Betrayal (8 page)

“Give me your hand.”

Mindlessly, I obeyed.

“Let’s go inside. Maybe it’s the chill.”

I stood, allowing Nox to guide me back into the suite. With only the slight pressure of his large hand in the small of my back I became his puppet.

“B-But our dinner?”

“Don’t worry. Mrs. Witt will bring it inside. If you’re feeling up to it, we can finish it in here.”

Hugging my midsection and calming the thoughts in my head, I nodded.

Once we were inside, Nox removed his suit coat and placed it over my shoulders. The intoxicating scent of cologne filled my senses. I wondered how I hadn’t noticed it outside. It must have been the breeze. With the soft satin covering my shoulders, I was enveloped in a woodsy scented cloud. Nox led me to a sofa near the windows while Mrs. Witt set our dinner on a dining room table.

His blue eyes swirled with gray and navy, like the clouds to his rumbling voice. “What happened?”

I lowered my chin, unable to answer, not because I couldn’t speak, but because I didn’t know.

His grin returned, if only tentatively. “Your coloring is better. How do you feel?”

I nodded. “Better. I really don’t know what happened. I-I don’t want to admit that I’m nervous.”

Nox’s confident tone was back. “Nervous? Surely, Charli, you’re accustomed to the attentions of men.”

I shrugged. “I-I’m not.” I looked up at his scrutinizing stare. “I mean, it’s not like this is my
first
either. It’s that I’ve been busy with school and, well, I haven’t dated in awhile.”

“School?”

“Yes, I recently graduated.”

“Tell me that you mean from
college
,” he demanded.

I couldn’t help the smile. Did I look that young? “Yes. I promise I’m of legal consent.”

“I didn’t doubt that.” His tone rose and he squeezed my knee. “Now, what it is that you’re willing to consent to
…
that’s what has piqued my interest.”

“Nox, this week is supposed to be my—well, our, my and Chelsea’s—
discover life
week. Discover and enjoy but take no souvenirs. I have a lot happening in the future.”

“Charli, I may have called you my wife at the pool, but rest assured, that’s not what I’m looking for. Simply put, I find you attractive—striking really. You’re well-spoken and witty. I like that. Believe me, when I decide a woman is mine, I hold on tight. But if we set the ground rules of going into this next week with no expectations for more, I can do that.”

I thought about his proposal as we moved to the table. Though the seared shrimp smelled delicious, I moved it around my plate more than I ate.

“Again with the rules?”

His forehead wrinkled. “Do you have a problem with following rules?”

“As long as they’re plainly stated, I suppose not.” Truthfully, I was too good at it. That was one of the things Chelsea has tried over the years to rectify. Live, be spontaneous, she’d say. “Take college for example…” I tried to steer the conversation away from the obvious.

We talked about my major. At first I told him it was quantum physics. After all, he’d said I was well-spoken. However, it didn’t take long before I admitted the truth. I’d majored in English with a dual minor in business and political science.

“Those future plans don’t include law school, do they?”

“Nox, I-I…”

“Yes, Charli, seeing as I still don’t know your last name, I’m going to assume that discovering life means some questions are off-limits. I can follow rules too, but I prefer to make them.”

I smiled. “Do you have a last name?”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

“Touché.”

With our meals as done as they were to be, Nox lifted up a new bottle of wine. “Shall we toast to a week of first names?”

I offered my glass. “I’d like that.”

His brow twitched. “I’ll add to that, a week of finding out what else you like and the
boundaries to your limits
.”

I almost choked on my wine as he added that final statement, but it was too late. As the crisp liquid flowed, I drank to his exploration of my limits.

“Are you up for going back outside? The view is why I stay here.”

I shifted to stand. The lighting within the suite was much brighter than what we’d had on the patio. With his drink in his right hand, he offered me his left, and I saw it—my limit.

Suddenly the handsome, powerful man in front of me was no better than every other man, no better than Alton Fitzgerald and all of his business trips.

My neck straightened. “I’ve changed my mind.”

