Everything to Lose (Moonlight Dating Series #2) (2 page)

“No tree?”

His tone was not accusatory, just matter-of-fact, but his simple statement wounded her. 

Turning away, she held her breath and rummaged for composure. “Oh, I’ve been so busy lately. Haven’t had time.”

She’d never
ever
tell him the truth of how it reminded her of past Christmases, when they would spend long evenings skylarking and teasing each other as they hung decorations all over their house; sweet times followed by hot, romantic interludes on the plush oat-colored rug by the fire.

Their bodies slick, entwined, in flames; her fair, sensitive skin darkened with the imprint of his fevered touch. The soles of her feet sliding over the tense muscles of his calves as he took her in deep, measured thrusts. The hard plains of his chiseled face, the consuming hunger in his eyes. Her palms digging in his rippled back as he strained to love her slow and easy…

She wiped off a tiny trickle of sweat from her brow – wiped off that sensual image and clutched harder to the specter of disappointment. Better to lose faith than unearth those moments of ecstasy from the attic in her mind.

No
.

She’d never tell him, not in a thousand years, how their separation had killed her inside, like a festering, gangrenous wound that whittled away at her flesh.

But the sound of his rich voice was a mean traitor to her resolve.

“I can help you if you
want me to. Can get it done
lickety
-
split.”

Right. They were still going on about that bloody tree.

She mustered the courage to look at him directly. “No, that’s fine. I’ll just keep the thing in the closet downstairs anyway. No use to bring it out just to take it back down to the basement in a couple of weeks. Too much work.”

And you’re not mine anymore.

Something else flashed in his bottomless light blue eyes—that same hint of vulnerability she had glimpsed a few moments ago—but it vanished so quickly, skittish like a sparrow among humans.

Silence.

Uncomfortable seconds ticked by until he finally took mercy on both of them.

“’K
ay, Lissy, let’s get that coffee brewin’ then.”

Her heart skipped a beat. Only he had ever called her Lissy; everyone else she knew used her full given name.
How
dare
he still address her that way?
She fairly stomped into the kitchen, dragging on puffs of cheap anger like a compulsive chain smoker.

He has no right.

But she checked herself. Anger wasn’t the way. In any divorce, no one side is the only cause, right?

As she walked before him
,
she briefly contemplated how the crude reality of Dane and Lisbeth Marsh splitting up wasn’t something she’d ever have betted on. But trying to make sense of things was much like trying to herd hissing wildcats.
An exercise in futility
.

She stepped behind the countertop and switched on the electric kettle.

“Instant cappuccino? I never got around to getting the machine.”

“Works for me.”

“Have a seat over there then.” She indicated the round dining table behind the bar area like she would to a new guest. It was like he’d never lived here or owned this place.

He took off his jacket and sat down to contemplate Jeanette’s package that she’d set on the table.

The last day she
’d seen
him before he left they’d sat in the kitchen just like this and argued while the coffee and syrupy breakfast pancakes went cold. It had been a dreary October day, the eighteenth to be precise, one of those unremarkable mid-week dates, which would otherwise have passed unnoticed on her calendar.

“So what if I want to take this position in Seattle?”

“I’m sick and tired of living like a nomad. We’ve been married six years and I followed you everywhere you wanted to go—Bristol, Atlanta, Charleston, Dallas—no complaints ever, and now I want to hold a baby in my arms. I want to get to know the neighbors and invite them to summer barbeques and Christmas parties! I want everything my parents had…”

Her voice trailed off, broken. Shattered like her stupid dreams.

“Millions of people live in Seattle and babies are born there, too. More so, what’s all the damn hurry?” he said defensively, predictably.

“So that’s the deal. You don’t want children.”

“You’re making a mountain out of a molehill.”

“Am I? My career’s also shot. I’d like to see you apply for a position with a firm and then explain to a potential boss you’d be gone within a few months!”

“You agreed to that when you married a well-paid
freelance web consultant
,” he spat out, sarcasm dripping from his voice. “I remember you bragging about me to your friends. Not proud any more, honey?”

She balled her hands into fists as
she quelled an overpowering urge to punch him in the face. “How could you be such a self
-
centered bastard?”

“Honey, you’re not the first to call me that,” he said coldly.

He was obviously hurt by her comment. She had never called him anything like that before, and it shocked her that she could be so callous. With her own husband, no less. What had they come to?

This hard, unbending Dane was a stranger to her. Her heart was breaking, but she knew she had to put a stop to this madness.

In as calm a voice as she could muster, she said, “If you want to go to Seattle, that’s fine. But I’m staying here in dreary old England.”

“What the fuck do you mean by that?” He wasn’t even pretending anymore that he hadn’t lost his cool.

“I’m British, after all, and this is where I want to be. You knew that eight years ago when you married
me
.
”
She
thoroughly enj
oyed
throwing his own reasoning
back at him. “I like it very much here. The neighbors are wonderful and I have a good chance of getting a position with a firm.”

