Games People Play (25 page)

He touched the sleeve of her coat with a single finger, rubbed the edge, a comforting gesture. “How did it go?”

“It wasn’t exactly the joyous homecoming of a lifetime.” She stopped. “That’s not exactly true. It was a start. She’s mellowed a lot, and admitted she made mistakes with me. She has regrets, too. This world seems so full of them.”

“Are you going back to see her?”

Sydney shook her head. “She might come here this summer, but I can’t go back there. Like I said, the past is behind me. So is Nebraska.”

“I’m proud of you for calling her. That took a lot of courage.” The tenderness in his voice surprised and moved her. What he thought still mattered to her. Everything about him mattered.

“So did your leaving Avalon,” she said.

Two lines appeared between his brows. “It had ended long before I quit, Sydney. I couldn’t stand another minute after you left. Who told you?”

“Azure. She said you’re working as an architect.”

“Hmm.” Arid humor tugged at his mouth. “I don’t know how she heard that, unless it was from Garrett. She has her thumb on everyone’s pulse, I guess.”

“Is it true, then?”

“Azure is always right.”

Sydney laughed a little before she said, “I came away from my conversation with her thinking she cares about you.”

“She loves all her boys.”

Neither of them spoke for a long time, James examining the portrait again while Sydney stood across from him, taking in the wave of hair that fell over his forehead, the straight nose, the sensitive mouth. Ten minutes in his presence and she was falling again, but this time she didn’t berate herself. She simply let the feelings wash over her, the freed soul of her speaking its truth at last.

After a while he looked up and grinned. “I was naked a lot when I worked with you.”

“Weren’t you used to it?”

His eyebrows went up and she hurried, “Modeling, I mean. Naked. Ugh.”

She felt like a complete idiot until he looked away, a flush warming his cheeks. She’d never seen him blush before, and she liked his vulnerability. The last of the polish about him, the part she’d never been able to quite touch, fell away. Colm was truly gone.

“This portrait’s not finished,” he said finally.

Folding her arms on the countertop, she let her gaze drift over his face. “Does that bother you?”

“Well—shouldn’t you finish it?”

Sydney hesitated. “What do you propose?”

He gave a one-shouldered shrug. “We could finish it together.”

“You mean . . . at my place?”

His smile held the slight quirk of humor she’d so missed. “We could do it here, but somehow I don’t think you brought your paints.”

“My studio would be best.” God . . . what was she doing? She’d come here to resolve the last of her past. In truth, though, she’d known somewhere deep down that he would draw her close again, and oh, she’d craved it.

She glanced at her watch. “I’ll be at my place this afternoon. Can you meet me?”

“Sure.” He watched her straighten from her leaning position on the counter and finally came around to meet her. “How about four?”

They walked together to the front door, Sydney loathing to leave him even for a few hours. What would she do this time if their relationship blew up in her face? Could she—would she—ever trust him again?

She was borrowing trouble. Nothing about this arrangement meant a reconciliation, and the thought both distressed and relieved her.

They stood too close on the small landing, the breeze nipping at her cheeks.

“I’ll see you at your place at four,” he murmured.

Sydney nodded, zipped her coat, and headed down the steps, ever aware of his steady regard behind her. When she pulled her car away from the curb, he was still standing with the door open, watching her go.

Chapter Twenty-seven

A
nice lady in a fedora let James into Sydney’s building, saving him from being buzzed up.
Not safe
, he thought, but caught the door she held for him.

He let her go into the elevator without him and stood outside it for a long while after it closed, the portrait held tight under his arm. He hadn’t been able to read Sydney when she was at his house, but he liked having her there. She fit in, he’d thought as he leaned against the counter across from her, both of them looking at the half-finished portrait she’d painted. She fit into his life. There was room only for her.

But that morning she’d been inscrutable, the way she was the first time he met her, and God, he wanted her. It washed him in waves now as he studied the elevator, wondering if this was the worst idea ever.

The building’s entry doors swung open behind him, ushering in a cold draft and snapping him to life. A woman with a little boy offered a polite smile and stepped around him to let her child press the elevator’s Up button. Before James could ruminate further, he stepped onto the elevator after them and pushed three. Nervousness had him by the throat, but he swallowed the feelings and glanced down at the boy, who was staring at him in that uninhibited, eerily perceptive way of children.

“Hi,” James said. The child didn’t reply.

“I see you have a canvas,” the woman’s cheerful voice came too loud in the enclosed space. Her perfume was strong, too. It reminded James of fruit cocktail and Avalon.

“Are you involved with the artist who lives on the third floor?” she asked.

Involved? Hell, yes. Every aching cell of his heart.

“I meant to say are you working with her?” the woman rushed on. “She let me come in once and see her studio. She’s so talented.”

“Yes, she is.” He smiled. “And yes, I’m working with her.”

