Red Hot Obsessions (16 page)

“Good.” He holds out his hand. “Come on. You'll need your energy if you're going to survive the night ahead of you.”

I don’t believe for a minute he’s forgotten all his emotions of a moment ago, but if he wants to pretend that he’s not hurting, then fine. I’ll play along. It’s not like I’m not suppressing my own tumultuous feelings about Calder’s role in the current state of the Frazer Center.

No, tonight isn’t about delving into our emotions. It’s about forgetting about the troubles of the outside world and focusing on the joys our bodies can bring each other.

And honestly? One look at the wicked expression on Calder’s face, and I’m perfectly okay with that.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

If I thought Calder was magnificent before, it doesn't take long before I'm convinced he's a genuine sex god. A couple of hours after dinner, we lie tangled among the rumpled sheets, sticky with sweat and breathless from our exertions.

“Wow,” I whisper into the darkness.

Calder chuckles and pulls me closer to him. My arm rests across his chest, my leg across his thighs. I feel his lips press against the top of my head.

“I'm glad you enjoyed yourself,” he murmurs against my hair. He runs his hand up my arm.

I give a contented sigh. My entire body aches. Calder bent me into positions I've never even imagined before, let alone attempted, and my arms and legs feel like jelly. He brought me to the peak of ecstasy and back again, and my flesh still quivers at the memory.

“You're a feisty thing,” he tells me. “Anyone who sees my back will think I was attacked by an animal.”

I start to pull away, embarrassed, but he laughs and grabs me closer again.

“That's a good thing. I like a woman who's not afraid to get wild, and you, sweet Lily, are the wildest one I've ever met.”

Now it's my turn to laugh, and he grabs me and kisses me. I draw him closer. Maybe this is just sex. And maybe I don’t really know him that well. But there's a part of me, deep down, that knows I've glimpsed a deeper side of him, however briefly, and I know I've exposed a bit of myself to him, too.

And that terrifies me.

“Go to sleep,” he says, and kisses me again. “I plan to wake you again in an hour.”

I bite my lip, and he gives a low chuckle and closes his eyes. In minutes he's asleep, his chest rising and falling steadily beneath my arm. I'm exhausted, too, but I know slumber won't come for me anytime soon. I've got too much on my mind.

I wait for a few more moments, just to make sure he's completely out, before I slowly ease my way out of his arms. There's just something too…
intimate
about lying entwined while we sleep. This is just sex. Just a few crazy days of indulging some wild lust. After I leave this place, I'll never have a reason to contact Calder ever again, and he has no reason to contact me either. I need to remember that.

I climb out of bed and fumble around in the darkness for my jeans. I finally find them in a rumpled pile at the foot of the bed, and I reach in the pocket and pull out my phone.

My heart almost stops when I see the number of missed calls. I thought I heard my ringtone go off a couple of hours ago, but Calder and I were a little preoccupied at the time. Now I wonder how I managed to miss it ringing
eight
times over the course of the evening.

All of the calls are from Garrett.

I panic. Has something happened at the Center? Or to Dad? I click into voicemail and hold my breath as it connects.

“You have eight new messages,” the automated voice tells me.

“Hey, Lils,” Garrett's message begins. He sounds perfectly calm. “Just wanted to check in, since you haven’t returned my last couple of calls. I talked to your dad, and he says you’re stuck in Barberville because of the weather. I'm worried about you. Give me a call, okay?”

In the next one he's starting to sound a little agitated.

“Hey, Lils, it's me. I haven't heard from you. I just want to make sure you’re okay. Will you call me and let me know where you are? I have the Jeep, remember? I can probably manage the roads. But I need to know where you are. Now's not the time to be stubborn. You asked for my help with the Center. I'm not going to let you shut me out again. Call me back.”

With each subsequent message I can tell he's getting progressively more frustrated, and by the sixth he's starting to sound livid.

“Dammit, Lils, don’t leave me hanging,” he says. “I know you’re up to something. I don’t know what you’re trying to pull, but this is ridiculous. Where the hell are you?”

But it’s the next one that really ticks me off.

“What the fuck is going on? Fuck this! I'm not your fucking puppet! You can't just expect me to do you favors and then fucking blow me off. I deserve some basic fucking respect. Excuse me for giving a fuck.”

It makes me so angry that I almost don't listen to the final message, but it starts before I can hang up.

