by Angel Payne
What the hell was really going on? And what words were going to unlock the answer from her?
“Margaux.” I stepped onto the terrace, too. The air was definitely different up here, a crisp breeze of sea salt and summer flowers, romance novel perfection to accompany the sunset forming over the bay waters in the distance. Not that I’d be paying attention to it. “Margaux.”
She whipped an unseeing stare at me. I almost jumped back myself. I liked disorienting the woman by seducing her, not scaring her.
“Margaux?”
“Huh?” A wave of a hand, a shake of her head, and suddenly, the lost princess had been dismissed. The PR princess took over again with a camera-ready pose, hand on her hip, practiced grin on her lips. “Hey! Sorry, babe.” She tapped at her head. “With Claire still out, there’s a party going on in here all the time these days.”
I jogged up a brow.
Babe?
Why did I suddenly crave a shower? And why from that one and not stud?
Because she meant it about as much as a red carpet air kiss?
“Okay, what’s really going on?” I approached her again, though her cheeky mien remained unchanged. So I stepped closer, getting near enough that I could smell her—expensive soap and subtle perfume—and observe the subtle trembles she was hiding so well beneath that attempt at a polished façade. “Margaux,” I lifted a hand, gliding it over the one she still gripped to her hip, “Sugar. It’s me.” I meshed my fingers between hers. “It’s me.”
She wet her lips again—just as she tried to yank free, hiding the deeper shivers beneath those few inches of skin pressed against mine. “Nothing’s going on.” It was better than babe, despite the toothpaste commercial mask she threw down yet again. “Nothing that’s any of your business, Michael.”
“You know I believe you like I’d believe Trey Stone in rehab, right?”
The commercial grin suddenly took on a shit-ton of plaque—with enough to spare for the newest crap turn of her composure. “Why the hell are you mentioning him?”
“Why the hell are you reacting like I just told you to wear white after Labor Day?”
“Cut the jokes.”
“Then cut the entertainment show cheese.”
Her eyes narrowed, perhaps a lame attempt to make me think PR Princess was about to wield her scepter of doom on my ass. But I was onto her game now and we both knew it, a recognition that swirled like thick incense between us before she snapped it in half, whirling and marching back inside. During the trip, she dashed out a retort that was classic, acidic her.
“Say what you came to say, big boy, then get the hell out.”
Shit. Why hadn’t I let her pour me a drink when I had the chance? “I didn’t come to say anything to you.” I skirted around the couch to stake a position at the foot of the stairs to her second floor—obeying my instinct that she was ready to bolt any second. “I came to talk with you.”
“Said the executioner to the convict?”
I shook my head. And let a soft laugh spill out. Should’ve seen that one coming, but didn’t—just like every other page of this chapter of my life with this woman’s name on it. I’d been perfectly content in a world where my only deep wounds bore the name Laci, and the sole source of fun at work was a scapegoat named Princess-zilla. But this astounding, confounding, bewildering, bewitching person had changed it all—and now I didn’t want the chapter to end. Ever.
One minor hitch to that plan.
We’d written ourselves into a corner. An impasse overlooking a daunting blank page. Stood staring each other down in an ivory tower above a sea of lights, with walls of silence closing in on us more by the minute. Walls fortified by four fucking weeks of the same stuff.
But what were walls made of? Bricks.
And what did serfs at the base of the tower know how to do better than anything?
Lay bricks.
Which meant they could tear them down, too.
I couldn’t give up. I wouldn’t. Not if it meant clawing out the mortar of this fucker with my bare hands.
Or taking advantage of the fact that she rushed back over to shut the door to the terrace—making it damn easy to pin her against the thing. She yipped as I flattened my hands on either side of her head—and refused to budge.
“Michael, this isn’t—”
“Talk to me.”
Her nostrils flared. “I’m not trashed tonight, Pearson. The Neanderthal thing isn’t going to—”
“Talk to me. Dammit Margaux, I think I deserve an explanation.”
