“Which gallery?”
“The one here in town. The owner is good friends with Grams. I’m sure he was just doing me a favor, I don’t know. There’s an art show in Mount Gretna every year. It’s prestigious for this area, and a lot of the pieces get shows in Philadelphia. Some in Boston and New York. I’ve wanted to enter for years, but this is the first time I feel ready.”
“Then go for it,” Dexter said. “To hell with what anyone else thinks. No one’s opinion should matter but yours, Jules. If you love what you do, then screw it. Sell a painting to the Republican National Committee if that’s what it takes to live your dream. Never give up on that.”
“Dexter, that’s really sweet,” she choked out, blinking back more tears. Who would’ve thought Dex would be the one person whose pep talk she’d actually appreciate? “It is my dream, but like I told you a few days ago, it’s hard and scary, and…I haven’t painted seriously in a while.”
“Not true,” he said, rolling to his side and scooping up one of her hands. She froze at the unexpected touch, wanting more. “You painted the other day. See? New color stains on your fingers.”
For a moment, she looked at him through the darkness, preparing for what she knew she had to say next—something else no one else knew. “The last few months, I’ve been blocked, like I was missing something important I couldn’t find. At first I thought it was Grams, but even when I got here to the cottage, I still couldn’t do it.” She paused and closed her eyes in a long blink. “Until you.”
Having zero follow-up, she could only let the words hang in the air and land where they may.
Slowly, Dexter sat up, his face a blank canvas.
“Uh-uh, back down you go,” she said.
“No.” He moved to sit on the edge of the table, the sheet over his lower half. Well, at least the room was semi-dark so he wouldn’t see how badly she was blushing. “I’d like to know, what changed because of me?”
“Everything,” she said without thinking. “I can’t explain, it’s like I’m…open. Being with you opened me. I don’t know how or why, but I can’t express how grateful—”
“I don’t want gratitude,” he said, cutting her off midsentence. “Listen to me. You’ll do whatever you want, and it won’t matter what I say, but you have to keep painting. You love it, I know you do, because you light up when you talk about it. You fill the room with energy and warmth.” He took her shoulders so they were face-to-face. “Jules, it’s your dream. You’re going to paint every day until you have the perfect piece to enter that contest. You’ll win it, because you’re amazing. And then I’ll take you to the gallery in New York where it will hang. Awing the world forever.”
If not for his grip on her shoulders, she wouldn’t be able to sit up straight anymore. Those words… She’d never felt such support, even from Grams. Because this came from a man with no strings, no reason to say what he did. Except that he wanted more for her. He cared.
Though there was no way he cared for her on the same level she cared for him.
“Dex,” she whispered. “That means…”
“Jules.”
“…so much…”
“Juliet.” He cupped her cheek, his thumb moving across her skin.
Before she slipped away, she closed her eyes, trying desperately to drum up all the fears from before, how she swore she’d never love again or lose her identity over a man.
With Dexter, though, those fears didn’t exist. He knew her, all her quirks and needs to stay her own person. With him, she’d never have to worry about that.
His thumb traced across her lips, making her tremble. A heartbeat later, his thumb was replaced by his mouth, in the sweetest, deepest kiss.
Finally, she did slip away.
His other hand moved to her waist and in one swift motion, he pulled her onto his lap. “I’ve wanted to do this for days,” he said, his breath against her neck.
Jules took his face between her hands and tilted it to meet her eyes. “Really?”
He raised a wicked grin, then kissed her again, causing white dots to explode behind her eyes. Red dots. Rainbow dots.
“Your lips,” he said, running a finger across them. “Last night when the family was here, it took everything in me to not kiss you.”
“No.” She laughed.
He hugged her tight. “I almost jumped in the lake to cool off.”
Jules kissed him hard, combing her fingers through his hair. “My superhero,” she whispered. His hand slid inside the back of her shirt, making her shiver with pleasure, making her remember they were on a massage table, and she was one toga costume away from his body. The thought made her pull away, take a breath.
But Dexter unleashed a sexy growl and drew her back to him. “I’m not letting you go.”
He kissed her mouth, her collarbone, the notch at her throat. Everywhere he touched turned to fire, causing giddiness and relief like morphine to flood her bloodstream.
“I’ve never wanted”—he paused to kiss her forehead—“so much.”
“Dex,” she whispered, her breathing jagged. “You’re leaving tomorrow.”
“Am I?”
“Dex.” She curled her fingers around his shoulders, feeling hard muscles flex. “I’m not one of those other girls.”
“I know you’re not,” he said, tugging a strand of her hair that had fallen loose. “That’s exactly why I…” He didn’t finish but just stared into her eyes—his were dark with desire. “Juliet, you’re nothing like any of those other women.” Her eyes fluttered closed when he kissed her slowly until her body arched. “You’re my wife.”
Not a shred of doubt remained in her mind. Her last fear of Dexter not changing his womanizing ways was now gone, causing another burst of giddiness to zip through her veins.
