by Nan Comargue
Alexa read it over several times on the way to the restaurant.
“Pressing business?” Nik asked, his tone devoid of sarcasm. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t there.
“It’s just David,” she told him, immediately regretting the ‘just’. Why couldn’t she have said ‘David’? Or, better yet, ‘my boyfriend’?
“How about you pay attention to your date for the night?”
“Stop calling it a date!”
He smiled. “That’s better. Your anger, I can take. Hell, I miss it when you’re not around. But indifference? That drives me crazy.”
Was he trying to say that he had missed her? He had a strange way of showing it.
“You’re crazy,” said Alexa. “I have no idea what you thought you could accomplish by insisting on going through with this dinner but I’m only doing it to please your mother.”
That effectively silenced him. Good. Did he think she was trying to please him? Those days were long gone. It was only her silly stupid heart that wanted to read too much into everything he did and said. He was no doubt here tonight for the same reason she was, to build tentative bridges and to please Val. The bridges would only have to hold up for a few days.
Although most people’s Christmas celebrations were over, the restaurant was still festooned in red and gold. The interior sparkled with hundreds of twinkly lights and several tables were pushed together for large parties.
“Late holiday parties,” the host guiding them through the room confided. “You won’t believe how many we get every year. People think they can leave the planning for the last minute and, well, this is what you get. Christmas in January.”
“We’re used to it,” Nik said with a smile.
The merrymakers didn’t seem to be suffering from the delay as cheers and toasts went up with regularity. Alexa had a difficult time concentrating on the menu offerings, not that there was much variety.
“Pasta, pasta, pasta,” she read out. “I didn’t realize this was an Italian restaurant.”
“Mediterranean,” Nik corrected her. “Try the Cypriot lamb.”
She ordered the eggplant.
“Alexa—”
She swirled the harsh Greek wine she was drinking. The waitress had warned her that it was an acquired taste and she was swiftly acquiring it. It was bitter and raw, like her heart. “Don’t.”
Though his mouth tilted upward, Nik’s eyes were wary. “Don’t what? Don’t say your name?”
Not like that. Not like he cared about her. It only confused her more. “Don’t say my name,” she said. “Don’t start some terrible conversation that we can’t stop.”
“And you knew that I was going to do that from that one word?”
“Yes.” She lifted her eyes to his face. “And from the way you spoke my name. You never say ‘Alexa’ unless you want to be serious—or cruel.”
His eyes were softly lit. “I’m not trying to be cruel.”
“Not anymore,” she reminded him. Not at that moment, but he could be. And he would be again. Because that was his pattern. Warm and loving, then cold and hateful. She hardly knew which mood was worse.
Her heart was pounding in anticipation. Warm or cold? Love me or love me not?
He loved her not. She knew that already. Stupid, hopeful heart.
She stared down at the table, at their hands spread out against the plain white tablecloth. His, big and strong and pale. Hers, olive-skinned, smaller—weaker.
She’d always been weak. Needy. Desperate for her father’s love and approval, but that went to Nik. Desperate for love, but Val’s affection naturally went to her son first.
A year ago, she’d thought Nik’s love would heal the old hurts. But he’d only added to the scars, slicing her open when she’d least expected it. Pulling away from her so suddenly and inexplicably, almost as if he’d been hurt—
No, Nik wasn’t hurt. He’d been cool and distant in New York, then ardent and interested. She’d mistaken lust for love. He hadn’t really cared. Alexa blinked rapidly. She would get through this visit. She always did. She just had to make herself harder too.
“I thought it would be perfect.” Nik’s voice was quiet, musing, as if he was talking to himself.
She looked up from beneath her eyelashes, but he was staring at a spot over her shoulder. She resisted the urge to turn and see what he was seeing because she already knew that there was nothing there.
“I’d loved you for so long that when it finally happened, I thought it would be the end of things. The end of our arguments. The end of our distrust.” His gaze shifted and suddenly he gazed straight into her eyes. “But that wasn’t the way it happened, was it? Those old resentments and suspicions? Those didn’t just melt away. They needed to be dug through and peeled back. We didn’t do that, did we? We tried to take a shortcut.”
Alexa didn’t know what to say. She wanted to speak, to respond in kind, but the memories of the pain she’d gone through since the last time they’d seen each other kept her silent.
He’d hurt her so badly.
He reached out to touch the back of her hand then withdrew as if in fear that she would do so first. “I want a second chance, Lexy.”
A second chance. Had they really gotten a first one?
Every instinct told her to say yes. To agree to open up her heart again and lay it bare for him to use and abuse as he saw fit. But where would that get her in a month’s time? In a year? Back here. Back hurting and trying to hide the pain.
She thought of David—comfortable and kind and stable. Unexciting, yes, but she knew that he wouldn’t hurt her. Not in this way. She didn’t love him enough for him to do that.
“Last year, when I came to New York, you pushed me away,” she reminded him, not even aware that those were the words she needed to say until they’d left her lips. “Why?”
This time when he picked her hand up, he held onto it. Lightly, as if it were precious to him.
