Eight Ways to Ecstasy

by Jeanette Grey

“Actually.” Her voice cracked, anxiety making her breath go tight.

  His arms went stiff around her.

  Stomach roiling, she shifted inside his embrace, twisting until he let go. Unable to look at him, she crossed the room to where he’d thrown her top. She picked it up and pulled it on. It was long enough that she felt at least a little bit covered.

  “Actually?” he prodded.

  Steeling herself, she crossed her arms and turned to face him. “Actually, I have a lot of work to do.”

  His expression scrunched up in confusion. “But you just said you didn’t have any food. It’s only dinner.”

  Right. Just dinner. But even if she managed to survive the wait and then a meal with this man, she knew how he worked. She knew how weak she could be. Their first round had left her boneless and sated, but one look from him and she’d be ready to move straight into a second—after her recent dry spell, maybe even a third.

  And then there they’d be, naked in her bed, and she’d be exhausted, and he didn’t really have a place to stay, so he’d might as well crash at hers. Just for the night.

  A different kind of shiver racked her frame.

  It was exactly how things had gone in Paris, with them falling into each other’s pockets, going on one sightseeing adventure after another until it had only felt natural to spend every waking minute together. Until she’d had to let him down to get a couple of hours to herself to draw.

  Somehow, she’d managed to mistake all that time together, all those pieces of herself he’d convinced her to give away, for intimacy. His stunted, guarded replies to her most basic questions for reciprocity. It was how she’d gotten her heart broken.

  She had to hold him at arm’s length this time, no matter the temptation to do anything but. She’d be grateful, later, that she had.

  Standing firm, she set her shoulders and lifted her chin. “Like I said, I have work to do.” She gestured idly toward the stacks of canvases she’d turned toward the walls. “I have an assignment for one of my classes, and—”

  “So you decided to go.” His voice cut her off. The sheer wonder in his expression made her pause. “To grad school.”

  Oh, hell, that was right. Last he’d known, she’d still been making up her mind between an office job and an MFA.

  “Yeah.” She nodded, fidgeting. “Things went so well on my trip.” Her heart had been left a mess, but her sketchbook had been full to the brim. “And you told me…”

  It was the one good thing to come from the whole sad affair. Rylan had looked at her drawings—really looked at them—and he’d told her she’d be a fool not to follow her dreams.

  Licking her lips to wet them, she met his gaze. “When I told you I was considering it, you acted like it shouldn’t even be a decision. It just…” He’d given her that extra shot of confidence she’d needed. “It meant a lot.”

  “I’m so glad.” His eyes shone. “I spent all this time wondering, hoping you’d made the right decision.”

  She rolled her eyes at herself. “I’m still not sure it was the right one—”

  “It was. Absolutely.”

  His unwavering confidence in her after all this time threatened to crack her resolve. But she had to stay strong.

  “I’m glad you think so,” she said, squaring her shoulders all over again. “But it’s a ton of pressure and a lot of work, and I just—I don’t think getting pizza with you is a good idea.”

  He tilted his head to the side, and for all the world, it felt like he was trying to peer clear through her. But then, instead of arguing, he rose to his feet. Her heart got stuck in her throat as his full height unfurled, muscles rippling across his chest. He found his boxers and pants and pulled them on, then crossed the remaining distance to her and ducked to look her in the eye. “Why?”

  She blinked at him in disbelief. “Excuse me?”

  “Why? It’s not the work, so don’t try to tell me that it is.”

  An irrational panic tore at her throat. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “You want me to go. I want you to tell me why.” He said it like it was a completely reasonable thing to request.

  And maybe that was what made her snap. Uncrossing her arms, she flung them out at her sides, stepping back, pulling away.

  “Because—because you can’t just,” she sputtered, “just show up at someone’s apartment after the way we left things. I told you when I let you in. I’m still—God, I’m still so mad at you I could—” Could what? Shake him? Deck him?

