Keep (Command #2) (33 page)

After dinner, they’d checked into a hotel near the airport that housed his plane, waiting to return to Munich in the morning. He’d had a bottle of red wine and two glasses sent up, but she didn’t touch it. The impending conversation was going to be difficult and the worry was she’d drink too much and then say something she’d regret.

“I want to ask you something,” he said, with a serious look, sending her heart rate skyrocketing. “Move in with me when we get back.”

She sighed. “I can’t.”

“Come work for Osterhägen. It’s not like you’d be reporting to me.”

“No.” That wasn’t a remote possibility.

“All right, there are plenty of other opportunities in Munich.”

She’d been right. She knew exactly where this conversation was going. “I don’t speak German.”

“You’re smart, you can learn.”

Maybe he didn’t hear how that sounded to her, or perhaps she was hypersensitive from Paul, but her eyes narrowed to slits.
No.
This had been her fear from the beginning, that she would lose herself in Shawn. Bend her desires to match his. “I’m not going to Munich.”

He looked confused. “How do you see it working then?” At that moment, he picked up on the fact that she’d said ‘going’ and not ‘moving.’ His rich, brown eyes blinked slowly. “What are you saying?”

Her voice trembled. “I’m saying that I can’t go back to where he…”

The hands on her waist gently tightened and tried to comfort. “We don’t have to leave tomorrow. We can give it time.”

But he needed to get back and they both knew it. Plus the kind of time he was talking about wasn’t adequate; one or two more days wouldn’t make a dent. She had to be honest with him.

“I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to go back.” It hung in the air for an impossibly long time. So long, she wondered if he was all right.

“That’s ... unacceptable.” His voice wasn’t cold, but the words were.

The sadness she had was replaced with annoyance that if left unchecked would grow into anger. “I’m sorry?”

“The idea of us apart. I find that unacceptable. You tell me what you want and I will make it happen.”

But what she wanted wasn’t possible, unless he could go back in time, and if he did, how would they have ever met? They were from separate worlds. She came from a poor family in a town that was so small, it didn’t have stoplights. He was from the bustling city of Munich, born into unbelievable wealth.

“I tried living overseas,” she said, “but I was miserable. The last six months before I met you? Those were the worst of my life, even worse than Paul.” Her body shook from the raw emotion coursing through her. “I can’t do it.”

“You didn’t know a soul and didn’t speak the language. Of course you were miserable.” He stroked a hand over her hair and cupped her face. “It will be different. Jason and L are there. I’m there.” He kissed her and all she could taste was the subtle drug of his persuasion.

“Please don’t make me.”

He froze. “Make you?”

“We both know you could.”

His face changed to an expression she couldn’t read. “I don’t have any control over you.”

Was he truly unaware of the power he held? “Yeah, right.”

“I don’t. If I did, you never would have had a chance to take L’s place. We would have left that stupid event, and you would have been in my car and on the way to my bed when the bombs went off,” he said. “But I don’t want control. All I want is… whatever you want.”

She croaked it out. “I want to stay here.”

He took an enormous breath and the warm eyes turned dark and sad. “Very well. That’s fine.” His shoulders sagged and it looked like whatever he was thinking about was killing him. “I’ll resign in the morning.”

“W-What?” Her knees went weak, and she almost fell over.

“I have plenty of investments, that’s where most of my money comes from. I can retire anytime.”

Her heart slammed against her chest so hard, it ached. “You can’t do that.”

“What I can’t do is bring my company here. I would move my family’s whole goddamn empire to this uncultured and rude place, for you. But I can’t.”

She choked back the urge to cry. “Shawn —”

“I want to be with you, and you want to be here. It’s simple. You’re the one who’s always had the power between us.”

Her eyes fell shut and for a moment she allowed herself to consider this enormous sacrifice he was willing to make for her. He’d give up everything he loved… for her.

No
, she yelled against the weak, greedy and selfish part of her. She’d moved across the country for a man, taken the job he wanted her to take, and let him make decision after decision for her. And she would go to her grave resenting both him and herself for it. She’d be damned before she’d do that to Shawn.

“I will not allow you to do this, do you understand? You love your job and you’re too good at it to resign.” He opened his mouth to protest, but there was too much passion filling her soul to contain. “I want to hear you say it.”

“Excuse me?” He was less than thrilled at her tone and yet she could see it turned him on, ever so slightly. He loved control. But he loved her controlling him even more.

“Tell me that you’re going back tomorrow.”

“Not without —”

“Yes, without me. I love you and we’ll figure it out, I promise we will. But if you stay, I’ll never forgive myself.”

Again, he took a deep breath with his gaze unwavering.

“Please,” she said.

“I don’t want this.”

“I know you don’t. I’m sorry.”

He said a whole bunch of things to her in German then, things he wanted to say but didn’t want her to know. When he was done, he looked defeated. “Fine.” His voice was quiet and heartbreaking. “I’ll go back tomorrow. Alone.”

His jet was over the Atlantic. Shawn had a glass of bourbon in one hand and Kara’s wedding rings in the other, and although there were three other people on the plane with him, he’d never felt so alone in his entire life. It was his third glass of bourbon and the hope was he’d stay drunk until there wasn’t enough fuel left to turn around.

