“Not so fast, my dear wife.” He stopped alongside Eloisa at her lime-green door. Keys dangled from between her fingers but he didn’t take them from her. He wanted her to ask him inside of her own free will, no coercion. But that didn’t exclude persuasion.
She faced him with a sigh. “You managed a whole year without speaking to me. I’m sure you’ll do just fine without me for another night.”
“Eloisa, just because I didn’t contact you doesn’t mean I stopped thinking about you.” That was sure as hell the truth. “We left a lot unsaid. Is it so wrong for me to want these next couple of weeks to clear the air before we say goodbye?”
Eloisa studied her clunky key chain, a conglomeration of whistles, a lanyard from some children’s festival and a metal touristy-looking token. “Why a couple of weeks?”
Damn. It wouldn’t be that persuasive to say that was all the time he had available to pencil her into his work schedule. His brother Sebastian’s marriage had fallen apart because of his insane hours at his law practice.
“That’s how long my attorney says it will take to get the ball rolling.” He’d asked for Sebastian’s help this time, as he should have done a year ago. “You can’t blame me for wondering if you will disappear again.”
Sure the morning after their spur of the moment wedding, they’d both agreed it was a mistake. Okay, they’d both agreed after she’d slapped him. Then she’d gasped in horror and yanked on her clothes as she’d stumbled toward the door. He’d expected once she cooled down, they would at least talk about things, maybe take a step back—a few steps back.
Except once she’d left his place in Spain, she’d ignored any further communication other than mailing the paperwork his way. So actually, the crummy paperwork was her fault.
And his. He couldn’t deny it. He shouldn’t have been so damn proud he didn’t show his lawyer brother Sebastian.
Jonah tugged the dangling keys from her loose grip, sifting the bulk in his hands. The touristy token caught his attention. He looked closer and found…an ironwork reproduction of the house he’d worked on restoring the previous summer. Interesting. Encouraging. “Nice key chain.”
“I keep it as a reminder of the risks of impulsiveness.” She tugged her keys back, gripping them so tightly her fingers turned bloodlessly white.
“Risks?” Anger kicked around in his gut. She was the one who’d walked out, after all. Not him. “Seems like you walked away mighty damn easily. If it wasn’t for this inconvenient legal snafu—” not to mention her lies “—you would have gotten away scot-free.”
“Scot-free?” Her face went pale in the moonlight. “You can’t possibly think this didn’t affect me. You have no idea how deeply I’ve wrestled with what we did, the mistake we made.”
Confusion dulled the edge of his anger. She’d left. She’d never called. Why the hell had she been hiding out if their time together stayed with her this heavily?
“Well, Eloisa? What do you say we make every effort possible to put this to rest once and for all? For the next couple of weeks, you can just call me roomie.”
She gasped. “You can’t really expect to bunk at my place?”
“Of course not.” Jonah focused on the little piece of memorabilia on her key chain, a sign that she’d remembered and even cared. He let her relax for a second before retorting, “I could phone the chauffeur and we could be taken to my beachside suite.”
Shaking her head, she slid the key into the lock. “You’re outrageous.”
He clapped a hand over his chest with a half smile. “That hurt. I prefer to think I’m being considerate to my wife’s needs.”
“I’m just dying to hear how you reached that conclusion.” Shaking her head, she pushed her front door open and stepped inside without giving him the boot.
He took that as an invitation and followed. Victory pulsing inside him, he checked out the space she called home for clues about her. The more he knew the better his chances. He wouldn’t make the same mistake again of letting her keep him in the dark.
The living area was airy and open with high ceilings in keeping with the historic-reproduction feel. Her tastes ran to uncluttered, clean lines with a beach theme—white walls, wood floors and rattan furniture with cushions in a muted blue, tan and chocolate. And of course books—in end tables, shelves, curio cabinets. She’d always carried books in her purse in Spain, reading during breaks.
Her reed roll-up shades covered the windows from outdoor eyes. Only the French doors gave a glimpse to a garden patio with an Adirondack chair and ferns. Did she lounge there and read? Soak up the sun?
What he wouldn’t give to take her to his penthouse suite with a rooftop pool and deck where they both could do away with restrictive bathing suits.
He slid his jacket off and hooked it on the coatrack made from a canoe paddle. “Nice place.”
“I’m sure it’s not near the luxury level you’re used to, but I like it.”
“It’s lovely and you know it. Don’t paint me as a bad guy here just to make it easier to dismiss me.”
She glanced back over her shoulder, her purse sliding from her shoulder onto the island counter separating the kitchen from the living space. She tossed her keys beside the bag, the cluster jangling to rest. “Fair enough.”
