‘I know she’s your wife. Tawanda didn’t tell me. I just guessed, from the tattoo and from other things she said.’
He reached for his wrist and ran a finger over the inscription there.
‘She isn’t my wife… wasn’t my wife,’ he said, his words charged with emotion.
‘Wasn’t?’
‘Why d’you want to know, Autumn? What’s Tawanda actually said to you about me?’ he questioned, his eyes wild.
‘I… nothing. She’s said nothing. I just—’
‘My wife’s dead. She died five years ago.’
The words hung in the air, like a barrier between them, and Autumn didn’t know what to say. He paced back and forth across the expensive Marisson Hotel crest-emblazoned carpet. It was then she noticed he wasn’t wearing shoes. He creased up his feet as he walked, as if making contact with the fiber helped him somehow.
‘I’m sorry,’ she offered. ‘I didn’t know.’
‘It’s not a secret. You can’t keep something like that a secret. I just don’t talk about it. I don’t want to talk about it,’ he made clear, stopping and taking a drink of the champagne. As he held the glass, his hand trembled.
‘How did it happen? Was she ill?’ Autumn asked.
‘Fucking hell, Autumn, which bit of I don’t talk about it didn’t sink in?’
‘Sometimes talking about it helps.’
‘You think so? You don’t think I’ve had people a lot more qualified than you try to get me to talk about it? Talking doesn’t help. Trust me,’ he spat.
‘They can’t help. I agree with that. They think they know you because they’ve seen countless others in a similar situation. You’re just a case to them. They don’t know you, and they don’t want to know you. They just try to fit how you feel into their charts and theories,’ Autumn said.
Nathan snorted in agreement. ‘Tell me about it.’
‘No, tell me about it,’ she suggested.
She watched him flex his feet into the carpet. The idea of speaking about something that was obviously painful to remember, let alone talk about, flitted across his face.
‘I can’t,’ he answered and let out a breath.
‘Whatever happened, it hurt you, and it’s still hurting you.’
‘Do you want a fucking white coat? You’re sounding just like them,’ he told her.
‘I’m not like them.’
‘Don’t like me, Autumn.’ He put his glass down. ‘I don’t want you to like me.’
‘Why not?’
‘It just makes things complicated, and things are complicated enough right now, aren’t they?’
‘I do like you,’ Autumn admitted.
She held her breath. He was a few yards away from her, but she could feel him. His presence was close, she could sense his heat.
*
That feeling was there again, not just in his groin, but in his stomach, knotted up as he tried to ignore it, push it away. She sat on his bed, her legs tucked beneath her, the cheap dress she’d brought with her from Michigan barely covering her thighs. He wanted to take her in his arms and rip the dress off her, have her sun-kissed skin pressed against his. He remembered how she tasted—sweet, soft, vanilla. He tried to control his breathing, tried to avoid directly looking at her, but it was impossible. He shouldn’t feel like this about her. She wasn’t his type. Did he even have a type? All he knew was, she wasn’t Carolyn.
*
She wished he would say something, but she knew he wasn’t going to. She could see he was struggling with just being in the room with her now. No matter what they’d both said, being intimate together had changed things. She was even more attracted to him, and she knew he felt the same. She could see he felt the same.
‘Tomorrow, theoretically, we both could be dead,’ she said, breaking the silence.
‘That isn’t going to happen,’ he responded.
‘But it could, theoretically speaking.’
‘I don’t think that way.’
‘No, I know, but what I’m trying to say is, this could be it, for both of us. This could be it, here tonight.’ She slowly uncurled her legs and edged herself across the bed.
‘Don’t do this, Autumn.’
She stood and stepped toward him. ‘What are you afraid of?’ she asked.
‘What am I afraid of?’
‘Yes.’
She stood facing him, so close her chest almost touched his. She could feel the heat radiating from him now. His skin was aroused with color, and she could practically feel his heartbeat.
‘I can’t be all you want me to be,’ he stated in no more than a whisper.
‘What do I want you to be?’ She reached out to touch him. Her fingers opened the first button of his shirt, the tips of them touching his skin, before moving down to the second button.
He closed his eyes. ‘This can’t turn into anything. There’s no future in it,’ he told her.
‘We might not have tomorrow,’ she answered, parting his shirt and easing it down off his shoulders.
‘What do you want me to do?’ he asked as she pulled the shirt away and discarded it.
She didn’t answer him, but moved her hands across his chest, his abdomen. She found the scar on his left-hand side and stroked her fingers across the jagged skin.
‘What was it?’ she purred.
‘Knife wound, a Russian,’ he responded softly.
Her hands moved to a circular mark near the middle of his stomach. ‘And this?’ she asked.
‘Bullet, Iraq.’
A smile formed on Autumn’s lips. ‘See, Mr Regan, you can talk about yourself.’
‘Yeah, but I think that’s enough talking now, don’t you?’ he asked, feeling her pull at his belt buckle.
She met his eyes then responded, ‘Oh, yes, quite enough talking.’
*
The thin material of the dress ripped apart in his hands as he tore it from her. He let out a groan as he saw she wasn’t wearing any underwear. Her breasts were fully exposed right away, the nipples peaked and hard, as if waiting for his touch. He paused, admired her beauty, watched her shiver in anticipation, naked, longing.
She took hold of his hands. ‘Nathan,’ she pleaded.
He placed a thumb on one of her breasts, and, with a feather-light touch, began to circle the outside, slowly moving closer toward the center.
