by Alexis Anne
And while it made sense for me—I’d already given my heart away—my brother deserved better. He’d never found love. I wanted that for him. “Push him.”
“Can I push you, too? Because that man down there loves you. Give him a chance.”
I glanced at my watch. “Nope, just checked. Hell still hasn’t frozen over.”
* * *
He was there. Somewhere. Probably standing in the shadows. I had a sixth sense for that man and his intense stare. My skin always tingled warmly and the hair on the back of my neck and my arm always stood on end.
If it were anyone else I’d be completely creeped out that he knew my schedule and made it his business to be there whenever I left my flat, but it was Darcy so it was different.
He was worried.
I knew he was worried. And yet, I still ignored him. It was for the best. We were a great idea when our bodies were moving together, but absolute shit at living life as a couple.
“You haven’t RSVP’d,” Jenni sighed as I closed her office door and sat down across from her. She still helped manage the art gallery but now spent the majority of her time working as an art broker for independent artists like me. I left my flat once a month to meet with her and go over my work.
“I am so flattered you invited me. However, I won’t be able to attend.” I held my breath.
Her face fell. “You can bring Tad as your date. You don’t have to dance or talk to anyone.” Then she bit her lip and looked at me with those big, sweet eyes. “We both really want you there. You’re kind of an important piece of our puzzle.”
After six months of persistent patience, Dominic convinced Jenni to go on a date. Two years of dating later, he got down on one knee in a summer garden lit with twinkle lights. Their wedding was next week.
“I can’t tell you how thrilled I am for you both and I’ve gotten you the perfect wedding gift, but I just can’t attend a wedding. I can’t.”
She sighed. “I know. You can’t be in public.”
I’d never attended another show, never accepted dinner requests with clients—nothing. My entire world was Theo, Tad, Jenni, and Margaret. I only left my flat when absolutely necessary. I’d reached a delicate balance that usually kept me on an even keel but most of the time I was one wrong step away from everything falling apart.
An Italian wedding with two hundred guests was completely outside of my comfort zone. “You and Dominic mean the world to me. Please don’t take my personal problems to mean anything. I’m a crazy woman.”
“You’re not crazy.” Then she smiled. “You wouldn’t be a real artist if you weren’t eccentric, right?”
If agoraphobia was an eccentricity, maybe. And my therapist kept telling me to stop using that term to describe myself since that wasn’t what was at work. I’d dug my heels in and refused to live my life out of stubborness. That was an important distinction between me and someone who was afraid of what the world outside held.
“Perhaps instead of attending your wedding you and the groom can come over to my place for an intimate dinner? Tomorrow night?”
She frowned, tapping her pen on the desk, then sighed. “Fine. Dominic would kill me if he didn’t get to celebrate with you one way or another.”
I didn’t want to tell her that if she refused to come to dinner I probably would have dragged myself to the wedding. I would have hated it and spent the next week in bed with cold sweats of anxiety-laden dreams, but I would have done it.
This was a much better solution. “I’m so happy for the two of you. I watched you fall in love right before my eyes.” And as happy as I was for them, I was also jealous. It had been so easy and pure. Okay, maybe not easy, but definitely natural. Two kindred souls met, became friends, and fell in love. They just fell. Easy peasy.
I would always love Darcy but we would never have that.
She cocked her head to the side and her whole expression softened. “And we watched you. Whatever happened to Darcy?”
And now I was tense again. “It’s complicated.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Everything’s complicated Nicki. I know something big happened because you disappeared for a while and he wasn’t around when you came back. You were sad. And then…” She picked up her pen and started fidgeting.
“And then?”
Her eyes flicked up. “And then he started coming to the gallery without you.”
My eyes flew to the door. “You mean like now?”
Her eyes widened with surprise. “No. I didn’t know he was here.” She blinked toward the door then back to me again. “He comes alone. Once a week. Every Wednesday when we have our cocktail reception hour. He comes in and studies your work.”
My stomach turned. “Just mine?”
She nodded. “Yeah. Just yours. It’s,” she took a deep breath and swallowed. “Honestly, it’s sad. It breaks my heart. He’s like a widow who longs to have his wife back except I know you’re alive and I don’t know what went wrong.”
“I got angry at him,” I whispered. I’d never told anyone what I’d said to Darcy. It was my dirty little secret. I was so ashamed of myself I couldn’t stand it.
“For what?” Jenni asked.
“For being weak when I needed him to be strong.” I shrugged my shoulders. “I said horrible, terrible, mean things to a man who loved me, all because he wasn’t what I wanted him to be when I wanted him to be it. I’m the worst person who ever lived.” I laid my head down on the cool surface of her desk and screwed my eyes shut.
The memories flooded back.
My heart cracked in two every time I remembered the hateful things I’d spewed that night. So much anger and desperation. I’d held it all in for too long with absolutely no idea what to do with it. Darcy was my safe space. And in my infinite stupidity—in my weakness—I’d exploited it. Letting it all pour out like lava out of a volcano, destroying everything in it’s path.
And then, despite everything, he’d come back. I’d heard what he and Tad shouted at each other in my hallway.
