by Alison Kent
Didn't say much for the man he thought he was. For the man he wanted Eva to know.
He had to explain. To see if he was even capable of putting into words the changes this time in her company had made. "Why? Because when I saw you in New York with Judith, you looked so pulled together. So self-confident. Like being back in New York for the shoot meant nothing. That years ago you'd walked away, you'd ... really walked away. From me. The city. The memories. And I wanted you to pay. Because I'd never been able to do that. Everywhere I've gone, I've taken you with me."
She started to move off his lap. "It's been seventeen years, Carson. Why would you want to make me pay now for what happened then?"
"To see if I could?" The reason hadn't changed, the motivation. Once, he'd wanted to make her share his misery. But now ... now—
"And?" Eva's question halted his thoughts. "Did get your answer?"
"I think I did."
She looked at him, but did so down her cynical nose. "Oh, really. I'm fascinated. Please." She motioned for him to continue.
The knot in his gut told him he'd better get this right or he could damn well forget growing old with this woman. "It's not fascinating, Eva. It's simple. You're here with me. We just made incredible love. This wasn't about sex and we both know it. So, yeah I'd say there're still feelings here. And that means I could hurt you. If—" He held up one finger to stay her interruption. "If I still wanted to."
"I see. So, now that we've had sex—"
"Made love." He wasn't going to let her make less of their coming together than it was.
"Now that we've … made love, you've changed your mind? About wanting to hurt me?"
He shook his head. "I changed my mind the first night I was here. I was sitting on a bar stool, in fact. Barely sitting, but still upright."
She huffed. "Epiphanies reached while under the influence don't count."
Her pique amused him. As did her efforts to extricate herself from his octopus hold. She slipped free of one arm, but only long enough for him to move his other into place. She wanted distance for the very reason he wanted her close.
He wanted to see her eyes, see how close he was to hitting the head on the nail of her feelings. "Actually, the epiphany happened earlier that day. In the storeroom. Of your shop. And trust me, I was totally sober. It just took me a while to sort it out."
"You're talking about Zack," she said, and pressed her lips together to keep from saying anything more.
Frustration had him blowing out a long breath when it would've felt so good to yell. "Eva, Zack walked in on us and called you Mom. All I could think was that... my God." He rubbed a hand over his forehead. "My God. My son was standing in front of me. A son I'd never known I had. And then. Right then I stopped wanting to hurt you. I stopped because I didn't want you to have to feel any of what I was feeling."
"What were you feeling?"
He laughed harshly. The sound grated in his throat. "Like you'd ripped my guts out. You had my son and I had nothing. After all those years of working my ass off to prove ... whatever. That I was good enough. That I had measured up to your standards. That the mistakes I made didn't matter."
He shrugged off the thought because the reasons were no longer important. "But all I proved was that I'd been right. You really hadn't loved me. How could you have loved me and kept me from my son for almost seventeen years?"
Tears filled her eyes, hung on her lashes. "But he's not your son, Carson."
"I know that now." He reached for her hand and she gave it. "But I didn't know it then. The first time you told me was that day in the rain. And I wanted to call you a liar."
Why?" she whispered, and he barely heard her.
"I wanted something to show for the time we spent together. I wanted to believe what we had had been real. That I'd given you something good, left you with something tangible and worthwhile, despite my selfishness."
"Selfish? No. Self-involved? Yes. Self-critical? Yes. Self-demanding? Definitely." He rolled his eyes and she laughed softly. "Carson, you couldn't even please yourself. How was I supposed to make you happy when you weren't even happy with you?"
He remained quiet for several moments, realizing how accurately Eva had had him pegged. "Was I that obvious?"
"Not to everyone." Her mouth quirked with her failed effort to contain a grin. "Most people just thought you were a prima donna."
"I was a prima donna."
"Okay. You were. But you were so much more. And if you were a bit ... well, uppity, it was part of your artistic temperament."
"You give me too much credit." He slipped a finger beneath her chin and lifted. Right now he needed to see her eyes. To see the truth, the reality. "No one has ever believed in me. Not the way you believed in me."
