34. Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Four
Emma
I’m not sober, but I’m increasingly aware that I’m sitting on Luther’s bed. Which doesn’t have any of the delectable qualities that Dacre and I’s bed does. For a man only spending the weekend here, he’s sure made himself at home.
There are clothes thrown on top of the wardrobe. Snack wrappers and empty cans litter the end table and armoire before he decided to host the culinary club in his room. The party has spilled out into a few adjoining rooms, including Verity’s, which is next door.
“So, where is your room, Em?” Luther leans in next to me, and I’m crushed between him and another girl who’s busy with her boyfriend on the phone.
I shrink away from his alcohol breath and the volume of his voice in my ear.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” I smile, savoring another sip of my drink. Verity made the girls Dirty Shirleys.
“I very much would.”
“And why would that be?”
“I never see you in the morning.”
“I didn’t know you were looking.”
“How can I not?” He licks his teeth.
Luther is a few inches too close to my face, and his fingers are touching the edge of my leg. Even drunk, he’s not my type.
What would I say my type is? Dashingly handsome gentlemen who wear suits and just happen to have tattoos lining their arms?
I can’t hide from the truth. Nothing I like about Dacre has to do with his appearance. I mean, it helps, but . . .
I like his mind. I like those carefully thought out plans and schemes, even if I’m out of the fold, because it’s something I don’t have.
I like his effortless talent and the way he makes everything in the kitchen look easy because nothing is that easy for me, maybe aside from baking.
I could watch him cook all day and never get bored.
I love the challenge. Mom and Dad were perfect for each other, but natural opponents. Mom was the fire, and Dad was the rain. Their bickering was never malicious, more like heated debates and gentle bending when one of them won the argument.
It’s impossible to hate him. After all, I miss him, even though it’s only been hours. Checking the door every thirty minutes reminds me that Dacre is under my skin. Somewhere in him is a kind man whom I can feel but don’t always see.
When Luther leans in, I crinkle my nose and fall back on the bed to rub my hair into the sheets. It’s not an invitation for anything. Rather, it’s my last attempt at doing something Dacre might hear about and get jealous over. Perhaps he’ll go feral and start a fight.
That’s enough drunk Emma thoughts for me.
I weasel my way out from under Luther’s lustful stare by faking a phone call from my dad.
The house is made of pristine halls that lead to a confusing layout of meeting rooms and dining areas. The sterile birch wood makes me feel as if I’m walking around in an abandoned department store. I stumble as I turn the corner of another hall.
All I need to do is get back to my room. It’s past midnight. No one will see me.
I hit a wall. Or at least, I think it’s a wall at first because the lighting is dim.
“Emma.” Dacre towers over me, holding me up by the forearm.
I expect a lecture. A groan, an insult. I brace as if I have the energy or the desire to fight back, but I’m the vulnerable one here. I feel strangely bare in front of him. I check to make sure my skirt is down and that my shirt isn’t tugged in a way that reveals my bra or something.
“Is Luther going to walk you to your room?”
I shake my head, a little rattled and dizzy.
“That would be a bad idea, remember?” I say.
“Come on. I’ll take you.”
“You don’t have to . . . I can do it my—”
“You can’t walk around in the dark. Don’t argue.”
Heat rises in my cheeks and then makes its way down between my legs. It’s an order, and I’m not feeling very assertive. In fact, I’m feeling like rubbing my cheek all over Dacre’s chest because he smells so good, and I feel naked and exposed and want him to warm me.
I think I left my shoes somewhere in Verity’s room.
“You had a good time?” Everything about him seems neutral and unbothered as he walks next to me with his hands tucked into his pants.
“Yes, it was great.”
“Great? Wow.”
“Why ‘wow?’”
“I had no idea you and Luther were so . . . close.”
Does he know about the party? Does he think I was alone with him the whole time? I keep my cards close to my chest.
“Were you spying on me? How do you know I was with Luther?”
“With Luther?” he asks, his voice grave.
“Yeah . . . I was having a good time with Luther. How did you know?”
“Okay, we’re down to good.” He scoffs with a smile. “You smell like him.”
Gross. “I smell that good, huh? Must be from his sheets.”
That erases the smile from his face. A gleeful satisfaction runs through me. I win.
I could prolong his torture, but I have no desire to be associated with Luther in any romantic capacity.
“It was a party in his room. Yes, I was on his bed, but there were plenty of other people there too. Happy now?”
