Unfinished Sympathy (Absolution Book 1)

by Amélie S. Duncan

  His expression was dark when we parted, his breath as staggered as mine. “When you kiss me like that, I forget to control myself.”

  “Then just go with your feelings. I want you to,” I whispered.

  I took his hands and lifted them to my breasts. He groaned as he squeezed them, his thumbs tracing the outlines of the hard points through my shirt, and I shuddered again as they swelled in his hands. He kissed my face my neck and then my lips, harder, deeper, sucking my tongue.

  My head fell forward, and I panted, yearning for him to take my clothes off. But Paul took no more of my body than I gave him. He held my breasts, stroking my sensitive nipples hard through my shirt with his thumbs, watching me become unable to control myself. I moaned and writhed in his powerful hands.

  Paul’s lips took mine again, but I could feel him pulling away until he let me go. His hands caressed my flushed face and he breathed heavily, our foreheads touching.

  “Why won’t you? I want you to,” I said breathless.

  “Believe me, I want to, but we have time. I like how we’re connecting.” He kissed me on the forehead and stepped out of the room, calling back. “Good night, beautiful.”

  He closed the door, and I fell back on the bed. It was soft as cotton but held firm.

  If someone else had said he wanted to take his time with me, I’d be sure that was what he meant, but Paul wasn’t so easy to pin down. He thought about things so differently than anyone I’d ever met. And if I were to follow his lead and go with my experience, I’d say I was happy with him. Something I hadn’t been before.

  After lying there for too long thinking about it, I tore myself away from the comfort to clean up and take off my jeans and shirt. Before I fell asleep, I sent a quick message to Destiny.

  5:03 A.M. I’m sleeping at Paul’s (just sleep). We kissed. #Missyou #SweetDreamsBestie

  I would wait until I got home to share the rest.

  She was up and sent back a meme of a dancing cat.

  5:07 A.M. #Happydance #SweetDreamsBestie

  I laughed, then crawled under the covers and fell asleep.

  I couldn’t sleep past two in the afternoon, so I got up, showered and went downstairs. Paul was in his office, working. He lifted his arm for me to come around to him and took my waist, then kissed my lips. “How did you sleep?”

  I made a silly sleepy gesture with my head to the side with my mouth open, and he laughed.

  “I’m well rested and you’re up and working,” I said. “You must be tired.”

  “Last night was my normal,” he said, standing. “I kept you going much later than I planned, but sometimes the feeling is just right, and you reach the point where everything comes together. You can’t stop.”

  “Yes,” I agreed. “I felt it. The music was magical. Thank you for giving me that. It’s fun to try something I haven’t done before.”

  We went into his kitchen, and there were waffles, eggs, sausages and an array of fruit set up on the island. “We have more than enough to eat if you’re hungry.”

  “It won’t go to waste.” I piled up my plate and took a seat at the built-in nook. “What are your plans for the rest of the week?”

  “More of you,” he said flirtatiously, taking the seat across from me. “Absolution is close to finish. The rest of the soundtrack is coming along. I’d say we’ll come out ahead of our projected time of nine months with Emono.”

  “Oh. That means we won’t be working together for much longer,” I said. That meant he would be moving on.

  “We’re not there yet,” he said, as if he was following my train of thought. “Besides, I’d still like to have my lucky charm around me.”

  “How about hanging out with your lucky charm tonight?” I asked. “I could go to work from here.”

  “How about later in the week?” he said, his tone even. “I have a date with someone I arranged through a match-service a while ago. She’s coming back from a photoshoot in Madrid, or Paris, I don’t know, somewhere in Europe…”

  I heard a roaring in my ears and lost track of whatever else he was saying as my heart dropped to my pained stomach. My mind sought to soothe and explain why I shouldn’t be hurt. We weren’t even officially dating. But that didn’t stop me from thinking of the many days we’d spent together talking, laughing, playing music. The way he looked at me and touched me. The times we’d kissed. All the ways I felt for him had me trying to find the moment which would have shown me I wasn’t who he wanted to be with. That he wanted to stay out there and search for someone else.

  I focused back on our conversation and realized he had stopped speaking. When I looked at him, his face morphed into alarm. Being caught off guard, I couldn’t mask my hurt, and I didn’t want to keep hurting in front of him, so I said, “Well then, I think it’s best I go home.”

  The words struggled against the lump lodged in my throat. I could hear my pain, and the pull to connect this pain with all the rest of what was hurting me. I couldn’t bear it.

  My utensils made a noise on the plate when I released my grip on them and stood. Paul kept talking.

  “You don’t have to leave. Please, sit back down. You haven’t eaten your food. You could come over tomorrow, if you’d like. I’ll pick you up Friday and you can stay over Saturday night and Sunday…. It’s just dinner, nothing more. I can explain.” His voice was louder and less refined than usual. “The two of us are just getting together to talk, nothing else. Why do I feel like the asshole now? Come on, Aubrey. Let’s talk this out.”

  He reached for my hand, but I moved it away. I didn’t want to feel the connection that made me believe that there was much more between us.

