chapter 15
[Angelica]
If I thought Jude was going to ravish me after his possessive behavior earlier in the pool and then again throughout the evening’s party, I get a cold dose of reality when we enter our room.
He doesn’t touch me.
The switch in him is almost mercurial.
With full-on anxiety, I ask him to unzip my dress. Earlier, I had to call the front desk to send someone to help me zip it up, which is the real reason I was late. I didn’t want to call Jude and ask him to come back to the room. I was afraid if he did, I might pounce on him.
Him and his damn suggestion that I’d need my phone near the shower again.
He hadn’t been wrong, though, and another moment of self-pleasure took the edge off. Twice in less than twelve hours was like a Christmas miracle.
With my back to Jude, I sense his hesitation.
The warmth of his breath against my neck as I hold up my hair.
The long exhale from his chest. Then thick fingers brush along the expanse of skin exposed above the zipper on the wide-necked dress before he grips the top of the dress with pinched fingers and uses his other hand to lower the zipper.
The lazy drag down my back is like the gentle pull of stage curtains. A slow revelation of pale skin. But if I thought Jude would dance his fingers down my spine, he doesn’t. There is no encore to our earlier actions where the dance floor kiss was almost as powerful as the hot tub one.
For a second, I simply stand still, holding up my hair with one hand while clutching the front of my dress with the other, anticipation nearly killing me.
When I turn to face Jude, holding the dress to my chest, I silently beg him to make a move, knowing I can’t. I want Jude to be into this as much as me.
For just a moment, those icy eyes are cold. His smile is tight, like he’s slipped into character again. I have no doubt a man like Jude can have sex without emotion in the act.
Unfortunately, I cannot, so I drop my gaze.
Almost instantly, Jude’s eyes shift. The ice melts away a little bit until he almost looks . . . stricken. Like the last thing he wants to see is me naked, despite flirtatious words and seductive actions.
Reality strikes like the cold rush of falling between cracks in ice. He only kissed me for show. In front of a board member. In the middle of his party.
Embarrassment mixed with a pinch of shame fills me, and my tongue ties when I try to speak.
“I’ll just be—”
“It’s not that I—” he cuts me off.
“We don’t have to—”
“I want to—”
“But.” I can almost see the word between us, like an iron security gate lowered for protection. Is he protecting his heart? Or mine?
Unrequited desire is the worst. The naughty person list should have a column for it.
But. One simple statement that says so much.
Without another word, I turn for the bathroom, blinking back the sudden sting in my eyes.
I don’t know what I was thinking, anyway. I can’t get involved with Jude. One night would wreck me. I should be grateful he doesn’t want me, which is all kinds of wrong to consider.
When I come out of the bathroom, I slip my dress onto a hanger and hang it back in the closet while Jude sneaks into the bathroom. I help myself to the bed and lie back, staring up at the ceiling. Despite feeling tipsy earlier, I’m suddenly stone sober and wide awake . . . with disappointment.
When Jude returns to the bedroom, he stares down at the floor where he slept last night. His pile of folded blankets and a pillow are still on the boudoir chair.
His hand squeezes at his lower back. Whether he’s done that for affect or absentmindedly, I don’t know, but I sigh heavily.
“When my mother was young . . . too young. She was involved with a married man. He was almost twenty-five years older than her. And he got her pregnant.”
I prop up on my elbows to get a better look at Jude, who continues to stare at the floor.
“My dad . . . Tucker . . . the former rock star . . . wasn’t the father. His father was the man who went after my mom.” He finally glances at me, but I’m confused as I process the relationship.
“Tucker was asked by his grandfather, my great-grandfather, to marry my mom, because she was the daughter of a prominent business associate of Ashford’s.”
Jude is quiet for another second. “If it appears like I pissed a circle around you, as you so eloquently put it, it’s because Walt’s behavior reminds me of what my father, the sperm donor, did. How I was conceived.”
He swallows thickly. Despite his eyes toward me, he doesn’t see me. He’s lost in his head. Everything in me wants to give that lost boy inside him a huge hug, but I don’t move.
Instead, I speak. “I appreciate you looking out for me, but trust me, I’m not interested in married men or older men or men like Walt.”
“I’m not certain my mom was interested either.”
The quiet admission is a blow to my belly, and I swallow thickly. “I’m so sorry, Jude.” What more can I say? There’s no excuse for his biological father’s behavior or the sadness in Jude’s eyes.
“I appreciate you sharing this with me.” His honesty is raw, and his voice rough. Like he might not tell many people his secrets.
