Remembrance: A Contemporary Erotic Romance (Iris Series Book 4) (17 page)

“Janie, what the hell are you talking about?” he asked calmly, completely confused.

“Lana Gastaldi came into the bathroom and was saying she wanted to take a ‘bite’ out of you!” Janie nearly growled.  “Then she asked me if you were serious with anyone.  Can you imagine?  She doesn’t even know me!  What if
I
was seeing you?” she sputtered.  “And even though you’re doing whatever it is you’re doing with Vanessa, it was none of her business so,” she stuttered, “I may have hinted that you weren’t interested in the female population.”  She sat back breathing heavily, waiting for him to blow.

He continued looking at her in complete astonishment then started cracking up. 

A whoosh of air escaped her lungs in relief.  She smiled at him.  “You’re not mad?”

That seemed to make him laugh even more and he wiped at his eyes, shaking his head the whole time.

“What the hell am I going to do with you?”  He let out a sigh, still chuckling.  He looked over at her.  “So you were afraid she was going to let me think I was in charge, but really she’d be playing me instead?”  His look told her he was thinking of something amusing.

“Yes.  And she was a manipulator.  I can tell,” she pouted.

“Yeah, I can see how a woman who likes to play with a man’s affections would be someone you wouldn’t want me to be around,” he said dryly.

“What?” she blurted.  “Are you insinuating that I play around with men’s affections?”  She crossed her arms over her chest in annoyance.  “I’m not a tease, Luke.”  She shook her head to show him she disagreed with him, but also to clear her head from its slightly inebriated state.

“I never said you were.”

“You implied it.”

“A tease is a woman who leads a man to think one thing then does something else entirely.  You’re not like that with men, I’m sure.”

“I’m not!  Do you think I am?” she nearly screamed.  He was really pissing her off.

He was quiet, then took out his phone and dialed.  “Javier?  Hey, sorry to call so late.  Listen, there may be a story circulating tomorrow or the next day about me being gay.”

Janie heard a yell and a laugh on the phone then Luke smiled and kept talking.

“Yes, Javi, I know you would
love
to bring me over to your side,” Luke said dryly.  Janie let out a giggle and Luke glared at her.  “Well, how lovely.  Tell your darling hubby the offer of finding me a man is really sweet.  He’ll be the first to know if my DNA miraculously changes and I start leaning in a different direction…Yeah, Janie made a joke to someone she wanted to dissuade from coming near me…”  Then he chuckled at something Javier said.  “You can high five her next weekend…That sounds good…Yup…Alright, see ya Monday.”  Luke disconnected and put the phone back in his pocket. 

Janie had her hand over her mouth, caught between laughing and feeling remorseful over what she’d done.  “I’m sorry, I always forget about the press with you.”

“Javier will take care of it,” Luke shrugged, referring to his publicist.  “Although, we’re now going to have to add one more thing to your list,” he said with a snicker.

“It’s not g
oing to be how to hide a body, is it?” she said around her hand, biting her lip and looking at him with mirth in her eyes.

He made a face as if he was contemplating it, then she playfully kicked at his leg and he laughed, grabbing her foot.  He yanked on it so she’d look at him.  “Your man will definitely need a sense of humor.”

She removed her hands from her mouth and flopped back on the seat.  “I thought you were going to kill me.”

“That’s always an option,” he said, his tone droll.

She looked over at him.  “You don’t care if the public thinks you’re gay?  It might hurt your status with the ladies.”  She began giggling again.  She couldn’t help it.  She was half drunk and in love with the idiot.

“The public will think whatever they wan
t to think.  And I’m confident it won’t hurt my status with the ladies.”  His light blue eyes warmed.

“Is Vanessa go
ing to –?”

“I’m fairly certain Vanessa already knows my sexual orientation.”

