“No. He’s just a friend.” When her friends continued to stare at her, she sighed and confessed, “Okay. We’re friends who have sex.”
“Good for you!” Maddie nodded. “Adele told you that you should use him as a rebound man.”
Adele nodded. “I’ve had a few, and sex without strings is some of the best kind.”
Lucy was quiet for a few moments, then asked, “Are you sure?”
“About what?”
“That you can handle sex without strings? I know you. You’ve the heart of a pure romantic. Can you really handle sex without falling in love?”
“I can handle it.” She set her glass on the coffee table and reached for the white box. To prove it, she’d show them the gift from Sebastian was no big deal. None at all. “And I am handling it.” She opened the white mailer and smiled. Inside was a smaller box wrapped in pink metallic paper and excessive bows and ribbon. “It’s working out great. He lives in Seattle and sees me when he’s here in town to visit his dad. We have a lot of fun and there are no expectations.”
“Be careful,” Lucy warned. “I don’t want to see you hurt again.”
“I won’t get hurt,” she said as she unwrapped the pink paper. “I don’t love Sebastian and he doesn’t love me.” She looked down as she opened the box, and nestled in white and pink polka-dot tissue was a black leather belt. On the heavy silver buckle was the deep inscription, boy toy.
Clare stared down at the gift as she felt a sharp pinch in her chest and a frightening little flutter in her stomach. At the same time, she felt like she was being thrust to the top of a roller coaster. Up, up, up, and she knew there was nowhere to go but straight down. Boy Toy.
“What is it?”
She held it up and her friends chuckled. “Is he marking his territory?” Adele asked.
Clare nodded, but she knew it wasn’t like that at all. It was worse. He’d looked into a young, awkward girl’s heart and given her what she desired most. He’d paid attention. He’d listened to her and gone to a good deal of trouble to get it for her. He’d wrapped it in pink and he’d made sure it arrived on her birthday. Her face was suddenly hot, and her pinching heart pounded frantically, beating against the wall she’d built to keep Sebastian out. The wall she hid behind to keep from falling madly and completely in love with a man so totally wrong for her. Around her, her friends talked and laughed and seemed oblivious to the struggle within her to stay on top of the roller coaster. To struggle and fight and hang on. But it was too late. She was helpless as she started the plunge. Deep emotion rushed toward her, and the overwhelming force of it threatened to rob her of breath. She told herself that she couldn’t let herself love him, but it was too late. It slammed into her, and she fell madly, deeply, completely in love with Sebastian Vaughan. Splat. “Oh no,” she whispered.
Lucy noticed something was wrong and asked. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. I think turning thirty-four has put me in a weird mood.” She laughed and prayed she sounded convincing.
“I understand. When I turned thirty-five, I started getting a really panicky feeling,” Lucy said, and Clare breathed a little easier. “It’s normal.”
Later, during dinner, Clare tried to tell herself that the burning in her chest wasn’t real love, that it was a result of the jalapeno shrimp bites she ordered for an hors d’oeuvre. The tears threatening to sting the backs of her eyes were the result of turning another year older. It was normal. Even Lucy thought so.
But by the time the meal ended with crême brulée, Clare knew it wasn’t the jalapeno nor the day. She was in love with Sebastian, and she didn’t think she’d ever been so scared. Sure, there had been other scary times in her life, but she’d always known what to do. This time she had absolutely no idea. Somehow while she’d been convincing herself that all she felt was friendship, her love for him had snuck up on her quietly. It hadn’t been a whap to the chest or a breath-stealing glance from across the room. No warm fuzzy tingling zaps to the heart when she thought of him. Instead, it had grown from a little seed, finding the cracks and fissures in the wall guarding her heart, entangling her without her even knowing it until she was caught good and tight.
While she and Sebastian talked about a lot of different things, they had never talked about what they felt for each other. But at least she wasn’t in denial. Not anymore. Yes, he wanted to be exclusive, but she knew he didn’t love her. She’d been with men who’d loved her. She might not have felt so strongly about them, but she knew how a man in love acted. And it wasn’t like Sebastian.
Once again she’d fallen for Mr. Wrong. She was such a fool.
That night she went to bed thinking of Sebastian, and when she woke, he was still on her mind. She thought about the smell of his neck and the touch of his hands, but she refused to call him. She had a perfect excuse. She should call and thank him for the birthday present. In fact, etiquette demanded that she at least call him, but she refused to give in to the temptation to hear his voice. Perhaps if she just tried to ignore her feelings, they would go back into hiding. She didn’t kid herself that they would go away. She was a thirty-four-year-old relationship veteran and former love junky. But perhaps, if she were very lucky, his absence would make her heart grow a little less fond.
Eighteen
Three days after Clare’s birthday Sebastian called, and she discovered that she wasn’t so lucky. Not at all. If anything, the sight of his name on her caller ID made her chest hurt.
“Hello,” she answered, striving to sound calm and a little blasé.
“What are you wearing?”
She looked down at her robe and bare feet as she pulled a brush through her damp hair. “Where are you?”
“On your porch?”
Her hand stopped, as well as the blood flow to her head. “You’re outside my house?”
“Yeah.”
She tossed the brush on her bed and walked from her bedroom toward the entryway. She opened the door and there he stood, wearing a white T-shirt beneath a deep green wool button-up and looking beautiful. Smile lines creased the corners of his green eyes, and he hooked his phone to the brown leather belt wrapped around the hips of his faded jeans. Oh God, she was in trouble.
“Hello, Clare.” The sound of his voice sent hot little tingles up her spine and raised little goose bumps on the back of her arms.
“What are you doing?” she asked into the receiver. “You didn’t tell me you were coming to visit Leo.”
“Leo doesn’t know I’m here.” He took the phone from her, hit the Off button, then handed it back. “I flew in to see you.”
She looked behind him at the Mustang parked in her driveway. It had Idaho plates. “Me?” Her heart wanted to take that as a sign that he cared for her more than just as a friend with benefits, but her head wouldn’t let her.
“Yeah. I want to spend the night. The whole night. Like when you came and stayed with me in Seattle. I don’t want to sneak back to Leo’s like a kid. Like we’re doing something wrong.”
She should send him away before she fell even more in love with him, but the problem was, it was far too late. She opened the door wide and let him in. “You want to sleep here?”
“Eventually.” He followed her inside and waited until she’d closed the door before he reached for her.
“There’s lace on my bed, remember? Something bad might happen if you sleep in a girly girl bed.”
He pulled her against his chest. “I’ll risk it.”
“Thanks for the birthday gift.” She smiled and placed her hands on his shoulders. “It was very thoughtful of you to get it here on my birthday.”
“Did you like it?”
“Loved it.”
“Show me,” he said as he swooped in and planted a kiss on her mouth. He touched her as he always did, only this time there was a difference in the way she responded. No matter how she tried to hide from it, she was in love with Sebastian. Her heart was involved, and when she took him to her bedroom, it was more than just sex. More than pleasure and gratification. For the first time, she truly made love to him. The warmth of emotion spread through her body from the inside out. From the center of her chest outward to the tips of her fingers and toes. When it was over, she pulled him close and kissed his bare shoulder.