Chapter Eight #2
It was on the tip of Lainie’s tongue to tell her new friend nothing was going on in her life, yet she hesitated, wanting—needing—to share something of herself. To pretend this was a normal lunch between good friends. There it was again, that word normal. Would she ever feel normal again?
“I’ve sort of been seeing Christien Chevalier.”
Erica put her fork down with a loud clang and stared wide-eyed at Lainie for a moment. “You’re kidding, right? Chevalier? The guy who owns the nightclub?”
“Yes.”
“My God, Lainie. He’s…” Erica’s brow scrunched.
“Out of my league. I know.” She tried to tell him as much but he refused to listen.
Sometimes—most of the time—she found it hard to believe Christien Chevalier was interested in her.
But he’d as much as said it outside her apartment building Sunday morning when he claimed he would wait until she was ready for him.
She’d been trying so hard to give him an out, to make him understand she wasn’t going to be clingy or needy. Instead of taking the out, he’d stepped away from it and she’d lost her heart to him.
They were so different. He was rich. She was struggling to make ends meet. He’d been all over the world. She never made it out of Wisconsin. He was big-city sophistication and she was small-town rustic.
Yet the differences didn’t seem to bother him.
Erica shifted in her chair, preparing for a long talk. “So tell me. What’s he like? Have you slept with him?”
Lainie laughed. It felt good to laugh and shed her somber thoughts.
“He’s very nice. Very thoughtful. A little…
” She searched for the right word to describe Christien.
“Chivalrous. And no, I haven’t slept with him.
” She’d been surprised to wake up in his home, however.
She remembered him leaving to take care of business and being so tired.
The next thing she remembered was standing in the middle of the room and him holding her tightly while she cried, the remnants of the dream still terrifyingly close.
The dream. Madelaine and Christien in the garden, about to be caught by her husband. Even now Lainie shuddered at how close they had come to being discovered. It was almost like watching a soap opera on TV except it was so much more real and the intensity of the dreams was wearing her out.
She didn’t tell Erica about the dreams though, or running to Christien after seeing visions of herself dying. She hadn’t even told Christien about her visions of death and neither would she. He might say she wasn’t crazy, but she didn’t believe him. How could she when she thought she was crazy?
“But I have kissed him,” she said with a secret smile, her body warming at the memory of their kiss.
It’d heated her blood until she was completely flushed.
His arms around her made her feel safe. It’d been a long time since she felt safe.
When he pulled away, he looked flustered, not an expression he wore easily.
“Yeah? So tell me what it’s like kissing Christien Chevalier?” Erica asked.
“It’s…” Like I’ve come home. Like I’ve been searching for something all my life but didn’t even know it until he showed up. “Nice.”
“Nice? Nice? By the look on your face I bet it was much better than nice.”
Lainie laughed and tried to put into words what kissing Christien was like.
Except it wasn’t something easily explained.
When he’d said “kiss me” she’d been tempted to throw everything away.
To forget her responsibilities and be reckless for once in her life.
He’d been so tempting and she’d been so tempted, but common sense prevailed and she walked away.
She wasn’t sure how much longer her resistance would last. Her mind told her to stand strong.
A relationship with this man would alter her life forever.
Her heart said to grab what she could for the exact same reason.
Either way, she knew she would never be the same again.
Do you feel it? he’d asked the other day. Do you feel what is between us?
She had felt it. This…connection…was the only word to describe what was between them, but even that didn’t come close.
When she was with him, it felt right, like she’d been missing the other half of herself her entire life and had finally found it.
It was as if she knew him, knew what made him tick, what he was thinking, what he liked and disliked.
Was he right? Had she known him in another life?
She shook her head and handed the waiter her credit card.
Reincarnation only happened in the pages of books, not in real life.
Lainie had to keep her head on her shoulders.
Christien was wonderful and kind, but she had to stop him from distracting her.
She had to think of her father and his needs and wants before her own.
While signing her receipt, she glimpsed the man from across the street out of the corner of her eye.
He was still sitting at the table, his magazine forgotten, the corners of the pages lifting in the warm breeze.
He sat back, relaxed, hands on a flat stomach, watching the women walk by.
Their gazes locked, but his moved on almost immediately.
Maybe she was wrong. Maybe she’d never seen him before. Maybe this past weekend was getting to her, making her imagine things.
She and Erica walked back to the office with the larger-than-normal lunch crowd. The sidewalks were busy on this warm April day.
They paused at the corner to wait for the light to turn with a handful of people.
Erica chattered about her weekend and the movie she and her husband had seen.
Lainie turned to respond when suddenly she was shoved from behind.
Her foot slipped off the curb. She cried out, catching a glimpse of a mini-van barreling down on them.
Tires squealed. Someone screamed. The driver of the van laid on the horn. Lainie’s shoulder slammed into the hood. The impact threw her backward. She landed on her side and slid across the road. The asphalt ate through her clothes. Her head hit the curb and everything went black.