Addicted to Love (32 page)

Judge Pruitt and the sheriff, he decided, could just look somewhere else for campaign donations the next time they came up for reelection.

Kelvin looked over at Giada. She looked so self-assured sitting there on her little folding camp chair in her tight jeans and snug red sweater, with that smug canary-swallowing grin on her feline face — because she did look like a cat with her mysterious watchful eyes and her lithe, controlled movements. And like a cat, it was impossible to knock her off balance. She landed on her feet every time.

She was facing away from him, knees crossed, swinging one leg as rhythmically as a calico swishing her tail. She held the rod and reel loosely in her hands — casual, relaxed, a woman who had the world by the balls.

Who was he kidding? She had
him
by the balls.

Kelvin wished a big fish would swim along, take the bait, and snatch the pole right out of her hands.

“We could be friends, you know,” she said, completely out of the blue.

“Huh?”

“There’s no reason we have to be enemies.”

“The fact you’re gunning for my job is reason enough for me.” He didn’t like talking to the back of her head.

“Don’t pout.”

“I’m not pouting.”

“Yes? So why’s your bottom lip protruding?”

Kelvin sucked his bottom lip up against his teeth. She was looking out over the bow of the boat. He was behind her. How the hell could she tell he’d had his lip poked out?

Giada pulled back lightly on the pole and turned the reel half a turn, softly murmuring something in Italian. The seductive sound of her native tongue spoken on the crisp late- autumn air sent a spike of hot desire straight through his gut.

She uncrossed her legs and leaned forward on her camp chair, closely watching the ripples on the water. “That’s it, my sweet, take the bait.”

“You gotta nibble?”

“Shhtt.” She held up a hand, silencing him.

Her abrupt gesture irritated him. Everything about the woman irritated him, while at the very same time she turned him on in a way he’d never been turned on before.

He hated it. He loved it. Confused by his feelings, he plowed a palm down the length of his face.

“Gotcha,” she whispered in urgent victory, setting the hook and tugging back on her pole as she dialed in the line on the reel.

Eyes narrowed, Kelvin watched her haul in what had to be a fifteen-pound catfish. He snorted.

She tossed him a saucy look over her shoulder. “Jealous?”

He scowled.

“You know,” she said, expertly taking the catfish off the hook and slipping it onto a stringer, “you can sit there and be miserable, feeling sorry for yourself all day, or decide to get over your foul mood and make a competition of this.”

That piqued his interest. Kelvin was nothing if not competitive. “A competition?”

“Whoever catches the most fish today cooks dinner for the other,” she said, and the lilting sound of her voice raised hairs on his forearms.

“I have an even better idea.”

“Yes?” She swung around to meet his gaze.

“If I catch more fish, you drop out of the election.”

Giada’s hearty laughter carried across the water. “I don’t give up that easy.”

“Stubborn woman.”

“Pig-headed man,” she tossed back.

He studied her for a long moment. “How about this. If I catch more fish than you, you’ll give me a chance to prove to you that Valentine Land would be good for this town.”

Giada paused, considering his proposal. “I suppose that wouldn’t hurt. I am open-minded.”

“Fair enough.”

“And what do I get? ” she asked, eyebrows cocked on her forehead. “If I win.”

“That, Ms. Vito,” Kelvin said with the confidence of a man who’d never lost a competition in his life, “ain’t gonna happen.”

“Don’t be so sure of that,” Giada said, and held up the stringer with the flopping catfish. “I’ve already got a leg up.”

O
N THE OPPOSITE
end of Lake Valentine, at the very apex of the heart, things were shaky for Selina and Michael.

Selina had told herself she would be the bigger person. That she could get through this day and come out on the other side exorcised from the ghost of her marriage.
Face your fears and all that jazz
, she told herself.

But that’s not what happened.

She sat rigid, arms crossed over her chest, looking in the opposite direction as Michael guided the boat through the water. At this point, she was seriously regretting not kicking up more of a fuss on the dock, even getting into the boat with him. What had she been thinking?

Honestly, she’d been thinking this was her very last chance to work things out, to save her marriage. It seemed a foolish notion now. Michael hadn’t even looked at her since they’d cast off.

