Truly Madly Deeply Boxed Set (45 page)

And when Mike’s hand went to his bad shoulder, her fears were confirmed. Pain sliced through her as the message wound its way to completion. “Relaxation time’s over. We could use you on assignment. Same place, different setup. Pack your bags and get the first flight out, buddy. It’s time to move on.”

* * *

Carly stood behind him. Bracing himself, Mike turned to face her. Moonlight filtered in through an open window, illuminating an otherwise dark room. Her eyes had taken on the bleak, haunted look he had seen earlier. To her credit, though, her shoulders were squared as she tried to look unaffected. Too bad he wasn’t buying the act.

The time had come sooner than he had planned. Leaving her would be next to impossible, but he had no choice. He wondered if she would beg him to stay. Part of him longed for that security while another dreaded the confrontation.

He almost laughed aloud. For a moment he had forgotten her feelings about their relationship. She might just welcome his departure. His entire body turned cold at the thought.

“Mike?” she asked in an unsteady voice.

“What?”

“I have one favor to ask.”

“Okay, but I can’t promise anything.” No matter how much he wanted to.

“This you can.”

“What is it?”

Tears shimmered in her dark eyes. “Don’t wake me to say good-bye.”

She should have begged him to stay. That and a body blow would have been less painful than the plaintive but resigned note in Carly’s voice. She was going to let him go. Mike thought he had been prepared.

He had been wrong. “Sit down.” Pausing to flick on a lamp, he prodded her toward the living room couch.

He dropped onto the soft cushion and patted the empty space next to him. She sat. But her silence unnerved him more than any hysterical scene.

“Tell me about the sections of your book,” he said.

“What?” Startled, she looked up at him.

He cupped her chin in his hand and stared into her eyes. “We have tonight.”

“And you want to spend it talking about my book?” She blinked and a lone teardrop leaked down her cheek. He caught it with his thumb, pausing to lick the salt off his finger.

“I want to spend it with you. In case you don’t realize it, sex isn’t the only thing between us.” He couldn’t leave letting her believe he cared only for the good time they’d had in bed. Given her inherent fear, the possibility shook him to the core. So he would spend what little time they had left condensing a few more weeks of intimate discussion into one night.

He drew a deep breath. “I care about you. All of you.”

“You do?”

He slanted her a look meant to chastise.

“Sorry,” she murmured.

“You should be.” He let his hand come to rest on her shoulder. “Why do you keep doubting me?”

She flicked her bangs out of her eyes. A gesture that had become second nature to her and so familiar to Mike that it caused a warmth in the region of his heart... because she used it whenever he touched hers.

“I can’t remember the last person who cared enough about me to ask something so... trivial.”

“Since when is your career trivial?”

She shook her head. “To me it’s not. But to other people...” Her shoulders lifted and fell.

“Hey.”

Raising her long lashes, she looked at him with wide eyes.

“Don’t I deserve a label a little more personal than
other people
?”

“Yeah, I guess you do.” She laughed, a light-hearted sound that despite the tense and somber circumstances sounded natural, not forced. A sound Mike knew he would carry with him wherever he went.

“Progress.” Releasing an exaggerated groan, he propped his feet up on the couch, prompting her to shift and join him laying down or be dislodged.

“So. How do you go about solving the problems of the American teenager?”

Carly leaned her head against his chest and snuggled closer so she wouldn’t topple onto the floor. Enjoying his warmth and needing his strength had nothing to do with her actions. “Name your biggest problem as a teen,” she said.

“Family,” he said without hesitation.

Thinking about his parents’ deaths and his disinterested aunt and uncle, she could only imagine the depth of the dysfunction he’d lived. “And after family?” she asked.

“Sex.”

She nudged him in the side with her elbow.

He groaned. “Direct hit,” he muttered. “I meant girls.”

“Relationships,” she clarified. “And from a teenage girls’ perspective, it was probably friends and then relationships,” she said in a purely authoritative tone.

“I like this take-charge side of you,” he said, wrapping his arms around her waist and resting his chin on her shoulder.

