All except for one man, handsome and tall in a tux and a half-smirk.
I skid to a stop. “What are you doing here?”
Wilson shrugs. “Wanted to have a drink with you.”
“You didn’t text.”
“You didn’t either.” He gestures to the bar, and we place our orders. I want a shot of a tequila and a lemon water. He wants a beer.
In September, I’d returned to New York again, and we’d spent another day and a half in the SoHo hotel. It had been exactly as good as in August, and there was no good reason why I hadn’t reached out to him to see when he might be heading this way, or if I should head that way…but I didn’t.
“I figured you’d worry about that,” I say lamely. It’s not true. I’m scared of how intense this is between us. How he’s all I can think about much of the time, and how I feel when I’m with him—like I’m a completely different person.
One I like a hell of a lot more than the person I am the rest of the time.
But I don’t need to go to therapy to know that’s unhealthy. I can’t hook all of my dreams of my life changing on Wilson. That’s not anywhere near reality. That’s a fantasy I’m way too jaded to let myself indulge in.
The bartender sets my shot in front of me and I take it like the pro I am.
Wilson watches with an amused look on his face as I take a quick suck at the lime wedge that came on the side.
“And worry about it I did.” He winks. “Actually, this is a work trip. I’ll be back in a few weeks, but a case we’ve been working on for a long time has come to a head and that’s why I’m in L.A.”
Oh.
Shit, I’m the worst kind of self-absorbed bitch for thinking he was only here for me.
“But seeing you is the highlight of my entire month,” he says softly after we get our other drinks. He cups his hand around my elbow and leads me into the ballroom again. The way the room is set up, there are tables all over the place, with no assigned seating, and there’s a dance floor at one end. At the other are displays about LAST, and this is where he guides me. He takes our drinks and sets them on a ledge running along the wall as the DJ slows down the music.
He gives me a serious look. “Last time I was out here, I had to watch you dance from the shadows.”
“And tonight?”
He holds out his hand. “Maybe you could join me in the shadows. May I have the honor?”
My heart pounds as I slide my fingers over his.
He folds me against his body, warmth radiating off him as he begins to turn us in a slow, meandering circle. “I can’t stay for long. I have to fly back to D.C. tonight.”
“Okay.” My voice does a shitty job of masking how much I don’t like that.
He presses his cheek to my temple, and I’m grateful for the ridiculous heels bringing me closer to his height. “Next month.”
I nod silently, disappointment sliding through me. This is a warning sign. Danger. Getting too attached. “I like the tux, by the way.”
“It serves a purpose.”
“More than just seeing me?”
He hesitates. “Yes.”
I probably can’t ask what that other mission is. So I change the subject because all I want to care about in this moment is how good it feels to dance with him. “This is nice, though.”
“It is.” He kisses my temple and his arm tightens around my waist.
“Tell me something,” I whisper.
“Like what?”
“Anything. Something surprising.”
He leans back enough to look at me. His eyes are crinkling at the corners, like he knows he’s actually going to surprise me. He does. “I know how to knit.”
I laugh in delighted surprise. “You do not.”
“I do.”
“How?”
“A client taught me.”
“A woman?”
His mouth tightens as he gives me a hard look. “A client.”
“Okay.”
“There’s nobody else.”
“I know.” I hesitate. “The same, you know.”
“I do.”
Obviously, we’d exchanged health reports and the promise was implicit there, but jealousy was on a whole other level.
I take a deep breath. “Knitting. Huh. What else do you know how to do?”
“Everything.” He says it lightly, but there’s a hint of a challenge in the back, faint as can be. I wonder if anyone else has ever noticed that he worries he might not be good enough.
“I have no doubt,” I say softly. “I’m impressed.”
He smirks. “Sure.”
Oh, no. Challenge accepted. I’m going to prove to Mr. Tough Guy that I really am impressed. “Teach me how to knit.”
He shrugs. “Yeah.”
“No, I mean it.”
The music changes, but he doesn’t let me go. “Where are you going to be next month?”
“I’m going home for a few weeks before we start rehearsing for tour.”
He steps back, deftly sweeping up my hand as he moves. He kisses my fingers, then gives me a serious look. “Then I’ll come to you, and I’ll bring some wool.”
—twenty-three—
Wilson
Seattle
November
As soon as I’m able, I take four days off and fly to Seattle. I rent a car at Sea-Tac Airport under an alias, and arrive at her place mid-afternoon. She has a three-car garage, and one of the doors opens as soon as I text her that I’ve arrived.
She opens the inside door and steps into the garage, backlit by the afternoon sun streaming through her house.
I don’t know what to expect here. This is the first time we’ve done anything like this.
It’ll be the first time we’ve done anything—other than shopping and a single dance—outside of a hotel room.
I’ve come prepared for anything.
Knitting lessons.
Kinky sex.
Sparring.
I’m kind of hoping we do all of the above.
But first, a kiss.