"Of course I believed in you, Carson. I loved you," she said, and her smile nearly took him apart.
"God, I was so stupid," he said, his voice catching on a raw splinter of that realization.
"Aren't we all at that age? I was years too young to appreciate what we had. And too young to handle it. I don't think we would've lasted." She sighed, and seemed to grow smaller, shrinking into nothing in his lap. "It's best, you know. That we never had a child together."
His nod wasn't agreement as much as acknowledgment that she'd spoken. "He'd've looked a lot like Zack, don't you think? I mean, the age is right. And the coloring."
"Unless she would've looked like me." Her voice was sad. almost regretful. Or … Oh, shit. "Uh, Eva?"
"Hmm?"
He didn't want to ask because he feared the answer. "Are you still able to conceive?"
For a moment she was motionless. And then she nodded. He felt the movement against his chest.
Carson leaned his head back and stared at the vaulted ceiling. How could he be so stupid? Again. How could he be so stupid? "Christ, Eva. Why didn't you stop me? Why didn't I stop myself? I'm so sorry."
She sat up. Pushed her way out of his lap and his legs. Her face was pinched, strained. The picture of resignation. "We have a real problem, Carson."
He didn't want to hear this. He really didn't want to hear this.
She tugged the hem of her top snug to her waist. "Every time we're together we get caught up in all this grand passion and forget to use our brains. We let emotions drive us. And that can't be healthy." She punctuated the couch cushion with one finger. "That isn't healthy."
He didn't like her tone. Or her succinct stating of the obvious. "I guess that's a problem we need to work on."
"I'm not so sure we have anything to work on. Listen, Carson"—Eva reached for her jeans—"I wanted what just happened to happen. I wanted to make love with you and I have no regrets."
"But," he prompted when she stood to button and zip.
"But I don't see things changing. Ever." She blew short feathered locks from her face and looked down. "We are who we are. We may be older and I hope we're wiser. But just because we recognize what we have between us doesn't mean we can handle it any better."
"Maybe not." He sat up. Stood up. Kept his distance. "But we have made progress. At least now you'll know to kick my ass when I'm too self-involved. And I'll know to—" He laughed when she lifted both brows. "I'll know to pull you into my arms and kiss you senseless when you let me get away with too much."
She looked at him for several moments. Hundreds of thoughts chased one another through her eyes. Denials pushed aside possibilities to dog the heels of fear. "We're crazy to even be thinking about it," she finally said.
"Aha. But we are thinking," he said, and knew he'd scored a big point.
At least he thought he had until she came back with, "We're thinking long after the fact, after the deed has been done, after the horse has left the barn."
He moved closer. He wanted to be sure she heard him. "We don't have to think all the time, Eva. Passion doesn't have to stop and think. This connection, this bond we have. It's unique. It's rare. Totally one of a kind."
"It had better be one of
a kind."
His heart flipped. That was almost a declaration exclusivity. "So does that mean you'll think about, you know, going out with me?"
"Going out?" She frowned. "Like on a date?"
It was nice to know he wasn't alone in his vernacular confusion. "No. Going out. Like Zack and Katie."
"Oh. That kind of going out." She laughed. Then stopped as quickly as she'd started. "What do you know about Zack and Katie?"
"Besides the fact that their eyes are all over each other? Which means—"
She cut him off with a wave of both hands, then crossed the room to turn off both the TV and the DVD player. "No. Don't say it. I don't want to know what it means. Because I do know what it means. And I'm not sure I'm ready for whatever else it is they have all over each other."
"I wouldn't worry about it too much." Carson leaned across the back of the couch and snagged his shirt from the floor. "Zack's got a good head on his shoulders."
She stopped in the process of returning the DVD to its case. "You've been talking to Zack? When did you talk to Zack?"
Way to go, Meathead. "We talked awhile this evening. Before he left for the lake with his friends."
"And you talked to him about having his hands all over Katie?"
"Actually, no. I talked to him about not having his hands all over Katie. Until the time was right. And then to be prepared."
