Текст книги "Night After Night"

Автор книги: Lauren Blakely

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Текущая страница: 6 (всего у книги 10 страниц)

Chapter Eleven

The moon glowed overhead, bathing the balcony in a shimmery light. Julia was snuggled in one of Clay’s sweatshirts. It had the name of his alma mater across the front, and for some reason that made her like wearing it even more. Maybe because it was not only his, but it also said something about him. He was a man who knew his stuff. He was passionate about his work, dedicated, driven.

But then Dillon had known his stuff too, hadn’t he? He was a passionate photographer, until, well, until he took off. Hell, maybe he was shooting beach shots somewhere. She hadn’t a clue.

She angled her chopsticks into the carton of pad thai, dug out some noodles and took a bite. Lounging across an outdoor bench, her legs rested on his thighs. He’d covered the bench with a blanket because the wood was damp from the earlier rain. Now, the night sky was quiet, and the faint hints of an earlier storm clung to the air.

He was clad in boxer briefs and a T-shirt that showed off his sexy, sculpted arms. She found herself enjoying the view immensely, even though she’d enjoyed plenty of views of him undressed already. He was ogle-able at all times – in a dress shirt, in a T-shirt, in his birthday suit.

“Mmm. This hits the spot.”

He took a bite of the noodles too. “We worked up an appetite.”

“I’ll say,” she said, then set the carton down on the table. He reached for her legs and began rubbing her calves, gently massaging them with his strong hands.

She stretched and wiggled closer, delighting in the relaxing feel of his firm hands sending a new kind of pleasure through her. One that made her muscles sing, and her veins flood with warmth. “You are too good to me,” she murmured.

“Only way I want to be,” he said as sighed happily, a contented sound as he rubbed her legs, then moved down to her feet, cupping her ankle in one hand as he massaged the arch of her foot with his thumbs. “I figure your feet can use this with those crazy heels you wear.”

“I like my crazy heels.”

“I love your crazy heels, and I want to make sure you can keep wearing them.”

“How do you like them best?” she said, playfully.

“With your legs wrapped around my neck.”

She smiled at him, a woozy sort of contentment bathing the night. “What time is it? I feel like I lost all sense of the world around me tonight.”

He bent down to kiss her shin. “Good. That’s how it should be. And to answer your question, it’s nearly midnight.”

A brief hit of tension touched down in her body, like an alarm. Tomorrow night at this time, she’d be headed home. This weekend – perfect as it was – would be over. It would be a delicious memory, but only that. A slice of her life that was in the past. There was a part of her that wanted to stop time, and live in this escape to New York for a while, forget her debts, forget her obligations, forget Kim and her hubby and the rest of the employees at Cubic Z. Ignore the whole wide world and live in this bubble of sex and chemistry and the delicious sort of getting-to-know you that fools a person into falling. Boy, was she falling for him, headfirst into a crazy kind of like, the kind that made her want to send him sweet texts and naughty texts, that made her want to talk to him about everything and nothing, that made her want to hear all about his day. Every day.

To be the first person he saw in the morning, and the last one he saw at night.

What a crazy notion. She must he high. Intoxicated on epic sex, and she’d need to clear her orgasm-clouded head.

“So Miss Julia. How’s this going to work out?”

She raised an eyebrow inquisitively. “What do you mean?”

He pointed from her to him, speaking in a clear, firm voice. “You and me. I don’t want this to just be a one-time thing. I want to see you again.”

She fixed him with a quizzical look. Surely, he wasn’t the kind of man who wanted a long-distance relationship. But then, he said he’d been with Sabrina for a while, and she had no reason to believe he was a player, or a ladies man either. And while she wasn’t sure what she wanted from him, she did know one thing for certain – she wanted to see him again. He’d rocked her world in more ways than one. With pleasure, and with laughs, and with the tender ways he had. That was the problem – he was so good for her, and she simply had no real estate in her life for this kind of potential. One of them or both of them would wind up hurt.

But she had enough problems, so she made a split-second choice – to be abundantly honest in this instant about how she felt. “I would like that,” she said, without agenda, without teasing. “I live on the other side of the country though.”

