by Marie Hall
Her lips twitched as she pictured a pantless Tobias sprawled out on a toilet, with his mouth gaping open, dead from a heart attack.
“My imagination is so vivid that I’m having a very hard time not picturing this,” Elisa said with a chuckle.
He winked; his normally pinkened cheeks were now an even deeper shade of red. He and Meredith had been hitting it hard. It’d surprised Elisa how unpretentious academia actually could be.
She’d expected before arriving that everyone would be buttoned-up snobs, only interested in expounding the virtues of whatever priceless rare collections they’d been recently working on. And they were, to an extent.
Tobias seemed to take almost orgasmic delight when reading through the Book of Kells, as one of the U.K.’s premiere authorities on it, he was the man to ask if you had any questions on the matter. But he also enjoyed a ribald joke or two, he loved his beer, and the weekly get-togethers had been his brainchild. A place, he’d said, where they could go to relax and not talk about work for just a few hours. Elisa had come to look forward to their Saturday nights.
Callum smiled at her again, and she glanced away.
“Well, I know how I’d like to die,” his deep throated voice interrupted Mere and Tobias’s squabbling.
“How?” Angelica asked with a raised brow.
Elisa was convinced that Angelica only came to these get-togethers because of Callum and her hope of someday making him husband number three, but that was just a guess.
“Alone on a secluded island, with a good woman beside me.” He grinned at Elisa as he said it. “And a stack of books that reaches toward the heavens.”
“How utterly Hemmingway of you.” Meredith chuckled.
“Never go on trips with anyone you do not love.” Callum smiled, tipping his glass toward Elisa.
She swallowed hard, feeling slightly anxious by his obvious attentions tonight. Apparently she wasn’t the only one to notice because a moment after Callum excused himself to the bathroom Meredith shielded the left side of her mouth with her hand so that neither Tobias nor Angelica could see her mouth, “Wow.”
He’d gotten friendlier with her since the day he’d helped her with the boxes. It was nice to have finally broken the ice, but now she was scared that she might have done more than broken the ice with him.
There were moments where her mind would drift, wondering what he was doing, where he was at. It unnerved her that she couldn’t seem to control those thoughts. She still loved Julian, but it was so easy sometimes to imagine what it might be like if she was free and so was he. As much as it pained her to even think it, all signs were pointing toward their relationship heading in that direction.
Shushing her friend, Elisa waved her off. “I think I might go.”
“Oh no,” Meredith cried, “not yet, I haven’t even gotten properly drunk.”
Laughing, she got up, feeling a little lightheaded, but not too bad. She’d only had two beers and a shot. Her tolerance for liquor was growing since meeting the rowdy bunch.
“No really.” She pretended to yawn, accidentally bumping into a bar patron as she did. “I’m tired, I haven’t slept much the past few nights and I’m exhausted.”
“Oh, come on,” Meredith wrapped an arm around her neck. “You can sleep in tomorrow, there’s no rush.”
“No.” She looked up as Callum sat back down, giving her a strange look as she slipped some cash onto the table. “Really. Angelica.” She gave the French beauty a nod of goodbye. “God of Books,” she then said to Tobias, who gave a hearty chuckle at her nickname for him and reached his arms up for a hug.
He was quite touchy when deep in his cups. Elisa would never tell him so, but in the pub he was a happy drunk, unlike the strict taskmaster at work.
Giving him a quick hug, she nodded at Callum. With a quick kiss on Mere’s cheek, she gave a final wave and headed for home.
She’d walk tonight—it was a distance, but she wanted the fresh air.
The city was alive with the sounds of laughter and lights, she loved Dublin, loved everything about it’s Old World charm, so unlike Maine. She felt like a different person, a new woman here.
Though she’d spent the majority of her life on U.S. soil, she found it almost too easy to settle into life in Ireland.
Deep in thought, she didn’t hear the pounding footsteps coming up behind her until they were right on top of her.
“Hey you.” Callum’s deep throaty voice made her whirl on her ballerina flats.
“Whoa.” She expelled a long breath. “Oh my God, you scared me.” She gave a weak chuckle and grabbed her chest.
His hair looked windblown from running, he’d shaved his beard weeks ago, but he now had a fine dusting of dark shadow on his jaw. Her fingers twitched.
“Where are you off to?”
Nibbling on the corner of her lip, she glanced forward and then back. “Did you just chase after me?”
Sticking his hands into his jeans he shrugged and with a coy grin said, “And what if I said I did?”
Pulse thundering so hard through her ears she was afraid he could hear it, she turned on her heel, confused whether to stop and chat or keep walking for home.
“Did I leave something there?” she finally asked in confusion.
“Elisa.” He grabbed for her hand, threading their fingers together just briefly. “You must know by now.”
The touch of his skin on hers sent shockwaves through her arm. Jerking away from him, she shook her head. “You…you…” She cleared her throat. “You shouldn’t touch me that way.”
Grabbing her elbow, he pulled her to a stop.
His deep brown eyes mesmerized her.
“How long are we going to play this game?” he asked and she frowned.
“What game?”
Cocking his head, a thick lock of his wavy hair slipped over one eye, and she had to curl her hand into a fist to keep from brushing it back.