She raised her hands, almost pressing them to my chest—hell yeah; go there, sugar, please—but then whimpered as if ordering herself away from a chocolate bar, dropping them. “I sent you an email. I know you read it. Can’t you just accept that and—”
“I ‘accept’ job offers, babe. I ‘accept’ global warming. I ‘accept’ cash back at the grocery store. I do not accept ‘complicated’. What the fuck is ‘complicated’?” I didn’t grant her any mercy, tracking her head’s slow back-and-forth with equal arcs of my own. “And if you wet your lips like that one more time, I swear I’m just going to kiss the answer out of you.”
As if loaded on springs, her hands did fly to my chest—
And shoved.
Wasn’t caught with my pants down though I was damn certain my cock would’ve preferred it that way, swelling into a distraction so significant, I stumbled back without a fight. Inside three seconds, I stood gaping at the smears I’d left behind on the glass—
And her new sprint across the room, as far away as she could get.
“I can’t do this, Michael. Not now!” She got to the stairs, raced halfway up then whirled on the landing, reaching for the rail with a hand that visibly shook. “Things just—are what they are, okay? I let you come up because I figured you needed this—”
“I needed this? Needed what?”
“—so let’s get it all said like the grown-ups we supposedly are. I do realize that getting closure can be important—”
“Closure?” Disbelief choked me from voicing anything original. Outrage prevented me from doing anything but advancing at those stairs like a SEAL tracking Bin Laden. Though she watched every step I took, she still started when I pounded a foot on the bottom step.
“Don’t get surly,” she snipped. “I’m attempting to be nice.”
“Nice?”
“I can do that from time to time. And…well…”
“Well what?”
“You’re—you’re important to me.”
Well, shit.
One little whisper and she’d led my SEAL to an empty cave. Then ordered him to sit and chew on his nails just like she did now. With her feet on the next step down, she curled in both arms, baffling the crap out of me. Did I stand down against the insecure girl she evoked with the pose or surge up toward the minx who now had to steal glances at me through those thick, gorgeous lashes?
I snuck a foot onto the next step. Let out a resigned sigh. “And you’re important to me.”
She sat a little straighter but left her hands curled in, posture still guarded. “I know that, too. But if you need to…move on…and stuff, I understand, okay? I do.”
“Is that what you want?”
My growl made her jump. Good.
I enjoyed that glory for two seconds before hating the fuck out of myself for it. Dammit, this was a mess, but I was not giving up. My new creed sent an invisible grappling hook into the rail behind her head, pulling me up the five stairs remaining between us. I knelt on the step below her feet, stare still locked, resolve still firm. “I don’t think it’s what you want, Margaux.”
Another averted gaze. She was really entranced with her kneecaps tonight. Like she needed an excuse. To me, every inch of her was entrancing on any night, but the woman was on a mission of her own: to keep her reactions hidden from me, in any way she could. Her rickety reply bore that truth out. “What I want doesn’t matter right now, Michael. Not that it ever did.�
�� She twisted her fingers together. “My mistake was thinking it would ever be any different.”
Hell. My body was perched on a step, but my mind stood at a crossroads. It had been the MO since I got here, hadn’t it? She’d really let me come up with the purpose of cutting me free—even when that option was torturing the crap out of both of us, and even when she had no damn intention of explaining why. “Complicated” didn’t qualify as explanation—not on this planet or any other.
But unlike all the other intersections she’d parked me at tonight, I had a very different outlook on this one. And smiled.
Because I already knew what direction I was headed for next.
Because she was coming with me.
The ju-ju from my grin finally altered the air between us. It tugged Margaux’s head up. She jolted—again. In the years I’d known her, the woman had never done the scared kitty twitch as many times as tonight. The observation lent new strength to my decision.
“Pearson? What are you—”
I cut her off by yanking her to her feet. Without pause, kissed her. Though my body screamed for more, I kept it to a commanding smack. “No more questions,” I decreed. “Not mine, not yours.”
