Reckless Exposure (5 page)

Both gestures were very bad signs. “You can tell me anything,” he encouraged. “Talk to me, Lucy.”

“I want to know where I stand with you. We’ve been together four years, Rand. Four wonderful years, but where is this relationship headed?”

He knelt on the floor in front of her and took her hand in his.

Entwining their fingers together seemed as natural as breathing.

“You’re my girl, Lucy. I care about you. I don’t see what the problem is here. Things are great the way they are. Why fix it if it’s not broken, angel?”

Her eyes pleading with him, she tucked a stray hair behind her ear. “I want to be more than your girlfriend. Don’t you think it’s time to talk about the future? Our future?”

“Are you so sure you want to change this, baby?” The Miller men weren’t cut out to be husbands. Rand leaned down and placed a gentle kiss to the back of her hand. He kept his gaze locked on hers as he trailed kisses from the inside of her wrist to her elbow.

Lucy shuddered and tried to pull her hand away, but he was quicker, stronger. He held her firm and cupped the back of her head with his palm. “Why chance ruining a good thing?” He pulled her forward and pressed his lips to hers, relishing the way her breath hitched. Her mouth opened, inviting him in. He took the advantage and allowed his tongue to duel with hers. He coasted his palm down her back before slipping around the front to cup one firm breast through her blouse. Without warning she jerked backwards, her eyes narrowing.

“Damn it, Rand, you do this every single time!” He stood, his own anger pushing to the surface. “What the hell are you talking about? Do what?”

“Try to wiggle out of talking about marriage. Don’t deny it. You always get around me with sex. Well, not this time. I won’t let you seduce me into forgetting about our future.”

“We have a good thing. What the hell is wrong with letting things go on as they are?”

She shook her head and looked down at the floor, her body slumping as if in defeat. “I think I need to move out.” His entire body went rigid. He couldn’t have heard her right.

“What did you say?”

She finally lifted her head, her soft eyes full of tears. “I think it’s time we call it quits.”

His life was suddenly spiraling out of control, and he had no idea why. His temper flared. “What the fuck for?” Lucy flinched and stayed silent.

He went to her, unable to stand the distance another second.

He crouched in front of her and placed his hand on her knee. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to shout at you. But you can’t mean that.

You’re angry.”

“Rand, please understand. You really are wonderful, but I need more than a boyfriend. I want a husband.”

“Can you honestly tell me you’re ready to walk away from what we have, Lucy?”

“I-I want to get married. I want to have babies some day. I need to be more than a cover model. I’m twenty-six years old. It’s time I started thinking about the future.”

He got to his feet and stepped backwards. Marriage and babies.

There it was, the warped image of his own childhood. As if it were yesterday, he could see his mother’s crazed eyes as she shouted at his father. Every time she came down off a high, Rand’s life would turn to shit. She’d lash out at anything and anyone as she suffered through the withdrawal. He’d often gotten in the way of her fly-ing fists when he was too small to defend himself. Later, as his body matured, she’d use words to hurt him, knowing she was no longer strong enough to confront him physically. What the hell did he know about family? He hadn’t seen his mother since he turned eighteen and left home. His father had deserted them long before that.

He went to the window and stared down at the street. He saw a few teenagers standing around, chatting and texting on cell phones.

A woman pushing a stroller walked by and Rand’s gut clenched.

Lucy wanted babies. He could already see her pregnant. She’d be a wonderful mother. But she couldn’t possibly want him as the father. He was a piece of dirt from the streets of Brooklyn. Maybe she had someone else in mind already. Did she have someone willing to fill in as husband and daddy once he was out of the picture?

“When did you decide all this?” he asked as he continued to watch the woman until she rounded a corner and went out of sight.

He didn’t trust himself to turn and face Lucy. He wasn’t ready to see the knowledge in her eyes that he wasn’t good enough to father her children.

“It’s not something I came up with on a whim. I’ve been thinking about it for a while now.”

He swiveled and pinned her with a hard glare. “You’ve been sharing my bed, all the while knowing you would be leaving me soon? You knew last night? We made love, Lucy! Three damn times!”

