Wrong Man, Right Kiss (20 page)

He looked up at the ceiling and pinched his eyes shut as though supremely tested. She thought she heard him counting under his breath, stopping at thirty-eight, his hands still clenching and unclenching.

Gradually, he turned around to plant his hands on the wall, then stared out the window with his forehead almost touching the glass pane. His voice was a coarsened whisper. “I’m damned well listening. So talk.”

Molly dragged in a breath as she watched his hands splay wider on the wall. She longed to feel those fingers again, feel him touch her, caress her, hold her. “Garrett wanted to talk to me that day I went to his office. He wanted to discuss our relationship.”

His hands fisted against the window frame. “Whose?” he asked, his knuckles white. “His and yours?”

“Yours and mine, Jules.” She flung her hands up in exasperation. “Obviously! So I told him—”

He spun around like a cyclone. “You told him that I was leaving the
Daily,
and my family could have ruined everything I’ve planned for years. What
else
did you tell him? You were fishing for his approval by ratting me out, weren’t you?”

The hurt that exploded in Molly’s chest was so massive that she almost staggered. “Do you really believe that?
Do you?
” Her voice sounded panicked, but she didn’t care.

The look he shot back at her was so raw and stark it all but extinguished her candle of hope.

Her voice broke, and she opened her hands out in silent plea. “Look, I’m sorry, Jules. It wasn’t on purpose. I was angry about the way they tried to warn me off you and wasn’t even thinking clearly. Please, please help me out here. I’m so in love with you I just can’t bear this anymore.”

“That information wasn’t yours to share and
especially
not with them, Moo!” He shook his head and plunged a hand into his damp hair. “Look, I just can’t talk to you now. I can’t. I’m too goddamned pissed that you would…” A halting hand shot up in the air when she started forward, and she abruptly stopped, her heart in her throat.

He sighed and backed away from her, and every step he took felt like a mile she would never be able to recover. He took a seat on the window bench, and Molly eased back and ended up alone on a floral couch, silent and hurt.

He didn’t say he loves me back
was all she could think.
God, please, doesn’t he care for me just a little bit anymore?

She thought of how easily he had jumped between lovers and beds his entire life and she wondered if there had been women warming his bed all this time, comforting him while she’d been pining for him alone, producing the worst artworks of her life because of him.

Seduce him,
a little voice whispered.
Make him forgive you.

But the thought made her feel cheap and as fake as he thought her to be. How could she go through with a seduction? First of all, he wasn’t even giving any indication that he still
wanted
her. And it had never been just about sex between them. It had been about friendship and fun and sharing and trust….

Trust.

Once long ago, Molly had been careless and had broken Eleanor Gage’s prized crystal figurine, one up on display over the chimney mantel. No matter how Julian tried to help her fix it, the thing could never be properly glued back together without looking pitifully disfigured. Now the thought that she could have shattered Julian’s trust just like that dolphin figurine, a figurine they’d ended up
throwing away,
terrified her.

Despair made her sink deeper into her own personal bubble. She’d always felt strong in her life, plunging into adventures without thinking too much about their consequences. But now the source of her strength was gone, and she felt totally lost without him.

The sun began to set outside, the lights of dusk bathing the room in a golden glow. She wondered if some woman had been stroking Julian’s Beckham-blond hair a day before. If a woman with model legs and bigger breasts had been feeling his beautiful hands on her skin and sighing under his searing kisses. His beautiful kisses.

“Have you been sleeping around again?” she blurted out, unable to stand the torment of wondering about it any longer. The jealousy was ripping her insides into shreds.

“I don’t feel like sex ever since you and I—” He glared, as though furious he’d revealed as much. Eyebrows pulled downward, he then growled,
“No.”

The relief she felt made her sag back against the couch.

“Have
you?
” he shot back.

“Of course not!” she cried.

His narrowed gaze held hers with magnetic force, and they both fell so quiet that Molly could’ve heard a pin drop across the room. Unable to bear the strength of his stare, she broke eye contact and surveyed her sandaled feet, her stomach roiling. God, how she missed his oak leaf–green eyes.

“So do they plan to leave us here all night?” Sounding just as thrilled as he had minutes ago—which was not thrilled
at all—
Julian looked around the cozy cottage as though he still hoped to find an escape route.

It made Molly feel about as wanted as an abandoned rug. She nodded dejectedly. “I think they left some food in the kitchenette and water and…champagne.”

How foolish to even mention that last item.

As if they would both have something to celebrate.
Uh-huh. Right.

She had totally underestimated the size of Julian’s pride, and the size of her own, and now she just wanted to stop begging and curl up on a pillow and never wake up until the Earth spun the way it was supposed to. The way it used to.

Her eyes blurred as she glanced up at him, but he was looking out the window, still unapproachable, and though she trembled with the urge to feel his arms around her, she curled up on the sofa and grabbed a pillow embroidered with
Home Is Where the Heart Is
. Shutting her eyes tiredly, she cuddled on one corner and strove to pretend Julian wasn’t here with her. It was easy. Because she’d never before felt so broken, so somber and so lonely when she was with him.

But then his voice flicked through her, soft and husky enough that she could almost pretend it was a caress.

“Do you remember when you flunked your second driving test, Molly?”

She nodded, throat tightening. He had to bring that up.

“Do you remember taking out Landon’s car for a little practice drive and crashing the hell out of it?”

She nodded faster, her throat tightening even more.

“You pulled me out of a damn Spurs game in the final period. And I fixed things. Fixed them so that you’d never be caught, gladly taking the super-fun lecture from my brother and mother for you. I never ratted you out. Never.”