“I am aware of that and I want to see you again and again. You’re not seeing anyone else, are you?”

She rolled her eyes. “No, of course not. I wouldn’t do that.”

“And you like being with me presumably?”

“Obviously.”

“So let’s do this,” he said in the most matter-of-fact tone. As if a relationship spanning 3000 miles were truly that easy.

“How? How are we supposed to pull this off?” As much as she liked him, long-distance love affairs had a gigantic built in roadblock.

“There’s this thing called an airplane,” he said dryly. “It flies. You get on it. I get on it. We both get off on the other side.”

“Oh ha ha, funny guy.”

“Why thank you very much. I like to make sure all departments are fully functional including the humor one.”

“Well, it is. But I do work a ton, you know,” she said, her natural instinct to erect walls rearing its head.

“As do I.”

“So it might not be that often that we can see each other.”

“If you are not interested in this continuing, you should just say so rather than point out the obstacles,” he said, his dark eyes fixed on hers, his gaze serious and intense.

She opened her mouth to speak, but it was as if she’d been injected with an overdose of nerves. One she needed to ignore. “I am interested in this continuing,” she said, and it felt like an admission, as if she were confessing something hard but true. Because this was only supposed to be one weekend. This wasn’t supposed to be more. But the idea of this – them – ending after one weekend felt like a stone in her chest.

“Good,” he said, running his fingers across her calf, and his touch was something she was already used to, and already going to miss desperately. “We will manage what we can then.”

“Okay, but it might get expensive.”

“I don’t know how to break this to you gently, so I’m just going to be blunt. I do well for myself. I have frequent flyer miles and a credit card that works.”

She heaved out a playful sigh, even though inside that was part of what worried her, and a big part of why she needed to keep him not just at an arm’s length, but a football field length from Charlie. He’d find a way to blackmail him, tie him up into all sorts of trouble. A prominent lawyer boasting a client list teeming with money, he’d have a field day with Clay.

“I want to see you and I will buy you tickets and buy my own,” he continued. “I also have clients in San Francisco, and Los Angeles and I get to the west coast a lot.”

“I am sure, but I don’t want you paying for me. I don’t like owing people,” she said with a firmness to her tone. She didn’t want to be in anyone’s debt ever again.

“I don’t want to be paid back. I want to see you. I’m not buying you. I’m saying I want to date you and some dates require a cab, and some require a town car, and some require an airline ticket. And if that’s the cost of transportation – an airline ticket – if that’s my fare from New York to San Fran, I don’t see how that’s any different than if you lived in Brooklyn and came to see me here in Manhattan over the weekend,” he said, keeping his eyes locked on her the whole time as he spoke with such confidence.

“I guess, but I don’t want to feel like I’m a kept woman,” she said, even though she relished the idea of seeing him. He’d made a more-than-convincing argument that they should make a go of things.

He laughed hard. “No one ever in the whole wide world could keep you. I’m just going to be happy if I can spend a few hours with you.”

“You like the sex that much,” she said, playfully pushing her toes against his hard abs.

“You know I like the sex. I think the part that’s not getting through to you is how very much I like all the other parts. I like what’s in here,” he said, stretching across her to tap her forehead with his index finger, “And I like doing the things here,” he said, sweeping his thumb across her lips, “that involve talking.” He traveled down her chest, tracing a line between her breasts, and landing on her heart. “I also like the things I’m seeing in here.”

Her heart beat in double time, and it was such a foreign feeling for her, it had been so long since she’d felt for someone. It scared her, but felt wonderful at the same time too. But then, wasn’t that what liking someone felt like? A little bit like stepping off the diving board and taking the plunge. She grasped his hand, clutched it in hers, holding his against her chest. His eyes sparkled with a happiness, a genuine sort of joy, as if she’d just said yes to him. Which, she supposed, she had.

“So you’re gonna be my boyfriend?”

“Gorgeous, I’m not your boyfriend. I’m your lover. The only one.”

“Obviously. You are my only lover. No woman could ever have you and want or need another man.”

“Good. Now remember what I was saying about liking all the things we do?”

She nodded. “Yeah?”