That shut Janie up and wiped the smile from her face immediately.  “Yeah.  I guess you’re right.”  She slowly removed her foot from his hand and sighed.  Turning away, she looked out the window of the limo.  They were almost to her loft, thank God.  The reality of his Vanessa comment completely erased the fun she’d been having all night.  Now all she wanted to do was crawl into bed and sleep.

He was quiet next to her so she ignored him for the final two minutes it took to pull up in front of her place.  When Kenneth opened her door to let her out, Luke got out as well.  She looked stupidly at him.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m walking you to your door,” he stated in a no nonsense voice.

Janie looked over at Kenneth who was getting back into the limo.  Once he was in with his door closed, Janie spoke.  “I don’t need you to walk me to my door.”  She turned and started heading to the entrance, stumbling only once.

See?  She was fine. 

“I’ll see you next weekend,” she continued, letting her voice lilt up as if she was happy as a clam and didn’t have a care in the world.  “Thanks for tonight.  It was fun.” 

He was at her side within two seconds holding her elbow as she approached the building’s front door.  “I’m walking you in anyway.”

“I don’t need you to,” she ground out.

“Tough shit, Janie.”  He glared down at her.

She huffed and took out her key, letting herself in to the foyer and mailbox area of the warehouse.  She turned to stop him from following her in.  He didn’t even slow and grabbed her arm, gently pushing her back into the foyer so he could walk her to her loft door.

“You’re a pain in my ass,” she grumbled.

“The feeling is mutual at the moment.”

She’d reached her door and turned on him.  “Then why the hell are you even here if I’m such a pain in the ass?  Just,” she sputtered, “go find Vanessa, will you?”  It was the last thing she wanted him to do but she was so pissed and hurt that he never seemed to catch a clue, she just wanted to lash out at him, push him away.

He backed her into the door, but kept his hands in his coat pockets.  “Is that what you want?  You really want me to call Vanessa right now?”  He was so quiet.  And he was pissed.

She smelled the wine on his breath coupled with the cold air still clinging to him from outside.  Just underneath, she could make out the subtle spice from his cologne.  His hair fell over his eye as he leaned over her, and his light blue eyes lasered into hers.  He licked his lips.

“Do you?” he whispered.

She was done playing games.  She shook her head no and blinked madly to stop the tears now watering her eyes.  She felt physically sick thinking of him go
ing to Vanessa, like she was going to throw up any minute.

His look went from pissed to worried in the span of a heartbeat.  “What
’s the matter?”

“I’m just tired,” she murmured.  “I’m go
ing to bed.  I’ll see you next weekend.”  The last thing she wanted him to do was leave, but the whole Vanessa conversation was exhausting her.

“You had too much wine tonight,” he said backing away, finally allowing her to breathe.  He didn’t wait for her to respond and took her key from her hand, unlocked the door and slid it open
letting her in.  Flicking the light switch on the wall, the area by the door became dimly illuminated.

“I’m a grown woman, Luke.  If I wanna drink too much wine, I will,” she mumbled
on a slur, practically tripping over to her sofa.  “And you know, maybe you need to make your own list.  So you don’t get snookered by women like Lana,” she groused then collapsed inelegantly, her body falling sideways so she landed face down onto the end pillow. She muttered into it.  “You should be more appreciative that I saved you from her,” Janie pouted into the pillow.

He was kneeling next to the sofa, removing her purse from her shoulder and tossing it to the floor.

“You may be right,” he said humorously, then he pulled her to sit up so he could help her take off her coat.  She looked up at him and raised her eyebrow inquisitively while he worked her arms out like she was a doll he was undressing.  He smirked at her facial expression.

She tried not to look shocked, but his comment nearly floored her.  If he was seriously going to start making a list, he better not want her to find him a woman.  She might have to kill him.

“I mean,” he said sardonically, “now that my reputation with the ladies is going to be stilted for a while –”

“What about Vanessa?”

He looked at her intensely then said, “Up.”  He stood and put out his hand.  She looked up his body appreciatively until her head was back and she was staring into his smiling eyes.  Her hands began to sweat with nervousness.  She had no clue what he was going to say.  “Can you stand?”