She laughed. “Normally I handle myself pretty well. You just came into my life at... a crossroads.”

“You’ll get through it. I have faith. So tell me, how far have you gotten on each section?” he asked, then listened intently as she filled him in on her progress—or lack thereof.

His interest warmed her. He obviously cared for her, for more than just the physical relationship they’d shared. And despite his imminent departure, he’d proven the kind of man he really was. The kind who wouldn’t be content to leave friends and responsibilities hanging. The kind who would face his fears and move on, leaving her behind.

She snuggled closer into his embrace. Letting him go would be harder than she had thought, but he’d never expressed an interest in anything long-term, never even indicated he’d want to stay. She ignored the little voice reminding her that she hadn’t exactly encouraged him, either.

Lacing his fingers through hers, he rested their hands together on her stomach. “I know you’ll finish that book and make me proud.”

He laughed, and the deep rumble passed right through her. “If I can get past my own family history, maybe.”

“I have faith, but we’ll see, won’t we?”

No, we won’t
. Because he wouldn’t be around. “Will you be okay?” she asked, hating her unsteady voice and the trembling in her body.

“I’ll be fine. I promise.” He pressed a gentle kiss against her cheek.

Carly closed her eyes, fighting the tears his touch inspired. She knew his promise wasn’t within his power to keep, but she let the words lie. She needed to hear them, to keep them close to her heart.

“You can handle this, Mike.” Bolstering his confidence, even when her own was flagging, was the least she could do for the man she loved. And she did love him. No sense in denying the truth to herself. Not now. “And once you go back, you’ll understand that. Everything you love is waiting for you.”

“Not everything.” His arms grasped her tighter, making it difficult to draw a breath.

She didn’t care. For tonight, his embrace was the only thing that mattered.

They lay in silence. The clock in the hallway mocked them as it loudly ticked away the moments of the night. With each passing minute, dawn came closer.

Carly didn’t realize she had dozed off. When she awoke, she had a stiff neck from her position on the couch. She knew without looking around.

Mike was gone.

He had kept his promise. He hadn’t woken her to say good-bye.

And they hadn’t made love, either.

* * *

For the next month, Carly indulged her need to mourn a relationship that was over before it had begun. She hadn’t mourned the loss of her fiancé, but Mike’s departure affected her in a much more profound way. He wasn’t just a man who’d passed through her life. He’d touched her life and made it better. He’d made
her
better.

She found it difficult to touch food; even yogurt and liquid wouldn’t pass the lump in her throat. She puttered around the bright kitchen and attempted to block out the memories of love, laughter and lobsters, without any success. So she turned her attention to her work, finding not solace but refuge from the painful truths that surrounded her.

But she couldn’t hide out forever. When she couldn’t stand the bright sunshine beating down on the beach since her own mood was so gray, she decided the time had come for change. Self-absorption and wallowing in pity wouldn’t solve anything. Like Mike, she needed to reclaim her life. As fast as she had packed up and traveled to the Hamptons, she repacked and headed for the city.

Once back in familiar surroundings, she pulled herself together. She contacted the school and put herself on call for students who needed summer counseling. She worked on both her book and some new column ideas until she was so exhausted that she fell into bed each night both mentally and physically drained. She met Juliette for dinner and drinks, some of her friends for lunch, and tried to resume her life.

But she still dreamed of Mike. His laugh, his sexy swagger, his lips on hers. Nothing distracted her and nothing came easily. Not even the book. Looking back on all the work she’d done over the summer, she found length but not depth. Oh, the friendship section had fared well enough, but not the relationship or family portions. She hadn’t expected them to be simple. But carrying Mike’s faith deep inside her heart, she’d managed to put together a rough draft of both. Though she wanted to be pleased, she couldn’t because the effort lacked heart. Perhaps because her own was so badly damaged.

