Hot for Him

by Sarah Mayberry

  He shook his head as though he couldn’t quite believe what she’d said.

  “She’s your mother,” he said simply.

  “Leandro—read my lips. I don’t want to go over old ground,” Claudia said.

  He touched her arm. “How are we supposed to build a future together, have a family if you won’t tell me what’s going on in that head of yours?” he asked.

  She let out a short, sharp bark of laughter.

  “A family? Are you kidding?” she said, knowing even as she spoke that she was being a bitch, that all the things she should have said, should have told him last week were coming out the wrong way because she was terrified for her mother and she’d allowed her feelings for Leandro to get out of control.

  He frowned. “I want a future with you, Claudia, you know that.”

  “I don’t want children,” she said bluntly. “Never have, never will.”

  “I know you’re really into your career, but we can work around that. I’ll share the load, we can do it together,” Leandro said.

  She shook her head.

  “No. I told you right from the start that I wasn’t interested in a relationship, but I wanted you so badly I kidded myself that maybe we could pull this off. But from the moment I saw you with your family, I knew I could never be the kind of woman you want me to be. I should have said this to you last week, except…Anyway, I’m sorry if you feel I led you on. I didn’t mean to. But now we both know where we stand, and we can put this all behind us and move on.”

  It was hard to say the words, to finally draw a line under what had happened between them, but it had to be done.

  He blinked. “What are you saying? That we’re breaking up?”

  “What’s the point in carrying on when we’re never going to be on the same page?” she asked.

  “I don’t believe this,” he said incredulously. “Look me in the eye and tell me you don’t love me.”

  “I love you. That’s the problem. That’s why I kidded myself that I could do this thing with you, that we could sleep together and I could control it. But deep down inside I knew we’d end up here. I won’t give up my life for anyone, Leandro,” she said.

  He looked stunned, as though she’d whipped the rug out from beneath his feet. Guilt and sadness spurred her on.

  “You knew. Right from the start. The reason you sprang your grandmother’s party on me was because you knew I didn’t want us to get serious,” she said.

  They’d both been complicit in this game of “look the other way.”

  “No, I just don’t buy it. You were made to love people, Claudia. I’ve seen you with your friends, the way you look after your team, the way you talk to your nephew. You said when you saw me with my family last week that you knew you could never be the kind of woman I want—well, I had the exact opposite experience. I saw you laughing with my grandmother and dancing with my father and gossiping with my mother and I knew that you belonged, that we have the foundation for something great between us.”

  “You saw what you wanted to see,” she said.

  “No, I didn’t. I saw you,” he said.

  Stepping closer, he pulled her into his arms and tilted her head up with a finger.

  “I love you, Claudia,” he said before lowering his head to kiss her.

  He tasted familiar and precious and for a few stupid moments she let her body soften against his, let herself imagine what it would be like to have his comfort and strength to draw on, to know that she would always have him by her side.

  It was too seductive, and way too terrifying. She had only to remember her mother’s face to find the strength to resist him.

  Sliding her hands between them, she pushed herself away from his chest.

  “I think you should go now,” she said quietly.

  She felt him tense even though she was no longer touching him.

  “I understand that you’re upset about your mother,” he said. She could see he was struggling to keep his emotions in check. “I don’t want to lose you, Claudia. Let’s just leave this for now and talk about it later.”

  “Nothing is going to change, Leandro.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “You want a family, I don’t. One of these things is not like the other,” she said.

  He still looked stubbornly unconvinced.

  She smiled sadly. “This is why your first marriage ended, isn’t it?”

  “Partly. But there were other reasons as well.”

  “Even if we did decide to look the other way for now, this would always be between us.”

  He looked stricken, disbelieving. She reached out and cupped her palm on his cheek.

  “It’s for the best,” she said, dropping her hand and stepping away from him.

  “I can’t believe you’d give up on us so easily, that you won’t even give this a chance,” he said. He sounded angry, like she’d betrayed him. “What happened to the woman who kicked my shin for stealing her idea?”

  “She’s standing right in front of you,” Claudia said, her voice calm even though inside her heart was breaking. The only way to stick with this, however, was to remind herself that worse pain lay ahead if she allowed herself to be drawn back into his arms.

  “I hope it’s worth it, this great career of yours. I hope those awards keep you warm at night,” he said, his voice and face cold now.

  “I know what I want,” she said.

  “And that’s not me?” he asked stiffly.

  Slowly she shook her head. “I don’t have room for you in my life.”

  “Room for me?”

  He stared at her as though he’d never seen her before. Then he walked away, back straight, head high.

  That easily, it was over.

  She stared after him, telling herself that she’d only done what had to be done. After a minute or two, the sick feeling in her stomach began to fade and she forced her mind to the matter at hand. Coffee for her brothers, her silent, condemning father and herself. Then conferences with the doctors as they began the inevitable fruitless rehabilitation discussions that would go nowhere because her mother refused to acknowledge her illness.

  She managed a small, twisted little smile. She’d had her moment in the sun, her few days of glory. Now it was time to pay the price.

