“You planned on seeing me again?” He stared at the painting hanging on the wall, his body rigid.
“Hoped.” She dragged her gaze to his face. “I need to explain why I left.”
“Is there really an excuse for leaving your fiancé without even a goodbye or a fuck you?” He frowned again, his eyes full of confusion when he met her gaze.
“Probably not a good enough one,” she whispered.
“How come you never looked back? Not once did you look back.” He closed the space between them with two slow steps. “You left me like I meant nothing to you. When I got home, you had disappeared. Vanished. Now there's all of this...a painting of our place here, pictures of Florence in your living room, you're wearing my ring...but you never looked back, you never contacted me."
“I had responsibilities, no choices.” Regret rolled through her.
“You had a choice.”
“No, I didn’t.” All of the reasons that had seemed important felt insignificant now. "I went back," she admitted without looking at him. "But you were gone. I'd waited too long, other people were in the apartment, all of my things were gone, Luca didn't have any answers. You were no where to be found."
"What do you mean you went back? When?"
"About a month later...you were gone."
"A month? That's impossible. You're lying." He stalked toward her until her back collided with her easel. His hands gripped the top of the canvas, arms pinned her where she stood. “I haven’t wanted to remember you in a very long time.”
“I suppose not.”
“But I have.”
“Me, too.”
“Are you happy?”
“What do you mean?” She folded her arms across her chest.
“Did you make the right choice? Leaving me? Leaving our life together? Tell me you’re happy and I’ll walk out of your life forever.”
“What does it matter? I can’t undo it.”
"But you tried to undo it, if you're telling me the truth. You went back."
"It doesn't matter anymore. You said it yourself. We're successful people, our lives moved on for the better." She wished she hadn't admitted going back to Italy looking for him. It made her sound pitiful and weak.
“So you have no regrets, is that what you're saying?”
“Of course I have regrets, but so what? What good does that do us?”
“That’s why I came here tonight, to see…”
“See what? I’ve done what I said I would do. "Pride forced her head high. “I’m up for associate partner at my firm. I’m a good—no, great—architect.”
“You’re lying. You’re not happy.” His hand framed the side of her face, forcing her to look at him. “I see it in your face. It’s like you’ve died. You're living in the past, which tells me you're not that thrilled with the present.”
“When did you get so mean?” Too tired to fight, tears blurred her eyes. “Get out. Enough insults for one day. Just go.”
“Why are you still wearing my ring?” His voice was low and powerful in the small room.
“Why do you?”
“My ring.” Dark blond hair covered his left eye when he bent forward, only a breath away from her face. “Why are you wearing it? Does it mean anything to you or do you simply think it’s pretty?”
“Please go.” She flattened her hands against his chest, but wished she hadn’t. The feel of his hard body beneath her hands liquefied her bones.
He slammed his hand against the canvas, knocking it to the floor behind her. “You just left. One day we’re living together, talking about creating a future, and then you disappeared.”
Her lungs deflated like air from a balloon. Breathing ceased. "I needed to come back here to—”
“To be safe? To do the right thing?” He had her backed against the easel. “You vanished.”
“You had my address. I didn’t disappear.”
“You let me go without a word.”
“I said I was sorry.” Every inch of her quaked with restrained emotion. “Leave now. Go. Good luck with your exhibit, with your life, all of it. Just get the hell out of my home.”
“Do you know why I brought your address with me? Do you?”
“You wanted to tell me off, right? That’s why you came here, to hurt me.”
“I wanted to show you how much I don’t care.”
“Doesn’t that show me how much you really do care?” She lifted her chin, determined not to cry.
A fraction of an inch separated their bodies. She dragged her gaze over the opened buttons of his shirt, over his neck, over his lips until resting on the deep green of his eyes. Damn, the man rocked the word 'sexy'.
Boldness replaced caution.
Standing on tiptoes, she smoothed her hands along the front of his chest. Touching him again was like coming home from a long, exhausting journey.
He shook his head once as if trying to clear his mind. Only once. He stared at her lips. His hands curled around her forearms, but he didn’t push her away.
“Kiss me,” she whispered against his mouth.
“No,” he whispered as his hands slid up her arms before cupping the back of head.
"I dare you."
"Never."
"I know you want to."
"I don't."
"Now who's the liar?" she asked, her teeth tugging at his lower lip.
Their mouths met in a kiss that melted her skin like candle wax, turning them into one being, one entity consumed by desire. To hell with the consequences. She needed this, needed him, here and now. Passion overrode all other thought or senses. Her hands stroked his back, kneading and searching. Every sense was alive with his touch, with his kiss. The need for him was an ache that burned deep. Hot. Necessary. Urgent. Primal
God, she had missed this, missed him.
They fell against the easel, knocking the canvas and paint in every direction. A tangle of limbs, they made eye contact for a moment, chests heaving, breathing labored.
He ripped her tank top in two and tossed the material aside. He looked down at her naked torso, a wicked grin on his face before squeezing her breasts, claiming them, and devouring her mouth with an intensity that bordered on decadent.