The edges of his mouth curl into a smile as we reach the lawn, which is covered in dew from the sprinklers and bathed in moonlight. The smell of salt carries on the cold air wafting in from the ocean. Before I can finish a string of words about the wetness on my feet, Dacre lifts me. With one arm.
I cuddle up to his chest with my arms wrapped around his neck.
All consuming comfort suffocates me from all sides.
It’s what I imagine it’d be like being with the stars, like my mother is.
She’s probably looking down on me right now, watching me get carried barefoot in the moonlight by a man to our room.
“Careful, Em.”
“What?”
“You know what.”
I wasn’t doing anything, just thinking . . .
Playing with the collar of his shirt, I trace little hearts across his skin.
He really does smell like . . . mine. Not in a possessive, no-one-else-can-touch-him type of way, more like a cologne made for me.
A person born for me. And with the large amount of sloshing of alcohol in my stomach, I can’t help but think of what it might be like to blend our chemistry together.
How it might feel to be that close to my person. Skin on skin, with nothing between us.
Personally, I don’t have much of an idea, and that’s what makes me so curious.
“I mean, what do people even do all night anyway? It just seems excessive,” I mumble.
“All night? You mean . . .”
“Sex. Everyone in the movies seems so . . . into it, just like these animals going at it. The girl is always so loud, panting like a dog, and it just never feels like that, I guess.”
“This isn’t surprising, coming from the girl who hadn’t had an orgasm yet.”
“I had a really overbearing family, okay? I shared a room with my sisters till I left, so things like that, not really on my mind.”
He drops me next to our door, and I wait while he unlocks it.
“I thought you were mad at me,” he says.
“I am. But . . . I’m also a little drunk, and I can’t help but want to talk. Ask my sisters.”
“I don’t need to ask what I already know. You like to talk, drunk or not.”
Once through the door, he sits on the edge of the bed. His green eyes glow as he takes in my full image. His gaze crawls slowly over me from head to toe.
What might happen if I joined him at the edge of the bed and pressed his lips against mine? And what if that’s better done naked?
“Emma.” He tilts his head and shakes it like a rejection.
I knew his answer would be no.
“What?”
“You know what.”
“You’re right. I’m mad at you . . . And you’re engaged. And you don’t tell me anything, so . . . I should punish you.”
“I’m not engaged.”
“But you will be.” With both hands, I tug at the edges of my skirt, and it falls to the floor.
Finally, I’m a step ahead. Dacre grips the bed as I unbutton my shirt.
“What . . . are you doing?”
I shrug. “Undressing in my room. What else?”
His gaze follows the shirt to the floor and then lands on my breasts. I had no master plan when I picked out this floral corset top, but as always, my instinct to choose cute lingerie only benefits me.
There’s a growing weight in the air as I roll down my socks. With a satisfied purr, I stride to the bathroom to brush my hair and remove my makeup for the night.
I feel his gaze on my back. My legs. My breasts.
“Enjoying the view?” I ask.
“You’re actually ridiculous.”
When I’m done, I skip to my side of the bed and stretch out with a yawn.
“So tired.”
Dacre is next to me with water and a little purple potion. “Drink these before you sleep.”
“Drugging me again?”
“Helping you have a better morning when you wake up naked in bed next to me.”
“I’m very coherent.”
“Uh-huh.” He nudges the water toward me.
Both liquids are cool in my throat as they go down, and Dacre’s smirk is the only thing on my mind. He looks so damn handsome.
“I could show you, you know.”
“Huh?”
“Show you why all those women in the movies are screaming and panting like animals.”
My whole body grows hot, and my heart rattles against my ribs. Oh, no. He’s not seducing me. I’m seducing him.
“Nice try.” I snuggle beneath the covers.
His smile stays on for the first time. He strips his shirt and his pants to the floor, and though seeing his bare chest and the curve of his tattooed biceps is enough to make my mouth drop open, none of it is better than how he looks smiling.
“And just what do you think you’re doing?” I ask.
He skips to his side of the bed and yawns. “Just undressing in my room. What else?”
As he tucks himself in, laughter is shared between us. Dacre has a nice laugh. I’d like to hear it again. It’s lighter than I expected.
“I think that’s the first time I’ve seen you genuinely laugh,” I say as I lie, facing him. I test the edges of our usual boundary by stroking my foot along his leg.