He leaned across the bench, kissing her lips gently, then brushed them with his fingertips. The slightest kiss sent tingles through her. “I could do that and other things all night. But right now, I want you to use those lips to tell me more about you. You said your best friend is your sister. Besides your hair stylist, Gayle. Were you close to McKenna growing up or did you become best friends later?”

Her eyes widened. She was impressed that he remembered all the details, down to her hairdresser’s name. “We’ve always been close. We’re one year apart. Irish twins, as they say. We fought like sisters did, but most of the time, we were like this,” she said, twisting her index finger around her middle finger. “Read the same books, liked the same TV shows. We were both huge My So-Called Life junkies. The show was only on for one season, but we watched all the episodes over and over on cable, and recited the lines together, and we loved Jordan Catalano too from that show. So McKenna and I had this thing in high school when we started dating that we’d always check in on the other with a phone call.”

“Ah, the old friend emergency call,” he said, sketching air quotes.

“Yup,” she said, nodding proudly. “But our deal was if one of us was having a bad time and needed to be saved, that person would say I can’t believe Jordan’s arm is broken. And if we were having a good time and really liked a guy we’d say You’re watching My So-Called Life right now?”

“Ring, ring. McKenna’s calling. You better pick up.”

Julia mimed answering a phone. “Hey McKenna, how’s it going?” she said into her pretend phone. She paused as if listening. “Oh, I’m so glad Jordan’s arm isn’t broken.” She locked eyes with Clay, and he grinned as she continued her phone call. “What did you say? You’re watching My So-Called Life right now?” His grin widened, lighting up his whole gorgeous face. “That is the best show. Well, you have a good time, because I am having the best time.”

She hung up her imaginary phone and ran her fingers across his stubbled jaw, sandpaper rough with his more than five-o-clock shadow. “You, mister, are better than My So-Called Life,” she said, and was surprised by how easily the admission rolled off her tongue. This was precisely what she hadn’t wanted to happen this weekend. To feel. To want. To have strings start to attach themselves that would extend well beyond a weekend.

But here she was making plans, making commitments, telling him exactly how she felt.

What was she getting herself into? She needed to put on the brakes and deal with her debt first. But then Clay’s mouth was on her, kissing her hard and hungry again, consuming her with his lips that made her bones vibrate and her blood sing, and all thoughts of brakes and debts and troubles turned to rubble in her brain, because desire had slammed hard into her body.

He picked her up in his arms, carried her inside, up the steps and into his bed. This time there were no ties, no binds, no hard, rough hands, though she had loved all of that.

Now, he simply laid her on his bed and kissed her from head to toe, his lips melting her from the inside out. She trembled, both from the way he touched her and from her heart thundering with hope of what they could be. They could be so good for each other. He entered her, taking his time, making slow, sweet, luxurious love to her as she wrapped her arms and her legs around him, reveling in all the ways they came together.

Chapter Twelve

Brunch sounded nice. Julia envisioned one of those lazy New York mornings. They’d make love, then shower, then wander around the Village, stumble into some fantastic four-table restaurant that had fabulous French toast or decadent omelets. Wait, no. She had a better idea. They’d go to a diner because diners in New York were the best ever and diners in San Francisco could suck it. At the booth, his hands would be all over her, touching her back, her waist, her legs. They’d return to his place, unable to stop touching, then smash into each other in the elevator and fall into his apartment already in a state of undress. Fevered and frenzied, he’d take her, one last time, the kind of urgent and desperate goodbye sex that would make them both miss each other terribly when she left for the airport an hour later, waving goodbye in her taxi, trying hard not to stare out the window the entire time as the cab drove away.

She stretched her arms over her head, enjoying that fantasy as morning sun streaked in the window, painting the bedroom in the early glow of dawn. Clay was a sound sleeper, and lay snoozing on his stomach, the covers hitting his hips. His gorgeous back, strong and muscled, was on display. She was tempted to reach out and touch him, trace lazy lines down his skin, but a light flashed on the nightstand.

Grabbing her phone, she headed into the bathroom and scrolled through her messages as she brushed her teeth.