“What?” Nox asked, visibly surprised.

I pulled my eyes from his left hand. “I forgot. I promised Chelsea that I’d be back to our room tonight. This week is about us. It really isn’t fair of me to leave her alone.”

“I saw your sister. I doubt she’s alone.”

Though Nox tried again for my hand, I pulled it away, busy with removing his jacket from my shoulders. Shoving what undoubtedly was a very expensive suit coat his direction, I reached for my handbag.

“Goodbye, Nox. It was nice to meet you. I’m sorry, but I do know my limits and I’ve already, albeit unknowingly, broken a hard one.” I hurried toward the elevator. “Please don’t attempt to contact me.”

As the elevator doors opened, I turned to see not only Nox’s puzzled expression but also Mrs. Witt’s. With my lips pressed together in disgust, not only at them, but also at myself, I stepped into the elevator and waited for the door to shut. When it did, I exhaled and tried to comprehend how either of them would assume that I’d be comfortable with this circumstance.

I didn’t care how good looking or charismatic Mr. Nox—no last name—was. I didn’t see married men. The tan line on his fourth finger was too prominent to be anything but recent.

“MISS CHARLI?” FREDRICK
asked with concern in his voice as I rushed from the private hallway. “Is everything all right?”

All right? No!

I took a deep breath. If I couldn’t stop whatever game Nox was playing from getting to me, I sure as hell could stop from showing it to others. Pausing only briefly, I replied, “Thank you, Fredrick. I’m not feeling well.”

“May I help you? Do you need assistance getting to your room?”

“No, I just need to lie down.”

“Really, Miss Charli, I don’t mind. I’m sure your host wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.”

My host
. I wasn’t born yesterday. Maybe I was being paranoid, but I believed as soon as Fredrick escorted me to my room, he’d report my room number directly to Nox.

“No, thank you.” I began to walk away. “That won’t be necessary. I’m sure your resort is safe enough for a woman to walk unescorted.”

“Yes,” he admitted coming out from behind his stand. “It is. However, if you need anything…” He handed me a card. “…you can call me direct.”

I took his card and dropped it in my purse. “I’ll be sure to do that. Good night, Fredrick.”

I hurried away and toward the guest elevators. As I waited for the elevator, my chin dropped to my chest, and I tried to stop the memories of our evening from replaying in my head.

Anger, shame, disgust—all of it swirled like a cyclone.

I was not only furious with
him
but also disappointed in myself. Then again, I tried to reason, we hadn’t done anything, not really. We’d talked and eaten dinner. Yes, I’d had some wine, but there was no touching. Well, he’d kissed my hand and helped me into the suite, but nothing overtly intimate.

It was still wrong.

I did my best to ignore the other resort guests passing by me. It didn’t matter what I told myself, how I tried to justify it, I was appalled with Nox
and
with myself. I lifted my unseeing eyes and faced the truth; this was exactly what I deserved for going on a mystery date. I may never have made my prospective dates fill out a ten-page résumé, as Chelsea had joked, but at least I knew their names and marital status before I agreed to go out with them.

I could justify my situation as all Nox’s fault, but if I did, it made me the victim. I wasn’t a victim. I refused to be one. I’d been there and done that. Alex Collins was not a victim. I’d made the decision to meet Nox for dinner, me and no one else. He wasn’t to blame for my decision.

When the doors of the elevator finally opened, a happy couple stepped from the elevator. If I hadn’t noticed the way they looked at me, I wouldn’t have even realized I wore a scowl.

Stupid, naïve people.

Happiness in another person wasn’t real. All people did was betray one another: if not on the first date, then eventually. Look at Alton and Adelaide. They were supposed to be my example of love, of a healthy relationship. Hell no! They were dysfunctional on more levels than I cared to admit. Alex Collins was better off without someone. Just because continuing the Montague bloodline had been pounded into my being, since I was old enough to understand, didn’t mean that I intended to do it. There was nothing Nox or any other man could do for me that I couldn’t do for myself. This was the twenty-first century. I didn’t even need a man, if and when I wanted to continue that bloodline. That’s what sperm banks were for.

