by Kati Wilde
Before I completely erupt. Tearing away from her, I head for the nearby balcony. A dozen pairs of French doors are open to the outside, where the cold air slaps my face and some sense into me. The fireworks that suddenly explode overhead are like the ones going off in my brain, a goddamn epiphany of color and light.
This marriage isn’t going to work. And it’s not fucking worth it.
If it was just the money, just the lawyers, yeah. But marry someone who’ll treat my friends exactly the same way the Wyndhams treated my mother? I wouldn’t be any better than them. And I’m no fucking saint as it is.
I can and would tolerate a whole lot of shit if Audrey’s snobbery was just aimed at me. But the way she treated Patrick—and would probably treat anyone else I know and care about? No. I won’t accept that. Not even to destroy the Wyndhams.
Fuck this marriage. If she still wants to pay for the lawyers, I’ll let her. If not, I don’t give a shit. I’ll find some other way or just let this all go. And try to get over the shame of wanting a woman who would have looked at my mother the same way the Wyndhams did.
It’s time to call off this bullshit engagement.
People are streaming out onto the balcony to watch the fireworks, but I push through the crowd and return to the ballroom. Audrey’s not where I left her. I scan the tops of heads, searching for a pale blond ponytail. She should be easy to spot.
I don’t see her anywhere. Goddammit. I just want to get this over with. Tell her the wedding isn’t happening—and then go and get so fucking drunk, I forget the way she felt against me. The way she smelled.
“Hey, man.” Patrick stops beside me, Karen on his arm—both of them heading toward the balcony. “You looking for your girl? She just took off that way. Looked kind of freaked out by the noise.”
My chest tightens. “Freaked out?”
“Yeah. Was all”—he hunches his shoulders and sticks his fingers into his ears before straightening up again—“so maybe you better check up on her. And she explained about earlier. About having a tough time with crowds, then being overstimulated and spacing out. So, you know. It’s all good.”
“We invited her to our ugly sweater party next Saturday,” Karen adds. “And she said that would be fun. So make sure to bring her.”
“Yeah,” I tell her, barely listening. Searching for Audrey again. “Which way?”
He points and I surge through the crowd in that direction. Remembering the reverend telling me about the fireworks.
Not telling me about them. Warning me about them.
And remembering Audrey, saying that she needed me to stay at her side until we left the party. But I abandoned her right in the middle of a crowd—which she apparently has a tough time dealing with. Now I don’t see her anywhere.
Because she was freaked out. Was she afraid?
Or hurt?
With worry clawing at my stomach, I stop at the coat check. She’s not there. But how hard can it be to find a woman who looks like she does?
To the attendant, I rasp out—“Blonde ponytail. Red dress. Fucking beautiful. Which way?”
“That way,” he says immediately, pointing.
So I’ll ask every person in this hotel until I find her. And when I do…
I don’t know. Not anymore.
Not that she’s likely to give me any choice in the matter. Not after what I said to her.
But I’ll deal with all that after I find her. After I make sure she’s all right.
As soon as I know she’s okay, I’ll follow my original plan. Get drunk, and try to forget. But not her scent or her touch.
Instead I’ll try to forget how I just fucked everything up.
5
Audrey
The hotel isn’t currently hosting a conference, so it isn’t difficult to find an empty meeting room to hide in. I sit in the quiet and the dark, on the floor and with my back against the wall.
I know now what the unfamiliar emotion is, the pang in my chest that’s accompanied by fear. It’s vulnerability. Because I opened myself up to being hurt by Caleb. And hurt me, he did.
A snobby little ice queen.
He’s so different from anyone else I’ve dated—and different from most people that I know. So I hoped he would see me differently than most people do.
But the only difference is that I’m marrying him.
If he still wants to marry me after I was rude to his friend. I suppose it’ll depend on whether his need for revenge against the Wyndhams is stronger than his anger at me. And he’d been furious. Believing that I’d deliberately insulted his friend. Believing that I’m the same as the Wyndhams.
That pang strikes again, deeper. My throat tightens until the ache there matches the one beneath my breast.
From across the room comes the sound of the door opening. A light flicks on, a burst of dull red through my closed eyelids.
Without opening my eyes, I tell whoever it is, “This room is in use. Please shut off the lights and close the door behind you.”
Darkness falls again. The door snaps shut.
But I’m not alone. Footsteps come toward me. Only hotel employees have access to the electronic keys that can open these rooms. But I know without looking who this must be.
My throat feels raw. “They let you in here?”
“They let you in, too,” Caleb points out softly. “So apparently all anyone has to do is ask.”
“I don’t have to ask. I own this hotel.”
He falls silent for a moment. The gravel in his voice seems rougher as he says, “They let me in because I told them you’re my fiancée and I was worried about you. I came to make sure you’re all right.”
“I will be.” But I’m not yet. And I can’t pretend that I am. “In a little while.”
“Do you want me to stay with you?”
No. It should be so easy to say. Just a little lie. But I’m no good at lying, so I remain silent. That usually works as well as a lie, because people assume the answer I don’t give.
