Concierge

by Stella Barcelona

  “I can’t force...” She drew a deep breath and her shoulders shook more. Still face down, she continued, “...myself to do push-ups. I s-s-suck at them on a good day. Oh God. What the hell?!” Sniffle. Sob. “Dammit. I can’t stop crying and I don’t cry in front of people. Damn. Damn. Damn.”

  “It’s okay,” he said, leaning forward so he could hear her whisper. “I could tell you were in a funk. I thought a workout would make you feel better. I’m sor—”

  “Don’t.” She turned her head in his direction, flattening her right ear on the mat. Her gaze found his. “Don’t say sorry. Please.” More tears welled and dripped out, unchecked. “Normally, I’d have loved for you to coach me through a vigorous workout.”

  “I was being a hardass, though.” Because I’m turned on, and I’m trying not to be, and trying not to show pity, because I know you hate it. “Sor—”

  “Stop saying you’re s-s-sorry. I hate sympathy. It’s a c-c-close cousin to pity. I can’t stand either of them from other people, because I obviously have enough on my own.” A steady stream of tears was flowing. “I should’ve been able to work out.”

  “It was an apology. Not sympathy.”

  She nodded. “But now I have you worried about me being too sensitive to handle what you were dishing out. And you’re going to treat me like I am different. And that’s what I hate. I should’ve been able to shake this feeling of…of…oh crap.” She gave him a pained glance, then turned her head from him, pulling her towel close, fisting it as she wiped her nose and eyes. “You can go now. I won’t be exercising. I need a few minutes to…be alone.”

  Instead of leaving, he lay down on his mat, flat on his stomach, and turned his head to her. Each sob, each sniffle, wrecked his gut a little more. Thankfully, his erection had subsided, as a solid flood of concern filled his mind.

  After a few minutes, she turned to him. “Why are you still here?”

  That question, he could answer honestly. “Don’t think I’ve ever walked out on someone who was crying.”

  “Now would be a good time to start.”

  “Nah. I’d rather stay, if that’s okay with you.”

  She shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

  He shifted so that he was in a more comfortable position, lying on his side, his right hand in front of him, propping him up. She shifted and lay on her side, staring at him for a moment, then sniffed. More tears fell. Her cheeks were kissed by a delicious shade of cotton-candy pink that traveled down her neck, to her chest. He wished he had the courage to ask her if she wanted a hug. Or a shoulder to cry on.

  To hell with seeking permission. He could just reach for her and see where that took them. But he didn’t want to shut her down. So he stayed still, breathing in her soft fragrance of lavender and rose, and using his willpower to keep from reaching for her.

  “I didn’t realize the party would make me feel so bad. It kind of came at me out of the blue, too, when you and I were joking about sex.”

  Aw hell. Goddamn idiot. I should’ve known better. “I didn’t mean to make you—”

  “No, no,” she said, shaking her head, as more tears flooded out of her eyes. “It wasn’t you, or what you were saying. Well—” She sniffed. “Maybe it was. But it wasn’t your fault. You see?”

  “No.” He matched her low whisper, with his own soft voice. “Totally confused.”

  “It’s because that’s the kind of joking I used to do. Before the kidnapping. I had no hang-ups, not even about sex. Especially not about sex. I’m so different now, and the party reminded me of all the parts of me that are dead. I’d love to be that girl again who loved life so much that she’d try anything. My lack of professional drive might have given me too much time on my hands, but I was having f-f-fun, Gabe. I used to l-l-l-laugh.” Tears flowed in earnest. She took a moment to catch her breath. “All the time. I was happy. I used to smile, l-l-like you do.”

  Aw hell. I’ve got to touch her.

  He reached his hand out and used his index finger to swipe a lock of hair out of her eyes. “This okay?”

  She nodded.

  Working silken strands through his finger and thumb, he tucked the errant skein behind her ear, then ran his fingertips down her neck, along her collarbone, and down her left arm. Gently, he retraced the imaginary line. It was barely a whisper of a touch. In fact, it was absolutely the lightest touch he’d ever used on a woman, but it electrified him. Electrified her, too, he could see, because goosebumps that pebbled her skin pressed at his fingertips, despite the warmth of the room. He was so goddamn screwed. He knew this moment was going to be frozen in his mind forever.

