Love, Chloe (32 page)

I had a vague recollection of him lifting me up. Of him carrying me to his bed. I found my bearings around the time that my back hit the sheets. I helped him pull off my shirt and watched as he yanked at his, his abs flexing as he threw it into the corner of the room, his fingers quick as they worked at his pants. He was
so
freaking hot. So strong, the cut of his muscles showing in the simple act of shedding his clothes. His eyes were on mine the entire time and when he crawled onto the bed, hard and ready for me, I was ready for him.

I was
so
ready for him.

“You need more furniture.” I picked up a shrimp with my chopsticks and gestured to his bare bones room.

“I don’t like clutter,” he remarked, scooping fried rice onto his plate.

“Yeah—I’ve seen your closet. I could tell.” I popped the shrimp in my mouth and chewed, watching him crack open a Coke.

He glanced my way. “You prefer your men messy?”

“Not at all.” I thought of Vic, who tossed his clothes on the floor, a maid picking them up the minute our back was turned. “I’m just jealous I wasn’t born with that gene.”

“I don’t know if I was born with it or if it was beaten into me.” He made a whip motion with his hand, and I raised my eyebrows.

“Please tell me it wasn’t by Presa.” I made a face and he laughed.

“No, no. My mom. She wouldn’t let me eat unless everything was in its place.”

I smiled at the image, one so different than my childhood. I could picture him, a miniature heartbreaker, then a lanky teenager, put into place by a bossy mother. “I wish my mom had been more like that. Maybe then…” Maybe then I’d be a lot different. Maybe then I wouldn’t have struggled so much when the rug was yanked out from beneath me.

He shrugged. “It’s one of those things that you hate as a kid but learn to appreciate the benefits of later. I think they did a pretty good job of raising me.”

“Was your Dad strict too?”

He nodded, scooping out some noodles and holding them out for me. “Do you want kids?”

Kids? That wasn’t something I had ever thought about. Literally. I had always assumed I’d have them, just hadn’t ever really thought if I had wanted them. Vic had wanted five boys. So that had always been that. Discussion over, damn whatever sperm or Chloe had to say about the matter. “I don’t know,” I said, taking a sip of my tea.

“I think you’d make a great mom.” I almost asked him to repeat himself, wanted to hear the words one more time.

“Really?” I scrunched up my face. “I can’t even handle myself.”

“The best parents are those that try. And that can admit their mistakes.”

Well, wasn’t that the truth. Maybe, if my parents admitted their own shortgivings, I would have seen more of my own. “So…” I said slowly, setting down the box of food and sitting back in my chair. “You’re saying that because I’m a train wreck, I’ll be a great mom?” I narrowed my eyes at him and he smiled.

“I’m saying that Chloe Madison doesn’t seem to do anything half ass.” He stood and walked around the table, leaning over and resting his weight on the arms of my chair.

“That sounds like a challenge,” I mused, grinning wickedly up at him.

He laughed and pressed his lips to mine. “You up for it?”

I was up for it. And as it turned out, so was he.

The alarm blared, jerking me out of sleep, an insistent beep that was impossible to ignore, especially not at five in the morning.

I rolled over, pulling a pillow over my head and listened to him silence it. I fell asleep around the time that his shower started and woke up again when he whispered my name, his mouth kissing my neck. He asked if my alarm was set, and I grunted out a yes. Then he was gone.

My meeting with Vic loomed, just one day away. I dreaded it. I had always done better with Vic when I didn’t see him. There was something about us being face-to-face … it had, in the past, weakened all of my barriers. This time needed to be different.

“You know, you don’t need Carter as a reason to say goodbye to Vic.” Benta reached over, stabbing her fork into one of my grapes and stealing it. “Cutting ties with Vic has been overdue, regardless of anything else.”

“I know.” Benta caught the eye of the waiter, and I snuck a glance at my watch. Our lunch had been impromptu, the stars aligning to give us a forty-five minute window of time to inhale salads and pregame my meeting with Vic.

“You broke up with him for a reason,” Cammie added.

“I
know
,” I repeated, pulling my plate closer and warding off a second attempt by Benta.

“You know what I think?” Cammie mused, taking a long and dramatic sip of ice water.

“I think … you better hurry up because I have to get back to work?” Benta drawled.

“I think,” Cammie said, shooting Benta a glare, “that Chloe’s a saboteur.” She looked at me. “You know you have a good thing with Carter, and it scares you. So you’re tempted by Vic purely because you want an excuse for your relationship to fail.”

“But she’s not tempted by Vic,” Benta argued. “Right?” She looked at me.