“The game where we pretend that we don’t feel this.”
Clenching her jaw, it was everything she could do to turn away from him. “I have a boyfriend,” she said; bringing Julian up made her feel a little braver.
“You mean the man who rarely comes anymore?”
“Hey,” she snapped and twirled on him, “what we do is none of your business.”
Holding out his hands, he gave her a calm look. “I’m not trying to fight, believe me. I admire you. I have almost from the moment we’ve met. But I would be a fool to not let my feelings be known. To not fight for any sort of a chance.”
Anyone else and she wouldn’t even have a second’s doubt. But Callum was beautiful. Beyond beautiful, he was the type of unattainable male most women only got to dream about and admire in magazines. He’d modeled for some of the most elite designers in the world and he was telling her he liked her.
Her stomach heaved.
“I love him,” she said and meant it with every fiber of her soul. Regardless of how strained things were now between her and Julian, she’d never be able to just move on to a new man. Even one as beautiful as Callum.
He brushed his knuckles over her cheek and for the first time in years Elisa felt the type of sensations that could only spring from new love.
What she felt for Callum wasn’t anything close to what she had with Julian, but there was definitely attraction, which made this so much harder.
“I’ve lived a lifestyle of ease and women, money, and everything it could buy. But none of it made me happy. I’m the kind of man who when I see something I want, I go for it. And I want you, Elisa, I’m intensely serious about that.”
He stepped into her, crowding her space. And even though she’d been drinking and could blame anything that might happen on that, she knew she wasn’t really that drunk.
Though Callum smelled of books and wine and cigar smoke—smells she loved now—and his looks could make even a saint stop and stare, she turned her face to the side.
“I really don’t think this is appropr
iate,” she said.
But he was already swooping in, and she turned just in time for his mouth to graze her cheek instead of her lips.
Her entire body lit up in a blaze of heat, her skin tingled where he’d touched her. It was all she could do not to brush her fingers over the spot where he’d kissed her.
Stepping way back and out of his reach, she shook her head. “Don’t do that again.”
“I want to see you tomorrow. Just you and me, wherever you’d like. Tell me you’ll come.”
Each word out of his lips weakened her resolve further. Needing to get away from him, right now, she said, “Callum, I—”
Lost for words, confused, and shamefully excited, she sidestepped him and ran straight to her flat.
The run was exhausting, and by the time she got to her flat she was coated in a layer of sweat, but it’d also helped to clear her jumbled thoughts. She needed to talk to Jules. Running to her laptop, she called him, trying to Skype. But it rang and rang and rang. Either he was asleep or out.
Wanting to leave him a message, she clicked on her Gmail, but stared at the screen as too many words crowded her head.
He’d graduated almost two months ago. They’d just talked last week, but things were so different now. So horribly, terribly different.
Sniffing, she shut her laptop and shuffled into her room, stripping her slacks and shirt off, then stumbling into bed with nothing on but her bra and panties. Yanking Julian’s pillow to her, she lay down and stared at the painting of her and him in the hospital room hanging up on her wall.
Was it really possible that after everything they’d gone through, it could be over just like that?
But as her eyes closed and her mind began to drift, it wasn’t Julian’s sea-green gaze she saw, but a pair of sensual brown ones.
“I want you, Elisa, and I’m intensely serious…”
Chapter 18
Elisa smiled as memories of her pseudo-date last night crowded her waking thoughts. She really didn’t even know what to call it. But Callum made her feel things she hadn’t felt in years, alive, excited, happy.
She winced into the rare sunniness of a bright Irish morning and pulled the sheets up over her head one final time. Her head ached from one too many beers and her mouth was dry. The idea of eating anything right now didn’t appeal, but if she didn’t at least have a coffee and some dry toast she’d regret it later.
Thank God it was Sunday and she had the day to recover—Meredith had kept pushing those beers on her last night. Granted, she could have said no, but Callum’s teasing smile had made her feel stupidly brave.
He’d asked to see her again today. Her stomach dove to her knees. They’d been drunk and silly, what if it was nothing more than just words? She’d tried hard not to encourage him too much last night. But that kiss on her cheek right before she’d run away…
She worried her bottom lip thinking about it. Why did everything have to be so complicated?
Rolling over, she buried her nose into Julian’s pillow, breathing him in before she started her day, but then froze as it felt like she’d just been sucker punched.
Elisa sniffed again.
Nothing.
Eyes going wide in an instant, she shook off her sleepiness and sat up, snatching the pillow up as she did so. But no matter how many times she buried her face in it, his smell was gone.
Numb, she stared at the crimson pillow case with tears blurring her eyes as the finality of what that meant began to wiggle itself through her brain. She and Julian hadn’t out and out broken up. But their talks were less, their need to see one another was less, they had their lives, and somehow—without her even being aware of it—they’d begun to move on.
With an inarticulate cry she picked up her phone and called her mother. It would be very late there, but she hoped her mother was still awake.
She picked up on the second ring. “Elisa, honey?” She sounded anxious.
“Mum.” The moment she said it the floodgates poured open and the tears began to fall. “Mum, he’s gone.”
