Wild Fling or a Wedding Ring?

by Mira Lyn Kelly

  Her breath sucked in on a hiss. She’d been a fool. And the pained expression on Jake’s face said that he was seeing her recognition.

  The worst kind of fool.

  He’d told her—warned her—from the very first night, but somewhere along the way she’d forgotten. Let her heart take the lead in a relationship that was supposed to remain skin-deep. And now Jake was looking at her as if this was goodbye. Not because she’d accused him of sleeping with another woman and once again jumped to the wrong conclusions, but because he’d seen in that moment when she’d been proved wrong the purity and depth of her relief. He’d figured out something she hadn’t even admitted to herself.

  “Cali, you’re too invested in this.”

  “No.” The harsh denial had left her lips before her brain had time to process the decision she’d already made. The answering silence spoke as loudly as the doubt written across Jake’s face. But she wouldn’t let him go. Not after having only the barest taste of being with him. Just enough to let her know how desperately she needed more.

  She didn’t need him to love her. She’d lived without it for so long, and she could live without it from Jake. Because whatever it was he’d been giving her this last week, and even before that, was enough. Was wonderful. All she needed was just more of that. Being with him. Laughing with him.

  “It doesn’t have to be love.”

  Clearing his throat, Jake leveled her with a heartfelt stare. “This was supposed to be a fling. Just a fling. Something it seemed like we both needed. Wanted. A feel-good, sexy good time between two consenting adults who were clear from the start they weren’t looking for something serious.”

  She could see the banked heat behind his stare. The desire was there, burning in him the way it always burned in her. Only he was fighting it. Being careful of her.

  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “And I don’t want this to end.” She wouldn’t let it.

  The wheels began to spin as problems and solutions sped through her mind. Costs and returns. Needs versus wants. Every kind of workaround. Cali had made her career of thinking past problems to meet her goal. This time she’d do it for herself—and just that fast she had a plan.

  Her seeing Pam, coupled with his realizing how deeply Cali cared for him, had pushed every commitment-phobic button he had. She just needed to put them back on safer ground. Give him the space to get comfortable again and everything would be fine. She could do that.

  “You’re right. Maybe I got carried away.” She let out a cool laugh she only hoped sounded more convincing than it felt. “I mean, let’s face it, you’re a lot of fun.”

  Jake’s shoulders stiffened, his brow drawing down as he studied her. He’d caught the change, but didn’t trust it.

  Balanced at the edge of the couch, she forced her posture to loosen. Slid one leg over the other, positioning her knees at a sharper angle toward Jake as she leaned back on one hip into an exaggerated seductive pose that caused the hem of her skirt to inch up her thigh and Jake’s intent gaze to follow.

  “I get that this isn’t about forever. Okay. I don’t need forever. I need London. But before I get there…” she reached down to flick a little piece of nothing from the turn of her ankle, allowing her fingers to run a short distance up her calf “…I wouldn’t mind having a little more of you.”

  “Cali.” He shook his head, closing his eyes with a rough groan. “I don’t believe you. You’re talking like a different woman than the one who was sitting here with me, her heart in her eyes, two minutes ago.”

  “I’m talking like a woman who can understand the concept of having a good time.” Cali leaned further into Jake’s space, noting the whitening of his knuckles as her breath feathered over his ear. “We have fun, Jake.” Her breasts brushed against his arm. “I won’t let you hurt me.”

  “Cali,” he groaned, an instant before dragging her across his lap to straddle his thighs. Crushing her mouth with his kiss, demanding more. She opened to him, took the thrust of his tongue with a desperate moan, shivering as he licked once and again. Everything would be fine. Jake was holding her. So strong. So right. Gripping her with hands that sought to touch every part of her at once. Devouring her with the kisses of a starving man. How could he have thought they could end this?

  He pulled back with a harsh curse, his fists balling in the bunched fabric of her skirt. A question stood clear against the stark heat of his gaze.

  She nodded once.

