Beautifully Forgotten (8 page)

“A group of us are going to an improv club tonight. Do you want to come?” asked Tara. Darcy was surprised to see her because this was Tara’s first day off in the two weeks since Darcy had started.

Something feeling remarkably like gratitude moved through Darcy at being included. “Yeah, that sounds great.”

“We’ll grab a bite before, say around six thirty?”

“I’ll be ready.”

Peacock was a little hole in the wall where the drinks were watered down, but the music was incredible. Darcy sat at a table with Tara, and Chloe and Tommy who waited tables at Allegro. They’d had dinner at a vegan diner, sitting in a booth eating veggie burgers and drinking “milk” shakes while gossiping about everything; nothing was off-limits. Now they were more mellow, tuned in to the band.

Darcy listened to the music while she looked around the place. It was during her sweep that she saw the tall man in the corner, his back to her. Her heart immediately moved into her throat and her body started to pulse with excitement.

Lucien wasn’t dressed in his normal work clothes, but in faded jeans and a tee; the sight of him made her mouth water. His hair was pulled back into a ponytail and the stage lights were pulling out the red highlights. She hadn’t yet seen his arms because he was always wearing long-sleeved shirts to work, but now she could see his well-defined triceps and biceps bulging underneath the black tee that was stretched taut across his muscled back. Her eyes moved lower to his denim-covered ass and thighs, and she had to catch herself from whistling in appreciation.

And then he moved enough for her to see that he was talking with a woman, a beautiful woman who was eying him like a piece of candy. Darcy should have turned her eyes from them, but she couldn’t. It was like a train wreck—brutal and disarming—but she was morbidly curious.

Their heads were close, and though she had no idea what they were talking about, she saw a lot of smiling and touching.

“He’s up next,” Tara said, making Darcy turn pink from the embarrassment of getting caught staring like a drooling moron at her boss. And then she realized what Tara said.

“Who’s next?”

“Lucien.”

Darcy had no idea what Tara was talking about, but it wasn’t necessary to ask her to clarify because in the next minute, Lucien was climbing onto the stage with a saxophone to join a band that was just setting up. The woman he had been talking to settled behind the piano.

And then the music started and Darcy sat transfixed. They were good, fantastic even, but that was not why she couldn’t pull her eyes from the stage. Her eyes were completely on Lucien as she discovered yet another part of him. He was so comfortable and clearly doing something he really enjoyed because, even from her distance, she saw the sheer contentment on his face.

“They’re fantastic, aren’t they? People can’t get enough of them,” Tara said from her side, which made Darcy look from the stage toward the audience, and sure enough, they were captivated. She couldn’t blame them because she was just as guilty.

In that moment the magnitude of what she had walked away from came crashing down on her. She tried to convince herself that they might not have worked out and so she hadn’t missed out on as much as she feared, but she knew the words didn’t ring true even as she thought them. Had she met him that day, they would have had fourteen years of memories, of smiles, of touches, and of love. Instead she got to sit and watch the life he had made for himself without her.

Darcy stood.

“Where are you going?” Tara asked.

“I need a drink.”

Darcy wasn’t a big drinker, limiting herself to a glass or two of wine, but she wanted numbness. She took a stool at the bar and flagged down the bartender.

“Patrón, straight up.”

It burned all the way down her throat. She was pretty sure it was even now disintegrating her stomach lining and yet it didn’t stop her from ordering another one. After two, she felt a lightness she hadn’t felt in a long time. After three, she was smiling for no particular reason, and after four, she was downright happy.

She didn’t realize the band had stopped playing and that music was being pumped in over the speakers until she recognized “Rhythm Of Love” by the Plain White T’s. A group of people formed a sort of dance floor, so Darcy stood—almost losing her balance and grabbing the stool until she was steady—then walked over to join them.

The words of the song poured over her; she’d never realized how accurate the lyrics were to her own life. She had had more than a night of loving, she had had weeks, and for that time she was his and he was hers alone. And like the song, even after he was gone she remembered him; boy, did she remember him.

She felt him before she saw him, walking toward her in that sexy way of his. She couldn’t read his expression and at that moment she didn’t really care to. He pulled her into his arms without saying a word. And being in his arms again almost made her sigh.

Her hands moved over his back, relearning his body, the muscles and contours now unfamiliar. Her eyes closed and she rested her cheek against his heart and listened to the strong, even beat of it. His fingers trailed down her neck, lingering at her nape before he threaded them through her hair, and the memory of him doing that so many years ago made her tilt her head into his hand.

