Closer (25 page)

Chapter Twenty-Four

She sat in the luminous moonlight, nursing and rocking Luna to sleep within the solace of Sven’s balcony suite, enclosed in glass and encircled by an exterior garden patio overlooking the vast starless night and the churning black waters of Lake Michigan.  Somehow, someway, Sven had arranged a crib and rocking chair to be delivered to his penthouse. 
He must have done it earlier that evening
, she thought, despite the fact that he had no assurance that Inez would agree to come home with him.  Now, as she swayed back and forth with Luna nestled snugly in her arms, she felt his silent presence in the adjacent master bedroom as he dimmed the lights to ensure her peace and comfort. 

He did not want to disturb them
.  She reflected on his efforts to accommodate them since the moment he realized she was not just his sassy opinionated temporary hire, but also a struggling single mother. 
It had not been what she expected from him
.  In the past several hours, he had surprised her at every turn, except perhaps for his offer to spend the night.  And by finally accepting it, she had surprised herself.

Yet tonight was different than previous nights because he had offered her the balcony suite—her
own
room—to nurse and sleep with Luna without any hint that he desired more from her.  He had offered it to her as a gesture of generosity and compassion rather than a complex extension of their business arrangement, and it made her feel safe and secure when there were so few times in her life that she had ever felt safe and secure.

She synchronized the rocking chair to the motion of the waves that curled across the surface of the lake, until she was certain Luna was fast asleep.  After a few moments, she noticed a sudden shift in the light and peered out of the glass door leading into the garden patio.  Barefoot and coatless, Sven was there, peering over the balcony railing with his head angled towards the sound of the ebbing and flowing crests.  His dress shirt was untucked and his tie had been discarded, as if the open air and caressing breeze had lured him into abandoning all formalities.  Rising from her seat, she cradled Luna, asleep and warm in her pink flannel onesie, and carefully transferred her into the solid wood crib, hand-carved and ornamental like a throne. 
Clearly, he had spared no expense
. 

She slid open the glass door and exited onto the patio.  He turned as she approached him. 

“Is she asleep?”

“For now.”

He nodded and shifted his attention back to the hypnotic rhythm of the waves.  She shivered and he revealed his suit coat in his hand. 

“I thought you might be cold, but I didn’t want to intrude.” His firm chest brushed behind her back as he draped his coat over her shoulders.

“Thank you,” she whispered, noting the way his fingertips grazed her skin.

“You know, you had me fooled for a little while...” His voice trailed as he fixed his vacant gaze on the black abyss beyond the balcony. 

“Because I didn’t tell you about her?”

“No.” He dropped his head and drew his bare foot across the patio’s smooth tiled surface.  “Because you made it seem like tending to a baby would be much more difficult than I could manage.”  He gave her a playful smile, clearly trying to get a rise out of her.

“Well, you made it seem
way
easier than it normally is,” Inez replied defensively.  “And really, you got off easy because you didn’t have to change a poopy diaper on the floor of the men’s bathroom.”

“Yes, that sounds truly horrifying.” 

“Whatever, Sven.  Let’s wait and see if you still have that cocky smile when projectile baby spit-up is all over your three thousand dollar Armani suit.”

“Unfathomable,” he mused, leaning his back against the balcony railing.

“Okay, fine…you win,” she conceded with a toss of her hair over her shoulder.  “It was pretty easy tonight.  Magically easy in comparison to so many other days that have not been so easy.” 

“I’m certain there have been many days when it has not been so easy.”  He reached out and replaced a wayward strand of her hair behind her ear. 

“But still so worth it,” she whispered.

“I have no doubt.”

Their gaze connected, and for a moment, she thought she saw his eyes focus on hers with clarity. 

“Sven…I don’t think I can go to Shanghai with you.”

“I understand.” There was no judgment or resignation in his voice.  He made it sound like an obvious fact. 