  “It’s a fling, Jake.” All confidence. No emotion. “So make me feel good.”

  Jake wrenched the tap closed and stood naked in his shower, chest heaving, muscles bunched, glaring at the wall.

  His palm hit the tile with a resounding smack. How the hell had he ended up in her bed, in her body, spilling himself inside her, when he’d stepped through her door with every intention of making a clean break and walking straight out.

  But that was not how it had gone. He’d started to tell her goodbye, and she’d looked at him with those gorgeous green eyes and told him she wanted him. Didn’t need more than he had to give.

  There was no way she was as cool as she was playing it. And he’d known it even as he’d watched the words fall from her lips. But that had been part of the problem. He’d been watching her lips. That mouth. Thinking about how it felt moving over him. And when she’d crossed her legs….

  She’d done it on purpose, knowing he couldn’t be within fifty feet of her without wanting to pin her against the nearest flat surface. And then that unbelievable concession. She’d suggested a fling, and he’d snatched it from her fingertips so fast he hadn’t even realized what he’d done until Cali was spread over his lap, moaning into his mouth. And two hours later he’d staggered out of her bed, already half hard for her again, dishing up some lame excuse about not spending the night to avoid any confusion.

  Nice guy. He could kick his own ass for letting things get so far out of hand so fast.

  He dried off and whipped the towel at the hamper in disgust. He was always so careful. Picking women with an innate understanding that their relationship wouldn’t extend beyond passing a few evenings together—sharing some spectacular food at chic restaurants, a little intelligent conversation, followed by a few rounds of no-strings sex. Not women who’d taken a three-year hiatus from dating and all but screamed from their every action that they wouldn’t be able to keep the line between physical and emotional intimacy from blurring. From confusing lust with something—something more.

  He’d been off his game with Cali from the start, intrigued by the novelty and challenge of so many conflicting signals coming from such an enticing package. Stop and go. Yes and no. Sexy and shy. The good girl who did bad things. There was only one signal that remained steady, burning bright. That single beacon he hadn’t been able to lose sight of. The smoldering heat between them was a constant. Whether she was enraged or listening attentively, telling him goodbye or laughing in his arms, it never cooled—and that should have been warning enough.

  But he’d liked it. Too much.

  And, ego-driven jackass that he was, he hadn’t recognized the danger of breaking his own rules. He’d gotten caught up in the chase, working for her in a way he couldn’t ever remember working for a woman before. Her hesitance to get involved had been exciting, challenging, and had given him a false sense of security about her unwillingness to commit.

  Stupid.

  Because of course he’d caught her. And, blindly reveling in the thrill of conquest, he hadn’t even noticed when she’d begun bombarding him with one incredible sensation after another. The sight of those green eyes glinting with mirth. The sound of her laughter whispering through the night. The feel of her sigh washing over his chest as she drifted off to sleep. The scent of her hair as he woke with his nose buried in the soft tumble of it. The taste of abandon when she gave in to his kiss. She was a full-scale assault on his senses, and he’d been heedlessly following this feel-good tug at his heart until he was te
etering at the edge of that sinkhole of contentment he’d spent the last four years so deftly trying to avoid. Poised to wade in.

  And then to discover she was already there!

  What a mess.

  Dressing for a day of patient appointments he hadn’t had enough sleep to look forward to, Jake jammed his legs into a pair of khaki trousers, and buttoned up a white Oxford shirt. As mad as he was at Pam for dropping out of thin air with her usual sense of selfishness and bad timing, it was more than obvious he owed her one this time. It hadn’t taken more than a few hours with his ex-wife within cursing distance to clear his head of the emotional fog that had settled there. To realize how complacent he’d allowed himself to become and to figure out that he needed to stop what was happening with Cali before it spun any further out of control than it already had.

