______________________
I slide my thumb across the device. “What, Jack.”
He sighs. “Where are you? I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”
“What part of ‘It’s over and I’m out of here’ did you not understand?”
Silence, then, “Where are you, Bec?”
Silence, then, “I’m not telling you.”
Silence, then explosion.
“What the hell is going on! Ten years of my life and I don’t even get an explanation?”
I’m sporting the opposite of his energy level. “I told you. I screamed all my reasons, but you weren’t listening which is no surprise. You’d only have heard me if I started the conversation with ‘the Dow Jones is up three points; I’m leaving you.’ That’s the only way you would’ve heard me.”
I hang up before he has a chance for an unwitty comeback. This time I turn the phone completely off. Why torture myself? Best just to torture him. I’m done.
Staring at the stars outside my window, I wonder how he hasn’t figured out that I came to our anniversary spot alone. I guess he wouldn’t have expected me to fly without him. It’s a thing I’ve never done. We met when I was twenty-five. Married at twenty-seven. Separating at thirty-seven. Divorcing at thirty-eight, I guess. All of this sans genius kids. What happened to having children? What happened to that?
I let the wine do its magic of lulling me finally into a dreamless sleep. Better than nightmares, thanks.
5
Brendan
Cottage 2. Porch. 9 a.m. Clothing: Faded blue jeans. No shirt. No shoes. Service? Definitely.
______________________
Her door opens and I wait. A chain reaction happens in my body, beginning with my mind, moving to my gut, landing in my crotch. I rest my hand on the space on my leg just below and wait, eyes on where she’s about to be. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. What’s taking her so long? Stick your head out already.
Bam.
She steps outside and turns her head right. Looks right at me like she was hoping I’d be here. The same tigress I saw last night is peering out from her eyes. She gives hungry a whole new look and it’s got nothing to do with wanting donuts. I check her body out as she stands staring at me from the welcome mat. Nice rack held up by a bra that doesn’t need to push the already perky bounty up. Her sundress is tight around a womanly waist and it hangs to the floor so I can’t see her legs. That’s okay, I’ve got an imagination. I bet what’s under there is smooth and firm. Shaved. Flawless.
She scans my body too, but more quickly, like she thinks I won’t notice. Oh, I notice.
I just stare at her. No smile. Fuck smiling. I can’t be bothered.
“Hey.”
Her head tilts like an alien who doesn’t speak the language. “Hi.”
That’s the most reluctant greeting I’ve ever heard. Time to bring out the big guns. I slowly raise my hand and touch my abs like there’s an itch I need to scratch, moving as slow as a snail on Quaaludes in a snowstorm. Her eyes fixate on my hand and she backs away into the cottage and closes the door.
What the fuck.
Fine. I’ll go check out the ocean.
6
Rebecca
Cottage 1. Back: on front door. Chest: heaving. Panties: soaked.
______________________
Okay, somebody tell me that didn’t just happen. I’m pretty sure I just got undressed by a pair of the most beautiful blue eyes I’ve ever seen. His abs have nooks and crannies I want to nibble on and his arms are just the right amount of muscular. The kid looks like Zeus and Angelina Jolie had a son who sprung out fully formed and ready.
But there’s no way he’s older than twenty-four. I’ve got a million years on him, easy. But those abs… when he touched them, I wished I were his fingertips. Why do I have to be so much older? Why did I waste my good years on a guy like Jack? It’s so unfair. It’s screwed up how society tells you marriage is the prize so much so that you choose the first ring that comes along thinking I won, I won!! And not thinking – wait, this guy for… my whole life?
I scan myself in the bathroom mirror and see newly embedded crows feet and a wedding ring. It takes gallons of soap and hot water to squeeze it off my atrophied finger. Finally I place it atop the tiny, hotel-sized soap where it can clean away my past and stay the hell out of my future.
Walking into the bedroom, I look out the window. The ocean waves at me from across the two-lane road. There’s a cliff.
Maybe I could throw myself off it. It’s worth a shot.