“Look, Lils, I'm sorry,” Garrett says. He sounds defeated. “You just drive me crazy, you know that? Call me, please. Please. I promise I'll do what I can for the Center. Just call me and tell me what you're doing. I know you, Lils. You get these crazy ideas in your head sometimes. I just want to make sure you're safe.” There's a long pause, and then he sighs deeply. “Please, Lils. I miss you. I still—”

I hang up before I can hear the rest and throw the phone down on the carpet. I'm so upset that I'm shaking. What the hell does he think he’s doing, blowing up my phone like that? We’re not together anymore. I’m not obligated to answer his calls, and I’m certainly not obligated to tell him where I am at any given minute.

I've seen Garrett's temper before. It never reached the point of physical violence, thank God, but there was plenty of abuse on the verbal end. There's no talking to him when he gets worked up. It's like he morphs into a completely different person—one that completely terrifies me.

I knew it was a bad idea to ask him. Fuck me and my stupid, desperate decision making.

I'm having trouble standing still, so I grab Calder's shirt from the ground and slip it on. I march over to the table, grab our half-finished bottle of wine from dinner, and head over to the double French doors at the far side of the room. I don't care that it's raining. I pull open the doors and step out onto the balcony.

The cold, wet air is a welcome slap in the face. The rain has slowed to a drizzle, and I wonder if that means I'll be able to go home tomorrow. I lean against the railing and take a swig of wine right from the bottle.

This whole thing is a mess, and I'm not sure there's any way out at this point. The Center isn't any closer to getting help. Garrett is back in my life—and worse than ever. And on top of it all, Calder has turned my insides into a big confused pile of mush.

I take another swig and stare out across the land behind the house. If there are any lights out in the garden, they've already been shut off for the night, but I can just make out a great dark section that I suspect is the hedge maze Calder boasted about. If I'd come here under different circumstances, I have no doubt I'd be delighted by the romance of it all, but I'm not sure what I feel anymore.

My body has never responded to anyone as it does to Calder. And it's not just the way my flesh prickles when he's near, or the way my breath seems to stop when he kisses me. There's something that coils in my belly when we're close to each other, something more than just physical attraction. Every time I see a glimpse of pain in his eyes, or the darkness of a suppressed memory dance across his features, the coil tightens. There's the potential for something else here, something deeper, but I know it's stupid to indulge those feelings. That course can only end in heartbreak.

The situation with Garrett only emphasizes that case. I
knew
it was stupid to call him again, even with completely innocent intentions, and it still blew up in my face. I need to start listening to my gut and stop allowing myself to be swayed by desperation or attraction or whatever it is that keeps getting me into trouble.

I take another swig of wine and close my eyes. I force myself to focus on the feeling of the cool rain hitting my skin, of the drops sliding down my face and neck. Not for the first time this weekend, I'm struck by the sensation that this is all just some odd, vivid dream, and that any moment I'll wake and go off to work at the Center and all of these emotions rushing through me will be forgotten by the time I've finished my first cup of coffee.

“Drinking without me?”

Calder's voice snaps me out of my thoughts. When I turn, he's standing in the doorway, heavy-lidded and looking absolutely delectable, for all that he’s unfortunately decided to pull on a pair of pants before joining me in the rain. I turn back toward the rail and take another gulp of wine, fighting down the surge that rises in my belly at the sight of him.

“I didn't want to wake you up,” I say without looking at him.

He joins me at the railing. “Aren't you cold out here?”

I shake my head. “It feels nice.”

He holds out his hand for the wine bottle, and I pass it over. He takes a drink and hands it back.

“It's not often that I fall asleep with a woman in my arms and wake up to an empty bed.”

“No?” I ask. “Is it usually the other way around?”

I stare down at the wine bottle, but I can feel Calder's gaze on me, and I know he's trying to read me in the darkness.

“That's not what I meant,” he says finally. “I'll admit, men have a reputation for preferring sex to the intimacy that might come after, but it's rare to meet a woman with such sentiments.”

“I'm not sure what you're suggesting. I couldn't sleep. That's all.”

He doesn't say anything for a long moment, and I can't help myself.

“And even if I am 'avoiding intimacy' or whatever it is you're accusing me of, why does it matter?” I say. “I have no misconceptions about what's going on here. Why should I act like I have feelings for you when we're just fucking?”