Eva returned the movie to its slot in the entertainment center, sliding the drawer shut with a control that was eerily silent. She had yet to look Carson's way. "You talked to Zack about condoms? And sex?"
"We talked about a lot of things." Carson struggled into the shirt, figuring it wouldn't hurt to be dressed since it looked like he was about to be asked to hit the road. "And we only talked about sex in the context of responsibility."
"I see," was all she said, and she turned to face his way. She took a very deep breath, then blew it out. "Thank you."
Carson decided to see if he could salvage what was left of the night. "Zack's a good kid, Eva. He's intelligent. And he uses those smarts. He's not going to do anything stupid with Katie."
"Oh. Right." She tossed both arms expansively. "Easy for you to say. You're not his parent."
"No. I'm not." He worked on tucking his T-shirt into his khakis. Then he stopped and made sure Eva was listening, really listening, when he said, "But there's no reason I can't be a friend."
She looked like she was going to explode, the way she buried her face in her hands and shook her head. "This is all way too complicated. I don't know, Carson. I don't know about any of this. I'm happy here. I have a great life. My business is thriving. My son is thriving ... maybe too much." She let the thought drift unfinished.
"What about you?" he asked softly. "Are you thriving? Are you living life the way it was meant to be lived?" When she remained silent, he went on. "You don't have to say anything. What just happened on the couch is answer enough."
Her head popped up. She glared. "You're talking about sex again."
He hadn't meant to go there, but she'd made the accusation. And he wasn't going to back down. "I'm talking about Eva Channing. Not Zack's mother. Not the owner of Blooms."
He stepped closer. "I'm talking about your needs. Simple, basic needs." He took another step toward her. "Having your neck rubbed at the end of a stressful day. Celebrating a big landscaping project." He stepped closer still. "And, yes. Sex."
The word hung in the air, sizzling and popping and hot. With her eyes fiercely bright and her breathing borne on rapid gasps, she retreated. The heel of her boot hit the base of the TV cabinet.
Carson stopped, leaving her only inches of personal space. "Sex, Eva. Making love. Being brought to the point where you want to crawl out of your skin. To the point where you can't help but scream."
Her glare grew heated. "I do not scream."
He wasn't going to argue, though they both knew the truth. But he did move to stand behind the room's only chair, planting both hands on the headrest. "Sex is a part of life, Eva. And a big part of what we had ... what we have ... together. I'm not stupid. I know it's not everything. But you can't shrug it off as nothing. If it was nothing, it would be just as good with anyone else. For me, it never has been."
He took the plunge. "I don't think it has been for you either. But this is about more than sex. This is about you and me." Frustration fought with fear. Both grabbed hard at his gut, twisted his nerves into knots. He tightened his hold on the back of the chair to keep from punching through the padded ticking.
He was only going to say this one time. Once was all he could manage. "I'm not asking you to compare. I'm only asking you to think, truly think about what we have. Don't throw it away without giving it a chance. Because this time I won't be back."
Chapter Ten
"He talked to Zack, Jan. He talked to Zack about sex." Eva jerked at the tab on her Diet Coke. The cold soda fizzed through the opening in the aluminum can. She wished she had her own tab to pull. Such a practical way to release pent-up fizz. Hers was burning a hole in her stomach.
"So they talked." Sitting at the Hollings' breakfast table with Eva in the Sunday morning quiet, Jan readied ten more wooden craft sticks to glue onto David's Texas history project. "This is a bad thing because?"
"Because Zack is my son. Not Carson's." And guiding Zack through life's adult lessons was her responsibility. Not that of some interloper, even one who claimed good intentions. Why was this so hard to understand? And since when was Jan on Carson's team?
Traitor.
The traitor snapped a stick in half lengthwise. "I'm assuming Carson has accepted the fact that he's not Zack's father."
"Yes. He knows."
"But—" Jan gestured with one of the split sticks. "He doesn't know about your miscarriage."
"No. He doesn't know." Eva wrapped cold fingers around an even colder can and groaned at the mess she'd made of her life. "I just wish that was the worst of it."
