Chapter 4: The Whole of You
Laura stood at the door of apartment 5A and lifted her hand to knock, then hesitated, unsure if she'd be welcome. She'd been so busy patting herself on the back for making Remington and Mildred squirm a bit the last two days for their misdeeds, that she'd erroneously written off Remington's sudden devotion to work as repentance. Oh, she was still certain his commitment was due, at least in part, to that, but she hadn't realized until tonight, as she'd sat alone in her loft, imbibing on some leftovers he'd put up in her freezer, that it went deeper than mere apology.
When he'd scooted her out of his office that afternoon, she'd been left with the unsettling feeling he was put out with her. The thought had nagged at her all afternoon, and several times, she'd laughed it off. She hadn't done anything… or at least nothing came to mind. Oh, no, the transgressions this last weekend had belonged to Mildred and Mr. Steele…
Right?
She became less confident of that premise as the day had ticked away.
Remington, when caught in a ploy, didn't back away, evade. He employed boyish charm, hoping to evoke a smile. He flashed smarmy smiles, hoping to draw a laugh. He tried to urge her into a clinch, hoping a knee buckling kiss would make her forget, or at least forgive. Hell, he even apologized, something he'd become proficient at over the years.
He hadn't tried to kiss her since Saturday night when they sat in a pickup truck while on stakeout. Oh, he'd kissed her on the cheek when Fred had dropped her off after their return to LA, but that was it. There hadn't been a single phone call, before bed or otherwise. There had been no invites to lunch or dinner. There hadn't been any of the touches throughout the day which she'd grown accustomed… perhaps too much to, as she hadn't realized they'd been absent until she'd begun to scrutinize his behavior. There had been no innuendos, no quick smiles meant only for her. What she'd interpreted as contrition and diligence, had also been distance.
An angry Remington stormed out and when he returned would flash too toothy of smiles or freeze her out with a look so cold it would leave her shivering. He'd been in the office, diligently, acting like a consummate professional both yesterday and today. So it wasn't anger.
An injured Remington shut down, placed distance between them. He'd done it after Cannes. He done it in spades after Westfield.
She'd paced her loft – back and forth, back and forth – for the better part of an hour, stopping now and again to take a nibble of her dinner, only to resume again. Finally, at a little past nine, recognizing she wouldn't sleep until she knew the answer, she shoved her plate across the counter, grabbed her keys and purse and walked out of the loft.
Taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly, she turned her hand over and used her ring to rap on the door.
On the terrace, where Remington had retired with another glass of wine after his shower, his head snapped up from the glass of wine he'd been studying, as though it would hold the answers he sought. Only one person rapped on his door in such a manner and for a half-second he was tempted to let it go unanswered, then admitted his inability to do so. The rap came again before he reached the door. Swinging the door open, he swept out his hand indicating she should enter.
Laura's heart caught in her throat. Wearing only a pair of pajama bottoms and a silk bathrobe he'd allowed to hang open, her toes curled at his sheer beauty. His damp hair lay tousled on his head and that piece of unruly hair that fell across his forehead left her fingers itching to brush it back. The blue robe he wore made his eyes the color of sapphires. Her stomach clenched when she noted the absence of the twinkle that normally graced his eyes when she surprised him by showing up unannounced. Closing the door, without so much as a greeting, let alone a welcoming kiss, he walked past her into the living room.
"Would you like a glass of wine?" he asked out of nothing more than politeness, nodding towards the glass he held in hand.
"I'd love one," she agreed. He disappeared into the kitchen, then returned shortly, handing her a glass of the Bordeaux, before continuing back to the terrace where he resumed the seat he'd occupied before she arrived. Brows furrowing, she followed in his wake, taking a seat across from his at the café table.
Silence stretched long and thin between them.
"So," Laura began, in an attempt at breaking the ice, "I think Mildred was relieved we let her off the hook so easily." He nodded his head.
"Mmmmm, seemed so." His response was so close ended it left no opportunity to continue the conversation. Taking a long drag of the wine, she pondered her choices. Finally, deciding the direct approach was always best, she dove in.
"I'm a bit embarrassed to admit I hadn't realized until this afternoon that you're… put out… with me over something I've apparently done, but for the life of me I can't figure out what that is. Care to enlighten me?" she prodded. Circling his finger on the rim of his glass he gave no indication he'd heard a word. So, when, after an intolerably long minute had passed, he spoke, she started.
"I had an… interesting… phone call this evening," he said thoughtfully.
"Oh?"
"Hmmmm. Do you remember Eloise?"
Remember? She felt her hackles rising. How exactly does one forget the tall, gorgeous, buxom stockbroker that was so… genuine… it made it impossible for me to hate her, even if she had hoped to take one of LA's 'most eligible bachelors' off the market… or at least off to bed.
"No, can't say that I do," she lied smoothly. Infuriatingly he only nodded his head, as his finger continued to circle the rim of his glass.
