Kiss Me Twice (9 page)

"Tell me it's not true." He could barely force the question past the lump in his throat.

"What?" Kelly said, bewildered.

Kit shook her head, ignoring the others' confusion. "I wish I could. But I'm the one who took her to the emergency room."

"What are you talking about?" Nick asked.

Mike struggled to keep his self-loathing from spinning out of control. "About Karen. About Jeremy, about how he—" He stopped himself.

This was Karen's secret. If and when she chose to share it with Kelly was her business. "I have to go. I have to find her." He pushed himself off the bench and ran to the lodge, determined to find Karen.

Mike paused outside of her door. What could he possibly say to her? Guilt and shame flayed him. If only he hadn't been so scared at the prospect of falling in love with her, she wouldn't have been alone. Hell, he would have never invited Jeremy down in the first place but instead would have followed his gut and savored every moment he had with her.

He knocked on the door, three short raps. Nothing. He knocked again, pressed his ear to the door, and heard muffled footsteps. She had the chain engaged so the door only opened a few inches. Through the crack she peered at him with one big tear-swollen eye.

He swallowed convulsively, uncharacteristically close to tears himself. "Can I come in?"

She closed the door, and Mike heard the scrape of the chain lock being unfastened. The door opened and he stepped in, following her out onto the veranda. An open bottle of chardonnay sat on the table next to a glass.

Karen had changed from her dress into a peach terry cloth shorts set with a zip-up hoody and shorts that showed off her long, tan legs. Barefoot, she came up to the middle of his chest, and he was struck again by how small she was.

Too small to defend herself against most men. His hands shook at the thought. He fought the urge to pull her into his arms and beg for her forgiveness.

Without asking, Karen poured him a glass of wine and settled into one of the wrought iron chairs.

He sat next to her and took a fortifying sip. He studied her profile, the small straight nose, full lips set in a tight line over her small upraised chin. He willed her to look at him, but she kept her gaze averted, staring instead at the view of Squaw Valley below.

Never had he so completely loathed himself. "Karen, I owe you an apology," he began. Christ that sounded so lame and inadequate.

"I was trying to make you jealous," she said softly, still staring off into the horizon. "I was so angry that you were leaving early and that you'd lied to me about the apartment. I finally realized you were never going to love me back, and I wanted to hurt you." She turned to face him, her gaze oddly blank. "I thought I could make you jealous enough to take me home with you at the very least."

Mike didn't say anything, sensing she needed to purge herself of the memory and knowing that he deserved every bit of pain and regret her words conjured.

"He told me he was teaching me a lesson, not to mess around with his friend. Like he was protecting you," she said with a short, humorless laugh. She refilled both empty wineglasses.

Mike pressed his thumbs into his eyeballs, as if that could stem the flow of horrific images in his brain. Looking back, it didn’t surprise him that Jeremy was capable of such brutality. He was crazy, the kind of guy you love to party with but a borderline sociopath. Women were nothing but objects to him. Guilt flooded Mike's chest as he realized the kind of person he had brought into their lives, how oblivious he'd been to Jeremy's true nature. He wondered how many other women Jeremy had hurt.

"Why didn't you go to the police?" He regretted the words the second they passed his lips.

Karen finally focused on him, anger and disbelief crackling in her eyes. "My own boyfriend wouldn't believe me. Why would the police?"

He winced, ashamed. "Kit said something about the hospital," he heard himself say. Part of him couldn't bear to hear it, but he needed to, as though by experiencing his own pain, he could absorb some of hers.

Karen sipped at her wine and looked away. "I had some bleeding afterward and I wanted to get checked it out, not to mention make sure he hadn't given me anything."

Rage and guilt nearly overwhelmed him, and he wanted to smash Jeremy's face in all over again. But this time he wouldn't stop at knocking out his teeth. No, he'd bash in his skull and rip off his balls so he could never, ever hurt another woman. "Oh God."

"I'm okay now. No permanent damage," she said matter-of-factly.

"I'm so fucking sorry," he said, reaching out to grab her hand but stopping before he made contact. He was the last person she'd want touching him. "I would give anything to go back and change what happened. Anything."

