Reckless Hearts: A Billionaire Romance (11 page)

"Food?" I said, the barest hint of amusement managing to peek out from beneath the cover I had thrown over it.

She pursed her lips, looking down at her laptop, then over her shoulder at the clock. She always sat facing away from the clock whenever she could. She told me early in our friendship that being able to see the time always made it harder for her to work.

"In 15 minutes maybe? I'm on a bit of a roll here and I want to get this thought down before it manages to run away."

"Sounds good to me," I replied.
15 minutes? I can wait that long. I know I can.

"Thanks!"

I packed up five minutes later and tried to look anywhere but the clock, which I thought might tick backward if I stared at it too hard.

I watched a librarian with her hair up in a tight bun re-shelve some books. I listened to the quiet rattle of the cold air as it moved through the ducts. Nothing worked. Time turned into a mountainous flood of molasses, crashing in slow motion through the streets.

"Almost done," Jennifer said, glancing at me over her laptop so that the Apple logo stood in place of her mouth.

I hated Owen for this. For displacing my thoughts, for forcing his way into my life and not leaving my mind no matter how hard I pushed.

It still mystified me how it was even possible. So what if there was something sexy about his confidence, or the way he looked dressed both casually and for business. Something sexy in the way he put that stick-shift Jeep through its paces.

Something sexy in the way he knew exactly what he wanted and wouldn't stop until he had it.

Blah. What's wrong with me?

The last time I could remember feeling remotely this way was my first year of junior high. The year before I decided to get serious about school.

Money had been tight that year because the GM plant where my dad worked had gone through a round of layoffs and he'd only been getting 20-25 hours instead of his normal 40 or more. And he was lucky to get that.

We couldn't afford a lot of back to school stuff, so I ended up wearing some hand-me-downs. A few pairs of jeans so white and worn out that I wondered if they might fall apart on me. A few shirts dating back from the '80s with names like
Wham!
and
Tears for Fears
in faded silk-screens on them.

Needless to say, I hated them. I would have worn my old clothes from the previous year if any of still fit. I'd hit a nice growth spurt that summer, too.

Anyway I thought I might die of embarrassment going to school in them, but my mom forced me.

A few kids did snigger at me. The ones in brand new clothes probably bought the week before.

Then a guy named Scott Jeffries, who was a year ahead, saw my shirt and told me he thought it was pretty cool. He was the best-looking guy in school, and he'd just complimented me, noticed me for being different from everyone else.

He was my first real crush. I'd pined away the rest of the school year until one dance when I got up the courage to ask him on the floor. He turned me down, my crush crushing me.

Come to think of it, it was right after that when I dove headfirst into school.

Except Owen wasn't like Scott. Owen wanted me. Didn't he?

Maybe I didn't want to tell anyone because it might somehow break the spell, make him realize that he didn't want me at all, not really. That he'd just been kind with all this and I had misread the whole thing.

"Done!"

"Sorry?"

"Wow, you are out of it. You're the one who suggested food, remember? Or is your appetite gone, too?" Jennifer said, slipping her notes and her laptop into her bag.

"It's still there. Come on." I couldn't wait to get out of that library with its off-white walls and useless study rooms.

It was still before lunch, so the cafeteria belonged to us. I got some tomato soup and then joined Jennifer over at the bench seating that looked out onto a small garden. A caretaker was busy wrapping the more delicate flowers and bushes getting them ready for winter.

"I need to tell you something," I started.

"Okay."

"I'm not really sleeping well. But it's not because of school stuff. It's... There's... This boy." My cheeks colored as I heard the words coming out of my mouth. Words I didn't think I'd ever say again. Not after that first year at junior high.

Sure, there had been the boyfriend later, and the prom date. But no one that made me feel this way.

"I knew it!" Jennifer said, placing the fancy, roasted red pepper sandwich she liked so much down onto its paper wrap. "Is it someone I know?"

