by BETH KERY
“Make up for it by going home and getting some sleep.”
Christian nodded. “After I apologize.”
He thought he finally knew how he could find a sense of calm. He just hoped he didn’t get thrown in jail for trying it.
* * * * *
Megan stayed at her studio until eleven that evening, working like a woman possessed.
She was so intense that Tina, who came by to chat, vacated the studio immediately. She was totally absorbed in the process of chasing a newly cast sculpture. Aside from the loud sound of the sandblaster she was using, Tina probably could tell that she wasn’t in the mood to talk. Tina probably assumed it was her work that was preoccupying her. Her friend knew how focused Megan was about cleaning up and refining her pieces after they’d been removed from the investment casting. She was like a doctor bringing a new baby into the world.
What Tina didn’t know was that she’d thrown herself so completely into her work in order to distract herself from the pervasive ache in the vicinity of her heart.
Christian hadn’t called or sought her out for three days now. It surprised her how much she missed him—how much it hurt that he hadn’t called. The sinking feeling she had in her gut told her that three days were about to become four…and four days were likely to lead to forever. The thought had plagued her so greatly that she’d dealt with her anguish in the best way she knew—she’d lost herself in her art.
She’d worn herself out so much that she barely was able to mumble a coherent “good night” to the new condominium doorman when she got home that night.
She’d considered asking Jeff as she left for school early that morning if Christian had to leave town again, but had felt too humiliated to do it.
Was he irritated at her for cutting off their passionate embrace so abruptly? It was the only thought that prevented her from calling him on one of the phone numbers he’d given her. She wanted more than anything to hear the sound of his singular voice, to look into his singular gaze, to see his crooked smile. But what if she tried to call him and he behaved coldly toward her? If he did, it would all be because of her immature handling of that situation by the elevator.
When the doorman hopped up to open the door for her, Megan paused speculatively. He was a stranger to her, so it wasn’t as embarrassing as if it were Jeff--
“I’m sorry, I forgot your name.”
“It’s Peter, ma’am.”
“Hi, Peter. I’m Megan. I live in unit 506. I have a friend who lives up in the penthouse suite on the ninth floor.”
Peter looked impressed. “Chris Lasher is your friend?”
She nodded. “I was wondering; do you know if he’s in town?”
He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “I was told during my orientation that I wasn’t supposed to reveal that kind of private information about our residents, ma’am.”
“Oh, of course, I understand. I just haven’t seen him in a few days, and I was beginning to get a little concerned,” Megan mumbled, embarrassed.
“Don’t worry. He’s okay. I’ve seen him the past few nights when he comes home late. He must be a real night owl.”
Megan’s lips parted in surprise and the unexpected morsel of information. She barely managed to mutter a coherent “thank you” before she walked away, leaving Peter to look after her with puzzled speculation.
A half hour later, she lay in bed and stared at the ceiling sightlessly. She had been so exhausted earlier, she would have thought that she would lose consciousness the moment her head hit the pillow. Instead, her thoughts kept her wide awake. She turned on her side to protect the vulnerable area around her heart.
Christian had been here, in the same building as her, for the past three days, and hadn’t even called. What was he doing when he stayed out so late at night?
She told herself that it didn’t matter, that the likelihood of them ever becoming seriously involved was so small as to be negligible. She reminded herself of how different they were. They might as well be two different species, or beings from different planets.
Megan Shreve and Christian Lasher. Together. The concept was ridiculous. Part of her knew it to be true.
But that didn’t stop her from falling asleep with tears wetting her cheeks.
* * * * *
Christian felt no sense of victory as he glanced down at the key in his hand and punched the fifth floor on the common elevator.
In the first place, he was too tired to feel much of anything. His mind was numb, and his eyes were gritty. The second reason for his lack of triumph involved the fact that it had been vaguely alarming that the doorman had agreed to his request so obligingly. But since Peter’s foolishness had played right into his hand, he’d worry about the doorman’s lack of wisdom later. The fact that Megan had apparently asked Peter about him several hours ago only added to the young man’s willingness to believe Christian’s bald lie.
The moment that Christian entered Megan’s front door he smelled her. The subtle floral scent had the immediate effect of calming his overwrought body. He felt like a prowler, but the thought didn’t deter him from following his instincts and moving silently down the darkened hallway. He told himself that he only needed to see her, to confirm with his own eyes that she was safe.
The sound the bedroom door made when he opened it was like a slumberous sigh.
Even though he was only planning on staying for a brief moment, he closed the door silently behind him. He stilled when he heard Megan’s soft breath, and suddenly knew why he’d shut it. The darkness, the woman sleeping in the bed, the sounds of her peaceful breathing, and the intimacy of the enclosed room all created a soothing balm to Christian’s aching spirit.
He waited until his eyes adjusted to the darkness, then made his way to her bedside. She was lying on her side, facing him. His hand reached out, itching to touch her. He longed to awaken her, to still her fright, to hold her while she was still warm and pliable with sleep.
