Only Pleasure

6

Khalid eased from the bed and came slowly to his feet as he glanced at the dark window of Kia’s bedroom. Dawn hadn’t yet come, was several hours away in fact. He never slept well outside of his own bed for some reason. Deliberate habit, he told himself as he searched for and found the articles of his clothing.

As he dressed, he stared back at the bed, his lips almost easing into a grin. Kia was curled against Chase like a tired little kitten, her head against his chest, her arms over his waist as he enclosed her in a very intimate embrace. His arms were wrapped about her, and her legs were tucked between his.

It was a surprisingly innocent picture, he thought, considering the sexual excesses that had been played out in that bed.

Long, champagne-blond hair flowed over Chase’s arm. Chase’s hair was mussed, lying over his forehead, giving him an almost boyish look. As though a Falladay could have a boyish look, he thought with a soundless snort as he sat down on a chair and pulled on his socks and shoes.

It was wickedly cold outside. Temperatures had fallen to the teens even before they left the party; it would be even colder now. If there was one thing Khalid hated, it was the late-night cold. It brewed around him, within him, reminding him too much of things best forgotten.

He shook his head and rose to his feet, sparing one last look for the couple before moving through the silent apartment.

He stopped at that couch, his eyes narrowing at the small gas fireplace on the other side of the room, the wall of windows beside it, and appraised the couch. There was a pillow, and along the back of the cushions a thick spread.

This was where Kia slept, she had said. Did she stare into the darkness and feel the pain it held? Did the warmth of the fire ease her ache for Chase as he held so stubbornly onto his heart?

Chase, it seemed, refused to acknowledge what even his friends knew. Kia Rutherford would not be easy to walk away from. He might wish she was. Khalid had no doubt Chase would try, but he would never let her go.

Khalid shook his head at that as he let himself out of her apartment and pulled his cell phone from his jacket.

“Abdul, I am ready to leave,” he stated as the chauffeur answered.

“Yes, sir, but I should inform you, I have company.”

Khalid’s brows lifted. “What company could you have, Abdul?”

Abdul sighed heavily. “It is her, sir.”

Khalid paused at the elevator, then stared back at the apartment as he smothered an oath. He didn’t have time for her.

“And she is with you why?”

“Because she brought with her a Thermos of excellent dark coffee and some rather fresh donuts.” Abdul cleared his throat. “But her ride left.”

“Then she can get a cab,” Khalid snarled.

Abdul cleared his throat again. “It’s very cold, Mr. Khalid. Her hotel is not far from here.”

Khalid stepped into the elevator, grinding his teeth.

“Does she not have a coat?”

“No, sir.” Abdul did the throat-clearing thing again. “Well, yes, sir, but it is very thin.”

He felt his nostrils flaring. “And I should care about this why?” he snapped.

“Mr. Khalid,” Abdul’s voice was shocked. “It is very cold tonight.”

“He’s being a bear again, isn’t he?” Martha’s voice sounded through the phone. Too damned cheerful and too fucking perky. “Tell him to get over it.”

“Get over it?” he snarled.

“Now, Mr. Khalid, her hotel, it is just down the street.”

“Go,” he said harshly. “Get her out of my limo, immediately. Take her to her hotel, give her her coffee and her donuts, and get your ass back here. Are we clear?”

“I drank the coffee and donuts,” Abdul said mournfully.

Khalid was forced to massage his temples as he heard Martha making compassionate sounds in the background.

“Abdul, ten minutes,” he said furiously. “You had best be back in front of this building within ten minutes, without her. Are we clear?”

“I am going now, Mr. Khalid,” Abdul promised nervously. “Ten minutes. Should I, umm, replace her coffee and donuts?”

Khalid swore he would have to make his first trip to the dentist ever if he didn’t stop grinding his teeth.

“Let her get her own,” he growled slowly, just to make certain Abdul understood. “Ten minutes, Abdul.”

Abdul cleared his throat. “Ten minutes, Mr. Khalid.”

And in the background, Martha, damn her hide, laughed.

Chase awakened as Khalid left the apartment. His eyes opened and he stared around the bedroom, feeling strangely content. And content wasn’t a feeling he should be experiencing in Kia’s bed. His arms wrapped around her. His legs encasing hers. Her head against his heart, her breathing deep and even, as though she belonged there.

He had to force himself not to jerk away from her, to jump away as though in fear. He didn’t fear anything. He hadn’t feared anything since he had stared down the woman whose finger was tightening on the trigger of a gun aimed at his brother, Cameron.

