There was more going on with Wes than he was admitting. Not that it mattered. He’d said “weren’t” not “aren’t.” We weren’t exclusive. Past tense implied there’d been a change in his and Rosanna’s coupledom, and that kiss was the tip of this nonsensical iceberg. “Why didn’t you tell me you were a DJ?”
“Why didn’t you tell me you’d decided to do the same?”
She slapped her thigh and cackled, the sharp sound carrying into the night. She abruptly clamped her mouth shut. “Let’s be clear about something, Herbert.”
“Who’s Herbert?”
“You are, old man. I’m doing the asking, and you’re doing the answering. You owe me that and then some. Capiche?”
He twitched his nose, looking more like Felix the rabbit-squirrel every day. “Let’s walk while we talk.” He shrugged his backpack higher and started toward the city.
She gawked at his back. “You’re not seriously planning to walk to your condo. Or do you have a Bat Cave nearby?”
He turned slowly, impatience in the exaggerated move. “I have a Falcon Cave, not a Bat Cave. It’s in my condo. And I need air, which is why I asked my driver to let me out.”
“Do you have a Falconmobile, too?”
He smirked. “Wouldn’t work. I’d need a car designed for homogenization.”
“Designed for milk? Would it shrink into a freeze-dried powder that gets mixed into drinks to make you so annoying people around you drop dead, because that would actually make sense as your superpower.”
He laughed.
She glared. “What did I say about the laughing, Weston?”
He dragged his hand down his face and sighed. “Homogenization. Not homogenized milk. It would have to blend in. And I wasn’t planning on walking all the way to my condo. I needed air. Figured I’d walk a bit then hop in a cab when I got tired.”
“Then let’s walk. I have an inquisition to unleash.”
He scrubbed his shoe over the sidewalk. The sound grated her ears. “I’m sure you have a thousand questions. I have a number of my own. But it’s late, and neither of us is in the right headspace. Let’s grab a cab. We’ll both go home and get some sleep. We can meet tomorrow night for a proper interrogation.”
How convenient for him. “I want answers now.”
“I’m too tired to give them to you.”
Her tongue prickled with the urge to lash out, but the skin under Wes’s eyes looked bruised, sunken. It could be the darkness, the late hour. According to Duncan, there was another source. She and Duncan had texted periodically since their date. He was actually pretty funny, last week’s bout of texting banter amusing enough to have her cackling.
Duncan: Are you sure you don’t want to add benefits to our friend status? All the cool kids are doing it.
Annie: I don’t give into peer pressure.
Duncan: That must be a typo. You mean you want peer pleasure, right?
She’d replied with laughing emojis, and he’d replied by asking about Wes, wondering if his boss and friend was okay. He’d mentioned that Wes had been exhausted at work, grumpier than usual. Instead of calling Wes and checking up on him, all Annie had done was avoid him while chasing Falcon. With tonight’s revelation, it was clear Wes was burning the candle at both ends. Tonight, in this blue-gray light, he looked haggard.
“Fine,” she said, her emotions warring. “Tomorrow it is, and you better not think about lying.”
Weston was right to postpone this interrogation. She was confused about that kiss, his relationship status, upset he hadn’t confided in her about his music. Not that she’d been much better lately. She hadn’t told him about meeting that busker, the piano lessons, her DJ plans. And he was Falcon, the man, the myth, the musical genius! She’d been lusting after Weston and his alter ego. The awareness ratcheted her spark of attraction into a full-blown fever.
She needed time to acclimatize, figure out how she felt under this mess of emotion. Get her haywire hormones in check. Then she’d attack him with a list of questions, none of which would be: When do I get to kiss you again?
11
“When did you start DJing?” Annie sat across from Weston, spine straight, her hands clasped together on his dining table.
