buried her face in his shirt.
Troy stroked her dark blonde hair. For the wedding, she’d worn it in an elegant roll at the back of her neck, but it was free now, and he sifted his fingers through the silky, shoulder-length strands. Having her in his arms again was . . . well, it wasn’t supposed to be like this. His buddy Michael was right. Troy was a structural engineer. Troy was experienced in what happened when things fell apart – both from a
professional and personal point of view. It was why he’d grabbed at the chance to take over the project in Argentina.
He figured he’d spare both himself and Jemma the disaster that was certainly looming between them. Six months, he’d reasoned, would be enough time to dispel the chemistry that had propelled them into bed. Six months would dissolve what had been building between them – putting a less-painful end to their relationship, one that saved them both from the devastation of the inevitable, total structural collapse.
Idiot that he was, though, when he’d been alone with her only a few minutes, he hadn’t been able stop himself from telling her the truth.
In those six months, he’d missed her.
He’d missed touching her . . . and he wanted to touch her some more.
But that was a bad idea – their bond was gone – or near to it, anyway. So now, when she shoved against him, apparently trying to break his hold, he was all about re-establishing their autonomy. His head was, anyway. Because damned if his arms didn’t stay locked around her.
“Troy,” she said, looking up at him.
Jemma had the sweetest face. Heart-shaped, with a pair of blue eyes that were almost as enticing as her small mouth with its full, lower lip. She wasn’t beautiful in a look-at-me sort of way – except perhaps in her Pussy Galore get-up – but she caught a guy’s eye and made him think . . .
Mine.
Oh, hell, that’s what he was thinking. Yes. Now. Again.
Mine.
She licked that puffy bottom lip. “Troy.”
He tried refocusing on practical matters. “What scared you, honey? Why’d you scream?”
“I . . .” She shook her head, looked away. “I’m going to sound crazy.”
Some of that’s been going around, he thought. Look at me, still entwined with the woman I tried so hard to forget. “Give it a try.”
Jemma glanced over her shoulder. “This is hard to believe, but . . . someone, something, propelled me out of my bedroom and slammed the door shut in my face. When you showed up, I felt hands on my back, forcing me in your direction.”
