Gateway to Heaven (16 page)

“
That’s not what I was asking you, Christian.”

Christian shrugged his shoulders.

Seth sighed before he took a gulp of beer. “You better find out for sure before you make a decision. Why don’t you just see her some more? Get to know her better, find out just how strong she is emotionally, figure out the likelihood of her possibly getting hurt.”

“
What if I find out that she could?”

“
That’s why you need to figure out how you really feel about her.”

“
What’s that got to do with it?”

“
Everything.”

“
What do you mean?” Christian demanded. His head was throbbing and he didn’t have the patience to deal with Seth’s laconism.

“
You need to decide how serious your feelings are for her. If you don’t care for her—
really
care—then Hilary is right. You should keep as far from her as possible. I’ll be the first to kick your sorry ass if you do any different. But if you really do care for her than you would be willing to allow Megan to decide.”

“
But if something unexpected happened, a flashback, a traumatic memory—“

“
Then you would be there to help her deal with it,” Seth replied with a pointed glance.

Christian took a slow, deep breath that cleared his head of some of the remaining whiskey fumes. He set the glass of ice on the bar resolutely.

“
I think it’s time I went home,” he said gruffly. “You have a beautiful woman who’s been waiting for you for a very long time, and I need to get some sleep.”

Chapter 7

Megan pulled her hair into a ponytail and barely acknowledged the result in the mirror before she left the bathroom. She wore shorts and an exercise bra, but still needed a T-shirt before she went jogging. The one that she grabbed had been thrown heedlessly on the chair in her bedroom after she’d discarded it for another shirt yesterday. Her impatient motions as she whipped the soft cotton shirt over her head stilled abruptly. She pulled at the bottom of the shirt and held it up to her nose.

Christian Lasher’s scent filled her awareness. The unexpected sensation brought a surge of tears to her eyes. She sat down at the end of her bed and cried as a storm of grief raged through her. Her grief was for Christian—for the fact that he’d apparently lost interest in her—but only partly. The pain was also for everything that Christian had awakened in her, but left unfulfilled: the way he’d made her feel so alive and whole, the way he’d awoken the sensual being in her that had been repressed for so long.

The storm eventually passed.

God, did she miss Christian so much that she was beginning to smell him on her own clothing? Megan wondered as she dried her tears for what she swore was the last time. She was already dreaming about him incessantly. She woke up in the morning feeling like she’d just spent hours with him, only to have reality slap her in the face. Her thoughts depressed her so much that she briefly considered getting back into bed and pulling the covers over her head in order to cling to that insubstantial, fragile connection to Christian.

As tempting as the thought was, Megan endured and found her running shoes in the closet. All of her hard work on her sculpting and her emotional unrest regarding Christian had taken a toll on her muscles for the past few days. She was tense and sore, and knew that aside from a good masseuse—something she couldn’t afford right now—the only thing that would give her relief was exercise.

When she reached for the lobby doors forty minutes later, she knew she’d been right. Exercise was exactly what she’d needed. She felt calmer and a lot less tense.

At least she did until she saw Christian leaning casually against the doorman’s station, looking for all the world as if he’d been waiting for her to walk through the door.

“
Good morning,” he said.

“
Good morning,” Megan replied. Her eyes moved over to Jeff, who watched her expectantly.

“
There she is. Told you she wouldn’t be long,” Jeff said.

“
Were you looking for me?” Megan asked Christian with what she hoped sounded like crisp unconcern.

Even if her voice didn’t betray her, she knew her eyes must have. They roved over him as if they were starved for the sight. He must have just showered, because his hair was still damp around his neck. He was dressed uncharacteristically, but very attractively, in a pair of low-riding khakis and a blue button-down shirt that matched the brilliant color of the eyes that were currently watching her so intently.

“
Yes,” Christian answered simply. “I was hoping to convince you to have breakfast with me.”

“
I can’t.”

“
Why not?” he countered swiftly. “Jeff says it’s one of your off days at St. Cat’s.”

Megan’s gaze flashed to Jeff’s accusingly. Jeff seemed to find something fascinating to look at on his desk. “I haven’t even showered yet.”

“
I’ll find a book to read and wait while you get ready,” Christian said as he reached for her shoulder and urged her toward the entrance door. Megan only acquiesced because she was too embarrassed to have this conversation in front of Jeff.

“
We’ll still have plenty of time to make our reservation for brunch,” Christian assured her as he pressed the fifth floor on the elevator, all the while ignoring her irritated expression and defensive stance.

“
Reservation?” Megan muttered in disbelief. “Weren’t you a little too confident that I’d go, Christian?”

“
Was I?”

She just gave him a hard stare and marched off the elevator a moment later.

“
I’m surprised you’re up so early this morning,” she said sarcastically as she followed him into her living room. She was a little surprised at the wary look in Christian’s eyes when he turned around.

“
What do you mean?”

She exhaled in disgust. “The night doorman told me how you’d been staying out really late almost every night this week. I just thought that eight a.m. might be a little early in the morning for you, given all your late night
excursions
.”

“
Peter told you that?” He grinned lazily. Then a thought seemed to still his flash of humor. “Is that all Peter said?”

“
Yes.” Megan shook her head in bewilderment. Did she really just manage to reveal to Christian for the second time in a row that she was keeping tabs on his comings and goings with their doormen?

God, she was pitiful.

She watched as Christian sat down on her couch and nonchalantly picked up a magazine from her coffee table. “I guess I’ll go shower,” she said sharply. Her anger at his insouciance mounted when he glanced up casually.