  She met his eyes, with a slight and wobbly smile. “My father. Brandon. Phillip. Stone. Pic.”

  “Yes?”

  “I’ve just counted on one hand the men who I’ve consciously allowed to touch me since….” More tears flooded her eyes. “Then.”

  Hell. She just put me in the category of friends and relatives. Not exactly where I want to be. But still, I’m in a galaxy far away from being Agent Number One.

  “Oh God. Why can’t I stop crying?”

  “Because—”

  “Rhetorical, Gabe.”

  “But it ended with a question mark. I could hear it in your tone.” She chuckled, as he traced a line down her forearm, and back up, with whisper-soft touches that fueled another erection. “I’ve got all night to listen.”

  With the towel hiding her face, she said, “Do you always say just the right thing?”

  He chuckled. “Nah. Sometimes I get it absolutely wrong, ma’am.”

  At hearing the forbidden word, she laughed out loud. She shifted herself onto her back, then sat up and hugged her knees to her chest. With her movement, he let his hand fall away, reminding himself to take it slowly.

  “I’ve been in mourning for the old me for two and a half years, and tonight was officially the funeral.”

  He could see that more tears were building. Having nothing to say to make her feel better, he stayed silent.

  “Problem is, I don’t know what or who I am now. I don’t want to be like the old Andi. I was just as shallow as some of those people, and I don’t want to be like that again.” She glanced at him, her eyes brimming with tears. “But where does that leave me? If I’m not like my old self, what the hell am I supposed to be like?”

  “Is that one rhetorical?”

  She chuckled, despite herself. “Yes, but if you have an answer, I’m all ears. Do you have any bright, optimistic ideas on how I should fix myself, because trust me, I’ve gotten lots of advice. Nothing seems to work. I’m tired of overthinking the issue. Overthinking everything. Give me your idea. I’ll throw it on the pile of useless advice I’ve gotten since that asshole kidnapped me.”

  He shrugged. “From my point of view, there’s really nothing to fix. Just try being you for a while. Stop trying to fix anything.”

  “Being me? Exactly as I am?”

  “Yeah. Isn’t that who you’re being right now? In this exercise room? With me?”

  Her eyes welled with more tears, but she nodded.

  “Okay, so go with it. Tonight’s pretty memorable, right?”

  As she nodded again, he gave a slow nod, intended as encouragement. He wiped a tear from her cheek, hoping like hell their conversation would ultimately make her feel better.

  “From this point forward, if you’re uncertain, go with that. If you’re miserable, go with it. If you’re scared, happy, bitchy, or—” He paused. “—crying. Overthinking. Whatever. Just be you.”

  His words prompted her to grab her towel and bury her face in it. She cried hard, with her shoulders shaking, her breath heaving. “Surely someone’s told you this?”

  She kept her face buried in the towel for a long minute. Long enough for him to worry that his honesty wasn’t going to help her. After a while though, she lowered the towel and glanced at him. “If they did, I haven’t heard them. Everyone else tells me to stop doing things. Stop worrying. Stop obsessing
. Stop thinking about what happened. Lose the anxiety.”

  He gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze, then rested his hand there, dammit, because he wanted to hold her. Comfort her. “How’s that advice working out for you?”

  “Obviously not well.”

  “Then try it my way for a while. Be totally natural. Don’t filter anything out. Sort of like you’ve been with me for the last day and a half. I suspect I’ve gotten a strong dose of the real you. Be that natural with everyone.”

  “What if no one likes me?”

  “Never going to happen.”

  She dropped her hands, turned to him, and frowned. She looked pretty, even with a red nose and eyes that were filled with tears. “It could. I’m scared no one’s ever going to l-love me, or hell, even like me, if I’m just the ‘me’ I am now.”

  Are you kidding me?

  “Couldn’t possibly be true,” he said.

  She narrowed her eyes. “How are you so sure?”

