Commitment (6 page)

Without saying the words, they agreed:
‘when I’m with you, I’m with you and what happens when I’m not with you doesn’t matter.’
And it had worked. At first.

Until Riley he’d forgotten that when he was working and
travelling
things seemed to stand still and move really fast at the same time. Shawn raced through cities and meetings, shows and appearances at lightning speed, almost expecting that when he was done, he could pick up right where he’d left
off with the rest of the world.

But it didn’t work
like
that. When he was doing his thing, she was doing hers – working, meeting new people, dating and eventually transforming a “sort of” boyfriend into the real deal. Riley’s life was a universe of events, friends and ideas that he had nothing to do with and that had nothing to do with him. It should have been a relief.

Her shirt was close-fitting and scooped in front exposing the length of her neck. All he could think about while she stretched her arms and rotated her head as though to work out a
crick
, was whether Brian kissed her neck and if she liked it. When he did it, he could feel a low, rumbling vibration in the back of her throat that excited the hell out of him. 

“What’s on the tasting menu?” she asked, idly playing with the ends of her scarf.

Shawn impatiently signaled for their server, who brought the menu right away. Riley skimmed it and looked up.

“Can’t wait,” she said. “But why would you leave Paris and come eat at a French restaurant in New York?”

“It’s not like you think,” he said, still impatient. “Y’know what I see
when I’m in Paris? The inside of a suite in the Hotel Champs Elysees, the arena and the airport. Most of the time I eat crap that someone brings to me in plastic containers.”

“You s
hould do something about that,”
she said seriously. “Maybe spend more time before your shows. Or after. What’s the point of visiting these amazing places if you never see them?”

“The point is to work and get the hell out of there
,
he said reaching for his glass of water.

“
Wow, someone’s a little t
esty
this evening
,” Riley said.

What he didn’t say should have been obvious by now. If he lingered to sightsee in every city where he had a show, he probably wouldn’t get to see her when he did, which was only about once every
three
weeks or so for maybe two, three days at a time. She never asked for more than that. She never
asked
for anything.

Nine months of this and most women
wer
e screaming for
something more. Hell, he couldn’t remember
ever having
spent nine months with the same woman exclusively or otherwise. His lifestyle wasn’t conducive to that, but it had suited him just fine. 

“Shawn?”

He looked up.

“You
’re
probably just
tired from the flight,” she said. “Maybe we should’ve eaten in your suite.”

“Nah, I’m good.” He leaned forward and smiled at her, which she returned right away with one of her own. 

“Guess who finally got an interview with the schools’ chancellor, by the way.”

“You did? Cool.”

“You remember what I’m talking about? The piece I’m writing on that case where they gave that kid Ritalin without his parents’ consent?”

“Yeah, I remember.”

She sent him text messages when he was away. Sometimes they were
just about the weather, sometimes
about her work or a story she’d read in the newspaper
.
She asked him about music she’d heard and wanted to know whether he’d heard of the artists as well. Even while they were apart, her presence was almost tangible to him, more real than some of the people he saw every day.

“A
nyway, someone Greg knows saw him at a cocktail party and let slip
that we were investigating it and . . .”

He only half-listened as she went on. Mostly he watched her face, the way her eyes lit up when she talked about her work and the big gestures she made with her hands as she spoke.

She had an even
oval
-shaped
face, a cool dark-olive complexion that glowed when she was embarrassed and sleepy dark almond-shaped eyes that needed no help from all that smoky eyeliner and mascara crap that other women plastered on.
Knowing her, w
earing
her hair naturally curly hair short and cut evenly was probably her way to ensure that running her fingers through it occasionally would be enough to take care of grooming. 

Shawn smiled to himself. He was jonesing for her and she was sitting right across from him. But of course, it was way worse when they were
apart
.

In Paris, some groupie tried to jack him up in the bathroom of the show promoter’s penthouse apartment. She was a half-French, half-Ethiopian model
,
with reddish-brown hair and large gray eyes, and no joke, she was even more beautiful in person than she was on the
pages of fashion magazines.

She didn’t speak a word of English so they’d barely even exchanged ‘hellos’ but that didn’t stop her from shoving him into the closet-sized latrine and falling to her knees in front of him. Shawn was surprised at what he’d felt looking down at the top of her h
ead.

Exhaustion.
Exasperation.
Anything but lust.
 