"Tall brunette I dated for a bit last year when you decided…" he left that thought unfinished on purpose. "You, that fellow… what's his name… we double dated…" he feigned forgetfulness, frowning as though trying to recall his name. Bill, Bill Smith, as if I'd forget you tossing the blighter in my face, even as I ached to hold you.
"Bill Smith," she provided helpfully.
"Yes, yes, that's it. Bill Smith. The four of us. L'Ornate?" he prodded. She pursed her lips and rolled her eyes skywards as though trying to remember.
"Oh, right," she said returning her attention to him. "Eloise. What about her?"
"She called this evening, out of the blue. Quite the surprise." He glanced at her from under his eyelashes, gauging her reaction. Nothing yet. "Flattering, too, I must admit." That did it. He watched as her face flushed.
"Oh? How so?" she inquired, pretending minimal interest. Tipping back the glass of wine, she took a long sip.
"It's going on a year since we were seeing one another, yet she remembered my appreciation for the Opera." Her hand moved to her throat, stroking it, a tell she was disturbed.
"An odd reason to call someone," she commented. "To reminisce about someone's love for the Opera."
"Maybe not so odd," he replied, scratching the side of his nose. "She asked if I'd escort her. Seems she has box seats." Her glass froze midway to her mouth, as humiliation turned her face a darker shade of red and her temper flared.
Here it was. One of the things she'd feared most about turning the corner with the conniving con artist. He'd gotten her into bed, had satiated his curiosity and was ready to move on. Maybe not disappearing into the misty night, but moving on in his head, none the less. Committed, ha! She'd been a mark. Even worse a willing conquest. A fool. She carefully set down her glass. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of seeing this break her. Tipping back her head, she stood stiffly.
"Well, what are you waiting on then? Have at it!" she bit out, before storming out as quickly as her feet would take her toward the door. Which was all of about three steps before he reached out, grabbing her arm with those quick reflexes of his.
"Don't you want to know what I told her?" he asked in a calm voice that grated.
"I think I've heard all your lines, no need for an encore performance," she retorted coolly, not answering, but not looking at him either. His lips quirked upwards with admiration. Never gives an inch, my Miss Holt.
"I told her I was committed." She gave a cursory tug of her arm, putting no real effort into it, as the rest of her body remained still. "She didn't even have to guess to whom. Would you like to know what she said?"
"Not particularly," she ground out. With a shake of his head, smile still playing on his lips, he forged on.
"'Tell Miss Holt she's a lucky woman.'" She snorted her disbelief. "It's funny isn't it?" he pondered aloud.
"I don't find anything particularly amusing about it, but then I don't have your warped sense of humor either," she answered, looking down at the fingernails on the hand of the unencumbered arm. He found her stubbornness one of her most endearing traits and one of her most infuriating at the same time. Tentatively, he relaxed his grip on her arm. She stayed where she was, a sign, at least, that she was listening.
"Perhaps 'interesting' is a better of choice of words." He'd dance around whatever he had on his mind all evening, she knew, unless she gave him the opening he was looking for. Well, he wouldn't get much of one. She'd open the door a crack and he'd have to squeeze through.
"Oh?"
"Mmmmm," he hummed. "How it is that the woman who have passed through my life these last years," he watched as she stiffened again, "Not through my apartment or my bed, but through my life," he clarified, "Have so easily identified where it is my interest lies without a word spoken by me." He moved in for the kill. "Yet, since London I have twice now been approached, and twice now, with remarkable ease, turned down those offers with two simple words… 'I'm committed.'" He sighed. "It makes a man wonder why the woman he's committed to can't do the same." She deflated before his eyes. Turning, she retook the chair she'd vacated and picked up her glass of wine, tapping on the glass with her fingertips as she mulled the implications of what he'd said.
"Do you think I'm not committed to this? To us? You?" He shrugged his shoulders.
"I believe in actions, Miss Holt," he answered simply.
"And my actions have said otherwise?" she wondered, searching recent memories for when she'd made him believe so.
"I find it," he pursed his lips, considering the rim of his glass again, "… discomfiting…. That the words come so easily to a man who once likened commitment to the plague, yet the woman who has claimed for years it is what she needed… can't bring herself to do the same." He turned piercing blue eyes upon her. "And, in fact, revels in the attention of another man." If the first words baffled her, the second took her aback.
"What are you talking about?!" she demanded in an affronted voice, even as a memory niggled at the edges of her mind.
"Do you really need to ask?" he countered with a raised brow. She shifted in her chair uncomfortably.
"If you're speaking of Preston Hayes, I was more embarrassed than anything," she claimed.
"Ah," he answered disbelievingly even as he nodded.
"Maybe a little flattered. It had been more than a dozen years and he remembered me," she qualified. She flinched as he slapped his wine glass down on the table and stood to cross the balcony. Leaning his backside against the half wall he peered down at her, waiting. She scrunched her face. "Maybe I could have handled it better," she conceded.