The marble monstrosity sat twelve comfortably. The cool surface was clean and polished and did zero to douse the heat pulsing off her body. Anger heat. Defensive heat. Not in-heat heat. She meant business. She may have worn an off-the-shoulder maxi dress in shades of turquoise, exuding summer fun, instead of a blazer or pantsuit, but she had three pages of questions and a pen to cross off each one. She wanted to know why Wes had hidden his DJing. She was determined to have him teach her. She needed to understand why he’d devoured her that night and had lied about enjoying it.
No one was leaving this table until she was satisfied.
Weston removed his tie and folded it over the chair to his left. He undid the top two buttons of his dress shirt and rolled his cuffs, as though he had all the time in the world. Like he was the one in control. She gritted her teeth.
He matched her pose, non-dainty hands clasped, shoulders squared. “I started playing in clubs three years ago, but I’ve been dabbling in music longer.”
“How much longer?”
A small vein pulsed at his temple. “The year after my mother died.”
Her heart squeezed. This confrontation was bound to unearth painful memories from both their pasts, but she’d been determined to maintain an emotional distance. There were reasons she’d kept secrets from him. He no doubt had his motivations, too. Yet here she was, one question in, already softening toward him. “Because you missed her?”
He unclasped his hands and ran a hand over his mouth. “Because I was angry. Violent at times. Marjory blackmailed my father by threatening to quit and forced me into therapy. It was suggested I find an outlet.”
Wes’s mother had died a year after Leo. Another devastating blow. Still, he’d maintained his weekly visits with Annie, had never failed to rag on her about homework, hobbies, friends. He’d show up random days to walk her home from school. He’d been serious, not angry. Intense, but not the type to lash out. “I don’t get it. We hung out back then. You always seemed fine. I mean, fine for a guy who thought wearing loafers was dressing down.”
He smirked, then swallowed. “I need a glass of Scotch with this conversation. I have that Chardonnay you like.”
He didn’t ask if she wanted a drink, just stood and moved through his kitchen methodically. He knew the wine she liked, expensive stuff she’d never buy at home. He stocked it for her, along with her favorite salt and vinegar chips and rocky road ice cream. He even had an Architectural Digest subscription because she used the magazines for scrapbooking. None of these details were new, but warmth spread through her chest. This man who’d kissed her passionately knew her better than anyone. And he had a girlfriend.
Wes returned with their drinks and walked to her side. His hip brushed her arm as he set her glass down. They both froze. Her belly windmilled.
He returned to his seat and took a pull of his Scotch. “I was never out of control with you,” he said, his attention on the glass in his hands. “Everything was always better with you.”
It was a good thing he wasn’t looking at her. Her cheeks felt like they were on fire, and the windmill situation upgraded to dizzying spins. She sipped her wine. The toasty notes clung to her tongue, settled her stomach. Her body loosened as she looked at Wes for what felt like the first time. “I wish I’d known you were struggling.”
“I didn’t want you to know.”
“I’m strong on my own, Wes. I never needed you to be strong for me.”
“It was never about that.”
“Then why hide the music from me? The therapy? I told you when I had counseling. You were the one who said talking about tough stuff was important.” He’d been the reason she’d stuck with those sessions. She’d despised them at first, had grown to accept them, and was thrilled when they’d been done. In h
indsight, they had helped. Wes had helped her, but he’d never let her help him.
He ran his finger around the rim of his glass. “There were things about Leo’s death I didn’t want to talk about. It was all too hard at the time.”
She pictured Wes’s devastated face when he’d woken her at the shelter, his choppy words, his tears. Visions she didn’t want to recall. They weren’t here to rehash what they’d lost. This was about his secret identity, the changes in their relationship.
She consulted her question list. “You could have picked up guitar, drums, the triangle. How’d you end up DJing?”
“My man hands are too big for the triangle.”
Smart ass, trying to distract her by being adorable. “Wrong answer.”
He smiled. “Same reason you’re into it.”
Right. Leo. She took her pen and crossed off that obvious question. “How’d you come up with Falcon?”
“Same answer.”
The Batman comics Leo had loved, which she should have realized, too. Another useless question. “Don’t get too comfortable. I’m starting with the easy stuff.”