  “Aubrey, please let me hold your hand.” His hand remained close, waiting for me to cross over to him, but if I did, that would mean I accepted what he was doing, and I couldn’t. My heart wouldn’t let me.

  “If you won’t let me touch you now, let me know how you feel,” Paul asked, gentling his tone. “I need to know what you want from me.”

  My voice was scratchy, and I sought to clear it before I tried to speak again. “I… I thought…”

  I stopped. I’d thought the reason he’d said all those things about passion and connection was that he wanted them with me. I believed him when he said we were building something good, something that wasn’t just about the music.

  I ran my hand down my arms and held myself. Gunnar’s words came back: Paul was flaky and would make me feel special, but I’d find I wasn’t special to him at all. Maybe this was what he did with other women and they went along with his whims to keep him. I couldn’t do that.

  He stood and placed his hands over my own, and when I didn’t stop him, he wrapped his arms around me. His solid warmth and incredible scent cocooned me. “We’re only meeting up to talk. There won’t be anything else, honestly.”

  “Nothing physical may happen, but you’re still sharing your time with someone else.” I swallowed hard. Just talking was how we’d started, too. Had this always been his plan? Was this why he’d held back last night? No matter—he didn’t want me.

  I broke from his hold and gathered myself, and my dignity.

  “I understand what you want, and it’s your right, but I won’t stand in the way of your chance to build a relationship with someone,” I said.

  Just not with me. I hadn’t risked looking at him, but his magnetic drive was too strong.

  When I did, my heart constricted with the pained look marring his face now.

  He took an audible, deep breath as he ran his hands through his hair before he looked at me. His jaw was taut; his voice rough as he spoke. “I want you, damn it. There was nothing more I wanted to do than fuck you last night, but I can’t just do that. People I cared about and trusted have threatened me or brought sexual harassment lawsuits against me. Believe me, it changes you completely when something like that happens. I want to continue seeing you, but we haven’t reached the point where we are exclusive with each other. Hell, we haven’t
even discussed ‘us’. Come on, Aubrey.”

  I nodded a few times stepping back to make more space between us. What he said probably made perfect sense for him, but not me. I’d already grown too attached to him to accept him with someone else now.

  “What you’ve said is true, but I don’t go out and kiss someone then start dating someone else. If that’s what you want, we can just be friends. As you say, we haven’t even started officially dating.”

  He shook his head “No. I don’t want that,” he said sharply. “I can’t do that with you. We’re more than friends, Aubrey, and you know it.”

  He gently took my face in his large hands and lightly stroked my cheeks with his thumbs. “I don’t want to end what we have. I enjoy our time together. I want us to continue seeing each other. If my going out on a date makes you feel uncomfortable, we can slow down what we do together physically. As much as I want to touch you, I’ll try it for you. When we’re ready and with less complications maybe we can see where we can go together.” His blue-green eyes seared me as they implored me to agree.

  He would stop kissing and caressing me while he dated someone else meant I wasn’t enough for him. He wanted to keep looking for a better opportunity.

  I averted my eyes. “I don’t want to do that. I just want to leave.”

  I walked into the living room. He didn’t follow me, though after I had my shoes and bag, he was there at the foot of the stairs. “I’ll take you home.”

  “I want to ride the subway,” I said hoarsely.

  “I don’t want to leave you alone,” he said. “Give me a second.” He stumbled over his call to Regan and grabbed his shoes, forgetting a jacket. The rain pounded down on the large factory windows.

  I swallowed down my impulse to say something and remind him I didn’t want him to come with me.

  “Regan’s across town picking up some work for me, if you’ll wait.”

  “I’m ready to go now,” I said. “It’s fine.”

  He grasped my hand stroking the back of it. “I don’t want to end what we have just because I’m going to talk to someone else. I’m not getting physical with her. Hell, I don’t even know her.”

  I pulled my hand out of his and tightened it around my handbag. “Give her time.”

  “Is that what you really want?” he said. “I don’t believe it.”

  “I just want to be left alone right now,” I said, and turned towards the elevator and pressed the call button. He was a palpable presence next to me and it took a lot to ignore him, but I had to shut him out to protect myself.

  “I could’ve kept the date from you, but that’s not my way,” he said.

  Was this his way? If he says something that makes it all okay? If it were, had he made other arrangements with women besides me, and had they agreed?

  “Is Cara okay with you ‘talking’ with me?” I asked him.

  He gave me a confused look before his face hardened to stone.

  “No. She’s dating Recon, but it’s not public yet. I sat with her to show we were friends and had no more animosity between us. I also thought it’d protect you from Daniel’s suspicions. I never tried to abuse our relationship. I made this date weeks ago. She’s due here in hours. It wouldn’t be fair to her to cancel it.”

  I touched my chest. My heart was too full I was sure it would burst. The feelings so raw, I could barely take it. He wanted to be fair to her. What about me? We’d spent time together, but he wanted to continue dating. That was the difference. I’d spent the same time with him and knew there wasn’t anyone else I wanted.

  “It would be unfair to me also. You claim you want real. This is me being real with you. Goodbye, Paul.”

  The elevator doors opened, and I left.

