“A walker?”
“An escort. He provides companion services for woman—entrepreneurs, mainly—who need a partner for social functions but don’t need the hassle of a social relationship. They hire him, he will arrive in a limousine to pick them up, he’ll be dressed in exactly the right clothes for the occasion, he will say exactly the right things to the right people, be charming, witty and intelligent. He’ll be attentive to her needs and won’t get his nose out of joint if she spends most of the evening networking with every big spender in the room. He’ll drop her off safely at her apartment at the end of the evening and take home a fat envelope of cash.”
“He’s a gigolo?”
“No. The opposite. He’s paid not to have sex. Most of the businesswomen he walks out don’t want that complication but they need the appearance of a successful personal relationship with a man who matches their business profile.”
“That’s…so calculating.”
Luke shrugged. “That’s business life for a woman. She is still judged by the man on her arm, even in the boardroom.”
“How do you know him?”
“Jean-Claude always uses that table to set his deals.”
“You come here a lot too?”
“I used to, before it was ‘discovered’. Now there are too many here.”
The waiter led them to an empty table then and Luke sat her down.
“Why did you bring me here, then?”
“I know lots of people here. It’s a convenient way to bump into them.” Luke emphasized his point by lifting a hand in greeting again, to someone over her shoulder.
She resisted the impulse to turn and look.
“Luke, man. Been a while.” A hand thrust at Luke and she glanced up at another business suit. The man barely glanced at her.
“I’ve been out of the loop for a while,” Luke said, shaking the offered hand.
“I heard about it. Sick aunt in hospital, right?”
“Something like that.”
“She got better, obviously.”
“No.”
“Oh. Sorry to hear it. Give me a call when you’re ready. I’ll throw a party. It’s been a long time since we had a hell-raiser. You too—you’ll come, right?”
Lindsay blinked, realizing he was talking to her. “Well, um, if I’m in town…”
“Great!” He moved off, already waving to someone else and heading in their direction.
Luke caught the waiter’s eye and beckoned him over to order coffee and a bagel and cream cheese for her. Before the waiter had even left the table, another person came to stand next to Luke. A woman. She looked very young but her eyes seemed old beyond their years.
“Luke, honey. You’ve been away.”
“For a while, yes. Karen, this is a friend of mine—Lindsay, Karen.”
Karen nodded at her, with a friendly smile, then touched Luke’s shoulder gently. “You’ve been missed, honey.”
The hand wasn’t a particularly feminine one—the nails were chipped, uneven and there were lots of little nicks and scrapes and red knuckles.
But the way Karen let her hand linger on Luke’s shoulder for that fraction of a moment longer than was really necessary irritated Lindsay
Luke smiled up at Karen. “What can I say? You get a job in the boonies and you tend to lose contact.”
She grinned. “Then you’ll just have to ditch the job and come back to us here, won’t you?”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” Luke assured her.
“Do that,” she insisted and walked back down the aisle to another table further into the room.
“You weren’t exaggerating, were you? You really do know lots of people here,” Lindsay observed.
“I guess these people were the reason I kept coming back to New York every weekend. It’s hard to let go.”
“Let go of what?” Lindsay asked, genuinely puzzled.
“This. Friendships. A life. Your identity, I suppose.”
“But these aren’t friendships,” she retorted. “That guy, the one who stopped by here first—he’s so moved by the news of Stella’s passing that he’s urging you to get over it quickly so he can have another party soon.”
Luke frowned. “What would you know about it?” he asked and his voice was even, even though the narrowed eyes seemed to be glittering with a suppressed reaction.
“Beyond what I’ve seen in the five minutes I’ve been here? Nothing. And I know I’m not a shining example when it comes to meaningful relationships but I do have some. More than you, I’d guess.”
“Your father,” he said dryly.
“And Timothy,” she shot back, feeling her irritation spurt. “They were both at my mother’s funeral. Timothy was there for my sake. Were any of your friends here at Stella’s?”
She watched his lips thin and the corner of his jaw ripple as he clamped down hard. “More Lindsay-Eden-style truth? You just don’t know how to pull punches, do you?” His voice was low. Hard.
Suddenly, all her anger drained and she felt incredibly tired. “No, I don’t,” she admitted freely. “I’m sorry. Again. I guess my only excuse is that I can’t bear to think that these people are what pulled you back week after week. That your life was so shallow. I’m sorry if that hurts but that’s how I see it.”
“Truth or die, is that it?” His expression was bitter.
“Oh, Luke, haven’t you figured out that’s the reason I’m here in New York, yet? I didn’t come here to get Doug his favorite salesman back, for goodness sake!”
“I know that much.”
“Then you must know I can’t afford anything else but truth right now.”
“Maybe it’s the last thing I want.” There was no mercy in his eyes at all. Not an inch given.
She swallowed back the fear his words provoked. “If that’s truly how you feel, then we’re doomed to keep walking away from each other for the rest of our lives.”
The waiter arrived with her bagel and she stood up. “I’d better have that to go,” she said.
Luke’s hand gripped her wrist and she was reminded of the last time she had walked out on him at a restaurant.
