Again, Anton showed the patience of a Saint, which was odd, because I knew he boxed for sport and worked out like a mad man. He could probably take Wes, or at the very least, destroy this hallway trying. “When she came to me, she couldn’t even handle a simple hug. It was bad, man.” I sunk to me knees.
No. No. No. No.
Wes wasn’t supposed to know. I didn’t want this ruined. It was too new, too important. Now he would see that I was damaged. Not good enough for him. I hadn’t had enough time with him. Heather shouted something I couldn’t even hear through the roaring noise in my head. I was lifted up in a flourish, held in the cocoon of the only arms I ever wanted to be in again. Wes.
“Sweetheart, I’m sorry. Baby, it’s okay, it’s okay.” I trembled against his chest. Somehow he got into my apartment and sat on the couch with me curled up in his lap. He held me for a long time while I cried. He soothed me, petted my hair, whispered sweet nothings to me. Finally, parched, he got me to take a few sips of water from a glass that appeared from out of nowhere.
“We’ll leave you. Amigo, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. Puneta! Lo siento.”
“If you need anything, I left our cards on the counter. I’ll touch base with you later. Take care of our girl,” Heather said.
Our girl. They thought I was their girl, but the only girl I wanted to be was Wes’s girl. I sniffed against Wes’s neck, enjoying the ocean scent, wishing we were at his place in Malibu, not in Miami in a strange albeit nice apartment.
“Hey, you okay?” He tilted my head up and wiped away the remaining tears as I nodded. “You hungry?” I shook my head. “Thirsty?” Same response. “What do you need?”
“I need you to love me.”
“Mia, I’ve loved you from the moment you took off your helmet at the beach. Hell, maybe it even happened before, when Mom showed me your photos on the website. I knew then I had to have you. And not just in my bed.” He squeezed me tight. “Though I love that too.” He grinned wickedly. “With you, Mia, it’s always been more. Everything about you calls to me. Your body makes me weak with desire. Your love of life and new things makes me want to set the world at your feet just so I can see you smile. I’ll love you today, tomorrow, and every day after that.”
“Prove it.”
He groaned and then sighed. “Sweetheart, we need to talk.”
“Prove it,” I pleaded, my voice bordering on begging.
He ran a hand through his dirty blond layers and down his face. “Fuck me,” he grumbled.
“Exactly. Fuck me.”
He shook his head. “Not tonight. Tonight I’m going to worship you.”
Chapter 9
Back and forth. Back and forth. Stop abruptly. Tug the hair. Scowl. Mumble profanity. Turn. Repeat.
I watched Wes pace the floor, figuratively burning the tread off his shoes in the process. He stopped suddenly, clenched both hands into fists and faced me. “I’m going to fucking kill him. I’ll ruin him. Political career”—he made a slashing gesture with his hand—“over. He’s going to pay in blood!”
“He already did.” I glanced up when the chill in the room turned white hot. Wes’s eyes were dark, pitch black with only a tiny ring of translucent green around them. “Mason beat the hell out of him,” I whispered, the words trailing off. Gulping down the dry ball of newspaper that had built like paper Mache in my throat, I tried to speak, but the look in his eyes kept me silent.
Wes’s eyebrows narrowed so severely a gnarly pair of eleven’s worked its way above his nose. “Mason? Who the fuck is Mason?”
I blinked at the grating tone of his voice. “Uh...uh, Mace is an ex-client…” Wes’s eyes went dead flat, devoid of feeling then widened. “Friend,” I amended.
Back to pacing.
“I can’t believe this. My girlfriend gets attacked, by a scumbag”—he turned on a heel and kept walking—“and ends up in the hospital, and I’m not told jack shit about it! Jesus Christ, Mia! This is so fucked up.” It probably wouldn’t do any good to point out that we hadn’t officially determined the status of our relationship until yesterday, but I thought it might go over worse than a hole to the head. He stood still, his eyes closed, jaw ticking with the extreme way he was holding his mouth so tight. “I don’t know what to do.”