She yanked his shirt free from his jeans and shoved it high on his chest, needing his skin against hers more than she'd ever needed anything in life. Clothes fell away, bread crushed beneath their bodies, wine spilled from an overturned bottle at their feet.
"This is wrong," he muttered against her skin.
"Right. Always right with us." She sank her fingernails into his shoulders.
"What the lady wants, the lady gets," he said, a predatory gleam in his eyes.
His hands worked at pushing her yoga pants over her hips while his mouth claimed her breast.
She looped her toes in the waistband of his underwear and yanked them over his thighs. Her hands sought his erection while her back arched with every stroke of his hands and every lick of his tongue.
He ground himself inside her with the intensity of repressed rage. Her legs wrapped around his hips, holding him as close as possible as he plunged deep inside her.
Sex had never been tame with him, but this was animalistic. This was raw. Teeth sank into skin. Nails scraped against each other's bodies. They rolled together, locked as one being. Streaks of yellow and red paint lined their faces, stuck in their hair, no one cared.
Waves of pleasure rolled through her veins like a tsunami until all strength left her body. She laughed, breathless, as her mouth sought his again in a kiss filled with satisfaction and surprise.
"Is this what you meant by a do-over?" He shoved his hands through her hair, palms framing her face, and stared into her eyes. His chest rose and fell against hers.
"Not exactly but it'll do," she whispered, still out of breath, heartbeat slamming like a caged bird's wings inside her chest.
His mouth sucked on her lower lip, tongue teased hers. "I don't know what to do with you, Jessica Moriarty."<
br />
"You've always known exactly what to do with me, Jacques Sinclair." She repeated the words they'd always said to one another. She dipped her finger into the wet yellow paint on the canvas beneath his head before smearing it across his chin and over his mouth.
He grabbed her hand, linked his fingers with hers and stared into her eyes. Laughter faded. “This shouldn't have happened. I lost control, I always lose control around you.”
He rolled away and stared at the ceiling. Then he stood and pulled a piece of cheese from where it had stuck to his shoulder. Without looking at her, he dressed.
Rattled from the sex and his reaction, she stumbled to standing, grabbed the blanket from the sofa and wrapped it around herself. Man, she was on a roll today with fucking up her life.
He walked down the stairs without saying a word.
She returned to the kitchen to find him still waiting. She'd hoped he'd gone.
Back against the wall, he finished buttoning his shirt. He hadn't bothered to wipe the streaks of paint from his face and hair; then again, neither had she. When he lifted his gaze to hers, he looked agonized.
"I didn't intend on that. I should go," he said.
“Stay. Don't go.”
She wanted to scream, stomp her foot like a child, fall to her knees …anything to make him stay.
“There is someone else, Jess. Life moved on without you, things happened.” His quiet words sliced her heart into a million pieces. “I came here for answers, to understand. I didn't intend to rip your clothes off. I only wanted to understand why you left me. That’s all.”
“And now you understand?”
“No.” He shook his head, a slight grin curving his lips. “But I accept that I will never understand.”
She rubbed the palm of her hand over her face. Of course he had someone else. She had discarded him like a used napkin.
“You're serious with this woman? What you said about the different women all the time was just to hurt me, right?”
“Yes to both questions.”
A chasm ripped through the room, creating a space larger than the ocean that had once separated them. She felt the loss of him again, more powerful, more poignant than before.
“I wish it wasn’t like this between us…”
“I’m still the same man you left in Italy. The reasons you left haven’t changed. I’m a gypsy at heart, never in one place longer than six months or so.” He looked at the matching ring on his finger and blew out a long breath.
"You don't know my reasons, you only think you do. I went back..." Warm tears fell despite her resolve not to cry.
"I can't believe you went back." He shook his head. "You have no idea how that would have changed things. It's too late now. All of this has been a horrible mistake."
She winced at that and gripped the blanket tighter around her body. “Please leave. Your girlfriend must be wondering what the hell you’re doing.” She hugged her arms across her chest and tapped her foot against the floor. “Please leave, Jacques.”
“Are you happy? Tell me that you love being an architect. Tell me that you don’t love me anymore, that you are content.” With every word, his face mirrored the agony she felt. “Tell me that you have no regrets, that you are happy with your life as it is now.”
“My life is damn near perfect.” She forced a smile. “Partnership is in sight, remember? Corner office here I come. I have everything I’ve ever wanted. It’s a fucking love fest.”
“It is time I let this go then.” With a quick movement, he pulled the ring from his finger and laid it on the back of the red chair.
She stared at the ring against the faded fabric. “Please don’t leave it. Like you said, it’s yours.”
“Keep it, throw it away, it no longer matters to me. Be well, bella.” Door open, he hesitated at the threshold and looked around the room before meeting her gaze again.
Bella. The word hung in the air as they stared at one another, the language of Italy dancing in her memory and tugging at her heart.
“Caro…” she whispered.
Without another look back, he closed the door behind him.
She listened to the fall of his footsteps on the stairs, the outside door opening and closing, and folded his ring into her palm. She pressed the closed fist against lips still swollen from his kiss. Silent tears streaked her face.