First there was Kim saying they had a rocking Saturday night and raked in some serious money. Next, McKenna saying Chris’ TV show had hit an all-time high in ratings, and the network execs were talking to him about renewals. The note was followed by several exclamation points.

Then there was a message from Charlie.

Julia tensed as she opened it.

We have a big whale in town tonight. We’re moving up the game. Need to see you there by nine. There is a chance for you to get a lot closer if you can take him down.

She wrote back quickly. Can’t. I won’t be back til 11.

She set the phone down on the sink counter, finished brushing her teeth, and rinsed with a glass of water. Her phone buzzed again. Perhaps you mistook that for a request. It was not. I will see you at nine.

Anger slithered through her. Hot, black anger at Charlie, at Dillon, at all the ways she was indebted to those two. She clicked on the message and dialed Charlie’s number.

He answered on the second ring.

“I am not in town,” she whispered through gritted teeth. “I can’t be there.”

“Red, I have seen the airline schedules. I even checked for you. And there will be a ticket waiting for you on the 11 a.m. flight back. It gets you into town at two-thirty, so you will have plenty of time to make yourself beautiful and show off those lovely breasts to help distract our high roller.”

She squeezed her eyes shut, clenched her free hand, feeling like his prostitute. Like his dirty little trick to lure them in, because that’s what she was. A woman used. “Don’t you get it?” She said in a low voice, not wanting Clay to hear, though the bathroom door was closed. “I can’t.”

“But you can. And you will. And if you don’t, I will be happy to visit your bar more frequently. After all, it may very well be my bar someday soon. How do you think your pretty little friend with the baby in her belly would like working with me? Maybe we can even put her little one to work for me soon too,” he said, and her insides churned with the thought. Images of sweet Kim and her family becoming part of Charlie’s circle of indentured servitude made her want to vomit. Not to mention hang her head further in shame. “But I haven’t decided if I will keep Cubic Z open, or if I will take great pleasure in driving it into the ground and all that money you needed for your bar will be for naught. But you will have the reminder in front of your face to never try to take my money again,” he said, and it was as if his foot were on her chest, digging in, keeping her pinned and prostrate under all his weight. “Unless you come back and you play and you win.”

If there was one thing Julia had learned in this lifetime, and in these few months being on Charlie’s very short leash, it was that whoever had the leverage won. There was no bluffing when you owed money to someone who lived on his own side of the law, who operated by his rules. Call him a mobster, call him a gangster, she didn’t care about the semantics. A real Tony Soprano but without the Italian heritage, Charlie was like Tony in the sense that he was the man, he was in charge, and you didn’t fuck with him. There was no need for a poker face for Charlie because her cards were shit. He had a royal flush. He could take what he wanted from her. She knew of his ways, had heard of all the things he’d done, how he made sure money and debts were always paid to him, and for much more than the debtor bargained for.

The interest he charged damn near killed you.

When you owed him, he owned you and that meant everyone you cared about was in line if you couldn’t pay the vig. Soon, he’d encroach further, plucking at her family, her friends, all her loved ones. She couldn’t take the risk of pissing him off. He’d hurt someone to punish her for her impudence. She had no choice but to abide by his wishes.

“Fine. I will see you tonight.”

She stabbed the end button on her screen, but it was thoroughly unsatisfying. She pushed both hands roughly through her hair, grabbing hard against her scalp, something, anything, to unleash her agitation. She wanted to shake a fist at the sky, to slam her phone onto the floor. But in the end, she’d have to do what Charlie told her to do. Come home, slide into a tight black dress, and too-high heels, and sit down at the table ready to be ogled and to win. She was his secret weapon, a one-two punch with boobs and talent.

She looked at the time. The flight he wanted her on left in two hours.

The back of her eyes burned, the start of a thick sob threatening her. She inhaled sharply, drawing her hurt back inside, sucking it down. She was a fool for thinking she could manage any sort of relationship while she was still clawing her way out of the mess her last relationship had left for her. But that’s what she was – a fool, a mark, a pawn. She’d been taken, she’d been scammed by Dillon and she had no clue it was happening until it was done. Damn him, leaving her saddled with this while he got away scot-free. Leaving her no choice but to walk away from a man she was starting to feel real things for.

