Jessica exits the bathroom. “All yours,” she says. “I’ll wait for you.”
“That’s okay,” I say. “I’m good. I’ll be right back to the table.”
“You’re sure?”
I nod. “Positive.”
“Okay then. See you in a sec.” She hurries off, and I dart into the bathroom. Locking the door, I pee and wash my hands. I check my makeup and don’t allow myself to think about how I might look to Roarke. My lipstick isn’t on my nose. Good enough. I open the door and gasp as I find Roarke standing there. “Wrong bathroom,” I say, recovering quickly. “Do you need an escort?”
“No,” he says, pushing off the wall and stepping in front of me. “But you do. I know you. I know how you reacted to the wine. I’m not letting you drive back to Dallas tonight.”
“I’m fine, and Jessica and Jason—”
“Left. I sent them on their way. We need to talk.” He catches my hand in his. “Come with me.”
Heat rushes up my arm, over my chest, and settles low in my belly, and that’s when I know I’ve made a mistake. An Uber can save me from drinking and driving, but it can’t save me from Roarke.
Chapter Ten
Hannah…
I don’t know what part of me is reeling more, my emotions or my body. Either way, the friction Roarke’s touch is creating in my body isn’t helping. I tug at my hand. “You can’t grab me and order me to go with you, Roarke.”
“I’m not ordering you around, Hannah,” he replies, releasing my hand as if burned. “You know that’s not me.” He catches the doorframe, holding it instead of me, and I hate that part of me wishes he would have held onto me a little longer. “You know me.”
“I don’t know anything where you’re concerned.”
“You know me like no one else but Jason knows me.”
“If that was the case, we wouldn’t have ended the way we ended. No. We wouldn’t have crossed the lines we crossed.”
“Is that what you call being engaged to marry? Crossing a line?”
“It’s the line that left us here.” I fight the urge to push him out of the way, which would require touching him. “You’re blocking me in the bathroom.”
“Blocking? Where the heck is that coming from, aside from your need to run, and you can’t run right now?”
“Run? I’m here tonight. That’s not running.”
“After running to another state.”
“At the table, I was brave,” I fire back. “Now I was running? You’re still standing in front of me.”
“Because we still need to clear the air, for us and everyone else involved in this project.”
He’s right. Of course he’s right, but I’m suffocating from this man right now. “What are you going to do? Tell me everything I think I know about the past is wrong?”
He cuts his eyes, seeming to struggle a moment before he levels me in a stare. “There’s a lot you don’t know, Hannah,” he says, “but right now, right now we need to focus on now. We need to find out how we move forward, and that won’t happen if we’re living in the past.” He takes several steps back, offering me space I both crave and despise. “But this is your decision. Start a new future or live in the past and torture everyone around us, as we do.”
I force air into my lungs and slowly push it out. “You’re right. You’re completely right. So—back to the table?”
“No,” he says softly. “We need to be alone, Hannah. To my hotel. I’m not letting you drive home.”
“Your hotel?” My heart is officially beating too fast. “Roarke—”
He presses a hand on the doorframe next to me but only one hand. He’s close again, but he hasn’t blocked me in. I wish he would. I wish he’d piss me off. “I’ll get you another room if you don’t want to stay with me.”
I blanch. If I don’t want to stay with him? What is he saying? “Is that an invitation?” I ask before I can stop myself. I turn to him and hold up a hand. “Don’t answer. I don’t want an answer. I’ll get a room, my own room.”
“As long as you don’t drive, Hannah.” He offers me his hand. “Come with me.” He pauses for effect. “Please.”
The please gets me, and not because it’s out of character for Roarke. It’s not. Roarke isn’t a man who backs away from that word. He’s not a man who demands unless we’re naked, and that’s a different ball game. That’s the balance that is this man. He’s an alpha. He’s in control, and yet, he makes me feel like I’m in control. He makes the animals he works with feel they’re in control when it’s him with the control. That’s what he’s doing to me right now, both giving and taking my control. He’s given me a choice to go with him or to refuse, but in truth, if I accept his offer, he’s won. No. No, that’s my anger at him talking. He always makes sure everyone wins. That’s the balance part of this man again. We both win if I say yes because we get to the other side of us in a more positive way.
