Текст книги "Night After Night"

Автор книги: Lauren Blakely

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Текущая страница: 7 (всего у книги 10 страниц)

Chapter Thirteen

Even steven.

For a card player there were worse words. Like lost it all, or lost big.

But for now, the words even steven stung.

That’s where she’d netted out. With nothing to show for her race home to play Charlie’s whale.

“You disappointed me tonight, Red. I expected more from you,” he said, as he bent over a steaming bowl of noodles. He slurped up a spoonful, the noodles trailing wetly down his chin, the last one snaking into his mouth.

He pushed his index finger down hard on the ledger next to him. “This? This blank line for you tonight? This tells me you have something else on your mind. Do you?”

She shook her head, pressed her lips together as if she could hold in all the nasty things she wanted to say to him. Her fists were clenched at her sides. “No,” she muttered.

He pushed back his chair, the sound of the legs scraping across the floor of the Chinese restaurant. He rose and reached for her chin, grabbing her roughly. His calloused fingers dug into her jaw so hard that he was practically pushing the inside of her cheek into her teeth. All her instincts told her to cry out, to yelp from the sharp, cruel pain. But he’d see that as a sign of weakness, and weakness had no place in his poker circuit. If she let on, he’d throw her out and find some other way to extort her. A worse way, surely.

He angled her chin, forcing her to look at him. “You lie to me, Red. You lie like you lie at the table with your poker face. You went away for the weekend to see a man, didn’t you? And you can’t stop thinking about him.”

She rolled her eyes as if that notion were ludicrous. “I only wish I had done something so interesting. Told you I was seeing friends in New York. That’s all.”

“Your friends have distracted you then,” he said, enunciating each word so crisply that a bead of spit flew out of his lips and landed on her skin. “Do I need to pay them a visit? Enlist them in my employ?”

“No,” she shouted, as he poked at her deepest fears. “But maybe you shouldn’t have called me back then. I barely got off my flight before I had to show up.”

He sneered at her, his fingers drilling her face. “You had three hours in between. That is enough.”

“Well, it wasn’t enough tonight.”

He yanked her closer to him, so close her eyes could no longer focus on his face. She stood her ground though, her high-heeled feet digging into the floor as his brutal fingers jammed her jaw. “I can’t have my ringer bringing me nothing.”

“Sometime you win, sometime you lose, sometimes it rains. That’s the way it goes,” she said in as flat a voice as she could muster.

He dropped his hold on her chin, then stared at her curiously, as if she were a science project. “I do not like baseball. Do not give me baseball analogies. Give me your best poker face and beat my whales. That is all I want from you.”

“That’s what you’ll keep getting.”

“But Red, I did not like your performance tonight. If it happens again, I will be adding on to your totals.”

Her heart plunged and she wanted to shriek No. A loud, echoing cry that would carry through the night. “It’s not even my fault. It’s not even my money,” she said, insistently, as if that might change his mind.

“It is your fault. It is your money. And you are mine until I say you’re not,” he said, rooting around in his pocket. He took out his knife, opened it, and stabbed it into the wood of the table. She cringed, and there was no hiding her emotions this time as the sound of metal parking itself into wood rattled in her ears. He didn’t remove the blade; he left it in the wood like some strange trophy. “Or do you want me to visit your pretty bartender friend?” He asked, making a circle over his stomach, as a reminder that he knew Kim was pregnant.

Her heart twisted. “No.”

“How about your sister? She’s a lovely lady and quite perky on that little fashion blog of hers,” Charlie said in his cool even voice.

It was as if he’d sliced her open with his knife, her bleeding organs on display for all to see. Julia bit her lip hard, trying to stop her insides from quivering. Charlie had never gone near her sister, or her friends. He’d also never mentioned McKenna until now, and her heart raced at the pace of fear. She’d do anything to keep her sister away from him. “Please leave them out of this. This has nothing to do with them.”

“That’s right,” he said with a firm nod, pointing from her to him. “It is our business, and we will continue do business until it is all resolved, or else I might need to collect from them too. Is that clear?”

With his words, the floor felt out from under her. He’d done it. He’d done the thing she feared. Threatened her family. Fear coursed through her body, rooting itself in her belly in a twisted knot, where it planned to set up camp for a long, long time. “Yes,” she choked out.

“Now get out of here, and I will call you when I have a game you won’t mess up.”

