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He slid a hand up her hip and into the curve of her waist, his gaze tracking the movement as if she was the most fascinating woman he’d ever laid eyes on.
“Then you’d better not say things like that, or I’ll get too excited.” She thrust her hips twice to demonstrate.
His eyes narrowed. “You wicked, sexy girl.”
But as fun as it might be to tease him, she owed him exactly what he wanted after all the ways he’d already brought her to release. Besides, she needed to make the night last as much as he did.
More.
Because while Gibson might deceive himself that they still belonged together—that he could win her back and there would be more nights like this—Lark knew better.
He’d never want her back if he knew her secret. That she’d been selfish about something she had no right to keep from him.
So she took her time giving him everything he could want from her. Every slow slide of her flesh over his. Every kiss. Every graze of her breasts over his chest.
She rolled her hips. Rocked them. Rode him.
And when her legs could take no more, she let him roll her to her back and take everything else. When he came at last, his hand buried in her hair and his other arm wrapped around her, Lark wanted to weep with the perfection of it.
Or, maybe, she needed to weep from everything they’d both lost. Everything they were losing all over again. Because as the world seemed to contract to just the hammering of their hearts against one another, one thing had become abundantly clear during the course of this night with her ex-husband.
She still loved Gibson Vaughn. And that was still a very, very bad idea.
Eleven
Aphone ringing woke Gibson in the morning.
Disoriented at the full sunlight streaming through his bedroom windows onto the king-size bed, he blinked a few times to remember why he was still sleeping at this hour. Almost nine, according to a sleek black clock on one wall. But then, with the scent of Lark in the sheets wrapped around him, memories of their time together returned.
Where was she now?
R-r-r-ing!
His cellphone hadn’t stopped, prompting him to retrieve it from the bedside table even as he rose to find Lark. Would she be in the shower? The need to see her, to touch her and assure himself that last night hadn’t been a dream became his primary goal. His feet headed toward the en suite bath while he connected the call from—surprise, surprise—his agent.
“Dex, I’m not fielding any offers except for endorsement deals,” he said preemptively as he passed through the walk-in closet to enter the bathroom. “What have you got for me?”
“Gibson, you’re going to love this,” his longtime professional representative began. “A contract’s already drawn up and everything, with the best money we’ve seen to date. Plus, it’s from a team guaranteed to make the playoffs this season.”
The bathroom remained dark, and there were no signs that Lark had been here at all. Gibson’s stomach clenched as he pivoted fast. Maybe she was in the kitchen?
“There’s no such thing as a guaranteed spot in the playoffs,” he said wearily, recognizing Dex’s call as yet another attempt to woo him back into the game. “And it doesn’t matter anyway because I’m not playing anymore.”
He paused in the bedroom to throw on his T-shirt and sweats from the night before, noting that Lark’s clothes were gone. Which only meant she’d already dressed for the day, right? Glancing out the bedroom window at the Flat Tops Wilderness all around the cabin, he reminded himself she couldn’t have gone far. They’d taken a helicopter in, for crying out loud. It wasn’t like she could walk to Crooked Elm from here.
Why hadn’t she curled up next to him and awakened him with a kiss, the way she had when they’d been married?
“Gibson, you’re the biggest story in sports media this week. I couldn’t have scripted a better way for you to command a new contract—”
“And that’s part of the problem,” he shot back, unable to scavenge even an ounce of the composure he’d been famous for on camera throughout his career. Had his agent’s machinations behind the scenes helped ratchet up interest in Gibson’s career transition? Was Dex planting seeds around the media to drive coverage of an angle that wasn’t ever going to happen? “My life is more than a sound bite, and I’m not a clickbait story anymore.”
Striding into the kitchen with fast, angry steps, he knew at a glance Lark wasn’t there. A piece of paper lay on the butcher-block countertop that hadn’t been there the night before.
A note?
Knowing it wouldn’t contain anything good, he approached it slowly, still hoping she’d walk through his front door. Say she’d been out for a morning walk and couldn’t wait to shower together.
“But, Gibson, as your agent it’s my job to share all offers with you—”