Instead, he fumbled quietly until he reached an upholstered chair and sunk into it. For the first time in days, he felt his muscles uncoil. A heavy wave of relaxation and warmth surged through him, leaving him limp and content in its wake. He didn’t examine why. It was enough that it was true.
He hadn’t analyzed his motives for this middle of the night raid into Megan’s home since the thought had first popped into his brain back at the recording studio. He’d only followed the idea as though it were a biological imperative, something that he could have denied as easily as trying to turn his eyes brown or attempting survival without water and food.
He knew he should stay away from Megan Shreve. His mind knew it, but his stubborn body refused to believe. And as with the other most elemental things in life, the body wins out in the end.
He gave in to an overpowering urge to sleep.
When he woke up abruptly hours later, it was dawn. He wasn’t disoriented. He knew exactly where he was. Pale light peeked around the edges of Megan’s drawn blinds. He rubbed his eyes, vaguely surprised that they were nowhere near as gritty as they had been before several hours of deep sleep. He lowered his hands and stared at the vision of Megan in the muted colors of early morning.
He never took his eyes from her still form as he stood.
His hesitation took the shape of a visible swaying on his firmly planted feet.
Shutting his eyes was an act of will. Moving his feet to exit the bedroom and out of Megan’s loft must have been an act of God.
* * * * *
By the next night, Christian was convinced that his temporary insanity had been the result of sleep deprivation. Was there anything a good night of sleep, a premium Scottish whiskey, and a beautiful woman couldn’t cure? Christian glanced over at Carla Somebody and inspected her through alcohol-saturated, beneficent eyes. Okay, she wasn’t exactly beautiful. But she was sexy as hell and stacked to the teeth. Christian knew this personally, because his shoulder was pressed cozily in between what seemed like a half a foot deep of female
cleavage.
“You ready to go now, Chris?” Carla asked huskily.
For a second, Christian couldn’t recall where she wanted to go. Then he vaguely remembered making a comically crude sexual suggestion earlier. He’d been joking—he wasn’t remotely interested—but Carla automatically accepted his offer. His gaze locked on her full, heavily glossed pout and then lowered to the breasts that were sandwiching his shoulder.
“I need another drink,” he slurred, moving away from her. She stepped closer again.
“That’s what you said the last two times I’ve offered.”
Christian shrugged negligently. “Relationships can be rough, huh?”
“What’s that supposed to be? Some kind of a joke?”
“Biggest joke of the universe,” Christian mumbled.
He felt the outburst of offended breath across his ear. After a moment, she seemed to think better of her show of pique, however. She pressed her full lips to his ear, and then let her tongue enter the act. He heard the plaintive call of the saxophone in the distance. It caused pain to sluice through his brain, but Christian still longed to hear more. He pushed Carla away from him.
“Give it a rest, will ya’?”
The way Carla demonstrated her disapproval this time wasn’t likely to be followed up with erotic kisses. She cursed him so vehemently, yet so bizarrely, that Christian was left puzzling whether her crude suggestion was even a remote human possibility.
Her musky perfume lingered after her dramatic exit. For a second, Christian regretted his impulsivity. He knew from experience the two best bets for temporary forgetfulness were alcohol and a scalding orgasm. He must be getting old. But the fresh glass of whiskey just placed in front of him on the bar looked far more tempting than Carla had.
“Enjoy it, Lasher. It’s your last one.”
Christian turned at the sound of the gravelly, familiar voice. “I’m not eighteen anymore. There are plenty other bars in Chicago, Emilio.”
“Yeah, but you showed up at my place, didn’t you, Chris? Was does that say? You must have wanted someone to keep you from doing something stupid. Just in case I wasn’t enough to do the job, I called him.”
Christian glanced over his shoulder, already knowing who was going to be standing beside Emilio Jackson. His mouth curved in disgust, but he made a subtle motion to the empty barstool next to him. Neither of them spoke as Seth ordered a drink, and Christian began to nurse his whiskey thoughtfully for the first time all night.
“Sarah’s not even working tonight,” Christian said after a minute of silence.
Seth took a meditative draw on his beer. “No. But she’s here. She came with me when Emilio called. We were out together tonight, on our first Emilio-sanctioned date.” Seth watched from the corner of his eye as Christian swayed back from the bar. He glanced behind Seth and located Sarah talking to Emilio, her anxious gaze glued to Christian. She looked beautiful in a sophisticated black dress. He gave her a quick wave, half of reassurance, half of apology.
Regret penetrated his intoxication. Christian shoved his drink away from him.
“You about ready to tell me what’s going on with you, Christian?”
“Not really.”
“Tough shit. I wasn’t ready to come and baby-sit your drunk ass when I was appreciating how Sarah looks in candlelight and anticipating our first evening alone together. Ever.”
Christian frowned. It wasn’t until that moment that he realized he hadn’t talked about what was eating away at him to anyone close to him because it hurt too much to say the words. He needed to expel the poison, though.
He’d already ruined Seth and Sarah’s special night because he couldn’t seem to get a hold of himself.
He told Seth what he’d learned about Megan from Hilary Molloy in a flat, emotionless tone.