She turned on her heels, and left the restaurant, Skunk holding open the door. He lowered his voice to a whisper, as if he didn’t want Charlie to hear him. “Want me to call you a cab?” He asked, and he sounded like a sweet, sympathetic bear. Like he legitimately wanted to do something nice for her after the way Charlie had treated her. He had some kind of soft spot for her. But she wasn’t going to be fooled. She knew where his loyalties lay and it wasn’t with the woman he wanted to help. It was with the man who owned him, just as Charlie owned nearly everyone he worked with.

Except her. She told herself Charlie only rented her and eventually the lease would be up.

“No thank you. I don’t need a cab,” she said, and walked home in the night, the fog crawling into the city, threatening to ensnare the night. She brushed her hand roughly against her cheek, wiping away a tear.

But another one fell, and then another, and that’s how she walked home, wishing there were a way to unravel herself faster from Charlie’s clutches. Wishing she’d never met Dillon, that he’d never made off with $100,000 from the mobster he worked for, that he’d never claimed the money was for her.

When she reached her home and poured herself a glass of whiskey, her fingers itched to pick up the phone and call Clay. To tell him why she ran, that she missed him, that this weekend was the best she’d ever had.

But she could still feel Charlie’s hand on her chin, and she knew, she fucking knew, she shouldn’t be involved with anyone. Because when you get close to people, your debt becomes their debt, and theirs becomes yours, and you are left with nothing but an aching well of shame inside you as you try to claw your way out.

Clay could be just like Dillon – disappear and leaving her holding all his problems.

She put the phone in a kitchen drawer and shut it hard.

* * *

“Uncross your legs,” Gayle said, pointing her sharp scissors at Julia.

“You have the weapon. I do as you say,” Julia said, following orders. “But why is it that I see you every six weeks and I still can’t remember to uncross my legs?”

“Maybe because you have too much else on your mind,” Gayle said, patting Julia’s shoulder then widening her stance so she could trim the ends of her hair.

The stylist dressed in black as she always did, and today’s homage to the shade of midnight was a black tunic top and tight leggings, with black cowboy boots on her feet. Down her arm was her permanent mark – a tattoo in a swirling script that said I want to be adored. Julia loved the boldness in branding her own body with a wish for love. She longed for that sort of daring. The wish had come true; Gayle had met someone recently who she’d fallen hard and fast for, and he for her. There were no issues, no problems, no pasts in the way.

Of course, you never knew what was coming. When someone would turn on you. She would never have predicted Dillon would be a world-class douche. A knot of anger was set loose in her body at the thought of the ex; like a marble in a Rube Goldberg machine, it rolled down the tracks, picking up speed. Her insides were twisted, and Dillon wasn’t the sole cause. She’d been wracked with tension since she left Clay behind in a swirl of dust in New York. Every night she’d been tempted to text, to call, to chat. Every night she’d resisted.

Her chest felt like a pressure valve inside her. The valve was stuck, so the pressure kept building. She tapped her toe on the hardwood floor of the salon as Gayle cut.

“What’s the story, Jules? You’re jumpy today.”

She sighed heavily, as if the weight of the last week were pouring out in that one breath. “Oh Gayle, it’s getting harder,” she said, because she couldn’t take it anymore. Her stylist was the only person who had a clue about the troubles Dillon dumped on her doorstep with when he skipped town with Charlie’s money, claiming she’d be paying it off. Julia reckoned a stylist was akin to a shrink. Maybe even a priest. A stylist was the one person you could pour out all your secrets to. Gayle wasn’t a part of her regular life – she was someone she saw every six weeks. Neat and cordoned off, safe from the harm that was circling her on the other side. “I still owe a crap ton of money, and the people I owe it to aren’t making it any easier for me, and on top of that, I met someone I really like, but I can’t let myself get close to him because of all this stuff going on, and I want to trust him, but he might screw me over too, but I miss him like crazy, which makes no sense because it was only one weekend. Okay, it was two weekends, but still, they were both spectacular,” she said, the words spilling out of her. Julia stopped talking for a second, stared in the mirror at her friend’s reflection. “Wow. That was like a confessional or something.”

She squeezed Julia’s shoulder, then continued snipping. “I’m so glad you met someone you like. It’s been so long since Dillon, and even then you weren’t terribly fond of the douche. With good reason, of course,” she quickly added, with a wry smile.

Julia narrowed her eyes. “He is such a douche. And I feel so stupid for ever trusting him, or even getting involved with him.”