“Not this time, you don’t,” he said, pulling her slowly but inexorably back into her chair. “Sit.”
She sat. Luke kept his grip on her wrist, however, while the waiter put the coffee on the table between them and scurried away.
All the time, Luke’s gaze bored into her.
“Tell me what you meant,” he said when they were alone.
“Meant?”
“About us always walking away from each other.”
Her heart started hurting. She was at the point she had been trying to rehearse for days now and despite her preparations she was still no more ready to take the risk she was facing.
Luke gave her wrist a little shake. “Tell me what you meant,” he insisted. “Because last time we talked to each other in Deerfoot, you gave me every indication that you never wanted to see me again.”
“True,” she said evenly. “That’s what I meant, then.”
“Then? So are you trying to tell me now that this trip to New York isn’t just a way of turning the knife a little deeper and harder? Of getting in any last licks you forgot to hand out back home?”
“No!” The idea appalled her. “I would never do that!”
“A mercy trip then? Luke goes missing—better check and make sure he hasn’t chucked himself into the river in remorse and misery?”
It was too close to the almost subconscious reasoning she had given herself for making this trip out to the east coast. She gave a mock laugh. “You? Chuck yourself into the river? That’d be the day.”
His grip on her wrist tightened, almost convulsively. His eyes were steady on her face, his gaze so intense it seemed to be all she could focus on. There was a ferocity in his eyes that almost frightened her.
“Then I’m right,” he said, his voice very low. “You are here to take back your demand that I stay away.”
“It’s no
t quite as childish as you’re making it out to be,” she said quickly, disliking the way he phrased it.
“No?” His tone was so cynical it could have curdled the cream in her coffee. Abruptly, her wrist was free. “You know, you were very persuasive last go-around. You managed to convince me I was a complete loser, a waste of good earth. In fact you were so convinced I’d poison your child, you disdained even the money I should rightfully provide it.”
Lindsay bit her lip. “That’s not—”
But he didn’t wait to hear her out. “Goddamn it, Lindsay, you carved a piece out of my heart and threw it back at me and now you’re saying you’ve changed your mind?”
She sat mutely, staring at him, her heart pattering along unevenly, while she composed and discarded a dozen different responses. None of them could do more than inadequately defend her actions.
There was a sharp peak of laughter from one of the other tables. It reminded her of their public position. She realized, uneasily, that there was someone sitting so close behind her he could probably hear her breathing…and would be privy to everything they were saying.
“Is there somewhere else we could talk about this?” she asked a little desperately.
Luke glanced around the room, as if he was seeing it for the first time. He swore under his breath and stood up. “Come on,” he said, pulling out money and dropping it onto the table. “Let’s go.”
His hand was on her arm, tugging her along as she scurried to keep up with him as he strode back to the car. She had the feeling that he barely noticed she was there, so preoccupied with his own mood and feelings was he.
He unlocked the car and opened the door for her to get in, a deep frown burrowing a ridge between his brows.
She reached up to touch it with the tips of her fingers. “Don’t,” she murmured. “I didn’t come here to hurt you.”
He snatched at her hand. “Just get in the car,” he growled.
But she couldn’t leave it there. She knew she had to act now. There was no way she could get in the car and meekly sit beside him while all this churned up desperation circled through her. Her heart couldn’t stand it.
So she gave way to an instinct that led her to press herself against him and slide her free hand into his hair and kiss him.
He was a solid, unresponsive mass that oozed hurt and fury but within a heartbeat she forgot all that as the pleasure of kissing him rushed through her mind and body. There had been so few kisses! How could she have lived without these for the week since she had sent him away?
The rigid body against hers relented and she heard his guttural groan as she was clamped against him, his arms coming to life and circling around her. His hands were in her hair, pulling her head back so her mouth would lift up and it was Luke kissing her, his lips hard and demanding and, yes, hurried.
Her senses slowly faded beneath the steady beat of pleasure coursing through her, as the kiss intensified and left her breathless and weak.
Abruptly she was released—almost pushed away and she staggered back against the car. She blinked in the suddenly harsh light and saw the curious glances some of the pedestrians were giving them.
Luke was watching her and as she tried to make sense of what happened, his mouth twisted. “Damn you,” he said, his voice low. He lifted his key chain and picked out the car key again and she was astonished to see his hand was shaking.
“Get in,” he said harshly.
She obeyed and realized that she was trembling too.
He slammed the door on her and strode around to his side of the car.
She braced herself for the journey to wherever Luke was taking her next. She had to pull her resources together again. She had to move beyond this moment but for the entire silent, tense trip, she kept recalling the way she had felt Luke’s defenses crumble and how he had drawn her to him.
There was hope, she would reassure herself.
And then she would glance at the grim, steely man sitting beside her and a terrifying wave of fear and doubt would wash over her.
Chapter Sixteen
The trip was short, for which Lindsay was eternally grateful. Luke drove the car into an underground car park and parked in a slot with 7G painted on the wall behind it. An apartment number, she realized.