I drop my suitcase in front of her and she leaps into my arms. “Missed you,” she whispers as I trace my fingers up her neck and spear them into her hair, holding her in place for my mouth to show her I feel exactly the same way.
She tastes sweet, like berries, and warm, like a turned-on woman.
I definitely came prepared for that, too. I have her shirt off before we’re even inside. Her shorts are left on the floor of the hallway as she leads me, naked, to her bed.
“Nice room,” I growl as I climb on top of her, jerking her thighs up and open for me. She’s wet, slick and hot already, and I sink right into her.
She gasps and throws her head back.
“Nice house, too.”
She giggles. “You didn’t even see it.”
“Okay, nice bed.”
“Nicer with you in it,” she whispers, tugging my weight down onto her. “Kiss me.”
I slide my tongue along hers, curling and thrusting in time with my cock inside her cunt, and we come together in a fast, hurried climax.
When I roll to the side, I hold on to her, and pull her on top of me.
She exhales roughly and puts her cheek down on my chest.
“So…”
I can feel her smiling in reaction. “Yeah?”
“How was your week?”
“Busy.” She yawns. “Rehearsals are going well, though. So that’s good. And I went grocery shopping this morning so I’ve got food for us.”
“Such luxury.”
“I ate half of the strawberries, though.”
“I tasted them,” I say with a quiet laugh. “Were they good?”
“Amazing.” She kisses my chest. “Almost as good as that delicious fuck, Mr. Carter. Shall we do it again?”
My cock leaps to life beneath her, and I set my hands on her hips, urging her back. She’s sloppy from my first load, and fuck, but that’s hot in a filthy way.
She squirms a
gainst my erection. “You like me on top?”
“Fucking right. I want to watch you writhe for me.”
“I should show you the rest of my place…”
I thrust into her. Yes, being on the bottom is my favorite position. “All in good time.”
~
The next thing I see is her bathroom, which is magnificent.
“This shower holds what, like ten people?”
She blushes, and I pin her against the tile wall.
“Really?”
She rolls her eyes. “You know how we are. Hedonistic Hollywood types. And it was tight at six.”
I laugh and kiss a water droplet off her lower lip. “I bet.”
“It was a few years ago. When I bought the place. Housewarming party got kind of out of control. I don’t usually…here.”
“It’s fine,” I whisper, and the kiss gets deeper.
The sun is setting when we finally make it to the kitchen. The west-facing side of her house is almost entirely windows, letting in a stunning view of Puget Sound, and an island in the near distance.
She’s made up some plates of finger foods, mostly fruits and vegetables, but some meat and dips and crackers, too. We carry them outside, where she has a fancy heater for the deck, and a box of blankets.
I pull her into my lap and we lazily eat while we talk and watch the sun drop out of sight on the horizon.
“This feels like we’re playing house,” I muse as we tidy up in the kitchen.
She shoots me a weird look. “Is that a bad thing?”
I frown. “No.” Did I make it sound like it was?
“Is it a good thing?” She laughs. “Want me to get a 1950’s style dress and cook you a meatloaf?”
“Forget I said anything.”
“But you did. Why?”
“Because it’s different than what we’ve done before, that’s why. Leave it alone.”
“Or what, you’ll spank me for questioning the master of the house?”
I raise my eyebrows at her. “That’s an interesting direction to take it.”
She rinses her hands, then slowly dries them on a towel hanging on her stove. “Come on. Let’s go to bed and watch a late-night comedy show.”
“How domestic.” I swat her bottom, and we do just that, but the exchange continues to sting at the back of my mind.
The next morning we make waffles, then workout together in her home gym. I teach her how to take me down to the mat, and she teaches me how to sing and run on a treadmill at the same time.
After lunch we’re being kind of nappy together on the couch when her phone vibrates, and I grab it off the coffee table and hand it to her. “Someone who doesn’t know how to make your phone magically ring wants your attention,” I whisper against her neck.
She giggles and takes it, but she kisses me first before looking at the message. A good, dirty kiss that gets me halfway hard.
But after she reads the message, she scrambles off me and starts to pace as she types a fast response. The scowl on her face deepens.
“What is it?” I stand, too, worry mounting.
She gives me a helpless look. “You have to leave for part of the day tomorrow. Grant’s flying in with contracts.”
It’s the last thing I expect to hear. “Excuse me?”
“I didn’t know he was coming. He just told me.”
“How long will that take?”
“He’ll stretch it out. It might take most of the afternoon.” She has the good grace to wince, but I don’t like this.
I really don’t like this. “I’m only here for two more days.”
“I can’t tell him that.”
“Yeah.” But I don’t sound like I understand, because I don’t.
Fuck it all to hell.
She follows me into the kitchen.
I ignore her as I pour a glass of water.
“I couldn’t tell him no,” she whispers, and I nod.
“Yeah, I heard you the first time.”
“You knew this was the deal.”
Reality has slammed back into me. We might be playing at domestic fun, but I’ll always be a dirty secret. “Right.”