“That’s the thing. Sometimes you just can’t know how someone is going to turn out,” Gayle said as she ran a comb through Julia’s wet hair, appraising her work so far.

“Right? So I guess it’s all for the best that things aren’t happening with this other guy. He might turn out to be just like Dillon. I was an idiot for getting involved with him, and an even worse idiot for the way he scammed me.”

“That’s not what I meant. I mean, you can’t beat yourself up for not knowing Dillon was going to con money out of his employer and pin the debt on you,” she said, because that’s the extent of what she knew. Not that Charlie was a gangster, but that Dillon had swindled money from him. “That man should have his balls chopped off.”

“If I ever see him again, can I borrow those scissors?”

“I’ll order a better pair. A ball-snipping pair. But let’s talk about happier fates for balls. What’s this other guy like?” Gayle said, stopping her cutting for a moment to bump her hip against Julia’s shoulder, giving her a salacious wink in the mirror. “I want to hear all about him.”

She couldn’t help but grin at the memories that came racing back – images that warmed her heart, and sent her body soaring. Clay’s strong hands holding her down. His tongue working her over. His mouth claiming hers. Okay, now she was doing more than grinning. She was tingling something fierce. A sharp bolt of lust shot straight to her core. And then a burst of warmth surrounded her heart as she flashed on all the sweet things he’d said to her. “He’s the sexiest, dirtiest, smartest, and kindest man I have ever met.”

Gayle’s eyes widened. “More, more. Tell me more.”

She told her about their weekend. Not every detail, but enough to make Gayle’s jaw drop, and the tension to loosen momentarily in Julia. Just talking about him felt good. It was as close as she was going to come to being near him, because once she left this salon she was going back on lockdown. She’d tie her hands behind her back if that’s what she had to do to resist him.

Chapter Fourteen

Flynn’s jaw dropped when he saw the gift. A new set of five-irons that his junior partner had been eyeing for a few weeks. Talking about. Showing him pictures on the Internet. It had damn near gotten to the point of golf porn. But Flynn had sealed the deal with Pinkertons yesterday, and with the kind of dough the film producers were raking in, he was contributing quite nicely to the firm’s bottom line. That kind of dedication and drive needed to be rewarded.

“Holy crap,” he said as he reached for the set and removed one club, touching it as if it were some kind of rare treasure. He stroked it with his palm.

“Flynn, man. You can’t start feeling up the golf clubs in my office. If you do I’m going to need to take them back,” Clay joked.

“I can’t help myself,” he said, his eyes wide as he gazed at the club in his hand. “This is a thing of beauty. Almost better than a woman.”

“You haven’t met the right woman then,” he said, and his mind latched onto Julia, and how she’d seemed like the perfect woman for him. Smart, sharp, witty, and with that vulnerable side underneath. His mind flooded with images of their weekend – her curled up on his bench on the balcony, him washing her legs in the tub, that kiss in the rain that she’d insisted on. Then, to all the things they shared, her stories of her sister, his tales about Thanksgiving, and the easy way they had together. Like two people who were meant to have been matched. Until she walked out on a lie. His chest knotted up, and his shoulders tensed, both with anger and annoyance.

Damn.

This wouldn’t do. He didn’t have the real estate in his head or his heart to keep going back to her, and all the ways he’d wanted her. Good thing he was seeing Michele tonight. She had a way of keeping him focused on the present, not the past. “I’m out of here. Meeting a friend for drinks,” he said to Flynn, then grabbed his suit jacket and took off, making some phone calls when he hit the streets of New York.

First, he rang his buddy Cam about their poker game this week, and to check in on some information he’d asked him to run down on another potential client – a TV producer who’d seemed a little shady when he came to him, claiming his studio had screwed him over.

“I looked into your guy, and I can see how he might seem like a crooked bastard with the way things ended with his last deal. But you know what? I checked him out six ways to Sunday and that fucker is squeaky clean as can be,” Cam told him.

“Good to know,” he said, relieved his gut had been wrong. It was rare when it happened, but that’s why he liked to do his homework and research clients in advance.

“That’s why you like me though. C’mon admit it. You love me because you never know if someone is a slimeball, but I can always find out.”

“That you can. And I guess I love you, in some pathetic needy way that makes me sick,” he teased.

“Aww, you’re so sweet when you shower me with compliments. So you gonna take this deal?”

“I probably will.”

