Don't Speak (A Modern Fairytale, #5)(96)

Taking his glass to the balcony, he opened the doors and stepped outside onto the icy platform.

Where has she been all this time? And with whom?

Where was Ava Grace’s father? Was he still in the picture at all?

He had so many questions, but as he took another sip of bourbon, they faded, and older questions resumed their place in his mind: Why did she break up with him? And had she ever loved him at all?

The final question loomed large and hurt most, and he swallowed back the remainder of the alcohol in his glass as he stared out at the sea, ruminating.

She’d called their epic love affair a summer fling that day in the hospital. She’d practically begged him to leave her alone. And tonight, when he’d said, You never wanted to see me again, she’d answered simply, No.

But he sensed it wasn’t that simple.

He rested the empty glass on the iron railing, the frigid sea air bracing and welcome.

No. He knew it wasn’t that simple.

When he’d said to her, Well, too bad for you, then, because here I am, she’d sobbed. And when he’d looked at her face, he’d recognized the emotion in her eyes immediately.

“Agony,” he whispered into the wind.

He knew it because he’d felt it every day they’d been apart.

And if Laire felt agony, he reasoned, then things between them hadn’t ended clean for her. In fact, he thought, remembering his own anguish at losing her, you didn’t feel an emotion that strong unless your heart was broken.

“But I never broke her heart,” he said softly, turning back into the room and closing the French doors behind him. Fuck. He had too many questions and not enough answers.

Well, I want answers, he thought as he turned off his desk lamp and placed the lowball glass beside the bottle of bourbon, wondering how to get them.

Ava Grace had invited him to join them for breakfast, hadn’t she? Well, Erik would go downstairs at seven and wait until nine for them to come down. And when they did, hopefully he and Laire could figure out a time to talk. Because he deserved to understand what the hell had happened between them so many years ago, and this chance meeting might be the last chance he’d ever have to find out.

Sighing with frustration and still reeling from their unexpected meeting, he stripped naked and climbed between the chilly, crisp white sheets, pulling the duvet over his bare chest.

For a moment—just a moment—he allowed himself to remember the flush of her cheeks when she said she was leaving and didn’t go. He could feel it between them in that instant: the crackles and currents of attraction that had existed between them since the first day they met. They were still there now, though her suggestion that he go fuck himself made it clear that she wasn’t happy about it.

Erik took a deep breath and closed his eyes, drifting off to sleep, dreaming of the days when their attraction had led to love, not hate, and wishing for those days once again.

***

Laire waited until the last-possible moment to go down to breakfast, hoping to avoid seeing Erik. She’d had a terrible time trying to fall asleep last night, her mind swirling with memories and questions. Why had he looked so relieved when she said she wasn’t married? Why had he said that he was never engaged when she knew that he was?

But even worse than these unanswered questions was the way he’d made her feel. She’d almost fainted on first seeing him, but he’d been up in a flash, telling her to breathe, holding on to her elbow until she’d regained her composure. She would never have expected such tenderness from him, such instant concern.

And her heart ached from the warm, gentle way he’d spoken to Ava Grace, calling her darlin’ and cheerfully tolerating Mr. Mopples’s swift and caustic judgment. The way he’d looked at them together—like he’d never seen anything more beautiful in his life . . . She remembered that look from their precious summer together, and it made her long for things that she couldn’t have, that she shouldn’t want. Not with him, not with the Governor’s Son, who was duplicitous, who’d willfully broken her heart.

Finally, at eight fifty, with Ava Grace complaining bitterly that her tummy was “growly,” they went downstairs.

And there, sitting in an easy chair in the reception area, facing the stairs, was Erik.

She wasn’t as surprised to see him this morning, of course, but it shocked her that her heart lifted effortlessly, practically singing with pleasure to see his dark head bent over his laptop. Her fingers twitched with the sensory memory of those thick strands against her skin. And deep inside, parts of her body that she’d tried to ignore for six long years awoke from their dark, deep sleep, ravenously hungry for the man who’d tricked her and lied to her.

For shame, Laire, to let a man who hurt you make you feel such things.

“Oscar!” cried Ava Grace, letting go of Laire’s hand and rushing down the remaining stairs. “You waited for us!”

As Erik looked up, his face split into a grin, first at Ava Grace, then at Laire, who held his eyes like seeing them again was a miracle she never thought she’d be granted.

Dear Lord, she still wanted him.

Gyah, this is bad. This is really bad.

Suddenly his face changed, and in an instant he’d thrown his laptop on the sofa and was up and running toward them but not fast enough to catch Ava Grace, who had stumbled in her haste to get to him.