“For the longest time, I blamed my dad . . . Tucker . . . for my mother being miserable. For her having the affair she later had. But then I learned the truth and I was so . . . angry.”
I hear it in his voice, even now.
“I’m not a good guy, Angelica. Not a great man, and I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You won’t,” I state, licking my lips, feeling his rejection once again. He’s wrong about himself. He’s nothing like the man who impregnated his mom.
“I’ve been born and bred by selfish men.” His eyes narrow, and he looks away from me. “Well, Tucker didn’t turn out to be selfish, but that’s another story.”
One I’m certain Jude doesn’t want to share tonight as he bends with the intention of lowering to the floor.
“Just sleep in the bed.” I can keep my hands to myself as he’s certainly going to keep his hands to himself.
Jude halts his movements in that bent-over position and stares at me. Those cold eyes melt a little. The urge to hug him returns, but I recall how stiff Jude was when Sabrina hugged him. Maybe he doesn’t like hugs. Or maybe . . . he isn’t used to them.
Either way, we don’t need to touch. I grab one of the pillows from the pile next to mine and set it between me and the opposite side of the bed.
“Pillow wall. Nothing passes,” I state, like when my younger sister and I shared a bed.
Jude hesitates a second as he stands to his full height. His eyes are suddenly wild, like when Sabrina gave him that awkward hug in the hospital, and he didn’t know how to respond.
Eventually, he kneels at the end of the bed and crawls up it. The prowl shouldn’t look so sexy. The slink of his body. The hug of his boxer briefs. That tattoo on his side.
Dragging my gaze away, I fall to my back again while Jude flips to his before reaching for the lamp and turning off the light. We’re plunged into darkness, and silence falls heavily around us, the weight thicker than the pillow between us.
Eventually, he clears his throat. “Thank you for listening. And being here with me.”
“Of course.” I smile, but the motion feels forced. “That’s what a fake girlfriend does.”
“Yeah. A fake one,” Jude replies, his voice quiet, sleepy almost.
After several long minutes of silence, I assume he is sleeping when he clears his throat. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure,” I whisper to the dark ceiling, before holding my breath.
“Do you think people can change?”
I roll my head on my pillow, struggling to make out Jude’s form in the darkness. “Absolutely. Why?”
He doesn’t respond at first, then says, “Something strange happened to me. When I had the heart attack.”
Stress cardiomyopathy, I want to correct, but I bite back the words.
“I heard something. Felt something.”
I roll my lips, holding my breath.
“Like a voice spoke to me.” He pauses. “Asking me not to leave her.”
“Who?” I whisper, not because I need to know who she is, but to learn if he knows it was me.
“I don’t know. I think she was an angel.” He chuffs, dismissive but low. “But that’s silly, right?”
“Anything is possible, Jude.”
He is quiet another minute. But I can almost hear the gears of thought clicking from his side of the bed. Questions churning. Emotions concerning.
“She didn’t kiss me, but it almost felt like she did.” His voice is so quiet, I’m not certain he intends for me to hear him, but I do.
“Like she was giving her breath to me.” The confusion in his voice is evident. Like he’s baffled by what he’s saying, by what happened to him.
“Like she wanted me to live and brought me back so I could.”
I lick my lips before I speak. “Maybe she did want you to live.”
His head turns in my direction. “But not as I was. Not like those greedy bastards with old school ideas and a fixation on money.”
“Perhaps,” I offer.
He shifts once more. With my eyes adjusting to the dark, I see he’s on his side, facing me. His hand slips over the pillow and his fingers brush the inside of my elbow.
“The whole idea is a bit ludicrous, though. Scrooge didn’t really change after those three ghosts visited him, right?”
“I think he did,” I state, recalling how A Christmas Carol is all about transformation. In an effort to lighten the moment, I add, “And I thought you didn’t watch that stuff.”
“Don’t you remember it being required reading back at Immaculate Academy?”
I chuckle. “I’m surprised you remember.”
Silence fills the room again until Jude’s fingers brush along my inner arm. “I’m sorry we weren’t friends in high school.”
My damn eyes start to burn again, and I blink at the threat of tears. The apology is decades late and not really necessary, but the sincerity in Jude’s words is like a needle through my heart. A good needle, stitching up a hole.
“Thank you, Jude. I’m sorry we weren’t friends as well.” Because Jude could have used a friend back then. A real one. Someone who supported him so he didn’t slip on frozen ice.
Or didn’t suffer a broken heart.