Jumping up, I grabbed his hands, brought them up between us and rubbed out the tension until they loosened. “Baby, there’s nothing you can do.”
He bit down hard on his lip, so much so that I worried he’d break through the tender flesh until he drew blood. “Mia, I’m so angry.” His voice was raw and pained. “I need to do something.” His eyes opened and found mine.
“No. You need to see to me. Help me. That’s what you can do. It’s over.”
And it was. I had spent the last hour going over in excruciating detail what happened, the moments leading up to the assault and the fallout. Through it all, Wes held my hand, sat patiently while I retold the horrific experience, and caressed my back, wiped my tears and more. He listened and didn’t react until afterward. Once I’d told him an acceptable version of what Aaron did to me that night and the time before, when he inappropriately touched me while I slept…that’s when Wes started the pacing. And profanity. Next came anger.
Wes shook his head and clutched at his hair for the umpteenth time. “It’s not over. There’s a god damned whole in my gut. Sweetheart, the only thing that’s going to fix this is me taking that fucker down. Don’t you see?” His eyes blazed as his hands shook. “He hurt the woman I love. Badly. He needs to feel that pain.”
“Like I said, he is. He has to go to a therapist, AA, and more. Baby, if this hits the news or anyone finds out about what happened, the ramifications will hurt a lot more people than just Aaron. Hundreds, possibly thousands more in other countries. Warren, his Dad, he’ll have to pull out of the project. His investors would never support a man whose son is a sexual predator and a drunk. Please try to understand.”
And back to the pacing. I knew by the slump of his shoulders that he got it. We’d already been over it. I told him about Warren’s business, about the work he was doing, about the contributions pouring in and how all that could very well stop if something this heinous came out. The good ol’ boys club would crucify him and take their money with them. Weston knew that. He agreed to it because, if faced with the same circumstances, he would pull funding.
“Wes, there’s also the backlash…” I tried to broach the very sticky subject of my work and how the rest of the world would view me.
His eyes narrowed, and he leaned against the edge of the chair across from me. “Backlash?”
I nodded. “Yeah. On you, on Alec, Mason, Tony, Hector, the D’Amico’s, Tai, Anton; it’s too much to risk to go for a full-court-press-style justice for what he did.”
“Sweetheart, you’re losing me. Who are all those people?”
And that was when it got real. Very real. The kind of real that either made couples stronger or broke them forever. I had no choice.
“Wes, you know I’m an escort. The general public thinks that means I’m a well-paid hooker, and in some instances, that information could be inferred as correct.” He huffed and let out a long breath. “Also, securing me as an escort means that the people who can afford me are all big in their own right.”
“I’m not following. Explain it.” He spoke in a way that I found rather ruthless. He wanted to go there? Fine. I’d take him.
I shrugged. “You asked for it.”
Looping a finger around the opposite hands first finger I called them off. “Aside from Warren and his help the poor in third world countries, the clients immediately before him were the D’Amico’s. I did the Beauty Comes In All Sizes campaign. News that they hired an escort to model for them could destroy what they built.”
Wes pointed at me. “I actually saw the campaign. Was really proud of you, sweetheart. You looked great. Amazing really.” I beamed under his compliment. It made me feel amazing that Wes was proud of the work I’d don
e. “Next?”
“Mason Murphy.” Wes’s eyes widened in recognition. “Yep, the famous baseball player for the Boston Red Sox. Was hired by him to be his girlfriend to perfect his image. In the end, it actually worked, and he did find his mate in his PR representative.”
Wes moved to the bar at the side of the room. He lifted the whiskey and I nodded. I’d need a drink to get through all of this. He took two tumblers and filled them with three fingers full of the amber liquid. Yep, it was going to be one of those nights. A straight confessional. I could only hope he wouldn’t crucify me for my sins.
He handed me the tumbler, and I took a sip. The liquor burned down my throat like those Hot Tamale candies, leaving an even thicker aftertaste that sizzled on the tongue and warmed the belly nicely.
