Mills & Boon Showcase. Christy McKellen
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only reason you want to know?” It was direct and she didn’t back down with her question or when she held his eyes. What she’d had with Matt in the past had been a lie and she damn sure wasn’t going to continue to let anything but the truth be between them now. He didn’t answer.
“It’s not the only reason.” She looked up as he started his response and saw heat in his eyes. They were locked on hers and she felt her whole body flush and pulse in response. What had seemed like a good idea, to call Matt out, now seemed an obvious, horrible mistake. The detached tone of their earlier conversation had left and everything personal was flooding in. She didn’t know how to respond, couldn’t respond, as her lips parted and she struggled to breathe in and out.
“Kate, are you sure you’re ready to hear more? Are you ready to ask me about the things you want to know?” He was being gentle in his voice, the same soft whisper that had once been in her ear, the same careful handling when she was clearly in over her head.
“Why now, Matt? What’s changed?”
“Everything, and nothing, Kate. I’m not the same man you knew, just as you aren’t the same woman, but what’s between us hasn’t gone away and never will.” He reached out and covered her hand with his. It felt warm, and strong, and all-encompassing.
“There wasn’t anything between us.” She pulled her hand from under his and tucked both hands under her legs, away from the temptation to touch him. She couldn’t let herself get drawn back into the belief that their love was mutual.
“How can you say that, Kate? How can you speak to how I felt about us?” He was lawyering her now, using her own argument about not speaking for someone else against her. It left her cold and brought out the clear, precise, objective words and voice she used as a surgeon.
“Because you told me. You looked me in the eye the morning after we made love and you said, ‘Katie, I’m sorry. I don’t love you.’ Then you proved it by walking out and not coming back, not answering my calls, my e-mails, my letters, and running from the sight of me. That’s how I know how you felt about us.” The ache in her throat was intensifying but she was not going to cry, despite the burning feeling that was pooling behind her eyes.
“I lied to you.”
Her eyes flew to his.
“Why? Why would you do that? Was I that disappointing? That bad in bed that it was worth throwing everything else that was good about us away?” Gone now was her composure and with it her pride, and out came the most painful thought she had buried deep within her and avoided voicing at all costs.
She placed her elbows on her legs and buried her face in her hands, unable to face him any longer, unable to hear his response and horrified that she had asked the question. Within seconds she was being lifted from her seat. Matt had reached for her beneath her arms and raised her out of her chair. Startled, she wrapped her arms around his neck for balance and he wrapped his arms around her further, gathering her to him.
Then he crushed his mouth to hers. It wasn’t soft, it wasn’t gentle, it was possessive. The pressure of his lips parted hers and he began to taste her and explore her mouth as if he was a dying man searching for his last drink of water. She was angry, surprised, and entranced all at the same time, until the same urgency and passion from the other night took hold.
She ran her tongue across his lower lip, her response escalating the passion between them. At some point he walked them up against a wall and pressed her against it, shifting her to place himself between her legs and holding her by her bottom, his hands firm and solid. Warmth was spreading through her body until she felt like she was on fire. When they finally broke apart, both were gasping and he slowly slid her down his length to the floor, his erection prominent in the journey.
He cupped one side of her face and brought her gaze to his, and it was the same old Matt. He put his finger against her lips and silenced her before she could talk. “You are the most perfect woman I have ever met, both in bed and out. No woman before or after has ever compared to you. Not a day has gone by in the last nine years that I haven’t wanted to be with you, to hold you, to kiss every inch of your naked body and move inside you until you scream out my name over and over and over again.”
“No.” She shook her head against his words, looking away from the man who was confusing her mind and body.
“Yes, Kate,” he said as he cupped the side of her face again, bringing her eyes to his.
“I don’t believe you,” she said. Actions were more important than words, and his actions had spoken so loudly.
“I did it for you, Kate, I walked away for you, not for me. You were going to throw away medical school, everything you had worked for. You were the most perfect, selfless woman I had ever met and I wasn’t going allow anything to change you or take away your dreams.”
She was stunned by his claim, both by the audacity of the lie and how truthful and heartfelt he seemed to be while making it. She took a deep breath and very clearly and slowly spoke to Matt, looking him in the eye and searching for the truth. “So what you are saying is that if I had been strong enough and gone to medical school in New York, you wouldn’t have broken my heart and walked out on me without looking back?”
“If you had been in New York, I wouldn’t have been strong enough to stay away from you, even if I thought it was for your own good.” The passionate statement fueled her own passion and she reached out and slapped him across his cheek. The sound echoed across the conference room and she was shocked silent by her own action, drawing her hand up to touch her own cheek, mirroring his reaction. She was horrified by her response yet unwilling to apologize.
“It’s been nine years, Matt, you don’t need to bother lying to me any more.”
She didn’t let him reply. He seemed shocked by the turn of events in the last few minutes. She grabbed her jacket and purse and left the conference room, searching for the quickest way out. She didn’t have a keycard to access anything, so instead she headed for the fire stairwell and fled down the twenty-five flights into the building alley. Her heart was pounding as the sound of her boots echoed on the cement stairs. In the dark, in the cold, she caught her breath, her chest heaving. He wanted her. He wanted her enough to lie to her to get her back.
SHE WAS FROZEN. The wind was blowing strongly off the harbor and the wet coldness was seeping through every inch of her body. She walked quickly through the cobblestoned old roads of Boston that wound their way through the city’s core from Matt’s office back to her apartment. Why had Matt lied to her? What purpose did it serve? Nothing made sense, and she couldn’t tell what hurt more, Matt’s lies or that for a moment she had believed him.
It had taken so long to learn how to trust herself again, but she had, and a lot of that feeling had come from her confidence and success in medicine. She had even felt happy and contented with her life, leaving the past and Matt behind, until Tate had proposed.
Tate on one knee in front of her with a ring, and she had seen Matt. Pain didn’t begin to describe the way she had felt when she’d realized she wasn’t in love with the man in front of her, and that deep inside Matt was still trapped in her heart.
When were those feeling going to go away? Matt wasn’t the same man she had known back at Brown, but that didn’t seem to make a difference. The way she sensed him when he walked in a room hadn’t changed. The way she felt when he touched her had changed, but unfortunately had increased a thousand times over in the intensity she felt go through her the moment his lips or hands touched her body. It was the only time her mind forgot about everything that had happened between them.
Thoughts of the passion tempered the cold she was feeling and she quickened her pace. She could have hailed a cab, but the clear, cold night air was a needed contrast to the storm she was feeling inside. Forty-five minutes later she reached the steps of her apartment, not failing to notice