  Retreating farther, she dug her nails into the meat of her palms.

  “Because I don’t trust you,” she said. Her rib cage echoed with the words, because really, that was what this all boiled down to. “I know we had something.” They’d had a connection like nothing she’d ever felt before, but finding out it hadn’t flowed in both directions, not as freely as she had thought—nothing could come out of that entirely intact. They hadn’t. No matter how much he seemed to want to pretend. “We had something incredible, but you don’t just get it back by asking for it.”

  “I told you. I’ll do whatever it takes to earn your trust again.”

  “And tonight, what it’s going to take is you leaving.”

  His eyes widened, and a beat of silence passed as they sized each other up.

  Then, all power and precision, he stalked the rest of the way toward her. She held her ground, working not to betray how inside she shook like a leaf.

  He reached to curl a hand around her neck, and drew her into a soft, gentle kiss.

  After a minute, he released her, and her heart leapt around inside her chest. She cleared her throat, but it did nothing for the fog he left in her head. “I just need some time,” she said. And some distance, to give her any hope of keeping her feelings in check when he had the power to turn her to liquid like this. “It’s a lot to take in, you know.” She gestured between the two of them.

  “It is.” His smile went sad. “And time’s exactly what I asked for from you. Time to prove myself.” Seven nights to be exact. “It’d be pretty bad if I weren’t willing to give you some to think this all through.” He dropped his hand, leaving her skin singed. “Don’t think I’m happy about it, though.”

  She wasn’t entirely sure she was, either, honestly. But she had to hold the line this time.

  Rylan finished getting dressed as she watched on, leaving only his tie undone, the fabric hanging loose around his neck. When he was put together again, he turned to her.

  And something cracked behind his eyes. “It’s not just the money, is it?”

  “What?”

  “That’s not why you don’t want me here. Because it doesn’t really matter. I’d be happy with you in a hotel in Paris or a studio apartment in Brooklyn, or in a cave for all I care. It’s just details.”

  It was the kind of thing only someone with money could say.

  Suddenly, her lack of it felt like a brand.

  “It’s not the money,” she managed.

  “All right.” He captured her lips one last time, tongue softly seeking in her mouth, body firm where it pressed to hers.

  Before she could second-guess herself or let the heat he kindled under her skin catch flame, she drew away. He stopped her from going far, ducking to rest his brow against hers. “Six more nights?”

  Her stomach did a little dip. It sounded like too many and too few. But maybe, depending how they went, they’d be just enough—enough to figure out who he really was. If they could even work outside a fantasy.

  If she’d made a mistake, letting him in again as much as she had.

  She nodded. “That’s what I said.”

  “We’ll do the next one soon. And Kate?” There was something quietly desperate to the way he said her name. To the way he clutched her close.

  “Yes?”

  “The next time you invite me to share your bed—” His eyes turned to liquid pools of rushing heat. “I promise. I’ll make it count.”

  And then he w
as drawing away, leaving her sagging against the wall, relying on the plaster to keep her up. He grabbed his suitcase by the handle and rolled it to the door. With one look back over his shoulder, he cast the door open.

  It closed behind him, and sucked all the air out of the place. Leaving her alone with her life exactly how it had been before he’d walked into it, and yet utterly changed.

  Leaving her to wonder what the hell had just happened.

  And what on earth she was going to do.

  Chapter FOUR

  Rylan barely waited until they’d pulled up to the curb before he was yanking open the taxi’s door and setting his feet down on the pavement. From behind the glass, the driver offered to help him with his luggage, but Rylan waved him off, clenching his jaw against the urge to snap. None of this was some random cabbie’s fault.

  It was all Rylan’s own damn fault.

  And yet there was this part of him—this small, seething part—that kept replaying the way Kate had closed him off and kicked him out. The look on her face as she’d asked him for time.