When I get to the edge, I’m surprised and happy to find I’m not alone. Zeus Jolie turns at the sound of my footsteps. His dreamy eyes flicker and he scans me again, gaze resting on my breasts like there’s a NY Steak resting on them, complete with a bottle of A1 sauce.
“My eyes are up here.”
He doesn’t stop eating my skin with his mind. I feel dizzy at the way this kid looks at me. He’s about 6’1” and has forsaken a shirt so that the morning sun shines down on his skin like a spotlight on a party I can’t miss. Most guys would look embarrassed if I called them on what he’s doing. Not this guy. It’s like he isn’t interested in my objections. My breath comes shorter and my chest rises to his call. I want to cross my arms and turn away but that want is only a habit of thinking I’m taken and therefore off-limits. But there’s another part of me that is on limits. Very, very, very on. So I get up the nerve to be a little naughty. “You like the view?”
Those blue eyes finally slide up to meet my eyes. Without blinking, he nods. “Better than the waves or the sunlit sky.”
Is this guy a poet or was he just born that smooth. Oh my.
7
Brendan
Ocean Cliff. Not alone. Slope difficulty just went from black diamond to solo green circle.
Go.
______________________
“You here alone?” I ask Wildcat. She turns to the ocean and gives me a great view of her profile, her dark hair blowing back to just below her shoulder blades. Her back is straight and dignified. She’s a thoroughbred, this one. She’d win the trophy and ride the jockey all the way home. But she’s angry. It’s in her eyes. You spot it, you got it – that’s what they say. I’m spotting it all over the place. I see what I see when I look in the mirror… detachment.
“I am. You?”
I nod, but I’m thinking about that wall of hers, how high up around her it is. There’s something wild about looking at a person who’s in the same mental place you’re in. It’s like I know her more than I should. I look away… because suddenly it feels too intimate. “Yeah. I just finished college.”
“Shouldn’t you be partying in Cancun or somewhere with your buddies?”
I stare at the ocean, thinking of Mark, Tommy and Ross in Hawaii. I didn’t go with them because I was supposed to be in New York celebrating with my girl. I’m supposed to be there now. By the time she broke it off, my friends were already gone.
Mark had ribbed me about not going. For four years he’s been trying to get me to join him for mayhem and parties. He and I both started school late – after a couple years of working to save for it, and that gave us an instant bond when we met. We both weren’t from rich families. My parents made me earn it, which was good. I’m better with money now. I know its worth.
Do I wish I was with him and the guys now? Now that I think on it, no. The sanctuary of this secluded place, bereft of tourists, feels perfect. I don’t want to party. I want to ache. The crashing water down below this cliff feels right. I feel in sync with the darkness of it. I can’t see the bottom, just like I can’t see the bottom of the pain of losing Sara.
Wildcat’s voice breaks through my thoughts. “Hey…I’m sorry. You want me to leave you alone?”
“What?” I ask her, turning and drawn in by her stare. Those brown eyes are smoking. We say nothing until her thick, dark eyelashes shyly flutter to the ground. Something just happened inside her and I don’t know what it is �
�� but somehow I got past that wall to where the vulnerability lies hiding. To see it is exposed like that is intoxicating.
“Don’t go. Stay with me awhile.” It’s the hurt in me that’s asking. “To answer your question, I didn’t want to go with them. I needed to be alone for the weekend. But not that alone. Please.” It’s the truth, just not all the truth.
She looks back up at me and holds my eyes. Her bottom lip gets a tiny nibble and she frowns. But after a second of thought, she nods. In silent agreement, we turn to the water again, the wind blowing through our hair. We stare at the ocean, spread out before us, so big and forever. It will go on with or without us, and will be here long after we’re gone. That makes our problems seem small, and we love it for that.
8
Rebecca
Suicide: put off. Eyes: misty. Mind: slowing like a terrifying carnival ride finally coming to an stop.