"It gets worse? Wait." Jan put both hands on the edge of the kitchen table and pushed back. "This calls for more than Diet Coke."
Eva choked on the sip of soda she'd just swallowed. She waved a frantic hand. "Absolutely not. Alcohol has done nothing but get me in trouble lately."
"Who said anything about alcohol? Good grief. It's not even noon." Jan rummaged through the contents of the cabinet beneath the kitchen bar, and emerged with a blender. "I was thinking more along the lines of coffee. And chocolate. Something smooth and creamy and cold."
"Oh," Eva answered, wondering what the combination of acid and sugar and caffeine would do to the ulcer on her ulcer. "I thought you were trying to get me drunk again."
Jan delivered an arched look Eva's way. "Excuse me? Who used my scotch to drown her troubles, sorrow, worries, and woes? Which, by the way, you should've shared with me years ago without benefit of alcohol because I'm your friend."
"I know. I know. I should've shared a lot of things with a lot of people," Eva mumbled. Her eyes hurt. Her temples were aching, and she'd had nothing to drink but the soda. The pressure of the truths she'd kept from Carson had inflated her head beyond the fill line. She closed her eyes and collapsed.
"Okay. That's it." Leaving the blender on the counter for the moment and relegating the Popsicle sticks and Play-Doh model of the Alamo to the far end of the table, Jan turned her full attention in Eva's direction. "What big bad secret haven't you told me?"
"When have I had time to talk to you about anything?" Stress rose to balance on the edge of hysteria. She really did need that pull tab. "If I'm not at Blooms, or at Zack's ball games, I'm stuck working on his calendar shoots." Slumping back in her chair, Eva added, "And every time I turn around, I run into the blight of Carson Brandt."
"You know," Jan began, sliding a knowing glance from beneath long tawny lashes. "You say his name like a woman with a hankering for his brand of blight."
"Ha." Eva slammed the soda can to the table, apologized, and mopped at the sloshed puddles with the paper towel h
er friend extended. "Hankering? Hardly. Like I need anything from that man."
"Hmm. Judging by that color in your face, you don't only need what that man has to offer, you've had what that man has to offer. And you want more."
"Just goes to show that you shouldn't judge a face by its color," Eva bluffed, even as the blush of heat crawling up her throat blossomed into what was no doubt a shade of bright crimson.
"So. tell me." Jan twisted a craft stick between forefinger and thumb, the movement mimicking her prurient smirk. "Is he as good as he used to be?"
"No." Liar, liar. Pants on fire.
"No? You've got to be kidding. I've seen the man. You can't tell me he doesn't know how to use the motion of the ocean." The craft stick undulated sensuously over imaginary waves.
Seasick. Eva would think about being seasick. That would keep her from thinking about Carson Brandt in bed. "What do you mean, you've seen him? When have you seen him?"
"I give up." Jan tossed up the stick in frustration. It shipwrecked somewhere on her spotless ocean of blue floor tiles. "He's been at your house every day for, what? Two weeks at the least."
"Has not." Eva cringed. Nice grade-school comeback. "It hasn't been that long."
"Not only that," Jan continued, ignoring Eva's denial and digging again into the bag of crafts for fresh supplies, "I saw him backing out of your driveway at the crack of dawn this morning. I said hello, waved. Asked him how he was enjoying our mild Texas spring weather."
Well, crap. How many other neighbors had witnessed Carson's covert departure? Eva narrowed both eyes. "What were you doing snooping around my driveway at the crack of dawn on a Sunday morning?
"Getting the paper. Gerald wasn't up yet. At least he wasn't out of bed yet. He was, uh, sleeping it off, so to speak."
"Welcome to the club," Eva mumbled. She'd spent half the morning recovering from her own after sex euphoric exhaustion.
"Aha!" Jan's hand came down against the tabletop. "So he is better than he was before. I knew it."
"Better than the twenty-one-year-old stud I knew in New York?" Parking both elbows on the table, Eva cradled her chin dreamily in her palms and gave all pretense of innocence. "Damn straight he is. Who needs a young stud when there are seasoned nearly forty-something studs to be had?"