Her mind traveled back to the opera house and Eliot Watercross.  “What’s going to happen if you don’t go?”

“I don’t know,” he replied, bouncing his weight against the balcony.  “It’s a strange feeling, really.  When you’re trapped, you have this inclination to fight your way out of it.  Fight, fight, fight.  That’s why I hired you—to help me fight them by preserving my career and my reputation, the reputation of a man so consumed by anger and bitterness that he has forgotten why any of it matters in the first place.”

“It matters because you’re a talented architect who deserves the chance to achieve great things, and it’s not fair that they’re trying to take that from you.”

“Yes, and I could try to keep fighting them if I wanted to.  Or I could just accept that things have changed for me in a way that makes it impossible to fight anymore.”

“But you can’t just give up either, Sven.  You’ll lose all your money.”

He shrugged.  “I’ll make more.”

“They’ll steal your designs and claim them as their own,” she insisted.

“I’ll design something better.”

“But it’s not fair that they’ll go to Shanghai and pretend that they deserve to build the Li Long Towers when that opportunity is rightfully yours.”

“And they’ll all be miserable together,” he said confidently.  “But not me.  I’ve been so consumed with the injustice of my loss—physical, personal, and professional…” He cleared his throat and adjusted his eyepatch.  “But now I realize the true injustice is how much of myself I’ve truly lost along the way.  And rather than feeling angry about everything I stand to lose, I feel somehow better about what I have gained.”

The intensity of his gaze arrested her.  “What have you gained?”

“A reminder of who I was before all of this.”

“I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t like a happier Sven van der Meer,” she teased. 

“Because you’ve gotten so used to the moodier disillusioned one?”

She nodded.  “At least I’m certain the old, bitter Sven would keep taking Luna and me to tragic operas where the gypsy flower girl gets tuberculosis and dies at the end.  The new, gleeful Sven might start taking us to
Sesame Street Live
.  And I much prefer the tragic opera.”

He smirked. “I am fairly certain the new, gleeful Sven would still be honored to take you and Luna to the opera.”

“Well, if the new Sven is all sunshine and roses, then I guarantee he’ll grow tired of the fact that I’m still as moody and disillusioned as the old Sven.”

“No,” he countered, drawing her hand into his own.  “He wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“How can he be so sure?” she whispered, breathlessly awaiting his answer.

He gazed at her, as if he heard her naming her deepest, most secret fear, and in response, he pressed her hand against his racing heart.  “Because over the past few days, the old Sven has come to realize you’re the main reason for his happiness now.  And he has no intention of letting that go.”

Their eyes locked, but this time—unlike the nights before—he would not allow her to pull away.  Drawing her closer into his body, he nuzzled the interior of her wrist, letting the sensation of his kiss overwhelm her.  She opened her mouth to protest—a weak futile plea to release her before they crossed that invisible line of intimacy that prevented them from going back from where they had come. 
There was no going back
, she sighed as he grazed his lips against her cheek and exhaled his warm breath against it. 

She closed her eyes rather than refuse him.  She no longer had the responsibility of getting home to her baby, nor the stubborn determination to maintain the formality of their arrangement.  And as he laid a second kiss on the tender curve of her collarbone, she realized the real charade wasn’t pretending to be his girlfriend; it was pretending to be a woman who wanted to remain alone and isolated in her own private struggles rather than allowing her mind and body to become vulnerable—and risk the pain and heartache of being hurt again.

He feathered her throat with his lips, closing the gap between them with the strength of his firm chest against her own.  Sighing, she tilted her chin, allowing his mouth to drop lower down her neckline.  She, too, had been fighting, and fighting, and fighting.  She was exhausted by her own willful rage against the world and she was tired of battling the chronic fear and disappointment within her own heart.  But with his every whispering kiss along the lobe of her ear and the pressure of his forearms crossing around her waist, he offered her nothing but peace.