“It’s Vic’s money,” Cammie interrupted me before I could speak. “That’s what she’s struggling with.”

“I’m not tempted by Vic.” I swallowed. “And I’m over his money.” I looked down at my plate, thinking of every horrible thought that had crossed my mind, back when I’d first met Carter. How much money and future lifestyles had ruled my decisions back then.

Benta laughed. “Really? The same Chloe Madison who balked at our Spring Break trip because she was too fancy for Carnival Cruise lines?”

Cammie leaned forward with a smile, because it was apparently Make Fun of Chloe Day. “The same Chloe Madison who had
daily
maid service at your old apartment?”

“That was Vic’s maid,” I pointed out.

“And you loved it.”

I rolled my eyes. “Who
wouldn’t
love daily maid service? That’s a stupid statement.”

But I did. I’d loved it. I’d loved everything about that life. And maybe that
was
what I’d struggled with so much in terms of Vic. Maybe it hadn’t been him, but his money, his lifestyle—a distinction that turned my year of struggle from being lovestruck to just being materialistic.
Ouch
.

“Chloe’s right.” Benta’s comment dragged me back to the conversation. “I would
love
daily maid service.”

“Let’s not talk about Vic and maids,” I groaned. “Please.”

Cammie raised an eyebrow at me. “Oh, I’m sorry,” she said. “How terrible of us to remind you of his cheating right before you end things with him.”

“I already ended things with him,” I shot back, standing and gathering up my trash. “This is just closure.”

Closure. Such an odd concept. Did relationships really need it? Or was it just an excuse for one last glimpse at what could have been?

I didn’t ask them the question. They were, at times, a little too honest for my heart’s sake. But I thought Benta and Cammie were both right.

I needed to kiss Vic’s ass goodbye because it was the right thing to do and it was about damn time.

I needed to embrace my relationship with Carter and stop being a wimp. Whether I’d told him so or not, I loved him. He made me realize how empty my old life had been. And in his eyes, I saw a future that I wanted more of, a future where I was a better person.

Wow. I might have just become a grown-up.

I met Vic in the downstairs bar, instead of his upstairs office. I’d been in that office too many times. Bent over that desk, on top of liquor invoices and payroll docs. Pressed up against the window, my cheek to the glass, his hips pumping against my ass. Vic loved that office. I didn’t want to think about how many women, both during and after me, he’d had up there.

I got there first, finding a stool at the bar and pulling out my phone, returning a text to Cammie.

“Can I get you a drink?”

I looked up at the bartender. A drink. Ha. Alcohol was the one thing I
didn’t
need to add to this situation. “Diet Coke,” I said. The man winced, but grabbed a glassful of ice.

It took fifteen minutes for Vic to show up. When he did, it was in a dark gray suit, a blue shirt underneath, his jacket unbuttoned, his tie loose around his neck. His hair was neat, his skin tan from his fishing trip. He smiled at me as he approached and my hand tightened on my glass. The problem with not drinking? You lost the careless steel it could give your spine.

I started to speak, and he cut me off, leaning forward, so close I could smell his cologne. “Cute outfit.”

“Thank you.” I’d dressed casually, knowing it would irritate him, especially in this club, an establishment that prided itself on an unbendable dress code. My jeans and V-neck had made the doorman shake his head as soon as I had stepped up, his mouth souring into a scowl when I flashed the gold card that Vic had given me. There were only a handful of them in the city, some VIP bullshit that Vic printed up that gave carte blanche at any of his places. I hadn’t ever used it when we’d dated, everyone knowing who I was but now, eighteen months later, all of the faces were different, the city of New York one that changed often and easily forgot.

Vic pulled his stool forward and it was then I realized that the bar had emptied, the bartender gone, the velvet curtain to its entrance pulled shut.

We were alone and God, I hated it when he did shit like that.

Well, now I hated it. I used to love it.

His stool was near enough that his knee brushed the inside of my thigh, his huff of breath close enough that the hair on my skin rose in response. I pushed my drink away and stood, needing space. Being that close to Vic never led anywhere productive.

“Vic.” I swallowed. Short and sweet. I could do this. “You’ve got to stop … reaching out.” He sat back, his elbows on the bar, his body completely relaxed, his mouth twitching a little as if he was holding back a smile. “I mean it.” I narrowed my eyes and stood a little straighter, wishing for a moment that I wore something more commanding than flats and Hudsons. “You and I are done. I’m in love with Carter.” It was the first time I’d said the words aloud, and they came out flat and uncertain, almost like I was posing it as a question.