He forced the memory, the thought, back and closed his eyes, allowing himself to hold Kia just a few moments longer.

During the years when he had been his brother’s third in his relationships, sleeping with a woman hadn’t bothered him. It had been his responsibility to make certain more than their sexual needs were fulfilled.

Hell, now he knew why Cam had fought sleeping with Jaci, or in taking her without a third. Because there was this intimacy. He could feel it, working its way inside him, filling him with something so damned unfamiliar he couldn’t make sense of it.

The feeling that if he didn’t get the hell out of that bed now, then he might never make it out of her bed, and then he would never keep her out of his heart.

Like Khalid said, women were gentle creatures with fierce desires. And one of those desires was the need to be touched and held outside sex. It had never bothered Chase to be the one to supply that, until now. Now it frankly scared the shit out of him. Because the longer he held her, the more he felt her.

He turned and stared down at her in the darkness. Thick blond lashes lay against her cheeks; her lips were relaxed in sleep, though they were still swollen from his kisses, from the thrusts of his cock.

He swallowed, brushing his thumb over her cheekbone in the lightest caress.

Sometimes, he knew she saw into his soul. It was an uncomfortable feeling for a man who had learned to hide who and what he was. She knew parts of him that he knew other women could never guess. And though she hadn’t vocalized it, hell, he had given her a chance to, he wondered if perhaps she didn’t know more than he did about himself.

It was going to have to stop.

He touched her hair, let the soft strands caress his fingers, and felt his jaw clench at the thought of dragging himself from her warm bed and facing the cold outside. And he knew he had no choice.

This wasn’t a relationship, he reminded himself. It was just for the pleasure alone. Confidences weren’t exchanged; late-night pillow talk and waking to the same pillow the next morning weren’t condoned.

If he did that, he was admitting it was more, and admitting it was more held the power to weaken him. Chase had stared into the dark void of weakness six months before when he had to kill a woman he was more fond of than most, a woman who had somehow lost her grip on reality and attempted to kill his brother and his brother’s fiancée.

A woman Chase had desired. One he had thought was a friend. His judgment had been flawed to the extent that he had overlooked all the signs as he ran the investigation into Jaci’s and the Robertses’ pasts in an attempt to figure out why the Robertses had tried to destroy her.

And now, here he was, six months later, caught in the grip of some strange, unknown hunger for a woman who threatened to twine around his heart in ways Moriah Brockheim hadn’t had the chance to.

If he didn’t get away from her, then he was going to end up trying to keep her. And keeping her wasn’t possible. Keeping any woman wasn’t possible at this point. Because Chase had never been good at letting anyone get close to him. It was too much of a risk; the danger in it was too great.

He’d lost his parents at thirteen and lost his twin for nearly twenty years. He had allowed Cameron to be nearly destroyed when he was a child, and for years he had fought to survive without the bond he had grown up with.

He’d learned how to be alone. It was all he knew. He’d never wanted, never ached for anything more, but Kia made him wonder what more would be like. That curiosity was brewing inside him, and it was dangerous.

He didn’t want to hurt her. Breaking her heart, after what Drew did to her, was something he flinched at the thought of doing.

This wasn’t for the emotion, and he had to remind himself of that. It was never for the emotion.

He forced himself to untangle himself from her slowly, tucking the blankets around her as she moaned, a whispered “no” leaving her parted lips as he rolled to the edge of the bed and straightened up.

His fingers plowed through his hair as he fought to keep from turning back to her. Shaking his head, he pushed himself to his feet and stared back at her. There, in that ocean of a bed, she looked like a little doll, lost and alone.

Son of a bitch. No wonder she slept on that fucking couch. This bed was meant to be shared with a lover. Large and romantic, but it swallowed her small body. The couch, with its firm cushions against her back, would at least give her a measure of illusion. Maybe she could pretend there was someone to hold her through the night.

And he was leaving her to that.

He jerked his clothes from the floor and quickly dressed. If he didn’t hurry, then he would never be able to walk away from her.

What the hell had he managed to get himself into here? Falling in love wasn’t in his game plan, but if this didn’t stop here, then he or Kia, if not both, was going to end up stepping into something that could destroy both of them.

Tucking his shirt into his pants, he lifted his head to look at her one last time, and froze.

“At least you’re not gnawing your arm off in your attempt to leave without waking me,” she said quietly. “Can you dress any faster, Chase?”

