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Nick had driven Jenna back to the hotel and overheard her say her daughter would be spending the night in her friend’s room having a pajama party. Eric knew Jenna was downstairs in her room alone. He threw on gray trousers and a plain white shirt and rolled back the cuffs. He went back into the bathroom and brushed his hair again.
****
Jenna sat at the table by the window and looked down. Her room was on the Fifth Avenue side, its view of the park’s greenery blurred by the lights of the city. Cars, streetlamps, and the steady glow in windows created an illusion. Orbs of radiance seemed to hang suspended in the night’s air. It was magical. She spotted a man whose hand was gallantly extended to help a woman step from a hansom cab. She was dressed in something Jenna might have worn herself if she’d the occasion for such an outfit—a dress with fitted bodice and full skirt that was layers and layers of pearly tulle and chiffon—a romantic outfit. Jenna watched, eyes moony and longing as the couple locked arms and strolled into the warm New York night.
She went to the bathroom to brush her teeth, gathering her hair into a ponytail as she slowly walked. Her face was scrubbed free of makeup and wisps of hair fell from the elastic band. Shaking her head at her reflection, she sighed. She was at the Plaza, alone on a Saturday night, wearing a huge T-shirt that hung close to her knees. On it was a picture of a green and orange dinosaur with the words Mommy-saurus written in bright purple letters.
“You are one hot babe, Jenna Laine.” In an instant, her fingers were at her lips. She’d barely claimed the name long enough to put it on her driver’s license. “Black, Jenna Black,” she corrected.
Ambling from the bathroom, she grabbed the remote and clicked on the television. She fell into bed, hoping to get drowsy enough to sleep, but a rap on the door disturbed her.Janie. Jenna sprinted over and pressed her eye against the peephole, but when she saw who her visitor was, her heart began to pound. Slowly, breathlessly, she opened the door no farther than the security bar allowed. “It’s after midnight.”
“Nick just dropped you off ten minutes ago.”
“I…I’m…I’m not dressed.”
Eric offered no reaction other than to smile and slide his hands into his pockets. She turned from the liquid stare, her back against the partially opened door. Admitting to being undressed wasn’t the way to dissuade a man or cool his passion.
“I know it’s late but, I…um…wanted to know how the concert was.”
“You wanted to know about the performance of a fifteen-year-old pop star?”
“C’mon, Jen. I just want to talk to you. Don’t make me beg. Open the door…please.”
“Okay.” She answered in a whisper because the thready breath was all she could manage. Her eyes fluttered shut, and she inhaled and exhaled, slow and easy, until her heart’s rhythm calmed. She slipped the bar from the slot and opened the door.
Eric stepped inside, but weeks of fleeting encounters had exhausted his willpower and his eyes touched her everywhere. Though she was blanketed in an oversized T-shirt, the memory of gently swelling curves and sun kissed skin heated his blood. He brought his sight up and away from her body, but as his eyes settled on her face, he felt a deeper stirring. Tendrils of golden hair escaped a band and tumbled around her face. Her soft lips, slightly parted, whispered to him in his imagination. He blinked and swallowed hard, willing himself to break what he knew was a forlorn gaze.
As if feeling the intimacy of his stare Jenna tugged at the shirt. When she spoke, her words rolled across her tongue in a stammer. “S…sit.”
“Thank you.” His arm accidentally brushed her shoulder as he walked by, and it caused a shock to pass between them. “Sorry. It must be the carpet.”
“Of course,” Jenna agreed. “Static.” She brushed her hand up and down her arm as if the tingle persisted. “Let me go put some clothes on.”
He tilted his head and smiled crookedly, his eyes again sweeping over her. “That’s a pretty big shirt. Besides, it’s not like I haven’t seen you without your…Oh hell, I didn’t mean to say that.”
They stood face to face, moments long and uneasy, their eyes locked as if some hypnotic force connected them. The blue pools of Eric’s glinted in the dusky light and the wide golden gleam of Jenna’s shone like polished topaz. Eric grabbed one of the chairs at the table, turned it around and straddled it. He leaned his arms on the back and smiled again.
The masculine yet graceful way he moved made Jenna’s breath skip into her lungs. No one walked the way he did, his shoulders slowly dipping with each easy step. No one leaned against a wall, or just sat, giving off an aura of pure maleness the way he did. Jenna wished to hell she still didn’t see him that way. Before her insides turned liquid and she fell into a boneless swoon, she pulled a chair close and sat, her shoulders rigid against the back, her hands folded in her lap. “Why are you here?”
“So many reasons,” he said with a shrug.
The truth about Janie lay suspended on Jenna’s tongue, and her heart once again began to race. She pressed tighter against the chair’s tufted upholstery and dropped her sight to her clasped fingers.
Eric wished to reach for her, to pull her close and shake the stiffness from her body, to let the heat of his hands spread over her till she fell warm and curving against him.
“Us,” he said. “We need to talk about us.”
Jenna’s eyes were wide and pained. “There hasn’t been an us for almost ten years.”
“Money then.” Bringing up memories, going back to a place that had shattered both their hearts seemed an unwise path to take. “I need to sign control of a portfolio to you. I could recommend someone to handle it.”
“I don’t need you to recommend anything.” Her words were a sudden flow of ice. “I run a business and know how to handle money.”
Jenna felt her face flush and angry tears were building behind her eyes. His talk of money stung. The Eric Laine she was married to had carried his net worth in his pockets. The sting became the quick slice of a blade. How would they ever be able to share Janie when she couldn’t shake her anger and be civil to him for more than a moment?
Standing, she tightened her ponytail and tugged at the edges of her T-shirt. She wished for a thousand other things to feel other than how much it hurt that he had done so well without her—that he had accepted Bree Davis’s help and never her own. In the short time Jenna and Eric had been together, she’d offered him countless business opportunities, and each time he’d flatly refused. Anger over his stubborn pride, she decided, was the easiest to grab on to. “I think you should go.”
He stood and pushed the chair away. “Jesus, Jen, ten seconds into a conversation and I’ve already pissed you off. I can’t seem to do or say anything right.”
