HIGHER (The Indigo Lounge Series) (6 page)

The sense of déjà vu hit her the
moment she crossed the foyer and exited into the sunshine.

The town car was back on the
kerb. And she watched, her heart in her throat, as Zach opened the back door
and slowly stepped out.

Chapter Eight

Her parents’ banter stopped as
she froze on the sidewalk. Her mother followed her stare and her eyes widened
as her gaze lit on Zach.

“Sweetheart, is everything okay?”
her father demanded.

“I…yes.” Her voice emerged in a
croak and she cleared her throat.

Zach stepped forward. “Hi.”

“Uhh…hi.” Despite the avid gaze
of her parents and the tempest of emotions crashing through her, she couldn’t
stop her eyes from devouring him.

Sunlight glinted off his face and
hair. A curl had fallen halfway down his forehead and her fingers itched to
brush it back.

As usual even the most casual
clothes made his body a work of art that demanded attention and worship. This
morning he wore a simple white T-shirt and jeans. The strong line of his
bronzed throat and powerful shoulders made heat pound through her.

He stepped forward and her breath
caught as she noticed what he held in his hand.

“I won’t keep you. I just wanted
to drop this off. Happy birthday.” He held out the large white velvet box tied
with silky black ribbons.

“Umm…thanks.” She took it and
cursed herself for her sudden monosyllabic ailment. Her eyes clashed with his
and her pulse jumped again. She wanted to stay there, gorge on his beauty. She
wanted to run away from the strength of her feelings.

She knew her parents were
wondering who he was.

Both her mother and father had
known and liked Chris and had been concerned when they broke up. Of course,
Bethany had never told them the real reason behind the breakup but her mother
had hinted more than once that she hoped Bethany would patch things up with
Chris. Now she saw the keen speculation in her mother’s eyes and hurried to
speak.

“Mom, Dad, this is Zach.” She
deliberately withheld his surname. Her parents weren’t media hungry but she was
sure they knew who Zachary Savage was.

Zach’s eyebrow rose at the curt
introduction. His eyes also told her he was aware she hadn’t mentioned his
surname.

Zach held out his hand. “Mrs.
Green, Bethany’s told me a lot about you. It’s great to meet you.”

Her mother smiled wide and
preened beneath the charm oozing from the man who’d once again caught Bethany
completely off guard and turned her brain to mush. “Please, call me Felicity.”

Zach smiled and said, “Thank you,
Felicity.” Her mother melted into a shameless puddle.

Her father was less malleable.
His eyes narrowed slightly as he shook hands with Zach. There was no invitation
to use his first name but Zach lost none of his charm, nevertheless.

“Can I give you a ride anywhere?”

She forced her brain to track and
shook her head. “My parents brought their car. We’re driving to The Village.”

A hint of disappointment dulled
his eyes but he nodded. “Okay. Enjoy your day.”

“Thank you.”

Her parents said goodbye and
headed towards her father’s SUV.

Bethany tried to move. Her feet
wouldn’t comply. Zach seemed incapable of movement either. They stared at each
other, his hunger undisguised, her heart clamoring in return.

“Your father’s watching me like a
hawk.” His gaze dropped to her mouth and his tongue touched his lower lip.

The shameless evidence that he
wanted very badly to kiss her made heat bloom into her face as she wondered
what her parents were seeing as they looked at them.

She licked her tingling lips and
his eyes darkened dramatically. “I have to go.”

“I’ll call you tonight.” There
was an implacable bite to the statement.

She wanted to refuse but truth be
told she was beginning to recognize that forcing things with Zach would get her
nowhere. At least by talking to him on the phone she could keep her emotions
under control and maintain a little distance “Okay.”

Pleasure lit his eyes at her
simple agreement. He grasped the door and nodded to the present. “I hope you
like it.”

Bethany glanced at the box in her
hand. She’d forgotten about it but now curiosity spiked through her. She wanted
to open it there and then but she knew her parents were waiting for her. Also,
she couldn’t be sure that it would be appropriate for public consumption.

Zach laughed as if he’d read her
thoughts. “It’s perfectly respectable, Peaches. A little sentimental, even. The
naughty stuff will keep for behind closed doors.”