She stood then, her back stiff with anger. “Like I said, I’ve tried to talk to you about this several times, but you always change the subject. Don’t lie. You know you do. And while we’re at it, can you honestly stand there and tell me you love me? That you would want to marry me and have babies with me?” He took two steps toward her and pointed a finger at her. “You aren’t exactly over the hill, Lucy. There’s still plenty of time to consider marriage and kids.” He paused as a painful thought hit him. “Maybe the real problem here is that you’ve already decided I wasn’t good enough for the long haul. A street punk. Is that all I am to you?”

She blanched. “Of course not. I love you. I always have.” He closed the distance between them and caught her arms before she could turn away. “Have you found someone else? Is it that asshole I heard on the phone?”

Lucy pushed at his chest, but he refused to budge. “It’s not like that. There is no one else!”

“So for four years I was a good enough to fuck, but now it’s time to move on.”

He knew the instant he’d pushed too far. She clenched her fists at her sides and angry sparks flew from her gorgeous brown eyes.

“Do not put words in my mouth. You’re the one dodging discus-sions of the future, not me. You’re the one who can’t get over the past, not me. You’re the one who can’t admit you love me, not me.

You’re the one who swore never to have kids for fear you’d be just like your father. Not me!”

He released her and stumbled backwards. Every single word she’d thrown at him was right on the mark. She was leaving him, and he’d pushed her to it. He had no one to blame but himself.

He’d kept her at arm’s length for four years. No self-respecting woman could put up with that type of treatment forever.

“Rand?”

Her pleading voice was too much. He shook his head and headed for the door. He needed time to think, to figure out how to fix the mess he’d made. To figure out how to keep the woman he loved from walking away and leaving him a shell of a man.

“Rand, please talk to me,” she said as he slung the door wide.

“I need a few minutes, Lucy.” If she said anything else, he didn’t hear it. All he heard was his own inner voice lecturing him on his idiocy. Rand closed the door behind him and started down the hall.

He wasn’t watching where he was going and smacked head-on into someone.

“Hey, Trey. Sorry about that. I wasn’t paying attention,” he mumbled.

Trey quirked a brow. “I gathered. Something wrong?” Wrong? His entire life was going down the goddamn toilet!

“Yeah, you could say that.”

“Come on.” Trey smacked him on the back. “I’ve got a few beers in the fridge.”

Rand wasn’t the sharing type, but Trey had already moved around him and started down the hall. He shrugged. What the hell?

Maybe if he got drunk enough he wouldn’t have to think about Lucy marrying some dickwad and living in the fucking ’burbs.

Rand walked into Trey’s living room and shook his head at the peculiar furnishings. He had a hodgepodge of stuff and nothing seemed to match, yet it all looked damned expensive. Antiques from around the world filled the room. An old roll top desk from the early 1900s. A rosewood bookcase that had such intricate carvings Rand thought it had come straight from China. A pair of mahogany end tables and an oak-and-glass corner cabinet that was filled with nothing but crystal. He’d bet his last dollar it wasn’t the cheap shit either. He’d known for a while that Trey counseled couples in trouble, but now he wondered if Trey was also a col-lector, though he didn’t really strike Rand as the type of guy to go antiquing. Damn, helping couples work out their problems must be a lucrative business.

In the kitchen, Trey tossed him a beer and grabbed one for himself.

Rand popped the top and drank half the bottle before setting it on the counter.

“So, what’s eating you?”

That was Trey, straight to the point. “Lucy wants to move out.” Even saying the words hurt. He couldn’t imagine a future without her. His blood ran cold just thinking of her waking up to someone else every morning. Sharing a pot of coffee and fighting over the last donut with some man who could give her what she wanted. A future.

Trey leaned against the counter. “She say why?”

“She seems to think I’m not the marrying kind.” Rand pushed his fingers through his hair as his mind played back the argument with Lucy. “We’ve been together four years. I never figured on her ending it like this.”

“She wants a ring on her finger, but not your ring?”

“Not exactly. She’s tried to talk to me about marriage before.

I’ve gotten good at getting her to change the subject.”

“So you’re the one with cold feet, huh?”

“Lucy wants a man who can be a father to the kids she dreams of having,” Rand said. “I’m not cut out for that job.”

“Why not? You don’t want kids?”