  * * *

  CLAUDIA WAS FEELING bone weary by the time she arrived at work the next morning. She’d texted Sadie and Grace to tell them about Talia’s hospitalization last night, and they were waiting in her office with takeaway coffees and bagels when she arrived.

  “How is she?” Sadie asked.

  Claudia shrugged a shoulder. “Still sleeping.”

  She’d had no sleep herself, and had only made a pit stop at home to shower and change clothes.

  “Do you have any idea where she’s been?” Grace asked, pushing a bagel forward.

  “She’s filthy, so she’s obviously been sleeping rough. God knows where, or with whom,” Claudia said.

  “Eat something,” Sadie said, nodding toward the bagel. “You look exhausted.”

  Claudia picked up the bagel, but the warm scent of yeast and flour made her feel sick. Ever since Leandro had walked away from her, a heavy weight had been sitting in her stomach, and the thought of food was repellent.

  “I had something at the hospital,” she lied, putting the bagel down again.

  “It must have been so horrible, coming home to find her on the doorstep like that,” Grace said, rounding the desk to hug Claudia. “You should have called us, we would have come to be with you at the hospital.”

  “Leandro was with me,” Claudia said flatly.

  She felt rather than saw Grace and Sadie exchange glances.

  “So he knows then, about your mom?” Sadie asked hesitantly. Both her friends knew that she’d been holding back on telling him about her mother’s situation.

  “He knows,” Claudia said.

  “How did he handle it?” Grace asked.

  “Well. Leandro ha
ndles everything well,” Claudia said. She didn’t want to tell them that she’d ended things with Leandro last night. Not yet. They’d want to talk, and she didn’t want to. She felt as though one false move would puncture the fragile bubble that held all her raw, aching hurt inside her. And there was no point hashing it all over, anyway—nothing was going to change the fact that she and Leandro wanted two very different things out of life.

  “So, what next?” Grace asked.

  Even though she knew Grace was talking about Leandro, Claudia chose to deliberately misunderstand her friend.

  “Tests, a general checkup. They’ll see if she’s done any permanent damage to herself. And then my father will take her home, and everyone will go back to pretending that it never happened. Just like the last time and the time before that,” Claudia said matter-of-factly.

  “Maybe this time your mom will recognize she’s got a problem,” Sadie said.

  Claudia shook her head. “I can’t believe in that, Sadie. You know I can’t. I’ve believed in too many second chances over the years. She always lets us down. Always.”

  The heavy silence that fell between them was broken by the ring of Claudia’s phone.

  Claudia snatched it up eagerly. For as long as she could remember, work had been her solace, her safe house. She drew confidence from her successes, and each step up the ladder was another brick in the wall separating herself from her mother’s fate. Now, more than ever, she needed to remind herself of that. She was not her mother’s daughter, and last night she’d taken steps to ensure she never would be.

  “Claudia Dostis,” she said into the receiver.

  “Claudia. You got a moment to look at those promo slots?”

  It was Harvey, her immediate superior, calling to ask a question about the network’s promotions schedule. Pulling the appropriate file folder toward herself, Claudia indicated to her friends that she had to take the call.

  Sadie and Grace withdrew. Focusing on what her boss was saying, Claudia gave herself over to work.

  * * *

  THE FOLLOWING DAY, Leandro pulled up in front of Dom’s house. His brother had signed up for another run along the fire trails, following through on his determination to lose his paunch. For his part, Leandro was hoping that a bit of physical punishment would give him some relief from the pointless circling of his thoughts.

  Claudia had made her position very clear—she didn’t have room for him in her life. And even if she had been able to slot him in, even if she had wanted to talk, he knew how immovable a committed career woman could be. He’d played this game before with Peta, after all. He knew all the angles, all the parries and thrusts. He knew exactly how irreconcilable two divergent life views could be.

  He frowned with surprise when his mother opened the door to his knock.

  “Ma. What are you doing here? And what have you done to your hair?” he asked, eyeing her new, elegant jaw-length cut.

  Alethea put a hand to her newly cropped hair and preened. “Don’t you love it? Claudia did it for me,” she said.

  His frown deepened.

  “Claudia cut your hair?” he asked skeptically. He was used to his mother’s roundabout ways of telling a story.

  “She arranged for one of her show’s stylists to cut it for me. So I could look like one of the characters. Not that I watch the show, of course. I was changing channels one day when I saw this woman’s haircut.”

  “It’s okay, I know you watch Ocean Boulevard. I watch it, too,” he said dryly. Although that was probably about to change. There was no way he could watch a single frame anymore without thinking of Claudia.

  “Really? You don’t mind?” his mother asked as she led him into the kitchen.

  He stopped short when he saw that his youngest brother, Theo, and his wife Isabella were there, as well as his father and his two sisters, Magda and Georgia, and their husbands Peter and Jack. Theo’s two daughters, Alice and Chloe, were sitting under the kitchen table with Dom and Betty’s Alexandra and Stephen, all of them coloring up a storm on scrap paper. Dom and Betty were the only absentees.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “Betty’s gone into labor early,” Isabella said. “Her water broke first thing this morning.”

