What He Really Feels (He Feels Trilogy) (16 page)

“Spencer’s a lucky guy.”

I sort of tuned them out; I hardly knew Spencer and didn’t really care about his love life, and these two guys were gossiping like women.

“Oh shit!” I yelled a little louder than intended when the Phoenix Suns turned over the ball. I wasn’t a huge basketball fan, but I had to cheer for my home team.

“What?” Dan asked, looking at me.

“Sorry.
Basketball.” I pointed to the screen, and Dan grinned.

Craig excused himself while Dan and Melanie went to grab round two.

“You doing okay?” I asked Tracy. 

“Yeah.
Mel’s really sweet.”

“I’m not ignoring you, am I?” I asked.

She shook her head. “I figured I wouldn’t know anybody anyway, so I mentally prepared myself for that. But Mel’s in the same boat as me.”

“You’re a good date.”

“You’re a hot date.”

I grinned, and I saw her melt a little.

“This place is really nice. Your company did this?”

I told her a little about the various parts of my company that had contributed to the place, and then Dan and Melanie returned with our wine.

We drank for a bit, and when our second glasses were empty, I invited Tracy to dance with me in an effort to be a good date. She gladly obliged, and we made our way to the dance floor, a little make-shift area in front of the band over by the reception desk.

I pulled Tracy into me, and it felt natural as we glided around the floor together between the other couples. The floor became more crowded the more people drank, and I found that I enjoyed holding Tracy in my arms. She was beautiful, and she was fun, and she knew that this wouldn’t be anything more than a casual date with a friend who needed nothing more than companionship.

It was really the perfect night, just exactly what I had needed to try to put the mystery woman and my troubles with Jules out of my mind.

And then, out of nowhere, someone bumped into my shoulder
as I danced with Tracy. I turned around automatically, ready to give the offender a dirty look, and I found myself opposite a familiar face.

A gorgeous, familiar face.

A face that took my breath away as if someone had punched me in the stomach.

“Sorry—” she started, and she cut herself off as her eyes met mine.

I felt my entire body tense when my eyes met hers.

My breath caught in my throat and I felt a little woozy as I gazed down into her eyes.

The absolute shock in her wide eyes was as evident as the astonishment in my own, surely, and she gasped as she looked up at me.

“Gorgeous,” I murmured at the same times she whispered, “Tiger.”

A million thoughts ran through my head in the span of a split second, but I knew that wherever the evening headed, I had to find a way to get her alone and to tell this woman the feelings that I had for her. Because in that moment that I came face to face with her again, I knew my memory hadn’t made her into some goddess that she could never live up to. She truly was a goddess, this mystery woman whose name I didn’t know, and I knew that the untamable and extreme feelings I had been having over the past two weeks since I had met her were confirmed.

Julianne Becker was now just a woman in my past.

This woman before me, Gorgeous, was the woman in my present. And, with any luck, my future.

I didn’t know if it was “love,” because I had always felt like love was something that grew between two people. Surely you had to know someone’s name before you could claim to love her.

But something about my connection to her was different. Something about her told me that my feelings ran deep. It wasn’t just lust, although TJ certainly was telling me in a very painful way that he felt it.

The problem was that I was dancing with my date while she danced with hers. And hers just happened to be my colleague-turned-mentor, Spencer.

He spoke, breaking the trance that held my eyes to hers. “Hey, Travis. This is my girlfriend, Lindsay.”

Girlfriend?

Lindsay?

Lindsay.

I finally had my answer. It was a beautiful name to fit this perfect creature standing in front of me.

I held my hand out. “Nice to meet you, Lindsay,” I said evenly, my calm voice a total contrast to the rush of emotions that I felt.

She took my hand in hers and I was transported back to my apartment, back to the wild, incredible night we’d shared. Her hand was cool against my skin, and I remembered those hands pressing across my back as I drilled into her. I remembered those hands running down my chest, down to my abs, and… dear God, what she could do with those hands.

“You too, Travis,” she said, my name rolling off of her tongue for the first time like butter dissolving in a hot fry pan.

I saw it in her eyes, too.

She wanted me as much as I wanted her.

Whatever bizarre, miraculous coincidence had brought us together didn’t matter.

What mattered was how I was going to get her back.

“This is my date, Tracy,” I said, finally remembering that there was a woman standing behind me. “Trace, this is my colleague Spencer.
And his girlfriend Lindsay.” I emphasized the word “girlfriend” as I shot her a look.

She looked back at me, confusion in her eyes. I had purposely called Tracy my “date” so as to give the impression that it wasn’t serious. I needed to find a way to get Lindsay alone, and pronto.

We had some things to sort out.

“Anyone up for drinks?”
I asked, figuring that walking to the bar would at least get Spencer’s hands off of her.

We walked over to our table, where we found Dan and Melanie sitting. They got up to go dance when we arrived, and I volunteered to get the next round while everyone else sat. “What does everyone want?” I asked.

“Same,” Tracy said, lifting her empty glass of wine.

“Bud Light,” Spencer said. It figured he’d order Bud over my preference, Miller.
Pussy.

“I’ll come with you. I’m not sure what I want,” Lindsay said, that same look of shock still evident on her face. I idly wondered if she was still talking about her drink. “Excuse me,” she said to Spencer, and he held onto her hand for a second longer than absolutely necessary, as if he didn’t want to let her go.
Maybe somewhere deep inside he had a feeling that he wasn’t just letting her go to get a drink, but I was certain that he didn’t have any knowledge of our night together.

