Eyes of Ice (Eyes of Ice Erotica Series) (21 page)

“Cecelia?” Andrew asked,
his voice even. Cecelia forced herself to look up, into Andrew’s eyes. Their irises were turning an icy white out of restraint, and his lips were a thin line.

“I can’t go home,” Cecelia choked out. “Mom, Dad, I can’t!”

Her mother gripped the edge of the table. “Cecelia,” she said in an exaggerated tone of reason. “I think we know what’s best for you. This is what your father and I would like for you. There’s no call to be stubborn.”

“I agree,” Cecelia’s father added needlessly.

“Can’t you see,” Andrew’s voice was again restrained and cool, “that you are tearing her apart?”

Then he was at her side, pulling out her chair and helping her up. He had moved far faster than was possible, but Cecelia knew that he didn’t care. She stood, the room swimming through her tears, while her father made incomprehensible noises of disbelief and anger. Andrew’s arm was firm around her waist once more, wordlessly guiding her through what now seemed to be a maze of chairs and tables toward the door. Out of the corner of her eye, Cecelia saw her father rise as well, her mother’s protest: “Darling, the check—”

“It’s taken care of,” Andrew answered. His voice had shifted from coolness to coldness.

If her parents said any more, Cecelia could not hear it through the sound of static in her ears and her own sobs. They were in the bright sunlight once more, and Andrew kept guiding her down the street. Cecelia recognized her own voice and realized that she was apologizing over and over.

“It’s all right, stop that,” Andrew murmured, and led her through a doorway. It was a nearly vacant coffee shop. He left her at a small, round table for a few moments, and returned with a mug filled with a steaming spicy and creamy drink Cecelia didn’t recognize. It tasted salty through the tears that kept pouring down her face, and she realized she must look horrible. She could imagine her face now; red, blotchy, and probably already puffy, glistening with tears. For some reason, that made her cry harder.

“Drink,” Andrew ordered softly from across the table, and Cecelia obeyed.

After a long while (if felt like hours, and Andrew had ordered two refills of her drink) Cecelia was able to stop crying and raise her eyes to Andrew’s.

“I’m sorry,” she said again.

“Don’t be. I should be the one apologizing. I wouldn’t ever have predicted they would react as they did. And I am sorry for intruding, as well.” His finger was tracing the rim of his own mug of steaming liquid, and, his brow furrowed, he looked as if he could be doing nothing more complicated than examining his mug’s contents.

Cecelia felt like crying again, but somehow managed the gargantuan feat of holding back another flood of tears. “Please don’t be sorry, either. I really … that really … meant a lot. Thank you.”

“I should have stopped myself. I felt … an overwhelming urge to protect you,” Andrew went on.

Cecelia tried to swallow around the enormous lump of sadness that had materialized in her throat. “How do you do it?” she asked. “Live without parents, I mean.”

He was again considering his mug, and when he spoke his words were chosen with even more care than usual. “I don’t know. I suppose it’s easier for me, because I’ve never knew my own. I sometimes watch children with their parents and it’s like watching some variety of fantasy film – it’s that unreal and fantastical, and practically unimaginable,” he paused. “But Devon is my family, now. The family I never had. It’s what I imagine a family is like, anyway.”

There it was again – that sharp pain that Cecelia felt in her stomach and the clenching in her heart that occurred whe
never Andrew talked about Devon, that disorienting mixture of guilt, shame, and sorrow, and a late-blooming fear that she had been the cause of their dysfunction.
Maybe it’s only a matter of time until Andrew realizes it, and then what we have will be over – because I’m not family to him, am I? I’m not the family he never had.

“He’ll c
ome back to you,” Cecelia heard herself say, but it sounded like a wish even to her own ears.

Andrew shrugged, as if it was a matter of little consequence, drifting away from the man who had saved his life, and Cecelia hated everything even more, knowing that hatred was taking the place of sadness as an easier feeling to have. She hated her parents’ meddling, and hated that it had made her break down to weakness in front of Andrew, to whom she had sworn she would be strong; she hated Devon; she hated that she was still the wedge driven between Devon and Andrew; she hated
that Andrew still refused to be vulnerable and she hated that she demanded it of him.

“Cecelia,” Andrew said, obviously noticing that her attention was straying. “I’d like for you to come over tomorrow evening. You’ve been so good to me, and … I’d like to do something special for you.”

“All right,” she agreed automatically, numbing now to a forbidding feeling.
He’s going to break up with me. He’s seen me at my worst, and he can’t stand what I’m doing to him and Devon.
“I have to go,” she said suddenly, feeling the rising sadness again and knowing that it would only be seconds until the tears began once more. She stood quickly and left the coffee shop before Andrew could say another word. Looking over her shoulder as she left, she saw him through the window of the coffee shop. She watched briefly as he rubbed his forehead with one of his hands and stared at the ceiling, looking as conflicted as she had ever seen him.

             
                                                      
 
Ten

It was not Andrew who knocked on her door the following evening, but a suited man wearing a driver’s cap – he could have belonged to nobody but Andrew, yet Cecelia still greeted him with confusion.

“I’m here to take Miss Hardwicke to Mr. Forrester’s apartment,” the man informed her.

“That’s me,” Cecelia said glumly, the sinking feeling that had been intensifying all day starting to make her feel sick. She’d put less care into her outfit and appearance than she normally did, supposing that it didn’t matter anyway;
If Andrew’s going to do it, he’s going to do it,
she had reasoned with her tearful expression a few hours earlier.
There’s nothing that’s going to convince him otherwise. Not with what we’ve been going through.