He knew Trey was just trying to help, but talking about his past wasn’t something Rand was ever comfortable with. He hadn’t even told Lucy everything. He’d skated over the details because he hadn’t wanted to dredge up bad memories. Looking down at the floor, he shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “It’s in my DNA. The Miller men suck at being husbands and fathers. My dad skipped out when I was ten. His dad beat the shit out of him every chance he got. I come from a long line of deadbeat dads. It’s best if I end the cycle here.”

The silence that followed his speech lasted so long that Rand lifted his head to see if Trey had left the room. He hadn’t.

“We have to walk our own path,” Trey said, his face devoid of emotion. “
You
decide the kind of father you’ll be. No one else.” Rand didn’t agree. “I don’t trust myself with kids.”

“You’re using the past as an excuse not to deal with your problems. It’ll only make things worse.”

Trey’s words pricked Rand’s temper. “What the hell do you know about it?”

“What, you think I just fell out of the sky?” Trey pointed at his own chest. “I know a thing or two about relationships. Besides, I have my own fair share of skeletons. But if I let other people’s mistakes dictate my future, who’s the fool then?” He knew Trey counseled couples in trouble, but Rand’s demons went deeper than most. “Hell, I don’t know. All I do know is that I can’t lose her. I’d be lost without her.”

“Do you love her?”

“Yeah, I do, and it scares the shit out of me.”

“Have you told her that?”

“She should know how I feel. I show her every day!” Trey crossed his arms over his chest. “Women like to hear the words.”

But that was part of the problem. Rand couldn’t say the words.

He’d never been able to say them. The one time his father had said those words, he’d left the next day and he never come back. “I’m not sure it would matter. She’s dead set on moving out. She wants things I’m not sure I can give her.”

“Then maybe the best thing to do is let her go.” Hearing Trey say what he had already been thinking made Rand sick to his stomach. Lucy deserved better. It was selfish of him to hold onto her. “Damn, this sucks.”

“Give her a going away present.”

Was the man insane? “A present? She’s leaving me and you want me to buy her a fucking gift?”

“Not a gift from a store, bonehead. Something more personal than that. Fulfill her wildest fantasy or something.” Rand shook his head. “Jesus, you really are nuts.” Trey grinned and took a swig of his beer. “Maybe. But if you care about Lucy, don’t let her leave with a heart filled with regrets and what-ifs. Give her a night to remember. Come on, what’s her wildest fantasy?”

Rand didn’t have to think on it. He already knew. She’d revealed it to him once after a few margaritas. His heart swelled as he thought of that night. It didn’t take much to get Lucy tipsy. She was a total lightweight. Plus, she got really horny, a definite plus.

“She was buzzed once and told me she’s always dreamed of being with two men at once,” Rand admitted.

Trey’s gaze lit up. “Think you can give her that?”

“Why would I even want to?” Rand imagined Lucy sandwiched between himself and some faceless stranger. He’d never thought the scenario would appeal to him, but knowing how much pleasure Lucy would derive from the act held a hell of a lot of appeal. Still, could he stand to let another man’s cock anywhere near Lucy’s soft supple body? Hell, no.

“So, Lucy’s really fantasized about a threesome?” Rand narrowed his eyes. “You sound intrigued.” Trey’s expression lightened. “Of course I’m intrigued. Lucy is a beautiful woman. Besides, I am a sex therapist.” Realization dawned. “The hands-on kind?”

Trey’s gaze never wavered from his. “My sessions are private.” Rand didn’t pry. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know. “And you think I’d let you be our third?”

Trey tsked. “That’s not up to either of us, now, is it? It’s up to Lucy. It’s what she wants that matters here.”

“Bullshit. You want to fuck my girlfriend.” Rand’s anger rose as an image sprang to mind of a naked Lucy touching and kissing Trey.

“Half the United States wants to fuck your girlfriend, Rand,” Trey shot right back. “She’s sexy as sin. Besides being gorgeous, she’s also smart and a genuinely nice person. Do you really think I’ve not thought about it? Shit, I’m not dead!” Rand slammed his beer bottle on the counter and moved toward Trey. He grabbed the other man by his shirtfront and yanked him close. “Keep away from Lucy.”

Trey held up his hands as if in surrender. “I’m not angling to take your place here. Ease the hell up.”