by Sarah Hegger
“Emma.” She put some starch in her voice. “Listen to me carefully.”
Emma whimpered and went silent.
“Are you listening, Em?”
“Uh-huh.”
Holly wasn’t convinced, but she forged on. “Emma, I am going to need you to organize away for some money to get to me. I think you can use PayPal or something similar.”
“Holly.” Emma went all breathy. “I don’t know how to do that.”
“Neither do I, but if you go to the bank they’ll tell you how to do it.”
Holly counted slowly to twenty.
Emma sniffed. “Okay.”
“While you’re there, I want you to get the credit card sorted out.”
“It’s your credit card,” Emma said. “Why can’t you do it from there?”
“Because.” She would have to spell it out clearly. Emma wasn’t stupid, but if she could possibly get somebody else to do the thinking for her, she would. “I have no identification. My entire wallet was in the car: driver’s license, passport, everything.”
“But—”
“And you are the other account holder, and as such you have rights on the account.”
“Oh? What about the car?”
“I’ll call the insurance from here.”
“Good idea.” Emma sounded relieved.
“Do you think you could look in my files and send me the policy number?”
“Yes,” Emma said.
“Good, Em.” At least it was a step in the right direction. “Do it as soon as you can and text it to me.”
“Okay, Holly.” Emma went quiet again. “Will you find Portia today?”
“I’m going to do everything I can.” Outside the window, the city moved into a new day. The sounds from inside the apartment grew louder. It was time to go. “You keep calling the police and …” The words got stuck, and she forced them past the knot in her throat. “You might want to start calling hospitals.”
“Holly.” Emma’s voice quivered. “You don’t think she’s—”
“Don’t.” Holly couldn’t stand it if Emma voiced the unthinkable. So far, there’d only been that one incident, right before they’d got her sister on medication, when Portia had veered too close to hurting herself. Those were two hours Holly never wanted to live again.
“What the hell were you thinking?” It slipped out of her mouth before Holly could stop it. “You know how unstable she is and you let her go.”
A long, dead silence followed, and then a sniffle. “You’re so mean.”
Dread fastened its claws around Holly’s throat as the sniffle grew to a sob. Emma was crying. It’s what Emma did when confronted. It’s what Emma did when she was sad. It’s what Emma did when she was angry. It’s what Emma did all the bloody time, and Holly didn’t have the patience for it this morning.
“I’m here in Chicago and I have a place to stay, but I would like to be able to take care of myself.” Holly steeled herself. “I need some money, so please organize it as soon as you can.”
And she hung up.
The phone weighed in her hand. She almost called back to check if Emma was all right. She shrugged it off. Emma would be fine because she was sitting at home in London in an apartment Holly paid most of the rent on, with all her things around her. Emma wasn’t in another country, wearing someone else’s clothes, and relying on a man who’d gone to bed angry with her.
What was needed here was caffeine and a shower. Both of which were going to involve Josh. But first there was an apology owed. She hated the idea, but there it was.
She found Josh in the kitchen, standing beside one end of a central island and staring at his open fridge.
He wore a pair of exercise shorts, some running shoes, and nothing else. The chorded muscle on his arms and chest slid beneath smooth tan skin as he leaned into the fridge. His athletic shorts hung low on his lean hips beneath a perfectly ripped set of abs. He must have been exercising. A fine sheen of sweat created a light-and-shadow play across his upper body.
He tipped back his head and drank from a bottle of water. His throat moved as he drank and, right on target, a large trickle of water escaped over his chin, stroked his throat, and disappeared into the carved groove between his pectorals.
Holly followed the drop into a line of coarse, dark hair disappearing beneath his shorts. She peeled her tongue off the roof of her mouth.
He turned and caught her standing there like a starstruck tween.
Holly dragged her eyes away; a guilty blush crept up her neck. She didn’t like the whole muscle thing. Much.
“Good morning.” His greeting was polite enough, but missing a smile or any trace of warmth.
Holly stopped halfway to the island. “Good morning.”
“Did you sleep well?” He tossed his empty water bottle into the recycling bin. The bottle hit the sides of the bin with a clatter and dropped.
“Yes, thank you.” Jeez, so polite she almost bobbed a curtsy.
“Would you like juice? Coffee?” His smile stopped way short of reaching his eyes.
Holly trod the few remaining steps to the island warily. She was at a distinct crabby and grimy disadvantage. “Coffee, please?”
Dark stubble shaded his jaw, and against the warm tan of his face, his eyes were piercingly blue and colder than a blast from the air conditioner. “What kind?”
“Hmm?” Holly tried to regain her balance. The combination of his crazy, sexy body and detached civility wound her up tight.
“What kind of coffee would you like?” He indicated a stainless-steel beast squatting against the far wall like it belonged in an Italian café.
“Oh?” Of course he had one of those. “Latte?”
His body was, honest to God, sculpted like one of those men you saw in aftershave commercials. What was the matter with her?
“Sure.” He turned to the coffee machine and twisted and pulled at knobs and levers. Rippling, lovely things happened beneath the skin of his back.