Throat burning thick now, she kept her eyes closed and prayed he didn’t notice the dampness in her lashes, the tears stealing from between her eyelids to slide down her cheeks and to the pillow. “I’m sorry,” she gritted out helplessly, opening her eyes to see the blurry vision of him. “You’ve always been my hero. I’m
sorry
I turned out to be the villain in
your
plot!”

He laughed, a sarcastic sound that said he didn’t even care, and then he said no more and leaned a shoulder on the window and stared outside, probably wishing he was anywhere but here. With her.

“If we hadn’t slept together,” she asked his profile, “would you still be my best friend and talk to me?”

He rubbed one of his arms absently over his chest as he continued staring out the window. “Ask Garrett to be your bud,” he said quietly.

Her eyebrows furrowed, and the anger and injustice that had been building up in her for days overtook her in an explosion. She jumped to her feet, shaking in fury. “You know what, Jules? Go to hell! If you want to hang on to the one thing I’ve done wrong to you in my life, that’s your call. But you know I’ve been there for you every single second of your life like your own private cheerleader. If you had a fan club you know damned well I’d be the
president.
I happen to think that there’s no one in the world as perfectly wonderful and special and incredible as you. But if you think that I would willingly hurt you in any way, for
anyone
else, even your brothers, then you’re an idiot. And you don’t deserve me
or
my friendship, much less my
love!
”

She was just too hurt and too tired to beg anymore. She’d thought what Julian and she had would survive anything. That they were invincible and powerful.

And now here they were, strangers and almost enemies, as if they hadn’t once meant everything to each other.

He didn’t reply to her words, but kept staring stiffly out the window, his profile taut.

Molly sighed and dropped back to the sofa, tired from her trip, from twenty-three days without sleep, weeks of wishing to find love and losing everything precious in her life in the process. Tired and frustrated, she tossed and turned on the couch, and she did that until finally sleep took over.

During the night her eyes fluttered open to see him still sitting by the window. Every time she looked, she found those green eyes watching her in the darkness.

The last time she woke up shivering and confused, and when she saw him still sitting there, alone and watching her with eyes that were almost as shadowed as the room, she curled herself into a ball and groggily said, “You should get some sleep, Jules. You can keep on hating me tomorrow.”

He started coming over with something in his hands. “People with insomnia don’t sleep, Molls,” he murmured, and covered her with a blanket.

And that was as close as he got to her.

Eleven

It was past 7:00 a.m. when Julian heard someone fiddling with the outside bolt, and he stalked across the room like a man chasing a diabolical fiend. He’d slept exactly zero hours, had been torn between taking Molly in his arms and breaking a freaking window with his fist, but he would be damned if he gave his family the satisfaction of doing either.

No. He was through doing whatever they wanted him to do.

They thought he and Molly would have something to celebrate? The only thing Julian was going to celebrate today was ramming his fist into his brothers’ jaws.

And that was exactly what he did as soon as the bolt was removed and he pushed the cottage door open to find Garrett outside, turning to leave.

“Good morning,” Julian said to make his brother turn back around. He did.

And the force Julian put into his punch was so heavy it floored him instantly. Garrett smacked the ground with a loud thump.

Inside the cottage, Molly jumped to her feet with a start, her eyes wide and startled as she came over and saw the middle Gage brother sprawled at Julian’s feet. She whipped her face up to him and fiercely scowled. “Oh, you were just itching to do that, weren’t you? You’ve been talking about your guns for months!”

Frowning, Julian stretched out his fingers in confusion, because damn, that had hurt. Apparently, Garrett was too hardheaded to punch without getting a bit of a jolt in his knuckles, too.

“Yeah,” Julian admitted to her. Then he glowered down at his brother and nudged him with his foot. “That felt real good, you son of a bitch!”

Coming up to a sitting position, Garrett wiped the blood off his mouth with the sleeve of his polo shirt and spat out the rest. “We have the same mother, you
moron.
”

“I’m going home,” he heard Molly mutter under her breath as she stormed toward the terrace, where Julian watched her grab some keys from Kate’s purse. A minute later the catering van was pulling out of the driveway.

He wanted to chase her, yell and fight with her, the adrenaline was so off the charts in his body. But his instinct to spare her his rage was still too strong, and he was more bloodthirsty to make his brother his outlet for his rage.

Garrett was pushing to his feet, but Julian didn’t let him. He shoved him back down by bracing one knee on his shoulder. “Stop meddling in our lives! We’re not your responsibility, or Mother’s or anyone else’s. And if we wanted to be together, we sure as hell have never needed your idiotic help!”

Garrett pushed him aside and shuffled to his feet, rubbing his sore jaw. “She loves you, Jules. You’re being an ass.”

“Make that a headline in the paper tomorrow, brother. See if I buy a copy.” Julian stalked away and flipped Garrett his two middle fingers without even glancing backward.

“Argh, you hardheaded bastard.” Garrett pounced, scowling as he blocked his path. “You’re going to make me fight you, aren’t you?” Gritting his teeth in obvious frustration, his older brother began rolling up his sleeves.

“Get out of my way,” Julian warned.

“Molly didn’t betray you, you imbecile! She was furious because we were warning her away from you. She didn’t
know
we’ve been riding you about her for years and she was trying to defend you. Why can you not
see
that?”

Julian wasn’t listening. He was still restless, reckless, seething.

All night. All night, watching inches and inches of goose-bump-covered, creamy white skin, lustrous red hair and parted pink lips. All night, torturing himself with wanting her so damned much. He’d had a hard-on for hours. Hours.

“You know that girl loves you more than anyone or anything in this world. Don’t you?
Don’t you, Julian?
” Garrett demanded.