Crimson and Clover (33 page)

“I’m not denying it.” He pinned her with a warning look that only served to enrage her further.

“You can say it all you want, but when you’re sitting there, shaking your head ‘no’ … Fuck you, Jay. I don’t want to talk to you.”

Jay got to his feet and gripped her arm. “I don’t give a shit if you want to or not, but you’re going to!”

“Let go of me!” Katie tried to pull away, fighting not only his grip, but the resultant flood of emotions at his touch. “You have no right to touch me after what you’ve done to me.”

“I’ve got a news flash for you, babe.” Jay’s voice shook. “Yours wasn’t the only heart broken!”

“Oh, boo hoo.” At her cold tone, Jay released her and she stumbled back. “Who broke your heart?”

“You did.”

The words penetrated the red haze of anger in her mind and rendered her speechless. She saw the hurt in his eyes and took quick action to harden herself against it. No way was she going to let him play her like that.

“Impossible,” she spat out. “First of all, you don’t have a heart to break. And furthermore, there’s no way I broke your heart. You’re the one who left, remember?”

“And what about you?” The lines of strain on his face became more pronounced. “After I dug my head out of my arse and came home, you were nowhere to be found.”

Katie’s mouth dropped open. “Are you fucking kidding me? Did you really think I’d just sit around waiting for you to decide to come home?” Knowing she had done exactly that for three months infuriated her and she turned her back. “I know when I’m not wanted.”

“Not wanted?” His voice came from right behind her and she jumped. She’d forgotten he could move so fast. Jay turned her to face him, but she kept her eyes screwed shut.

“Katie, look at me.” He took her chin in his hand and tilted her face up. “Please.”

The desperate plea in his voice made her open her eyes. The naked, raw emotion she saw on his face made her want to cry aloud. The thought of how she’d felt when she’d seen that empty closet, though, erased any momentary tenderness. She hardened her features and attempted to shake his fingers loose.

Ignoring her efforts to pull away, he leaned close and captured her gaze. “There has never,” he gritted out, “never been a day I didn’t want you.” She closed her eyes again, refusing to be drawn in. “I mean it, Katie. Even when I didn’t want to, I did.”

“No!” His grip loosened with surprise at her exclamation and she jerked away. “That’s not how it works, Jay. I don’t believe you.”

“Christ, Katie.” His voice broke. “I’m sorry. There aren’t words to tell you how sorry I am. Believe me; you can’t hate me more than I do myself. But I want to try to make it right, to make it up to you. What do I have to do?”

Was he kidding? He could have himself drawn and quartered; that would be a start. A span of years spent prostrate at her feet would be another. Tar and feathers, hot oil, a stone cell with only bread and water; yeah, that might begin to make up for the hurt she’d suffered. “You can get out and leave me alone.” The words dropped like rocks from her mouth and she turned away.

“That’s the one thing I can’t do.”

As his words penetrated her brain, she turned to face him again, fire in her eye. “So what’s the plan this time? Got some new bit of torture worked out for me?” She shook her head. “I hate to disappoint you, but there’s not anything you can do to hurt me more than you already have.”

An alarming shade of red crept up his neck and suffused his face. “The last thing I want to do … ” He broke off and took several deep breaths. “I know you’re hurt. I fucking know that!” It was becoming quite clear he was enraged. She’d never seen him so angry and a quiver of apprehension slid down her spine. His eyes had gone an almost tawny shade. She expected to see them glow red any minute. “I came here to try … I’d give anything … But you won’t even fucking tell me what I can … Goddamn it!”

He seized his half-full coffee cup and Katie expected it to fly across the room to smash into the sliding glass doors. Instead, he turned and stalked into the kitchen, leaving her breathless. Her knees quivered with reaction and she sank down on the raised stone hearth of the fireplace. Her hands rose and crossed over her chest protecting her pounding heart. He’d always been even-tempered, calm and collected, bearing her occasional outbursts of emotion with equanimity. But it seemed she’d pushed him to the breaking point.

She looked up with trepidation as he strode into the living room, a coffee cup in each hand. He’d made some effort to regain his composure during his absence. His eyes were hazel and the flush of anger had faded. He sat one of the cups on the table.

