I watch the way she carelessly wipes wild blonde hair out of her eyes, letting her mom tug her along while still turned toward me, a secretive smile on her face as she gives me a five-year-old finger wave.
I wave back and then stand there watching them go, a cold breeze playing with the hair at the back of my neck. It’s not until I see the mother speaking to the man and then pointing at me that I give my head a shake and walk back up the beach toward where I think the gate is. Sure enough, within a few minutes of walking I find the wall and the gate.
Surprise, surprise, the gate is unlocked and I have no problem passing through. On the villa side the beach is quiet, though I can hear sounds from the neighboring units as I pass, shaking my head and still trying to come to terms with everything that’s happened, still feeling like my eighteenth birthday was last night and I’d just lost my virginity. Just as I’m about to head toward the terrace and private pool of my villa, I notice a figure approaching from the opposite direction and even though he’s still a long way off, I know who it is. I’d recognize that long, loping gait anywhere.
Do not ask me how it is that I’ve just relived whole days from my past while Chase was still out for his run. I have no idea how that happened how time can be different speeds for different people. Maybe I’ve been roofied. Maybe this is all a weird drug-induced experience by a man with way too much money obsessed with playing God.
But, right now? None of it matters because I still feel like an eighteen year old and all the excitement and passion that I felt for Chase—feel for Chase—is fresh. His essence still lingers on my body. My body still aches—pleasantly—from where he penetrated me.
His lope slows as he gets nearer, his face flushed from exertion, his hard body covered in a sheen of sweat, his hair damp and his smile grows as his gaze takes in my bikini.
“I always liked you in pink.”
I react, sprinting straight at him and jumping into his arms, mashing my mouth to his, giving him a fierce open-mouthed kiss.
“Wow,” he says, looking at me curiously. “What was that for?”
How do I explain to my ex-husband that in my mind we just finished making love...for the first time? I’m not sure how to tell him that I want to make love to him again. Another first. This time it would be the first time since our divorce.
“Tess, if you keep looking at me like that I’m going to toss you over my shoulder, carry you inside and fuck you silly.”
Opening my arms wide in invitation, I say, “You won’t get any resistance from me.”
Chase stares at me, a weird expression on his face like he can’t figure me out. Then something playful and hot flashes over his face and he lunges, scooping me up and carrying me not to the villa, but out into the surf with me squealing in his arms. Not until the water comes up to his waist does he drop me, letting me slide down the length of his body until I’m standing, my hands flat against his bare chest—so reminiscent of that first time—him staring down at me with almost the same confused expression. Desire mixed with pain.
Going up on tiptoes, I try to pull him halfway down so that I can kiss him, but he remains stoic and unbendable.
“What’s wrong?”
He grazes my lips. “Fuck, Tess. I can’t do this unless I know you mean it.”
“Of course I mean it. I always mean it.”
His smile is sad. “I know but I need more. I need to know that you want me.” He motions between us. “Us. Together again.”
“Why? Why do we have to commit in order to be together? Why can’t we just be who we are? Accept one another? Love one another for all our similarities and differences?”
He shakes his head. “Because it’s not equal.”
“How?” I frown up at him, feeling petulant again. “How is this not equal?”
All playfulness is gone. “Because you always leave.”
I shake my head and turn, the water cooling me off. I start walking toward the shore, frustrated with how slow it is to walk through the water, feeling my eighteen year old self ebbing away with each step I take and my current self, with all my memories, experiences and desires filling in the empty slots.
We don’t speak again until we’re back in the villa. He follows me to the master bathroom, not letting me shut the door on him, taking a towel from the rack and wrapping it around his waist before blocking my exit with his outstretched arm. “There’s something I need to tell you.”
My body goes stiff, not knowing what he’s going to say, but not liking his tone. “What?”
He runs a hand through his hair and looks away. “There’s...ah...” he sighs before meeting my gaze again. “There’s someone else.”
“What?” I stumble backwards.
He catches me. Holds onto me. Stares into my eyes as he tries to formulate his next sentence. After a couple of deep breaths, he says, “I’m in a relationship.”
“Is it serious?” I ask.
“Yes.”
I pull my arm out of his grasp and smack his chest. “Then what the hell are you doing here?”
“Are you really asking me that?”
“Yes, Chase. I’m really asking you.”
“I had to know Tess. I had to see you and I had to know.” He reaches for me but doesn’t touch me, his hand curling into an outstretched fist. “You are so fucking under my skin.”
“Does she know you’re here?”
He blinks twice before answering. “Yes. She wanted me to come.”
Fuck.
I duck under his arm and head back out into the living room, needing distance. He follows. Staring out the window, with my back to him, I ask, “Do you love her?”
“Yes.”
The knife goes cleanly into my lower back and twists, forcing me to fall against the window. What is this piercing pain? God! It feels suspiciously like jealousy, yet I’m never jealous.
Except this is different. This is Chase. My Chase.
I guess I always thought he’d be there. I know that’s stupid and selfish and contrary to everything I believe in but you can’t always control your emotions and for the first time in years I’m eaten up by jealousy.