Holly pulled up a stool and enjoyed the view. “Um, Josh?”
“Yes?” He half-turned to glance at her over his shoulder.
“About last night?” Holly had to raise her voice above the hissing and gurgling of his machine. “I wanted to say sorry for taking your head off.”
“Whatever.” He frothed the milk. There was no point in trying to talk over the noise. Holly regrouped as she waited.
“Look.” She tried to catch his eye as he put a steaming cup of caffè latte in front of her. “I was tired and worried and I had a knee-jerk reaction. It was nice of you to go to the trouble of carrying me up here and—”
“Don’t sweat it, Holly.” He reloaded coffee grounds. “I’m going to help you find your sister and then we’ll go our separate ways. There’s no need to even get into this.”
Holly opened her mouth to argue and shut it again. She didn’t have to be friends with Josh to find Portia. She didn’t have to get any closer to him than politeness demanded. She could keep him at a healthy distance and still benefit from his help. It was the perfect deal.
Except it didn’t sit right.
Josh made an espresso for himself.
He didn’t look mad. His movements were smooth and controlled, no jerking or slamming things about. An impassive mask settled over his face, as if she had ceased to exist outside of the realm of the strictly necessary.
“I really am sorry.”
“Fine. Apology accepted. We were both tired.” He shrugged one muscular shoulder and leaned his hips up against the counter.
The lure of coffee won and she took a sip of her latte. Holly moaned. A man who made a cup of coffee like this was worth risking the bear cave. She drank half the cup in the loaded silence.
Josh thumbed through his phone.
She should probably leave him alone to get over himself. But she wouldn’t be Holly Partridge if she did that. “No, it’s not fine. Because you were great to me last night and I behaved badly. I was tired and cranky, an
d I have this propensity to shoot off at the mouth before I think.”
He sipped his espresso and studied her over the rim of his cup.
The heat spread all the way down to her toes. At least he’d made eye contact. “I’m sorry I was such a bitch.”
“You think I slept with your sister,” he said.
“I was probably wrong about that.” Holly managed to look contrite.
“Probably?” He glowered. “Definitely.”
Wow, he was seriously pissed about that. “Look, Josh, what was I supposed to think? Given the past and what I know of you.”
“I’m not that kid anymore. I cleaned up my act after—” He clenched his jaw. “I cleaned up my act.”
“Okay.” Holly held up her hands in surrender. “You didn’t sleep with my sister.”
“And you called my car a penis.”
Holly opened her mouth and shut it again. “I shouldn’t have said that.” The car was a penis, but she kept it to herself. “Are you done being mad now?”
“I’m not mad.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No. I. Am. Not.” There was a glimmer of life through the permafrost.
“Are, too.” Holly poked.
“Holly.” He stopped on the cusp of yelling at her, but at least he couldn’t freeze her out when he was irritated.
“I’m not worth the sulk,” she said.
He groaned and dropped his head forward. “You are the most irritating woman I know.”
“Gosh.” Holly went back to her coffee. “That’s quite something, considering all the women you know.”
He strode forward and planted his elbows on the island, putting his face level with hers. “Someone should have wrung your neck by now.” Up close she could see how long and thick his eyelashes were. A ghost of a smile chased across his face.
“Most people find me easy to get along with,” she said.
“Oh, yeah?” He folded his arms over his chest.
Holly’s eyes strayed over the bulge of muscle the action initiated.
“Name one.”
She had to think. “Steven.” Most of the time. “He’s always saying I’m easy to get along with.” For always, substitute sometimes, but still …
“And Steven is?” He kept it light, but Holly sensed a sudden tension creep back into the kitchen.
“My boyfriend.”
“Boyfriend?” There was nothing alarming in his tone, but Holly got a shivery sensation over her skin.
The loaded atmosphere in the kitchen made her want to babble. “Technically not a boyfriend. He doesn’t like that term, but, yes, we have a long-standing arrangement.”
Something hot and primal flickered across his face but was instantaneously gone again. “Is he going prematurely bald from all the hair you make him pull out?”
“Ha, ha.” She attempted to lighten the atmosphere. “Steven has a full head of hair, thank you.” It struck her how close his face was to hers. She would only have to lean forward a small bit. Until her mouth touched his mouth. Holly sat back and raised her cup.
“What do you mean by arrangement?” The weird tone was back in his voice.
Holly’s guard slipped into place. “Why do you want to know?”
“I’m curious and we’ve exhausted my love life.”
Holly snorted into her latte. “I doubt we’ve even scratched the surface of your love life.”
“Tell me.”
“Tell you what?” Holly hedged, not sure she wanted to discuss her relationship with Josh.
“How long have you and Steve been an item?”
“His name is Steven; he doesn’t like to be called Steve. And we’ve been together for six years.”
He whistled. “Sounds serious. You going to marry him?”
“No,” she said. “We don’t believe in marriage.” And they didn’t, or else they might be married by now. Or not. It didn’t matter. “Marriage is an outdated institution.”
“Really?” He tilted his head. “Since when?”