“Here. I found it on the kitchen counter. I assume it’s yours.” He sat on the couch and crossed his legs. “It’s a fresh cup.”

Coffee. He was sitting there talking about coffee after everything that had happened. Katie grabbed her temper in both hands and throttled it. She wasn’t going to let him get another rise out of her if it killed her.

Closing her eyes, she concentrated on her breathing. When she’d regained control, she opened her eyes to find herself under intense scrutiny. Jay looked at her with an unwavering stare, his eyes a bit unfocused. Katie bore it as long as she could, but felt her nerves stretched thin. “What?” she snapped.

His focus sharpened at her exclamation. “I’m just looking at you, all right? I’d forgotten how lovely you are.”

Katie made a rude noise and rolled her eyes. If he thought he was going to win her over with flowery words and syrupy sentiments, he was dead wrong.

A muscle jumped in Jay’s cheek as he clenched his jaw. “Will you kindly stop being so dismissive of everything I say? Jesus, Katie, what do you want?”

“What do I want?” She glared at him. “I want to know why, that’s what. I want to know what I did that was so horrible you had to leave without one single, solitary, bleeding word of explanation.”

Jay sighed and ran a hand over his face. “You didn’t do anything.”

The heavy weight of self-doubt and blame started to lift at his simple statement. But it wasn’t enough. She deserved an explanation and was determined to get one. “Then why?”

He cleared his throat. “You didn’t need me anymore.”

She looked at him in amazement. “Jay Sterling Carey, that has to be the most stupid, ridiculous, brainless thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

He squirmed, betraying his discomfort. “It’s what I thought. I mean, what the hell did you need with a washed-up guitar player who’d pissed his band away and had absolutely no idea what to do with himself? You had MKS; you didn’t need me.”

“Are you out of your ever-lovin’ mind?” Katie shook her head with exasperation. “None of that mattered. Designing clothes wasn’t my goal in life.” Frowning at his look of skepticism, she leaned forward. “And let me tell you something else. The fact that you’re a fucking rock star is not why I needed you, you bleeding idiot! I needed you because I loved you.”

“Yeah, well. I thought I’d blown that, too.” Jay frowned at his feet. “I didn’t love myself and I couldn’t see how you could. Especially with the way I treated you. I didn’t even have sense enough to realize you were bothered by the groupies until you told me.” His face grew taut. “Damn it, what kind of idiot thinks his wife is cool with that? But no; I was off in my little rock star la-la land, not even considering I was hurting the only woman I’ve ever loved. I’ve not touched another woman since, but the fact that I had and that it had hurt you … ” He sighed, a tired, defeated sound that wrenched Katie’s heart. “I absolutely loathed myself for that, and for so much more. I didn’t want any of my problems to affect you, so I pulled away. It was never because I didn’t care.”

Surprised, Katie’s eyes popped open. “Bloody fool.” Mortified, she clapped her hands over her mouth. She hadn’t meant to say it out loud.

Jay laughed and looked at her with admiration. “I couldn’t have put it any better myself. I was a bloody fool.” The laughter faded from his face as he sighed and re-crossed his legs. His manner made it clear he was ready to bring up another uncomfortable revelation and Katie’s guard went back to full alert. “I saw Adam last week. He told me you still love me.”

Katie snatched a cup and raised it to her face. “Gossiping old woman,” she muttered, bringing a surprised snort of amusement from Jay. The warmth of the coffee drowned some of the butterflies in her stomach.

“Do you?”

Not fair. She didn’t want to lie, but at the same time she didn’t want him to think a declaration of love would make everything alright. The silence grew uncomfortable as she hesitated. More afraid of it than how he might construe her meaning, she answered. “Yes. I still love you.”

He sighed. “I love you, too, Katie. I always will.”

Katie shook her head, raising her hand in an unconscious warding-off gesture. She was relieved when he didn’t speak further and used the silence to marshal her see-sawing emotions into some semblance of calm. When she dared glance in his direction, his eyes were closed, his head leaning against the high back of the couch. Katie took the opportunity to observe him the way he’d scrutinized her. His words may have been flowery, but Katie recognized the truth in them. The reality of Jay was more beautiful than any image she’d carried in her memory.

Jay took a deep breath. “Do you remember the night we met?”

Katie frowned, on guard. “Of course.”