  She sounded worried, and Leandro did some rapid calculations in his head.

  “She’s not due for another six weeks, right?” he said.

  “Seven,” Theo said tightly.

  “It’s all going to be fine,” Alethea said firmly, filling the coffeemaker with water. “I refuse to believe anything different.”

  And there is the reason I let myself fall in love with a woman I knew would make me miserable—genetic optimism, Leandro thought grimly.

  As if she sensed the general lack of belief in her proclamation, Alethea began ticking off her arguments on her fingers.

  “The babies are already a good size, we know that from the ultrasounds. And Betty has always come on early—Alex was two weeks early, and little Stephen was three. Plus, I read in Betty’s coffee grounds that she will have four children.”

  His mother shrugged her shoulders as though this last “fact” sealed the deal.

  Leandro ran a hand through his hair, his own problems receding for the moment.

  If Betty and Dom lost the twins…He could only imagine the dark well of grief that would be waiting for them.

  “We should go to the hospital,” he said.

  “Not with the children,” Georgia said firmly. “Dom will call when they have news.”

  Leandro let it go. She was probably right, anyway. The kids would only get tired and bored at the hospital, and he knew from his night in the E. R. how difficult screaming children made it for everyone else.

  Inevitably his thoughts clicked over to Claudia again as he remembered the events of Thursday night. He felt…Cheated was the only word that matched the emotion sitting on his chest like a dead weight. He’d fallen in love with her, and he knew in his bones that she loved him, too.

  Without him consciously willing it, he had a memory flash of the anguish in Claudia’s face as she’d listened to her mother’s cries in the E. R. How he’d wanted to make the world right for her, but Talia Dostis’s alcoholism was obviously a long-standing family issue. Just as obviously, there was a rift between Claudia and her father. And she’d never brought either subject up with him. All the while he’d imagined their relationship was progressing, that they were becoming closer and closer, she’d kept him firmly at arm’s length.

  Belatedly Leandro realized what he was doing: flogging a dead horse. Hadn’t he learned his lesson? He and Claudia wanted different things. It was as simple as that.

  Unless, of course, he changed what he wanted.

  Could he give up his dream of a family of his own, children of his own, if it meant keeping Claudia in his life? It wasn’t something he’d ever really considered with his ex-wife, but Claudia was different. He felt so connected to her, so complete when he was with her. Was it possible he could content himself with being an active uncle, channeling his frustrated parenting ambitions into his nieces and nephews?

  Looking around the room, at his mother and father, his brother and sisters and their partners, at the four children lying sprawled beneath the table, he felt an expanding warmth in his chest. Family was important to him—the center of his universe. He found his career satisfying, but it was not his everything. These people were. It was part of who he was, part of his essential character.

  The answer was no, he could not live without the love and laughter of children in his life.

  “Uncle Leo, come and look at what I drawed,” Chloe called from under the table.

  Pulling his thoughts back to the here and now, Leandro crossed to the kitchen table and squatted down to peer under it.

  “Look. This is you and the pretty lady from the other day,” Chloe said. “Mommy said you love each other, so I drawed a big heart for you to share, see?”

  Isabella made an embarrassed
noise as Leandro accepted the proffered drawing. Two stick figures filled the page, the only differentiating feature being the triangle of the woman’s skirt. A big lopsided love heart encircled them both.

  “That’s great, Chloe,” he said. “You got my hair just right.” He went to give it back to her, but she shook her head.

  “It’s for you. For the fridge,” she said firmly.

  Thanking her, he stood and realized that the adult members of his family were all gazing at him speculatively.

  “So, when are you going to ask her?” Alethea said, lining up coffee mugs on the counter.

  “I beg your pardon?” Leandro said, even though he knew what she was getting at. This was the last thing he wanted to think about, let alone talk about. But he also knew it was easier for all of them to concentrate on his love life right now than on what might or might not be happening at the hospital.

  “I can see you love her, Leandro. You couldn’t take your eyes off her,” Alethea said. “When are you going to ask her to marry you?”

  “I don’t think it’s really the time—” Leandro stalled, but Theo cut him off.

  “Might as well give, Leo. She’s not going to stop until she hears what she wants to hear.”

  Leandro sighed and stared down at the two figures holding hands in Chloe’s drawing. As much as he hated to say the words out loud, they needed to be said.

  “Claudia and I decided not to see each other anymore,” he said.

  A stunned silence met this announcement.

  “But we liked her,” his father said.

  Leandro felt a belated stab of sympathy for Peta, who had never been so unreservedly welcomed into the fold.

  “She was perfect for you, Leo,” his mother said. “Warm and smart and so pretty. Strong enough to match you, soft enough to love you. She was perfect.”

  “We wanted different things,” was all he said. He wasn’t about to go into the complexities of his and Claudia’s relationship.

  “I’m sorry, Leandro,” Magda said quietly.

  “Yeah, I really thought…” Theo said, trailing off when Isabella dug an elbow none-too-subtly into his ribs.

  “Don’t you like my drawing, Uncle Leo?” Chloe piped up from down on the floor.