And now comes my move, my choice.
I could withhold my hand, but I think about his words, about stepping out of the past into the future. If I hold back, if I act as if I’m afraid to touch him, then that past owns me. He owns me. And he’ll know it. He’ll know how much he affects me. A man who didn’t even come after me doesn’t get to own me.
I press my palm to his palm, the connection tingling up my arm, and it’s not just sexual chemistry, though we’ve always overflowed in that area, a volcano of pure, hot lava. This now, though, is far more scary, far more impossible to control. This is like sliding back into a second skin, into a familiar feeling, and that feeling of belonging with this man I can’t fight and I don’t even try. We do belong together; we’re a part of each other’s lives, just not as husband and wife. That was where we went wrong.
My gaze lifts to his, and we stare at each other, those intelligent eyes of his searching my face the way I’m searching his, looking for answers, though I wonder if he knows what answers any more than I do. “I’m parked near the back door,” he says, pushing off the wall and straightening. “We can get your car in the morning. If you’re agreeable.”
I nod without argument. It’s all logical. It’s all a smart choice. “Yes. Yes, that works.” He gives my hand a small tug, urging me forward, but he turns as I near, laces his fingers with mine, and guides me toward the door.
I’d call our handholding inappropriate if the floor didn’t feel unsteady, and I think he knows this. I just hope he believes it’s all about the wine. I wish that was the case.
We exit into the parking lot, into a dark, humid Texas night, no signs of fall this October evening. There are no stars in the sky, but the restaurant is smart and safe, with plenty of artificial lighting. Roarke motions to the right. “That’s me,” he says, and I’m not surprised when I see a sporty black pickup truck waiting on us. Roarke is comfortable in life. He was even before his recent fame, thanks to his veterinarian skills, but he’s not a man who laps up luxury. He’d rather buy a horse a stable it might not have than buy himself a BMW. Every man I dated in L.A. would have picked the BMW. I’d rather watch him care for a horse than ride in a BMW. We made sense right up until the point that we didn’t.
Roarke leads me to the passenger’s side of the truck and opens the door. It’s a big step up, and I know a truck and know it well, but I also dress for the country when I’m in the country. This truck is country. This man, he’s far more complicated. Right now, we’re complicated, and considering how complicated, I thank the Lord that I wore slacks. I place my high heels on the ledge and hike myself up, but my heel catches on a hole somewhere, and it’s not pretty. I start to tumble, yelping as I do, only to have strong, familiar arms catch me. “I got you,” Roarke murmurs, and the thing is, there was a time when I believed he did, when I believed he always would.
That time is now gone.
In this moment, with his hard body holding me, I don’t remember a
nything but need and pain. It’s a powerful feeling. It’s every question I’ve wanted answered since I left, that only he can answer. It’s an ache that seeks comfort, one no other man has soothed. And yet Roarke is the reason it exists.
He inhales, drawing in the scent of my hair, I think. He always loved my shampoo, and I want to scream at him to stop. I want to scream at him to never stop.
He sets me down on the ground, one of my heels staying behind. Roarke turns me and allows me to grip the door. He’s close, his body big, hard, heat radiating off him and smashing into me. He leans down and pulls my shoe from a hole between the step and the truck itself. “Sorry about that, Han,” he says softly, setting it down on the ground next to my naked foot. I quickly slide it into place, but when he stands up, towering over me, I’m aware that I’m naked in almost every possible way with this man. That’s a problem I need to fix. That’s a vulnerability I need to erase, and there’s only one way to do that.