“You’re supposed to hate me, remember?”
He turns, and our bodies mirror each other, and there’s the comforting rub of Dacre’s thumb on my thigh.
“I do.”
“Good. Keep hating me. Because I don’t know what happens when you don’t.”
I scoot in closer, brushing my hands over his chest. His fingers graze through my hair as I lay my head on his chest.
Dacre rubs my head, and his heartbeat is a soft lullaby.
I don’t know what happens after this, and I don’t care. At least not tonight, I don’t.
Being let into Dacre’s world, if only for a night, is enough. Forget the marriage contracts. Everything else falls away when our skin touches.
It doesn’t take long for me to feel myself drifting off to sleep. I keep imagining Dacre pulling my chin up to kiss me.
“You didn’t tell me,” I say softly.
“Tell you what?” he whispers into my hair.
“You didn’t tell me your parents died.”
“I don’t tell anyone that.”
“You can tell me. You can trust me.”
“I know.”
His silence stretches on, and I almost doze off when he speaks again.
“I wasn’t very old when they died. I have very faint memories, more pictures than anything. My grandfather took in my siblings and me after.”
“What were their names?”
“John and Beth. Very traditional. There are lots of Johns in my family. My father was the fifth Everhart with that name, and then he named my eldest brother after him.”
“Are they all as charming as you?” I squeeze around his ribs.
“I wouldn’t know. I barely talk to them . . . My family isn’t like yours, Em. I’m not even sure my parents had kids because they wanted to. Sometimes I think it’s better that I don’t remember much of anything because I can imagine my parents however I want.”
Maybe that’s one reason he isn’t close with his older brothers. Maybe they know the real answer.
“Is anything you remember good?”
“The few memories I have are short. They’re like fleeting feelings and moments, but none of them feel solid anymore. I do remember my mother helping me get ready every morning, combing my hair, and helping me with my shoes. She’s smiling at me, telling me to be good.”
His chest heaves. I reach for his hand. My fingers graze over the fresh scar, and I squeeze the warmth of his palm.
“You should sleep,” he says.
“No, I want to keep talking. You haven’t told me your hopes and dreams yet.”
I have him in my grasp. Finally. Dacre is like an evasive animal. Just when I think I’ve created enough space for him to feel safe enough to open up, he bolts.
“I don’t have any. Not really.”
“That can’t be true. Everyone has them. Even if they’re small.”
“The only thing I’ve ever cared about is grabbing my stake in the company so I can take care of my sister and make sure she gets to graduate and then maybe go to college. I don’t have much hope she’d want to go, though.”
“What about when you were a kid? Did you dream of anything?”
“I thought I was going to be a hotshot chef in the city.”
“You changed your mind?”
“The more I do this . . . the less I care about fame. I want to go far away on a boat and be a personal chef or something, where no one knows me. I guess . . . When I was little, I did think of one thing. But my grandfather hated the idea.”
“Tell me.”
I haven’t let go of his hand, and I don’t think I ever will.
“You won’t laugh?”
“No way.”
“I had this idea that I’d run a bed and breakfast .
. . And when my parents died, I . . . I had this plan to use their house, with all their old pictures, to keep their stories alive.
But the house went to my brother. Well, until recently.
My grandfather just gave it to me. It doesn’t matter, though.
What am I going to do with it now, except visit and try to remember? I’m a little scared to go back.”
“You have to make the bed and breakfast. I can help you. I have all these ideas—Wait. Sorry, I’m making this about me.”
“No . . . Please, go on.”
“Well, first, you’d choose an aesthetic for the house, something that honors your parents’ style, but you add some of your own. You get fresh flowers from a florist every week, and then I could help you come up with a menu. I’d even let you help me with baking.”
“I love how you weaseled yourself into my dream.” He chuckles again, and it’s rich and beautiful.
“Is that sarcasm?”
“No.” Dacre rakes his fingers across my scalp. “I really do like the way you assume you’ll be there . . . like . . . you want to be.”
“I do. You don’t believe me?”
“I don’t know what you see in me, Em. I’m just some guy who’s been an asshole to you.”
“You’re more than that. You’re . . . mine. My person. You’re caring and sweet.”
“I’m not sweet.”
“You can’t help but be sweet to me.”
“Very true.”
“I’ll go to sleep if you promise not to pretend this didn’t happen.”
He squeezes me tighter. “I promise.”