Her face crunched ten different ways. She was goddamn adorable when struggling to figure something out—or maybe I just thought so because the expression was rare. “So we’re done?” Her voice pitched up then down, a mixture of relief then sorrow, the convict finally being given an execution date—still totally clueless she was about to be sprung from prison altogether.
“Not by a longshot, beautiful.” I let myself laugh it. I cupped a hand around her nape, pulling down so her gaze was compelled back up. Our kiss had ignited new emerald specks in her eyes, splitting my grin even wider.
“I don’t understand,” she finally uttered.
“Of course you don’t.” I wound my fingers deeper into her hair. “Because you can’t see past the demons you keep seeking in every corner of this place.” Which was pretty funny, once I thought about it. Between the spotless white walls and the polished concrete floors, I doubted the tiniest dust bunny could successfully hide here.
One thing I didn’t doubt: somehow, I’d sliced open a nerve. “Michael,” she snapped, “cut the games.”
“Great idea,” I returned. “Perfect idea, actually.”
“You’re making no sense.”
“Another good point.” I swept my gaze away long enough to take in all the nouveau-industrial décor—then dismiss it in one grunt. “Not a lot of ‘sense’ going on in here at all.”
She cocked her head. “Which means…?”
“You need to get the hell out of here. So that’s what’s going to happen.”
She stiffened. “Ummm, negative. It’s a damn freak show down there, with the holiday crowds and the guys from the base. Besides, I thought you weren’t interested in…” Her voice trailed as her stare narrowed, hooking into the steady intent of mine. “Shit. You don’t mean dinner.”
I curled my grin wider. And yeah, it probably made me a bit of a pig, but watching her fidget in expectation of my next words…instant wood sprung again between my thighs. Sometimes one had to leash a tigress for her own good. Didn’t mean it had to all be work.
“You have ten minutes, Miss Asher,” I charged. “Pack a bag. You’ll need to bring shit for five days. Casual shit—got it? That means denim. And cotton. And a warm jacket. And comfortable shoes.”
She glowered. “Heels are comfortable.”
I lifted a brow at my watch. “Nine minutes, thirty seconds.”
“Michael, I’m not just packing a bag and leaving with you.”
“Good enough.” I folded my arms. “That means you’re ready to tell me, right now, why you’re as skittish as a virgin in an HBO script.”
She grimaced. “I don’t know whether to applaud you or smack you for that.”
“Go for either, but you’ll be eating deeper into your allowance. Which, by the way, is down to eight minutes, forty-five seconds.”
Her glare weakened. The convict-in-conflict thing rushed over her face again, though this time, her eyes were brighter, almost hopeful, before diving under their shadows again. “No,” she asserted. “No. Come on. I can’t.”
I gave my eyebrow another workout. “Or won’t?”
“Can’t. How the hell do I explain this? Claire’s still not settled in after the honeymoon. She also has a bad case of the flu and—”
“Don’t worry about Claire.” I backed that up by pulling out my phone and flipping to my friend’s number. “I’d be stressing more about the seven minutes you now have left to pack a full bag and change your clothes. Or not. Your choice, as well. I do like those shorts…”
“Or what?” She persisted with a defiant stance, bunching fists to her waist, but now it felt like watching a poodle taunt a Great Dane. Everyone in the room could smile about it, knowing exactly which dog would end up on top in the end. “You going to just throw me over your shoulder and—ahhhh!”
I opened a smile into the luscious curve of her ass—now taking up most of the view on my right side. “Thanks for the suggestion,” I drawled. “One of your best ideas, sugar. Really.”
She groaned but ended it in a giggle as she took advantage of my distraction to snatch my phone from my hand. “You get this back when you put me down. And add ten minutes back to the timer.”
I reached up and landed a firm spank on her cheeks. When she squealed, I chuckled. “You really want to play the negotiation game with a lawyer, Miss Asher?”
“And are you really tossing that one out for a slice-and-dice under my Louboutins, Mr. Pearson?”
“For the next five days, your Louboutins will be useless.”
