Gramercy Nights (The Argo Press Trilogy Book 1) (24 page)

My stomach tightens with desire.
I’m sure you could think of something
, I respond playfully.
Now go back to work and stop distracting me. I have important things to do.

My phone vibrates seconds later.
You’re the one distracting me. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to concentrate when I get a hard-on every time I think about you?

I laugh and put my phone down. If we keep this up, there’s no way I’ll get anything done today. And Megan and I have a meeting scheduled later in the week to go over the draft of
L’hivern fosc.
In the meantime, she wants me to write a short foreword, introducing Marc Serrat to an American audience and discussing my process translating the book.

I make a cup of coffee and sit down with a notebook and a pen to get started. Call me old-fashioned, but I’ve always believed first drafts should be done by hand. It’s more personal. Computers rush ideas, forcing them out before they’ve had a chance to solidify.

Writing by hand helps me connect, not just to the individual words on the page, but to the ideas behind them.

I take a sip of my coffee. Where to begin? I close my eyes, letting my mind drift. To mom, to the small plaza in Barcelona where I first read
L’hivern fosc,
to the way the light filtered through the jacarandas, the taste of coffee, the green parrots squawking overhead.

By the time I put my pen down and sit back, my fingers cramped, the sun is setting, filling the apartment with a warm orange glow. I sat down assuming I’d write about Marc Serrat, but the pages of the notebook in front of me aren’t about Marc. They are about me. About my relationship with my mother. About my relationship with Catalan.

I’m sure it’s not what Megan is looking for but I’m pleased. It’s personal. Deeply personal. But this whole book has been personal. It’s about Marc’s loss, but translating it, it’s become about my own loss. For the first time, it seems so obvious. I didn’t realize it when I picked the book up all those years ago. I thought I was moved by Marc’s words alone. That I was responding to his loss.

And I was. But I was bringing a lot to that reading. Mom’s sickness. Being alone. The deep need I felt to learn Catalan, to connect to that one last happy memory I had.
L’hivern fosc
has been a project of love. Of remembrance. And maybe, on some level, that’s why I’ve been so reluctant to let it go. To admit that it’s finally finished.

I sigh, hoping that Megan will like it, though I’m not even sure I’ll be able to show it to her. It’s that personal. Megan is probably expecting something more academic. Word choice and syntax and cultural differences.

Writers are always going on about how you should write what terrifies you. If the writing scares you then you’re doing something right.

For the first time, I think I understand what they mean.

Chloe and Laura are still at work and the apartment is too quiet, too lonely. Normally, I love these stolen hours alone. This time to myself to think. But right now, I don’t want to be alone. I’ve been alone enough.

I grab my phone and text Sebastian, asking if he still wants me to come over tonight.

The whole point of giving you keys is you don’t have to ask.
A moment later, my phone vibrates again.
Gary will be downstairs in thirty minutes.

I don’t know what Sebastian said to his assistant when he told her to buy me clothing, but I blush just thinking about how that conversation must have gone. Because I’m sitting in his kitchen, having a glass of wine, wearing a sleeveless black silk shift dress, beneath which is the most gorgeous corset I’ve ever seen. Blush silk covered in a layer of black lace embellished with tiny flowers. It’s feminine and edgy and I’ve attached stockings to the garters.

This time, I remember not to wear panties. My ass is still sore and I don’t know if I could handle another spanking, though the thought is more than a little tantalizing.

The smell of roasting beets fills the apartment. I had Gary drop me at the Union Square Farmers Market to pick up a few things. I never shop there. Local, organic, pesticide-free produce is a little out of my budget, but not today. Today I want to be the girl with the book deal, the girl who can shop at farmers markets, the girl with the gorgeous boyfriend.

It doesn’t matter that it’s a fantasy.

For tonight, that fantasy is real and I get to be that girl.

I’m making a beet salad with soft chunks of melt in your mouth Australian feta, pan-roasted salmon, and asparagus. The only thing left to do is throw the salmon into a smoking hot pan when Sebastian gets here.

