Seeing Red (21 page)

But wasn’t it always? The man could smile about anything, and Meg envied him for it.

She set the frame back on table as he returned to the room.

“The machine will take about five minutes to brew.” He took a seat on the love seat adjacent to the sofa, which even under his substantial weight didn’t budge nearly as much as the seat Meg had chosen.

“Dammit.”

“What’s that?”

She shook her head. “Nothing. You need to work on your furniture.”

“Furniture is on my list. Among other things. I’ve been in flux lately.”

Part of that was her fault. She didn’t know if she should apologize or shrug, but in the end, did neither.

“You didn’t answer. Where’s Toby?”

“Right. You did ask. He’s with my mother. She came down to help me do some cleanup, and she took him to Great Wolf Lodge for a long weekend.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it, and shook his head.

“What? What were you going to say? Tell me, whatever it is.”

“Just that if I had known, I would have called. Would have come over. I didn’t know how to reach out to you and didn’t want to do it with Toby around.”

“It’s my fault. I overreacted, and that’s why I’m here. Obviously, I’ve had some time to think. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve said this in my life, but…you were right, and I was wrong.”

His eyes widened a hair. “I’m sorry?”

She had to laugh. She could hardly believe it herself. “You were right.”

“What exactly was I right about?”

The look of confusion he wore was so damned adorable she wanted to grab him by the ears and kiss him, but she sat on her hands and resisted. “All this time you were looking out for me. Toby, too. I guess at one point I was feeling a bit jerked around, especially after you met with Spike. I didn’t know what your motives were.”

“I’ve—”

She unseated her hands and put them up, quieting him. “I know. You haven’t had any motives. You are an odd duck, Sergei Rozhkov.”

“You sure you haven’t caught something? I heard Rozhkov’s Disease is contagious.”

She scoffed. “I don’t know which of my friends I owe for telling you about that, but yeah, maybe it is. I’m surprised it’s not more infectious than it is. Or maybe I should say, I’m lucky that it isn’t.”

She must have been talking in one hell of a circle, because that look of confusion on his face deepened.

The coffeemaker beeped, and Seth stood. “Hold that thought. Be right back.”

“Yeah.”

While he banged around in the kitchen, opening and closing cabinets and drawers, Meg leaned over and perused the piles of paperwork on the coffee table, just out of curiosity. She wondered just what kind of clutter an astrophysicist-slash-aerospace engineer accumulated. There was a stack of printed MLS listings. Takeout menus. Health-insurance booklets, one with her name on it, which she pulled onto her lap to inspect. One thick envelope gave her pause.

She nudged it closer and squinted at the return address.
Ellison Relocation
.

“Relo?” She picked it up, and brazenly pulled the sheath of paper out of the ripped envelope. Quickly, she scanned, giving not one shit about the personal nature of the correspondence. If one’s wife wasn’t privy to her husband’s job status, then who was?

She didn’t bother looking guilty when Seth walked in with the coffee cups.

“Was wondering where that went.”

“I bet.” She tossed it on the table, then tried, and failed to stand. She growled and kicked her heels against the sofa front.

“What’s wrong?”

“You’re moving to fucking Boulder? Are you kidding me?”

“Megan, I—”

“Seriously, do you recover that quickly? I had hoped that maybe my mother was right, and you felt a little something for me. That’s why I drove down here at the ass-crack of dawn.” This time when she tried to heave herself off the sofa, she succeeded with an aha! She stomped to the door. “Screw the coffee.”

“Wait, can we discuss this? You’re overreacting.”

“Say it again.”

“What? You’re overreacting?”

“That was it.” She huffed past him and planted her palms against the door. Before she could manage to turn her wrist, he grunted and wrapped his arms around her waist.

“I hate doing this. Hate it.” He picked her up and carried her, kicking, to that damned trampoline of a sofa where he dropped her unceremoniously onto her belly.

Before she could scramble up, he straddled her legs and pressed a palm between her shoulder blades, pinning her. “I don’t like manhandling ladies. Regardless of your behavior right now, I count you in that group.”

If Meg could have startled, she would have, but she was pressed too tight against the plaid. “Did you just make a joke?”

“I guess. Up to you to decide how funny it is. Finish what you were saying before the coffee.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

She sighed, feeling her reserve crumbling. “What difference does it make?”

“More than you know. You’ll feel better once you get it off your chest.”

“You think that or you know?”

“I hope.”

Fair enough. “Let me up, Sergei.”

“Are you going to run screaming like a headless chicken?”

“I—wait.” She furrowed her brow. “You just mixed a couple of idioms there, sweetie, but no, I’m not going to run.”
Yet
.

Slowly, he let her up.

She backed into the corner of the sofa and pulled her legs against her chest.

He picked up his coffee cup and sipped. “Tell me.”

“Okay, since I really have nothing to lose at this point. I think sometimes we have a bit of a language barrier, and it’s not just the English-Russian thing. I’ll get right to the point.”

He had the good grace to set his coffee down.

“Would you like to go out with me?”

That didn’t seem to be what he was expecting. “What?”

“Go out with me. Like, date. Be my boyfriend.”

“I understand the words you’re saying, but perhaps not in the correct context.”

God, he was going to make it hard for her. Maybe she deserved it. “Do you like me, Sergei?”

“Of course I do. More than like you. I think you know that.” He batted her uncombed hair out of her eyes and leaned down to meet them with his gaze. His smile was tentative.

