Authors: Dawn Atkins
If they both felt that way…
But then her orgasm caught her sharply and she buried her face in Cole’s neck.
“What am I going to do without you?” Cole whispered and pulsed into her.
“I don’t know.” She nearly cried the words, and blinked back the water in her eyes. She looked into his face. It could be so easy with him.
I could just be.
No work, no struggle, no worry. Feel whatever I feel. Not hurry past, not move on. Just be myself. Be here.
But there was something scary about that. A big, deep hole of expectation and need. What if it wasn’t enough? What if things changed? What if it didn’t work? Then where would she be?
She pushed away that thought. She was overreacting. Some of this was probably jealousy. Another woman wanted him, after all. There were still her fears about leaving to blame this on.
She seemed to have one excuse after another. Meanwhile, there was so much emotion in Cole’s face. Desire and longing and something he wanted to say. Something that would make things right—
Then the doorbell rang.
“Food!” she said. “I’ll get it. Just stay naked.”
She leaped out of the bed, grateful for the reprieve, and rushed to the kitchen where their clothes lay scattered. Radar ran with her, his tags jingling merrily. He thought this was a game, not the end of everything.
“Just a minute!” she called toward the door, throwing on her skirt, buttoning her blouse quickly. Realizing her nipples showed through the fabric—what had Radar done with her bra?—she threw on her jacket, then slid her bare feet into her shoes, hoping to hide the fact she’d just had sex by looking put together.
She yanked open the door…to a woman in a pinstriped business suit. No delivery person, this one.
Her eyes went wide, her eyebrows shot up. Her thin and jumpy eyebrows. Kylie would have recognized them anywhere. Oh. My. God. It was Deborah. “Is Cole Sullivan home?” she asked.
“Uh, yes. Of course. Come in.” What the hell was Deborah doing here? Worse, what was Kylie’s excuse? Janie would kill her for this. “I’m…here to…” She spotted Radar heading toward the hall. “Get the dog. I’m Cole’s friend…the one with the dog. Radar, let’s go. Cole, you have company!”
“He’ll be right out,” she said to Deborah. “I think I, um, woke him up coming for the dog.”
She glanced at Deborah, who was staring at her, wanting to believe her, Kylie could tell, but not quite able to. Two dots of red—alarm or anger—popped onto her pale cheeks and began to grow.
“Radar, come on. Let’s go.” She grabbed the leash from the entry table, then realized Deborah was staring past her toward the floor. She turned and saw Radar trot her way, her bra in his teeth. Good Lord.
Deborah stared at the dog as though he’d taken a dump in the living room. Her eyes jumped up to Kylie’s.
“That silly dog. It’s his favorite toy, can you believe it? My old bra and he carries it around like a chew toy.”
Then Cole appeared, his shirt open over his chest, pants barely zipped, hair disheveled. When he saw Deborah, his jaw dropped.
“Cole?” she said in a quavery voice.
“Deborah! You’re early,” he said lamely, looking sheepish and guilty as hell.
In the silence, Radar trotted the bra to Kylie and dropped it at her feet, sitting back on his haunches.
Did I do good?
Deborah’s gaze zipped from the bra to the dog, to Kylie, and finally settled on Cole’s face. “No,” she said bitterly. “It looks like I’m too late.”
“I’ll just get Radar and his chew toy out of your way,” Kylie said and lunged for the dog, who galloped away. What the hell was Kylie doing? Pretending to be a dog sitter? And her bra was a chew toy? No one would believe that.
“There was a window in my schedule…” Deborah said faintly, sounding stunned. “I left you a message. Your office said you’d gone home early, so I came straight here. All the way from London. To surprise you.”
“I’m surprised. You bet.” Horrified was more like it.
“Radar, dammit, come to Mommy,” Kylie said through gritted teeth, bounding after the dog who seemed to be playing tag with her.
“What’s going on, Cole?” Deborah demanded, her eyebrows doing jumping jacks on her forehead. They were strangely thin, almost invisible.
“Deborah, listen, I—”
“Nothing’s going on,” Kylie blurted, ceasing the chase. “Really. Let me just get the dog out of here and you two can talk. I know Cole’s been dying for you to arrive, Deborah. Just let me get out of your hair.” She shot him a frantic look.