Kia drew the silk sheet over her breasts, surrounded by the smell of Chase and of sex, and watched him solemnly. It wasn’t even daylight, and he was already leaving.

She glanced at the clock on the bedside table. It was barely two, wickedly cold outside, she was certain, and he was rushing to dress and leave before she awoke. Now, wasn’t that good for a girl’s ego?

“I need to get back to the apartment,” he said as he fixed his slacks and adjusted his belt. He tossed his jacket on the end of the bed before moving to her.

“Of course you do.” She smiled, rather insincerely she knew, but it was hard to be sincere when she could feel the hurt rising inside her.

He couldn’t even spend the night with her, she realized.

“I’ll see you soon,” he promised.

She stared into his eyes, and read things there she didn’t want to see. His desperation to leave, his regret. Regret that he was leaving? Or regret that she had awakened before he could escape her?

“Of course you will.” She kept her arm tight over her cheek and refused to let him see the hurt that came with that particular state-merit. “You know, Marcy Stephens bragged quite horribly about the nights you and Cameron spent in her bed. She swears Cameron was the one who escaped moments after his release and you were the one who petted her through the night. She must have managed to get the two of you mixed up.”

There was that scar across Cameron’s cheek, though. That would have been hard to do.

A frown flitted across his brow.

“Go,” she told him softly. “Before it gets much later. I’m sure you have an early meeting or something in the morning.”

She could almost see him latching on to the excuse.

“Ian keeps us busy.” His voice was soft, not exactly latching on to it, but he wasn’t denying it either. “Call me if you need me.”

“I will.” She would never call him under these circumstances; she would make certain she didn’t need him.

She kept her lips from trembling as he leaned closer and gave her a quick kiss before jerking his jacket from the bed and leaving.

Silence filled the apartment after the latch of the door fell and the hollow beep signaling the security reengaged. She pushed the sheet aside and dragged herself from the bed, shivering in the chill of the room as she pulled her heavy robe from the chair on her side of the bed and shrugged it on.

She belted it tightly around her, the heavy material shrouding her from neck to wrists to ankles. It kept her warm when there was nothing else.

She stared around the bedroom and blinked back the tears quickly as her breathing hitched and she fought to hold back the pain.

He wouldn’t even spend the night with her.

She pushed her hands into the pockets of the robe before walking slowly into the living room.

The gas logs were still lit, their faint light guiding her way to the couch where she normally slept. She lifted her blanket from the back of the couch, placed her pillow against the arm of the couch, and curled against it.

Behind her, the overstuffed cushions gave her the illusion of warmth, of someone behind her. She stared into the wall of windows and watched the sky. Sometimes she watched the sun rise and pretended those golden rays were warming her as they warmed the earth.

For the past two years, she had only grown colder inside, and lonelier. She had lost something inside herself that she wasn’t certain how to find any longer. She had thought it was her courage, but after the past night, she knew it wasn’t courage.

It was her ability to trust, to care, until Chase held his hand out to her and told her he wasn’t playing games with her. That he wanted her. That he wanted to share her.

Perhaps one of them should have given this nonrelationship a bit more thought, because she could feel it slowly destroying her.

It wasn’t the sharing, it was the loss. When Chase walked away, it meant she would awaken alone, dreaming his arms were around her.

That knowledge that there was nothing to hold on to throbbed inside her like a vicious wound. There hadn’t been anything to hold on to in far longer than the past two years, and she hadn’t even realized it. Until tonight.

As she stared out the windows, she didn’t count the minutes or the hours. She stared, and remembered Chase. Touching her, holding her, his eyes locked with hers, her imagined feeling that he was touching not just her body, but her soul.

That she was touching him, that her touch went deeper than his flesh.

She was really quite good at fooling herself, she decided. Because for a few precious moments tonight, she had imagined he felt more for her than desire, more for her than the other women he had taken.

Those women he had spent the night with.

Those women he had taken to the opera, to dinner, to the clubs he frequented. Those women he was seen with in public without shame.

And the only time she was seen with him was when they were leaving. Disappearing.

She wiped the tears from her cheeks as the sun began to peek over the horizon. She sniffed back any sobs that might escape and reminded herself that she shouldn’t have expected more.

He hadn’t promised her emotion. He hadn’t promised to warm her.

He had just promised her the pleasure.

She had no right to complain, no right to feel slighted. But the woman he touched, the heart that beat inside her, felt very, very slighted.