“
I’ll be here.”

She didn’t move. Her rapidly beating heart seemed to falter when she noticed his blue eyes were on her bare legs instead of the magazine he was supposedly reading. His stare slowly moved up to her face. When he lowered the magazine, his gaze on her was warm and sincere. Megan felt some of her anger melt away when she experienced its impact.

“
What kind of
excursions
do you think I’ve been on these past few nights, Megan?”

“
I wouldn’t presume to know.”

“
But you
have
presumed, haven’t you?”

“
Why didn’t you call me?” she asked in a rapid rush of emotion. Heat flushed her cheeks, but for once, Megan wasn’t aware of her self-consciousness. Her frustration and hurt overpowered it.

Christian set the magazine down carefully. “Did you want me to?”

Angry tears stung her eyes. “What, do you get some kind of perverse pleasure out of making me say ‘yes’? Okay, then.
Yes
. I would have liked to hear from you. It’s almost been a week since…”

Her voice trailed off and she licked her lower lip nervously.

Christian’s eyes crackled with fire, but his voice was paradoxically calm. “Since I practically attacked you by the elevator? Is that what you were going to say?”

Megan’s mouth fell open in surprise. She hadn’t been prepared for the self-disgust in his voice. She inhaled raggedly. “
No
. That’s not what I was going to say. I was going to say that it’s been almost a week since I made a fool of myself by the elevator.”

Christian sat up straighter. “Honey, you didn’t make a fool of yourself. I’m the one who had promised myself that I wasn’t going to push you until you were ready. And the next thing I knew, I found myself dry-humping you with less restraint than a wild animal would have shown.”

Megan went temporarily speechless at his crude description. For some reason, hearing him say it evoked what it had felt like, how on fire her body had been. She met Christian’s eyes and knew that he was remembering, too. She flushed and looked away under the impact of his hot stare.

“
I guess I’d better shower.”

“
Okay,” Christian said gruffly.

They didn’t speak again of the days that they hadn’t seen each other for the next several hours as they ate brunch at
Nomi
. They seemed to have joined in an unspoken pact to avoid anything potentially stressful…to just enjoy each other’s company.

Christian sampled her salmon Benedict and Megan nibbled at his omelet with fresh herbs. He tried to get her to try his sushi, but Megan just laughed and shook her head, insisting that the thought of raw fish for breakfast sounded far from appetizing to her.

She asked Christian about the places he’d traveled, encouraging him to elaborate on some of his favorites. She sipped her coffee and listened to the sound of his deep, resonant voice with contentment. He peppered her with both salient and silly questions, such as where she’d attended college and graduate school, why she’d chosen education as her double major in addition to art, what her top five favorite movies were of all time, and why she wore her hair up when it looked so beautiful spilling around her shoulders.

After Christian had paid the bill and they were riding the elevator down, Megan looked up at him. He was so tall in comparison to her, so strong, so male. His eyes on her were like cool flames. Later, she couldn’t believe she had the nerve to do it. She went to him and wrapped her arms around his waist. She pressed her cheek to his chest and closed her eyes. At the moment, it seemed like the most natural thing to do in the world.

He embraced her in return and murmured near her ear.

“
Sweet Megan.”

She felt the sting of tears behind her eyelids when she heard the catch in his deep voice.

The elevator opened much too soon for either of them. He took her hand in his and didn’t let go when they got in the backseat of the cab.

“
Let’s have dinner together, too,” he said.

Megan laughed. “How can you think about dinner already? I’m stuffed.”

“
I wasn’t thinking about dinner. I was thinking about you.”

“
Oh,” Megan replied, swallowing thickly.

He went on to explain that he’d called his mother, and that she’d invited them to come to dinner at the house in Evanston that evening.

“
Will your sisters be there, too?” Megan wondered, eager to meet people who knew and loved Christian. She smiled when he nodded.

When they got home, he walked her to her door. She paused when he spoke.

“
Megan?”

“
Yes?”

“
The only excursions
I’ve been on late at night were working hard with my band practicing. We have a concert coming up soon. We took today off, because some of us were getting exhausted from the schedule.”

“
I see,” Megan murmured, a little embarrassed at how she’d subtly accused him of more illicit nighttime activities.

“
I thought of you every day. Every night,” Christian said with a penetrating blue-eyed stare before he caressed her cheek in parting.

Megan leaned against her front door and waited for her rapid heartbeat to still.

* * * *

When Megan came home from her studio at Earth later that afternoon, there was a message on her answering machine from Christian. He asked her if they could leave an hour earlier than the time they’d agreed upon, because his mother had asked him to bring along Seth, and Seth wanted Sarah to come, too.

“
So that means we’re going to swing by and pick up Seth at the Four Seasons and then Sarah at Emilio’s house before we hit Mom and Dad’s,” Christian explained on the answering machine.

Megan’s gaze raced to the clock in her kitchen, realizing that she’d have to hurry to make it on time. She was happy that Seth and Sarah were going. She’d enjoyed the couple’s company the other night at Emilio’s.

She showered and let her air dry naturally into soft curls while she worked a moisturizer deeply into her skin. Christian had told her to dress casually for dinner, so she donned a pair of jeans and a yellow top that complimented her hair, eyes, and figure, and which felt sensually soft next to her skin. She applied her make-up sparingly, needing little tonight due to the glow in her cheeks and the added shine in her light green eyes. She needn’t have worried about being late, though, because she was completely ready when Christian knocked at five o’clock.