by Dani Collins
But his being here, asking the question, affected her. She’d been relieved when things had cycled along as normal. Of course she’d been relieved. Yet a small part of her had suffered a wistful moment. A baby would have been a disaster, but it would have been family. Real family. The kind she could love.
Holding out a hand, she said, “Can you just give me my mother’s necklace?”
“There’s definitely no baby.”
“Definitely.”
He absorbed that with barely a twitch of his stoic expression before he jerked his head and held the door for her.
Dear Lord, he was handsome with those long, clean-shaven cheeks set off by his turned up collar, his mouth pursed in dismay, his short thick hair tossing in the bluster of wind that grabbed at them.
The fierce breeze yanked her bound hair and shot up her skirt to bite at her skin. She clenched her teeth and beelined for the limo at the curb.
He opened the back door himself. “What’s the address of where you’re going?”
“Don’t do me any favors, Roman. I’ll just take the necklace and go.”
“You’re refusing my help out of spite?”
“I’m protecting what’s left of my self-respect.” Her knees knocked as the blustering cold penetrated mercilessly. Teeth chattering, she held out her hand. “Pearls?”
“They’re right there. Get in. I have more to say.”
“To quote you, I don’t care.”
With an air of arrogant patience, he closed another button on his coat and set his back to the wind, adopting a stance of willingness to wait for the spring thaw.
“You won’t just hand them to me. You’re determined to make me miss my job interview. Look around. Getting me fired did nothing to my father,” she charged.
“I know that I misjudged you,” he snapped back. “But your father and brother are on the attack against me. That’s not up for dispute. It’s reality. And it’s not common knowledge that you’ve lived apart from them all these years. Given the way things looked in the funeral photos, it was an easy mistake to make.”
“I know,” she said with the same impatience. She could understand and almost forgive that part. She had plenty of unexpressed anger of her own toward her father and brother. “And I have no problem believing they stole from you.”
His brows went up a smidgen. “Not many would take my word for it.”
“Anton isn’t capable of writing his own email, let alone launching a high-tech start-up. I’ve always wondered how he managed it.” She smiled bitterly. “And I have a lot of experience with how low they can sink.”
His gaze sharpened and she dropped her own, shielding herself, unprepared to let him delve into all the anguish and fury roiling inside her.
“So get in.”
“No.”
“For God’s sake, why not?”
“Because I don’t trust you!”
His head went back and his expression grew carved and stoic. “I’m not going to touch you. I didn’t mean to sleep with you that day.”
“Oh, that’s funny,” she choked, trying to end that topic before it went any further. She was mortified he’d brought it up.
“It’s the truth,” he shot back, his energy like a living thing that whipped and raced on the tail of the wind, lashing her with its force. He was tense. Very tense as he confronted her, as if he was willing her to believe him. It was weirdly fascinating.
She tore her gaze away, not wanting to get caught up in trying to decipher the truth from his lies. Not wanting to hear excuses and let down her guard. He’d already gotten past her defenses too easily, setting her back so she was as naked and defenseless as she’d been that day. It wasn’t him she mistrusted, but herself.
She ought to be able to shut him out the way she had with her father and Anton. Roman meant nothing to her. Less than nothing. As bitter as she was toward her father and half brother, she went days, weeks even, without thinking of them, but no such luck with Roman. He was top of her mind every day, ambushing her with memories of kisses and caresses and wrenching pleasure.
She swallowed, not wanting the recollections to surface now.
Her blood warmed anyway. Her senses heightened, making her aware of his scent, masculine and sharp, beneath the sweet smell of rain and the comforting notes of damp wool. Clothing didn’t make a man, but everything about his appearance amplified his stark masculinity. His cheekbones were proud and chiseled, his nose a blade, his lips twitching almost into a closed-mouth kiss as he prepared to speak.
“I slept with you in spite of who you are, not because of it,” he said in a growl.
“Had a staggering crash in your standards, did you?” Insult blindsided her as she absorbed that he was saying she’d been willing and he had merely taken advantage. Any man would. “At least when I thought you seduced me for revenge, it was personal. I honestly thought I couldn’t feel worse about that day. Thanks, Roman. You’re a real guy.”
“And you’re twisting me into a far more vicious bastard than I am.”
She stared at him, astonished. “You made hatred to me.” The words swelled in her throat. She clenched her jaw, trying to hold back convulsive shivers, trying to hold on to control and not allow emotion to rise up and sting her eyes. “At least I had some respect for you that afternoon, before you started ruining my life.”
“Would you get in the damned car?”
She realized people were walking by, staring. Overhearing.
She was freezing, and warm air radiated from the interior. With a sob of annoyed misery, she threw herself into the backseat.
He followed and slammed the door, adjusting the vents so hot gushes of air poured directly onto her.
She didn’t thank him, even though her legs were stinging and her fingers were numb. She attacked the box with her name on it, spilling her mother’s necklace into her lap. Picking it up, she pressed the treasured beads to her lips.