The song came to an end, and he separated them, waiting a minute to make sure she was steady, before he turned without a word and walked away. She was tempted to follow him, until he stopped at the side of the woman he had been talking to earlier. She looked pissed that he had danced with Darcy, but then Lucien leaned into her and pressed his mouth to hers. She obviously wasn’t so pissed that she couldn’t immediately drape her arms around his neck to pull him closer.

The alcohol had blessedly numbed her, so his cruelty was going to take a while to sink in. She just stood there watching and knowing that this was payback. She wanted to hate him for being so deliberate and, maybe when she wasn’t numb from the alcohol, she would.

Somehow she watched as he disengaged from the succubus who was trying to swallow him whole, and his eyes turned to Darcy. For a moment it was like they were the only two in the room. She nodded her head at him, acknowledging that his slight had hit its desired target. She turned and headed to the table and grabbed her purse. She offered her good-byes and then left the club.

T
he cab pulled up in front of Trace’s cooking school, Everything
,
which pulled Ember from her thoughts on Lena
,
her onetime best friend. They hadn’t spoken in over a year, but that didn’t keep Ember from thinking about her sometimes. She climbed from the cab and took a minute to study the building. Had someone told her that the man she first saw in all of his sexy beauty two years ago would now be teaching people how to make homemade pasta, she would have thought they were on drugs, but Trace loved it.

He had come a long way from the tormented, lost soul trying to deal with the life he’d been dealt. There were times when she saw that lost look buried in his expression, but it was occurring less and less and that must be looked upon as progress.

Ember loved sneaking in and getting a seat in the back, so she could watch Trace, unnoticed, but somehow he always knew she was there.

As soon as she stepped inside, she heard the deep voice that still had the power to make butterflies take off in her stomach. When she entered the main section of the school, she saw him immediately. Standing at six feet four, he towered over everyone else in the room. He was walking around the various kitchens as his students worked on the day’s lesson. Dressed in his favorite outfit of faded jeans, tee, and boots, he had added one of those chef’s jackets in black. He’d been wearing his hair shorter lately, and the inky black strands were spiky around his wonderful face.

It didn’t pass Ember’s notice that most of his students were young women who spent a good portion of the class looking at him adoringly. But she couldn’t blame them for their interest. Had she not been married to him, she’d be here for every class he taught too. That was not to say that she didn’t have the occasional bout of jealousy since she was, after all, only human. And then, like right now, those steel-blue eyes looked right at her and she realized how silly she was being.

Ember watched as a smile spread over his face before he excused himself and started over to her; but the closer he got the less he was smiling, until he was downright frowning as he stood before her.

“What’s wrong? You don’t look so good.”

“That is just what every wife wants to hear from her husband. Thank you for that.”

She didn’t miss the twitching of his lips. “Seriously, Em, what’s wrong?”

The truth was, she was exhausted. She had given up her hours waitressing at Clover, but she’d been putting in long hours on writing her book and working as a correspondent at Trace’s uncle, Charles Michaels’s, campaign headquarters twenty hours a week. She was coming to realize that five hours of sleep a night wasn’t enough. “I’m tired.”

“I’m guessing you’re on your way home. If you wait for a few minutes, I can take you because this class is almost over.”

“I’d like that, but aren’t you worried about disappointing your students? Several of whom are not looking too thrilled that you’re over here talking to me. I guess it sort of bursts the illusion when you chat with your wife.”

“What illusion?”

“That you’re available and interested.”

In a blur of movement he wrapped her in his arms and lifted her off her feet seconds before his mouth claimed hers. She pulled her hands through his hair and gave back as good as she was getting. She could feel the grin on his lips as his mouth lingered just above hers.

“Not interested and not available.”

She was still reeling from that kiss, so the best she was able to offer was, “Yeah, I get that.”

“Good. Give me ten and I’ll see you home.”

“Okay.”

He dropped her to her feet before he kissed her hard one last time and then he turned and started back over to his students.

“Let’s wrap this up.”

“It stops now, Dane, or we cut you off completely.”

Dane Carmichael shifted in his seat as he glared at his persecutors. His father, a senator; his uncle, the district attorney for New York; and his grandfather, the circuit court judge.

“You get high and you lose control.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Dane demanded.

Irritation met his gaze as his dad continued, “You’ve had three women this year alone claim you raped them.”

The women in question, except for one, never reported him to the cops. They only shared their “stories” with his family. Why his dad and grandfather refused to acknowledge the shakedown always baffled and annoyed Dane. Rape, like hell. He liked it rough and they wanted it the same way, flaunting their assets and teasing him. Besides, when he was balls to the wall inside them, it was too late to say no. Funny that he needed to explain his behavior to his father, affectionately termed the playboy senator—handsome, charming, and a total hound dog. “It’s not rape,” Dane said to his relatives. He pointed at his dad. “He is no different than me.”