Wes leaned forward. “When did you get bitten by the DJ bug? And why didn’t you tell me about it?”
“This is my inquisition, not yours.”
“Quid pro quo, Squirrel. If you want answers, you need to bend.”
Fine. If he wanted answers, he’d get them. “Two months ago, and I didn’t tell you because of that nickname.”
His dark eyebrows drew together. “You didn’t tell me because I call you Squirrel?”
“At least your hearing isn’t failing in your old age.”
“Explain yourself.”
She opened her mouth to finally tell him how demoralizing his judgment could be, when she heard a soft scritching. She’d been in Wes’s condo enough to recognize the hum of the air conditioner, the ringing echo of steps when walking on his hardwood floor. This sound was new.
Side-eyeing him, she pushed her chair back and snooped through the kitchen, scanned the loft condominium’s open space. The fancy paintings and dramatic sculptures were still fancy and dramatic. The reclaimed brick walls still stretched up to the third story, making her feel small. Nothing was new or out of place, then she heard another scritch, scritch, scritch.
“What are you doing?” Wes asked from his chair.
“Investigating. I heard…” She walked toward his living area, made a wide circle around his leather sectional, and abruptly laughed.
Wes didn’t ask what she’d found. Weirdo knew what had her grinning. “I completely forgot you kept the rabbit-squirrel. Does he sleep in your room with you or out here?”
“You didn’t answer my last question.”
“Because you have a real, live pet. But I’m confused. When I met you outside your building, you were coming from work. You weren’t carrying the cage, and I’m pretty sure you didn’t have Felix cradled against your stomach in a Rabbit Bjorn.”
He looked up at the towering ceiling, his attention meandering to the massive widows. “His separation anxiety’s gone.”
“His anxiety’s gone? Just like that?”
“At least your hearing isn’t failing in your old age,” he said, stealing her line.
Such a comedian. “How’d you cure him?”
“Living here has calmed him down.”
She squinted at the rabbit, but he looked the same as when she’d first met him. “I still don’t get why you kept him. You hate pets the way most people hate eating liver. What changed?”
“Felix is different.”
“Oh, I know he’s a rare rabbit-squirrel with a penchant for world domination, but you’ve always said…” She trailed off as she recalled his pet dismissals.
Over the years, she’d suggested he get a cat or fish or monkey, because the guy could afford one, to warm up his solitary life. Easy companionship. Wes’s answers had always been the same: It’s too much commitment. I don’t have time. Pets require care I’m not equipped to give. And they smell.
She’d roll her eyes and tell him he was made of stone. He’d retaliate with a Squirrel joke. Annoying, but his vehement pet stance could be linked to the kiss conundrum. Aside from this Rosanna socialite, Wes had never had a long-term girlfriend. He would sometimes mention a night out with a woman, but as long as she’d known him, he’d been single. She’d never given his lifestyle much thought. There had been no physical attraction to prompt curiosity.
She was curious now.
Odor factor aside, commitment issues might be a more defining attribute of Wes than she’d realized. There was no way around the bond Annie and he already shared. Building upon that with intimacy was daunting for her. It was likely as scary for him. He might even have liked kissing Annie as much as she’d liked being kissed by him, but the depth of their relationship had sent him running to this other “safer” woman, one who didn’t come with their emotional history.
She chewed on those possibilities while squatting next to Felix’s cage, her knees fanning out the soft fabric of her dress. She poked her finger through the wire slats. Felix munched his hay. “I’m glad you have each other,” she said loud enough for both pet and owner to hear. Wes’s stylish condo felt more like a home with the silly rabbit.
“Back to the nickname,” Wes said, ignoring the rabbit in the room. “What does that have to do with your DJ interest?”
She stayed facing Felix. It was easier talking to him. “When you call me Squirrel it reminds me you think I’m flighty and incompetent and never stick with anything worthwhile. I’ve always known I’d figure out my life eventually, and when I decided this was what I wanted to do, I didn’t want your judgment to discourage me.”
