Seven Nights (23 page)

     “Well, believe it.”

Sean snapped his fingers over his shoulder and two busboys appeared from the little tower in the distance. As they moved closer, Leah realized they were carrying luggage.

     Her luggage.

     “Here you go, Leah.” Sean motioned for her bags to be placed in the open hatch of the jet. “I made it even easier for you to run this time.”

     She shook her head as the pain inside her roared out of control. “You know, up until this moment, I didn’t want to run away. But you’re sure as hell doing a good job of encouraging me.”

     He shrugged as if he couldn’t care less, but Leah saw the powerful blast of pain that darkened his eyes to steel. Then the emotion was gone.

     “Look, you have to choose. If you really want to stay here, really want to be with me, no bags, no jet, no bodyguard will keep you from me.” His eyes narrowed. “And if you want to run home to your Mommy and Daddy, nothing I say or do will change that either. But this time, I want you to look me in the eye and tell me which one it’s going to be. No ‘Dear John’ letters or avoided phone calls. Just choose. Home to your parents, or stay with me?”

     “How about neither.” She folded her arms and stared at Sean evenly.

He flinched the tiniest bit, but kept his face steely. “Not an option.”

“No, let me explain. Neither one is my choice. You see, the real problem we faced and still face wasn’t a problem of control. It wasn’t a problem of me running away.”

She stared at him, looking into the eyes of the man she’d loved for so long, the man who still didn’t understand what she needed. Well, this time she was going to tell him before she walked away. It was their last chance.

“Then what was it?” he asked incredulously.

“It was that you wouldn’t let me fight for our love. You never gave us a chance to fight on the same side in any battle.”

He looked at her like she was crazy. “What are you talking about?”

“Before you got your MBA, you never let me proofread your papers. I was in my last year of a degree in journalism, I’d won the Riverton Medal for Fiction the year before.” She laughed, but it was a bitter sound. “And yet you kept your work away from me because you didn’t want my help.”

“Leah, this isn’t about some stupid thesis from years ago,” he began.

She shook her head. “You’re damn straight it isn’t, Sean. When you were working at Jones and Sellars, you had that project that took all night, remember?”

He looked utterly confused. “Yeah, so?”

“I asked if you wanted me to come in. I offered to help file or pick up food for everyone. You blew me off and told me you had it taken care of. Well, Sean, I talked to some of the other wives and girlfriends. At least three or four of them came in that night to do exactly what I said I’d do. But you wouldn’t take me up on my offer.”

Now he made no attempt to stop her. In fact, he stared at her, eyes wide and all the anger drained from his face. He looked pained and it pained Leah, but she pushed on.

“You even kept me out of things that directly involved me.” She sighed as more and more heat left her voice. “Like when you met my parents that weekend at the shore. I found out later what my father said to you.”

Sean turned his face. “That I’d never be good enough for you, whatever I did.”

“Exactly. But did I hear it from you?” She shook her head. “No. I heard it from
him
long after you and I broke up and I started working at the magazine. Sean, if you’d told me, we could have fought him together. Or at least I could have told you he was a blustering old fool. Which, by the way, is what I told him when he informed me of your little conversation.”

That elicited a small, sad smile from Sean.

“The thing is, you want to pretend like I just left without any reason, without any cause.” She paused in order to gather her composure. Her throat was constricted with tears. Tears she was determined he wouldn’t see. Taking a long breath, she whispered, “But I left because I realized we wouldn’t have made it.”

He jerked back. “What?”

“A marriage is a partnership. It’s in the handbook, for God’s sake. ‘For better or worse. For richer or poorer. Through sickness and in health’.” She shook her head. “You didn’t want me in the worse, the poorer or the sickness. You didn’t want my support or my love in the times when you needed it most. And you know what, Sean? Even now, when I can feel the connection growing between us, you still don’t want that. Not from me.”

“I do want it, Leah. I do more than anything,” he insisted as he took a step toward her.

She warded him off with a warning hand. “No. You don’t. When you started having business trouble a couple days ago, I offered you my input. More than once. And you either ignored me or bit my head off. I’m in the same damn industry as you are, but you acted like I’d be in the way.”

He shook his head. “Leah, I have to prove I can do this on my own.”

She threw up her hands in exasperation. “And you think I’m going to swoop in and take it away from you? You have very little faith in me at all. Do you want to know
why
I called my father last night?”

He nodded slowly. “Yes.”

“I called him because I had a sneaking suspicion he was behind Midler’s pullout. After a few really awful minutes, he confirmed that was true. I told him if he hopes to maintain a relationship with me, he’d best not interfere with your business again. Could
you
have made that threat to him?”

He dropped his gaze to the tarmac in silence.

“Then I spent the whole night online gathering this information.” She dug into her bag and pulled out the file she’d created for Sean and Will. “You’ll see it’s just a list of names and numbers. People I’ve dealt with in the industry in the last few years. People who won’t be influenced by my father, but
will
be influenced by your financials. And the only last ‘interference’ I’ll be making is a few introductory phone calls. Calls I’ll still make for you while I’m on my way to Jamaica to pick up Danny and go back to Philly.”

He stiffened and his eyes lifted back to hers in a panic. “On the plane?” he repeated, a little louder than he probably intended.

“Yes.”

She sighed. How could this be happening again? How could she be saying goodbye
again
?