“Tess?”
I don’t turn.
“Tess, I’m sorry. I should have said something right away.”
“It’s okay.” I glance over my shoulder, a smile wobbling on my lips. “You know me, I’ve got my own thing going on.”
He makes a sound at the back of his throat, kind of like a growly, bitter laugh.
I am so aware of Chase, I mean, his body is basically an extension of my own so I feel his approach. Without looking, I know he’s struggling with whether to touch me or not. Wondering if it will end with me falling into his arms or shrugging him off. I’m as uncertain about what my reaction to him will be as he is.
So, when he does finally reach for me, taking hold of my hips, lightly at first, and when I don’t pull away—because I can’t seem to—he tugs and I fall, my back against his impossibly solid chest.
“The thing is, I’ll always love you, Tess.”
I close my eyes, whispering, “I know. Me too.”
“I want you more than part-time. I need you to be mine. All the time.”
I nod.
His hands slide around my rib cage, hesitating beneath my breasts, telling me they want to move across my flesh as badly as my flesh wants his hands to cover me. But he controls the urge and I don’t push him.
“You still can’t give me that, can you?”
Even though I know the answer to the question, I take my time answering because I realize how fucking final it is. Chase waits, probably knowing the answer as well, but giving me silence to consider and reconsider before saying the thing we both recognize to be true.
After a deep breath...and then another, I turn in his arms and look up at him. He gazes down at me, a resigned expression already making its home in his expressive eyes. His lips and jaw are taut, waiting. Not wondering. Just waiting.
“I’m
sorry.”
A wisp of hair flies across my face and gets stuck on my cheek and he carefully captures it between his fingers and tucks it behind my ear.
“Don’t ever apologize for who you are.”
“I’m not apologizing for who I am, I’m apologizing for who I can’t be.”
“Who can’t you be?”
“That young girl you saved. I can’t keep being her for you. I don’t need to be saved anymore, Chase.”
He tilts his head, considering my words. “I don’t want that girl, Tess.” He cups my face. “That’s what you’ve never understood. Yes, I fell in love with that angry girl, but the woman she became?” He bites his lower lip. “Fuck. She’s the woman I love.”
“Goddammit.” I reach for his cheek, loving the warmth, the familiarity, the strength all simmering beneath my fingers in one perfect package. “I want you to be happy. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”
He shuts his eyes and I can tell he’s taking a deep breath by the way his nostrils flare. With his eyes closed, he whispers, “This has got to be the end. I can’t keep hoping and waiting things will change.”
“I know.” White hot pain slices through my chest as if the knife in my back is making an upward cut, making it nearly impossible to speak, I still force the words out. “I don’t want you to wait. You deserve more than what I can offer.”
He shakes his head as if in disagreement.
“And I deserve to feel like I’m good enough.” I look up. “That’s why I left in the first place.”
“I know.”
“I wish...” The words, I wish I could be different, echo between my ears. I don’t say it, though, because it’s not the truth. Not really. I like being me, even with all my idiosyncrasies. I was incredibly unhappy being married. I guess I wish I could be me and be with Chase too. There’s still a part of me that wonders if maybe that day will come. Someday.
Until then...
I catch my breath because the love shining in the depths of his eyes rips my heart out from behind my rib cage and squeezes it, wrings it out until there’s no shape left to it.
Speaking is difficult when your heart is in pieces, but somehow I manage it. “Seeing as we can’t seem to find it together, let’s go and find happiness apart.”
With both hands holding my face, he bends down and kisses me. Softly. Chastely. Protectively. Telling me that he knows he was my first and perhaps greatest love and that I was the same for him.
“I love you, Chase. I always will.”
“Love you too, Tessa Savage.”
The kiss lingers, not out of passion but out of melancholy, our foreheads resting together, breathing in each other’s breath and scent, so intimate, so achingly familiar.
In the next breath, however, he drops his hands, steps back and before he can change his mind, he turns and walks out the patio doors and back up the beach, never turning around.
Chapter Eighteen - Chase
I have no idea where Chase has gone but he doesn’t come back. At least, I don’t wait for him to come back. Calling the direct line to the concierge, I speak to Andre and ask him to arrange for my departure.
“There’s a plane leaving in an hour. Do you think you could be ready by then?”
“No problem.”
Back in the master bedroom, I see my bags standing beside the door. I quickly change out of my bikini into a comfy pair of capris and a tank top and run a comb through my hair and fasten it into a ponytail and apply a minimal amount of makeup to my glassy eyes.
You would think after everything that just happened, after spending time in the past, reliving my first sexual experience with the first man—first person—I ever loved, I’d feel more crushed right now. But oddly, that’s not how I feel. The truth is, I’m not sure how I feel. Maybe there have just been too many emotions roiling through me, from the anger and loneliness, joy and pleasure of reliving my younger self’s eighteenth birthday, to the sadness and heartache of my current self’s situation, that I’m numb.