“Oh, come on, Joshua.” What was it Steven said? “The idea of a man and a woman staying in a monogamous relationship for years and years is antiquated.”
Josh raised his eyebrows.
Holly squelched the tiny part of her that was just as doubtful. “People change, they grow, and most of the time they grow away from each other. The world moves too fast these days to hold on to some sort of sweet, outdated romanticism.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really. Marriage was only a secure position for women who had no means of supporting themselves once they had children. Nowadays, women don’t need a safeguard; ergo women don’t need to enslave themselves in an institution that fundamentally disadvantages them.”
He grunted and narrowed his eyes. “That’s quite a theory you have there, Holly. What does Steve say?”
“Steven.” He was doing it on purpose. “And we are in perfect agreement on the matter.”
“Help me here, Holly?”
She bristled at the soft underlying challenge in his voice.
“How does this theory of yours work in practice?”
“What do you mean?” Where the hell was he going with this?
“How does it work?” He shrugged. “According to you, the idea of a man and a woman in a long-term, monogamous relationship is antiquated?”
“We have an open and mature relationship.” Holly huffed and drained her coffee cup. She couldn’t quite meet his eye. This bit always stuck in her throat when Steven brought it up. She wasn’t going to share that with Josh.
“ ‘Open and mature’?” His eyes didn’t waver from her face, and the skin on her neck and cheeks warmed. “How open? Like seeing other people open?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know. Steven and I believe in not putting labels on things and restricting them. We enjoy what we have and take each other as we are.”
“Interesting,” he said, challenge overloading every syllable. “And how open have you been in this relationship, and how open is Steve the Swinger?”
“He isn’t a swinger.” Holly’s hackles came up. “And I have never felt the need to have my needs met outside of our relationship.” She never asked and Steven never told her if he did. She didn’t want to think about that.
“So Stevie keeps you happy and satisfied, does he?”
“Yes.”
“In bed?”
His question rocked her back. Where did he get off asking her stuff like that?
“I don’t have to answer that.” Holly leaped to her feet, done with this conversation. “That is absolutely none of your business.”
There was nothing wrong with her relationship with Steven. It was the way both of them liked it.
“You know what I think, Holly?” Josh calmly ignored her outrage and turned back to his coffee machine.
“No, and I don’t care.”
He chuckled, but not nicely. “I think you’re kidding yourselves.”
“I don’t care what you think.” Her voice rose, and she was sorry now she hadn’t left him to sulk.
“I think your Stevie has got this rigged to suit himself.”
“What bloody rot. You have no understanding of a … a mature and … giving relationship that allows both partners to develop and grow.”
“You’re right.” He turned and propped his hips on the counter. “I don’t know anything about that. I tell you what, though, Holly. I sure as hell wouldn’t let some other man touch my woman, and I would make damn sure anyone who came sniffing around her knew it.”
“That’s barbaric and sexist.”
“Could be, but I don’t share, and I sure as shit wouldn’t share you.”
“It’s a good thing we’ll never have to put that to the test.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. He opened his mouth, shut it again, and shook his head.
“What?” Holly demanded.
“Nothing
.” He grabbed her coffee cup. “Do you want another one?”
Storming off versus another cup of coffee; no contest. “You have no right to attack my relationship. You’re only doing this because you’re still mad about last night.”
He made a rude noise and turned to make her coffee.
Holly was forced to study his rather delicious back and fulminate in silence. A caveman like Josh Hunter would have no way of understanding the kind of sophisticated bond shared by two self-actualized adults.
He put a fresh latte in front of her and stood on the other side of the counter looking delectable.
“Who are you to judge anyway?” Holly narrowed her eyes at him, but he remained impervious to her displeasure. “You bounce from one woman to another.”
“Used to.” He held up one large, rough finger. “I’ve grown up since then. I remain faithful to one woman for as long as I’m seeing her. And I’m sorry to break it to you, Holly, but any man who says he wants an open relationship is trying to get the milk without buying the cow.”
She gaped at him. Outrage boiled up inside her. “You’re disgusting. And what you’re saying is utter bullshit.”
He tilted his head to the side and stared.
“That is such crap. Steven is nothing like you.” She was inches away from tossing her latte at him. “He’s comfortable with his feminine side. He always understands my feelings and needs. He doesn’t crowd me or try to turn me into a possession. He is cultured, well read, thoughtful, sensitive, and considerate.”
His eyes bored into her.
Holly glared right back. She wanted to fry him with her eyes.
Suddenly, he shook his head. “You know what, Holly? You’re right.” He walked forward and propped his elbows on the counter in front of her. “Your relationship is nothing to do with me. If it works for you, great.”
She sensed more. “But?”
He shrugged. “You’re a beautiful woman, you’re smart, funny, and strong as hell. A woman like you deserves a man who is in it so deep he doesn’t want to see daylight again.”
“Oh.” She deflated like a balloon. “Some of us don’t want that sort of relationship.”
“Really?” His face softened and took her breath with it.
“Yes, really.” Holly’s hand trembled and she almost dropped her cup down on the counter. Coffee sloshed over the rim.