  Well, buddy, that’s a direct question. Answer it. But be careful. Don’t scare her.

  He reached for the edge of the towel in her hand. Rubbed the terrycloth between his fingers and cleared his throat as he thought through how to start, because he hadn’t quite imagined he’d be laying his cards on the table so soon. But in the face of her abject misery, it seemed like the only move to make. With his pulse racing, every molecule in his body became aware that he was experiencing a moment of his life that he was going to remember until he died.

  “I think one day, someone’s going to see one of your paintings. Like Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door. And he’s going to be captivated by it. Immediately. The world’s positively going to start swirling around him as he studies it. He’s going to wonder how an artist created something so magical and compelling out of paint and canvas, because just looking at it makes him feel the emotions he feels when he hears that song.”

  Her head was resting on her knees and she was still hugging her legs in close. Instead of crying, her eyes had dried and she was studying him with full attention. “I don’t know who purchased that painting.”

  He stared at her for a long second, then shrugged, as he let the edge of the towel fall from his fingers. “Yeah. You do.”

  She stopped hugging her legs so tight. He continued talking in the abstract, because it was easier that way and because he could tell by the intense interest in her gorgeous eyes as her gaze fixed on him that she was drinking in every word. “Because he’ll see more of your paintings and be positively mesmerized, because he’s tried for years, to be creative. And he can’t. Just can’t do it. He’s going to be so amazed by your talent, he’ll lose his breath when he sees your art. Then he’ll see photos of you, and meet you in person, and he’ll know…that the paintings are only the beginning of your magic. Seeing your creativity was only the first wave of the magician’s wand for him. The abra before the cadabra.”

  She gave him a small smile.

  “The ball of fire shooting into the sky before the glittering fireworks explode in the night on the Fourth of July.” He ached to reach for her, but didn’t. “It’s going to take him a while to realize what’s hit him. A while to realize that what’s magical in the paintings…is you.”

  “A while?” There was a light tease to her voice. More skepticism. “How often do you make up this kind of stuff for women?”

  “I’ll answer your questions in order. About two days. And never before.” He paused. “May I continue? Because I haven’t yet made my point.”

  That earned him a smile.

  “All he’ll know when he first sees you…is that he needs to know more. With one eyeful of you, as you stand in your mudroom, with sunlight glinting off your hair, with two hundred percent of your attention focused on your paintbrushes, he’ll be hooked so hard, there will be just about nothing you can do to persuade that poor guy that he’s wrong about you.”

  The teasing and skepticism faded from her eyes as she listened, her gaze locked on his as he went deeper. “After a few minutes of talking to you, and seeing the ‘you’ that exists behind those gorgeous eyes of yours, he’ll be into you so much that watching you pull exercise socks on your lavender-painted toenails becomes the high point in his day, second only to hearing you voice his name for the first time. He’ll want to see if he can make you smile. Want to touch you. To hold you. Want to see what’s going to transpire when you embrace the idea of being you. Because his gut is telling him it’s going to blow his mind.”

  The room was silent for a long minute. He watched her breathe. Watched her think about what he’d just said. “That is the most wonderful thing anyone’s ever said to me. Thank you.”

  He chuckled. “And here’s my point. The best thing is all of that has nothing to do with the woman you were before your kidnapping, and everything to do with who you are now. See what your post-kidnapping self is capable of inspiring?”

  More tears fell, but these were different than the earlier ones. She wasn’t sobbing. It was as though his words had delivered the caress of reassurance he had intended. Through her tears, she gave him a soft smile. A real one. Slightly sad, but a smile nonetheless, and it sent his heart rate into the stratosphere. “How could you possibly be so optimistic? So...hopeful. About me?”

  “I’m wondering how could I possibly not?”

  “I’m too…needy for someone like you to feel like that.”

  Her words were like distant storm clouds. He drew a breath, glanced deeper into her eyes, and decided he’d weather the storm fine. “I get to decide how I feel and whether I’m interested. Not you.”

  “But I’ll just drag you down with me, and—”

  “I decide what is good for me. You focus on being you. Understand?”