I felt a low growl form in my throat as I watched his hand in hers, but I managed to swallow it down. He was touching her when it should have been
me
touching her.

How the fuck did this happen? How was she here? I was monumentally confused, but at the same time, I didn’t care about the
hows
of it. All that mattered was that it
was
.

I walked ahead of her to the bar, not sure what to say or how to react. On the one hand, I couldn’t believe that she had a fucking boyfriend. Had they been together when she and I had been? Did she love him? Was it serious?

On the other hand, I couldn’t believe that she was really here, in the flesh. All the times I had pictured her in my mind flashed before my eyes, the times when I thought I saw her or caught her scent on a breeze. These things hadn’t diminished one little bit in the two weeks since I had met her; my memories of her and our night together were as vivid as if they had happened only seconds before.

But she had a boyfriend.
A good guy who had become my friend, too.

I got to the bar first, and she stood next to me, fidgeting in her beautiful silver dress.

“Tiger,” she breathed softly as the bartender got to work on our order.

“Gorgeous,” I whispered. I wanted to reach out to her. My heart was racing in her presence. I wanted to pull her in close to me, to run my fingertips down her cheek, to feel her skin under my hands.
To kiss her. But she was here with someone else.

“Can we talk?” she asked.

“Please.” I was furious about the boyfriend bit, but one look into her beautiful brown eyes erased any reservations I had.

“Not here.”

“No?”

She shook her head. “No. I need to, um, clarify some things.”

“Get rid of Spencer.”

“It’s complicated.”

“No, it’s not,” I said, gazing down at her. I lowered my voice to a husky murmur. “I haven’t stopped thinking about you for one second since our night together.”

She looked up at me, tears filling her eyes. “It appears we’ve suddenly got some strings.”

I nodded. “Yeah. We do,” I muttered.

The bartender handed over our drinks, which happened to be complimentary, and I dropped a ten dollar bill into his tip jar. He nodded at me in thanks, and Lindsay took her drink and Spencer’s in her delicate, perfect hands as I grabbed mine and Tracy’s.

“Wait,” she said, as I turned to leave. “Meet me in room 204 in twenty minutes.”

“What?” I asked. I heard her, but I didn’t know what she was getting at.

“It’s a vacant room. Just trust me.”

How did she know that and I didn’t? “Twenty minutes?”

She nodded, and we headed back to the table.

It was the goddamn longest and slowest twenty minutes of my life.

I had to concentrate on sipping my wine so I didn’t just throw it all back in one gulp. Then I had to concentrate on not staring at Lindsay while she sat next to me. I was fully aware of her presence and still in total shock that she was really, actually sitting at the same table as me. I felt the magnetism between us, as strong as that first night. Her leg brushed against mine in the small quarters, and TJ screamed with pain against my zipper. I thought for a moment that he was going to claw his way out and make an appearance.

Finally,
finally
she excused herself to the restroom. I glanced at Tracy, knowing it was wrong on so many levels to go do what I wanted – needed – to go do, and then I excused myself as well.

I headed toward the restrooms and then cut off to the hallway with the hotel rooms. I found the elevator and got on it, and my gorgeous mystery woman slipped in next to me. I stared at her as she pressed the button for the second floor, and the doors closed. The two of us were alone, the music and noise from the party a distant memory in the silence that engulfed the elevator. We stared at each other, both of us unable to rip our eyes off of the other and equally unable to move or speak. The elevator skidded to a stop on the second floor, and we stepped out. She took my hand and led me to room 204. She pulled a keycard out of her purse and slipped it into the slot, and then she pulled the handle. The door opened.

“How did you know about this room?” I asked her as I walked in behind her. My voice sounded low and gravelly.

She closed the door and bolted it behind me
. “Let’s not get into that. We don’t have much time, and I don’t want to waste a second.”

I glanced around the
hotel room that Sunset Cliffs would rent out to potential guests. I wondered where her key to the room had come from. It was a beautiful room, posh and luxurious like the rest of the place, but the only beautiful thing I could focus on was the woman standing in front of me.

She moved into me,
clasping her arms around my neck. I groaned, not believing that this was really happening, and I tightened my arms around her waist.

“I missed you,” I whispered.

“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.” Her face came to a rest against my racing heart.

“I didn’t, either. And it was hell.”

“Tiger,” she murmured, pulling back to look me in the eyes. She ran her fingertips across my cheek, as if she needed to touch me to assure that I was real. “I can’t believe it’s really you.”

My lips found the top of her head. I breathed in her scent, that citrus picnic on a summer day scent that she had mastered. I wanted to taste every inch of her.

I leaned in to kiss her, but her palms found my chest.

“I’m sorry,” she said, trying to soften the rejection.

It didn’t work.

“I… I can’t,” she said, pulling fully away from me.

Panic set in. “Why not?” I asked through a clenched jaw.

“Because my boyfriend and your girlfriend are downstairs.”

“For one, she’s not my girlfriend.”

A flash of relief passed across her features. It wasn’t fair for her to look at me like that and tell me in the same breath that I couldn’t kiss her.

I had to know. “Were you with him when we…?”

She shook her head. “We were broken up.” She wouldn’t look me in the eye.

I gazed at the floor, because it hurt too much to look at her beauty. “Why are you back together?”

“Because of you.”

My head snapped up. “What?”

She gazed at me, her eyes heated. “Tiger, that night with you
was… out of this world.” Her voice was soft and delicate and everything inside of me screamed at me to pull her back into my arms and never let go. She broke her gaze and walked over to the window, staring out at the beach. “And when I got home, my heart was broken. Not because of Spencer. Because of you.”