The elevator doors open and Sebastian walks in wearing a slate grey suit with a robin’s egg blue shirt. He drops his briefcase distractedly by the door, his eyes finally meeting mine.

Suddenly I’m worried dinner was too much, that I’ve overstepped some invisible line Sebastian has drawn in the proverbial sand, that sometimes keys are just keys and nothing more. But then he’s smiling as he strides towards me and all my trepidation disappears, replaced by excitement as he pulls me out of my chair and into his arms, his strong biceps encircling me, trapping me against his hard body as he kisses me. He doesn’t release me, just leans back enough to look me in the eyes, studying me carefully.

When he rests his forehead to mine, I think my heart might melt a little.

“I didn’t think you’d be here.” The relief in his voice strips me of my senses.

I push him off gently and take a small step back. “I hope you’re hungry,” I say as I walk towards the stove, Sebastian following me like a shadow.

“Starved.” He runs his hands over my hips, tracing the outline of my body and it’s clear food is the last thing on his mind.

“Hands off,” I say, swatting him playfully, “I’ve slaved in the kitchen and I expect this food to be eaten.” I glance over my shoulder to see Sebastian sulking, but he does as he’s told. God, there’s something s sexy about watching a man loosen his tie and slip out of his suit jacket, and I’m momentarily frozen in place as my mind travels the hard lines of his body.

I tear my eyes away, trying to dispel images of Sebastian, naked, hungry. That look in his eyes right before he kisses me. I shake my head. There will be time later. He pours himself a glass of wine and leans back against the granite countertop, watching me.

“What are you making?”

I pour oil into a cast iron pan and turn the flames up high, checking to make sure the oven is preheated. “Salmon.”

“And what did I do to deserve this?” he asks playfully. “I’ll make sure to do whatever it is more often.”

I glance over my shoulder and he’s smiling happily at me. “Nothing. Can’t a lady just make dinner?”

When the pan starts smoking, I throw in the two salmon filets, skin down, then start putting together the salads, trying my best to ignore Sebastian, who is watching me with the strangest expression on his face.

Once the salads are plated and salmon skin is crisp, I put the cast iron pan into the oven and turn to face Sebastian.

“What?” I ask, brushing my face nervously. He just shakes his head, a ghost of a smile playing across his lips before it disappears completely.

“Nothing. It’s just nice, that’s all. Having you here.” He sips his wine thoughtfully. “You know, you’re the first woman who’s ever used this kitchen to do more than heat coffee in the microwave.”

“None of your other lady friends cooked?” I ask, trying to keep my voice neutral.

“My lady friends, as you call them, never ate here.”

“Really?”

He shrugs, oddly self-conscious. “Sometimes, we’d go out for dinner.” The way he says it, I can tell it didn’t happen all that often.

I shake my head. “I don’t get you.”

“What do you mean?”

“You have this beautiful apartment with the most decadent kitchen. Why wouldn’t you eat here? If this were my apartment, I’d never go out. Hell, I’d probably bake lattice pies just because.”

“Lattice pies?”

“They’re pretty.”

Sebastian laughs and then his face suddenly turns serious. “I didn’t want any confusion,” he says, answering my earlier question.

“And now?”

He runs his hand through his hair. “Now, I’m the one who’s confused,” he admits softly. “I can’t…” he trails off and I can see the confusion in his eyes and I turn away, my heart pounding. I don’t want to over think this. I don’t want to over think this.

I am obviously over thinking this.

Because whatever this is, it’s clear that it’s different from what he had with those other women. It may have started the same. With a proposition and a manila envelope filled with documents drawn up by lawyers. But something changed. And that gives me just the tiniest spark of hope.

There’s nothing more dangerous than hope.

“Did you love any of them?” I don’t know why I ask. I know you don’t have to be in love to have sex with someone. Hell, sometimes you don’t even need to like the person.