“Is that what you think? That we're just fucking?”

I blink up at him in the rain, and I can't keep the shock from my voice. “Isn't it?”

Again he doesn't answer immediately, and I'm not sure whether it's panic or some other emotion that makes my chest contract. When he finally answers, he avoids the question completely.

“Tell me, what happened with that guy you were with at your fundraiser?”

His query hits so close to all of my angst of the past couple of days that for a moment I'm stunned into silence.

“How—why does it even matter?” I say finally.

Calder takes the bottle from my hand and has another swig of wine.

“I told you that I didn’t approach you because I wasn’t looking to start a fight,” he says, “but that’s not the whole truth. The other reason I didn’t say anything to you was because I knew it would have been a lost cause. You only had eyes for him.”

Was I that obvious?
I wonder. Had I been that caught up in Garrett? I think back to that night, to everything that had been going on between Garrett and me the time. Arts & Hearts had fallen only a month before our breakup. I'd sensed something wrong between us for weeks already, but I’d still been desperate to save our relationship. I loved him so much—stupidly so, I now realize—and I wanted to make things work.

It was Valentine's Day, and I felt gorgeous in my black gown—not to mention immensely proud of what I'd accomplished with the event. That night Garrett was his normal, charming self, but nothing more. He laughed at my dad's jokes, listened attentively to the stories of our guests and patrons. But there'd been nothing for me. No secret smile, no admiring glances, no kind words about the work I'd done—or even appreciative comments about my slinky dress. I was a pathetic idiot. I should have realized it was over then. Hell, I should have dumped his ass ages before that.

Just thinking about it makes me sick.

“We broke up,” I tell Calder. “Not long after the event. I thought we’d discussed this already.”

He takes another gulp of wine and passes it back to me. “I just wanted to make sure.”

“Don't worry,” I assure him, wrapping my hands around the rain-soaked bottle. “I'm free to fuck whoever I like.”

“That's not what I meant.”

“No?”

He gives a humorless chuckle. “Lily, that guy was an asshole. Anyone could see it.”

Except me, apparently. And my dad. And the half-dozen friends and guests who'd complimented me on landing the handsome, successful journalist. I believe the phrase “great catch” was thrown around more than once.

But Calder's not done.

“He's the kind of guy who just likes to hear himself talk. He expects everyone to fawn over him, and most of the time, people do. He's happy as long as he thinks you need him. Meanwhile he couldn’t care less about what you actually think or want or feel. It's a very one-sided sort of relationship, I imagine.”

He's so on the nose about Garrett that I don't even know what to say. He got all that from watching us interact for one evening?

“Though I bet,” Calder continues, “that as soon as he thinks you're moving on, or that you don't need him anymore, he changes his tune completely. Guys like that hate it when they realize you don't need them anymore.”

I think of Garrett's messages this evening, and I know Calder has it exactly right.

“It's over,” I assure him again. “Don't worry. I have no misconceptions about him anymore.”

“Good. You deserve better than that. You deserve a guy who appreciates you, who considers himself lucky as fuck to know that you chose to be with him.”

I roll my eyes. “Are we in an after-school special now?”

“I'm serious, Lily. You're a remarkable woman.”

“I don't even know why we're having this conversation,” I say. “I thought we were just fucking?”

Something flashes in his eyes—is that disappointment? Anger? Something darker? I don’t trust myself to know. I wait for him to argue, but instead he pulls me hard against him.

“Just fucking, huh?” he breathes against my hair. “Then maybe we should be doing a little more of that.”

He kisses me, and heat explodes through my body. His tongue slips into my mouth, and I suck it between my teeth. He moans and grabs my ass, grinding against me.

Forget all the rest. This I understand. This I want. I twine my hands in his hair and curl my fingers against his scalp, holding his mouth against mine. There are no questions, no judgment, no exes. Just desire.

He breaks away from me, but only enough to yank his shirt off of me. He tosses it aside, then reaches into his pocket and pulls out a condom. He’s prepared, as always. He pushes down his pants in one movement, but before I can admire his naked form he grabs me, twists me around, and pushes me forward. My hands grasp at the railing, but he catches me by the hips, drawing my ass back toward him. His hand closes around the back of my neck, holding me bent over the railing. My fingers curl around the rail, and I lean my head forward to rest my forehead on the wet wrought iron.