She resisted him, edging off the bed. “It is tomorrow. Daniel, I shouldn’t have spent the night.” Her
voice wanted to crack on the last sentence when he slowly, slowly opened his eyes, and she couldn’t
even hold that gaze.
It took every ounce of strength in her being to find the same girl, the same woman, who’d stood up
before both judge and jury and related how she’d found her parents dead, after an hour’s shouting
match and then another several of silence, how she had found them in the master bedroom with their
wrists slit. Dad had also cut his throat. Or maybe mother had done it, she wasn’t sure.
Nobody was sure.
She felt the cold go through her again and said in a soft but toneless voice, as she stared at his
throat, “I can’t do this. You’ve always known I can’t. I merely didn’t want to leave without telling you
that whatever this is, it’s over.”
“Look at me when you talk to me,” he said, and then he gently grabbed her face and pulled it to him,
her jaw cupped in his palm from ear to ear, thumb on one side, four fingers on the other. “That’s
better. Now tell me, Monica.”
She clamped her teeth and, pushing his arm away, stood back at the ill-concealed anger in his voice.
“I’m trying to fix this. It was wrong of me to ask you to sleep with me. We can’t do this anymore.”
“Why did you ask me, Monica? You really think I’m buying that you wanted a fuck buddy? Sex
wasn’t the driving force here, princess, you just used it as an excuse to come to me at last.” He
uncoiled from the bed like a snake, suddenly coming to his full height, his eyes and voice sharpening
as he edged closer.
She held her ground, but inside she was shaking with the truth of his words, with his nearness, with
the pain of being at odds with him minutes after being warm and content in his arms and in his bed.
“There’s nothing wrong with you, Monica,” he said, his eyes fiercely tender as he stroked a loose
sable hair and rubbed it between his fingers like it were precious. “Only the fact that the man you’re in
love with is right here, and you want him with every bit of your being.”
She stiffened when he stroked his thumb along her lower lip, his voice dropping further. “Who is it
you think of when you pleasure yourself? I know, Monica. I know who you think of, because it’s you
who I think of, too.” He turned her face up to his when she tried to avoid his flaming green gaze.
“Every woman to me is a mirage of you, but my God I’ve been eating grapes all my life and my body
gets even hungrier when all it wants is this … fucking … red … apple … and I want you to feed it to
me, my love. I want you to feed me every day of you, just you … my one obsession, my one sole
addiction.”
She stepped back, her heart pounding, her systems trembling awake at his words. “Please don’t
touch me. I can’t think when you touch me.” She raised her arms to hold him back, forcing herself to
meet his gaze and the roiling force of the emotions flaming inside him, bearing herself to hold the
weight of this startlingly new misery she was opening up inside her.
“You’re right. You’re right, Daniel,” she agreed, watching his face tighten at her admission. “My
problem isn’t me, and it’s not them. My problem is for how long, how much, I’ve been trying to get
over you.” His body tightened like a bowstring at the admission, and he took a hungry step forward,
but she halted him with her hand again.
“Please, don’t. Don’t touch me.” She drew in a ragged breath. “Daniel, I thought if I caved in and
found a way to be with you, it would ease. If you’re hungry, and eat, you feel it eased … but it
doesn’t.” She shook her head. “My taxi is waiting. I just wanted to explain why I left and why I …
can’t do this anymore. I need to step back and breathe.” He was staring at her with anger and
frustration, holding himself as still as a statue with his hands tightly fisted at his sides. She
impulsively cradled his jaw because she had to touch him, could not help it. “I can’t bear to think of us
killing ourselves for each other like my parents.”
He caught her wrist and squeezed fiercely in a stunningly fast move, hissing through his teeth,
“Have the balls to love me, Monica.”
“I can’t! You can’t feel for someone like this and not hurt each other, Daniel. You can’t feel this
without doing something crazy. It’s so obvious to me now. I can’t even look at you without feeling …