“Absolutely not.”

“Did you even like them?” I can’t help but ask, shocked by the cold resolve of his answer. It’s like driving by a car accident. I have to slow down and observe the carnage.

“Some of them.” Sebastian’s voice is quiet yet carefully controlled. “For the most part, they were social climbers. Women on the periphery of society who desperately wanted an in. I was their in. They didn’t care about me, as a person. They were interested in my bank account and what it could do for them. The doors money could open. Invitations to social events. Introductions. They didn’t care that they’d never have a future with me. Not one of them. After a few months with me they could move on, a little richer, a little better situated. They knew there were more men like me.”

I take the salmon out of the oven just to give myself something to do before I ask my next question. “You don’t think of me like that, do you?” My hand trembles as I place the cast iron pan on the stovetop and it’s not because it’s heavy.

Without warning, Sebastian has crossed the kitchen, his arms wrapping around me. When he kisses my neck, I feel the relief of his unspoken answer and then he’s spinning me around to face him. “You are
nothing
like them.”

I push him away with a frown, but I’m not upset. “Good, because I don’t give a shit about the money.” I rest my hands on my hips, watching him, surprised to see his lips curl into a boyish smile. “Now, get me plates, otherwise dinner will get cold and if there’s one thing I seriously detest, it’s cold fish.”

We eat at the table, drinking wine and laughing. I’m comfortable here, I realize. Sebastian makes me feel comfortable here. It feels like we’ve known each other much longer than a few weeks. He asks me about how my translation is coming along and I tell him, not as my boss, which I suppose in a way he is, but as a boyfriend. I pause momentarily when the word pops into my mind unbidden, because that’s what he feels like. A boyfriend. But I dismiss the idea.

I nearly tell him about the foreword I wrote this afternoon, but in the end, I keep it to myself. I’m still not even sure I’ll show it to Megan. And I know if I tell Sebastian, he’ll insist on seeing it.

“It doesn’t seem fair. You know so much about me and I don’t know anything about you.”

“What do you want to know?” he asks, taking a sip of his wine, all the mirth suddenly gone from his eyes.

“I don’t know.”

Sebastian stares at me, unblinking, and I expect him to change the subject, but he doesn’t. “Father’s American, mum was from a small village outside of Barcelona. I was born here but moved to London when I was 14, when my father started the London office of his company. After my mum died, he couldn’t stand to be in the same room as me.” Sebastian shrugs, but I can see the hurt behind his flippancy. “He sent me to boarding school.”

“In England?” I ask, uncertain of what to say. In three lines, he’s given me his life story. It breaks my heart that he can recite it so coolly. Because it’s clear, whatever wounds he suffered in his childhood, he’s carried them with him into adulthood.

Sebastian nods. “It was pretty grim. About what you’d expect, really. But it was better than living in London. My father hated me. Granted, I didn’t exactly make it easy for him.”

“Lots of boys buggering boys while the prefects weren’t looking?” I joke. I’ve seen enough Masterpiece Theatre and read enough books about British boarding schools to have an idea.

“Something like that,” he answers dryly.

“Wait, really?” My mind races. “You’ve been with men?”

Sebastian laughs. “God, Danielle, you should see your face.” He takes a sip of wine, not answering my question and I swallow hard, because that’s all the answer I need. “Shocked and scandalized?”

I shake my head, still reeling from the idea of Sebastian with another man. I bite my lip while Sebastian watches me, his amusement clear. The idea is oddly arousing.

“I still don’t understand how you ended up with the last name Casal,” I say, changing the subject and the smile Sebastian gives me in response is anything but joyful.

“Casal is my mother’s maiden name. I changed my surname when I turned eighteen. I left the UK for university wanting a fresh start. Even at boarding school, I was always my father’s son. I wanted to know that whatever I did, I did it on my own. The good and the bad. I always knew my father’s name bought me a certain degree of freedom, though looking back, it always felt more like a prison.”