"You made no attempt to 'handle' it at all! It was positively revolting watching you titter and blush as though you were young girl fresh from the school room being courted for the first time by that bloody twit." He pushed off the wall to pace, adding in an undertone as he strode away from her, "Not to mention insulting." The last words brought her to her feet.
"Insulting? How did I possibly insult you?!" she asked, throwing a hand up in the air in frustration, while plunking another fisted hand on her hip. He turned to face her, ice blue eyes cutting into her.
"Tell me, Miss Holt, if the mere mention of a woman calling to invite me to the opera was enough to inspire you to storm out of here in a pique this evening – a proposal you neither witnessed with your own eyes nor heard with your own ears – how would you have felt if the shoe was on the other foot and you'd been forced to sit by and watch as I was? You'd have frozen me out for a month, if not ended us altogether."
Turning away from him, she walked to lean against the wall, staring out at Hancock Park. Truth be told, she had admitted to herself, there in Hayes office, that she'd enjoyed stirring Remington's jealousy, which always lay just under the surface when it came to her. Old habits? It was a ploy she'd used many times over the years whether as a tit-for-tat for a woman he'd brought around or to draw him back in after she'd shoved him away. A test? To see if he was as serious about his claim to her as he'd seemed in London, or if now that his curiosity was sated, he'd willingly take a back from the commitment they'd pledged? A touch of ego-stroking? That Preston Hayes not only remembered her, the details of their meeting a dozen plus years later, but made it very clear his interest had not waned?
She wasn't sure of anything, except she had been aware of Hayes's come on's and that she'd done nothing to sway them… more so, looking at her behavior now, had actually encouraged them. She turned around to face him again, leaning against the wall.
"You're right," she admitted, holding up her hands then dropping them. "About all of it. How I acted. Not dissuading his advances." She puffed out a frustrated breath. "How I would have reacted if it had been me placed in that situation instead." She shook her head and held out her hands in a helpless gesture. "I don't know what to say." She wrapped her arms around herself, whilst dropping her head to study the ground. He crossed the balcony to lean against the wall next to her, not making contact.
"Look, Laura," he began, shoving his hands in his pockets while he spoke. "I meant what I said. I won't share. I can't share. Not you. I'm no more capable of that than you are of sharing me with another woman." Removing a hand from his pocket he rubbed at his mouth. "If we're going to do this… really give it a go… I need to know that the whole of you is committed to me. Not just your body. But here," he reached over and brushed the back of two fingers along her temple, "and here," he tapped two fingers above her heart. She grasped his hand and turned to face him.
"I am. All of me. I won't deny that once I realized you were… jealous… that I didn't enjoy it, as horrible as that is to say. But I didn't do it intentionally and I wouldn't have accepted the invitation from him." Releasing his hand, she reached up and threaded her fingers through his hair, then pressing his head downwards, touched her forehead to his. "There's only one person I want to be with, Remington." He nodded his head, then slipped away, rubbing at the back of his neck as he took several steps away from her before turning back.
"About the boat..." Her brows lifted in surprise.
"I thought we'd already put that matter to rest," she reminded him.
"We had. Although I left out one pertinent detail." Crossing her arms, she regarded him at length.
"Which was?" He flashed that crooked grin at her, the one used by children everywhere after they've been caught with their hand in the cookie jar. Oh, this should be good, she thought, preparing herself for whatever line he'd cooked up.
"I had far more selfish pursuits at heart than I may have admitted to," he confessed in a voice meant to placate, cajole.
"You don't say," she retorted. He approached he then, grasping her hips and drawing her near.
"You," he pressed a kiss on a cheek, "me," then the other, "no interruptions," upon her chin, "the open sea," above one eye, "making love under the stars," then the other, "waking to the sunrise—" He leaned back and eyed her, a single brow raised when she broke out in laughter.
"You, waking at sunrise? That'll be the day," she chided.
"Alright, making love until the sunrise then," he modified with a waggle of his brows. She pursed her lips and gave the suggestion some thought. She'd done quite a bit of sailing in her teens and early twenties, and had really enjoyed it. And the prospect of what her Mr. Steele was suggesting…
"I happen to know a place that leases sailboats for weekend excursions…" His blue eyes lit with pleasure, and the twinkle that had been conspicuously absent for some days, returned.
"Can I convince you to steal away with me this weekend, Miss Holt?" he asked, drawing her closer, until they were fitted together from chest to hip.
"On one condition," she told him, smoothing her hands over his shoulders, resting her fingers on the back of his neck.
"And that is?" he asked, brushing her hair back over a shoulder.
"That we go skinny dipping in the Pacific," she leaned her head back and waggled a pair of brows of her own at him. His brows drew together.
"It's mid-November…." He reminded her. His heart thumped hard in his chest at the sultry grin she bestowed upon him.
"Don't worry, Mr. Steele. I'm sure I'll find a way to keep you warm." He growled low in his throat at the suggestion.
"What can I say to that, except, 'anchors away,'" he muttered before his lips covered hers, and he kissed her with a fervor that held a promise of things yet to come.