She’ll change her mind, he kept telling himself. She’ll wake tomorrow and call him, and he’d have her on the first flight to Munich he could get.

Once he landed, it got worse. Fuck, she was everywhere. His plane, his apartment, his office… his head. He couldn’t escape. The press interest waned considerably when he returned to his apartment alone, another knife in him when they hounded relentlessly about where he’d been and where she was.

New York was the answer to that one. Like Shawn, she wanted to lose herself in her job while they were apart. Their first conversation with an ocean between them was a failure. All it did was intensify his misery and remind him that, for once, he did not have what he wanted.

By the fifth day they’d fallen into a routine. She’d eat lunch in the same spare office she’d had that day he’d come for her in the rain, while Shawn ate a late dinner at home, both of their laptops running Skype.

“Paul got on the elevator this morning,” she said, “He didn’t realize I was there until it was too late, and it looked like he couldn’t breathe.”

“Great,” he replied, flatly.

She shot him a confused look. “I thought that’d at least get a smile.”

“It reminds me that he gets to be closer to you than I do.”

“Yeah, well, you look sexy when you’re jealous.” He couldn’t help but reward her with the smile she wanted. “I see you’ve made significant progress on your apartment,” she continued.

“Yes,” he said, picking up the laptop so he could show her, “I moved this box from the counter to the floor.”

“Nice work.”

“Furniture is coming. I… was hoping you would want a say in it.”

She pressed her lips together. He wasn’t going to apologize for pushing for what he wanted. Every day apart could be solidifying her decision to never return. If it was true, he was going to have to resign. The week in Wisconsin had shown him what it could be like, and now he was settling for considerably less.

“What are you doing next Wednesday?” he asked.

“Wednesday? Isn’t that the reopening ceremony?”

“As long as they stay on schedule. Do you have plans?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“Good, I put the flight crew on standby. I’ll head your way as soon as it’s over.”

“Isn’t there going to be some sort of party after?”

“I don’t care, I’m not waiting any longer.” Not to mention, the last one hadn’t gone so well. It would be two weeks since he’d walked her off his plane in New York and set her in a town car. It already felt like a millennium had passed since he’d held her.

After ten days, his mother broke their “no personal talk at the office” rule to tell him to stop moping and that people had concerns. Rumors were rampant throughout the company, and the media had sensationalized the story further when someone at the Trier hospital leaked Kara’s file. Even his assistant asked if they’d gotten married in secret. And today he was trying Shawn’s patience.

“I asked you to return that,” Shawn said, gesturing to the box containing Kara’s fake wedding rings. Not that the rings were fake, those were expensive, and he wasn’t frivolous with money. “Why is it still here?” It tormented him, and he could have sworn he’d dropped it on his assistant’s keyboard.

But it was back, dead center of his desk.

“I thought you might want to hold onto them a little while longer,” his assistant said.

The cold, authoritative look Shawn gave made the man go white and reach for the box. “I overstepped, I’m sorry —”

“Leave it.”

When he was alone, Shawn flicked the switch to activate the privacy glass and leaned back in his chair, scrubbed the stubble on his face with a palm. He shouldn’t torture himself. But, with a sigh, he popped open the box and glared at the rings, then slammed it shut. How could she do this? How did she not feel as empty inside as he did with four thousand miles between them? The door to his office creaked open, and made him even angrier.

“Not now,” he barked.

High heels answered back, and when he glanced up, his breathing stopped. The earth stopped spinning. It barely escaped his lips. “You’re here.”

She wore a black suitdress, her hair pinned back like a serious business professional, but on her feet, a new pair of red heels, even more provocative than the last. He watched the rapid rise and fall of her chest as she stood before him, visibly nervous.

When he’d first laid eyes on her months ago, he’d instinctively risen to his feet as if his body had known instantly that it had found its other half. He rose now deliberately, not uttering a word. Not sure what he would say anyway. It was deathly quiet, neither of them moving. Her blue eyes had gravity he couldn’t resist.

“I can’t live without you,” she said.

The words shattered him and rebuilt him stronger. But her voice was off; something was different. The chaos of his emotions had made his brain slow; there was nothing wrong with her voice.

“Are you attempting to speak German to me?” he asked in English.

“Yes.”

“Why?” Not that it mattered. Nothing else did after what she’d just said.

“Because you speak German.” Then she blushed, a muted shade echoing the color of her shoes. “And I want to know what you’re saying.”

His mind was cloudy with emotion. “What have you learned?”

“Not much, a few phrases. Just in case.”

“In case?”

“In case they come out of your mouth.”

It was only a few steps, and then she didn’t have to worry about words coming out of his mouth — it was too busy kissing her. His arms were no longer empty and he enjoyed the feel of her again. The subtle tremble he could draw out of her with just a touch. When he paused to try to calm himself, her hand clamped around his tie and pulled him back in, greedy.

“I want to know which phrases,” he said, his lips trailing down the smooth skin of her neck.

“Try some out.”

So he returned to his native language, finding the idea of her American ears understanding him wildly appealing. “I’m very glad to see you.”