She slammed the receiver down. “Pig. Prick. Bastard.”
“Bad day?”
She had to force herself to meet his gaze. “The worst.”
“Tsk-tsk. You never could hold your liquor.”
She smiled. “Seems I recall you liked that about me from time to time.” When his eyes smoldered, she wondered what she’d been thinking last night. He was still the sexiest man she’d ever met.
He leaned over her desk, arms outspread, hands flat. “You and Kat had quite a night, huh?”
She studied the long fingers, the wide palms. Thought about how happy she’d always been to have those hands on her.
She tried to remind herself that she hadn’t done anything serious. Not even a kiss. But she could feel the dragon man’s hands on her hips, his mouth on her breast.
“Des?” That voice that she’d loved for years. “What is it, babe?”
She played with a pen, sliding it over and over through nervous fingers. “I love you, Fitz. You know that, don’t you?”
The air between them went suddenly sharp and crackling. Fitz pulled his hands away without touching her. Went rigid. Voice strangely neutral, he spoke while jamming his hands into his pockets. “You weren’t at Kat’s last night, were you?”
“Yes, I was. I slept on her sofa.” The lie crowded her throat.
One eyebrow cocked. “But before that?”
She couldn’t figure what to do, what to say. Please, Fitz, can’t we go back? Where did it go, the perfect life we had?
“I…I went to a club, that’s all.” She swallowed hard. “Nothing happened.” But she’d stayed silent too long, she could tell.
“A club.” He shrugged. “Harmless, right?” His voice sounded anything but. “What club?”
Ever the reporter. Always digging for details. “I—I’m not sure.”
His snort condemned her without a trial.
“I didn’t do anything, I swear it. Just one dance.” Begging to be believed. Had it come to this? They’d never kept tabs on each other. Never needed to.
He rocked back on his heels. A deep sigh escaped him. A shake of the head. “I’ve been kidding myself, haven’t I, Des? You’re never going to compromise. You like this life, empty as it is, and you’re not willing to change.”
“Compromise?” Rage displaced shame. “When have you offered me a compromise? Have babies, move to Westchester, become a hausfrau like your mother?”
“My mother’s a good woman. You can’t say that she isn’t.”
Mona sank back in her chair, despair crowding in. “Your mother’s an angel. She’s absolute perfection.” She wasn’t being sarcastic. His mother was perfect. That was the problem. “But I’m not her, Fitz. I never have been.” She couldn’t keep the hurt from her tone. “You said you loved me the way I am.”
“I do love you, but there’s more than this, more than what we have.”
Not for me. I’m spread so thin I’m becoming transparent. She looked up at the man she’d loved for ten years and pondered when they’d become strangers. She summoned the nerve to ask, “What about our agreement? You didn’t care about kids. You understood who I was and what I wanted, and you said you felt the same.”
“You haven’t been listening to me. Everything’s altered for me. Everything. We’re living a half life, Des, a selfish existence. We’re not on this planet to be famous or win awards or—” he went for the killer thrust “—run our competitors out of business. That’s for people who think they have all the time in the world. All that is vanity. Two nights spent with a gun to my head taught me that I’ve been a selfish bastard, focused only on my career, on pushing and shoving my way to the top.”
He leaned over her desk again, in his eyes a zealot’s fire. “What we’re doing is bullshit, babe. Pure crap. We can’t be certain that we have past the next second, yet we act as if we’ve got all the time in the world.” His voice went low and urgent. “I realized those nights that I’ve been skimming along the surface. That you have, too. I want children, sweetheart—I always did. I thought you’d get over being so scared and inflexible. I believed you’d come to understand that I’m not like your father. I’d be the best damn dad in the world.” His eyes locked on hers. “I want children, and I’d prefer them with you.”
Prefer? What kind of commitment was that? The shock of it stole her breath.
Terror made her brusque. “And if I can’t want them? If I suspect that you’re just unnerved by what happened and you’ll recover, given time?”
