Desire in Lingerie (Lingerie 7)

“Aww,” Sapphire whispered. “He likes you, Vanessa.”

Why couldn’t we have had this conversation any other time of the day? “I thought our date went so badly. I was distracted and rude…I couldn’t believe he found me even remotely charming. I was sitting across from him but thinking of someone else the entire time…and he knew that.”

“He knows about the man you were seeing?” Mom asked.

I nodded. “I told him it’s been a rough breakup and I’m still in love with him.”

“And he still wants to see you?” Sapphire asked incredulously. “Wow, he’s got it bad…”

“I don’t know about that,” I said. “He told me he’s dating other women and stuff.”

“But they don’t mean anything to him,” Mom said. “He’s just keeping busy until you’re ready.”

“Aww,” Sapphire repeated.

This was so awful. I didn’t want Bones to hear this, to know there was some other rich and handsome man who wanted me. “So…do you think Carter will be next? Now that Conway is settling down, maybe Carter will want to too?”

Thankfully, that was enough to change the course of the conversation away from me and toward another Barsetti.

“I don’t know,” Mom said. “Cane has always said Carter is extremely independent like him. If he does settle down with someone, it won’t be on purpose…” She continued talking, discussing her nephew.

And I finally relaxed now that the worst was over.

Until I came face-to-face with Bones when they left.

They finally left an hour later, but I stayed on the couch and didn’t walk into the bedroom.

I wanted to enjoy the peace and quiet for as long as I could.

Bones was jealous in the same way I got jealous. If the situations were reversed and I heard about a woman wanting him, I wouldn’t be so calm about it either. When I saw him walk a woman to his truck after meeting her in a bar, I got so jealous that I dropped everything I believed in so he wouldn’t take her home.

We were the same in that regard.

When we finally came face-to-face, it would be in the middle of the storm.

When he didn’t come out of the bedroom, I knew he was waiting for me to come to him, drawing out the conclusion, making the tension build higher. It only made the fear more intense, the anticipation nearly painful.

But I had to face him eventually. The sooner I did, the sooner this would be over. I finally left the couch and walked into my bedroom. The lights were off, and the outline of an enormous man was sitting at the edge of the bed.

I didn’t flick on the light switch because I didn’t want to see his corded neck and clenched jaw. I didn’t want to see the throbbing vein in his forehead. So I leaned against the doorframe with my arms crossed over my chest. “I’m ready whenever you are.”

After a long pause, he rose to his feet and grabbed my bag from the ground. He hoisted it over his shoulder and came toward me, his massive shoulders straight as he moved because he had perfect posture. He walked past me into the living room, not saying a word.

His silence was worse than his insults.

I followed behind him, and we left my apartment and got into his truck. We spent the ride home in silence. We passed the dark buildings and the streetlights and drove to his place ten minutes away.

We parked in the parking garage then rode the elevator to his floor.

It was still quiet, but not the comfortable silence we were used to sharing. It was just silent, painfully awkward.

We stepped inside his place, and he immediately tossed his keys and wallet on the entryway table. Like nothing had happened at all, he walked into the kitchen and grabbed his bottle of scotch from the cabinet.

I wondered if my father had done the same thing before Conway and I were born. He was careful to enjoy his hard liquor when he was alone, not even when my mother was around.

It seemed like I was being let off the hook when Bones didn’t scream at me, but that somehow felt worse. I could feel his rage, his lethal hostility. Not talking about it seemed to be worse than talking about it. “You shouldn’t be angry about what you heard.”

His eyes shifted to me as he drank from his short glass. He wiped his lips with the back of his forearm and poured more amber liquid into his glass. He stood at the counter in the kitchen, his sleeves of tattoos stretching from shoulder to wrist.

“I obviously want to be with you, not him.”

He stared at me in the same way, like I hadn’t said anything at all.

I couldn’t read him anymore. I couldn’t feel his emotions. Like he’d placed an invisible wall all around himself, he wasn’t letting me in.