“I only meant to do to you what they did to me, which was cut short your career and leave you with bills to pay,” Roman said.
She dropped her hands. “But you accidentally slept with me, even though you hated me,” she charged, going hot again. Bristling with temper.
“Yes,” he asserted, as if that proved some kind of point beyond the fact he was a conscienceless womanizer.
“To humiliate me,” she confirmed in a jagged voice, looking over at him in time to see guilt flash across his expression before he controlled it.
“I thought you were throwing yourself at me for their purposes. It looked as if you were trying to trick me into letting you stay in my house. I let you come on to me so I could turn you down,” he admitted.
“But you went through with it,” she said, returning to that deep sense of bitterness that had burned through her with every step of her journey back to the hotel that day, as she’d absorbed that what had looked like a white knight had actually been the same blackened soul that the men in her family possessed. “How do people like you sleep at night? That’s what I want to know.”
“Do not lump me in with them, Melodie,” he fired back, temper riled enough to darken his expression and press her into her seat. “Do you see them chasing you down the East Coast to ask about consequences? I am not just like them.” His jaw worked. “I’ll be the first to admit I’m not a good man, definitely not a great one, but I’m not as immoral as they are.”
The way she’d set him on the same reprehensible shelf as the Gautier men ate at him. She could see it. That should have been more satisfying, but it just made her feel small.
“Sleeping with you just happened,” he muttered.
“Because I threw myself at you,” she provided, feeling the sting press forward from the backs of her eyes to blur her vision. “Because you couldn’t resist me.” Spider arms. Freak.
She narrowed her eyes, turning her face away as she willed Anton’s voice to silence and willed her tears to dry before they squeezed past her lashes and fell.
“Yes.”
She hated Roman in that moment. Really hated him. Because he sounded so begrudging as he said it. Not smooth and charming and manipulative. Resentful. He sounded as confounded by his reaction as she was by hers. That made him sound truthful even though she was convinced he had to be lying.
“I know I’m not beautiful. At best, I’m striking,” she said, straining to keep emotion from her voice. “I’m certainly not the type who inspires lust, so give it a rest. You wanted to hurt me. Which you did.”
“I’m not here to hurt you again,” he ground out, flinching as though she’d slapped him. “I can’t take back what I did. If I could...” he began tightly, emotions so compressed she couldn’t read anything in his tone but intensity.
He would take it back? Her heart clenched in a surprisingly strong contraction of agony.
Of course she would take it back, too, she assured herself, even as their heights of pleasure danced through her consciousness, reminded her how rare and singular the experience had been. He’d ruined her for accepting anything less, if he wanted the truth, which left her feeling bleak and hopeless.
“You told me that day that you were attracted to me,” he said.
“Don’t throw that in my face,” she cried, recoiling from being mocked.
“I was attracted, too. More than I knew how to handle. That’s why I slept with you. Not out of revenge. Not to humiliate you.”
She swallowed, wavering toward believing him, but it strained credulity. “It wasn’t love at first sight, Roman. I saw the way you looked at me the day I arrived. You weren’t interested.”
“I didn’t let my interest show. There’s a difference.”
She had to turn her nose to the window then, hope rising too quickly. Did she have no sense of self-preservation? Believing in him had only gotten her a giant helping of heartache the last time.
But he was very contained, not giving away much, very good at keeping his thoughts and feelings well hidden. Maybe he had been attracted.
Even if he had been, so what?
With a troubled sigh, she realized she was crushing the pearls in her clenched hands. Her fingers were warm enough to work now. She reached to close the strand around her throat.
Wool slid against leather and Roman was in her space, fingers brushing hers.
With an alarm that came more from a jolt of excitement than fear, she released the pearls and let him take over, angling herself so he could finish quickly. Her skin tightened all over her body as his knuckles brushed the tiny, upswept hairs at the back of her head. Beneath her layers of clothing her nipples tightened into sharp peaks and her blood grew hot, radiating heat outward to dispel any lingering chill for the rest of time.
The moment he was done she shifted away from his disturbing touch, adjusting the weight of the necklace so it felt right, and flashed a nervous glance his way.
He was watching her intently. “I felt it, too. There’s something in our chemistry.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she dismissed with an unsettled shake of her head. If the traffic hadn’t been so busy, she would have pushed out her side of the car. “I need to get to my job interview. Let me out.”
“Don’t start lying to me now, Melodie. Not when we’re clearing the air.” He didn’t move.
Her heart began to pound with a trapped bird sort of panic. “Look,” she said, tugging the hem of her skirt down her knee. Electricity seemed to crackle between them like fingers of lightning. “I know I gave you the impression I’m easy. I’m not. So don’t start with your moves.”
“Moves,” he repeated on a dry chuckle. “Like how I seduced you that day? You kissed me.”
“Don’t remind me!” she cried.