She nodded, her limbs feeling heavy.  Before she could stop herself, more giggles escaped.  She put her hand in his, but couldn’t seem to stand.  He leaned down and scooped her up a second later.

“I can walk,” she slurred.  “I’m too heavy,” she protested, snuggling into his neck and inhaling his scent.

“Shh,” was all he said.  When he got to her bedroom, he put her on the edge of the bed where she fell back onto her mattress.  She heard him chuckling.  He began removing her boots.

“What about Vanessa?” she asked again, staring at the pipes on the ceiling.  It was dark in the bedroom with only the light from the living room on.

“Vanessa is nice enough,” he finally said, removing her first boot.  “But I’m not dating her anymore, so it doesn’t matter.”

Tiffany was right. 
“You’re not?”

He began yanking on her second boot and Janie looked at him.  He just shrugged and shook his head no.

“When did you stop dating?”

He looked her in the eye.  “I don’t remember.  Sometime in mid to late October, I think.”

She chuckled nervously.  Her heart felt like it would burst with that news, so she just nodded, taking in that tidbit.  With her back still on the bed, he removed the second boot, tossed it then leaned over her putting his hands on either side of her on the comforter.

“Do you wan
t to sleep in your clothes?”  His voice was husky.

Her body reacted to his tone and words with goose bumps, feeling his voice caress her in all the right places.  “No, but I don’t care at the moment,” she whispered.  He looked hot as hell leaning over, staring into her eyes.  “Unless you wanted to help me out of them,” she added, then giggled.

His eyes perused her face, chest, then rested on the snap of her jeans.  He looked like he was actually thinking about it and she held her breath.

Fire extinguisher, please.

She watched him swallow then stand up.  “I think maybe you should just sleep in your clothes tonight,” he said dryly and picked up her legs to swing them up onto the bed.  Her heart was pumping hard and fast.  He sat down next to her and brushed a curl off her face, reaching up for her hairclip and releasing her hair to fall around her on the pillow.

She sighed and closed her eyes as his hand rubbed her scalp.  “You know,” she murmured keeping her eyes closed, “the list is for finding someone for a serious relationship.  Is that what you want, a serious relationship?”  She stopped and opened her eyes.

He acknowledged her statement with an affirmative head movement, but didn’t say any more.  His eyes moved to her hair, a smile played on his lips.

Breathe, Janie.
  “What would the first quality be if you were making this list?” she asked.  “Maybe some girl who doesn’t drink too much wine?”  She couldn’t help but look at him playfully. 

His mouth kicked up into a lazy smile.  “You’re fuckin
g adorable when you’re drunk.” He turned contemplative, apparently thinking about her question. “Someone I can see myself coming home to.”

She was a little surprised at the comment and obviously looked it. 

“That surprises you?”

She shrugged.  “For some reason I thought you were go
ing to say beautiful or sexy.  Or a redhead.”  She smiled on that last adjective.

His eyebrow went up.

“You do tend to stick with the same packaging,” she whispered, feeling tired but more content than she’d ever felt in her life with him sitting on her bed looking down at her.

He nodded, narrowing his eyes.  “I do, don’t I?”  His hand squeezed in her hair one last time then he removed it and sat back.  If she’d had the balls at the moment, she would’ve reminded him of her hair color.  She could’ve sworn he was looking at it. 
Wishful thinking, Janie.

“So, you don’t care about sexy, or…?”  She still had issues thinking she wasn’t sexy to a man.

“That goes without saying.  I obviously need to be attracted to her.  But it would be nice to find someone who makes me feel,” he paused, “like I’m home.”

She nodded, her mind racing.  “You’re a romantic,” she sighed before she could stop herself.

“Maybe since you know me so well,” he began while playing with her fingers resting on her stomach, “you can help me with that list.”  He looked pointedly at her.  “Like I’m helping you with yours.”