He’d
pulled her to her feet and gently but firmly steered her back out to the rest of the party where he had to endure her dirty looks for the rest of the evening.
She
was a
beautiful girl, no question. But
he was on edge, wound up and could think only about the twenty-
some
hours standing between him and this moment, when he would be with this girl, right here.

When
the food
came
out Shawn realized that the last time
he
’d
e
ate
n
had been
ten hours earlier during the flight from Charles De Gaulle. The rest of the time,
he
listened to music and got
a few hours of restless sleep, impatient for the moment when the airplane would touch down on the tarmac at JFK.

Sometime during the meal Riley suddenly stopped eating and smiled at him, reaching across the table with her napkin to wipe the corner of his mouth. He drew back and laughed at her.

“
What
are you doing?
I’ve been wiping my own mouth since I was
five
,
thank you very much.
”

“
It’s just that you’
re
so handsome,” she said. “I could eat you up.”

Shawn grinned
back
at her. “Who says stuff like that? I mean, who under seventy-five years old?”

Riley laughed and tossed her napkin at him. “I say stuff like that. That’s who.”

He shook his head in amusement and took the napkin she’d thrown at him, using it to wipe the area she’d been reaching for. And then, because he couldn’t help himself, h
e
slid a hand across the table until the tips of his fingers
brushed
hers.

They went through almost two bottles of wine with dinner and when they were done, Riley leaned back in her chair with a satisfied
and
slightly tipsy
smile.

“So
do I get to
see what fancy rooms at the Four Seasons look like
?”

“You’ve been here before,” he reminded her.

Shawn
signed the slip and stood to pull out her chair.

In the elevator, they were
finally
alone
.
W
hen
Riley turned to face him
with her chin slightly ra
ised,
he leaned in to kiss her
, feeling himself
grow
h
ard as
her tongue met his. She placed one
cool
hand on the back of his neck and the other
gripp
ed
the collar of his shirt. They kissed until they heard the ping of the elevator, and the doors opened on his floor. As they walked down the hallway, Riley reached over and laced her fingers through his
.

After their first night together when
he’d
left for Baltimore he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her. The way she’d walked out on him had been a first
. Women never walked out on him
-
they often had to be shown the door
, in fact
. But Riley, even after talking about how amazing their chemistry was, had left without a backward glance. For
the
two weeks
following
, thinking about
that, and about
her
,
became an itch he couldn’t scratch.

No matter
what
he
did,
the itch
didn’t go away.
And the more he thought about her, the less it was about ego. He remembered sitting up in bed
,
Riley astride him so it was difficult to see where he ended and she began
; her arms locked about his neck, and his face between her breasts.
She ha
d trembled from the intensity of it,
her breath soft and ragged, brushing the shell of his ears
.
He remembered how
later
she laughed at something he’d said, throwing her head back, completely herself and unconcerned
about how she might look
,
but how she looked was beautiful,
her face flushed and almost glowing in the dim light
.
He remembered her
dark, intense
eyes fixed on his while they moved in unison, like she wanted to see right through to his
very
soul.

Most of all,
h
e
remembered feeling like he was making
love
to her; even though they’d just met, nothing about what they did could be called
fucking.
S
o
he wanted to test his memory – had it
really
been th
at good?

So
fin
ally he gave in and called her.
The
Boys and Girls Club had invited him to come to a rally
so he had
a reason to be in New York that would pass muster, even with Brendan who was a stern gatekeeper for his time.

Shawn remembered the sound of
her
voice when she re
alized he was on the other end –
the little trill of pleasure that she tried to conceal. They
talked
for a few minutes about the scheduled release of the article she’d done on him. She told him that her editor had liked it so much he’d decided to make it the feature.
He
told her he would be in town
and offered to do a
photo shoot
for them then
.

“
I’ll pass that
message
on to our folks here
,”
she said.
“
But
I wouldn’t be the person who’d
set
that
up
,
”
she added.

“
I want to see you
,” he
said simply
.

There were a few beats of silence, which he struggled not to fill with
words of persuasion. If they were going to do this, she would have to meet him halfway.

“
Okay
,”
she said
finally. “
Yes
.”

That second time, when they met, she was almost shy. She’d come to his suite at the W and seemed not to know whether to hug him, kiss him or shake his hand. He’d cleared up that confusion right away.

g

Now, when they arrived at the suite, there were few words between them. Shawn shut the door, slowly unwound the scarf from her neck and tugged Riley’s shirt free of her jeans. Underneath she was wearing a hideous black cotton bra that looked like something that would have been standard-issue in a Catholic girls’ school.