I must have slept because I woke at three in the morning, going rigid with terror before I remembered where I was. I rolled over but Marc was gone, the sheet thrown back as if to emphasize that I was truly, terribly alone.
“Marc?” I called quietly, thinking he was in the bathroom.
When he didn’t answer, I got up. Candlelight wavered from the dark living room down the hall. I found him sitting in a chair by the window, watching the lights of Paris glow dully through a faint mist.
He heard my footsteps and turned. “You’re up,” he said. “You okay?”
“Yeah. You couldn’t sleep?”
“No.”
I sat on the rug at his feet. He wore only black boxer briefs, leaving bare his hard-muscled chest and stomach. In his hand was a highball glass filled with dark amber liquid.
“Single-malt Scotch,” he said, tilting the glass to one side. “Want some?”
“No, thanks.”
His face was pale and grim. He looked older, which somehow made him even more beautiful. In the candlelight, his eyes were a ghostly shade of silver-gray.
“What is it?” I asked. “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing.”
“Please. I want to know.”
“Let’s not worry about me, all right?” he said, staring out the window. “You’ve been through hell today.”
“So have you. Tonight was awful.”
“But it’s over now. And I’m glad I could be there for you. It’s just – forget it.”
“Marc. Look at me.”
He sighed and dropped his gaze to my face. “It was inevitable, wasn’t it?” he said quietly. “Something like this?”
My stomach was ice. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“I’d actually begun to hope that what happened with Lydia was a fluke, and I was free of it. But you can’t outrun who you are or what kind of family you come from. It’s pointless to even try.”
“This isn’t your fault any more than it is mine,” I said, slipping my hand around his calf. “It just happened.”
His smile was tight. “Nothing just happens in this life. There’s cause and effect, and there are choices. Take me out of the equation and Trevor never came to Paris. You never spent an entire day tied to my bed.”
“There are a lot of parts to this. For one thing, I should never have told Julia about us.”
He shook his head. “Come on. If you weren’t with me there’d have been nothing to tell. How many times am I going to make the same mistake? How many lives can I fuck up before I get the message?”
I could feel him pulling away, walling himself off the way he’d done for so long. “You haven’t fucked up my life, Marc. Not even close.”
“What an accomplishment,” he said with a caustic laugh. “You’ve known me less than a month and I haven’t ruined you yet. Give me time. I’m sure I’ll figure out a way.”
He sipped his Scotch and looked at me, his forehead wrinkling. “Forgive me. You’ve been through enough, you don’t need this, too. I just think – well, obviously, we can’t go on as we were.”
My entire body went stiff. “As we were?”
“You neglecting your life, submitting to a man like me. And the worst part is how much I want you right now. There was something about untying you from the bed earlier, rescuing you, that made me want to fuck you so much. Even when you don’t mean to, you give off this aura I can’t resist.”
“It’s okay,” I said, going up on my knees. “It was a strange situation.”
“It’s not okay. It’s despicable. It’s something Sade would feel.” He leaned forward, his face dark and drawn. “Don’t you get it? This whole thing is a warning. We have to pay attention.”
My eyes brimmed with hot, stinging tears. “You’re punishing me because of what Trevor did.”
“I’m doing the opposite. I’m protecting you.”
“I don’t want to be protected,” I said, laying my hands on his tightly-muscled thighs. “I want what we had before.”
“You think you do. So did Lydia.”
I drew back. The candle wavered from some unseen current of air. “Don’t, Marc. I’m not Lydia.”
“No, but I’ve had a negative impact on you, just as I had on her. For Christ’s sake, the police were here tonight. You spent all day roped to a headboard. How long can we keep doing this?”
His face was filled with a hundred unspoken emotions. Had he destroyed me and I just couldn’t see it? Was I so wrecked with desire for him that I would overlook anything?
“None of it was your fault,” I said, knowing I’d never convince him.
“Fault is a very tricky thing. I didn’t tie you to the bed but I made it possible. I’m not going to hurt you like that again, no matter what I have to do.”
The words broke over me with sickening clarity. “No matter what?”
It makes sense now, doesn’t it?” he said, his voice cracking. “Everything I’ve said from the beginning? This isn’t a surprise. It was just a matter of time.”
A tear trickled across the corner of my lip. “I don’t know why we can’t just put it behind us.”
“Please, Sophie. Don’t make it harder. It’s brutal enough already. My willpower, when it comes to you –” He stopped and drank the rest of his Scotch, wincing as he swallowed.
“I wish you’d look at me,” I said.
“Why? So you can break my resolve the way you always do?” He looked at me anyway, his mouth set in a hard line. His eyes were wild, sleepless and tormented. “I won’t change my mind again,” he said. “I can’t.”
I stood up and stared down at him, my nails tearing at my palms. “Okay, so...would you like me to leave right now? In the middle of the night?”
“That’s not what I meant at all,” he said with a pained look. “You know that. I’m just saying –”
“I understand what you’re saying,” I broke in. “And it’s exactly what Trevor wanted all along.” I went back to the guest room, shut the door, and got into bed.