Elisa smashed the pillow to her chest, rocking back and forth on her bottom.
“Baby girl, what’s the matter? Who’s gone?”
The tears were choking her voice, making her words come out garbled and stuttered.
“Honey, honey, slow down,” her mother crooned. “Baby, what in the world is the matter?”
Wiping her face on the pillow, she shook her head, feeling the loss of Julian in a way she’d not felt it before. “His scent,” she finally managed to say. “It’s gone, Mom. I went to smell it today like I always do and I can’t anymore. He’s just not here.”
“Oh.” Her voice drifted off knowingly. “Oh, baby. Did you guys break up?”
“I don’t think so. But…” She sniffed and scrubbed at her cheeks with the back of her wrist. “We don’t talk anymore like we used to. Sometimes it’s barely ten minutes a night. He’s so busy and so am I. Our lives are just moving on, but I think we’re both terrified to be the one to say it’s actually over.”
Cradling the phone between her ear and her shoulder, Elisa stared at her tattoo.
Destiny...
She rubbed it slowly. It’d felt so true the day she’d gotten it on her. Inevitable even, in her mind it’d been impossible to even think an ocean could break them apart.
“I met a guy down here,” she whispered slowly, admitting out loud what she’d tried so hard to deny to the rest of the world.
“Have you guys—” she began hesitantly.
“No.” Elisa shook her head hard. “In fact, up until last night I haven’t been encouraging him. But I feel electric when I’m around him. Alive, even. He kissed my cheek,” she said, smiling sadly, “and it was like the first time with Julian.”
“Hm.”
That was all she said, no more, no less.
“What, hm? What does that mean?” Elisa asked, desperate for some pearls of wisdom to be thrown her way. She was so confused. Everything was just wrong and upside down. “I don’t know what to do, Mom.”
A long sigh sounded and then her mother said, “Elisa, do you love him?”
That was an odd question to ask. She barely knew Callum; true, they’d been working together for two years now and she liked him a great deal, he was sexy, and brilliant, and his accent was to die for, but…
“I don’t know, I feel crazy, passionate things when I’m around him. I feel like I can hardly breathe when he smiles at me, and like his mind, he was a Calvin Klein model and—”
“But that’s not what I asked you. I asked you do you love him?”
She sighed. “Of course not.” Pinching her nose, she said, “So I assume you’re getting at the fact that if I don’t love him, I must love Julian, and you know that’s true. But sometimes I’m scared that the passion is gone.”
Elisa could almost hear her mother shaking her head. “I’m going to share a secret with you, honey. One that most romantics will never own up to. Love is not an emotion, it’s a choice.”
Elizabeth laughed and Elisa frowned.
“Do you honestly think that after twenty years of marriage I wake up next to your father and still get the sensation of fireworks?”
“To be honest, I’d rather not think about you and Dad having sensations at all.” She chuckled, sticking out her tongue.
Elizabeth ignored her teasing. “What you’re describing, that’s what we call the puppy dog stage. We call it that, Elisa, because it’s short-lived and intense, but it’s not made to last. No matter how many men you date, or how long you keep searching, or how many times you think you’ve finally found ‘the one’ it will always, always go away.”
“Well, I know that.”
“No, dear, I don’t think you do. Because if you question whether what you and Julian have is still relevant than you’re failing to see my point at all. True love is so much more than sexual chemistry or attraction. True love is finding a mate who is as devoted to you as you are to them. Who w
ill hold your hand through the good and the bad. Who will love you even though you’ve begun to age, started to wrinkle, when your looks are no longer what they once were. Does this man in Ireland know you at all?”
The more her mother spoke, the harder Elisa dug her fingers into Julian’s pillowcase.
“Not really,” she squeaked out.
Callum knew her fondness for apples, and her love of blues music. He knew she was a featherweight when it came to her alcohol, and that she loved to swim. But all of that was just superficial.
Surface-level stuff anyone who knew her even a little would know. He didn’t know her well enough to have told her which major to pursue. If he decided tomorrow that he was over her, it would sting, but would she be devastated?
A year from now, would she care?
“Let me ask you this, consider your life ten years down the road. Who can you live without? If you can answer that honestly, you can make your choice.”
With her mother still on the line, Elisa searched her heart.
When she’d dated Thomas, she’d tried to turn him into a replacement for Julian. She didn’t want to do that with Callum. He was Julian’s opposite in almost every way. A nerdy Irishman who loved a good beer, making people laugh, and being the center of attention.
She liked his style, liked his manners, she liked everything about him really. Then she thought of Julian. His quiet contemplation of the world around them, the intensity with which he lived life, the way he loved her…
Her heart raced.
How he’d held her when she’d cried devastated tears at knowing her one chance at the Olympics had slipped her by. How he’d brought her that apple back in high school and set it on her tray. How he’d listened to her. Really listen. Julian knew her soul inside and out, and the fact of it was she knew his too.
Callum liked British rock. He had a fetish for all things cardigan sweaters, an obsession with American movies, and a love for medieval literature.
But if she were asked to name ten things he loved, she’d be lucky to get to five. With Julian her list was endless.
