by Sybil Bartel
I took her plate from her. “No, my father did and gifted it to me.”
“Is that why you hate him? Because he gave you a condo?”
“I never said I hated him.” For my mother’s sake, I didn’t speak ill of him out loud.
“You said you weren’t anything like him.”
“I’m not.” I tossed the few utensils I used to cook dinner with in the dishwasher.
She watched me a moment. “So, he doesn’t want you to go into the family business?”
“He does.” I couldn’t remember the last time a woman had asked me questions about myself, let alone grilled me.
“But you aren’t going to?”
“Not if I can help it. My sister has it handled.” I shut the dishwasher. “My turn. Why haven’t you signed your divorce papers?”
Her face turned bright red. “Brian told you that?”
Leaning against the counter, I crossed my arms. “Yes.”
Her head dipped, and she folded her arms across herself as if for protection. “He shouldn’t have told you that.”
“Why?” I demanded.
She looked up at me defiantly. “Because it’s none of your business.”
“Isn’t it?” I played hardball. “You kissed me. I don’t get to know why a married woman lies to me then gives me something only her husband should have?”
Anger, fast and hot, spread across her features. “He’s not my—”
“Watch it,” I warned.
Her arms dropped to her sides, and her hands fisted. “Watch what?”
“What you say to me next.” I leaned toward her. “Do not lie to me again.”
“I did not—” She stopped herself.
Then she stepped around me, went for her suitcase and yanked on the handle. The flowered bag fell over.
Jesus. “Need help?”
She growled, but she didn’t say shit. Jerking her bag upright, she dragged it down the hall as one broken wheel shimmied it back and forth behind her.
A second later, the door to the guest room slammed shut.
I started the dishwasher and strode to my bedroom. Throwing on a long-sleeved moisture-wicking shirt and sneakers, I grabbed a baseball cap and walked back to the guest room. Feeling generous, I knocked.
“Go away,” she said through the door.
“Open up.”
“No.”
“Now,” I ordered.
Five seconds later, she yanked the handle to open the door an inch.
I pushed it open. “I’m going to the gym. It’s downstairs in the building. Don’t open the front door for anyone.”
Her back to me, staring out at the ocean, she didn’t reply.
“Genevieve.” Goddamn it. I wasn’t going to apologize for asking the question earlier. “Turn around.”
She spun and let loose. “I don’t have to do what you say just because you say it.”
I studied her a moment. Anger flaring, her hair tangled, her suitcase on its side in the middle of the floor, she was a mess. But I’d meant what I’d said to her last night. She was beautiful. Beautiful in a way that was raw and broken, but she wasn’t defeated. Far from it.
“Do we need to talk about it?”
“Talk about what?” she snapped.
“The kiss.” Or the way her body melted every time I put the slightest bit of dominance in my tone. Or why she hadn’t fucking divorced that prick from the hospital.
She spun back around. “Go to the gym, Sawyer.”
I walked out, and my cell vibrated with a new text.
Sullivan: Stop putting off your sister. Get your priorities straight and sign the quarterly paperwork.
I deleted the text from my father and went to the gym.
THE STAPLES ITCHED UNBEARABLY. I reached up to scratch them, but his hand shot out, grasping me around the wrist.
Instant awareness raced through my body, making my nerves sing like a full-blown orchestral crescendo.
“Leave it,” he practically barked.
I fought for patience. I was the one who was injured and who had to cancel all my appointments for the week while he went to work out every day, and he was the one with a crappy attitude? Five days of complete and total crappy attitude, mind you, even while he was cooking dinner, something he claimed he enjoyed doing. Whatever. “You know, you volunteered.”
“What?” he snapped absently, putting a cup of tea down in front of me on the coffee table. The kind of tea I casually said I’d liked on day two that had shown up later that evening in a grocery delivery by a really scary-looking guy wearing a Luna and Associates uniform.