  Paul

  I went over to my liquor cabinet and poured myself a double scotch. I wasn’t one to turn to drink or drugs when I had a problem. I usually talked friends back from doing stupid shit. Now I was doing it. First with Siena and now with Aubrey. What the fuck was wrong with me?

  I had to stop myself from demanding to take Aubrey home. She’d be soaked before she even made it down the block. She would be alone thinking I didn’t care about her. All I wanted to do was fuck her last night and I know she would have let me too. But this date I made was still in the back of my mind, and I couldn’t do it.

  I knew damn well Aubrey wasn’t the type to go along with me dating someone else. She expected us to be exclusive from the minute I kissed her. However, I explained it didn’t change that I was going out with someone other than her. I could have told her that the date was for the public and my sexual harassment case. If I did that, it would mean I was ready to start a new relationship, and I wasn’t.

  I cared for Aubrey, but I wasn’t even free from my ex. I was still fighting her bullshit lawsuit every day. And Aubrey and I were both still dealing with my contract with Emono Games. She had no idea how hard I had to fight behind the scenes to keep her at Crane Productions without showing I wasn’t giving her preferential treatment. I worked on her too, encouraging her to stand up for herself. It was the only way she’d survive in this business in the long run. But there was no denying it. I wanted her.

  Watching her last night go all in, all heart, with the music; I couldn’t resist. Her beauty, talent, and drive had me weak. I wanted to connect to that passion. I wanted it to be a part of me. But rebounding wasn’t what I wanted for Aubrey. I wanted to slow us down so we can see where we are, but she tossed me out cold, cutting herself off from me. And I didn’t like it.

  She didn’t even tell me how she felt about me. She wanted me to risk everything. But how could I take that risk with her when she constantly hides things about herself from me. I only found out about the little boiler issue she was sorting out because Gunnar suddenly grew a conscience. What else was she hiding from me?

  She kept her secrets and from the get-go had made it clear that her job came first. In truth, she needed her job more than she needed to have something with me. I should feel the same, but I didn’t. Even with all her secrets, I still wanted to be with her. And that was why I knew I couldn’t go on that date.

  I took my phone out to cancel and found a message from Ines, along with a picture of her in a topless bikini. An unsolicited, semi-nude selfie that showed confidence and a comfortability with her body. It also gave me the impression I wasn’t the only one that she’d sent it to. Her message told the rest.

  3:11 p.m. Don’t you have a place in the Cayman Islands? How about we go to the beach for a three-day weekend instead of going to a restaurant?

  Ines did her homework. She knew what I had financially and decided to upgrade our date to a fuck-cation. In the past, I’d probably agree to it to. It’d give me a much-needed break. We would have the paparazzi follow. I’d look like a wealthy man without a care in the world with my hot new girlfriend. I’d get no-relationship-pressure fucks and she’d get new selfies to advertise herself. She’d stay as long as I’d be willing to give her the rich and famous lifestyle. No doubt she knew that wasn’t the lifestyle I lived, but more the one that she was directing me to go if I was to be with her.

  The Ineses of the world didn’t care about books or movies. She would have offered sex instead of sharing a meal with me after I seen her naked at the yoga center. She’d passively listen to me when I shared about the latest music I heard that excited me so much that I couldn’t sleep. She wouldn’t suggest going to billiards and cheat at the games. She wouldn’t be satisfied with a song I wrote for her.

  Aubrey would.

  She was the one that I wanted to see naked again. She was the one I wanted to kiss and touch until she begged me not to. She was the one I wanted to travel alongside and have a fuck-cation with. Nothing good came easy.

  I sent Ines a message back.

  3:17 p.m. I’m canceling our date. I’ve just canceled my match service membership. Good luck.

  It took a few days before I saw Aubrey again. I opened my office door and found her standin
g there. She had on a T-shirt and jeans. Her long, dark hair was down and covering part of her face. But I still noticed the dark circles under her eyes. Had I done that to her, or had something else happened besides the boiler? I asked her directly.

  She lowered her eyelids letting me know she was about to lie. “No. I was just coming to remind you I’ll be at Emono Games this afternoon … I’m fine. You don’t need to worry about me.”

  I took a deep breath to stay calm and not argue. “I do worry. I didn’t like how we left things between us when you left my place. I can’t see you hurt without wanting to do something about it. I miss you. Tell me what you want from me.”

  Her chest rose and fell, and she wet her lips. “I don’t know what you want me to say…you’ve your dates—”

  “—If I tell you I didn’t go on that date would it change how you feel?” I asked.

  She blinked her big green eyes up at me and my heartbeat went faster. I realized right then that she’d made her way inside of it. I hadn’t a chance in hell since I reached for her on the train.

  “I…I know we’re not together, and we never had a commitment,” she said. “I had hoped….” She hesitated.

  “What had you hoped? Please tell me,” I pressed.

  Her lips parted as if she was going to say something and let me in.

  My hands trailed down the sides of her face coaxing her further. “Tell me what you want and it’s yours.”

  For a few seconds she seemed to consider it, but then her body tensed, and she closed her arms around herself, averting her eyes and shutting me out.

  “I need you to move on and forget about what happened between us. I’m over it now.”