“You need to leave, Higgins. She doesn’t want to see you. You’re done.” Tad had said.
Darcy had sputtered, then yelled right at my door. “We aren’t done by a long shot, love. We’ll never be done.”
I could never take back the things I said. They would ring in my ears until the end of time.
“You aren’t the worst person who ever lived,” Jenni said quietly. “He wouldn’t be waiting for you if it were that bad.”
I picked my head up off the desk but didn’t sit up. “It was that bad and I don’t understand why he hasn’t packed up and moved on. The things I said were unforgiveable.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “Obviously you’re wrong. Look, we all say or do things we don’t mean. Maybe, since he loves you, he knows you didn’t mean them. Maybe he’s already forgiven you and you just need to learn how to forgive yourself.”
In that fit of anger I’d seen my capacity for evil. I saw my father at work in the things I thought and felt. It terrified me and I never wanted to see it again. If it came out once then it was inside me and I was more than capable of letting it consume me.
“You can’t glue a glass back together and expect it to hold water,” I murmured, standing up. “See you tomorrow.”
I stumbled out of her office earlier than expected which was how I happened upon Tad and Darcy huddled together. In a matter of moments I took in a rush of information my brain had trouble filtering before my emotions took over. Tad hunched forward listening, Darcy’s jaw ticking, both men with phones out looking at something.
“Traitor,” I hissed, pointing at Tad.
His wide eyes snapped up before he had time to school his features. They were clouded with worry, pinched in a frown from his brow to his lips.
“You’re early,” he murmured, glancing back at Darcy before sliding his phone into his coat pocket.
“It shouldn’t matter if I’m early, late, or invisible. Stay away from him.” I tried to concentrate on Ta
d but I could feel Darcy’s gaze burning a hole in the side of my head. It drew me to him like a tractor beam and no matter how hard I tried to stop it my eyes flitted the few inches to the right and took him in.
Stupid eyeballs. No one and nothing listened to me, it seemed. Not Tad and not even my own anatomy.
I slowly took in a deep breath as a wave crashed over me. It had been months since we’d stood this close to one another and my body responded on all fronts. My heart rate kicked up, my skin warmed to a delicious electric tingle, and my head spun.
Darcy was dressed in a simple blue suit with a light blue shirt and navy tie. He managed to make designer look rough in the right ways: the stubble on his chin, for one, the well-worn hands, for two, and the experienced eyes, for three. He was as handsome as ever, but over the last couple of years he’d developed a new quality I couldn’t quite name yet. It was completely different and entirely sexy, whatever it was.
He was faster and smoother than Tad. He shook off the tension I’d noticed rolling off him only a moment ago and relaxed into a cocky wide-legged stance. “He has a name and he was simply sharing some information.” He even had the audacity to throw in a lopsided grin.
I gritted my teeth. “What information and what are you doing here?”
Those eyes drank me in slowly, one inch at a time. “Checking on you.” He didn’t have the audacity to lie.
“Why?”
He held my gaze, forcing seconds to pass. “To make sure you’re safe.”
I pointed at Tad. “That’s his job, not yours.”
He didn’t move.
“Stop checking on me, Higgins. We’re done. It’s time you moved on.”
He still didn’t move. It was the most infuriating thing.
“Why are you staring at me?”
“You know I’m never going to move on, right? I love you, Nicki.”
“Then I guess you’re going to die a lonely bastard.” I spun on my heel, heading for the glass doors at the front.
“I’ll happily be a lonely bastard if it keeps you safe.”
I stopped and spun back, frustration forcing those words I needed to say onto the tip of my tongue. Maybe today would finally be the day. “What exactly is it that you think you’re keeping me safe from, hmm? Father has disowned me, the Duncan Boys don’t care, Theo is doing a damn fine job of ignoring Dan Christie, and I have Tad. There’s nothing going on here, Darcy.”
Say it. Say the words, damn it. Tell him you don’t love him anymore and mean it.
But the words died on my tongue.
Again.
His jaw ticked. “Your father has never let you go and the Boys watch your flat every single day. Why do you think I sit outside your window, Nik?” He blinked away, almost as if he regretted saying so much, but then he sucked in a breath and thrust out his jaw, locking his eyes on mine. “Your brother has managed to fuck things up more than ever and we have real issues to deal with now.” He stepped forward. So close I could feel the heat from his body. “And Tad is fantastic but he isn’t me.”
The fire in his eyes was…intense. Yeah, I’ll go with intense. Because the only other way to describe it was as a terrified, determined, confidence and I really didn’t want to name that. Because if what he said was true, then that look meant everything I’d been watching and waiting for was finally coming to pass.
“And you can protect me?” I scoffed.
“I know I can. I’ve spent years preparing for this.” Somehow he’d gotten closer with each word until he was towering over me.
“Preparing for what?”
He stood there, breathing hard, touching me with out ever touching me, reminding me just how strongly I was attracted to him. It took every ounce of strength to stop myself from sliding back inside his arms as if no time had passed at all.
As if we hadn’t said things we couldn’t take back.