I sucked in a breath and told myself this was just like dealing with any of the ornery clients I’d dealt with over the years. But it wasn’t. He was nothing like anyone I’d ever met. He was completely self-contained. He didn’t initiate conversation. He didn’t even talk, not unless I asked a question, and then he would state a one- or two-word answer like he was put out by having to speak to me.
Fine.
He could be cranky all he wanted.
But I didn’t have to listen to it anymore. I was tired of watching him don a stupidly sexy baseball cap and go work out for two hours every day, then come back all sweaty and ripped muscles with no better of an attitude. I was tired of his perfect gourmet dinners he cooked every night like he was some five-star chef on a day off from his restaurant’s kitchen. I was tired of his perfect-smelling self after his showers and his stupid silence as he spent hours on his laptop not talking to me, let alone looking at me. I was tired of his curt daily good mornings and good nights.
I was tired of all of it.
I stood. “I’m going home. Thanks for your… hospitality.” I blew out a breath, glancing around at everything that was so perfectly put in its place that not even a pillow dared to topple over. I couldn’t say I’d miss it—not a single perfectly placed glass or plate or picture or made bed.
I wouldn’t miss any of it.
But I was going to inexplicably miss him. And his scent. And his stupid staring contests that I always lost. Speaking of which….
He studied my face. “What’s wrong?”
What was right?
I didn’t answer. I stepped around the coffee table. Carefully. Because I didn’t need any more staples.
My eyes on my feet, it was too late to move out of his trajectory when I saw his boots come into view.
Craning my neck, I forced myself to look up at his too handsome face. Then I lost my battle to keep my mouth shut. “You know, you would be more handsome if you smiled once in a while. I’m not saying you’re not handsome. I’m just saying, well, a smile, it goes a long way, and you could use one. A good one like this.” I smiled like a crazy person.
He stared.
Dropping the pretense, I swallowed past the sudden dryness in my throat and soldiered on. “Fine, whatever, but just so you know, smiles tell someone you don’t resent them. Or that you care, or that everything is okay, or that you made them smile, or a whole host of other things, all of them good. So yeah, smiles. They’re great, but forget I mentioned it.” I shook my head. “Anyway. I’ll get out of your hair.” I moved one step to the side.
“Turn around.”
Quiet, commanding, and not at all like he usually spoke to me, his voice barely touched the silence in his penthouse palace, but it cut through the air like nothing I’d ever experienced. Carving a block of submission around me as if I were made of nothing more than air and need, his command swirled through my head, then touched every inch of my body.
I didn’t understand it. I wasn’t sure I wanted to. All I knew was that for my own sanity, I couldn’t trust it. But that didn’t stop me from looking up into his stark gaze and asking the simplest of questions. “Why?”
“Turn around, Genevieve,” he directed, his voice suddenly smooth and effortless.
Curious, nervous, scared, flushed—I never had a choice.
I turned.
His huge hand brushed across
my back, sweeping my hair to the side, and his finger gently touched my staples. “I can have these removed for you.”
“The doctor said five to seven days. It’s only been five.”
“The sutures closed the wound, and it’s healed enough. If you’re careful, it’ll be fine. Taking them out will also make the wound site itch less.”
I didn’t care about the stupid staples anymore. “Why did you offer to have me here if you didn’t want me around?”
His hand stilled. “I never said I didn’t want you here.”
“No, you just act like it, in your mannerisms, your tone. I get it, I’m not an easy person to be around. I don’t even like my own company sometimes. I know I’m…. I know I talk a lot.” I’d talked at him for what had seemed like a month.
His hand dropped, and then he did what he’d been doing all along. He didn’t respond.
I couldn’t even be disappointed anymore, or hurt. I’d had days of this kind of behavior, and frankly, it wasn’t like I ever experienced anything different from Brian. Half the time he’d acted like I was a child.
“Whatever.” I stepped away from him. “You don’t have to answer that. In fact, don’t answer it.” I didn’t want to hear how I was a charity case or he was appeasing his guilt. I didn’t need a man to validate me or my existence. I made my own living, and I was pretty damn good at what I did.