A punishing gust of wind swept through the patio.  She cowered against him and shivered.  He wrapped his arms around her to protect her in his warm, steady embrace.  She gazed up at him, studying the way the moonlight softened the angular lines of his nose and cheekbones.  Then, without knowing why, she reached out to trace the faded scar beneath his rigid eyepatch, pondering the severity of his injury and the burden it had placed on him.  He flinched, only slightly, before relaxing into her touch. 

“Ebony told me what happened on the yacht,” she said carefully.

He shrugged it off, like he had so many times before.  “It was an unfortunate accident for which I bear the blame.”

“Is it true that you were planning to marry Celeste?”

His expression hardened and he exhaled forcefully.  “At the time, yes,” he confessed.  “But now I realize it would have been a mistake because the basis of our relationship was using each other for mutual gain.”

“Doesn’t everyone do that in a relationship?” she asked somberly. “In one way or another?”

“I thought that, too,” he conceded.  “Until very recently, when I learned what it feels like to want to give up everything you have for someone you barely know.”

He peered at her and fingered a loose tendril of her hair, letting her consider the sincerity in his voice.  She raised her hands and passed them through his hair, searching for the elastic band of his eyepatch and liberating him from it.

As if the sudden exposure pained him, he lowered his gaze.  She nudged up his chin.  With reluctance, he gave in and looked directly at her, granting her the rare privilege of viewing the beauty of his face in its entirety—his fair complexion, high cheekbones, boyish dimples, and sturdy green eyes, peering back at her with unwavering courage.  There was a faint narrow scar that crossed his left cheek, just below his injured eye, lackluster like an unpolished emerald.

“Can you see me?” she asked.

He shook his head.  “No, not the way you would expect me to…” His voice trailed off, dark and solemn. 

“I don’t expect anything from you,” she reassured him.  “Most people live their lives as if they’re blind, whether they can see or not.”

“You couldn’t have convinced me of that three days ago.” He cupped her cheek.  There was a heavy pause of silence between them as the moon passed behind a cloud, shadowing their faces.  “But now, I’m certain there are so many things I never saw until I met you.”

Within the darkness, the intensity of their connection coursed through her body as he guided her lips to his own, transferring the intimacy of his confession through his reverent kiss.  Their tongues entwined, gratifying each other’s yearning.  With every impassioned stroke, he signaled the sacredness of what she was offering and what he sought to claim—that tonight would be the night she would give herself over to him and he would attempt to fulfill her.

Without warning, he swept her up into his arms and carried her from the patio into the master bedroom.  He left the sliding door ajar, an unspoken agreement that together they would listen for her sleeping child.  But in that moment, there was nothing except the sound of the lakefront breeze shuddering against the panes of glass, mimicking her own shudder as he kissed her neck, throat, and lips with increasing urgency.  She released a sigh of surrender as he laid her across the endless platform bed.  Sliding his powerful body over her with the familiarity of a cherished lover, his hot breath buried into the sensual curve of her collarbone while his firm chest melded to her entire body.  A needy gasp escaped from her lips as his firm masculinity pressed against her, betraying how she flamed his desires. 

Yes
, she whispered, as his fingers pushed up the hem of her skirt and slipped between her inner thighs. 
Yes
, she nodded, as they inched towards the soft cotton lining of her black knit tights, seeking to relieve the tingling ache beneath it.
Yes
, she exhaled, as he tore off her black velour sweater top and swept his tongue over the satin cups of her black bra.  She arched her back and whimpered, allowing him to unclasp her bra and explore the fullness of her breasts with his hot mouth.  Caressing his hair, she encouraged him with a breathy moan to tease her nipples and savor their sweetness.  For longer than she could remember, her body had only had one purpose—serving the maternal demands of her child.  Now, with every erotic nip of her tits and seductive swirl of his tongue, he reminded her that she was not just a struggling single mother, but also a sexy woman who deserved to be pleasured and worshiped.