“I used to be young and stupid,” he murmured. “I honestly thought we could run away together and be happy. I never believed your father could actually take you from me, but he did. He took you and he hurt me. But I learned, Nicki. I learned and I will never let that happen again. You can keep pushing me away if that’s what you need to do, but I will always be here.” And then he turned and stalked off in the opposite direction, turning a corner and disappearing before I could say another word.
I stood there holding my chest, trying to catch my breath. “What the hell was that?”
“He’s just doing his job.” I’d forgotten Tad was there.
“His job is to run nightclubs.”
Tad shook his head, smiling. “A man’s job is to protect the woman he loves. That’s the job he’s doing, Nicki. The same one he’s been doing for years.”
18
“It’s beautiful,” Dominic murmured, his arms tight around Jenni. Then he cleared his throat and sniffed. “Thank you.”
I made Dominic Mangini cry. Holy cow. I made a man who flew around a racetrack at two hundred miles an hour in almost nothing, a man with balls of steel, cry.
And then it got worse. Jenni burst into tears and sobbed against Dominic’s chest. Jenni was emotional and empathetic, but she never cried. Ever.
What had I done?
I stared up at the canvas in wonder. It didn’t look like anything earth shattering to me. I mean, it was good—of course it was good—but it wasn’t like I’d invented a new style or cracked the space-time continuum. It was a painting.
But as I stood there watching these two people I realized I wasn’t very in tune with anything anymore. Not with the world and certainly not with myself. It was as if an invisible hand had reached into the universe and plucked me out, leaving me dangling from the clouds to watch everyone else live their lives.
I felt nothing. Not anymore.
Dominic smoothed the hair back from Jenni’s face and cupped her cheeks, tilting her face up. He gazed down at her with such raw adoration it sent a jolt into my cold, dead heart, lighting it up for the first time ages.
I was jealous.
I wanted that. The connection, the love, the intensity…I wanted someone to look down at me as if I were the answer to his everything, and I wanted it to come without the impending threat of doom behind it.
I swallowed down a lump as they whispered to each other and smiled, then looked away as he dipped down to press his lips to hers in a sweet, soft kiss.
My soul ached and my chest throbbed where my heart was suddenly beating again. Feeling hurt.
I hated it and yet craved it like an addict.
“You can stop pretending the wall is interesting,” Dominic chuckled.
When I looked back I found them smiling at me. “I was just giving you two a moment.”
“I can’t believe you did this,” Jenni murmured, shaking her head.
“Did what?”
She cocked her head to the side and smiled. “You painted the night we met. You captured it,” her voice fell to a whisper. “Because of you we get to keep it forever.”
I fidgeted and bit my lip as I studied the painting, trying to see what they saw. “I just wanted you to have it,” I shrugged. I saw something special that night and knew exactly how to capture it. It wasn’t an obvious painting like hearts and flowers or a man holding a woman. It was a lot more meta than that.
I guess two art lovers would get that more than most.
In the foreground I painted Jenni staring at the painting of Love. She’d been in awe of it that night and confessed to me how it reminded her of the moment she fell in love with her niece. Pure unadulterated love.
But what she hadn’t seen was Dominic and the way he looked at her that night. It was as if in the space of a few moments his world zeroed in on one woman and nothing else existed. Lust, need, and hope written as plain as day across his face.
So in the background I painted Dominic watching Jenni as she took in the painting of Love.
It was nothing special and it was the most special thing that can happen, all wrapped
into one.
“I’m glad you like it.” I did that super awkward thing where I clapped my hands, bounced on my feet, and turned red. Then held my hand out to the dining table. “Let’s eat.”
I ordered my favorite Indian food and set out a feast. Since Dominic and Jenni pretty much had wine with every meal they brought four bottles to pair with the different foods and taught me all the things I’d forgotten about wine—mostly that I’d never learned to appreciate it. I’d done the rebellious kid thing and gone straight past enjoying the capabilities of alcohol to enhance food and straight for the mind-numbing effects of oblivion.
It was fascinating to learn there was a purpose to wine.
Unfortunately, since I only drank once in a blue moon, it went straight to my head.
“I think we should have eased her in slower,” Jenni said with a frown.
I shook my head. “I forgot how much I hate the spins.” And of course the world spun more. I really needed to stop moving.
Dominic set a glass of water in front of me. “Hydrate. The effects will start wearing off soon. You only had two glasses.”
I glared at him as I chugged the first half. “I haven’t been drunk in years.”
He smiled kindly. “Why is it that you don’t drink?”
I shrugged. “I was young and stupid once.”
He patted my shoulder as he moved away, sitting down on the couch beside Jenni. He slid his arm around her shoulder and pulled her against him. She wiggled in closer and tucked her feet up.
They fit together so naturally.
I thought of the way my traitorous body so naturally responded to being near Darcy yesterday and that ache in my chest started to throb again.
“What are you thinking about?” Jenni asked. “Might it be a handsome club owner who stormed out of my gallery yesterday?”
“Maybe.” I studied my glass. “I’m really happy for you two. Please live happily ever after, okay?”
Jenni smiled sadly and Dominic stared at me with laser-focused eyes, dissecting the underlying meaning to our conversation. “I’ve always wondered what happened between you two.”