“Then cigars are on you this week. I want the finest Cubans you can get your grimy paws on because I plan on winning all the money in your pocket,” Cam said, and Clay couldn’t help but laugh at his friend’s brashness.

“We’ll see about that,” he said, then hung up to call Davis.

As it rang drops of rain began to fall. With his phone pressed to his ear, he navigated the rush hour crowds on Lexington Avenue. Women in skirts and heels and men in suits began to pop open umbrellas.

The rain wasn’t hard enough or heavy enough for him to worry about getting wet though. “Are they taking care of you across the pond?” he said into the phone.

“Of course. You know the producers love me,” Davis said.

“Modest as always.”

“Just like you,” he fired back.

“No troubles then? Anything I need to take care of?”

“You already got me that one day off a week clause so I could fly home and see Jill, so I’m doing just fine.”

“Ah, I guess that’s why I didn’t see you when you were in New York last weekend,” Clay joked, as he stopped at a red light.

“Amazing, isn’t it, how I’d rather spend time with her than you?”

“Shocking,” he said in a dry voice.

“What’s the latest with you? What happened with the woman you were hung up on?”

Clay clenched his jaw at the mention, frustration eating away at him. He didn’t feel like talking about Julia or how she took off. It had been more than a week now without a word from her. He hadn’t reached out to her, and he was doing his damnedest not to think about her. Burying himself in work, in contracts, in doing whatever he could for his clients. That was his focus. Head down in business and no place else. He could not tolerate a repeat of the Year of Sabrina, especially now that Flynn had reeled in the Pinkertons. He still felt guilty for losing Flynn’s big action-film director client that year when his focus had been tangled up in Sabrina’s troubles. Clay needed to train his associate right, and show him how to keep winning and closing deals. The Pinkertons were a prize, and he’d make sure they were treated right by his firm and given ample attention. “She was a piece of work,” he said vaguely as the light changed and he crossed, nearing the restaurant where he was meeting Michele. “I’m about to have a drink with your sister though.”

“Well, be sure to keep your damn hands off of her,” Davis said, in a light-hearted tone.

Clay shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Fuck off to you too. I’ll catch you later.”

After hanging up, he pushed open the door, brushed off the drops of water on his suit jacket, and weaved his way to Michele, who was perched on a stool at the bar. She waved when she saw him, and as he reached her she wrapped him in a hug, and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

“You don’t have an umbrella,” she said, wagging her finger.

He loosened his dark green tie, unknotting the damn thing. “I’m a man. Men don’t carry umbrellas.”

“I’m a woman. I carry a big umbrella,” she said, tipping her forehead to the umbrella holder by the door. “Mine’s the polka dot one about four feet high.”

“Is that supposed to be a substitute for something, Michele?”

“Oh yes. You’ve figured me out. I have penis envy so I carry a large stick.” She patted the wooden stool next to her. “Sit. Have a drink.”

“I need one,” he said, taking off his suit jacket and tossing it on the back of the stool. “Whiskey. Straight up,” he told the bartender.

When the glass of amber liquid arrived, he downed it in one quick swallow then ordered another. That glass earned the same treatment. Michele arched an eyebrow. “Shit day?”

“Shit week,” he muttered, running a hand roughly through his hair. He was sure his hair was standing up, unkempt. He’d been pushing his hands through it all week, as if that motion would someone ease the coiled frustration that had taken up residence in his bones and bloodstream, courtesy of one Julia Bell. It made no sense to him. He’d studied it from all angles, turned it inside and out and around. He didn’t understand how they could have the time together they did – a weekend that was unforgettable – and then descend into radio silence.

“Talk to me,” Michele said, placing a gentle hand on his arm. He looked down at her hand. Everything about her was familiar and safe. He’d known her for years, and though he’d never put his hands on her again after that one drunk kiss in college, there was something comforting about her. Maybe because they were long-time friends, maybe because she was a shrink. She helped people for a living. Maybe she could help him make sense of that woman’s exodus.

“Fine,” he said, because the alcohol had already loosened him up. He wanted to jettison this tangle of anger and hurt from his chest.“You ready for this?”

“The doctor is in session,” she said, sitting up straight and proper. “Only for an after hours session, I insist on another one of these,” she said, tapping his glass.

She ordered another round as he began talking.