Caleb ignores that unspoken answer. I hear him moving closer, the shuffle of his boots and the slide of his back against the wall as he sits on the floor next to me.
Then his hissed—“Shit, goddammit. What the hell did I just sit on…?” His voice flattens. “Is this your engagement ring?”
“Yes.”
“You took it off?”
“It was bothering me.”
He makes a sound of relief. “Okay. Good. And what else is…is this a handkerchief? It’s damp.” A bleak edge scrapes through the observation. “Were you crying?”
“It’s a pair of panties,” I tell him. “They were bothering me, too. So I took them off.”
“But…they’re damp.” Incredulity rings through the statement.
“I know. That’s why they were bothering me. I could feel them. And it was…distracting.”
“But they’re really fucking damp.”
“Of course they are!” I snap, my frustration boiling through. “I’m sexually attracted to you, and you were touching my bare skin and holding me close. So I was physically aroused. But then I hyperfocused on the wetness and I couldn’t feel anything else, or think of anything else. So I spaced out and was rude to your friend.”
“You didn’t talk to Patrick because you were focused on how wet your pussy was?”
“That’s what I just said.”
“And I’m making sure I heard it right. Because you just blew my fucking mind—and I don’t want there to be any more misunderstandings between us, especially when we’re talking about how me touching you gets your cunt so hot and wet.”
Not just his touch. His voice, too. Especially when he talks like that. I squirm against the floor, suddenly too aware of the needy ache between my legs. “Don’t,” I tell him, my breath shuddering. “Don’t talk about it. I’m trying not to think about it now.”
“All right.” His tone gentles. “You told Patrick and Karen that you don’t do well in crowds?”
“I don
’t.”
“Because of the noise? You get overstimulated, you told them.”
“That’s different. I have difficulty interacting with a lot of people even in a quiet room.” Sensory overstimulation just makes it harder. “It’s too much to process.”
“So you have, what—social anxiety?”
“No.” I don’t get anxious. “I get overloaded, trying to figure out what people mean. Because they rarely just say what they mean. And sometimes they say the opposite of what they mean, and I can’t easily parse their body language and tone and make it match their words. Like Jennifer Pearson. She says ‘interesting’ but that’s never what she’s really saying. So many people do that. And sometimes I know how to respond. If someone asks ‘How is your day going?’ I know it’s an empty question and they don’t want any answer except ‘Good.’ But most of the time, it’s not like that. And it’s exhausting trying to follow along.”
“That’s why you take things so literally.”
“Also why people think I’m too blunt.” Or frigid and condescending. “I say what I mean. You do, too, mostly. So it’s easier talking with you.”
“Mostly?” He pauses. “I’ll be more direct with you. And just ask me if you’re not sure of my meaning.”
Warmth blooms in my chest, big and bright and beautiful. “I will. I appreciate it so much,” I say to make my gratitude explicit. “Thank you.”
“Ah, fuck. Baby, you don’t need to thank me for that.”
“I know I don’t.” Then I laugh. “See? Whenever people say, ‘You don’t need to do that,’ it’s not what they mean. Usually they mean, ‘I don’t want you to do that.’”
“I meant ‘You shouldn’t feel obligated to thank anyone for treating you with a basic level of decency.’ With no effort on my part, I can make your interactions with me easier. And if you ever need something from me, I’ll give it to you. It’s that fucking simple,” he says gruffly. “So you better tell me what works for you and what doesn’t.”
“All right. But don’t go and look up any of this on WebMD. Because there’s no neat diagnosis or category for me. So you might think I have Asperger’s but I just share a few of the same tendencies—but only a few. Like I don’t have any trouble making eye contact. And I have some obsessive compulsive behaviors. But so many people try to figure out what I am based on a few things they’ve observed me doing, and then act shocked when I do something they didn’t think I would. It’s irritating.”
“So I shouldn’t play online psychiatrist.”
“Please don’t. I don’t need you to figure me out. My doctors and I have done a good job of it already.”
“I won’t, then. But tell me what you think I should know.”
The bright warmth in my chest swells. What you think I should know. Not demanding everything. But asking what I want to give. “I have trouble understanding nonverbal cues—and I prefer it when social interactions follow rules and are easy to make sense of.”
“Like conducting a business deal?”
“Yes. That’s easy. But I don’t always understand the rules of personal interaction. Sometimes I think there aren’t any rules, and that’s so frustrating to me. So it’s easier when I have a context, because there’s usually a guideline for that interaction. Employer, employee. Donor, donee. Investor, investee—”
“Or a marriage engagement?” he suggests in a low voice.
“Yes,” I say softly. “Though I’m still figuring out those rules.”
Like how to choose endearments, because he’s apparently already settled on one for me. Baby. As if he wants to hold me and take care of me.
Or whether to kiss him hello. To which he said, You don’t need to but meant I don’t want you to.