“I do, too. I walked into your flat and saw a fucking angel in black lace. I’d never wanted anyone so badly in my life. It happened that quickly.” He snapped his fingers. “And then I found myself dancing with you.” He sighed. “Something happened when we touched. It was like … like … ”

“Like time had stopped,” Katie whispered. “Like the earth had tilted on its axis. I felt it, too.”

“It’s still there, Katie. Whatever it was that was set in motion the first time we touched is still between us.” He drew in his breath. “It’s always been there; even after we both began to take it for granted. I don’t know much, but I do know it doesn’t happen to everyone. We have something so incredibly special and it’s a fucking shame to just throw it away.”

Steel fingers dug into Katie’s throat. She tried to swallow, to regain her voice to berate him more for the hurt he’d caused. But she couldn’t. His words conjured up too many feelings, things she hadn’t let herself feel for a long time. She could hear the ticking clock on the wall, but she felt again time had stopped, that the rotation of the earth had changed. She attempted to fight against it, but just as before it would not be ignored.

“We didn’t throw it away then. Remember?” Jay’s voice was strained. “We wanted each other and we did what we had to do to be together. We pushed past anything that got in our way. But even though it hurt people close to us, I’d do it again. You were more important.
We
were more important. Nothing mattered more to me than being with you.” He raised his head and pinned her with his gaze. “And nothing matters more to me now.”

She didn’t want to see the complete conviction in his eyes, but she couldn’t look away.

“I’m only half alive without you, Katie.”

Lips trembling, she whispered, “I’m only half alive without you, too.”

Jay took a quick, indrawn breath. “Do you mean that?”

“Yes. No.” Too agitated to sit still, she jumped up and looked out the patio doors. “I don’t know.”

Behind her, Jay’s sigh sounded irritated. “That helps a lot.”

Katie’s own irritation rose at his words. “Well, what the hell did you expect?” She turned to him. “You show up out of thin air after all this time and start laying all this on me about how much you love me and want me back and start pressing me to make a decision on the spot.”

“I should think it’s a simple one, Katie.” Jay got up and came to stand beside her. “Either you love me or you don’t.”

“I’ve already told you I love you.” Katie narrowed her eyes at him. “I just don’t know if I can trust you.”

Jay gave every appearance of a man who’d just been hit over the head with a brick. “I should think that’s simple, too. Either you trust me, or you don’t. I don’t know what else I can do.” He pushed his hair back with both hands. “I’ve told you how sorry I am, but if you don’t believe that, then I’m at a complete loss at what more to say.”

She took a deep breath. “There’s nothing more you
can
say.”

Jay grew still. “What do you mean?”

“I’m sorry.” She had to look away from the absolute devastation she saw in his eyes. “I can’t.”

The sound of his trembling breath seemed to fill the room. “Katie, I … ” The strain in his voice made it almost unrecognizable. “Do you want me to get down on my knees and beg? Because if that’s what it takes, I … ”

“No!” She whirled to face him. “Don’t you dare. That would be the final insult to what we had.”

“Have! What we
have
, Katie.”

Looking into the depths of his tortured, hazel eyes, she slowly shook her head.

“No,” he whispered. “I refuse to accept that.” He raked his hair back again and turned away from her.

“You have to.”

“No, I don’t!” He turned back to her, eyes blazing with emotion. “I will not fuck this up again, and I won’t let you do it, either. I love you and you love me and we will not fuck this up!”

Katie forced her voice around the giant industrial-sized lump in her throat. “We already have. We fucked it up and now it’s over.”

“You did
what
?” Even from six thousand miles away, Maureen’s voice drilled sharp as an ice pick and Katie winced, holding the phone a bit further from her ear. Maureen continued without pausing for breath. “You need to be smacked, Katie Carey, and you’d better be glad I’m not there or you’d get one. How could you?”

“I had to.” Katie wasn’t sure Maureen would listen to anything she said, but she was going to at least try to explain. “Yeah, I love him, Maur, but I don’t trust him not to just walk out on me again. I couldn’t take that and you know it.”

“But, sweet bleeding Jesus, you sent him away? Without even giving him a chance?”

Katie tightened her lips. “I couldn’t. I couldn’t let him hurt me again. Damn it, my heart’s nothing but a mass of scars as it is.”