  Fuck it all, he’d begged her for a second chance. He’d been prepared to tell her everything this time around. Whatever she’d wanted to know. But the distance he’d felt even as he’d pushed inside her had persisted, and when he’d offered her more, she practically slammed the door in his face.

  Grasping the handle of his suitcase, he stepped up onto the sidewalk and took a deep breath, then let it out with a disgusted sigh.

  What the hell had he been thinking, asking to be taken here?

  He shook his head and stiffened his spine. Not like he’d had all that many options. Kate had refused to let him stay, and the idea of an anonymous hotel room left him cold. He’d long since washed his hands of his own apartment in the city, had sold it in a fit of pique when he’d been determined never to return. All of his possessions were either back in Paris or wrapped up in boxes in some storage room at the mansion, and…and there was no chance in hell he was going there.

  No, this was his best course of action.

  He stalked his way past the doorman without pausing to introduce himself.

  Apparently, that was a red flag in doorman land. The fellow chased in after him. “May I help you, sir?”

  “Alexis Bellamy,” Rylan said, not stopping.

  “I wasn’t told she was expecting any…”

  “She’s expecting me.”

  She probably was, even. He’d dismissed her when she’d offered to let him stay, still holding on to the hope that Kate would take him in. But she hadn’t seemed entirely convinced.

  The doorman followed him to the elevator, his decorum slipping as Rylan continued to stride past him. “And who should I say is visiting?”

  “Her brother.”

  Rylan punched in the number for Lexie’s floor, and the elevator doors slid closed. As it rose up into the sky, he took a long, deep breath, preparing himself.

  A minute later, the chime sounded off. The doors opened to reveal his sister standing in the entry to her penthouse in a pink silk bathrobe, her phone in her hand, a smirk stretching all the way to her ear.

  “I thought you were going to ‘figure something out,’” she crowed.

  He fought not to roll his eyes. “I managed to find my way here, didn’t I?”

  “You gave Laurence downstairs a heart attack, I think.” She stepped aside to let him in. “He probably thought you were here to murder me.”

  “Let’s see if we can manage not to prove him right.”

  He stepped inside and tasted bile in the back of his mouth. He’d been here once before, back when she’d first acquired the place. It’d been a blank slate back then; now it was anything but.

  God, it was their mother’s apartment in Paris all over again. All modern lines and white carpet and rose accents, Eastern influences exactly where they were supposed to be. It wasn’t a home. It was a show.

  Like their whole damn family. Like their whole damn life.

  “Love what you’ve done with the place,” he gritted out. “Did Mother help you?”

  “She put me in touch with someone.”

  A designer then. “You ever think of doing your decorating yourself?”

  When she didn’t answer, he turned around. Her brow was furrowed, her head tilted to the side. “Why on earth would I do that?”

  He faced away from her. “You know? I have absolutely no idea.”

  With that, he tightened his grip on the handle of his suitcase and headed for the hall.

  “Last door on the left,” she called from behind him.

  “Got it.”

  And he should probably stay. Avoiding her interrogation until tomorrow would only make things worse, but he couldn’t deal with it right now. Today already, he’d squared off against a boardroom full of men who would eat him alive without a second thought. He gotten on his knees for the girl who’d made him willing to face his life again, but who refused to trust him.

  He’d convinced her to let him inside, only to be turned away.

  He closed himself in Lexie’s guest room and dropped his bag. Shoved his suitcase to the side. Twisting his hands in his hair and tugging hard, he fought to breathe.

  But there wasn’t any air to be found. Just a stale, ostentatious space, offered to him by the closest thing to family he had left.

  He’d made such a mess of things, running away from who he was. Trying to come back to it, trying to reclaim his life…He hadn’t expected it to be easy.

  But nothing had prepared him for it to be this hard.

  “Dammit.” Kate was scurrying across the street, the pedestrian crossing sign already flashing to red, when her phone buzzed at her hip. Late, late, she was running so damn late. She hitched her bag higher on her shoulder, trying to keep an eye on where she was going as she reached into her pocket.