But feeling more for Clay would only put him in the line of fire. She had to extricate herself before she made her problems his problems. No one wanted that kind of shit in their lives.

* * *

She was stuffing her clothes in her suitcase. Clay rubbed his eyes, and covered his mouth as he yawned. Maybe he was seeing things, but it sure looked like Julia was fixing to get the hell out of Dodge. Dressed in jeans and a sweater, she was tugging the zipper closed on her suitcase.

“I thought your flight wasn’t til five,” he said, scrubbing his hand across his jaw.

She shook her head. “I got it wrong. I transposed the times. It’s 11:05, not five-elven.”

“Let’s just change it then.”

“I tried. The later flight is booked,” she said, and her voice was strained, as if she were speaking through a sieve.

“Really?” He arched an eyebrow.

“Yes, really,” she said, but she didn’t look at him. She kept tugging and yanking at her suitcase. He got out of bed to help, kneeling down on the floor next to her. His shoulder bumped hers, and she cringed as if he’d burned her.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, fine,” she said, crisply as he closed the suitcase for her.

“You don’t seem fine.”

“I just need to go, that’s all. I hate being late and missing flights. It totally stresses me out,” she said, and there was a hitch in her voice, as if she were about to cry. Did she have some kind of bad childhood memory about missing a flight? Because she sure as hell seemed sadder than the moment warranted.

“Let me go with you then to the airport. We can at least spend more time together in the car.”

She shook her her head. “That’s sweet. But I just have to go. The cab is already here.” She stood up. “I need to get going. I’m going to have to work tonight too,” she added.

He cocked his head to the side, saying nothing, just studying her. He was used to negotiations, to dealmaking, to knowing when someone was lying, and his hackles were raised.

She didn’t seem so stressed or sad anymore. She seemed full of shit.

“Which one is is it, Julia?” His words came out more harshly than he thought. Or maybe they were exactly as harsh as he felt. “Are you working tonight or did you mix up your flights? Because I’d buy one or maybe I’d buy the other. But two seems like you’re piling on the excuses.”

She huffed out through her nostrils, narrowed her eyes. “Do not even think about accusing me of lying.”

“I did not accuse. I asked,” he said. “But it’s interesting to see where your brain went.”

Her eyes widened, and they were filled with anger. “I have to go,” she said, biting out the words. “I need to get out of here. I have shit to take care of at home and that is that. I will call you later.”

“I’m so sorry to hear Jordan’s arm is broken,” he said, not bothering to strip the anger from his voice.

She shot him a furious look, but kept her mouth shut as she grabbed her bag, headed down the steps to the front door and out of his building.

The door clanged shut, the sound of it echoing throughout his home, leaving him with cold, empty silence.

He could have gone after her. Followed her, gently grabbed her arm, and asked if she was okay, if he’d done something wrong. But there was no point. She didn’t want to be stopped. She didn’t need to be stopped. She was a woman who’d made up her mind, and he had enough self-pride and smarts to know he’d been played. Especially when he grabbed his computer and sank down on the couch in his living room to look up the email from Virgin Atlantic. Since he’d been the one to buy the ticket for her, he’d also booked the airfare.

His heart dropped. Hot shame spread in his chest. He had no clue what had gone wrong, but the time on the ticket told him that all this falling had been a one-way street.

She was still on the 5:11 flight.

He cursed more times than he could count as he slammed his laptop closed. He ran a hand through his hair, anger and frustration coursing through his bloodstream. The last thing he wanted to do was sit with this feeling. He pulled on workout clothes and went to the boxing gym to spend the morning punching the bag alone, letting all his anger pour out of him, and his hurt too. The stupid hurt he felt for having been left.

He’d only known her for a short time. Had only spent a few days with her. Perfect, fabulous wonderful days, but even so it shouldn’t feel like an ache without her. Like a gaping hole in his chest.

It should feel like nothing.

Like nothing. He let those words echo in his head with each punishing jab until eventually his mind was blank, and his body was tired, and he hoped against hope he’d forget her fast.