CHAPTER TWELVE
For three hours I lay in the tangled sheets, anguish and tears alternating with determination.
I would not stay where I wasn’t wanted. As wrong as I believed Marc was, I wouldn’t try to talk him out of it. I wouldn’t be Lydia, clutching at him in desperation, literally going insane with love and desire. It would only make him pity me, and I would not be pitied.
Though it wasn’t quite dawn, I got up. I stole past Marc, who was asleep on the couch with his arm over his eyes and an empty snifter beside him on the coffee table. Closing drawers and closets quietly in the master bedroom, I packed my suitcase. I left behind the dresses and shoes Marc had given me, and folded the lingerie in an empty drawer.
Instead of a note, I left the beautiful crystal bottle of perfume in the middle of his dresser where he couldn’t miss it. It had once been a token of how deeply he understood me – now it was a reminder of what happened when I let my guard down. I’d tried it once. Never again. I might spend the rest of my life isolated and unhappy, but it was better than this.
Stealthily wheeling my suitcase to the front door, I managed to leave without waking him. I took a cab to the Hotel du Fort across town and ordered a room service breakfast, which I choked down despite my lack of appetite. Eating, unpacking, planning out my last restaurant review – I did everything mechanically, with an instinctive numbness that let me function with almost no feeling.
I wouldn’t think about Marc or Trevor or anything else. Not yet. There would be plenty of time for that when I flew home in a few days.
Bruises covered by a long-sleeved blouse, I went to the lunch I’d missed yesterday. I had no smile for the hostess, only a request for a table near the back. I’d been avoiding my phone all morning but looked at it once I was seated, hoping for a message from Marc. Nothing but a blank screen.
By now he’d found me gone. Obviously he wasn’t wondering where I was or how I was doing after one of the worst
days of my life. He sure knew how to end a relationship – wait until things got messy, mumble a few half-assed excuses, and blow me off.
At least he’d waited to dump Lydia until she was out of the hospital. With me, he hadn’t even waited until morning to act like he was bailing for my own good.
It was my first day without lingerie, a beautiful dress, and heels in what seemed like months. In my simple gray pants and blazer I felt like the modest person I used to be. I’d been so willing to give her up and disown her. As I picked at my lunch I quietly mourned the Sophie I’d been with Marc – the free spirit, the sensual coquette, the woman who’d taken pleasure and risked everything, living as if this time would never end.
I had no idea when I’d see her again. I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to.
Just after nine that night there was a knock at my door – turn-down service, despite the Do Not Disturb sign hanging from my knob. I closed my laptop and pulled on jeans, prepared to send the maid away using ad-libbed sign language.
I peered through the crack wearing an apologetic smile, but jerked back as soon as I saw who it was.
Please God, no. This morning I’d begun the agonizing process of trying to get over him. Now I would have to start all over again.
“Sophie?”
I tried to shut the door but Marc blocked it with his foot.
“Let me in,” he said. “We need to talk.”
“We’ve talked enough. I don’t want to see you.”
I shoved the door as hard as I could but he pushed from the other side, forcing his way in. Using all of my strength, I slammed my hands against his powerful chest but he didn’t even take a step backward. He kicked the door shut with the heel of his boot and stood in front of me with his arms crossed, a wall of defiant, muscular strength.
I pounded against his shoulders. “Get out!”
He grabbed my wrists, restraining me so easily I was almost embarrassed. “No. Not until you listen to me.”
“Just what I need,” I said, trying to twist free. “Another controlling jackass who won’t leave me alone.”
“I’ll be happy to let you go when you calm down.”
Writhing, I glared at him. “Are you kidding? This is calm.”
It took all of my will to stop struggling. When I finally did, he dropped my wrists.
“That was quite a greeting,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “Hello to you, too.”
“How did you know where I was?” I demanded, straightening my sleeves.
“You stayed here before.”
“And they let you come up to my room?”
“The owners are business acquaintances of mine.”
I smirked. “In that case, I’m checking out.”
Marc’s shoulders dropped. “Are you going to fight me all night or can we have a conversation?”
“You want to have a conversation? Fine. Start talking. You have three minutes and then I want you to leave.”
I strode across the room and climbed back onto the bed. My half-eaten room service salad sat withering on a plate next to the television. I was unshowered with dark liner smeared under my eyes and I didn’t care. Let him see me at my worst, my ugliest and most exposed. None of it mattered anymore.
He started to sit on the bed beside me but I gave him a deadly look. “Over there,” I said.
He sat in the upholstered chair near the dresser, his legs wide apart. Wearing battered motorcycle boots, faded jeans, and a white turtleneck sweater, he looked so good it felt like a creative form of torture, devised to make me as miserable as possible.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asked.
“Under the very shitty circumstances, yes,” I said, drawing my knees up to my chest. “I’m just great.”
“How are your wrists?”
“How do you think? They hurt.” I rubbed them, pressing on a deep black bruise below my left thumb. The cut I’d gotten at the M Society was an angry, swollen red.