Karen leaned back in her chair and propped her feet on the railing, turning to face him once again. "I know, but you can't."

She was so beautiful. The rays of the evening sun burnished her tawny skin and made her golden highlights in her hair glow. Even puffy eyed and red nosed, she was more beautiful than any woman he'd ever known.

For eleven years he'd pushed every thought of her from his mind, unable to think of her and the time they'd spent without anger and bitterness. Now that was gone, and he was left with nothing but a deep, aching regret and a conviction that he had forsaken something very, very important.

"I'm sorry," he repeated. As though that could make it all better.

"Do you know how awful I felt, what it's like to have someone you love turn their back on you like that?" She choked. Pain and guilt ravaged his face, but she didn't let that stop her. For eleven years she'd swallowed her pain and borne this burden alone. He wasn't getting off the hook with a simple apology. "You didn't care about me at all, or you wouldn't have ever treated me like that. Like I was a piece of shit you'd scraped off your shoe."

He winced like he'd taken a blow, and his lips pressed together in a tight line. But not before Karen saw their telltale tremble. "I did care," he said, voice choked. "I cared so much that it scared the shit out of me, made me run from you instead of being honest like I should have." He closed his eyes, and a big, fat tear rolled under his thick lashes. He angrily scrubbed at his eyes. He took a deep, shuddering breath, and Karen tried to ignore the unmistakable sensation of her heart softening.

His beautiful hazel eyes were a more vivid green when he cried.

"But that's no excuse. I should have trusted you, trusted how I felt. I would never ask for your forgiveness," he said shakily, "but I would do anything to take it all back."

Part of her wanted to launch herself into his lap while the other told her to twist the knife a little deeper.

But with her initial surge of anger spent, she felt deflated.

Strangely empty.

She observed Mike, so obviously consumed by guilt. When she’d imagined this scene, she thought she'd revel in it, that she'd seize the chance to rub his face in how wrong he'd been about everything. She finished her second glass of wine.

"Funny, I thought it would be good to make you feel bad, but it’s not," she said, words slightly slurred. "But I needed to tell you, just the same. I didn't realize how much I cared what you thought of me until I saw you at Caesar's. The way you looked at me..."

He winced as though the memory of that night pained him.

His hand rested on the glass and wrought iron table between them.

Long fingered, tan and strong looking, with neatly trimmed nails. He had a scab on his thumb, and the index fingernail was slightly bruised.

Without thinking, she laid her palm over the back, noting that with their wrists aligned, her fingertips didn't even make it to his first knuckles.

He turned his hand over, capturing hers and interlacing their fingers. Warmth spread from her palm, up her arm, and pooled low in her belly.

For several long moments they stared at each other, saying nothing. It would be so easy to nurture a grudge or to use his guilt to manipulate him. But it felt so good just to hold his hand, to take and give comfort now that the truth was out.

"I wish I could make it up to you," he said, "that night at Caesar’s—all of it."

"That night at Caesar's was a relapse," she said.

"How do you mean?"

"After my mom died I took a hard look at my life, particularly my relationships with men, and realized I needed to make a change."

He squeezed her hand in encouragement.

"I never really believed that anyone would ever love me, you know? And so I acted in a way that basically guaranteed that." She took another drink of wine. "With guys, I knew none of them ever really cared about me, but at least I could use sex to get them to do what I wanted." She smiled humorlessly. "At least most of the time I could. I remember the first time you and I had sex," she said. "I never wanted to do it before you. I never really enjoyed fooling around until you, and when you made me come that first time..."

She closed her eyes, savoring the memory like she would a piece of rich, dark chocolate. "I knew you were the one, and I knew I wanted you to be the first. But then after Jeremy…” her mouth tightened. ”I slept with just about every guy who asked, because I figured, hey, at least if it's my choice, I'm in control, right? I thought on some level it would help erase the memory of what happened. And I got some nice dinners and even a vacation or two out of most of them. But then they'd roll off and go home and I always felt...empty."