He hadn’t told Kylie Deborah was no longer a possibility, and now she was madly trying to salvage a relationship that was dead before it started.
Radar emerged from the kitchen at that moment. With Kylie’s panties in his teeth.
“Oh!” Kylie yelped and lunged for them, but Deborah, of course, had seen. She had the quick eyes and head movements of a nervous bird.
“So it’s true. You are sleeping with her.”
What did she mean by that? She’d suspected? How?
“It’s not what you think,” Kylie said to her, scooping up her panties and wadding them in a ball. “This is all a big, fat mistake.” She shot him an apologetic look. “Just erase this from your mind like it never happened.”
“Kylie…” he warned, not wanting to hear the most beautiful experience of his life described as a mistake, even to save hurt feelings.
“You lied to me.” Deborah’s voice went high and sharp as a blade. “We talked and talked and you never said a word. We agreed—no games, be honest, be direct.”
“I should have said something, I know, but you and I were just a possibility and—”
“And you and her?”
He looked at Kylie and his heart flipped over.
We were heaven on earth. Pure joy.
“We were killing time,” Kylie said, her voice jagged with emotion. “Just until you got here and I left town. Consider me gone already. Forget this terrible moment. Please.”
He felt her words like blows. He couldn’t let her go. Not now. Making love to her before the doorbell, he’d known it in his soul. Maybe she wouldn’t stay, but they could visit. They had to do something, work something out.
She turned to him. “I wish you every happiness, Cole.” Her face was sad and embarrassed and scared. “I’m sorry. I knew better. I should have just said goodbye like a sensible person.” She blinked quickly, bit her lip, then rushed off, pausing to scoop her bra off the floor and blast out the door.
“What about her dog?” Deborah demanded of him. “She left her dog. And, who knows. Maybe a slip?”
“Radar’s not Kylie’s dog. That was…”
“Another lie?”
“Yes, but…”
“Is that hers?” Deborah pointed at Kylie’s purse on the floor where she’d flung it when they threw themselves at each other while ordering food.
“Yes, it is. That’s Kylie’s purse.” He grabbed it and headed for the door, hoping for a private moment in the parking lot to explain everything, but Kylie had returned and stood on his landing.
“Hard to stomp off without my keys,” she said, taking her purse from him.
“I’ll call you,” he murmured. As soon as he talked this through with Deborah, to whom he’d been unfair.
“Don’t. I can’t handle it. I have to leave and you have to fix this.”
“You don’t understand. I—”
“I do understand. Just fix it.” And then she was gone.
But it was Kylie he wanted to fix things with. He wanted her in his arms, his heart, his life.
He turned to face Deborah, who stared at him, arms folded, her eyes red, lips tight and thin with fury. “How long has this been going on?” she demanded.
“Just a few weeks.”
“And you’re in love with her!”
It sounded ridiculous, but it was true. He was in love. Desperately. Wildly. Head over heels. “Look, Kylie is—”
“Stop saying her name like that. Like a wish or a sigh. It’s irritating.”
“I’m sorry, Deborah. I know it’s ridiculous. And I’m as surprised as you are really.”
“Oh, please.” Deborah’s hard eyes swam in soft tears. A few weeks ago, he would have been willing to give this a try, despite his misgivings. But not now. Not after he’d been with Kylie and felt what he’d begun to feel. His settled life with an appropriate wife wasn’t working out the way he’d planned.
“I’m sure Jane will have a number of other Potentials for you and—”
“Don’t you dare pity me, Cole Sullivan.” Her face seemed stung with red, as if from a slap. “I paid Janie Falls one thousand dollars so this kind of thing would not happen again. I didn’t want to compete with other women. That’s why I chose Personal Touch. Jane Falls stole my money.”
“She sent Kylie to meet me so I wouldn’t quit the service before I met you. Her intentions were completely honorable. She was trying to help you.”
“Please. If that woman had a clue what she was doing, she would never have put you two in the same room. You look at each other like…dessert or a dream or a jackpot. It’s sickening. Jane Falls is a fraud.”
“Be angry at me, not Jane.”