She refused to blush. Luckily,
her body complied. “Bye, Zach.”

She turned and walked away. Her
body’s acute tingle told her his eyes were firmly fixed on her.

Opening the back door to her
father’s SUV, she slid in and slammed the door. Her father’s searching gaze
caught hers in the rear-view mirror.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

“Sure, Dad.” She smiled and
quickly shoved the box into her purse and pulled on her seatbelt.

“What a charming man. And he
looks very familiar. We haven’t met him before, have we, Beth?” Her mother
asked with a frown.

“No, I don’t think so.” She
couldn’t think how anyone who met Zach could forget him but she wasn’t about to
say that to her mother.

She firmly changed the subject
and breathed a sigh of relief when her parents moved on to discuss what was
happening in their lives. By the time they reached the busy street where the
art galleries were located, Bethany was up to date on everything involving the
Green clan, including her grandmother’s upcoming hip operation.

As they strolled from gallery to
gallery, Bethany tried not to glance at her watch. Or stroke the velvet box
burning a hole in her purse. Or think about Zach, wonder what he usually did on
a lazy Sunday afternoon.

She knew what he’d been doing two
Sundays ago. Round about this time, he’d been frisking her in his office.
There’s been nothing lazy about that, nor in the days that followed. No, the
days had been spent in high octane, world-rocking sizzle and turbulence. The
come down from that high was unbearable.

Over lunch, she tried to eat more
than a few mouthfuls when she caught her father’s concerned frown yet again.

Considering it was her favorite
Italian restaurant, she knew anything less than a healthy interest in her food
would trigger a full interrogation. Luckily, she managed to avoid it and
breathed a sigh of relief when her parents dropped her off back home just after
seven in the evening.

She let herself in and leaned
back against the door, her fingers already reaching for the velvet box.

Pulling it out, she slowly sank
onto her sofa and stared at it. Much like she’d stared at the envelope that had
changed her life just over a fortnight ago.

Recalling how she’d felt then,
her fingers shook and uncertainly crawled over her. It was hard to believe that
a box could change her life. But an indigo envelope had. In such a profound and
definitive way she wondered how she’d ever imagined she was alive before she’d
met Zach Savage.

She slowly pulled one end of the
black ribbon. It fell away, immediately forgotten. Swallowing, she pried it
open and her mouth dropped open at the exquisite bracelet propped up on the
velvet cushion.

The six linked dime-sized platinum
circles were studded with diamonds. In the middle link was a locket that sprang
open at her touch.

The clearly expensive jewels
weren’t what made Bethany gasp in shock. It was the picture inside the locket
had been taken as she came across the finish line during the camel race, a huge
smile on her face as she punched the air with her hat in triumph. Her face was
creased with such open happiness tears spring into her eyes.

She’d had no idea that her
picture had been taken. Had Zach taken it?

What did it say about her that
she’d been so far gone, so singularly focused on him that she hadn’t even
realized these pictures were being taken?

She fingered the charm and tried
to keep herself from dissolving into a seething mass of misery.

Her phone rang and she groped
through her purse for it.

“Hello,” she croaked, then
sniffed loudly.

“Bethany, Christ, are you
crying?” Zach demanded hoarsely.

“No. Yes!”

“Why?”

She gave a choked laugh. “Because
of you, Zach. You’re turning my life inside out. And I want to hate you for it,
but I can’t seem to. I just opened your present, and I…”

“Did you like it?” he asked with
a thread of anxiety that made her breath shudder out.

“Yes.”

He fell silent for several
seconds. “Baby, it’ll get better. I promise.”

She wiped at her eyes. “I can’t
see how.”

“Just…you have to trust me.”

She swallowed and laid her head
back against the seat. “It’s my birthday. I want you to do something for me.”

“Name it.”

“I deserve an answer to one
question.”

His breath hissed out. Silence held
a potent mix of hope and despair. “Okay. One question.”

“Did you…” she stopped, squeezed
her eyes shut and tried again. “Did you mean to kill her?”

A shuddering breath echoed down
the line. Ice cascaded down her spine.

