Captivated by You(102)
Her beautiful eyes closed. She leaned into me. “The hits just keep on coming, don’t they?”
I looked over her head and out the window beyond, at the world that waited for us once we stepped outside. “Let ’em come.”
She exhaled roughly. “Yeah, let ’em come.”
I entered Tableau One and spotted Arnoldo immediately. Dressed in his pristinely white chef’s jacket paired with black slacks, he stood by a small table for two in the back, talking to the woman I’d come to see.
Her head turned toward me as I approached, her long dark hair sliding across her shoulder. Her blue eyes lit brightly for a moment when she spotted me, and then that light was quickly banked. Her smile when she greeted me was cool and more than a little smug.
“Corinne.” I greeted her with a nod before shaking hands with Arnoldo. The restaurant he ran and I backed was crowded with lunch guests, the buzz of numerous conversations loud enough to drown out the instrumental Italian-themed music piping through recessed speakers.
Arnoldo excused himself to see to the kitchen, lifting Corinne’s hand to his lips in farewell. Before he walked away, he shot me a look that I understood to mean we’d talk later.
I took the seat across from Corinne. “I appreciate your taking the time to see me.”
“Your invitation was a pleasant surprise.”
“I don’t believe it was unexpected.” I leaned back, absorbing the soft lilt of Corinne’s speech. While Eva’s throaty voice stirred a deep craving, Corinne’s had always soothed me.
Her smile widened as she brushed at an invisible speck on the plunging neckline of her red dress. “No, I suppose not.”
Irritated by the game she was playing, I spoke curtly. “What are you doing? You value your privacy as much as I do mine.”
Corinne’s lips flattened into a firm line. “I thought the exact same thing when I first saw that video of you and Eva arguing in the park. You say I don’t know you, but I do, and having your private life splashed all over the tabloids isn’t something you would ever allow under normal circumstances.”
“What’s normal?” I shot back, unable to deny that I was a different man with Eva. I’d never indulged women who tested me expecting some grand gesture. If they pursued me aggressively enough, I let them catch me for a night. With Eva, I’d always been the one chasing.
“That’s exactly my point—you don’t remember. Because you’re wrapped up in a passionate affair and you can’t see beyond it.”
“There is nothing beyond it, Corinne. I will be with her until I die.”
She sighed. “You think so now, but stormy relationships don’t last, Gideon. They burn themselves out. You like order and calm, and you won’t have that with her. Ever. Somewhere inside you, you know that.”
Her words struck home. She had unwittingly echoed my own thoughts on the subject.
A server came by our table. Corinne ordered a salad; I ordered a drink—a double.
“So you’ve sold a tell-all to do … what?” I asked, when the server walked away. “Get back at me? Hurt Eva?”
“No. I want you to remember.”
“This isn’t the way.”
“What is the way?”
I held her gaze. “It’s over, Corinne. Exposing your memories of us isn’t going to change that.”
“Maybe not,” she conceded, sounding so sad it sent a pang of regret through me. “But you said you never loved me. At the very least, I’ll prove that wrong. I gave you comfort. Contentment. You were happy with me. I don’t see that same sort of tranquillity when you’re with her. You can’t tell me you feel it.”
“Everything you’re saying tells me you don’t care if I end up with you. But if you’re leaving Giroux, maybe you care about the money. How much did they pay you to prostitute your ‘love’ for me?”
Her chin lifted. “That’s not why I’m writing the book.”
“You just want to be sure I don’t end up with Eva.”
“I just want you to be happy, Gideon. And since you’ve met her, I’ve seen you be anything but.”
How would Eva take the book when she read it? No better, I imagined, than I was taking “Golden.”
Corinne’s gaze dropped to my left hand, which rested on the tabletop. “You gave Eva your mother’s engagement ring.”
“It hasn’t been hers for a long time.”
She took a sip of the wine she’d had on the table when I joined her. “Did you have it when you and I were together?”
“Yes.”
She flinched.
“You can tell yourself that Eva and I are incompatible,” I said tightly, “that we’re either fighting or fucking with nothing of substance in between. But the truth is that she’s the other half of me and what you’re doing is going to hurt her, which will hurt me. I’ll buy you out of the publishing contract if you’ll withdraw the book.”