______________________
There’s something about the ocean that gets me. I feel small around it, which means my problems are small, too. Is this why I came here alone when I’ve never flown without Jack in my entire life?
I was raised in Arizona and my parents were Think Inside The Box types. To be fair, Sedona is a beautiful space if you’re going to live in a box. It’s surrounded by red rocks, and inhabited by mystics, the supposed psychic epicenter that it is. But there’s no ocean.
With the gentle sunlight heating up my skin and the saltwater infused wind whipping back my sundress, I turn my head and look at the person who just ebbed my uncertainty about the future by saying, stay with me awhile. I’d wanted to crawl into his arms when he’d looked at me like he did; like he’d lost something precious to him, something he couldn’t explain to me, a stranger.
His dark, short wavy hair blows back and the light massages his bare chest. He’s stunning. His hands are stashed into the pockets of his slightly baggy blue jeans and his Converse shoes remind me of his youthful age. Jack would never wear shoes that cool. He wears white sneakers and I didn’t know it until now but I never liked them. White sneakers are not sexy. Not like these.
The naughty thoughts swirling around my lower regions must be ignored – I know. But that doesn’t mean I have to spend the day alone, if he wants to come. Before I even know I’m speaking, I hear the invitation slipping off my tongue. “I’m going into town. Would you like to join me?”
I can’t believe I just said that!
He looks at me from the corner of his eyes, head only slightly turned.
My heart speeds up as I wait. Oh God. What if he says no? Who’s the old lady trying to pick up on me, he’s probably thinking. I’m a fool. Good job. Well done.
But how can I blame myself for trying?
9
Brendan
Planned: A day of beer drinking, alone. Blood: racing at this unexpected question.
______________________
I cock my head toward her, checking her out. “What’s your name?”
She smiles and looks toward the sun, eyes lighting up like fire. A small laugh escapes her, like she forgot we don’t know each other or something. I guess I forgot, too. The ocean – it’s tricky.
“Rebecca.” She stops, doesn’t add her last name. I will look back on this and realize she didn’t want me to know she was married. Didn’t want me to search for her on the Internet. Didn’t want to know me past this one weekend. But today I’m a naïve kid who’s only ever had one real girlfriend and who’s playing at being a smooth-talking-swanky-ass-mother fucker. I don’t expect slyness or withholding. I will learn.
I pull my hand out of my pocket, hold it out with a smile. “I’m Brendan.” We shake hands and I hold hers a few seconds longer than I would anyone I didn’t want to nail. I hold her eyes, too, and remind myself to keep it together. Inside, I’m nervous, an open wound that will not heal for a long time. “Let’s do it.”
“What?” Her eyes open with surprise.
I grin, realizing where her mind had gone. “Let’s go into town.”
She steps back and puts her arms around herself. “Oh! Right. Yes.” The way the sun lights up her skin makes her look like an angel. I’m wishing I was those arms right now. She glances at me and the electric charge between us can’t be just in my head. She smiles, like she’s thinking the same thing. “Let’s do it.”
I feel a movement in my groin as the blood rushes there. A sexy smirk I didn’t know I had in me, finds its way onto my face. I hold out my arm. “Lead the way.”
She turns to the road, her eyes sneaking a peak at my chest.
I saw that, Rebecca.
I really like that name.
Rebecca…
10
Rebecca
Gallery Bookshop: Corner of Main and Kasten St. Face: shoved in “The Invention of Wings” by Sue Monk Kidd. Arms: stacked with five other novels. Me: In heaven.
______________________
“Have you read this?”
I look up to see Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged held up in Brendan’s hand. His entire body is in halo from the window’s light behind him. Since I’m already above the clouds, my breath catches and I nod. “I read it in college. My friends and I were into Rand back then.”
His eyebrows rise up above twilight-blue eyes deepened by the navy blue of the shirt he grabbed to come here. He walks closer to me, lowers the book waist-level. “What did you like about her?” I flick to it, pretending to check out the cover, but really I’m looking at his stomach. Knowing what’s under that shirt, from having seen his bare chest all morning, is sexy, like I know a secret… a chiseled, kissable secret.