With Mike gone and too many hours to fill, soul-searching became her favorite pastime. She needed to heal. Until she dealt with her irrational fears, she would never be free to commit to anyone or anything else. She couldn’t change how things had ended with Mike. She hadn’t asked him to stay because she knew how badly he’d needed to face his past, and how much he loved his career.

And because she hadn’t had the guts.

Despite the fact that she’d turned off the air-conditioner in her apartment, she shivered and wrapped herself in a blanket to ward off the chill. She rose and headed for the kitchen. A hot cup of tea would warm her inside and out. After fumbling around, she resettled herself on the couch.

The teddy bear Mike had won in Playland stared at her with large, accusing eyes. The beautiful memories paraded through her mind and settled in her heart.

So did the guilt. She’d allowed Mike to enter a dangerous situation without telling him the truth. She loved him. Whether or not she was capable of committing to that love, regardless of the fact that he
hadn’t
been, he’d deserved to know.

What if something terrible happened again, only this time he didn’t make it? Then he would never know someone in his life truly loved him.

Loved him and essentially abandoned him, just as he believed his parents had. Laying her head in her hands, Carly wept. For Mike and for herself.

* * *

There was no way she would let her past control her future. Carly drew a deep breath and followed her father into his study. The decision to come here hadn’t been easy, but it had been inevitable. She couldn’t find herself as a person or have a life if she was still mired in her adolescent pain.

She knew without asking that she and her father would have the opportunity to talk in private. Her mother hadn’t missed a weekly card game in fifteen years. Carly glanced around at the rich mahogany bookshelves her father had had installed when he’d moved out of the city to Westchester County. Though he still kept his apartment in Manhattan, it was more a place for weekend stays and work emergencies than his home.

She glanced around. Nothing in this room had changed since she was a teenager. Nothing and everything, just like her life. She clenched her fists. Her father stood across the room, obviously waiting for her to speak. When it became clear she didn’t know where to start, he cleared his throat “I was surprised when you called and
asked
if you could come. Most daughters don’t need permission to visit their fathers.”

She turned to face him. “I’m not most daughters... and you’re not most fathers.”

“No, I’m not.” His easy agreement surprised her, and she studied him more closely. His light hair was now more silver than tawny in color, and the dark circles beneath his eyes were a bit more prominent. But overall he looked well.

She couldn’t have this conversation standing up, so she gestured toward the couch and chairs in the center of the room. She chose her favorite seat as a child, an oversized, beat-up leather club chair and ottoman. Her father sat on the matching chair beside her.

“So...” She curled her feet beneath her.

“So. If you’re here, there’s a reason. What can I do to make it better?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

“I’m assuming you need something. Or someone to talk to, and picked me.”

“Why would you think that?” Her relationship with Mike, such as it was, and her fear of passion and commitment weren’t things she’d expect her father to be aware of. Funny how she’d accused Mike of being incapable of commitment when she suffered from the same thing herself. She just hadn’t known it at the time. Commitment to Peter wasn’t the same as commitment to someone she loved with her whole heart and soul. That frightened her to death.

Roger cleared his throat. “We had a company cocktail party a few nights ago. Peter mentioned that his brother was back overseas.”

Carly tensed. “So?”

“So, I met with Mike. He’s nothing like his brother.”

She smiled. “I know.”

“Judging by that glowing look on your face, I’d say that’s a good thing. You can’t be happy he’s gone.”

“And you think I’m here to talk about my love life?”

He shifted uncomfortably in his seat and a sheepish look crossed his face. “When you called, I didn’t know what to think. But I knew if I didn’t push, we wouldn’t make any progress. I’m sorry if I’m prying.” Apparently after all this time, father-daughter talks didn’t come easy for him either.

She sighed. “You’re not. I’m here, so we might as well say what’s on our minds.”

“Well, Pete seems to think you sent Mike away because of the pain he had caused you. He tends to ramble on when he has my ear, but I wondered.”

Laughter bubbled inside her, breaking some of her inner tension. Startled, her father’s shocked gaze met hers. “Who else but Peter would think so highly of himself?” she asked. “As if my whole life was affected by what
he
did.”