  Oh God, what if it was Rylan? Her heart leapt into her throat.

  And then she cursed herself in her mind. Just last night, she’d asked him to give her some time. If he was calling her already, she should be pissed. And yet here she was, her chest lighting up at just the thought that it might be him. Stupid.

  Even stupider when her stomach dipped to see it was her mom instead.

  Praying for strength, she flipped the phone open and brought the speaker to her ear. “Hey.”

  “Oh, I’m glad I caught you.” Her mother paused. “Don’t you have class this afternoon?”

  Kate flexed her jaw. “On my way to it right now.”

  It was funny—her mom hadn’t come right out and told her she was making a mistake choosing to go on for her MFA, but there was this tone to her voice every time she so much as mentioned it.

  “Well, I don’t want to keep you.” That tone again. “But I wanted to let you know I booked that flight I emailed you about the other day.”

  Kate slipped into the art building and made for the stairs. “Oh yeah? That’s great.”

  “I can’t wait to see you.”

  “Me neither.” And she meant it, too. Her mom hadn’t been able to make it to her graduation in the spring, and they’d been trying to figure out a time for her to visit ever since. But she worked so hard. Kate’s chest tightened up. Her mom had always worked hard, pulling double shifts whenever she could get them so she could support herself and Kate both. All on her own.

  She’d taught Kate the value of independence, and of paying your own way. Because you could never really rely on anyone.

  Her father had taught them both that.

  Suddenly, she missed her mom with a fierceness that blindsided her. Things felt so topsy-turvy right now, between Rylan showing up out of nowhere and her painting mojo going MIA. Forget the occasional note of disapproval. There was something about having your mom around. Something steadying—something that reminded you of who you were.

  She pulled up short at the top of the stairs, letting traffic flow around her. With her back to the wall and her phone to her ear, she blinked her eyes shut tight for o
ne long moment.

  When she opened them again, her vision was clear, even if her voice couldn’t hide a hint of an edge. “Sorry, Mom, I have to go. But we’ll talk soon, okay?” Her throat hitched. “Catch up for real?”

  There were so many things she hadn’t told her mom. Keeping the disaster that had been her fling with Rylan a secret had been plain good sense at the time, but if he was going to be back in her life, she didn’t know how long she could hold her tongue. How long she could keep her fears about her creativity and her love life and her future locked up inside.

  Her mom’s smile came across the line. “Count on it. And I’ll see you soon. Just a few short weeks.”

  Kate said her good-byes and hung up, then took a solid ten seconds to collect herself before she was off again.

  As it turned out, she must have been making better time sprinting her way through campus than she’d realized. She snuck into the painting studio where her cohort’s weekly seminar class met to find Professor Robinson still lingering at the back, talking to one of the other girls. Relieved, Kate moderated her pace. Then, from the edge of the loose cluster of students, her friend Liam gave her a lifted eyebrow and a little wave.

  Oh hell. Liam.

  Kate wanted to sit right down and laugh, or maybe cry. Less than twenty-four hours ago—before Rylan, before some of the best, most confusing sex of her life, before her whole world had been turned upside down—her best friend in the program had asked her out. He’d left it ambiguous, but the potential had been there, the invitation to take it as something more than friends. She’d demurred, letting him down easy. But at the same time, she’d left the door open.

  Any other day, it would’ve been the biggest thing on her mind. And here she’d gone ahead and forgotten it completely.

  Her stride went from faux casual to an absolute crawl. Liam’s raised brow fell, a crinkle of concern appearing between his gray eyes, and a twist of guilty shame made her gut clench.

  He was a nice guy. She’d mostly thought of him as a friend, sure, but the possibility had been there for it to grow into more. Over these last few weeks, they’d gotten to know each other as people and as artists. In coffee shops and bars and across their easels from each other, they’d talked.