  Okay, so he hadn’t managed to end the relationship. She’d made it too easy, given him too many ways to justify keeping what he wasn’t ready to give up. Yet. But this thing between them—no matter how they redefined the boundaries—wasn’t going to last. He didn’t want it to. And Cali was going to London—or wherever they assigned her next. She wasn’t staying in Chicago. Hadn’t even made any noise about wanting to stay. At least that was something.

  Yeah. Right.

  Draining his single-serve espresso in one scalding gulp, he thought of the three-day conference coming up in Colorado. Three days. More like five if he worked the travel and packing right. It could be a natural breaking point.

  They’d have a couple of weeks before he left. Time to get each other out of their systems—though he sure had a way to go before he got her out of his—time to have some fun. To make up for a few of those years Cali had gone without.

  The truth was, he wasn’t that phenomenal a catch for a woman with any kind of emotional capacity. Within a few weeks Cali would figure that out for herself. She’d be happy when he took off, and relieved when they didn’t pick things up after he got back.

  It was win-win. For both of them.

  Right.

  He stalked out into the hall, still carrying too much tension from the night before. Juggling his keys in his palm, he ended up somehow twisting the apartment key so its teeth caught in the smaller ring of his car key and wedged in place.

  Come on. There—he almost had it. How in the hell—? “Damn it!”

  “Good morning to you too.”

  Jake jerked his head around, to find Cali peering over his shoulder, amusement glinting in her all too alert eyes. She was wearing a creamy silk blouse and a knee-length skirt that might have made another woman look like the school principal, but on her….

  “Cali, hey—”

  “I hate it when that happens. Here, let me try.” Casting him an impish wink, she reached around him and plucked the keys from his hand. “I have less emotion invested.”

  Jake barked out a laugh, catching her lighter mood and the straightened keys as she tossed them back. “My hero,” he said, locking the door and then turning to wrap an arm around her shoulders—stopping himself an instant before he stiffened, gave himself away, made them both uncomfortable.

  That wasn’t going to happen. Just like pulling her into an embrace and backing her into his apartment to spend an hour or so in bed wasn’t. Shake it off.

  “Why don’t you let me buy dinner tonight as thanks?” He’d take her out to someplace cool. Give her a few Chicago experiences to remember him by. He glanced down at the vee where the silk of her blouse overlapped, shifting with her each step down the hall. Give her a few more when they got back.

  “Dinner sounds terrific. Is seven-thirty okay?” Cali peered up at Jake as they walked down the hall together, acting as if last night their relationship hadn’t been hanging in the balance. As if they hadn’t made love, only to have Jake rise minutes later to return to his apartment rather than sleep with her, as he had before. She’d seen him waiting for her to freak when he’d told her he thought it might be “a good idea”.

  It hadn’t seemed like a good idea at all, but she’d simply smiled and stretched, offering a teasing glimpse of her body as the sheet slipped below one breast. And then she’d wished him sweet dreams, acting as though she hadn’t seen his gaze riveted to that swell of exposed skin. It had been a head-game. Something she’d have sworn she didn’t have the first inclination to play, but she needed him to know she was fine…and she wanted him to hate to leave.

  Jake flashed his even white teeth in approval, though somehow it didn’t seem quite like the easy smile he always seemed so ready to give. The blue pools of his eyes didn’t reveal anything of his thoughts or emotions, just reflected light back at her in a way she found more disconcerting than when he’d gotten up to leave the night before.

  She could handle this.

  “It’s a date, then,” he said, jabbing at the call button for the elevator.

  Fighting the tremble trying to work its way through her lips, she nodded, quickly looking away. It was a fling.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  A WEEK had passed, and Jake had taken Cali out nearly every night. This evening they were seated in the tightly woven rattan chairs of Le Colonial, where the presentation of French-Vietnamese cuisine was as memorable as the unique blend of flavors—fresh and hot, sweet and tangy—that burst over the tongue. They’d sipped lemongrass martinis, surrounded by banana trees and potted palms, with Jake feeding her bites of wok-seared monkfish with chili, lemongrass and peanuts as he charmed her with childhood stories of Amanda, making her laugh until her stomach hurt.