The elevator arrived at Sydney’s floor. James touched the boy’s head and stepped off. The doors slid closed behind him and he followed the short corridor to the door on the right.

For the week they’d been lovers, Sydney had insisted he keep the key. He’d never given it back, taking it out frequently to torture himself with the memories. They’d lived a lifetime in that one week.

Now he knocked lightly and waited, vaguely aware of the sound of someone’s music coming from another apartment. Coldplay. He grinned to himself but sobered when Sydney swung open the door.

“You’re right on time,” she said, her expression pleasant but distant. “I like that about you. Come in.”

There was a time he’d stepped through the door, whirled her against the wall, and made love to her, no holds barred. But times had changed. He had no idea what to expect.

He moved inside and glanced around. The Christmas tree they’d decorated was long gone. The living room looked naked without it.

“Come to my studio.” She crossed the floor, slowing as they passed the kitchen. “Are you thirsty?”

“I’m fine.”

She took the portrait from him, unwrapped it, and set it on an easel. A few feet away was a small platform draped in black cloth.

“It’s kind of cold in here,” she said as he sat on the edge to remove his shoes and socks. “Need a heater?”

“I’m fine.” He was short on words.
I’m fine
was all he’d said since walking into her apartment. They were both acting so awkward, he could barely stand it.

“Want me to get naked?” he asked bluntly to break the ice.

Her eyes widened a little, the only shift in her expression. “Just your shirt. Same as the old days.”

While he tugged his shirt from the waistband of his jeans and drew it up and over his head, he glanced at her. Her blue eyes were averted. She sat in utter stillness, the palette of paint clutched in her hands, looking everywhere but at him. The same remote woman he’d met that October night at the gallery opening.

“Jeans, too?” he asked, his hand hovering over his fly.

“Unbutton them, but not . . .” She flushed and looked at him. “You know. Just like before. Lean back on your elbows, jeans undone, one leg hanging off the side of the platform.”

He did as instructed, then waited.

Her throat moved when she swallowed and picked up her brush. For the first time James noticed she had Diana Krall on the stereo, a soft croon that soothed the senses.

Sydney worked in silence, and he began to relax, muscle by muscle. The air in the studio was too cool, but he welcomed it on his heated skin.

After a while she said, “James?”

“Yeah?”

“Want to play a game?”

He smiled at her, but her features held no humor in return. His heart took a leap. “Truth,” he said, guessing her thoughts.

She continued to paint, a faint frown knitting her brows. “Did you know the truth would be so destructive?”

“Yes.” Their eyes collided. “I didn’t want to hurt you. I didn’t want to lose you.”

“You tore me up.”

He looked down. “I know.”

“I hurt you, too. I hated myself that night.”

“Not as much as you hated me.”

“More, James. Much more.” Tears sparkled on her lashes, but she gave a small laugh and dashed her hand against her eyes. “I’m sorry for what I did to you.”

“I’m sorry for how much I hurt you.” He sat up, then thought better and stood, hitching his jeans up around his hips. “Are we still playing, Sydney?”

She shook her head. “No more games.”

He took a step toward her. “Forgive me,” he whispered.

“I do,” she said, and slid off the barstool to meet him halfway at last.

* * *

S
ydney held perfectly still, trembling as he leaned forward and brushed his lips oh so softly against her cheek. He drew back a couple of inches to meet her eyes, his own a turbulent, darker green.

“I still want you,” she whispered, laying a hand over his naked, thudding heart.

“I want you, too.” His fingers caressed her hair, his thumbs sliding along her jaw to tilt her face upward. “Should we forgive each other, then?”

She nodded, her breath coming faster as he leaned toward her again and this time kissed her lips once—and waited for her rejection. When it didn’t come, he kissed her again, and made a low sound of satisfaction when her mouth opened beneath his.

“I missed you,” he whispered between hungry kisses. “God, I missed you so much.”

“I missed you.”

“Can I hold you?”

“Please,” she said, her cheek coming to rest against his hard shoulder, and his arms slid around her to enfold her in sinuous warmth.

This time when he kissed her, she tasted him, and he tasted like Colm Hennessy, but hotter, softer. His tongue was gentle in her mouth, drawing her out, and suddenly desire seized her like nothing she’d ever known. She dug her fingers into his shoulders, feeling the resilient muscle beneath her fingertips. “Make love to me.”

He lifted her until her legs wrapped around his waist and walked her, their mouths fused together, to the bed, where he laid her on the mattress and followed her down.

Her palms slid over his bare chest, down his stomach, and he raised himself above her to give her room to caress him, his head lowered to watch her fingers move on his skin.

“I thought of this so many times,” he whispered. “Your hands on me.”

“I thought of it, too. Too much, I think.”

She pushed down his jeans and he lifted his hips to accommodate her, laughing breathlessly when she said, “Commando, I see.”