“Wilson…”
I shake my head. “I get it. But I don’t have to like it. I’ll go out, it’ll be fine.”
But it isn’t fine, and when she takes my hand and tugs me back into the living room to watch a movie, I pull her into my lap. I hold on tight, so fucking tight, and it doesn’t make a difference.
I’ve fallen hard, stupid hard, for someone who can’t belong to me.
She fucking belongs to me, but she doesn’t at the same time, and I lost sight of that along the way.
The responsible, mature thing to do would be to get over it.
Instead, I stew all night.
When we fuck, it’s hard and rough. I hold her down and she pushes against me, her eyes on fire. I slam the first spurt of my seed deep inside her, hot and scalding, then pull out and mark her with the rest.
A white rope of come across her belly. Mine.
Another shot across the swell of her tits. Mine.
The last one catches her chin and drips onto her neck. My fucking woman.
She rubs it all in, every last drop, but then climbs out of bed and walks silently into the shower.
I don’t join her.
It’s dawn when I admit I’m not going to sleep.
I roll out of bed and sit, legs wide, head in my hands.
I feel her stir behind me and I don’t turn around until she says my name.
“Wilson…”
I glare at her. “Is this all you want from me?”
“I can’t…” She stiffens, then lifts her chin and looks me right in the eye. “Yes. This is all I want. This is what works for me. And this was the deal. I don’t want any more than this.”
It’s a damn lie. And we both know that this isn’t the end of anything, that I’ll be back for her sooner than later. But right now? I don’t want to see her face a single second more. “Then you don’t get me.”
I’m shaking as I do the one thing I swore I’d never do, and walk away from her.
—twenty-four—
Tabitha
Seattle
December
Christmas Day
I don’t hear from him for a month.
The silence is deafening, and deep inside, I can feel myself unspooling because of it.
Turns out there’s something worse than love. I can’t even name it, exactly, but what Wilson has unlocked by dragging me back to that buried pain has made me reckless.
Now I’m reminded constantly of that fleeting awakening when I finally, desperately knew what it was to love another person, only to have him snatched from me. Too small, too new, too fragile for this world.
Not Wilson, though. Nothing about him is small or fragile. But I lost him anyway, by the bonds of my own making.
I lost him, but…
I know he’s watching. I have no doubt he’s bugged my house top to bottom, and when I get back from Los Angeles, I hole up on the couch. In a weird way, that makes me feel a little closer to him, but I know I’m just deluding myself.
He’ll keep an eye on me because he’s noble, a dark knight, but I’ve wounded him.
And the worst part is, it’s for the best. I’m about to go on tour. Grant will be there constantly and I wouldn’t be able to easily hide a rendezvous.
We weren’t going to last forever, I keep telling myself.
It feels wrong. It makes me sick to the pit of my stomach no matter how often I repeat it.
I punish myself on the treadmill and in my home gym. I do sit-ups until my stomach seizes up in protest. I run for miles, long past the point of my legs burning. I don’t care.
When Grant comes by on his way to his parents’, he tells me I look better than I have in ages. I want to punch him in the face.
“It’ll be good to be fit for tour,” I finally manage.
He doesn’t ask me if I
want to join them for Christmas dinner. I know I’m not welcome there, not that I’d accept the invitation anyway.
I’m not the little slut that ruined their son’s life.
Exactly the opposite, not that I’d ever try to win that fight. They’d never hear it. People like them are too closed-minded to hear anything other than what they’ve already decided for themselves.
Well, fuck them. They can say a prayer for me to go to Hell when they go to Mass tonight. Joke’s on them. I know God doesn’t listen to bullshit like that.
Not when he’s got my son by his side, whispering the truth.
When he leaves, I slam the door a little too hard behind him, and something inside me snaps.
I sag against it, my oversized Acacia wood door in my sprawling, beach-view mansion that will never have crayon on the walls or a plastic play kitchen in the real kitchen.
Maybe that’s why I don’t fucking use it.
An ugly, gross sob wells up in my chest, and I fight it hard.
No, I tell myself. Fuck off with that sadness. It’s been a long year. A long decade. And I’ve done my share of grieving, but this feels different.
This feels like it might actually break me if I let it out.
I can’t break now. I gave up Wilson. I gave up the only goodness I’d allowed myself, to keep everything tight and controlled.
The sob didn’t care. It ripped out of me, coming out a wounded howl, and I crumpled to floor as another followed. I relived every moment in the hospital, from waking up in Emergency to being transferred to Labour & Delivery.
They shouldn’t call it that when your baby is dead.
They shouldn’t let you go there when you killed your baby, even if you’re a baby yourself.
There are some things that are unforgivable, for which they should just send you straight to the morgue.
Familiar guilt swirls over me like a fog. I can hear myself sobbing, but it’s in the distance. There’s ringing, too, but I ignore it. I give in to the fog until it swamps me fully, until I’m limp and lifeless on the cold tile of the entranceway.
Dirty Love (Forbidden Bodyguards #3) Page 10