She cleared her throat so she wouldn’t speak through tears. “I love you, Sean Dalton. I love you with all my heart and soul. I never stopped loving you. Leaving you the first time broke my heart. Leaving you this time is going to be worse. But until you’re really ready to have me in your life as a partner, as a sounding board and as a friend as well as a lover, we have nothing left to say to each other.” She stepped forward and touched Sean’s cheek. The tears stung her eyes now, as well as stole her breath, but she willed them not to fall, at least not for a few more painful moments. “You know where to find me if you ever really want a wife.”

With that, she leaned up and kissed him. He seemed too shocked to respond, which was just as well. Her heart was already wavering. If he’d crushed her into his arms, she wouldn’t have been able to turn away.

Which she had to do, and she did. With tears beginning to fall, she turned and climbed onto the jet. Vinnie followed behind and the staircase did its slow, mechanical lift. She didn’t take a seat by the window. She didn’t want to see Sean when she taxied away from him. Away from the life she’d almost had for a second time. That she’d walked away from a second time.

And as the plane moved down the runway and took off toward Jamaica, she put her head down and finally began to sob.

***

Sean couldn’t speak as he watched the jet’s engines fire up and the plane taxied away from him and back toward the United States. Back to Leah’s life that was so very separate from his.

Sean sank down on his haunches as the plane gained speed and finally altitude, then turned toward Jamaica and away from him. His eyes stung with tears that he refused to shed. As he stood back up again, he realized he was still holding Leah’s list. It was mangled in his iron grip and his fingers actually hurt when he unclenched them to open the twisted folder.

As she’d stated, all that was inside were a few sheets of paper with a list of names and Leah’s even handwritten notes about each option. Some of the notes were actually cute and funny, proof she’d been thinking only of him when she’d written them.

And what had he done?

Sent her off after accusing her of some pretty vile things.

“Fuck,” he said low. Then he repeated it over and over until the curse echoed off the tarmac and vanished into the jungle around him.

“Uh, sir?”

He turned to find the two bellboys still standing behind him with looks of confusion and concern.

“Look, you two take the jeep and go back to the resort and your duties,” he said. He held out the file. “Take this up to Mr. Todd as soon as you’re back and tell him Miss Prescott compiled this list of possible investors. He’ll know what to do with it.”

“What about you, sir? Aren’t you coming with us?”

“No.” He sighed as he looked out at the ocean. “No, I’ll walk back up. Tell Mr. Todd I’ll be there within the hour to help him with the details. He can call me on my cell if there’s an emergency.”

“Yes, sir.” The boys looked at him with concern, but then headed toward the jeep that was parked next to the tower in the distance.

Sean headed toward the beach. It was only a short distance back to the resort, but it was going to be the longest walk of his life. He had a lot of thinking to do.

And a lot of making up to plan if he had any hope of ever getting Leah back.

Chapter Sixteen

Leah stared at her computer screen, but hardly saw the cursor blinking in front of her. Blinking and blinking, waiting for her to have some kind of inspiration.

Well, her muse had left the building. After twelve hours back in Philadelphia, she wasn’t sure it would ever come home again. Not the way she was feeling.

That didn’t change the fact she had two documents open at once, both waiting to be finished. Her article on Sean’s island was the one with the blinking cursor.

How was she supposed to write some cold review about what she’d experienced while at Escapades? How could she describe the food when all she could think about was Sean feeding her mangos her first night on the island or the feel of his body pressed against hers when they were at the picnic by the private waterfall?

And the amenities she normally would have gone over in succinct detail?

Well, how about the pool? She could easily describe each and every inch of the cabanas, including the way a moan of pleasure echoed off their walls. Or the spa? Well, the tables weren’t totally comfortable for making love, but the wall sure worked.

Yeah. She was sure those little tidbits would bring the customers down in droves.

“Hey, Leah.”

She looked up to find Danny standing at her door. He smiled at her, but it was a pitying expression rather than his usual friendly one. Since he’d listened to her cry for an hour after the private jet had picked him up in Jamaica, he’d been especially gentle with her. She hadn’t been able to tell him the whole awful story and he hadn’t asked yet. A fact she was eternally grateful for. Everything was far too raw and painful to discuss over coffee like office gossip.

She somehow managed a weak smile. “Hi, Danny. Did you pick out any pictures from the island to go with the story?”

He wrinkled his brow. “Usually we do that after you write the article.”

She nodded as her eyes drifted to the blank page before her. “I know. But I was hoping they’d provide some inspiration.”

“Having trouble getting started?” he asked as he sat down across from her glass-topped desk.

“Yes. Every time I start to do a basic review, it seems so stupid and inadequate. My words aren’t really describing what I encountered at Escapades.” She covered her face with her hands. “And I certainly can’t write an article that portrays what
did
happen to me there.”

“Why can’t you?” Danny asked with a smile. “Tell your readers what happened. Be your usual honest, straight-forward self.”

She peeked at him through the web of her fingers. “And just what am I supposed to say? The owner will hold you hostage and make love to you until your senses are singing? That you’ll fall in love with the island and the man behind it all, but you’ll leave with a broken heart?” She gave an empty laugh. “I’m pissed off at Sean, but I’m not trying to destroy him. That’s my father’s M.O.”

Danny cocked his head. “What prompted you to write the article on the false promise of fantasy resorts that started all this?”

She searched her memory for the moment that had inspired her caustic piece. “Uh, that place in the Poconos, I guess. Mountain Castles or something equally stupid.”

“So why can’t Escapades inspire you to write a more sweeping article like that?” Danny shrugged. “Why can’t it make you write a piece about falling in love again? How an island, a hotel, a resort can open your eyes to what you have? That would be more truthful than a boring old review, wouldn’t it?”