Fire turned to shock. Then to ice. “Christ. I thought you’d change, but you aren’t interested, are you? You’re so damn sure yours is the best way that you aren’t even willing to try.”
“You can’t send babies back if it doesn’t work out.”
Learning that the man who’d made her feel whole had been secretly hoping she’d change one day, that their relationship had been based on a hidden lie…Mona reeled from it, her world shattering around her. She did the only thing she could figure to do, what had worked before when she’d seen her life splinter.
She pulled back from the stranger who stood before her. Retreated into a silence that would protect her, even as her heart cracked. “I guess we never really knew each other, did we?” She shuttered her gaze, forcing her face into a polite mask. “Perhaps we could talk about this later?”
“You’re just amazing.” Harsh laughter escaped him. “Sure. Later is great. Hell, it’s only our lives.” Fury rode hard on his frame. “You just go back to work, Desdemona. After all, your damn career is more important, isn’t it?”
Rage claimed her, too. “You backed me in this. I told you what I was, what my goals were. You had no right to change the rules.” She clamped her jaw shut. Felt a trembling begin. Sensed the sands shifting beneath her feet, but she held fast.
Fitz stalked to the door and grasped the handle. “I won’t wait forever, Des.” Honest regret shouted out from every feature. “We don’t have forever. I want more, sweetheart—” He paused, as close to pleading as she’d ever envisioned. “But I wanted it with you. I only wish you wanted me half as much.”
Then he was gone, leaving silence, sharp and painful, in his wake.
Mona groped for her mother’s teacup, fingers shaking so hard she had to grip it in two hands. Through a glazing of tears, her vision was drawn to the crack at the base. She traced it with one fingertip, seeing her life reflected there. What she and Fitz had had seemed so beautiful and indestructible, but a tiny flaw in the foundation was widening. She’d never viewed the crack as such before, blinded by love and work and the sheer relief that Fitz accepted her as she was.
Once.
He didn’t understand that she was trying to save them both. That even if she was too strong to give up everything as her mother had, she was quite likely capable of her father’s self-absorption. That had been fine for Fitz, a busy man himself.
But children deserved more. She would never doom a child to her own fate, but she understood herself too well to take on her mother’s long-suffering mantle. She was no hausfrau, no earth mother. And neither was Fitz. Any child of theirs would wind up starved for the kind of nurturing that should be every child’s birthright.
Mona set the cup into the saucer, careful not to put stress on the crack. With that same caution, she would shepherd her marriage until Fitz came to his senses. She would do nothing to widen the fissure, and she would pray fervently to the fates that it would not widen on its own.
Time. They just needed time. To heal, to mend. To find their love again.
Squeezing her hands until the knuckles turned white, Mona summoned every last ounce of strength she had.
Then, drawing in a deep breath, she reached for the next paper in her stack.
Chapter Twelve
Two days had passed since Lucas had left Tansy, endless hours of reminding himself that he was doing what was best for her, and that was staying the hell away.
He’d scrubbed pots that didn’
t need cleaning. He’d rearranged all the supplies. He’d washed every glass in the place during the long hours when he couldn’t sleep for thinking of Tansy with mingled fear and longing.
Carlton Sanford was more powerful and connected than Lucas could have imagined. Long sessions spent in the library on the internet had shown Sanford with prominent politicians and businessmen, raising money for fashionable charities. At the helm of a Fortune 500 company, Sanford was respected by legions, had impeccable credentials to his name.
Lucas Walker was an ex-con with a pedigree that led straight to the toilet, a child whose mother hadn’t thought him worth saving. Bad blood flowed through his veins, blood that could not be cleansed.
Tansy was better off without him, that was for sure.
But she wasn’t safe with Carlton Sanford, and that was what worried Lucas. What kept him up at night, aware that he was powerless to protect her.