Indeed, she’d lived in the London suburbs for most of her life—grew up in St. Albans, went to Catholic school there—and worked damnably hard to build a name in a thriving architectural practice when she met Dane. At the time, he had just moved to England after winning his fourth consultancy contract at barely twenty-nine, and he proceeded to turn her world upside down and back around. She was only four years younger but his adventurous life was a magnet she couldn’t resist.

Within nine months they said their vows amid Aunt Maggie’s mammoth flower arrangements, which had required the sequestration of all the yellow roses and daisies
in the entire county of Hertford
shire.

An arrow bore a hole in her heart like a highway carved through a mountain. She’d been happy to follow her heart wherever it took her, at least for a while. She just couldn’t do it anymore.

Sod him.

She paused and took a deep, shaky breath to brace herself, then made herself say those last treacherous words, almost as an afterthought—“But you’re free to leave if you wish.”

“So it’s like that, huh?”

She tucked her heart and soul away—away from her being—and returned his glare without a blink. “Yes. It’s
like
that.”

The anger continued to bubble inside them until it filled every square inch of the room, of the whole house until it bulged at the seams, unable to contain them both and their broken promises.

It would have been best to end the conversation there. She’d done enough damage, but she could take everything back if she chose.

She didn’t
. He
wouldn’t.

“In that case, I’d better pack my bags.”

“Fine.”

His eyes shuttered. “That settles it, then.”

He drifted out of her life the following morning, like a paper boat on the narrow canal of rain gathered heavily under a sidewalk. After that day, this house had become the hot drought after all the paper boats had ended in garbage and all the rain was gone, dried up by a beating hot sun.

It was an empty shell.
She
felt like an empty shell hovering about the hollow rooms, a ghost of her former self.

She was so lost in the gloom of her reverie that she jumped when a cool, calloused thumb lightly grazed her cheek and lingered on her sensitive flesh.

Electricity flowed through her, forged an instinctive connection between her mind and her treasonous body. The softest moan of pure delight surged inside her, up her di
aphragm, and taunted her
vocal cor
ds. Thankfully, no sound exited her lips.

Idiot.

She looked down and found herself holding a spoon in her fist, both hands poised on the cool granite by the empty mugs. Steam rose from the kettle. The water had boiled.

Good sense finally caught up with her and she drew back abruptly from his cataclysmic touch. It horrified her that she
wanted
his touch. Wanted to
feel
.

“You sure don’t make it easy on me, do you?” he whispered.

She pursed her lips while he regarded her with a candid look. Full of regret.

Not the cheerful, charming every man’s man that she knew. People loved him for that. Dane was level-headed, always in control of his emotions.

With the exception of that one time, the day it all came crashing down. For as long as she lived, she’d never forget the coldness in his eyes, the finality in his voice. He’d let her see the darkness inside him. The darkness he’d never trusted her enough to share with her.

She couldn’t be that kind of woman for him, the one who let him have his secrets or never questioned his motives. The one without a care in the world.

“Almost done here,” she said a little too loudly when he wouldn’t do more than stand still, his hand an inch from hers.

He started at her tone, as though she’d snapped her fingers in his face. “Sure thing.”

He stepped away. Perhaps he was afraid she’d lock him out if he didn’t.

She looked up at him then, held his eyes and knew…

No one could be more terrified than her.

He returned to the table, following her movements as she fussed around the kitchen
and
tried to calm her nerves
.

“Can’t believe how cold it is.” What else could she speak of when any discussion of substance lurked on unstable territory? Weather was good. It was safe.

“
Darn tootin’
.
” He sighed contentedly as the heat inside the house enveloped them. “Damn, feels good in here.”

She couldn’t help smiling at his
Texas
drawl
.
It was
a pillar of his roots planted during his childhood on a Texas ranch – an aspect of his life he mostly kept to himself, like a possessive lover. Although he often tried to suppress it under layers of manufactured corporate finesse, she could see right through his glib sophistry. It was all for show.

Do your fancy friends in Seattle like your country twang at all? Or perhaps you don’t ever show them who you really are,
she wanted to say but
held back like she often did.

The only time she’d let the devil rule her was at the end of their relationship. It was simpler to go with the flow.

“Steve and Rob next door
may
find your accent humorous
,” she quipped.

“Does that bother you?”

“I didn’t say that.” Again, she skirted the truth. Perhaps they both wore masks then to hide themselves from each other.

“You’d probably adapt like you always do.”
She said this
like it was a bad way to be. Like she disliked him for it.

Watch that tongue.

He visibly flinched while she stifled a curse.

“You never complained,” he said, his eyes alive with something dark and intimidating.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

It wasn’t that he tried to be fake, but it was like he had an alter ego, another person residing inside him who begged to be heard. Perhaps it all stemmed from a deep-rooted will to succeed. That part of him had always amazed her… how he could split himself into two different people at will. Two halves of one whole, but somehow, they didn’t fit together. A key piece
remained
missing.

He gave her a small smile tinged with sadness. “Yes, you did. And I reckon you’re right.” Contrite, apologetic.

She walked over to the table and handed him his cappuccino, taking extra care to avoid his fingers as he accepted the mug with an appreciative nod.

“Thanks.”

“Sugar’s right over there, in the usual spot.” She indicated the little apple-shaped jar in the center of the table.