“Are you still in love with him? Is that why you didn’t sign the divorce papers?”
Caught off guard, I froze. For five days we hadn’t mentioned the kiss, my impending divorce, or his family. “I don’t see how that’s any of your business.” He would never understand.
“Turn around,” he demanded.
I spun. “I’m not a dog. You don’t get to constantly bark out orders at me. Sit down, turn around, drink this, eat this, do that, do this—when is it ever good enough for you?” I laid every ounce of frustration and transference on him.
He didn’t so much as blink. “He’s moved on.”
Angry, hurt tears instantly welled, and I threw my arms up. “No kidding!”
“Then why hang on to someone who doesn’t want to be married to you?”
I lost it. “It’s none of your business!” I yelled, spinning around and storming off toward his spare bedroom.
I didn’t hear him follow me, but when I went to slam the door, he was right there.
His expression hard, his jaw locked, he glared at me. “He doesn’t deserve you.”
My hand on the door, I froze. Of all the things I expected him to say, that wasn’t even on my radar. Brian was… together. He wasn’t a billionaire’s son, but he had his life planned. He didn’t drop things or lose his keys or wake up at two a.m. and have to write stuff down. His clothes were always pressed, and he never forgot a dentist appointment. He was a financial planner, for God’s sake. He planned everything.
If anyone didn’t deserve anyone, it was me who didn’t deserve him. But that didn’t change a damn thing. “It’s between me and Brian.”
Sawyer’s eyes narrowed. “What are the terms of the divorce?”
Shit. “None of your business.”
“He wants your business,” he stated, as if he’d suddenly figured it out.
I snorted. “He wants nothing to do with it.”
“Then why not sign?”
“Because I can’t!” I made to slam the door, but an ex-Marine’s infuriating reflexes were no match for my frustration and anger.
Sawyer’s hand shot out, and he gripped the door in one hand at the same time as he grasped the side of my face. “And I can’t have a married woman in my penthouse,” he growled.
My heart slammed into my ribs, my stomach dropped and my mouth went dry. “I….” Oh my God. “Then I’ll leave.”
“I don’t want you to leave!”
Speechless, I stared at him.
His intense gaze burning into mine, his nostrils flared. “Why aren’t you signing?”
I blinked. Then I whispered the shameful truth. “He wants his name back.”
“Jenkins.” His chest rose with an inhale. “It’s his last name… and your business name.”
Trying not to cry, I bit my bottom lip and nodded. “Jenkins Events.”
His thumb stroked my cheek. “I know an attorney.”
I was sure he knew several. “I can’t fight him.”
“Yes, you can.”
“I don’t want to,” I clarified. It was more than him just wanting his name back. It was me losing the only family I’d ever belonged to. Not that Brian’s parents or siblings were overly supportive or even warm, but they were a family, and for the first time in my life, I’d belonged somewhere. Or I thought I had.
Sawyer frowned. “But you don’t want to change your business name.”
I shook my head as much as I could in his grasp, and I admitted the truth. “I would lose business. His family name, while nothing like yours, holds weight in Miami.” Brian’s mother was involved with so many charity groups, I continually had business through her referrals.
Sawyer pointed out the obvious. “You can rename.”
“I know. And I will. But I wanted to be in a position financially where losing some accounts tied to his family’s connections wouldn’t sink me, and I’m not there yet. I asked him to wait, but he….” I waved my hand. “Never mind. He wants his name back, and I wasn’t ready. End of story.”
“Why does he want you to give up his last name?”
I pulled out of his hold. “Because he wants to give it to someone else.” And irony was a four-letter word. A man with a name much more powerful, much more influential said I was beautiful, but I wasn’t a fool. He’d have a million more reasons to protect his name from the likes of me. Who was I? I was no one.
“It’s not an uncommon name.”