“I understand, though,” he said, “if you don’t want to, if you don’t trust—”
“I do,” she said, cutting him off with a kiss. Afterward, she pulled back, looking him in the eyes first; then she glanced over his shoulder at the bedroom.
Dexter grinned, then kissed her squarely on the mouth. Next thing she knew, he was on his feet, whisking her away in his arms.
Chapter Fourteen
Dexter opened his eyes to see a pile of pillows beside him. It wasn’t a shock this time when they moved and yawned. “Hey,” he whispered.
The pile of pillows sprang limbs as two feet curled around his leg, and then hands found his chest. “Hey, you.”
He sighed contentedly as he pulled the whole pile of pillows over to him. Jules’s body was soft and warm, the underside of her hair still damp with sweat. She tucked her chin and Dexter ran a hand from her neck all the way down her spine. When he felt her body shudder against him, he wasn’t contented anymore.
“What time is it?” she asked. Her wild mermaid hair was curtaining one side of her face. He pushed his hands through it, never wanting to stop touching it. She rolled to her side, and his hand found her hip bone. Okay, so there were many, many places on Jules he never wanted to stop touching.
“After six,” he replied, skimming his fingers along the curve of her waist, up her arm. “At least I think so. The sun looks ready to set.”
“Six? Dex, you missed your three o’clock conference call.”
“Indeed.”
Dexter stared up at the ceiling, remembering back a couple of hours when he’d realized he was going to have to make a decision about that. This was around the same time Jules was demonstrating how flexible yoga made her, and in his brain, there was no decision to be made. But now—
Jules kissed his neck, and he closed his eyes, taking it in, the feeling of her soft lips, her breath, her little tongue. Damn… No decision at all.
“Did you sleep?” she whispered.
He rolled his head to face her, their noses touching. “A little.”
“Yeah, right.” She laughed and snuggled close, wrapping an arm around him. “You snore—not loudly, but you sleep like the dead.”
“You must be right about this house.” He kissed her nose. “It changes people.”
“Told ya.” She smiled. “Because believe me, I tried to wake you a few times.”
Dexter propped an arm under his head. “What did you plan on doing if you succeeded?”
Her big green eyes looked off to the side. “Well, I think I’d rather show you than tell—eep!”
All in favor of show over tell, Dexter pulled her on top of him, feeling her curves and softest places. “Baby, I do like the sound of that.”
“We have to eat first,” she said, her hair falling past her shoulders, landing on his face. “You especially. I know you didn’t eat much breakfast.”
“The apples were burned,” he whispered.
Her body shook with silent laughter. “They were perfect, pooh bear.” She ran a finger across his jaw, over his mouth.
His muscles flexed, then relaxed at her touch, like they had for the last five hours. Not only his body, but his mind and heart came alive when she was near. It was a new reaction, one he was just beginning to understand, but definitely loved.
“I’ll get us something,” she said. And before he could stop her, she was literally rolling off the bed.
“Jules?” He sat up after he heard a thud. “You okay?”
A second later, her head popped into view. “Fine.” She smiled and blew the hair out of her face. “Landed on pillows. Did you notice Grams loves pillows?”
He laughed and leaned against the headboard. “You don’t say.” When she stood up, she was wearing one of his T-shirts. “Plan on going somewhere?”
“No,” she said over her shoulder, framed in the doorway. “But you’ve also noticed how people tend to drop in any time of day without an invitation.”
“Now that I have noticed.” He also noticed that his shirt, though long on her, wasn’t quite covering everything it should in the back. Which made Dexter want to spring from the bed and drag her back with him.
“Coffee?” she called from the kitchen.
“Don’t think I need it. Just bring me a PowerBar—maybe two. Better make it three.”
“Trying to beat your own record?” she said, coming back with apple slices, some of the bread she’d made yesterday, one Hershey’s bar, and a bottle of water. “You really will need protein for that.”
“This time, I’ll remember all three.” He relished the feeling when Jules looked at him, then away, that irresistible blush marbling her throat.
“Then I guess we both better eat.” She sat cross-legged on the bed, the food between them like a picnic. “Open up,” she said, holding an apple slice.
Dexter bit it in half, then sucked the rest of it in, along with her fingers. “Delicious,” he said. “Best meal I’ve had all day.”
“May I have my hand back?”
“Oh.” He opened his mouth, releasing her fingers. “So sorry. I thought they were for me to keep.”
Jules leaned back and laughed, making the bed shake.
That laugh, he thought. That big, scrumptious mouth. All that joy.
She hand-fed him a piece of her homemade bread, slathered with butter and jam. Then he did the same for her. After they’d each had a few drinks of water, Dexter was so done eating.
“Hey,” he said, sliding a finger down her throat, then hooking it on the neck hole of her shirt. “Afraid I’m going to need this back now…”
It was the middle of the night when Dexter left the bedroom. He paused in the doorway to look at Jules, hair strewn across the pillows, moonlight making her fair skin glow. A volcano burned in his chest when he looked at her, thought about her.
But for now, he’d let her sleep.
His own mind wouldn’t let him do the same. It had been racing for the last hour until he finally couldn’t keep lying there.