  He was the personification of the perfect date. His attention never wandered. His conversation never waned. Flawlessly, he entertained and enthralled from start to finish—and yet something fundamental was lacking in their interaction. Something she’d all too briefly enjoyed before helplessly watching it slip from her fingers.

  Of course this was what they’d agreed to—only a part of her had hoped this methodical, smooth-talking charmer would revert naturally back to the man she’d fallen for. She’d believed he simply wouldn’t be able to deny the connection. But she’d been wrong. Jake was as adept at maintaining the emotional distance between them as he was at closing the physical.

  Cali hadn’t caught on to the subtlety of his manipulation at first. All the extravagant dates—the opera, the Steppenwolf Theater Company, dining out at Chicago’s trendiest and most renowned establishments. He chose carefully, ensuring that, whatever the setting, something about it—an invitation to join co-workers, raucous noise, required silence—insulated them from the kind of conversational depth that had so naturally developed between them before. No more dinners on the floor, where the food cooled ages before they stopped talking long enough to remember to eat it. Of course they still talked, but the chit-chat came from a place as open to a passing stranger as it was to her.

  One element of their interaction, however, had not diminished. The heat. No matter what their activity, with each passing moment the tension between them built. A glance. A touch. A knowing smile. Each heightened the awareness. The arousal. The anticipation. Until desperation overwhelmed them, and the date ended with Jake backing Cali into her apartment, with her clawing at his clothes, climbing his body—

  But, regardless of the intensity of it—their desperation to have it—it was just sex. Incredible sex. Addictive sex. The kind you wouldn’t dream of turning your back on, regardless of the hollowing ache that lingered for hours once it was over. Once Jake had pulled on his clothes, dropped a kiss at her lips, and gone home to sleep alone.

  A fling. This was how it worked.

  Cali dabbed her napkin at the corner of her mouth, studying the Southeast Asian décor surrounding them. “You never should have brought me here. It’s almost too cruel to give me a taste of something so incredible, knowing I’m going to have to give it up so quickly!”

  Her eyes danced around the interior, hopping from the delicate fans suspended high above, to the louvered shutters lining the room, then the scatter
ed photos of 1920s Saigon, before landing back at the tight expression on Jake’s face. His guard was up, impenetrable eyes showing her nothing but a defense erected against her. Immediately she recognized the problem, the way he might have taken her casual comment.

  She smiled blithely. “I’ll be dreaming about this place for the next six years.”

  See? No big thing. No deeper meaning intended. No need to shut her out so completely.

  Or, at this point, did it really even matter?

  But then Jake’s thumb grazed over her wrist in a slow circle, and every cell in her body responded to the touch, pulsing with a need to get closer. Her eyes met his—still impenetrable, but smoldering with sensual promise—so different than mere seconds ago.

  Yes, it still mattered.

  “If we get out of here—” his fingers dropped beneath the edge of the table, stroked once along the back of her knee “—I’ll give you something to dream about for the next ten.”

  Trish waved a slow hand in front her face, beckoning with an amused smirk. “Earth to Cali…come in, Cali?”

  She snapped to attention, heat immediately rushing to her cheeks with the guilty knowledge of where her mind had drifted. “I’m so sorry, Trish. Where were we?”

  “Confirming that we’ve got RSVPs from all the criticals for tomorrow’s meeting,” Trish answered patiently.

  Right. The meeting. “We do—thank you.”

  What was wrong with her? Not only was she wasting her own time, but now she’d wasted Trish’s as well. It was inexcusable, and so completely out of character Cali felt herself brimming with frustration.

  “Great, we’re all set.” Trish piled up her folders, notepad and PDA, then shifted her weight to one hip, relaxing into the stance. “So, how’s it going with your hot doc?”

  Cali swallowed, busying herself with stacking a bunch of jumbled papers she was going to have to sort out as soon as Trish walked out the door, simply to avoid the eye contact. “Good. Very good.”