So she’d worn a simple white dress, still out of deference to his appreciation of her body in dresses, left her hair loose, and applied the bare minimum of makeup to conceal the circles under her eyes and the redness around her nose.

She glanced at her mediocre ensemble in the mirror one last time before she left her room, and then wordlessly followed the driver down the stairs. A silver town car idled on the street, and the driver ushered her into the cavernous backseat, making a great display out of his formal behavior. “Thank you,” she muttered as he slammed the car door shut behind her, sealing her inside the dimly lit space.

              Half-expecting to see Andrew sitting in the shadows, she looked around – but there was no one. There was, however, a slim velvet box tied with a gold bow on the seat next to her. With some trepidation, Cecelia picked up the box and undid the bow. From underneath the silk, a small envelope fluttered out into her lap, which read, in Andrew’s flowing handwriting:

So that we can go together.

              Curious, Cecelia opened the box, and restrained a gasp. A glittering sapphire necklace lay on white silk cushioning. It was the most beautiful piece of jewelry Cecelia had ever seen, and she was sure it cost more than anything she had ever owned. Fingers trembling, she hardly dared to touch it, but after some more time staring, she finally plucked up the nerve to take it from its resting place and hold it to the light that sporadically made its through the car window. The illumination of streetlights and storefronts passing by shone through the sapphires to scatter from the gemstones’ complex cuts, making the jewels shine like blue flames.

             
Hands still trembling, Cecelia somehow managed to put the necklace on over her silver chain, and stared at her reflection now in the car window. She appeared pale and ghostly, but somehow regal now, the largest of the gemstones, also teardrop-shaped, glimmering at her clavicle. Her reflection slid away from her unexpectedly, and she jumped back as the driver opened the car door. Somehow, entranced by her gift, she hadn’t noticed that the car had come to smooth halt outside Andrew’s apartment.

             
There was a bellhop standing by the elevator, the brass buttons shining like gold on his uniform. “A bouquet for Miss Hardwicke,” he announced in a stentorian voice, extending a long-stemmed bundle of red roses. As soon as the shocked Cecelia took them, he gave her a curt nod, a slim smile, and then turned on his heel and hastily left the building, his shows clicking rapidly away on the tiles.

             
Cecelia stepped into the elevator and pressed the number for Andrew’s floor, all the while staring down at the perfect roses with disbelief and happiness clashing together in her head. The elevator doors opened, and she walked toward Andrew’s door. It was open a crack, so she let herself into what looked like a scene straight out of a romance movie.

             
The entire apartment was bathed in the golden light from a thousand candles, and smokily warmed by a crackling fire at the living room end of the loft. As the logs snapped with flame and the windows reflected not the lights of the city outside, but the glow of the candles, Cecelia heard soft footsteps. Andrew stood before her, also simply dressed in a white button-down shirt and black slacks, and carrying two flutes of champagne.

             
Cecelia’s mouth was still open in shock, and Andrew smiled, drawing closer.

             
“I told you that I wanted to do something special,” he said, handing her a glass.

             
“I don’t understand,” Cecelia blurted, painfully aware that she was ruining the romance. She somehow broke out of her frozen stance by the door and walked to the living room to set the champagne and her roses down on the coffee table. Andrew followed her, an amused expression on his face. “Why?”

             
“I told you,” he said, also setting down his champagne and walking to the fireplace. “You’ve been good to me. I wanted to do something special.”

             
“That’s … that’s all?” Cecelia asked. Andrew stood easily with his back to the hearth, his hands in his pockets as he surveyed her, his eyes lingering on her neck.
Is he looking at my necklace or my jugular?
Cecelia wondered. “No hidden agenda?” she clarified.

             
“No, no, of course there is,” he said, beckoning her closer. Unable to help herself, Cecelia took a few steps forward until she stood within inches of him. Rather than touching her, though, his hands remained in his pockets. It was only his eyes that rested heavily on her skin before staring deep into her own. “I want to continue teaching you. But not tonight. Tonight, I want to make love to you.” His voice was heavy with that kind of sexual hunger she had grown to recognize him, but unable to help herself, Cecelia trembled.

             
“Cold, again?” he asked, a teasing note in his voice. “Stand in front of the fire.” He left her there, and settled on one of the couches to gaze at her.

             
“Make love to me?” she asked, as the logs snapped with flames behind her.

             
“Touch your body in a way it has never been touched. Ease your every desire. Pleasing you as every woman believes she yearns to be pleased.” He said softly.

             
“Oh,” Cecelia said, and swallowed, her imagination taking off on a thousand different paths toward desire.

             
“Would you like that?” Andrew inquired, taking a sip of champagne.

             
“Yes,” Cecelia answered, feeling the heat rise in her body.

             
“Would you like to take off your dress?” he asked, his eyes again tracing their way over her body.

             
Cecelia’s breath caught in her throat.
Take off my dress? Here?
Panicked, she scanned the apartment, but it was a velvety black beyond the glow of the candles.

             
“Yes,” she said.

             
“Do it,” he commanded, his voice a quiet undertone.

             
Cecelia reached behind her and found the zipper of her dress easily. She tugged it down, and let it fall to the floor, collecting in a white waves at her feet. Andrew watched it fall, his head slightly tilted to the side. Cecelia felt the heat of the flames behind her roll over her body, like countless warm fingers caressing her exposed skin.