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“Not really,” she said. “Not yetanyway.”
Karen came around the rack of clothes. “What’s thescoop?”
“He drove me home from the gallery the otherday.”
“And?” Karenprompted.
“And… I don’t know. It was nice to seehim.”
“But what did he say?” Karenasked.
“He said he missed me, that he wanted anotherchance.”
Karen closed her eyes and shook her head. “Jesus.”
“What?”
“You’re not going to fall for this bullshit, are you?” Karenasked.
Nina slipped her phone back into her bag and flipped furiously through the clothes on the rack without seeing any ofthem.
Karen put her hand on Nina’s arm. “Nina.”
She stopped flipping. “What?”
“Talk tome.”
“Why? You don’t want to listen,” Ninasaid.
“That’s not true,” Karen said. “I’m sorry. I do want tolisten.”
Nina looked around. “Do we have to talk about thishere?”
“Why not?” Karen’s gaze swept the women’s department. “There’s nobody aroundanyway.”
Nina resumed looking through the clothes, more for something to do than because she was still interested in finding a bargain. “You don’t know what it waslike.”
“What are you talkingabout?”
“Being with Jack,” Nina said. “You don’t know what it waslike.”
“You told me what it waslike.”
“No, I told you about the sex,” Nina said. “That wasn’t all it was. I wasn’t sure if he felt the same way at the time, but it wasn’t just sex for me. It was easy to think that because it was so overwhelming, but itwasn’t.”
“Then what wasit?”
Nina drew in a breath. “I don’t know,” she said truthfully. “But I missed him when he was gone, and I missed how he made mefeel.”
“Neen…” Karen’s voice held a trace of pity. “How do you know it wasn’t just thesex?”
Nina had a flash of her naked body, bound in scarlet rope. She saw Jack between her legs, felt him driving into her, the memory still so powerful that she was immediately wet, immediately desperate with the wanting of him, her face flushed, a pulse beating between herlegs.
Then she was back on the street outside the gallery, Jack standing in the shadows, saying her name, her breath freezing in her lungs. She remembered the urge to walk into his arms, the sense that safety was only a few feet away, his pained expression when he said he wasn’t good at sharing his feelings and her strange desire to protect a man who seemed impervious todanger.
“I just know,” Nina said. “I’m not denying that the sex was… consuming. But there was something else there too. I wasn’t in the right place to explore it, but it wasthere.”
“I’m not saying I don’t understand,” Karen said gently. “But we’re talking about Jack Morgan here. How do you know…?” She shook herhead.