“I was still angry,” he said. “Not at first, of course. At first, I was nervous and excited to see you. I was building up the nerve to come to Chicago and, well, I hadn’t gotten there yet. I was still scared to see you after the way I acted here.”
“You didn’t seem scared or excited,” she said. “You seemed irritated. You were so cold.”
“I was seething inside.” He shook his head. “I can’t explain it. When I saw you standing in my office, looking so impossibly remote, it was like my worst nightmare. I knew I had pushed you away. I just wanted you to be—I don’t know—more shattered. It drove me crazy that you were so cool and distant.”
This time Alexa did pull her hand away but gently, easing it out from his grasp. And he let her go.
“I was shattered,” she told him. “You won’t believe what it took for me to go out there to see you.”
His eyes glittered. “Baby—”
“No,” she said, denying him the right to interrupt. “I did it. I took the first step. I swallowed my pride and my anger—all those things you thought you were the only one suffering from—and I went to you. And you left me waiting in a hotel room. If you thought you deserved a second chance, that was it.”
Saying those words, it was as if her chest could suddenly take in more air. The tightness eased a little.
She wouldn’t have to put her heart on the line. She would play it safe, just like he did. Her brave, forthright Nik. What a coward he really was.
“I realized that afterward,” he said. “What a chance you’d taken after the way I’d treated you. I’ve regretted it for months.”
Alexa let her lips curve into a thin smile. “But not enough to do or say anything about it.”
He looked away. Unwillingly, her heart went out to him. Wasn’t this exactly how he’d treated her when she’d gone to him first? With coolness and disdain, as if protecting her heart was more important than filling it.
“Why do you think my mother goes to all the trouble to put on an orthodox Christmas every year?”
Alexa frowned at the sudden shift in topic. “It’s part of your tradition.”
“A tradition we barely bothered to pay lip service to during my childhood.”
It was true. They’d celebrated Christmas in January, yes, but they’d also celebrated in December when their friends and neighbors did. When they were younger, Val hadn’t seen the need to cook special dishes or otherwise go to much trouble.
“Then why?” Alexa left the question hanging.
“Because of you.”
“Me?”
“It was an excuse to get you back here every year.”
“Every—” She shut her eyes. Of course it was another secret. Of course. “Why can’t either of you ever be honest about anything?”
“That’s not fair,” Nik protested. “I wanted to tell you the truth about my father a long time ago. It was never your father’s preference. After he was gone, it took a lot of convincing to get my mother on my side. She thought she was betraying him.”
Alexa shook her head. “I still don’t know why you even wanted to tell me the truth.” Bitterness rose to her throat, threatening to choke her, but it had nothing to do with the wine this time. “Why couldn’t you have just left things as they were?”
“And have you hate me for the rest of our lives?” he demanded. “I couldn’t live with that.”
His voice was ragged. The pain in it tore at her but she tried to push down the surge of sympathy that threatened to overwhelm her. She’d reached out to him once before and been rejected, not the other way around.
Alexa smirked. “Because what we have now is so much better. Now I hate you for much more valid reasons.” It was perversely satisfying to watch him flinch, yet his hurt scored at her too. How unfair was that?
“Don’t hate me, Lexy.”
She picked up her glass. “I thought you preferred hatred to indifference. Or was that another lie?”
“I never lied to you!”
His raised voice caused several heads to turn.
Without acknowledging the stares, Alexa swirled the dark red liquid around in her glass. His anger gave her hope. Nik—no matter what else he was—was very slow to get angry. When he did, it was a sure sign of how deeply the subject touched him.
“No? What would you call it then?”
“It was never my secret to keep or to share,” Nik said.
“I wasn’t talking about that,” she said. His brow creased. “I was talking about last year in New York. You lied to me. You made me think that you didn’t love me.”
The room seemed to go quiet but really nothing changed except inside of her. Her ears blocked out every sound but that of her own breathing and the quick pounding of her heart. Everything else was superfluous.
“You’re wrong,” Nik said, his voice suddenly husky.
Her heart stopped as well.
“I never lied about that,” he told her. “Not to you and not to myself. I’ve loved you since I can remember. You were always the most important person in my life—always.”
There was no mistaking the naked honesty of his words. How could she ever have doubted him? The fact that she had probably said more about her than it did about him.
“Nik—” She didn’t know what to say. He’d said it all, better than her even in this. Braver than she was, certainly. Pride and hurt had made her resist making herself vulnerable yet again.
By choosing David, a man she knew she would only ever love in a modest—and therefore safe—way, she’d tried to shield her heart from being hurt again. But in robbing them of a deeper connection, she’d hurt both of them, even though David didn’t realize it yet.
“How do I prove it to you?” Nik asked. “Do you want me on my knees?”
Alexa dropped her eyelids to hide the sudden emotion that overcame her. “Yes,” she said, “but not begging for forgiveness or trying to prove something.”
Nik’s jaw firmed. What had Jeanne said about him being all laid back on the surface and intense underneath? It was true. He was molten lava beneath the devil-may-care casual air he carried around. Dangerous, but also beautiful and scorching hot.
