Remembrance (The Mediator #7)(32)

So I knew he wasn’t going to strip off my bathing suit and do me on the chaise longue in the middle of the pool area at my apartment building. For one thing, that would be gross. Anyone, including Ryan from upstairs, could wander out onto their balcony and see us. And for another, that wasn’t how either of us had envisioned making love for the first time.

Though I had to admit that at that moment, I didn’t particularly care. I wished we were anywhere than the stupid pool deck. My bedroom upstairs, for instance, or his bedroom back over at Jake’s. Except that even in those places he always managed to keep from ripping my clothes off, whereas I seemed to have a real problem not pawing at his. Maybe the curse was wrong, and I was the one with the demon inside me—

“Susannah,” Jesse breathed into my ear after a while.

“I know.” I removed my hand.

He pulled away from me, the chaise longue groaning in protest, and sat up, his back to me. It was hard to tell without being able to see his face, but he seemed like he was in pain.

I was familiar with the feeling.

“It doesn’t have to be this way,” I volunteered after a few moments of no sound but chirping crickets.

“Yes, it does,” he said to the concrete. “The wedding’s not until next year.”

“Screw the wedding.”

“Your parents would be delighted to hear that since they’ve already put down the deposit for the basilica and the reception.”

“You know what I mean. I get that I’m not as religious as you are, but I really don’t think God will mind.”

“I mind.”

“But most people these days don’t wait until the wedding—”

“Most people aren’t as indebted as I am to the bride and her family.”

“Oh, for God’s sake. No one cares about that.”

“I care. What’s worse is that I came here to rescue you, not ravage you.”

“I believe there was mutual ravaging, and what little of it there was I thoroughly enjoyed.”

“Still, you deserve better.”

“I’m pretty sure I’m the best judge of that. And I decided I deserve the honor of being the wife of Dr. Jesse de Silva a long time ago. There’s no greater honor, in my opinion.”

The crooked smile he shot me hadn’t the slightest bit of humor in it. “Thank you for the kind words, but what have I got to offer a wife? No family, no money, nothing but debt—over $200,000 of it. You know that as a resident, my salary averages out to about twelve dollars an hour, and that’s for an eighty-hour workweek. That’s less than what the orderlies earn.”

I reached out to smooth some dark hair from his forehead. “I know what you’re going to say, because you’ve said it so many times before, but I’d like to remind you once again that the income from my investments is enough to pay off your monthly student loans. If you’d just—”

He seized my hand so abruptly that for a moment I caught a glimpse of the darkness Paul had mentioned, and that Jesse usually kept so well controlled. A second later, however, it was gone, and he was pressing my fingers gently to his lips.

“Thank you again, but you and your family have given me quite enough.”

“You’re forgetting how much you’ve given me. Like tonight, for instance.”

His dark eyebrows knit in confusion. “Tonight?”

“My life, Jesse. You gave me my life tonight. Like you’ve done a million times before, remember? A million and one, if you count this evening.”

His eyebrows relaxed, and this time when he smiled there was both warmth and humor in it. “Oh, that. Well, it was the least I could do. You’ve returned the favor, occasionally.”

“Occasionally. So you might want to cut the self-pitying bullshit about how you have nothing but debt to offer a wife. You’ve got plenty to offer. Not in the way of material things yet, maybe, but you’re pretty good looking, in my opinion, and you’ve got the lifesaving thing down pat. And then of course there’s what’s in your pants. That’s pretty impressive, too.”

The smile turned self-deprecating. “How charming, Susannah. It’s a pity my mother is dead, she’d be so proud.”

“She should be.” I reached out to straighten his tie—he was required to wear one to work, and looked extremely dashing in it—and ended up fingering the collar of his shirt. “Uh-oh. You really are soaked, aren’t you? You can’t go back to your shift in wet clothes. You’ll catch a cold. You should probably take your shirt off and come upstairs with me and let me dry it for you.”

“You don’t have a drying machine in your apartment,” he pointed out. “Are you trying to get me naked, Miss Simon?”

“It’s called a dryer, not a drying machine, and yes, Dr. de Silva, I am.”

“Are we ever going to talk about what happened here tonight, Susannah?”

“Well,” I said. “When a man and a woman like each other very much, they start kissing, and then they get a funny feeling in their tummies. And in a normal relationship the man goes with the woman to her apartment, and they get naked and relieve each other of the funny feeling. Unless the man insists on waiting until we’re married, and then the woman has a nervous breakdown—”