But if the reporter was correct…he had to find a way. Sanford could not be allowed to get his hands on Tansy. If the rumor was true and Sanford really did plan to marry her, he had to be stopped.
Short of murder, Lucas had no idea how he to do it. All the power was in Sanford’s hands.
Misery swamped him. Tansy had opened up the protective casing of his heart when he wasn’t looking, and loneliness ate away at his resolve. He missed her with an ache that had teeth and claws. He longed to be with her, wanted the right to care—
But he could not risk being her doom.
Sinking down on his cot, he buried his face in his hands. Then he heard the noise. Quick as a cat, he was on his feet, a knife at the ready.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” Gloria. The stripper with the soulful eyes.
He shoved the knife out of sight. “No problem. I just—” Learned to have hair-trigger reflexes in the night. “You okay? Al’s not here. He’s already gone home.”
She smiled and moved across the darkness, moonlight scattering across her features. “I didn’t come to see Al.”
“Oh.” Lucas went on alert.
“I’m worried about you.”
Lucas shrugged uneasily. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not. You’re wound tight as a top.” Slender hands drifted over his chest, down the front of his jeans. The body that hadn’t had a woman in twenty years leaped to life with shocking speed.
“Gloria, no—” Lucas grabbed her hand.
“Sh-h. You’ve been good to me. Treated me as a real person, not a whore. You won’t ask, but I’d like to give something back,” she whispered, then covered his mouth with hers.
He stiffened, ready to shove her away. It wasn’t right, no matter how much he craved the release. How much he craved the oblivion. How badly he wanted to feel again what it was like to lose himself in the sweet heat of a woman’s body. God, he was tired of taking care of it himself.
Lucas groaned as hunger dug in with claws so sharp he thought he’d lose his mind. “Gloria—” he tried to say. I can’t. Tansy stood in his mind as a beacon, so pure and so fair. So innocent.
And so off-limits.
“Sh-h,” she soothed. “No strings. Just let me do this.” She had his jeans open, drawing him out, hot and hard, into her hand.
Lucas fought with himself as savage need pounded against the dreams of a boy who only wanted one shining girl. A girl who was not ready, might never be ready for him. A girl he should walk away from now, one whose only experience had been of violence and pain.
Expertly, Gloria touched him, and Lucas was sorely tempted badly to let go. To stop the fight. He was only a man, flawed and all wrong for Tansy. One who’d spent twenty years locked up. He’d battled to survive hell, had lived for the day he could do just this, fill his hands with a woman’s breasts, place his mouth on her nipples, run his fingers over every soft curve until he remembered what it was like to be a man again and not a caged creature, barely half-human.
Gloria slid down his body. “Let go, Lucas. It’s all right,” she soothed.
“No. I can’t—” But something inside him tore.
Her eyes were dark and ancient. “Please, Lucas. I’ve watched you—something’s wearing at you. You haven’t been sleeping, have you?” She stroked him, and his hands clenched. “You never looked down on me the way everyone else does. I needed a friend, and you’ve been that.” Sorrow crossed her face. “I understand your heart isn’t free, but…I’m lonely, too. Let me fight the darkness with you.”
“Gloria, this isn’t the way—” But her words were even more seductive than her skill. He was weary to the bone…and so damn empty.
“Sh-h, Lucas.” She took him into her mouth.
“No—” he groaned. He wanted to wait. Tansy might never be ready, whispered temptation.
No. He bunched his fingers in Gloria’s hair and tried to fight off the surge, but his body didn’t listen. Tansy…he keened silently with the agony of a man who has lost his last sight of hope—
And with a cry torn from his depths, Lucas let go. His mind went white. He sagged against the wall, drained…for one glorious moment unable to think.
But all too quickly, bitter truth returned with a vengeance. Oh, Tansy. Lucas sank to a crouch, head in his hands, despair crowding in, darker than the worst day of his years in the hole.