I close my book and lay it on top of the others. “Her books to me are about studies in excellence.”
He looks at my lips. “What do you mean?”
Self-consciously, I watch his eyes drinking me in. My heart beats faster and I struggle to focus. “Um, well, the main characters in her books strive for a transcendence of quality that surpasses excellence. But they don’t look for accolades.” I stop and wait to see if I should say more. His face is a steel door without explanation of opinion. So, because I don’t know what else to do, I continue. “They do it because their souls demand it. Dagney. She’s superiorly intelligent and capable and only cares about the railroad. But her brother, he cares about parties and how he looks to society without any concern that he’s running the company into the ground with his incompetence. Excellence battling mediocrity, that’s the plight Ayn Rand presents. She’s criticized for selfishness, but I believe she believed we should be all that we can, without regard to what others think of that.”
Oh my God, Rebecca, shut up. Shut up right now. Brendan’s eyes narrow and he looks at the generous stack of books I’m holding. I’m waiting for him to tease me about how many I’m buying, like my husband does. Or… did.
Brendan’s eyes glide back up to latch onto mine. “Is that the author of The Secret Life of Bees?”
My jaw drops open. I shut it. It drops back open. “Yes!”
“Ah.” He smiles. “You ready to go?”
I nod, speechless. He holds out his hand and moves to make room for me to pass him in the narrow aisle. Our bodies brush against each other. I don’t move as quickly as I should. Invisible sparks connect our skin and I glance up to him to find him intently staring at me. I look away.
At the register, I put my card on the counter. Brendan’s arm comes around me from behind and he lays his hand on it. “Let me get those for you.” His body, it rests against me and my eyes fly up to the bespectacled man ringing up my novels, expecting judgment from this stranger, and getting it. Did the stodgy old guy think I was Brendan’s mom until he touched me? Oh come on now, I remind myself. I’m not THAT old.
Just because I’m feeling rebellious, I lean against Brendan and purr, “Thank you, honey.” Brendan’s chest shakes with a silent laugh as the old stooge’s lips tighten and his eyes meet ours again, never.
“This one, too,” Brendan tells him, laying down the
mammoth thousand-plus paged Atlas Shrugged. An inner smile glows in me. Is he just trying to impress me? Because it’s working. A guy who buys me books has my heart. A guy who wants my advice on books, actually listens when I speak, and then buys the book? Well, he has my heart, mind, body and soul.
“Enjoy Mendocino,” Captain Crusty dutifully grumbles.
“Oh, we will,” Brendan smiles. “After you, gorgeous.” He holds open the door for me. I know he’s only playing, but I touch his chest and lightly brush my lips against his as I pass, causing an explosion of tingles all over both of us.
I murmur, “What a gentleman,” like I’m saying I’m going to rip you apart and eat you.
A sexy smile turns up his soft lips. He looks to the old guy again, waves, and shuts the door behind us. We both break out into laughter ten steps away from the door where he can no longer see us.
“That was fun,” he grins.
“It was.” I haven’t kissed anyone but my husband in twelve years, until now. The feeling is unreal. So, so, sooooooo good.
11
Brendan
Tent: popped. Mind: blown. Food: still needed. Drink: it’s 5 p.m. somewhere, isn’t it?
______________________
This woman is not only a wildcat from whom I want claw marks – she’s also wicked smart which makes me hotter for her than I thought I could be. When she was talking about the book, I wanted to push her up against the bookshelf and hike up that sundress, traveling my lips along the nape of her neck. I want to hear her moan. I want to be the one who makes her moan, and soon.
At the same time – as she was talking – it suddenly occurred to me I might be playing out of my league. That kiss was a light caress against my surprised lips, but it did something to me. It scared the living crap out of me. She’s no girl. Rebecca is a woman. She would make girls avert their eyes, knowing they couldn’t compete
It's in His Kiss Contemporary Romance Box Set Page 5