Mr. Darcy's Kiss

My throat tightened as I realized he wasn't coming back.

He was gone without saying a word.

My chest clenched and I fought back the tears. I was better than this. I was so much more than this. Was the connection, the intensity of it, just in my head?

I sniffled. I had nothing to show that there was anything between us.

I was nothing more than an easy shag. One I did for bragging rights.

I picked up my phone and messaged Jane that I didn't feel well and was heading home. The party was over.

Chapter 11

“I feel stupid, oh so stupid, it’s amaaazing how stupid I FEEEEL,” I sang softly to myself. No one on the subway even looked at me strangely. People singing on the subway wasn’t considered weird in New York City. I half expected someone to throw me a dollar.

I pressed my forehead into the cool glass of the window and watched the dark brick walls of the subway pass by. I felt so stupid.

Why in the world did I sleep with him?

I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I could understand that he was the most attractive man I knew. I could see how that might make me do something I now regretted. I wanted to pretend that I’d had some whiskey and some champagne, so I probably wasn’t in full control of my faculties. I knew that was a lie.

I’d known exactly what I’d been doing when I slept with him.

I’d wanted it.

And now I was paying for my stupidity.

I checked my phone again, but there wasn’t a single message from him. He’d slept with me, walked out on me, and then didn’t even have the decency to call me the next day.

He just didn’t want to talk to me. He’d gotten what he wanted. A shag.

I was an idiot, and he was a total ass.

I sighed and hummed my stupid song to myself again. I’d been singing it all day at work. I only had one patient, which meant that I had way too much time to sit and think. I kept hoping that a difficult patient would arrive, just so I could concentrate on something else, but everyone stayed miraculously heart-attack free.

Great for patients, bad for me.

My phone stayed silent in my hand, just like it had all day.

It wasn’t like it would be hard to get my number. He was a billionaire, and his best friend lived in the same building and was dating my roommate. Hell, he could have just sent Charles down to say something.

I sighed and knew that was stupid too. What in the world would he have Charles say?

“Hey, thanks for shagging my friend.” Or perhaps, “He wants to marry you and have your babies, but he had something really important come up last night. Sorry. All the apologies.”

Any way that I looked at what happened last night, I was an idiot. I knew he was terrible, although sexy as hell. I should never have gone upstairs with him. I should have stayed away.

I got off at my station and stomped my way home. It was dark now, but in New York City, it was never really dark. The lights were everywhere in the city.

I grumbled the whole way up the elevator to my apartment. I wanted to talk to Jane. I wanted her to tell me that I had simply given into my passions and that I wasn’t a complete moron. I wanted her to tell me that he was a terrible human being and that she would have Charles beat him up for me.

I needed her calm and sweet approach to this.

I threw open the door, ready to tell her what had happened the night before. I hadn’t seen her since I had to go to work early and had beaten her home last night.

I found her sitting on the couch, staring at the “Are you still watching?” screen on the TV. A half a container of ice cream sat melting on the couch next to her. Jane’s face was covered in tear stains.

“Jane, what’s wrong?” I asked, forgetting my problems, dropping my purse, and running to her side.