“Oh, I am angry at you, but how does that help? Compatibility scores mean zip when you’re in love with someone else. This has been a complete waste of time and…” Her lip trembled. “Just a waste.” She spun on her heels and marched out the door.
“I’m—” He started to apologize, but knew she’d think he pitied her. He’d call her later, take her to lunch, urge her to stay with Personal Touch, help her however he could.
Radar gave a low growl as she passed him. Poor Deborah.
Except then the dog growled at him, too. For hurting Kylie, no doubt. He had to talk to her, too. Tell her how he felt, see if she felt the same and figure out what they could do about it.
“Garrett McGrath, please… Yes, I’ll hold.”
In a way it was good, though. The shock showed her how far she’d strayed from who she really was. She was acting like Janie, who got so lost and sad after each breakup—and every move when they were kids. She would lose her appetite, pore over the photo album she kept of each place, dropping tears of desolation on the plastic cover sheets. Each drop stung like acid when Kylie watched. She hated, hated, hated seeing her little sister suffer. Her stomach would be tight with nausea.
Kylie had wished that Janie would handle it like she did—by holding back a little. That way moving became an adventure. New people. New places. New fun. She always did her damnedest to help Janie see it that way, but when they trekked through the new neighborhood Kylie often had the sense that Janie was just pretending to cheer up.
And now she understood Janie’s reaction. Kylie had never felt this much misery. She even had tears dripping onto her navy-blue lap.
She loved Cole. She wanted Cole. She missed Cole.
Which was ridiculous. Hell, the man had evidently been having long-distance heart-to-hearts with Deborah. Hopefully they could straighten it out. Deborah was what he needed, bad eyebrows or not, and Kylie couldn’t stand it if she’d ruined the match Janie had made for him.
The whole thing was bad timing. Bad timing to be having a farewell boff when his perfect match dropped in. Bad timing to fall in love with a man who was already taken…or at least promised.
She had to put it all in perspective. She wanted to roll into a ball and cry for hours. But she had steps to take, work to do, a future to step into. The S-Mickey-B hold music was Paul Simon’s “Still Crazy After All These Years.” She gritted her teeth. She would come through this fine. This was all for the better. She’d been playing with fire. And escaped with just the whiff of singed hair. Make that eyebrows.
“Hey, girl, Gina here. Garrett’s golfing somewhere. Can I help?”
She smiled at the sound of the friendly voice. Keeping her tone level, Kylie explained her plan to move over the weekend. She could handle the final Phoenix details from L.A.
“God, don’t hurry,” Gina said, surprising her. “We need to suck every bit of creativity out of you.”
“What does that mean?”
“You know, before group-think sets in.”
“Group-think?”
“Yeah. You start out with your own unique vision and fresh voice, but gradually the team grinds you down until you see and sound just like us.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I wish. Two years ago I was hot and new. Garrett hired me and now I’m hopelessly derivative.” Her tone was lightly ironic, but Kylie could feel there was honest worry in her words.
“That’s not true. You’re very good.”
“Maybe I’m being neurotic. Or maybe I was always derivative. Oh, and I should warn you that Garrett thinks the Home Town Suites stuff is, quote, ‘a mite confrontational.’”
“But that was the whole point.”
“Exactly. We have
got
to get Garrett to golf more. He’s a buzz kill in account meetings.”
“But Garrett is brilliant.”
“He’s the talent scout—sees it, reels it in. Just stick to your guns, Kylie. Push us out of our rut. No one wants to take chances or buck the partners. You’ll be good for us.”
While Gina’s words sank in, Kylie stared at a couple making out in the front seat of the car ahead of her, part of her wishing she could just escape into love like that. With Cole.
Group-think? Great. Something else to worry about. She’d thought the edges of the Home Town stuff were already rounded too much and now she’d have to convince Garrett not to squeeze it to pap? She’d barely accepted the fact she had ideas and now she had to do battle to use them?
Maybe she should delay her departure. Gina sure wanted her to. What about not going at all? She could help Janie with the final turnaround of Personal Touch, spend more time with her, ease the inevitable misery with the reporter she’d fallen for.
Oh, who was Kylie kidding? She wanted to see Cole, despite how impossible it was. He could be falling in love with Deborah this very minute. Kylie wasn’t herself.