“Bethany. I think you know by now
that my life isn’t that straightforward.”

“Just answer me, please.”

He hesitated. “I don’t want to
risk you retreating even more that you are right now.”

“I won’t if what you tell me is
the truth.”

“I’d never lie to you. I may not
always be in a position to give you full disclosure but I’ll never lie. Tell me
you believe that?”

“I believe you.”

She waited, her insides withering
with each passing second. Finally, she couldn’t stand it a second longer. “So.
Did you?”

“Yes. And no.”

“Oh God, what does that even
mean?”

“It means…there was a series of
events. Events I can’t talk about. It was a chaotic time in my life, Bethany. A
lot of shit happened. Part of it, hell most of it was my fault.”

“What sort of shit?”

He inhaled raggedly. She could
hear a low rhythmic sound, as if he was drumming his fingers on a surface. “The
usual shit that comes with misguided youth and unlimited funds. Insane
partying…sex…drugs.”

Her breath caught. “Was that how
she died?”

The drumming stopped. “Don’t do
this, baby. Please. Bottom line is she died. And I was responsible.”

Anger clawed through her,
blanking out the misery for a few relieved seconds. “You know what I should do?
I should be more like you. Just take the wall to wall sex and shut off the
emotion.”

“You think I’m emotionless?”

“I think as long as you have sex
you can survive without getting emotionally invested, yes. Did you learn to
block it out? Is that what she did to you?”

“Perhaps it’s what I did to
myself, in order to cope.”

“That’s what I mean. I should do
the same. Then we can be two emotionless people, indulging in mindless sex just
for pure relief.”

He fell silent for so long she
wondered whether he would end the call. But his breathing remained strong and
steady.

“The idea is not without merit,”
he finally said. “As long as the mindless fucking involves each other.”

She gasped. “Oh, fuck you, Zach.”

“Yes. Soon. Like yesterday.”
Tension throbbed in his voice. “Last night, watching you…it nearly killed me. I
don’t know how much more of this I can take.”

At the reminder of last night,
her anger oozed out of her, leaving behind the sticky mess of misery and
arousal. She bit her lip against the need to confess that it nearly killed her
too.

“Did you have a good time with
your parents?” he asked abruptly, as if he found the subject of sex or the lack
of it as tormenting as she did.

“It was fun, yes.”

“I like them,” he said again in
that snappish voice that told her his tension was still riding high.

“My mother was charmed by you.”

He gave a short laugh. “But not
your dad?”

“You’ll probably find him a
tougher sell,” she replied and stopped. Zach would most likely never get the
opportunity to sell himself to her parents. Lord knew where all of this was
going but there was no way she was exposing him to her parents and have a Chris
situation happen all over again. Her mother was already half in love with Zach
as it was. She sucked in a breath and tried to think of a safer subject.

“Did you find an apartment yet?”

“Yes. Would you like to see it?”
he invited.

She yearned to say yes so badly,
her vision blurred. But as bad ideas went, that would top it. Besides, she had
no desire to keep piling the anguish on herself and seeing Zach’s apartment
would trigger a need to wonder what it be like to share the space with him.

“I’m sure it’s great but no,
thanks.”

“Ok,” he replied.

Perverse hurt scythed through her
at his easy acceptance. “Ok?”

“It’s not ready to move in yet.
Not till the middle of the week. You can come see it then.”

“I won’t be able to. I’m going
back to work tomorrow.”

“You can still take a lunch
break. Or come after work.” That implacable tone was back again. Against her
will, thrills of excitement spiked up her spine. “It’s not far from where you
work. I can have you there and back in an hour.”

Again, it struck home hard just
how much Zach knew about her life. “It’s my first day back. I’ll probably be
inundated and won’t have the time.”

“Taking a break shouldn’t be an
option.” She heard the frown in his voice.

“In an ideal world. But I don’t
mind when there’s work to be done.”

“Dare I hope that statement
applies to us, too?”

“There’s a Kenny Rogers song that
I could sing to you right now but I’m not sure you’d get the message.”

He laughed and her heart turned
over at the sound. “I’ve never heard you sing, baby. Bet you’d be good at that,
too.”