He looked as if he wanted to come over and comfort me, but didn’t dare. “I woke up this morning and you were gone,” he said. “Why did you leave without saying goodbye?”
“Is that why you’re here, to say goodbye? You could have done that over the phone and saved us both a lot of trouble.”
He sighed. “Come on, Sophie. I’m here because I can’t stop thinking about you. You had a traumatic experience yesterday and I made it a hell of a lot worse. It was indefensible and I’m sorry.”
I shrugged and said nothing. I no longer cared about apologies or explanations. It was way too late for I’m sorry.
He sat looking at me, his stunning, dove-gray eyes rimmed with dark circles. Like me, he couldn’t have slept more than a few hours.
“I want you to know something,” he said, every word deliberate. “Trevor and I used the same rope, but that’s where the similarity ends. Everything you and I did, we did together. With love.”
I cringed. It was the first time either of us had mentioned the word, and the timing couldn’t have been worse. “Is it love to break my heart over and over again? To pull away every two days under the guise of protecting me?”
“Yes, it is,” he said, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “If you didn’t matter so much to me, I wouldn’t care if I hurt you. I’ve been that man, Sophie. I know how to use a woman and discard her when I’m done. But I’m not like that anymore. You wouldn’t want me to be.”
I got up abruptly, too consumed with frustration to sit still. “Have you really changed that much? First you all but throw me out and then you force your way into my hotel room. You can never make up your mind – actually, scratch that. You make up your mind three times a week and every time you want the opposite of what you wanted before.”
He watched me pace the carpet between the bed and the closet. “You’re right,” he said. “I’m torn between wanting you and shielding you. Those instincts are equally strong.”
Wanting you. Just hearing the words weakened my knees. “That’s all it is? Conflicting instincts?”
He gave me a trace of a smile. “You say that as if it’s simple.”
“Isn’t it? If you can’t feel both things at the same time, then you have to choose. And you need to do it tonight. I’m done hanging around waiting for you to decide.”
“I don’t expect you to.”
He stared at me, his expression calm and unruffled. The only clue to his internal struggle was the tic of a muscle near his left eye. “I want you to come to Provence with me as we planned,” he said.
I snorted. “Are you serious? Why?”
“Why not? You don’t want to fly back to New York yet, do you?”
Suddenly exhausted, I sat heavily on the end of the bed. Everything ached – my legs, my back, the muscles in my throat. “That’s the last thing I want,” I said. “I don’t want to be in the same hemisphere as Trevor. If I had to deal with the police right now…I’m not ready for that. Not even close.”
“Okay. How’ll you write your article if you don’t come with me? Katherine is expecting you to go.”
“I’m going on Monday by myself. I’ll call a real estate agency that caters to Americans and try to set up interviews with prospective buyers.”
He sighed. “I’ll be there at the same time, Sophie. I know the area and I already have an agent. I’ll help however I can.”
He came over and sat next to me. I looked up into his face, feeling as vulnerable and broken as I ever had in my life. “I’m not leaving this hotel tonight,” I said. “I need time alone. I need sleep.”
“Take all the time you want,” he said, his voice husky from exhaustion. “But I’m not ready to let you go. I want to be the person you deserve after what Trevor did to you. After everything you’ve been through in your life.”
I frowned, hearing something in his voice that put me on edge. “The person I deserve – who would that be exactly?”
“Somebody who doesn’t hurt you and put you in danger.”
&n
bsp; My eyes burned with uncried tears. Now I understood. It was a vow to change, to be as withdrawn as he’d been before seeing my picture and choosing me.
“No, Marc. You can’t go back to being who you’re not. It didn’t work then and it won’t work now.”
“It’ll be different this time,” he said, his forehead creasing. “I’m different. I have a very good reason to be.”
Far from reassuring me, his words felt like a crushing defeat. “I won’t be one of those women you pretend with,” I said. “I can’t be. Not after what we’ve had.”
“Just give me a chance,” he pleaded. “It’s only three days, and after that you can decide whether to stay or go. The power is yours. It always has been.”
“Bullshit,” I said. “Tell me how the power’s mine.”
Instead of answering, he raised his hand slowly toward my face. His head tilted and a frown flashed between his eyebrows.
“You’re so beautiful,” he said. “You know that? More beautiful tonight than you’ve ever been.”
“Don’t touch me,” I said, unable to tear my gaze from his.
“I won’t,” he said in a gruff whisper.
Eyes piercing into mine, he traced the air around my cheek before lightly touching my skin. At the feel of his fingertips, my defenses wavered and crashed. A slow burn snaked through my gut, an endless craving for him that went beyond sex to my soul.
In spite of everything, he could still tear me apart with a glance, lock into a part of me I’d never revealed to anyone else. I was naked in front of him, completely myself with no pride.
“Say you’ll come with me,” he whispered, and brushed his lips against mine.
When the tips of our tongues touched, I let out a whimper, audible proof that I was still completely his. In an instant I was soaking wet for him, my nipples stiff against the inside of my t-shirt.
Descended (The Red Blindfold Book 2) Page 10