He filled a glass at the sink—adding three drops of peppermint oil out of habit—pushed back the curtains from when Jules had drawn them for his massage, then gazed out the window. He smiled and shook his head. There was no way he was going to let her ruin this view.
The woman had plenty of charmingly screwball ideas, but he could talk her out of this one if he worked hard enough. His smile twisted as he thought of some creative ways he might convince her. They all required never leaving their bed.
Their bed. The pronoun had popped in his head without a thought. His wife. Their bed. It felt as natural as breathing.
The living room was striped with moonlight, and he nearly walked straight into the massage table. Both sheets were on the floor. He remembered the way she’d looked right before he’d kissed her. She’d never been so stunning.
His computer was plugged in but on the floor out of the way. Automatically, he stepped toward it, but then stopped. There were emails waiting, and probably even more missed calls on his cell since he’d blown off the conference call. Were they so important that he needed to deal with them in the middle of the night?
Maybe. Probably. Definitely.
Damn. He ran a hand through his hair. Jules is right. I really am a workaholic. What would she advise me to do right now? Repeat yoga mantras, then “breathe through it.” He laughed under his breath. Or maybe she’d tell me to zone out, or get lost in a painting until I found my Zen place.
At the thought, his eyes moved to one of her paintings on the wall. Even though the room was dark, the bright colors practically leaped from the canvass. This one was watercolor, and the red circles—which might’ve been abstract roses—blended halfway down, then bled together along the rest of the canvas. Wasn’t abstract art supposed to represent something?
What did bleeding roses symbolize? Death? Rain? A funeral during a monsoon?
He was supposed to have picked Jules’s brain about it yesterday, but he’d made a sharp left turn instead.
Another painting was wavy, vertical lines in orange and yellow that curled into waves in bright blue. One corner had two green dots. Dexter stared at it, concentrating, but couldn’t figure out what it was supposed to be. Sun rays? Why were they up and down? Were the green dots clouds? Airplanes? Two rendezvousing spaceships about to crash?
He shut his eyes, seeing waves, orange lines, bleeding roses, and a fiery crash.
His exhausted mind spun from lack of sleep and lack of order. Even his nonartistic brain understood that his subconscious was trying to tell him something—something he’d been pushing away, ignoring for hours.
Barely a second ticked by before he realized what it was.
He shouldn’t have missed the conference call. It was irresponsible, unprofessional, inexcusable, and even with the past week being so chaotic, there’d been no excuse to have dropped the ball, not when so many people were counting on him.
The team wasn’t prepared because he’d disappeared on them, and it would be entirely his fault when Friday’s meeting blew up in his face.
He had to fix this. Now.
There was nothing to do but ask the team to pull an all-nighter. Burning through an income he didn’t have anymore, but suddenly grateful for his bet winnings, he would book connecting suites at the Ritz-Carlton, and they’d push through. It was the only way; no time for anything else.
He gritted his teeth as he practically lunged for his laptop, powering it up impatiently. How the hell had he gotten so distracted?
For a split second, he wanted to blame Jules. If she would’ve reminded him about the meeting, maybe he wouldn’t have missed it. If he hadn’t been so thrown off schedule by being in this house with her, he wouldn’t have been distracted from work at all.
But that wasn’t fair. Even if it might’ve been partially her fault, Dexter couldn’t place the blame on her, even if that made it easier. Nothing to do now but try to fix the mess.
Jules knew what he was trying to do, and surely she’d understand why he had to leave. This was important, very important. In Dexter’s racing mind, it was the most important—it was everything.
If Jules didn’t understand that… Well, then he
’d be forced to do whatever he had to to make her.
Chapter Fifteen
Jules stretched out one leg, investigatively, but that side of the bed was empty. She sat up, alone.
“Dex?” There was no answer, but she heard movement in the kitchen. Smiling, she pulled on the same shirt that he’d sexily removed from her last night, painfully slowly, kissing each inch of her skin as he exposed it.
Holy maithuna. She might never wear another piece of clothing ever again.
Dexter wasn’t in the kitchen, but on the couch, typing on his computer faster than lightning. “Hey, you. Good morning.”
He typed for another few seconds, then lifted his chin. “Hey.”
“Whatcha doing?”
“Working. I should’ve sent this out yesterday.”
She sat on the arm of the couch. “Tell them it’s late because you were all tied up.”
“Yeah,” he said, typing again. “That won’t fly with the board of directors.”
She slid off the arm and landed beside him. “Hi there,” she whispered, then kissed his cheek. It took a second, but Dexter finally turned his face and kissed her.
“Hi.” He looked at her for a moment, but his expression wasn’t right, not like before. Well, actually it was exactly the same as before…exactly like the morning they woke up in Vegas. He blinked his blue eyes, wearily.
“How long have you been up?” she asked.
“Since three.”
“Working the whole time?”
He nodded while reading his computer screen.
Jules opened her mouth to say something else, but the words stalled. Dexter was completely dressed. No tie or jacket yet, but black pants, black belt, pressed white button-down. He was even wearing his shiny shoes.
Wife for the Weekend Page 19