“To finish the portrait, but also for you. I didn’t know if . . . but I hoped.”

“I didn’t know either. But now I’ve never been more sure.”

Her heart took a leap when she realized he was trembling as hard as she was. He sat up and drew her up with him to tug her silk blouse free from her pants. His fingers skipped down the covered buttons, freeing them one by one, and when she shrugged out of it, he covered her breasts with his palms.

“You’re so beautiful.”

For him. Only for him.

He let his fingers trace the curves of her breasts, his thumbs brushing her nipples through her lace demi-cup bra until they stood erect. At the same time she drifted a hand down and touched the hot, hard part of him she craved.

When he groaned and his head listed to the side, she smiled in triumph. “You’re beautiful, too.” She stroked him, base to tip, squeezing slightly, until he sucked in a breath and bit his lip.

Then, to his utter frustration, she slid from under him and stood beside the bed, her fingers lingering on the button of her pants.

James watched her, his gaze heavy-lidded, as she undid the fastening and pushed down her slacks, slow, taking her panties with them, and then undid her bra and let it slide, teasing, languid, from her arms.

Heart pounding, he held out a hand to her and she took it, letting him lead her back to him. He would have drawn her beneath him again, but she shook her head and rose over him, strong and hungry, and settled herself above him.

Together they reached down to poise the tip of him against her . . . and frustration froze him. He closed his eyes and groaned, “Wait. Condom. And I don’t have any.”

Leaning as far to the right as she could without unseating herself, she reached into the bedside drawer and withdrew a packet. “You’re not the only one who comes prepared.”

His frown darkened. “I have no right to say this to you, everything considered, but . . .”

“But?” She smiled, knowing what would come next.

“I’ll kill anyone who touched you while you were away from me.”

Sydney laughed and brushed her mouth over his. “I bought them for you months ago. I was tired of you digging in your wallet.”

Breathing strident, he reached between them, tore open the packet, and rolled the condom down his erection while she watched.

“Oh, James,” she said, her voice hushed. “You’re so hard.”

“For you. Hurry.”

She straddled him again, and with his hands bracing her waist, she slid down and he pushed up, and they met in the middle of ecstasy too long anticipated.

She moved on him, undulating slow and languorous. He slid his fingers through hers and held her arms out to the sides, his gaze hot with desire as it raked her breasts, her stomach, down to where their flesh met so perfectly.

With a desperate laugh, James seized her waist and stilled her. “Stop . . . I’m going to come if we don’t stop for a second.”

She paused on the edge of climax, breathing fast, and smiled down at him. She loved his pleasure, his sweet agony. She would do anything he asked, even wait, knowing the delay would propel them into release.

After a moment he lifted his hips and they moved again, faster now, harder, until they danced like a well-oiled machine, and desire became a wild sort of pleasure-pain. This time he didn’t stop her when she tumbled over the precipice, crying his name. When she fell forward he caught her, clutching her close as he rolled her beneath him and thrust into her over and over. The pleasure built in her again and another orgasm rolled through her, and this time James let go of his control. She clung to his back and held him tight through the shudders that seized his body, her kiss swallowing the desperate sounds he made.

The sinking sun cast a red-gold light through the wide factory windows, painting their bodies with an ethereal glow when Sydney finally stirred and rose up on an elbow to look at him.

He was watching her, his green eyes drowsy. “Hi,” he said.

“Hi.” She leaned in to brush his mouth with hers and found herself drawn into another full-fledged, ravenous kiss. And oh, the hunger. She’d never be able to get enough of him.

“Cold?” He reached down and drew the covers over both of them before settling her against him, her cheek to his chest where she could listen to the easy rhythm of his heart.

“I can’t believe you’re here,” she said sleepily.

“Me either. I didn’t let myself think about it until I got your phone call. And even then I couldn’t tell what you wanted.”

“I wanted this. I wanted you.”

“Ah, Sydney,” he whispered, stroking her hair. “I’m falling all over again.”

She swallowed and pressed a kiss to his warm skin, too filled with joy to form words. She was falling herself, this time for a man named James whose secrets were hers, too, to keep.

“Will you trust me again, Syd?” he asked. “Believe in me?”

“I think so.” She scooted up to look into his eyes. “It might take me awhile.”

“We have time.” He gave her an easy smile, though she felt the tension tightening his muscles. “Let’s start over, you and I.”

This was the moment to let him go, to escape the chance for more sadness, more hurt. But in all her thirty years she’d learned that happiness was a fleeting state, just like grief, and the only promise was peace, if she would allow it to suffuse her. And it did. The fear simply dissolved, replaced by the beginning threads of love and hope as she shifted over him and kissed him again, softly, with tongue and delight.

He blew out a breath of relief. “We’ll take it slow, okay? One day at a time.”

She smiled at him. “We have to. I don’t know James Hanford.”

“I don’t know Sydney Watson.”

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” she said.