He found a secluded spot near the shore, cut the engine, and dropped anchor. Without a word, he went about baiting the hooks of both fishing poles.

“You don’t have to do that,” she said. “I can take care of my own pole.”

Michael raised his head to look at her. His face was cool, expressionless. “I never said you couldn’t.”

“You’ve always treated me as if I were helpless.”

“Huh?” Now he looked genuinely confused.

“You never let me run my own household,” she said. “You hired nannies and housekeepers and gardeners.”

“Most women would appreciate those things.”

“I know how to perform manual labor, Michael.”

“I know you do.”

“I’m not some hothouse orchid.”

He shook his head. “Am I thick as a brick or is this some woman thing that I’m not getting?”

Her cheeks burned as hot as if he’d boxed them. “It’s not a woman thing. It’s a human being, self-worth thing,” she snapped. “And yes, sometimes you’re as thick as marble.”

“What did I do?” he cried. “Just tell me what I did!”

“The fact that you don’t know,” she said, “is indictment enough.”

“Selina.” He put out a hand to touch her, but she drew back, raised her arms defensively.

“Don’t,” she said. “Just don’t.”

She turned her head, peered down at the water.

“Are you crying?”

“No.” She sniffled.

“Honey,” he whispered. “Are you all right?”

She raised her head, drilled him with her eyes. “Fine, I’m perfectly fine.”

“You don’t look fine.”

“Well, I am.”

She jerked her gaze away again, busied herself with casting her fishing pole.

“You’re driving me crazy.” He shoved a hand through his hair. “If you hate me so much, why don’t you just sign the damn divorce papers and be done with it?”

“Is that what you really want?” she asked quietly.

“No, it’s not. It was never what I wanted!” he shouted, the temple at his vein throbbing.

“Then why did you have an affair with Vivian?”

“How many times do I have to tell you? We didn’t have an affair. Okay, I admit, I flirted with her through e-mail. Big deal. It was harmless. It meant nothing until you made something out of it.”

His words stabbed her heart. The man truly did not get it. “I wasn’t talking about now,” she said quietly.

He blinked at her. The anger came out of him in one loud whoosh of air like an inflated balloon let go without being tied off. “Selina . . . it wasn’t what you think.”

“Please,” she said, raising her palms to ward off his excuses. “Don’t insult my intelligence by lying to me again. For once, stop denying the truth. Once and for all, come clean so I can forgive you.”

Their eyes met and what she saw reflected there both surprised and puzzled her. Michael looked as if he was hurting more than she was. “Okay,” he said and gulped. “You want to hear me say it?”

“I’ve been waiting twenty-seven years.”

“You sure?”

“I already know the truth. You reeked of her perfume when you came stumbling in from your bachelor party that night.”

His face contorted with pain and shame. “Okay, yes, yes. I had sex with Vivian on the night before our wedding.”

The words fell like bricks, hard and rough. They echoed off the water, sending ripples of sorrow throughout Selina’s body, even though she’d braced herself to hear them.

“Say it again,” she said, keeping her face as emotionless as she could.

“Sel . . . ” His eyes begged her forgiveness.

“Say it again.”

“I had sex with Vivian on the night before our wedding,” he repeated, his voice filled with contrition.

“I already knew.”

“How did you know?” He looked haunted.

“I know you better than you know yourself. What I want to know is why,” Selina said, sounding as clinical as a psychologist even to her own ears. “If you loved me the way you said you did, why did you have sex with the one woman who could kill my soul?”

“Because I was scared out of my skull, Selina. I was nineteen years old. I wasn’t ready to be a husband and a father.”

“You think I was ready? You think I wanted to give up
my
dreams of college?”

He looked stunned. “I thought . . . I thought being a mother was the most important thing in the world to you.”

“It was. Is. But if I could have chosen, I would have waited ten years to have babies. But I loved you and —” She broke off that train of thought. “What I do want to know is the reason you had the affair. Was it because you thought I trapped you into marriage?”

“It was just one night!”

“One night that changed the whole trajectory of our marriage. All these years, have you been pining for Vivian?”

He reached across the boat and grabbed her wrist. “No! God, no.”