My tomato soup smelled good, and a pile of saltines waited for my fingers to crumble them up into the soup, but I couldn't bring myself to eat. Not yet, at least.

"Sort of."

"What's his name? I'm pretty good at putting names to faces."

"Actually you don't know his name."
Not his real name, anyway.
It wasn't a lie.

"Oh, okay. So what's the problem, then? Unrequited love? Or," her eyes glittered here, "Maybe some overly requited love? Like lots and lots of late night requited love? The kind that keeps you from sleeping?"

"No! Definitely not," I said, the blush burning brighter in my cheeks making me look the liar. "Nothing like that."

"Then tell me how it is."

I spread my hands palms up on the table, the smooth surface cold against my knuckles. "I don't know what to do. I'm not certain how I feel about him. Or how he really feels about me."

"He likes you, though?"

"I think so."

"And you like him?"

I turned the question over in my head. "I suppose."

"That's a ringing endorsement right there. Definitely makes me want to buy what you're selling."

I gave her the stare of death and she shrugged back at me. "That's part of my problem. There's this potential there, I can feel it. If I let go and fall into it, I don't know what will happen exactly. Only that it will be pretty crazy."

"Nothing wrong with a bit of crazy every now and then."

"He's pretty much the exact opposite type of guy I ever pictured myself ending up with, though. And that's just for starters."

Jennifer sighed. I thought I could see into her mind. She looked dreamy, like she wished there was a guy out there right then that would drive her crazy, that would fill every one of her waking thoughts.

Except I knew she didn't. Or rather, she wouldn't if she knew what it involved. One of those fantasies that turns itself into a curse as soon as you start living it in real life instead of your daydreams.

"This is serious," I said, wondering why I brought it up in the first place.

"And so am I. Haven't you ever heard the saying that opposites attract? You know, like magnets."

"Uh, yeah. I didn't grow up under a rock."

"No, but sometimes it seems like you're determined to buy up some prime real estate beneath the biggest, heaviest boulder you can find.”

"Hey..."

She reached out and put her hands on mine, slid her palms up a little so that she could wrap her fingers around my wrist. My pulse raced.

"I believe that people get opportunities. I don't know where they come from. Fate, luck, someone up there watching out for us. I don't know. All I know is that they do show up. And there's one sure sign to recognize them."

"What?" I asked.

"Fear. Utter and complete dread. Because they're dangerous and you know it. What they don't tell you is if it's more dangerous to take the chance or to pass it by and wait for the next one to crop up."

I chewed that over, my soup going cold and her sandwich getting stale. A few other people began trickling into the cafeteria. Some profs let their lectures out a little earlier than others.

"So what you're saying is that I should risk it? But Jenn, I really am afraid. My schoolwork is already slipping. I don't want to think about him anymore. I can't and shouldn't think about him anymore. What if taking the risk costs too much?"

"What if passing it by costs even more?" she replied. It sounded so trite, so stereotypical. Or it should have. It didn't. And it incited just the sort of cold, creeping fear in my stomach and at the base of my spine that she indicated.

My pulse quickened, or the color drained from my face, or both. Either, or, maybe more. Whatever the case, Jennifer sensed it. She tried comforting me with squeezing my wrists.

"Hey, it's okay. I'm not going to make you choose either way. That's for you alone. All I'm trying to say is that these opportunities come up pretty rarely. So don't make your choice lightly, whichever way you go. Get me?"

"Yes, I do." I pulled my hands back and she didn't hold on.

Was it an opportunity, though? It was dangerous, yeah. He was dangerous. To my sanity, to my schoolwork.

Except that danger called to me, and I found myself back at the edge that cliff face I'd been staring down since all this started.

Jennifer started eating again, crumbs from her crust pittering and pattering down on the sandwich's wrap.

I stirred my tomato soup, the cracker packs untouched beside the tray. I couldn't eat, though. Maybe it was the skin on top of the soup that had formed during our tet-a-tet. Maybe it was the belt tightening a few notches more around my stomach, making the back of my throat burn.