“Did you sleep with him?” He sat in the chair opposite me. We were separated by a long, slim glass table. The distance he put between us, whether intentional or not, wasn’t lost on me. Didn’t matter. This is what needed to happen.
I shook my head. “No, I didn’t. Not that he didn’t try.” I grinned, and he frowned. Okay, moving on. “Then before him was Tony Fasano.”
He cocked his head. “The food guy?”
That made me smile. “Yeah.”
“What did he hire you for?” This time when he spoke, it was a little lighter, carried less of that nervous weight.
“To be his fiancée.” I snickered and Wes cringed. “Best part is why he hired me.” I grinned.
The grin must have given Wes relief because he gave a half-hearted smile in return. “Why’s that?”
I pushed my feet under my booty and got comfortable, setting my glass on the arm of the chair. “In order to tell you that, I have to set the scene.”
Wes’s lips lifted into a crack of a smile and I thought that was definitely a tiny victory. “Okay, shoot.” He leaned back and took a swallow of his whiskey. I loved watching his neck and Adam’s Apple bob with the effort. Everything about Wes interested me, especially now that we were together. Hopefully together for longer than this conversation.
“After I arrived in Chicago, the house help put my bag in a room. It was a huge room, much bigger than I expected, even though Tony lived in a penthouse apartment in the city.” Wes didn’t say anything just waited for me to continue. “When the guy left me there with my luggage, I heard the shower running. You can’t imagine how freaked out I was knowing that I was in a room, probably the master bedroom and a guy I didn’t know, a stranger, was in the shower.” For a chick, this would be entertaining and funny. For Wes…not so much. His jaw clenched and he worked a nice grinding motion while I rushed to continue. “So he opens the door and this huge hulking dude is standing there in a towel and that’s when things get really interesting…” I tried to lead into the whammy but Wes just looked pissed off.
“I won’t hold my breath,” he gripped and I rolled my eyes.
“Well I stood there like a fish out of water, not knowing what to say and then out from behind him, another guy with a towel wrapped around his waist hugged my client. As in bare-chested hugging. As in they’d been in the shower…together.”
That’s when Wes gave me the full, beaming pearly whites. “He’s gay!”
“Don’t you read the news? Pay attention to the gossipmongers?”
He shook his head. “Not at all. I avoid that shit like the plague. It’s rarely based on truth, and usually, just ends up hurting the person they are featuring.”
“Anyway, to answer your question, Tony is gay. Been in a long-term relationship with an amazing attorney named Hector Chavez. Actually, during the month I was there, I became really close with Tony and Hector. More Hector than Tony for obvious reasons,” I winked.
“Obvious,” he mouthed.
I drummed my fingers against my leg and took a drink. “Then before Tony was Alec.” Remembering my time with Alec put that pit back in my stomach. I gave a piece of myself to Alec that month. A piece I never wanted back. Simple truth: I loved my filthy talking Frenchie, and I enjoyed being in his bed just as much. Not more than with Wes, but way up there on the list of great people to have sex with, same as Tai.
“And Alec was the artist,” he grumbled. How he knew that, I couldn’t recall. It’s possible that I mentioned Alec and our time together but Wes wasn’t giving anything away.
Pursing my lips, I looked away and down at my half-filled drink and took another large wallop of whiskey.
“You had a sexual relationship with him.” Wes asked in a way that wasn’t accusing, which I hoped meant it would be okay.
I nodded.
He shrugged and looked out at the setting sun. “But it was just casual, like Gina.”
The mere mention of that bitch’s name made the jealousy flags wave, the green-eyed monster sing, and the two-faced bitch shake hands with the Devil. “Alec was special. He means something to me.” I’d become defensive, not realizing I was showing my hand in a way I hadn’t been ready to deal with.
Wes inclined his head, leaned forward, and rested his elbows on his knees as he steepled his hands together under his chin. “Is that so? Special how?”
Tears pricked at the edges of my eyes. “Alec made me feel beautiful.”
“And I didn’t?” he challenged.