The fire in his eyes sent blood rushing to her heart. She clenched her jaw. “It’s okay to tell me the truth. I can take it.”

“You’ve got to believe me. From the minute I first saw you, there was never anyone for me but you.”

Selina furrowed her brow. “And yet you slept with your ex-girlfriend the night before our wedding.”

“I was drunk,” he admitted. “But it was no excuse. I was scared and . . . ”

“Looking for a way out.”

Michael grabbed her by the shoulders and stared her straight in the eyes. The look she saw there was so passionate a faint flicker of hope flared in her chest. “You were the one I loved,” he declared. “The only one I’ve ever loved. And since we’ve been married I’ve never once cheated on you. Not even after you left me.”

“You haven’t” — Selina paused, appalled by how much hope was surging through her — “slept with Vivian since she came back to town?”

“No.”

She knew this man inside and out. Knew when he was telling the honest truth and when he wasn’t. His eyes did not lie. She swallowed, splayed a hand against her chest, felt her heart gallop.

They were breathing hard, staring at each other. Feeling things they hadn’t felt in years. Anticipation, relief, tentative trust, and a brief, bright flash of joy.

For one lovely moment, she thought he might kiss her. He leaned in closer. She tilted up her chin, her mouth suddenly dry.

If he kissed her, she was gone.

Please let him kiss me. Please let everything be all right. Please let the last twenty-seven years of my life have meant something.

A noise from the shore disturbed the moment. It was the sound of an expensive sports car engine.

Selina looked from Michael to the bank. They were near a picnic area. Cement tables and chairs. Shade trees. A parking lot. The scarlet red Jaguar pulling up was impossible to miss.

And so was the sophisticated woman slipping from behind the wheel, dragging a wooden picnic basket done up with a red-and-white gingham bow along with her.

Vivian.

She walked to the water’s edge, swinging the basket. She waved at the boat. “Yoo-hoo, Michael, I brought your lunch.”

Disbelief squeezed out the hope. Suspicion squashed the relief. Betrayal stomped the tentative trust.

“What’s she doing here?” Selina asked, hearing the ice in her voice.
I won’t shout. I won’t do it. I won’t give that bitch the satisfaction of seeing me lose it.

“Honestly, I don’t know.” Michael stood, the boat rocking beneath them. Selina stood up, too.

Michael had to have set up a rendezvous in this spot. He had to have known Vivian was coming. The woman was cunning, but there was no way she could have known where they’d be fishing if Michael hadn’t already told her.

Selina crossed her arms over her chest. “Don’t lie.”

“Okay, okay.” He raised his hands. “I might have told her where my favorite fishing spot was, but you have to believe me. I did not invite her out here.”

“Really, Michael,” she said. “I don’t give a damn. You want to be with Vivian. Go be with Vivian.”

Then Selina placed two palms against his chest and shoved him headlong into the chilly October waters of Lake Valentine.

J
UST BEFORE DUSK
, Rachael and Brody returned to the marina empty-handed. After Brody had done what he’d done to her, they’d spent the rest of the day kissing and canoodling and enjoying each other’s company.

While other Fish-A-Thon entrants unloaded their catches, she and Brody sat in the boat grinning at each other, waiting their turn to tie up at the docks. His gaze was on her. His eyes alight with a spark of sexual hunger so hot it caused a trickle of sweat to roll down her breastbone in spite of the cooling air.

The wake of arriving boats rocked their little craft like a cradle. Water splashed against fiberglass in rhythmic, soothing sound. The remaining rays of late-afternoon sunshine dappled off the lake in a glistening golden glow.

The combination of Brody’s hungry gaze mixed with the pastoral tempo of the lake ignited a deep yearning inside her. It was all she could do not to reach across the boat and kiss him again, in a dizzying lullaby of love.

No, no, not love.

Lust.

She had to stop confusing the two. Would she ever learn to stop confusing the two? She was a terrible Romanceaholics sponsor, unable to control herself when faced with temptation. The embarrassing thing was, she wanted more.

Lots more.

As long as you acknowledge what you’re feeling is lust instead of love, it’s okay to want him. Just don’t romanticize him and you’re hunky-dory.