“And your law degree will be any different?”
At the top of the stairs, I followed the hall to the end, where a king-sized production of a bed was centered in a room evoking the rest of the condo’s minimalist chic. The whole place was clearly some overpaid designer’s idea of what “Margaux Asher” stood for.
Idiot.
Everything in here would be so much different if he saw the woman I set down on the mattress, hair tumbling into her face, mouth parted in impish delight, eyes shining with joy. The sight of her…consumed me. Overjoyed me. Already made me feel like a goddamn firework.
I wanted to tell her just that. Managed to stop myself by kissing her, instead—this time, turning the union of our lips into a thorough, passionate exploration. She moaned to me in welcome, meeting every sweep of my tongue with her own, but pulled back when I tried to press in even deeper.
“I’d—I’d—better get packing. Tick-tock, right?”
I snorted. “Touché, Miss A.”
“What? You don’t want to look at me in this for the next five days, do you?”
I groaned while rising up, now standing in front of her—and battling back all the urges to join her again, tangling her six hundred thread count sheets. “You want the real answer to that?”
She pushed at my stomach with a finger. “Get lost. Knowing you, I only have thirty seconds left.”
With phone back in hand, I jogged downstairs and out to the terrace again. The smile hadn’t left my face. The sky was on fire now, a blaze of red, purple, and orange left behind by the sun—though even the colors consuming the sky paled against the detonations now defining my spirit.
Want some tongs for that fucking corn, man?
I snorted. If that was the best my ego could come up with, I was sticking to the early fireworks show in my chest. Made it easier to concentrate on the business at hand, anyway. Two calls, fast and fun, if a little loud. Claire shrieked with joy when I told her she’d have to make do without her wing woman for a few days. Mom did the same when I told her I was returning home for another visit, starting tonight—with a special guest in tow.
*
Mom’s excitement only grew during the wait, a little over an hour long. She texted three times to ask what part of the journey
we’d hit, something she’d never do if I was driving up alone but taking shameless advantage of Margaux’s presence to be—well—Mom.
Not that the sixty-eight minutes weren’t interesting otherwise. On one hand, I was just as exhilarated as Mom, though everything was tempered by a sense of the surreal. I’d driven every curve, dip, and switchback of this mountain a hundred times in my life, but it was a trip into brand-new when accompanied by Margaux’s commentary. Her touristy squee when we passed the Safari Park. Her bigger yelp when the headlights caught a family of squirrels, dashing out of the way just in time. Her fascinated gasps at the blanket of stars above, becoming astonished cries as we climbed to higher elevations.
She captivated me in equal measure. I had no damn doubt it would’ve been more, if the road didn’t demand my attention. Her delight, authentic and unguarded and untamed, flung open yet another window I never imagined her having, let alone letting me look into. A year ago, had anyone told me I’d have a finger hooked into the belt loop on Margaux Asher’s jeans as she hung out the window of my truck counting stars, I would’ve asked what crack they were smoking. Now, I grinned like a fool at the breathtaking creature next to me, wondering how her light had been purposely snuffed for so many years.
“Michael!”
“What?”
“There’s millions of them!”
We’d reached the straight stretch before home. I took advantage of that to grab a longer stare at her. “From where I’m sitting, sugar, there’s only one.”
Screw the tongs. You’ve popped the fucking corn off the cob. How about some butter with that?
Sanity came with a sobering thought. It wouldn’t last. No way. Undoubtedly she was on a little natural high after my ballsy Luke Skywalker move, crashing into her “cell” and freeing her from her invisible Darth Vader. Besides, it was after dark, providing an added rush of romantic adrenalin for our secret adventure.
But that was psycho-babble for tomorrow morning. Right now, I greedily sucked up the little look she flashed, lips jutted in a silent I’m impressed, as we turned in at the farm. I gave in to a little pride as she eagerly took in everything, deliberately driving more slowly to stretch the moment. If showing her my place in town was like showing off the winning science project, this was nabbing the fucking prom king crown.