Riding up to our floor, my neck straightened with determination.
I’m Alex Collins and I have a future and plans
.

Shit!

I stepped from the elevator onto the multicolored carpet. Each slap of my shoes more determined than the last. The last thing a future hotshot attorney needed was an affair scandal in her closet of skeletons. How dare he lure me in? So what if he had a sexy voice and even sexier eyes. Who cared if he had a body like a Greek god? Not me. None of it mattered because that pale line on the fourth finger of his left hand told me all I needed to know.

Nox was a filthy cheater. Just like Alton and just like seventy percent of the married men out there. Well, I shrugged, as I dug in my handbag for the key to my suite, I actually made up that statistic. It was probably higher. Once I was out of this damn dress, I would Google that shit. Maybe civil law wouldn’t be so boring. If there were that many cheating assholes out there, I could have a rosy future as a divorce attorney.

My lips snaked upward into a smile. This night had just been a learning experience, something to point me in the right direction. Tapping my keycard on the lock, I opened the door to our dark suite and stood silently for a moment, suddenly concerned I was walking in on something, or more precisely, Chelsea and someone. Instead, I was greeted by more silence.

The curtains were open. Without turning on the lights, I made my way to the balcony and opened the glass door. The mild air fluttered the hem of my dress, and I wrapped my arms around my waist remembering the softness of Nox’s jacket as it blocked the chill. In the darkness the rush of the surf created a low rumble. Our view might not be as spectacular as the one from the presidential suite, but it was nice. As I kicked off Chelsea’s high heels, I suppressed the emotions that threatened to bubble to the surface. Nox wasn’t worth my anger or my tears. I wouldn’t give him any more of either.

By the time room service finally answered my call, I had my silver necklace and earrings lying in a pile on the desk. “Hello, this is Al—this is Charli Moore. I’d like to order a glass—no a bottle—of your house red.” I didn’t wait for him to figure the total. “Charge it to my room and if you have it here in less than ten minutes, I’ll double your tip.”

Hanging up the phone, I pulled the blue dress over my head. I had wine coming and I planned to enjoy it. Some rotten cheater wasn’t going to ruin my second night of vacation. No, I was going to make a night of it. Before sitting alone on the balcony and listening to the ocean, I would soak in a nice, warm bubble bath.

“I can do this,” I said aloud to no one. “I don’t need Nox.” I worked to remove the bobby pins from my hair. “I don’t even need Chelsea.” I raked my fingers through the red-brown waves. “Pretty soon I’ll be living alone in New York.” I nodded to myself in the mirror. “And I’m nearly twenty-four years old. It’s about time I get used to spending some time alone.”

Realizing that I was carrying on an audible conversation with myself, I stepped from the bathroom and took another look around the suite. It was one thing to talk aloud to myself. It was another to have anyone hear me. Maybe I’d get a cat when I moved to New York. Then talking aloud wouldn’t be considered crazy.

I read the different bottles of bubbles, oils, and salts while warm water filled the tub. As I tried to decide which one to use, which fragrance I’d choose to replace the lingering memory of Nox’s cologne, I washed the makeup from my face. It was ridiculous that I was so nervous about our dinner. He didn’t deserve the time I’d spent in his suite or the time I spent getting ready for it.

With each passing second my indignation grew.

I turned off the running water in the tub as a knock echoed throughout the suite. Wrapping the white satin Del Mar robe around my body, I walked barefoot toward the door. In a few minutes I’d have wine and a nice bath filled with bubbles. Who needed anything more?

Looking through the peephole, I saw the customary navy jacket on the young man through the lens. His face was slightly distorted with the dome of the glass, but I could see him plain enough. Had it been less than ten minutes? I wasn’t sure. Hell, I’d go ahead and double his tip. He’d made it before my tub got cold. Besides the way this week was working out, I would probably become very acquainted with the room service staff. It was best to keep myself in their good graces.