Mona rode up the elevator, leaning against the wall, lost in thought. She dreaded the impending darkness, wondering, once again, if Fitz would come home. He hadn’t been there for two nights now. She was so exhausted, a constant state lately. Maybe she would take a nap first and hope it would recharge her, make her more able to face his absence.
She opened the door and stopped in shock. Home at a very early hour for him, Fitz whirled toward her.
“Hi,” she ventured.
He nodded. “Hi.”
He appeared as tired as she felt. “Tough day?”
He shrugged. “Nothing special.” No explanation for the missing nights. He shifted on his feet. His gaze flickered to meet hers, then away.
All at once, she longed for nothing more than for him to hold her. When words wouldn’t work, physical contact always did. Setting her tote bag and purse aside, she crossed to him.
To her shock, he stepped back. Only one, but he might as well have hit her.
When he glanced at her, she spotted regret in his expression…and something more.
“Des,” he started. He studied her for a second with something that seemed too much like pity. “I’ve got a hotel room. I—” Here he huffed out a breath. “I would have been here earlier and gotten out before you came home, but I got a call from a source and I had to meet him. I could wait until tomorrow, but—”
“No.” It was all she could think to say. Then her voice lowered into some supplicant she’d never met. “Fitz, no. You can’t mean—” To her horror, her voice broke. “All this over babies?”
She began to pace. “I don’t understand. How can we live in Westchester? What happened to all our plans?” She turned back. “Florence. We were going to do Florence this year.”
“You wanted to do Florence, not me.” His eyes were at once gentle and resolute. “Babe, that’s the problem. We have no idea what the other one wants anymore.”
“You’re wrong, Fitz.” A voice she hardly recognized slid into shrill. “After ten years, we know everything about each other. You enjoy cigars and brandy and talking Kant and listening to Sinatra.” She moved closer, desperate to make him see. “You have a mole under your left shoulder blade. You understand how I like to be kissed.”
God. Was she begging? She didn’t beg. Ever.
“Des.” Oh, that voice she’d loved for years. “You have no idea what stories I’m working on. You don’t even realize that I turned down an offer to go to Newsweek.”
She blinked. “Why didn’t you tell me? Oh, Fitz, that’s wonderful, but why would you turn it down?”
One tawny eyebrow lifted. His eyes were sad. “Because ambition isn’t as important to me as it is to you.”
A surprised bark shot from her throat. “You’d kill over a breaking story. You love your work. It’s who you are,” she insisted.
“Not anymore,” he said softly. “But you haven’t been paying attention enough to realize that.”
“It’s just this stupid party. It’ll be over soon. A little longer and we’re home-free.”
“Don’t, sweetheart.” He clasped her shoulders gently, but it was to keep her at bay, not to bring her near. “It’s not just that you’ll never let it go with your father.”
“Daddy doesn’t have anything to do with this.”
His jaw hardened. “Don’t try to bullshit me, Des. And don’t lie to yourself. You’re never going to quit trying to become Daddy’s favorite, to make him admit he was wrong in ignoring you. You’ll never stop wanting him to look past Tansy and Paris and see you.”
She jerked away. “You don’t know what the hell you’re saying.”
Suddenly, her blood chilled. “Who is she?” That must be it: another woman.
He sighed. “There is no ‘she.’”
“Then why leave? You’re lying. You’ve found some little homebody to create your nest and give you babies. Who is she? Where did you find her? Was that who you were with last night?”
Her hand lashed out almost of its own accord and slapped him. “Damn you, Fitz. Why did you change the rules? You said it was fine. You told me all that wasn’t important—you only needed me. Me, you bastard.” A harsh sob scraped her throat as she stared at the red imprint of her hand on the cheek that even now she wanted to press against her own.
In horror, in grief, in pain that threatened to break her, she dragged out the question she’d been asking herself for days. “Why? You loved me. You said I was all you’d ever want. Why did it change? We’ve had so much.”
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