I have to prove to myself, and him, that he’s no more to me than I was to him. And that’s never going to happen when I want to be naked with him this badly.
Chapter Eleven
Hannah…
“Obviously it’s time to break out the cowboy boots again,” I say.
His lips, his really beautiful lips—I’ve always thought his lips were beautiful—curve. “And get back on the horse. There’s more than a few waiting on you in Sweetwater. How long has it been?”
“Too long,” I say, “it’s been too long,” and this time, I’m not just talking about a horse. I’m talking about so many things. It’s time I get a grip on every part of my life that’s been causing me pain, affecting who I am and how I interact with others. And the truth is that Roarke and Sweetwater represent those things. This festival is a blessing.
He offers me his hand again. “Need a hand?”
I don’t hesitate this time. I’m taking control and that means of everything, including what’s going on between the two of us. That means I don’t melt at the idea of touching him. I place my palm against his, and before I can even weigh my body’s reaction, it sways; I sway. Okay, I’m taking control after the wine stops taking control.
He catches my waist, his touch scorching. Lord help me, my nipples pucker. When was the last time I was that sensitive to a man’s touch? The answer is simple: the last time I was with him. We stand there, our heads low and together, our breathing the only sound between us, but there is so much more expanding in the thick Texas air: history, so much history. And friendship. This man was my best friend, and it would be a lie to say that I don’t miss him. Control isn’t lying to myself or even him. It’s owning what I feel and how I respond to what I feel. So yes. I miss him. I miss the him I knew before the him who hurt me.
“Let’s get out of here,” he says softly.
“Yes. Let’s.” I rotate and face the truck again, stepping up on the ledge, but not before I check my heel. The minute I hike myself upward, Roarke is right there, holding onto me, making sure I get inside this time.
Roarke doesn’t linger. He shuts me inside. Maybe he needs a breather, too, because Lord only knows, I’m suffocating from him and all the history, all the damn feelings. Control is my goal, and suffocating does not get me there. He’s slow to round the truck, but finally, he opens the door and climbs inside. The air thickens, and the cab light slowly dims. There was no slow dim for us. There was no slow start for us. It might have seemed that way to some. We were friends. We were neighbors. I was too young for him, six years his junior. I always had a crush on him, but then I was home for a summer, and college just seemed to erase the years that divided us.
He starts the truck, the sound jolts me back to the present, and that’s a good thing. I was about to go down a rabbit hole of locked lips and passion with this man. No. I was about to go down a rabbit hole of emotion. Sex is not emotion. He taught me that lesson.
“Where’s your hotel?” I ask.
“The Ashton, a few miles up the road.” He doesn’t look at me. He doesn’t say anything more.
I sink lower into my seat, and I wonder now if he’s regretting the decision to take me to his hotel. If he dreads the confrontation he’s invited? He probably does. He probably thinks I’m still that into him. My behavior has said nothing less. I’ve shown him that he still has that much control over me. And he’s right. Or he was. He did. Tonight, that ends. Tonight, I get my closure, and so does he.
It’s not long before he pulls the truck into the hotel parking lot. I don’t sit there all awkward. Maybe it’s the power of wine, but my leash is off. I open the door and climb out of the truck, and my heel doesn’t even think about getting stuck this time. Trucks are my history, and no pair of high heels, and certainly no man, no matter how hot, no matter how sexy all his dark hair and dreamy eyes are, gets to take that or anything from me. Even my damn boss took my career. Maybe I should have stayed and fought harder. Or maybe I just needed an excuse to come back home.
I slam the door shut, and Roarke is already standing in front of me, his handsome face hidden by shadows. He catches the fingers of one of my hands and walks me to him, the charge between us electric, just like it always was. Even before we were an us, before we were engaged, in love, and planning a damn wedding, when we still denied we were more than friends, the current between us was alive. This time, though, I’m not looking for a Prince Charming. This isn’t another Cinderella story.
“When we go inside,” he begins.