I toed the soft carpet that was so thick, it was like walking on a cloud. “Yeah, well, try telling him that.”
Sawyer caught my chin and brought my head back up. “You asked for him after the carjacking.”
I averted my gaze. “I was confused.” Brian had always been my person. He was who I’d always called. But I didn’t realize until too late that I’d relied on him too much. “I made a mistake relying on him.”
“Your husband should have been there for you.”
“No.” I stepped back from Sawyer. I had to. I was doing the same thing I’d done with Brian, and I swore to myself I wasn’t going to ever be that kind of girl again. “You don’t understand. I relied on him.”
“You’re supposed to rely on your spouse.”
“No, not like that. Not for everything. Not when someone has their own life and their own job and their own responsibilities,” I parroted, giving him the same speech Brian had given me.
Sawyer’s voice dropped to a tone I didn’t recognize. “Is that what he said to you?”
“I’m done talking now.”
Sawyer stared at me a moment. Then he threw me another curveball and said the last thing I was expecting. “If you were my wife, I would’ve made damn sure you understood that you could rely on me for everything, always.” Walking out of the room, he quietly shut the door behind him.
I stared at the space he’d occupied that now felt incredibly empty, until the sun dipped below the horizon and a muted orange hue took over the room. Every minute that ticked by, I cared less and less about the reasons I’d not signed the divorce papers from Brian and more and more about how pathetic I felt.
I didn’t drink, but if I was being honest, I wanted a drink. And I wanted more than a closed door separating me from a Savatier.
I didn’t belong here.
And admitting to him the pathetic reason I’d held on to Brian only made that more clear.
The last of the sunset bled into night, and I made a decision.
I pulled my suitcase out from the closet, the one that’d magically appeared after the hospital, and I started tossing the clothes I had lying around in it. I didn’t have any cash
or my wallet, but I had the new cell phone André Luna had gotten me, and I had my emergency credit card number that I had memorized that wasn’t in my wallet when it’d gotten stolen with the Escalade.
I could set up a new account for a car service.
Which was exactly what I was doing when a knock sounded on the bedroom door a half a second before it flew open and a blond man, all swagger, smiled wide.
“What’s up, darlin’?” Not as tall and not quite as muscular as Sawyer, but one hundred percent player, the green-eyed man waltzed into my room. “I heard you needed a house call.” He set a black medical kit on the dresser and grinned as his gaze traveled the length of me.
“Um….”
Sawyer strode in after him, looking pissed as hell. Then his gaze cut to my suitcase and his expression turned nuclear. “I told you to wait in the living room, Talerco.”
Talon Talerco, the man from the picture on Sawyer’s phone.
Talon chuckled, his gaze briefly taking in my suitcase. “What’s the fun in that?”
Looking like it was the last thing he wanted to do, Sawyer introduced us. “Genevieve, this is Talon Talerco. He was a hospital corpsman assigned to my unit in the Marines. Talon, Mrs. Jenkins.”
Talon’s grin amped up. “Oh, she’s missus now?” He tipped his chin at Sawyer, but winked at me. “How tellin’.”
“Talerco,” Sawyer warned.
Talon slapped Sawyer on the back. “Nothin’ doin’, nothin’ doin’.” He glanced at me before opening his kit. “I hear I’m takin’ staples out.”
My neck tingled and the wound itched. “I, um, that’s okay. I can take care of it later.” Much later. With a real doctor.
Without looking up, Talon rummaged around in his kit. “Sounds like she doesn’t trust me, Playboy.”
Sawyer’s jaw ticked.
“Playboy?” I asked, not sure I wanted to know.
Half of Talon’s mouth tipped up in pure mischievousness. “You don’t think he’s a playboy?” He glanced at Sawyer. “Looks like one.” He laughed.
Heat flamed my cheeks. “I, ah, wouldn’t know.”
Talon dropped his smile. “Course you wouldn’t, darlin’.” He took what looked like a pair of pliers out of his black bag. “Have a seat for me right here.”