Heat rose from her heart to her hairline, and she stared down at her shoes. “Toby idolizes you. He doesn’t even understand what it is you do for a living, but he wants to do it, too.”

“He’s a great kid. I meant what I said, Megan. I wouldn’t mind if people made assumptions about me being his father. Whatever he needs, you tell me, and I’ll make sure he gets it.”

“I know you will, but that’s not your job. But we’re getting off track here. What I came down here to tell you was that I don’t want an annulment. Not yet, or ever, if this works out. I want to try. Really try. But, you’re leaving.” She laughed, but it was bitter.

“Megan…” He blew out a breath and pulled her close, resting his chin atop her head. “Like I said, you were overreacting. Those papers are from June.”

“June?”

“I take it you didn’t read the date.”

“No.”

“June. Before we got married.”

“Wait.” She swatted him away and put some space between them. “You’d have to be an idiot to turn down a job offer like that. Why?”

He raised his shoulders and reached for both coffee mugs. He extended the second one to her, and she took it, glad to have something in her hands.

“It was a lateral move, really. I was only considering it because it’d be a new experience. New facility. Pay’s about the same, with a slight cost of living adjustment.”

She whistled low. “Lot of digits in that offer.”

He wriggled his brows behind his coffee cup. “I have a unique skill set and Russian citizenship. The company pays me well to keep me and my American education in the United States.”

“You make about four times what I do, and here I was worrying about you starving to death.”

“Told you. I eat well.”

He didn’t hear his unintentional double entendre, and she gave herself a mental pat on the back for not saying, “Yes, you do.” Instead, she hedged with, “We need to do something about your bogus citizenship. You’ve got an American wife. Putative American kid.”

He chuckled and rubbed his eyes with his free hand. “Yeah, that needs fixing. I think Stephen’s working on it…in between wooing some woman who’s playing harder to get than any I’ve ever encountered, and that’s saying something.”

“Why didn’t you take the transfer?”

“I think you know.”

“Really? You refused it to do a favor for a maniac, redheaded shrew?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Because Sharon told me she really believed we each had something the other needed, you and I. I can always move, but how many chances is a guy like me going to have to claim a trophy wife?”

“You’re an idiot.” That heat traveled up her neck to her cheeks again, but this time she didn’t try to hide it.

“I liked the idea of marrying within our little tribe,” he said.

“Yeah. I guess I do too, now. And it wouldn’t have happened otherwise.”

They sat in silence for a while and sipped, occasionally sharing shy glances, and then they both spoke at once.

She said, “Thank you. For everything.”

He said, “Tell me. Why’d you pick that ring? I know now it doesn’t suit you.”

She looked down at her left hand and studied her ring finger. She’d forgotten about that garish thing. It was overkill. Fit for a rock star’s wife, which was a job she was never suited for in the first place. The ring was meant to be seen from afar, but this stage in her life was about blending in. Discretion. Normalcy.

She’d missed being normal, or as close to normal as a Scott could manage.

“You’re right. It doesn’t suit me. I actually don’t like being stared at. It was meant to be a billboard, I guess. You know, Spike never bought me one. He wanted me to get his name tattooed on my finger, and I refused. I ended up buying my own band after the wedding. He never wore a ring.” She slipped the ring over her knuckle and held it up to the light. “Could probably put a down payment on a house with that thing.”

His lips quirked up. “If anyone from the press asks, you could tell them you lost it during your second honeymoon.”

“Oh yeah? Where are you taking me?”

His smile pulled in slightly, and he cleared his throat. “Someplace cold. Someplace where skimpy bathing suits would be inappropriate.”

“You liked it.”

“I liked it too much. And so did everyone else.”

“How about a modest one-piece? No cutouts, no butt floss. I think Toby wants to see Aruba.”

“Oh, Toby does, huh? As if I could say no.”

She bared her toothiest grin. “I’ll give you veto power over the suits, as long as you promise to not take any more light reading with you. Makes a girl feel like she’s not entertaining enough.”

“If you really think that, you need to have your head examined. I think you may be too entertaining. I still have a bit of a cramp in my calf from that last time.”

“What can I say? I like that you like touching me.”

“I like that you want me to touch you.”

Had that really been an issue for him in all that time? Fear of her revulsion? He had to be fucking kidding.

He offered her a lopsided grin and shrugged.

“Wow. How about we go do some touching right now? Got time before work?”

He set down his coffee cup and pulled her to her feet. Without warning, he tossed her over his shoulder and trekked to the front door. He locked it, then hauled her down the hall like a rolled carpet.

When he tossed her onto his unmade bed, he had a devilish glint in his gaze. “Not nearly enough time, but I’ve got an hour for a quickie.”

She smiled when he yanked her pants down her legs in one easy pull. “I’m all yours.”

Pausing his undressing to press a kiss on her lips, he whispered, “I know. And you have no idea how long I’ve waited for it.”

Holley Trent

Holley Trent is a Carolina girl gone west. Although raised in rural eastern North Carolina, she currently lives on the Colorado Front Range with her husband, two kids, and two cats. She writes sexy contemporary and sassy paranormal romances set in her home state.

The characters in
Seeing Red
’s world were inspired by Holley’s experiences at the University of North Carolina—a place where geeks, preppies, and country boys converge.

She liked the geeks best.

To learn what other stories Holley has in the pipeline, please visit her website at
 
www.holleytrent.com
.