Forget that. Now. She told Gina she’d think about her move date a little longer, and said goodbye just as she pulled into the parking lot of her office building. If only she could talk to Cole about this—the move, what it might be like at S-Mickey-B. Did she really want to give up her
own unique vision,
as Gina had called it? But she couldn’t talk to him. They’d broken up. Oh, this was agony.
And then, there he was, waiting in her lobby, sitting beside Candee’s desk, flipping through a magazine.
“Cole, what are you…?”
“I had to see you,” Cole said, rising. He let the magazine drop to the table. It slid to the floor.
“Well,” Candee said, looking from one to the other. “I’ve got class, I guess…in a while anyway.” She turned to Cole and said, “Good luck,” as if she thought he’d need it.
Then they were alone. In her office. Which Cole had never visited. Kylie’s heart heaved in her chest and her face grew hot. She wanted to run into his arms.
I love you…. Do you love me? Help me figure out what to do.
Instead, she said, “Everything straightened out with Deborah?”
“There was nothing to straighten out.”
“But you talked to her before? While we were…?”
“She called from London and we talked a couple of times. She seemed to feel more strongly about it than I did.”
“This is all my fault,” Kylie said, feeling despair and desperate hope. “Janie warned me I was distracting you. You have to give it a chance. You were counting on this. She’s perfect for you.” She fought like crazy to hide her real feelings, not even certain what they were. Her thudding heart and shaky breaths were her only clues.
“No, she’s not.” He stepped closer.
She stepped back. “Yes, she is. I saw her video.”
“You saw her video?”
She nodded, feeling miserable and foolish.
“You’re who I want.” He reached for her, but she froze. Everything inside her went still and scared.
“Deborah pointed out that I say your name like a sigh or a wish.”
“She did?”
“Kylie…” he said, as if trying out the tone. “How does that sound to you?”
Like heaven. “Like my name. What do you want me to say?” She swallowed, crazy hope filling her chest. Deborah was out of the picture. Cole wanted her. And she was terrified.
“I can’t stand the thought of not being with you. I feel better when I’m around you. Not so much like a hamster on a wheel. You make me laugh. You make me want to slow down and, I don’t know, plant a garden.”
Her heart felt as though it might explode. Cole loved her. Or at least he thought he did. She loved him, too, if she was capable of that in her current confused state.
Part of her wanted to sink into this feeling forever and the rest of her froze with terror. Cole mattered too much to her. It just wasn’t right.
“Say something, Kylie. Don’t leave me hanging…”
“I don’t mean to. It’s just a shock. And, well, maybe we’re making too big a deal of all this. Like a vacation we don’t want to end. Too much peanut butter brickle gets old.”
“Peanut butter brickle?” He shook his head, puzzled.
“Never mind. The point is that we’re having what Janie calls a ‘life-transition fling.’ You want a wife and I’m leaving town so we’re clinging to what feels good and safe.” The words hurt her throat coming out.
“Do you really believe that?”
She wasn’t sure, but she watched the possibility flicker in his dark eyes. “It makes sense,” she said. “Don’t you think? I’m not what you want. Maybe you don’t want Deborah, but you want someone like her. Someone not pushing so hard on her career.”
“When you love someone you compromise.”
“Not on your dreams. You know that. I can’t give up on mine, either. We care about each other, we had a wonderful time together, but now we have to move on.”
Keep moving. Keep your distance. New adventures
around the corner. New friends. Otherwise you could get hurt. Bad.
“How do you feel about me?” he demanded. He was stubborn, of course, the way she was.
“I’m not sure.”
“Do you love me?”
“I don’t know. I care about you. But it’s too soon and it’s not—” she swallowed a lump the size of a grapefruit “—enough.”
“Not enough. You don’t love me. I see.”
She fought like hell to not react.
He bought it and his whole demeanor went flat and still.
The lines of connection between them dropped like cut string and she felt abruptly alone and wobbly. Tears stung, but she blinked them back.
“I’m sorry, Cole. Maybe it’s not too late to give Deborah a chance.”
He shook his head. It was too late. “Goodbye, Kylie,” he said, and this time her name on his lips sounded just plain sad.