"What have I done?" Back against the door, she slid to the floor. The question she asked had no answer. Even she didn't know if she meant the past or the present; conflicting emotions meshed together in her brain like the various paint streaks staining her skin.
* * *
Chapter Four
He stared unseeing at the map of South America spread against the table. Carter and Kevin talked logistics, but he could care less about the details for the upcoming trip. Sighing, he twisted a rubber band around his wrist—a poor substitute for a cigarette.
Thunder rolled through the sky. He flicked his gaze toward the floor-to-ceiling windows of Carter’s loft. He wanted it to rain, felt it would complement his mood.
“I should go,” he said more to himself than his friends.
“Yes, we should leave,” Simone said from where she lounged on the sofa. “You promised me dinner before my flight, bebe.”
He nodded at his girlfriend, Simone—all legs, leather and red hair. A model, she traveled almost as often as he did, which perfectly suited him. Off to shoot the finale of the television show, International Super Model, that she hosted, Simone Belefonte knew how to deliver drama—which is why he kept her as mellow as possible.
“Oh, Simone, I forgot to mention something,” Kevin said with a grin. “We ran into Jessica Moriarty while we were in Boston. Sounds like one interesting apartment building you all lived in over there. Models, photographers, artists…must have been fun.”
If he had ever felt homicidal, it was now. “Didn’t I fire you yesterday?”
“You must have been too distracted with the brunette and your reunion.” Kevin’s grin transformed to a wide smile.
“Jessica Moriarty?” Simone’s brown eyes narrowed at him.
“Why don’t we all go out for dinner before your flight, Simone?” Carter suggested as if oblivious to the sudden tension in the room. “There’s a new Thai place around the corner I have been wanting to check out. I've been meaning to ask you about that other judge on the show, Lily. Would she be interested in going out with a handsome and brilliant documentary filmmaker? We could—”
“Shut it, Carter.” She stood, hands on hips and cast her gaze around the room. “We aren’t going anywhere until I know what happened with that bitch.”
“She bought my book.” He snapped the rubber band against his wrist. “Let’s eat.”
“That is all you have to say? Let’s eat?” She sauntered to him and stopped when they were nose-to-nose. “She is the reason you didn’t come back to New York until this morning? You were with her? And this is a coincidence?”
"Now you sound like Jacques." Kevin stretched his arms over his head and grinned. "Conspiracy theories and drama, you two really need to relax."
"You relax, you pitiful excuse for a man," she hissed between clenched teeth, her gaze sliding toward Kevin before flicking back toward Jacques. "Answer me."
Jacques sighed and scrutinized the woman Jessica had hated in Italy. Stunning rather than beautiful, Simone exuded attitude even in her sleep.
“Thai then?” Carter stepped next to him, an easy going smile on his face as he ignored the tension. "Jessica, huh? How's she doing? I miss her. Remember that time we all rode down—"
"We will not be reminiscing." Simone cut him off with a finger to his face.
“Were you all roommates or something? I still don’t get the dynamic here,” Kevin rambled, walking up to them with an exaggerated look of confusion in his eyes.
“The dynamic?” Simone faced him. “I hated her and she hated me. She let Jacques go. Now he is mine. You are such a stupid man.”
&
nbsp; “Like I said, the Thai place is just down the street.” Carter pushed open the door of his loft and held it ajar. “We should go.”
Kevin refused to look away from Simone. “Talk about chemistry. It was snap, crackle, pop all over that bookstore.”
“Why are you doing this to me?” Jacques grabbed him by the shirt and dragged him into the hallway. “What the hell is wrong with you? Do you want me to kill you? Is that it?”
“Simone is poison,” Kevin whispered. “You know it, you’ve said it yourself. Maybe you would be better off with—”
“With who?”
“Okay, you two, we’re going to a jungle in a few months. Save the survival of the fittest act for then, okay?” Carter guided Simone from the loft and slammed the door closed behind him.
She slipped free of Carter and wrapped her arms around Jacques. From warrior to seductress in three simple strides. “You came home to me, that is what matters, yes? You made your choice, didn't you?" She smoothed her palms across his shoulders. "I'm not jealous, why would I be? I understand. I trust you.”
“It’s like watching a python eat its prey one gulp at a time.” Kevin stepped away from them. “I quit.”
“Don't call for a reference.”
“I won’t.” Kevin yelled without looking back.
Jacques shrugged off the tension he had been feeling since arriving back in New York. Without another word, the trio walked to the street and around the block to the Thai restaurant.
A couple in the corner captured his attention. Their laughter, the way they touched across the table, the look in their eyes, and the intimacy without boundaries. Food came and went without him realizing it.
“I still don't understand why you need to go to a jungle to do a story on lost tribes. Aren’t there tribes in more civilized places?” Simone asked Carter who stared at her over his beer.
“It's the Amazon, Simone. We are canoeing deep up river, going places where most people never get to see...” Carter continued his passionate response but Jacques no longer heard him.
He leaned back in his chair and stared at the couple across the room. Mid-twenties. Idealistic. Foolish.
Snap, snap went the rubber band against his wrist. He tapped his booted heel against the floor.