Luke’s New York apartment? The one she’d always suspected he had. The one she’d wanted to see, to discover if it was more lived-in than the Deerfoot Falls one.
Well, she was getting her wish now but she didn’t want it. Not this way.
He got out of the car without a word and Lindsay scurried to get out before he could come around to the passenger door. He held his hand out toward the elevator.
“This way.”
She stood silently next to him in the elevator, trying to think of a way of justifying her actions by the car. Kissing him? It could only come down to sheer cruelty, or sheer idiocy.
She heard again his low “Damn you.” Well, no need to ask Luke what he thought her motivation had been. Her heart sank even further. This was not going at all the way she would have preferred it to go. But then, had she really expected him to scoop her into his arms without a fight?
He did just that a moment ago, her treacherous mind whispered.
It hadn’t been without a fight, though.
He opened the door of the apartment and let her in and she looked around with avid curiosity.
The brownstone was old and the furnishings matched it. The overall impression was one of contemplative comfort. Big, overstuffed chairs and a well-worn, deep sofa, a small, highly polished dining table with a richly patterned runner and thickly upholstered and stuffed dining chairs provided some of the comfort. Low task lighting, dark woods, a patterned, low-key wallpaper, helped the impression along.
But what most influenced the atmosphere was the fact that three walls of the room were lined with floor to ceiling bookcases and those bookcases were stuffed full of books, magazines, small freestanding frames with artwork, photos, maps, lots of video cases, music CDs and more and more books. There was a whole shelf devoted to what looked like about fifteen years of National Geographic magazines. The overall impression was of someone who spent a great deal of time intellectually occupied.
“Oh!” Lindsay said, a little awed. She had not been expecting this at all. A dying, potted plant, perhaps and a cheap, easy-to-move sofa bed and some plastic shelving to hold the rest of life’s barest essentials off the floor.
“What?” Luke asked. “Not what you were expecting?”
“No! The books…” Already, titles were catching her eye, drawing her closer to investigate.
“You like them?”
“I love them.”
Luke snapped his fingers together. “What a shame. They’re not mine.”
“They’re not?” Pure disorientation flooded her. “This is your place, isn’t it?”
“One half of it,” Luke agreed. He lifted his voice. “Josh!”
“Yo!” The answer emerged, muffled, from behind one of the closed doors leading off from the main room. The door opened and a young, good-looking guy with black hair and glasses shielding blue eyes, emerged from the room. He was carrying a pencil. “Heard you come in,” he said. He had a sharp, precise manner of speaking.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Luke said. “But Lindsay was salivating over your books, so I thought I’d introduce you.”
The sharp gaze was turned on her. “Hi.” He held out his hand. “Josh Morrow. You like my collection?”
“It’s very extensive,” she said, shaking his hand.
“Comes from twenty years of freelance writing.”
“You work from here, then,” she guessed, looking again at the pencil he held and realizing why the door to his room had been shut.
“That’s right. Luke, here, is probably the best roommate a guy could have. He’s not here half the time and always pays his rent. And he doesn’t mess up my books.”
“Wouldn’t dare,” Luke added.
Josh
jerked his thumb back toward his room. “I’m on deadline, so…”
“Oh, don’t let me keep you,” Lindsay told him. “It was a pleasure to meet you.”
“Ditto.” He nodded and retreated back behind the closed door once more.
She turned to face Luke. He was sitting astride the arm of the sofa, his arms crossed, watching her.
“You deliberately let me think this was all your stuff,” she said.
He nodded. “I wanted to see what your reaction would be.”
“That’s unfair.”
“Ditto, Lynds,” he said quietly.
She bit her lip. “Is that what this is about? Scoring points off me? Getting even?”
Surprised skittered across his face. Then he nodded again. “Maybe. A little. I’ve had a whole lot of points scored off me lately.”
“Isn’t that life, though? You win some, you lose some.”
“I don’t think life was designed to hand out a week like mine has been,” and he pushed his hand through his hair, slowly. Wearily.
“It’s been very bad for you, hasn’t it?” She spoke softly, feeling a sudden remorse for her ruthlessness. She’d not really stopped to consider what Luke’s week might have been like. She’d only really thought about her own week of misery.
“Bad? That doesn’t really cover it. I’d say the whole week could be written off as one of complete uselessness and frustration. First there was Stella.” His expression was bleak. “I hope you never have to sit by someone you love and watch them die in pain. It’s the most helpless, frustrating position anyone could be in. You can’t halt it, you can’t take the pain away, you can’t make it go faster. You just have to watch them suffer through it.” He stared down the fabric of the sofa arm, far away with his own thoughts.
She tried to think of something even remotely adequate to say in response and nothing came. And for a moment she cursed herself. Her mother would have known what to say. Luke would have known, if the situation had been reversed. All she could think of was a measly “I’m sorry,” and she had already said that too many times this morning.
He lifted his head to pin her to the spot with his dark gaze. “Then there was you,” he added.
She frowned, feeling her forehead pucker and her brows pull together tightly, as she braced herself. “I know my end of it,” she murmured.
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