Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4)(41)

She’d needed him to feel at home in America when she’d been alone, and he’d done more than that. He’d given her so much happiness. He’d needed her to survive the tragedy in his life, and she’d been there for him, even across the miles. She had thought she would marry him. She thought she’d be with him forever. And she hated that it had been too hard to stay together when they were young and so dependent on their families.

Now they were older and could find a way, and that was what he’d been trying to do when he sent that letter.

Except…. She toyed with the ring on her finger.

Her heart climbed into her throat, lodging itself there. She wanted to cry, and she wanted him, and she wanted to not want him.

She was happy, and she would always be happy with Julien. She just wished seeing Michael wasn’t so damn tempting.

And easy.

And good.

Soon enough, the clock ticked closer to boarding time. He walked her to her gate, and each step was a door closing, each second the final turn of the pages in a book. At her gate, they stopped, and unsaid words clung to the air like fog.

There was so much to say, and yet nothing that could be spoken. This was the last good-bye.

She swallowed her tears and choked back her emotions. “It was so good seeing you,” she said, and wished her words didn’t feel so inadequate.

He nodded. “And you.”

I’ll miss you. I’ll think of you. I can’t think of you. I won’t miss you. You have to understand how hard this is.

He moved first, raising his arms, and she practically fell into his embrace then lingered for a few more seconds, breathing in his scent one last time before she pulled away.

Remaining faithful. Staying true. Vowing to march forward and love her husband-to-be with everything she had.

Damn the past. The past was not her future. She wouldn’t look back.





CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE


The jeans were gone. Mercifully.

In their place she wore a short green dress that hugged her fantastic body, showing off her breasts, her small waist, and those long, endless legs.

At the table in the far corner of restaurant that Brent’s brother had recommended, Michael couldn’t take his eyes off the woman. Ask him a month ago if he’d be having sushi dinner in the Village, listening to Annalise tell stories about her sister, and he’d have said no f*cking way. She was nothing but a mirage, a sepia-tinted photograph of days gone by. Now, she was eating a salmon roll, and he was having the best time. They weren’t staying at the same hotel, so he’d picked her up at hers, the breath knocked clear out of his lungs when she’d answered the door.

In that dress.

And heels.

And, very likely, no panties.

But as much as he wanted her right then and there, he craved the anticipation, too. He was a patient man, and he wanted to take her out to dinner. To savor every moment from picking her up to walking to the restaurant to enjoying the meal. It was so simple, but this was what he’d dreamed of having with her. A freedom that wasn’t possible when they were kids, and now it was all theirs. No curfews, no rules, no regulations. A real date with this woman, and as the evening unfurled, a new sensation spread through him, a freedom from care he hadn’t felt in years. An ease.

“One time when I was helping out at Noelle’s bakery, an American woman came to the counter, and she tried so hard to speak in French,” Annalise said with a smile, continuing her tale of working with her sister from time to time.

“I bet you hate when they do that.”

She clasped her hand to her chest. “Me? No. Why would you say that?”

“Doesn’t it make the French people crazy when we try to speak French?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. Then a guilty little grin appeared on her face. “Only if it’s very bad French.”

He laughed as he picked up a yellowtail slice and swirled it in soy sauce. “Was her French very bad? Tell the truth.”

She held up her thumb and index finger. “Only a little. It wasn’t good, but she tried, so she got credit for that. She said she wanted un yaourt abricot, but she pronounced yaourt like tarte.”

“In her defense, yogurt is one of the hardest French words to say.”

She gave him a curious look. “You know yaourt is yogurt?”

“You taught me some French words,” he said, then popped the sushi in his mouth.

“Did I teach you yaourt?”

He nodded as he finished chewing. “Isn’t yogurt an important word to know?”

She set down her chopsticks, crossed her arms, and fixed him with a stare. “I taught you words like kiss, and come, and f*ck. I did not teach you yogurt.”

“Must have picked it up on my own then when I was in France. I spent a few weekends there.”

Something dark passed through her eyes. “I remember,” she said, sadness coloring her tone. She reached for his hand. “I remember seeing you at the airport.”

He straightened. “You do?”

“Of course. How would I ever forget?”

He shrugged, wincing. The memory still hurt. He hadn’t forgotten a single detail.

“I remember everything about it,” she said softly but confidently. Her bright green eyes held his captive, never looking away. “I remember the way your hair was shorter, how you looked at me in the gift shop, then the hurt in your eyes when you saw my ring. You have to know I never wanted to hurt you.”