But I don’t think that’s it. I stare at my reflection in the mirror, the crease between my brows, the taut expression that is the result of some unnamed emotion. I whisper Chase’s name to my reflection, just to see if there’s any reaction.
A small smile curls the edges of my mouth and my eyes change.
The smile isn’t sad. It’s...God, I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s soft. Warm. Happy. Maybe a little sad too, but not in a heartbroken way, in a wistful way.
Propping my elbows on the vanity, I lean even closer so I can look into my eyes. Quietly, I say, “Chase-fucking-Walker.” The name makes me chuckle. I think it’s because I have a hard time saying his name—or thinking of him, for that matter—without the word ‘fuck’ somehow attached to it.
Tilting my head, I say, “I will always love you, you know.”
In my head, I hear his whispered response. This too makes me smile.
“But,” I raise my finger to make a point, “I’m letting you go. Bye, bye.” My fingers make little wiggling movements, like they’re butterflies flitting away. “Fly away. Be free.”
You too, Tessa. Be happy, okay?
“I already am.”
The feeling starts behind my breastbone, a sort of nugget of heat, warming me up, thawing parts of me that I didn’t even know were cold. The heat emanates in all directions, down into my belly, shooting soothing warmth into my pelvis and legs, down to my toes. Warmth seeps up through my chest, shoulders and arms, radiating right to my fingertips. Finally I feel my face soften. The furrow between my brows disappears, my lips relax and the expression in my eyes finally becomes identifiable.
For the first time since the man came into my life, when I think his name the only emotions I feel are peace and gratitude. I have so much to thank him for. Our relationship helped to shape me into the woman I am today. How can I possibly regret that? Even the mistakes, the cheating, the pain, it all happened for a reason, so I could figure myself out so I could become the person I am today.
Chase Walker was not a mistake. He is probably the most important man to ever come into my life and I love him so completely I am able to let him go.
Finally.
As I observe my reaction to these thoughts, I watch my eyes fill with tears. These are not the hot heavy kind that burn the cheeks. These are the sweet, cleansing kind. Tears of relief. Tears of understanding.
After a few deep breaths, I splash my face with cold water, reapply my makeup and pack up my belongings. While wheeling my bags to the door, I pluck an apple from the fruit basket on the foyer table and drop it in my carryon, and go to sit on the step to wait for Andre. Sitting and breathing and taking in the surroundings. Just being in my skin, in the present. It’s lovely.
Andre appears ten minutes later, looking pale and solemn.
“Is everything all right?” I ask.
He takes my bags without answering and loads them onto the cart. Once we’re in the cart he says, “There was an accident. One of our guests was injured while diving.”
“Oh no.”
“I hope you don’t mind sharing the plane with him and the paramedics.”
“Of course not.”
The cart travels more quickly on the return trip to the dock and we ride in silence. During the ride, I take everything in, still wondering how this island accomplished the miracle of time travel. It looks so normal, like any other exclusive tropical resort. But the feeling here is anything but normal and I can’t seem to keep my eyes off the castle and the way the white stone shimmers in the heat like a mirage.
Is that what this all has been? A mirage?
Was Chase even here, or was he a figment of my imagination? Did I send Chase the invitation or was it some machination of this mysterious island?
I honestly don’t know.
I guess it doesn’t really matter.
The plane and the pilot are waiting at the end of the dock. Andre drops me off and helps to load my bags into the hold. “A
ll the best to you, Ms. Savage,” he says right before I climb aboard.
While I’m waiting, I reach in my bag for the apple. Something vibrates from inside. I take the apple out and hold it between my teeth while I fish out my phone. There’s a call coming through and I press answer, ecstatic because this is the first time my phone has worked since arriving.
Removing the apple from my mouth, I say, “Hey Wade. God, it’s good to hear from you.”
“Tessa Savage. Have you been avoiding us?”
“No. Why?” I take a big bite of the apple and chew.
“I’ve been trying to get a hold of you for a week.”
“A week?” I pull the phone from my ear to check the date. I’ve been in Eden for a week? That’s impossible. But the date on my phone confirms the fact. “Oh my God,” I whisper.
“Are you okay?”
“No.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“C’mon, Tess.”
“It’s been a weird week.”
“Where are you?”
“Have you heard of Eden?”
“As in...paradise? Adam and Eve?”
I take another bite of my apple. “No. The island resort.”
“Never heard of it. Why?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“What happened, Tess?”
“I think I was...” I don’t know how to end the sentence. I don’t know how to describe what happened to me here, even if I am speaking to my best friend. I can still smell Chase. I still feel the ghost of his hands on me, the phantom pain of my lost virginity. How does a person explain what happened, the emotions and realizations, the wisdom that comes from having an opportunity to relive the past?
“I think I was kicked out,” I joke, trying to make light of an experience that will take me a lifetime to wrap my head around.
“That’s funny,” Wade says.
Out the window I see a crowd of people making their way down the length of the dock. There’s a gurney at the center of the group.
[Invitation to Eden 24.0] How to Tempt a Tycoon Page 21