She’d never admitted that much to Wes, too worried about hurting him or their friendship. Even now, her pulse quickened, picking up speed until she felt shaky squatting next to the cage. She stood, straightened her dress, and faced him.
Wes’s cheeks were slack, his brow crumpled. He stared at his glass as though crestfallen. “I’m so sorry,” he said quietly.
Weston Aldrich didn’t do heartfelt apologies. He ran a multi-billion dollar company with single-minded precision. He was a planner who’d led a secret life for years, never buckling, never showing weakness.
Abruptly, he pushed back his chair and stalked over to her. He gripped her upper arms. “You are smart, Annie. And creative and funny and talented. You’re unbelievably capable, and I only ever wanted you to reach your potential. Consider that nickname banished.”
His genuine distress weakened her limbs. Or maybe it was their proximity. The shoulders of her dress slipped lower, and his fingers bit into her bare skin.
He’d taken her to the Hamptons last summer. A work function which had included families and friends. Initially, she’d said no, always feeling like his charity case. He’d insisted she come. In the end, she’d loved the hot sun on her skin, how it had warmed her bones. She had loved watching Wes laugh with coworkers and then smile at her. He’d dragged her into the water, the two of them messing around and splashing each other until Weston was all she could see. She’d forgotten how in tune she’d been to him that day.
The same sensations assaulted her now.
She dragged her gaze up, past the chest hair peeking out of his open collar, the masculine knot of his Adam’s apple, all the way to those scrapbook lips. She licked her lips, trying to remember how Wes had tasted after they’d been sweaty and dancing. She met his eyes and sucked in a rough breath. His pupils had dilated, darkened, eclipsing all that complex blue.
He released her with a jerk of his hands, turned around, and dropped his head forward. His shoulders were hitched high, the tightness of his shirt hinting at coiled frustration below. She wanted to go to him, knead those tense muscles, finally ask him if the merger was tough on him and find out how she could help. She wanted to kiss the sensitive spot at the back of his neck and wrap him in her arms, tell him his apology meant more than he could know.
>
Kissing him had meant more than she’d realized.
All their years together—the frustrating and funny, the good and the bad—had bound them irrevocably, but this relationship was the cornerstone of her life, and it was shifting. Quickly. The prospect suddenly terrified her. And he had a girlfriend.
Best to steer them in a safer direction. For now. Focus on their joint love of music and the fact that she was going to be his apprentice.
“Take me to your Falcon Cave,” Annie said from behind him.
Weston continued counting his breaths, slowing his pulse. Being this close to Annie was testing his willpower, and he was furious with himself for letting her down. That stupid nickname had been a joke. Her defensive comebacks had been amusing. She’d jab at him with her usual wit. Tease him for being uptight and controlling and a general pain in her ass. More proof jokes were rooted in truth.
He had thought she’d been wasting her talents. He’d wanted her to be successful, self-reliant. If she’d told him about the DJing, he would have tried to steer her toward a steady job with a decent income and good benefits. A career with a future. For all the “nurturing” he’d done, he’d only managed to undermine her confidence.
There wasn’t much he could do about the past. About Leo, any of it. But he could change the present. Make sure Annie knew how capable she was. As long as he did it from a distance.
Their drinks abandoned on his table, Weston led Annie down a side hallway, to the locked door at the end.
She hung back a few steps. “I thought this room held old financial records.”
He inserted his key, glanced over his shoulder. “I lied.”
“Shocker,” she mumbled. “At least tell me you have a Falcon suit loaded with cool weapons developed in Aldrich Pharma’s secret laboratory. And if there’s one of those gadgets that shoots a wire between buildings so I can slide from skyscraper to skyscraper, consider it stolen.”
“There’s no suit or gadgets, Sq…Annie.” Old habits died hard. “It’s a boring sound room with DJ equipment.” Except nothing about the space was boring to Weston. He’d never imagined sharing the space with anyone. The people he knew would find the equipment tedious, the soundproofed walls oppressive, and he was suddenly nervous about Annie seeing his sanctuary.
The Beat Match Page 11