But Jennifer was right. I had to make a choice, and I had to make it soon.

The trouble was, I didn't know which I wanted to make.

I
spent another night in a semi-unconscious state, writhing around on my bed. It was that strange state between awake and asleep, where you couldn't quite tell whether that monster in the corner was there or was the pile of laundry you'd been building over the last two weeks.

Except this monster was called Owen and he wasn't a monster but my lover.

My back arched with the touch of his lips to my neck. A gasp burst from me at the appreciative way his hand slid up my thigh and
squeezed
with a pressure that almost became pain.

This time I woke up when I came close to falling off the bed, my sense of balance jerking me to consciousness in time to roll the other way.

"No more," I said, my chest heaving. A phantom pressure lingered in my thigh where Owen's dream-hand had caressed me, "No more. I can't take any more."

The aching want, the visceral need, remained. It throbbed in me, low in my stomach, sending out pulses that left my fingers and toes tingling and my throat hot.

I couldn't take any more. I hadn't accomplished a single thing the rest of the day after that aborted attempt at lunch with Jennifer. Tomorrow, I knew, would be more of the same.

I was useless. And I sensed that uselessness would continue until I made up my mind one way or the other.

So, gathering as much of my wits as I could about me, I decided. I tried to decide based on cold logic, on reason. But that sort of things always falls to the wayside when your heart decides to exercise its veto.

Part of me despaired at the decision. The remainder (and, I thought, the majority) rejoiced.

More, none of this could wait until morning. So what if the clock said it was 3:17 AM? If I had to be awake and feeling this way, he should be, too.

Maybe we can get together and...
No. I told my hormones to shut up. There were certain things that shouldn't be rushed. This was one of them. No matter how much it deepened the ache inside of me to admit.

Still, I liked the idea of hearing the sound of his voice.

So I went over to my phone. I remembered destroying the piece of paper with his number on it.

I didn't need it. My fingers knew. I picked up the receiver, started punching in the digits. It struck me as strange that I decided to do this through the landline phone rather than using my cell, which I could have grabbed from my nightstand without even bothering getting out of bed.

Except it also struck me as right. He called me on that phone. He started the whole thing with it. That I continue this thing through it was right. Poetic, even.

I released my hold on my fingers and let them continue punching his number in.

It rang three times, each one deepening my fear that he might not answer.

Maybe he expected me to call him sooner. Maybe he gave up on me.
That earned a smirk from me. Of course Owen would be so presumptuous and confident to think I would cave in so fast.

"Do you know what time it is?" Owen said. The line made it so I couldn't be certain whether he sounded like I'd woken him or not.

"No. Please, what time is it?" I said, unable to resist.

"Late or early, depending on your perspective."

My heart started singing in my chest. Yes, this was just like talking with your crush and realizing that maybe, just maybe, they were into you, too. I had enough energy coursing through my trembling limbs to rival the Energizer Bunny.

Before I even knew it, I started curling a finger in my hair, pulling the strands tight before letting them loose and starting the process over again.

I'm reverting to a schoolgirl
, I thought, the remainder of the old me despairing.

"And what is your perspective on the matter?" I asked.

Something shifted on the other end of the line. I got the impression of Owen sitting up in his bed, maybe stuffing a few pillows behind his back to make it more comfy.

I wondered if he wore a shirt to bed, or went shirtless. Maybe he didn't wear anything but the sheets. That sent some exciting tingles through the lower part of my body.

"My perspective," he said, "Depends on what you have to say to me. I recall telling you that we're not going any further until you stop lying to yourself and tell me what I want to hear."

"I'm not saying anything over the phone," I replied, "It's something that has to be said in person."

"Is what you're saying going to please or disappoint me?"

"I guess you're going to have to wait to find out, aren't you?" I couldn't give him everything. I needed to keep something back for myself. Something that told me I still possessed some modicum of control over myself and this situation.