My hackles rose. “You did, but he made me feel like the Mia that everyone didn’t see, the same one I was with you, but not the rest of the world was okay to let out. Forced me to put down the mask and let the world in. I learned a very valuable lesson from Alec.”
“And that was?” His tone was hurt and scared.
“To love myself.”
Wes closed his eyes, inhaled, let out the breath and relaxed. “Mia, you have every reason in the world to love yourself.”
I shook my head. “I didn’t believe it. Not before Alec. Not before his art made me see what everyone else saw. Even though I was broken, was struggling in life, that I’d become an escort because my gambling, drunk father couldn’t hold his shit long enough to take care of his own debts, that I”—I slapped my chest”—“me, Mia Saunders, the waitress from Vegas, deserved more. I deserved happiness. Deserved love.”
“And I don’t give you that?” His voice cracked when he said it.
“You do, only at the time, Alec did too. In a way, he still does.”
Wes’s eyes hardened and then sadness swept across his features. “He loves you.”
I nodded and he closed his eyes. I was quick to respond. “Alec believes that you love the one you’re with for however long you’re with them. That it’s okay to take a piece of each other with you as you carry on throughout your life.”
“Does he want you back?”
And there was the jealousy on my normally laid-back, movie-making, surfer. “No. Not in that way. Alec loves every woman he’s with or he wouldn’t be with her. There are probably hearts all over the globe breaking daily because he’s loving someone new right this very moment.”
“That’s not how I operate. Mia. I’m a one-woman man when I commit, and I’m committing to you. To us. In order for this to work, you have to commit, too.” He cleared his throat. “And we have to get past all this history. Because, honey, that’s what it is. It’s history.”
I thought briefly of Gina, but I didn’t know the timeframe of when he was fucking her and making love to me. I only knew that now he wouldn’t be, and I believed him.
“That’s all the months. So you only slept with one man since we’ve been together?” His gaze was incredulous. He had reason to be so.
Closing my eyes I braced for it. “No. I was with Tai Niko, the male model, in Hawaii.”
“Hawaii? In May?”
“Yeah.”
“Like a one-time thing?” There was so much riding on my response.
My voice shook. “No.” I admitted because if anything, I wasn’t a liar. There was no way I was going to start out my first real relationship in years built on lies.
“Fuck!” he stood and started pacing,
tugging on his hair and cursing. This seemed to be his go-to response.
“You don’t understand. Wes, it was just fun! He’s already with someone else right now. Someone he plans on marrying!” I yelled to get my point across. Wes was too important to not get past this.
Wes shook his head from side to side. His shoulder slumped once more. “Shit. Sweetheart, you’re killing me. You spent a month in paradise loving someone else?”
He used the word paradise to torture me. Playing fair was off the table. “And you spent the last how many months fucking Gina DeLuca, America’s goddamned sweetheart, hot throb, sexiest woman alive and I’m supposed to be okay with that?”
Like a shot from a cannon he backed up several steps and clasped the side-table behind him. “Mia, she means nothing to me!” He clutched at his chest. “Nothing!” he reiterated.
“I find that hard to believe. You’ve been casually fucking her for months.” I gestured with air quotes at the word casually. “You don’t think she believes it’s something more?”
He shook his head. “She doesn’t. I swear.”
“Whatever. Tell yourself that until you believe it. At least I can say that I’ve had my time with Alec and Tai and moved on from it. I’m in a different place. I. Love. You! I’ve never said those words that way to them. I may love them as friends, as people I care about who I know care about me in return, but I’m not in love with them. Monumental difference. I’ve never been in love with them. Can you say the same about Gina? Huh?” My voice was at a screech, and I knew I’d lost it when I stood up and threw my tumbler at the wall. It didn’t even break. No satisfaction what-so-ever. Damn Anton and his love for quality glassware.
I groaned and flopped back down to the couch and cradled my head in my hands. “This is why I never fall in love,” I said the words aloud and repeated them in my head, over and over like a chant.
Without warning, Wes pulled me up and turned around so that my knees hit each side of hips in a straddle.
July (Calendar Girl #7) Page 9