  She stood quickly, wiped at her eyes with her towel, then looked down at him. “My head isn’t quite together, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  He nodded. “I think your head is more together than you’re giving yourself credit for. And no matter how much time you take, it’ll be worth the wait.”

  She walked to the doorway, then turned back to him before leaving the exercise room. “I’m going upstairs to paint for a while.”

  “Great idea. You get homemade chocolate chip cookies for your efforts this evening. They’ll be ready in twenty. You can eat them with reckless abandon, which you’ll want to, because I saw the store-bought brand you have in your studio. Trust me. These are better. Tomorrow’s workout will be extra rigorous, since you wimped out tonight.”

  “I thought they have no calories, due to your rule about chocolate and Valentine’s Day.”

  He laughed. “So you paid attention?”

  “Of course.”

  Standing in the center of the doorway, he watched her draw a deep breath. “I’m glad that Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door found a good home. It’s abstract, but I was painting Pic. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Figured as much.”

  Cocking her head to the side, she asked, “Where are you hanging it?”

  “Home.”

  Her brow furrowed. “I don’t know where you live.”

  “Don’t think that matters. Frankly, I think I’ve just told you everything about me that you’ll ever need to know.”

  She laughed. “Where do you live, Gabe?”

  “Right now, home’s a condo in Miami. But I’m building a house in Georgia, near one of our training facilities where I teach. It would’ve been perfect there, hanging above the mantle.”

  “Would have been?” Luminous eyes studied him.

  “Yeah. Don’t think I can put into words why that might have changed.”

  Because I’m going to hang it wherever we are. I first saw you Friday afternoon, when I opened the client file. In the stratosphere I’ve been living in since I saw you, the hours have amounted to light years. My home will always be with you. Don’t ask me how I know this. I just do.

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Pic

  Monday, February 15, 12:05 a.
m.

  The funny thing about leather was that it was hot as hell to wear in the summer, but when he needed it to be really warm, like fucking now, it didn’t do shit to help. Pic wore one pair of jeans, two t-shirts, and he’d even pulled on two sweatshirts under his bomber jacket. He had the hood of one of his sweatshirts pulled up, over his head. The scarf the lady on the bus had given him was wrapped around his neck, covering his mouth and nose. Except for an extra pair of jeans tucked in the bottom of his backpack, with a couple of t-shirts, he was wearing all of his clothes. And he was still freezing.

  It had taken his last scrap of energy to climb the levee, walk across the crest, then go about ten paces down. With the berm rising behind him, no one would see him if they drove on the street that paralleled the levee. Once he saw that no one was there, he collected a few rocks. Sitting cross-legged, he ignored moisture that immediately seeped through his jeans and wet his ass.

  I’ll rest here for a minute or two, then get up.

  Clouds concealed the moon in the dark sky. Thick swirls of fog were lifting off the river. A big ship glided by, its foghorn sounding in droning blasts as it made the bend in the river. The temperature seemed to be dropping, but maybe that was just a trick the humidity was playing. Tonight brought the suck-ass reality home that humidity made every temperature feel more extreme.

  He had to get somewhere with cover, someplace that wasn’t so obvious, because he had no doubt the two assholes from last night were on the lookout for him. A brass-knuckled punch wasn’t just a punch and the one he’d thrown was awesome, even if he did say so himself. He’d landed a royal fuck-you-and-your-whore-of-a-mother kind of punch. Not easily forgotten. And that guy whose cheekbone and lip were never going to be the same, looked like the kind that could make him pay for it.

  Another five minutes, and I’ll get up.

  His ears were so stopped up, sounds from the outside world were muted, but on planet misery, where he’d crash landed, a steady whump-a-whump-a-whump pounded in his head. His nose felt like it was being squeezed and pushed out from the inside. Because his teeth felt pressurized, like at any moment he’d be able to spit them out, shivering hurt. Yet he was so fucking cold, he couldn’t stop his jaw from moving and his teeth from clacking together. Coughing up the fluorescent green slime that filled his lungs hurt, because now his back hurt, as if someone who knew how to throw fists had used his back for a punching bag.