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Something flared in his eyes. Something … dangerous. “Who has tried to tear you down?”
“Do we have to get into this?”
“No. We don’t. But sometimes it’s better, I think, to go ahead and speak frankly of the past.” Now his eyes were tender again. Tender and somehow completely accepting.
She let out a slow, surrendering sigh. “I lived with a guy when I was in law school. His name was Ryan. He was fun and a little bit wild. On the day we moved in together, he quit his job. He would lie on the sofa drinking those great big cans of malt liquor, watching ESPN. When I tried to talk to him about showing a little motivation, things got ugly fast. He said that I had enough ambition and drive for both of us and next to me he felt like a failure, that I had as good as emasculated him—and would I get out of the damn way, I was blocking his view of the TV?”
Rule gave one of those so-European shrugs of his. “So you got rid of him.”
“Yes, I did. When I kicked him out, he told me he’d been screwing around on me. He’d had to, he said. In order to try and feel at least a little like a man again. So he was a cheater and a liar, too. After Ryan, I took a break from men. I stayed away from serious entanglements for the next five years. Then I met Peter. He was an attorney, like me. Worked for a different firm, a smaller one. We started going out. I thought he was nothing like Ryan, not a user or runaround or a slacker in any way. He never formally moved in with me. But he was … with me, at my house, most nights. And then he started pressuring me to get him in at Teale, Gayle and Prosser.” She said the name of her firm with another long sigh.
“You weren’t comfortable with that?”
“No, I wasn’t. And I told him so. I believe in networking, in helping the other guy out. But I didn’t want my boyfriend working at the same firm with me, especially not if he was hired on my say-so. There are just too many ways that could spell trouble. He said he understood.”
Rule still had his fingers laced with hers. He gave her a reassuring squeeze. “But he didn’t understand.”
“Not in the least. He was angry that I wouldn’t give him ‘a hand up,’ as he put it. Things kind of devolved from there. He said a lot of brutal things to me. I was still an associate at the firm then. At a party, Peter got drunk and complained about me to one of the partners. By the time he and I were over, I …” She sought the right way to say it.
He said it for her. “You decided you were through with men.” She glanced away. He caught her chin, lightly, gently, and guided it back around so that she met his eyes again. “Are you all right?” He sounded honestly concerned. She realized that her answer really mattered to him.
She swallowed, nodded. “I’m okay. It’s just … when I talk about all that, I feel like such a loser, you know?”
“Those men. Ryan and Peter. They are the losers.” He held her gaze. “I notice you haven’t told me their last names.”
“And I’m not going to. As I said, it’s long over for me, with both of them.”
He gave her his beautiful smile. “There. That’s what I was waiting to hear.” He let go of her hand—but only to touch her in another way. With his index finger, he traced the line of her jaw, stirring shivers as he went. He caught one of the loose curls of hair that Lani had pulled free of her French twist, and rubbed it between his fingers. “Soft,” he whispered. “Like your skin. Like your tender heart …”
“Don’t be too sure about that. I’m not only prickly, I can be a raving bitch,” she whispered back. “Just ask Ryan and Peter.”
“Give me their last names. Ryan and Peter and I will have a long talk.”
“Hah. I don’t think so.”
He touched her cheek then, a brushing caress of such clear erotic intent that her toes curled inside her Jimmy Choos. “As long as you’re willing to give men another chance.”
“I could be. If the right man ever came along.”
He took her untouched champagne flute and handed it to her. Then he picked up his own. “To the right man.”
She touched her glass to his, echoed, “The right man.” It was excellent champagne, each tiny bubble like a burst of magic on her tongue. And when she set the glass down again, she said, “I always wanted to have children.”
He answered teasingly, “However, not nine of them.”
Suddenly, it came to her. She realized where she’d been going with her grim little tale of disappointed love. It hadn’t really been a case of total over-sharing, after all.
“Actually,” she said. “This is serious.”
“All right.”
“There’s something I really do need to tell you.”
His expression changed, became … so still. Waiting. Listening. He tipped his head to the side in that strangely familiar way he had. “Tell me.”
She wanted—needed—for him to know about Trevor. If learning about Trev turned him off, well, she absolutely had to know that now, tonight. Before she got in any deeper with him. Before she let herself drown in those beautiful black eyes. “I …” Her mouth had gone desert-dry. She swallowed, hard.
This shouldn’t be so difficult, shouldn’t matter so very much. She hardly knew this man. Holding his interest and his high regard shouldn’t be this important to her.