“Let’s just go inside,” I say, because I want him to know that I’m not running as he accused. I don’t need to run from anyone or anything.
His eyes narrow, his expression unreadable, but his reaction is without further delay. Still holding my hand, he folds our arms at the elbow, aligning our bodies and placing us in motion. There is no question that we are, in this moment of time, ex-lovers, still burning alive for each other, but there is also no question that for me, this is about burning it out. No. It’s about burning it out my way, not his. Whatever happens when we walk in that hotel, I’m going to own it when I walk out; it will be my decision.
We enter the lobby, and Roarke doesn’t even pause, nor do I want him to pause. His pace is steady, our pace is steady, and he leads me to the elevator. I find that I’m not nervous. Why would I be? I’ve known this man my entire life. In fact, I’m more alive right now than I have been in a long time. Anger begins to take shape, a ball in my belly that grows and flows through my body. Yes, I’m angry. I’m really angry with this man, and I realize now that I have never allowed myself that emotion. I felt pain after his betrayal. I felt hurt, but I never let myself be mad. It’s a liberating emotion, rather than defeating like everything else I’ve engaged in since our breakup. It’s freedom, too. I’m not to blame for the past, and while he might owe me answers, why would I ask for them? What do answers solve? Nothing. Nothing he can say will change what happened. Nothing he can say will turn back time. Nothing he can say will make me put a ring back on my finger. And that’s okay. For the first time since I left, that’s really okay.
We reach the elevator, and he jabs the button. The doors open, and he doesn’t let go of me, like he believes I’ll run away. The more I think about that accusation on his behalf, the more that anger bubbles inside me, a kettle of built-up thoughts and feelings, waiting to boil over. He simply turns us and walks me backward into the elevator. He swipes his keycard and punches in a floor. I don’t know if I want to yell at him or push him against the wall and kiss him. I don’t do either. The doors shut, and we face each other, our hands and elbows still joined. And we just stare at each other, and that’s when I feel the push and pull of emotions, his emotions. He wants to try to explain the past. He needs to try to explain. But that’s not what I need. That’s not what I want. That is not where I find my zen, whatever that really even is—my center, I guess.
The elevator halts, and as we wait for the doors to o
pen, I feel the tension rising inside me. I don’t want to hear his reasons why. I don’t want to revisit what I felt back then. I will not listen. I pull my hand away from his and turn to the door. It opens, and I’m in the hallway in an instant. Roarke steps to my side and motions down the hallway. I’m going to his hotel room. I could ask for my own. I could ask, or even insist that we go downstairs, but those things don’t work for me. I know what does.
We reach the door, and he swipes his card, pushing open the door. Without hesitation, I enter the room, and I don’t even see the space before me. I whirl around to face him, and when he shuts the door and locks it, I’m right there waiting. The minute he turns to face me, I’m standing in front of him, pushing him against the door. “I don’t want to hear why. Ever. Do not open your mouth and give me a reason because it will only piss me off. It’s done. That part of us is done. We are—”
He catches my hips and turns me. Now my back is against the wall, and his powerful thighs cage mine, his hands cupping my face. “We are anything but done,” he says, and then his mouth is on my mouth, his tongue licking past my teeth, caressing deep.
I moan with the taste of him, wicked and wrong and yet oh so right. I want this. I want him, but this has to be on my terms. I shove on his chest, tearing my mouth from his. “This means nothing. You aren’t forgiven. We aren’t us again. We aren’t—”
“We never stopped being us, Hannah. If that’s not obvious to you, it is to me. I’ll show you.”
“Don’t show me. Just—just kiss me.”
“I don’t need to be told twice. Not where you’re concerned.” And then he’s kissing me again, and I don’t stop him this time because if I do, I’ll think too hard, and that’s not an option. I don’t want to think. I don’t want to talk. I just want to feel this man close, one last time. That’s all.
One.
Last.
Tangled Up in Christmas Page 6