That deep ache opens up in my chest again. I try to ignore it, because I’m supposed to be telling him—“I don’t react well to pain. And I don’t like things that aren’t in the right place, or out of order, or cluttered, or physically uncomfortable. And sometimes I get distracted by those things. But it’s not really a distraction. It’s more that I become hyperfocused on that thing, and that hyperfocus means that I’m not paying attention to something I should be paying attention to.”
“Like Patrick.”
“Yes. Though maybe that was also overstimulation because I was feeling so much. Usually it’s loud noises and flashing lights that do it. Then I have to give my brain a break.”
“Like now,” he says gruffly. “In the dark.”
I nod.
“Is that what the rubber band on your wrist was for, too?”
“That’s for when I feel myself hyperfocusing on something—that little bit of pain pulls my focus in a different direction. Long enough for me to realize what I’m doing and stop. So I have coping mechanisms that mostly work. And I usually recognize when I’m becoming distracted or overstimulated.”
“But not always.”
“No. That’s why I typically bring Jeremy or Jessica to events like this.”
“But tonight you had me. Fuck.” He exhales a breath that sounds forced through clenched teeth. “I should have stayed with you like you asked me to. And I shouldn’t have called you what I did.”
“Why? You meant it.” Snobby little ice queen. That vulnerable opening in my chest starts to ache again. Because even before he promised to speak directly to me, Caleb said what he thinks. Frigid and pretentious. “Didn’t you?”
“I meant it then.” His voice hoarsens. “But now I know that I was badly fucking mistaken.”
Knowing that he changed his mind should ease the ache, but it only deepens. As if I’m becoming more and more vulnerable simply by sitting here in the dark with him. And more afraid of that vulnerability.
Prodded by that fear, I scramble to my feet. “I’m ready to leave now.”
Almost instantly Caleb is at my side, an enormous shadow looming next to me in the dark. “Then I’ll help you find your car.”
“My driver will pull up to the front of the hotel. I can find that alone.”
“I’m sure you can.” He reaches the conference room door and opens it for me. I don’t look up as the light from the corridor falls over us, don’t let myself become distracted by his fascinating face. “But there are rules about this. An engaged man makes sure his woman safely gets where she’s going.”
His woman? “That sounds like an antiquated rule.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s not worth doing.”
Perhaps. “All right. You may escort me to my car.”
“I may?” A deep laugh rumbles from him. “I would have anyway. But hold up for a minute.”
His fingers catch mine, and he swings me around to face him—then backs me up a single step. My back hits the corridor wall and he’s all around me, his head bent toward mine. I lift my gaze but only as far as his mouth, my breathing shallow and my pulse racing.
His voice is low and intimate. “What do you want me to do with this?”
The diamond ring. He holds it in his palm, the gold band looking ridiculously small in his big hand.
I sigh. “I should wear it.”
“Because that’s what engaged women do? But I say there should be some rules that we won’t give a fuck about. If a ring bothers you, don’t wear one.”
“Yes, but…I only borrowed this one for the night. I shouldn’t risk losing it. And I’m more likely to if I’m not wearing it.”
As it is, if he hadn’t brought the diamond with us, I’d have forgotten it on the floor.
“All right, then.” He lifts my left hand, and my heart thumps as he slowly slides the ring onto my finger. As if this gesture has more meaning than simply putting on a ring so it won’t get lost. As if he’s righting something that almost went wrong.
He settles the band into place, then turns my hand over and draws a slow circle in the center of my palm with his thumb. “Okay for now?”
“Yes,” I whisper as his thumb circles again. I can’t even feel the ring. Only that caress.
“And what about your panties?” He reaches into his pocket with his other hand and, a moment later, black silk dangles from his fingers. “I’ll happily put those back on you, too.”
Immediately I imagine his rough hands sliding their way up my legs, tugging my skirt up and dragging that tiny scrap of silk into place. My inner muscles clench in response. An erotic shiver works its way over my skin, tightening my nipples, as if his thumbs were stroking those taut buds instead of my palm.
Sheer longing fills my chest, but I shake my head. “Not if they’re still damp,” I tell him. But even if they aren’t, soon they would be again. Especially if he’s the one who puts them on me. “I’ll feel them and won’t be able to think about anything else.”
He gives a short, pained laugh. “Then we’re a good match, baby. I can’t think about anything but these wet panties, either.” Which he slides into his pocket again—and before I can protest his thievery, he entwines his fingers with mine and we begin heading down the corridor toward the coat check.
Holding hands. This is clearly something we’ll do as an engaged couple. I like it very much, just as I enjoyed clinging to his arm and standing close to him in the ballroom. At first it was only to make certain everyone saw that he belonged to me—and to offer my protection. So many people within this social circle can be vicious, but my presence alone should stop the worst of it. And although I can’t detect the more subtle insults, people don’t know that. If any jabs slipped through, however, Caleb never seemed to be intimidated by them…and gradually, it was I who felt protected, standing there beside him. As he if was a solid wall between me and the crowd. As if I were safe with him, even as I was slowly overwhelmed by the constant interaction with everyone else.
Safe with him, yes—but only safe from others. Because even as I feel protected by him, Caleb Moore makes me so vulnerable. Just in a different way.