When he was finished, the two men sat quietly for a while. Christian drank the ice water that Emilio had told the bartender to bring to him. The wave of intoxication that the whiskey had given him was fading, leaving a throbbing headache in its wake.
Seth cursed.
Christian nodded in agreement. “Yeah, it’s hard to think of anything more profound than that to say when you hear it.”
“Megan’s sister sounds pretty overprotective. How can you know if Megan would be traumatized in any way by an intimate relationship?” Seth asked.
“I don’t know. That’s the whole point, isn’t it? What would you do? If it was Sarah?” He watched as Seth instinctively turned his head and looked across the bar to where Sarah now sat in a booth chatting with another waitress.
“You’re saying the two relationships are similar?” Seth surprised him by asking when he faced the bar again.
Christian hesitated, realizing what Seth was asking. His mind replayed the way Sarah’s dark brown eyes had glowed when Seth had just made eye contact, and the way the hard lines of Seth’s face had momentarily softened. Only Sarah could soften Seth’s hard angles, just as Seth was the only who would ever make Sarah’s eyes shine like she was lit from within.
“I haven’t known her very long,” he said uncertainly.
“That’s not what I was asking you, Christian.”
Christian shrugged his shoulders.
Seth sighed before he took a gulp of beer. “You better find out for sure before you make a decision. Why don’t you just see her some more? Get to know her better, find out just how strong she is emotionally, figure out the likelihood of her possibly getting hurt.”
“What if I find out that she could?”
“That’s why you need to figure out how you really feel about her.”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“Everything.”
“What do you mean?” Christian demanded. His head was throbbing and he didn’t have the patience to deal with Seth’s laconism.
“You need to decide how serious your feelings are for her. If you don’t care for her—really care—then Hilary is right. You should keep as far from her as possible. I’ll be the first to kick your sorry ass if you do any different. But if you really do care for her than you would be willing to allow Megan to decide.”
“But if something unexpected happened, a flashback, a traumatic memory—“
“Then you would be there to help her deal with it,” Seth replied with a pointed glance.
Christian took a slow, deep breath that cleared his head of some of the remaining whiskey fumes. He set the glass of ice on the bar resolutely.
“I think it’s time I went home,” he said gruffly. “You have a beautiful woman who’s been waiting for you for a very long time, and I need to get some sleep.”
Chapter 7
Megan pulled her hair into a ponytail and barely acknowledged the result in the mirror before she left the bathroom. She wore shorts and an exercise bra, but still needed a T-shirt before she went jogging. The one that she grabbed had been thrown heedlessly on the chair in her bedroom after she’d discarded it for another shirt yesterday. Her impatient motions as she whipped the soft cotton shirt over her head stilled abruptly. She pulled at the bottom of the shirt and held it up to her nose.
Christian Lasher’s scent filled her awareness. The unexpected sensation brought a surge of tears to her eyes. She sat down at the end of her bed and cried as a storm of grief raged through her. Her grief was for Christian—for the fact that he’d apparently lost interest in her—but only partly. The pain was also for everything that Christian had awakened in her, but left unfulfilled: the way he’d made her feel so alive and whole, the way he’d awoken the sensual being in her that had been repressed for so long.
The storm eventually passed.
God, did she miss Christian so much that she was beginning to smell him on her own clothing? Megan wondered as she dried her tears for what she swore was the last time. She was already dreaming about him incessantly. She woke up in the morning feeling like she’d just spent hours with him, only to have reality slap her in the face. Her thoughts depres
sed her so much that she briefly considered getting back into bed and pulling the covers over her head in order to cling to that insubstantial, fragile connection to Christian.
As tempting as the thought was, Megan endured and found her running shoes in the closet. All of her hard work on her sculpting and her emotional unrest regarding Christian had taken a toll on her muscles for the past few days. She was tense and sore, and knew that aside from a good masseuse—something she couldn’t afford right now—the only thing that would give her relief was exercise.
When she reached for the lobby doors forty minutes later, she knew she’d been right. Exercise was exactly what she’d needed. She felt calmer and a lot less tense.
At least she did until she saw Christian leaning casually against the doorman’s station, looking for all the world as if he’d been waiting for her to walk through the door.
“Good morning,” he said.
“Good morning,” Megan replied. Her eyes moved over to Jeff, who watched her expectantly.
“There she is. Told you she wouldn’t be long,” Jeff said.
“Were you looking for me?” Megan asked Christian with what she hoped sounded like crisp unconcern.
Even if her voice didn’t betray her, she knew her eyes must have. They roved over him as if they were starved for the sight. He must have just showered, because his hair was still damp around his neck. He was dressed uncharacteristically, but very attractively, in a pair of low-riding khakis and a blue button-down shirt that matched the brilliant color of the eyes that were currently watching her so intently.
“Yes,” Christian answered simply. “I was hoping to convince you to have breakfast with me.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?” he countered swiftly. “Jeff says it’s one of your off days at St. Cat’s.”
Megan’s gaze flashed to Jeff’s accusingly. Jeff seemed to find something fascinating to look at on his desk. “I haven’t even showered yet.”