“I met someone,” he started then told her the story. Not every detail. He wasn’t about to confess that he’d had a raging hard-on for the last week and refused to do anything about it because he knew he’d think of Julia, and he wanted to stop thinking of his fiery redhead. He didn’t tell her either that making love to that woman had been the most intense sexual encounter of his life. She was his perfect pair in every way – in the bedroom, and outside the bedroom. He’d never enjoyed a woman’s company as much as hers, and he’d felt like they could do anything together. “We had a great time. A perfect weekend. And we were falling for each other. I was sure of it. Talked about seeing each other again, making a go of it,” he said and Michele’s features tightened; her lips pursed as he told her about the plans they made for a long-distance affair. “Everything seemed like it was clicking on all cylinders. Every single thing.”

She drew in a sharp breath. “Every thing?” Her voice sounded strained as if the question were hard for her.

“Yeah,” he said, trying to keep the desire out of his voice. His throat was parched just thinking of Julia. “We had a connection.”

“Oh. I thought you meant,” Michele said, then let her voice trail off as she blushed.

He had meant that, but he didn’t intend to share details of his sex life with Davis’ sister. What a man did behind closed doors, or in a town car, or in a bar in the West Village – he shifted uncomfortably, recalling Julia’s stoic orgasm at The Red Line as he worked her over under the bar – was between the man and the woman. Only the woman he wanted had run; she didn’t want his business. “But the next morning, she was out of here like a bat out of hell. So tell me, Michele. Tell me, my wise little shrink. What am I missing? Is she secretly craving me and can’t figure out how to tell me?” he asked, laying it on the line as he ached for an explanation. “Cause I fucking miss her, and I want her in my life. Did I miss a cue from her? Fuck something up? Is there something I should be doing”

Michele didn’t answer right away. She reached for her glass and took a long drink. After she set it down, she looked straight at him, her dark brown eyes both intense and caring. “I’m going to be blunt. I’m going to be direct, and talk to you like I would talk to one of my patients. And here’s the thing, Clay,” she said, reaching out to place her hand on his thigh. “That’s not how a woman behaves when she likes a man.”

His shoulders sank and he sighed heavily. “Yeah?”

She nodded. “She’s history. I hate to say it, because clearly you have it bad for her, but she ran. Maybe there’s something in her life that’s tying her down. Maybe she has some deep dark past. Maybe she’s secretly married and really only could manage one weekend with you. But if she truly had a great time with you and truly was open to dating long distance like she claimed, then she’d have called you when her flight landed. She’d have texted you. She’d be, I don’t know,” Michele said, forcing out a laugh, “Sending you naughty pictures.”

Clay winced, and his dick rose to attention at the thought of a naughty picture of Julia appearing on his home screen. Maybe a shot of her topless, of those full luscious breasts that he longed to lick and kiss and squeeze. Or that ass, so round and sexy, and calling out for a spanking. In his mind, he could hear the sound of his palm smacking her ass, the sharp slap, and the surprised oh that would fall from her lips. Followed by a moan. She liked spankings. He was pissed that he hadn’t had the chance to smack her ass more than once.

He wanted to slam his fist against the bar. “So the lack of naughty shots on my phone is the surest sign that this woman is history,” he said through tight lips, barely wanting to acknowledge the cold hard truth Michele was laying out for him.

She flashed him a sympathetic smile. “Yes, Clay. She’s history. When a woman wants to be with a man, she makes the effort to see him, to call him, to spend time with him. Just as he does with her. She aspires to be honest and upfront. To share her heart. Besides, that’s what you deserve,” she said, and squeezed his arm.

For a second there, it felt as if she lingered on his bicep. But maybe it was the booze making his mind fuzzy. Which reminded him – he needed another drink.

By the time he left, he was pretty damn sure he was buzzed. Walking to the subway stop two blocks away, he changed that assessment as the cabs and cars and lights around him grew fuzzier. He wasn’t buzzed. He was drunk. So drunk, he saw no reason why he shouldn’t text her as he headed down the steps to the platform, reaching for his phone from his pocket, missing it the first time. He nearly stumbled onto the subway car, as his fingers flew across the screen.

I can’t stop thinking about you.

He hit send, then cursed himself, wished he could take it back. He was going to get nothing in return from Julia and that would only make her exit burn more.

When he emerged on Christopher Street, he hoped that maybe the gods of drunk texting were looking out for him. That perhaps there’d been no signal underground, and he’d be saved from his own stupid desires for her.

But there it was – in his sent messages, mocking his traitorous heart.