“I’m not begging for forgiveness,” he told her. “You made me wait for years.”
It was Alexa’s turn to raise her voice. “I thought you were my brother!”
He grinned wickedly. “That’s no excuse.”
“Sure, and Hell is lovely this time of year.” But she couldn’t help smiling back at him. “Besides, once I found out, I made you wait, what? An hour?”
“A few hours,” Nik corrected. “Those were endless hours, too.”
Alexa shook her head. “Idiot.”
His stare caught and held her eyes. “We need to get out of here.”
Somehow her head shake became a nod. “Yes.”
Chapter Eight
The waitress didn’t want to let them go. She kept asking them questions when Nik asked for the bill early. Was anything wrong? Was it the wine? Could she bring them a different wine?
“Nothing’s wrong,” Nik said, his teeth gritted to hold onto his smile while Alexa ducked her head to hide hers. “We just need to be somewhere.”
The questions continued. Did they want her to box up the food? It wouldn’t be as nice reheated but it was good food. Maybe they wanted a glass of ouzo before they left?
Nik started throwing bills onto the table as Alexa blinked away the tears welling up from her suppressed laughter.
The owner came out and went over the same track. What was wrong? What could he do?
“It’s an emergency,” Nik finally said, emptying his wallet onto the table and burying the modest bill beneath the shower of money. “We need to leave right now. Our baby is sick.”
That stopped the hand wringing and dried up the questions. They were briskly ushered out of the restaurant. Before they managed to escape, however, the owner thrust most of the money back into Nik’s hands and a huge plastic bag of aluminum containers into Alexa’s. Then he shooed them away dramatically.
Alexa was shaking with laughter by the time Nik pulled out of the parking lot.
“That was priceless,” she said between gasps. “Those must be the most incredibly over-the-top hospitable people I’ve ever met. I swear he even gave us extra food.”
“The waitress didn’t take a tip,” Nik added. “We’ll have to go back another time.”
“Every week,” Alexa promised, “at least. And tip extravagantly, just to make it up to them.”
Nik turned to look at her. “Are you trying to make me pull off on the side of the road?”
The thrill of making him react like that was almost enough for her—almost.
“Try it,” she urged him.
“Tease.” But he did put his foot down on the accelerator.
After a few minutes, Alexa realized that they weren’t speeding back to the house.
“Where are we going?”
“I’ve had enough sex in cars and in your old bedroom,” Nik said. “I want to have you in my own bed.”
Alexa was silent for a moment.
“You didn’t think I lived in my mother’s house still, did you?”
She hadn’t thought about it at all. “I thought you lived in New York, near your office.”
“I have an apartment there,” he said. “I also have a house in LA.”
A house in LA could be anything from a Hollywood Hills mansion to a place in Bell, a working-class neighborhood in the same area.
“Is that where we’re going?’
“Yep.”
They didn’t speak as he eased the car up well past the speed limit. Other cars flashed by in colorful blurs. Alexa peered through the foggy window, watching for the familiar black-and-white of the highway patrol. She snuck wary peeks at the speedometer.
The white needle crept up even more, although, to be fair, she hardly felt the difference in the car’s cabin.
“Nik.”
“The faster I go, the quicker we’ll be there.”
/>
“Remember that I was okay with the side of the road,” she reminded him.
He grinned over at her. “That’s my classy lady.”
She punched him in the arm. Then, rethinking her strategy, she slipped her hand over his thigh.
“Slow down,” she said. “Isn’t the journey supposed to be half the fun?”
“Not for us,” he complained. “For us, the journey has been long and hellish.”
But he slowed the car down anyway. Maybe the hand laid innocently on his lap helped. He kept glancing down at it.
His pants were made of thin material, so Alexa could feel every twitch of his cock as she rubbed his muscled leg. With every stroke, her fingers crept closer to their goal and by the time she traced his length through the cloth, he was already hard.
Nik swore beneath his breath. “I can’t drive like this.”
“You can,” she told him, “and you will—all the way home, where you’re going to lay me down in that bed of yours and fuck me properly, the way you’ve wanted to all these long years.”
She squeezed his cock for emphasis, making his hips writhe against her hand. Then, when he calmed down, she began playing with him again, letting her fingers trail up and down his dick, teasing him, before she tried to grasp his thick length fully. It was a futile attempt—he was well covered by his trousers—but it was fun trying.
“Jesus, Lexy!”
Sweat stood out on his forehead and his hands were clenched white-knuckled on the steering wheel.
Already half-turned toward him, Alexa leaned over to kiss his cheek. His skin was hot and slightly bristled. He smelled so good. She wanted to lick him all over. She told him so.
“You’re going to make me crash this car,” he warned her, sounding perfectly serious.
They were only half an hour outside of Los Angeles.
“You’re not,” Alexa told him. “You’re going to drive us safely to your house. Then you’re going to open the car door for me because you’ve got such lovely manners—most of the time—and we’re going to undress each other and get into bed like civilized people.”
Nik’s face was flushed and contorted. “If I can make it that long,” he said hoarsely, “I’m going to end up screwing you on the floor of the foyer —if I can make it that far.”