She looked at him then, challenging. Mike didn't tolerate weakness of character, and she was surprised at the lack of censure in his expression.

"Two years ago I went into therapy, and I decided I needed to clean up my act, find a nice guy, make peace with my family—all the stuff I'd been running from for so long."

"I still don't understand why what we did was a relapse," Mike said gently.

"I hadn't had sex for two years before that night," she said, a slightly crazed laugh erupting from her chest at his look of surprise. “I took a year off dating entirely, and then I was holding out for a nice guy. A guy with potential, you know?" She shook her head at her own stupidity.

"So what happened?"

"It's so stupid—I’m so stupid. I went to Reno with this guy, Brad. I should have seen it coming. I mentioned meeting his family, and he told me I wasn't the kind of woman a guy took home to his mother. Turns out he just wanted a hot chick to fuck for a while."

"When you saw me," she continued, "I was having a drink, planning to go back to my room. I honestly wasn't planning to, how did you put it, ‘fuck some poor schmuck for revenge'?"

Mike winced. “Karen—"

"It's okay. I didn't exactly behave in a way that would make you think otherwise," she said, starting to disentangle her fingers from his.

"I thought I was going to show you"you know, teach you a lesson. You acted so superior, but you were just another guy who could be led around by his dick." She pulled her hand from his and drew her feet up, wrapping herself in a tight ball on the chair. "I don't know why I thought I could handle it. I've never been able to control myself around you."

Mike swung his chair around to her side of the table so he sat facing her, his knees close enough to brush the edge of her chair. “If it's any consolation, you do the same to me. I kept telling myself I should get up and leave, but I couldn't. It pissed me off that after all this time I couldn't resist you, even though I knew being with you would only tear me up."

"Did it tear you up?"

"Ask Tony. I haven't slept in the past two weeks, and I almost beat the crap out of him yesterday over something stupid."

She couldn't help it. The thought of reserved, controlled Mike losing his cool all because of her brought a satisfied smirk to her face.

"You don't have to look so happy about it."

"Misery loves company."

"I'm sorry for the way I treated you that night, and earlier today," he said, his tone somber and sincere.

She shook her head. "I hated myself for falling back into my old patterns, for not being able to stand up to you and try to talk to you like a sensible person."

"Sensible is the last word I would use to describe our behavior around each other," he said ruefully.

She nodded. "We're really bad for each other's peace of mind."

"Uh-huh," he said, moving infinitesimally closer.

"We should probably avoid each other like the plague."

"Probably," he agreed.

She studied his mouth, the full lips pulled into a line of regret.

She knew he would leave if she asked. Maybe she was a masochistic fool, but she wanted him to stay. Needed him to wash away the memory of the last time they were together. Wanted to indulge in her uncontrollable desire without the wounds of the past intruding. Maybe this one night could wash her clean, help her recapture a brief time when sex was about pleasure instead of a complicated exchange of power. Crazy as it seemed, Mike was the only one who could set her free.

"I don't want you to leave." She put her hands on his knees.

"I don't want to."

Decision made, she closed the distance between them. Her hand wrapped around his neck, drawing his face toward hers. She kissed his cheeks. Her tongue flicked delicately along the seam of his lips, and he groaned, but didn't increase the contact.

She kissed him more firmly, encouraging his lips to part with tiny flicks of her tongue. Heat exploded between her thighs as he finally opened to her, his tongue tangling with hers in a kiss that tasted of regret and barely restrained desire.

He pulled her from her chair, and she found herself in a cocoon of muscles and chest. He lifted her legs across his lap and tipped her head back against his arm. One big hand came up to cradle her face as he sucked and licked at her mouth with increasing urgency. Each fervent caress was an apology, a plea for forgiveness. He didn't bother to hide his need, letting her feel everything in his all-consuming kiss.

She couldn't help but respond and squirmed against the hard bulge of his cock pressing eagerly against the backs of her thighs. She wanted him inside her with a fierceness that bordered on desperation. Her moan was part pleasure, part distress. As always with Mike, her need overwhelmed her, terrifying in its intensity.