“I will remind you,” he said, leaning into her. “And I’ll even be honest enough to admit I lied to you that day. I said it’s always like that for me, but who has an encounter like that ever in their lifetime?”
Melodie shot her gaze to his. He was so close and disturbing. His brow was pulled into a perturbed line, his skin taut with challenge and something else. Discomfort, maybe, with how much he was admitting.
Between one breath and the next the shared memory of their wild coming together filled the tiny space behind these tinted windows.
She couldn’t look away from his rain-forest eyes. He pinned her in place with nothing but a tiny shift of his attention to her mouth.
Her heart began to race and her blood felt as though it zigzagged in her veins. Her breasts flooded with heat, growing heavy and achy, the tips tight with reaction.
Desire clouded his irises.
A fog of longing smothered her consciousness, making sensible thought slippery and vague. She found herself looking at his mouth. In her dreams those lips plundered hers. She always woke with one question uppermost in her mind: Had it really been that good?
His lips parted as he came closer.
She opened with instinctive welcome.
They made contact and intense relief washed through her as a great thirst was finally slaked. His hand came to the side of her face, open and tender. She tilted into his touch, feeling moved and cherished as he cradled her head and gently but thoroughly devoured her.
She drew on him with greedy abandon, forgetting everything except that he filled a vast need in her. There were no words, just a craving that both ceased and grew as they locked mouths and touched tongues. His body closed in, pressed. He overwhelmed her as he wrapped his arms fully around her.
She moaned, pleasure blooming in her like a supernova. She instantly ached for more intimate contact with him.
His arms tightened, gathering her to draw her with him as he sat back, pulling her into his lap.
The shift was enough of a jolt to make her pull back and realize where they were, how her knees had fallen on either side of his thighs, skirt riding up. She was losing all contact with reality. Again.
Then what?
“This can’t happen,” she gasped.
She pushed off him, throwing herself awkwardly onto the seat opposite and glaring back at him. She felt like a mouse that might have freed herself from the cat’s mouth, but only until he wanted to clamp down on her again.
“Not here, no. Come to my hotel with me,” he said, voice sandpapery and exquisitely inviting.
“For what?” she cried.
“Don’t be dense,” he growled. “We’re an incredible combination. You can feel the power of it as well as I can.”
“You’ve really perfected this technique of yours, haven’t you?” she choked. “Listen, you might sleep with people you loathe, but I don’t. I won’t sleep with a man I hate.”
He snapped his head back.
Her conscience prickled. She didn’t hate him. There was too much empathy and understanding in her for such a heartless emotion.
“Well, that’s that. Isn’t it?” He thrust himself from the car, holding the door open for her.
Icy wind flew in to accost her, scraping her legs and stabbing through her clothes as she rose from the cozy interior to the ferocity of winter, entire body shaking, heart fragile.
“Goodbye, Roman,” she said, feeling as if she was losing something as precious as her mother’s pearls.
“Melodie.”
Not goodbye, she noted, but his tone still sounded final and made her unutterably sad. Clutching the edges of her jacket closed, she walked to the bus stop on heavy feet.
CHAPTER SIX
ROMAN WENT BACK to his house in France where he could live in his own personal exile and ruminate, but despite only being here once, Melodie infused the place.
He never should have gone after her. If it hadn’t been for the possibility of a baby, he wouldn’t have, but there was no way he could have let a child of his grow up the way he had—not just poor and alone, but with a million questions and a million facets of rejection glittering into the furthest corners of its psyche. The one time he’d asked his mother about his father, she’d said, “He was a rich man who said he loved me, but I guess he didn’t because he didn’t come back.”
He was a rich man, one who was very careful not to use those words and provoke false hope. He’d always hated his father for being a liar while secretly fearing he was just like the man: incapable of real love. He wasn’t particularly likable. He knew that. Foster care had taught him to hold back, be cautious, not expect that he was anything but a burden to be tolerated. He came in too late with any sign of caring, long after he’d been written off as stunted. This was why he didn’t pursue serious relationships with women or even have close friendships.
But he didn’t usually provoke people to hatred. It maddened him that Melodie felt that way. He shouldn’t have kissed her, he knew that, but the attraction between them had still been there. She’d responded to his touch.
Yet she reviled him too much to let things progress.
While he could think of nothing but touching her again. Grazing the warmth of her neck with his fingertips had been the height of eroticism. Kissing her again had inflamed him.
The fact that she was driving him insane, mentally and physically, told him it was time to cut ties altogether. It was time to forget her and move on with his life.
* * *
Melodie had always read her horoscope, trusted in karma and hoped fate really did have a plan for her. For the sake of her sanity she clung to the belief that good things happened to good people if they stuck in there long enough. The Gautier men were masters of cynicism, but she was different. And she wouldn’t crumble under the weight of the dark side like her mother had, taking the first path out of life that was offered. She would fight and prevail.
Then Roman Killian had happened.