He’d spent more than a few nights in tents or trailers during the early, intense stages of a restoration project, but he didn’t intend to make excuses to her. “Would you like more luxury in your life?”
His brothers showered their wives with pampering extras and while his sisters-in-law vowed they didn’t need them, he’d noticed they always used those spa gifts.
He thumbed a thick silver binder with an engagement photo of Audrey Taylor and her fiancé. “You said earlier you’re swamped with wedding plans.” He tapped the three-ring binder. “If we stay at my suite, you won’t have to cook or clean. You can indulge in the spa. A massage would take care of your stress at the end of the day. You and your sister and all the bridesmaids could avail yourselves of the salon the day of the wedding, my gift to the bride, of course.”
She slid out of her gold strappy heels and lined them up side by side on the floor mat by the patio door. “You can’t buy me off any more than my father could.”
He took his cue from her and toed off his python loafers, nudging them near the coatrack. How much further could they take this undressing together? “I was brought up to believe it’s not what a gift costs, it’s whether or not the gift is thoughtful. Needed.”
“That’s nice.” She relaxed a hip against a barstool.
“Then pack your bag and let’s go to my penthouse.”
She stiffened again. “I’m not leaving.”
“Then I guess I’m bunking on your sofa.” He stifled a wince at spending the night on the couch at least six inches too short.
“You can’t tell me you actually wanted me to stay together?” Her eyes went wider with shock. “Every woman on that site in Madrid knew what a playboy you are.”
“Were. I’m a married man now.” He still had his ring and hers in a jeweler’s box in his suite. He wasn’t sure why he’d brought them.
She shook her head slowly with a weary sigh. “I’m too tired for this tonight, Jonah. Go back to your hotel. We’ll talk tomorrow when we’ve both had a good night’s sleep.”
“Honestly? I don’t trust you.”
“Excuse me?” she gasped in outrage.
Then something else shadowed through her eyes. Guilt?
“You didn’t tell me about your father, a pretty major part of your past. You may have done a damn fine job hiding the truth over the years. But when my divorce attorney compared the information you filed on our marriage license at the church registry with your passport information, he found a red flag in the slightly different way you listed your name and your parents. He dug deeper and found your birth certificate. The original one, not the one reissued when Harry Taylor adopted you.” The shock he’d felt upon discovering the whole mess roared back to life inside him. “With a little help from a private detective, the rest of the pieces fell into place about your real father. I’m surprised you got away with it for this long.”
“You had no right to send private detectives snooping into my private business.”
Her words stoked his barely banked anger. “I’m your husband. I think that gives me a little latitude here. For God’s sake, Eloisa, what if I’d gotten married again, thinking we were divorced?”
“Are you seeing someone else?” Wow, she sure had that prim librarian gig down pat. She could have stared down an armed gang.
“Hell no, I’m not seeing anyone else.” He couldn’t keep himself from comparing other women to her and they all came up short. “Bottom line? Like I said, I don’t trust you. You ran once before. I intend to stick close until we have this settled.”
She pointed to the binder. “I have my sister’s wedding. I’m not going anywhere.”
“There are a lot of ways to lock a person out of your life.” He’d seen his brother Sebastian and his wife put a massive chasm between each other while living in the same town.
“You can’t really expect to stay here, in my town house.”
He would have preferred they stay in his suite where he could have wooed her with all the resort offered, but sleeping under the same roof would suffice.
Jonah picked up her keys from the island and held them up so the Spanish charm caught the light. “We both have a lot of unresolved business to settle in two weeks. We should make the most of every minute.”
She stared at the keys in his hand for so long he wondered if she was halfway hypnotized.
Finally, Eloisa pressed her fingers to her forehead. “Fine. I’m too tired to argue with you. You can stay, but—” she held up a finger, the stern glint in her eyes relaying loud and clear she was done compromising for the night “—you’ll be sleeping on the sofa.”
All the same he couldn’t resist teasing her, suddenly needing to see if her smile was as blinding as he remembered. “No welcome-home nookie?”
She frowned. “Don’t push your luck.”
“A guy can still hope.” He turned on a lamp, his gaze dropping to the glass paperweight sealing off a dried rose and seashell. He scooped it up, tossed it, caught it, tossed, caught…
“Could you put that down, please?” she snapped with an edge to her voice he hadn’t heard since the morning she’d left.
He looked back at the paperweight in his hand. Was it something sentimental? A gift from another guy perhaps? He didn’t like the swift kick of jealousy, but damn it all, she was his wife, for now at least. “Should I be worried about a boyfriend showing up to kick my ass?”
“Let’s talk about you instead. What have you been up to over the past year, thinking you were a bachelor?”