Waiting for the Sun (Waiting for the Sun #1) Read online

  Yeah, me too.

  By the time we reach our floor, my brain’s turned to blissful mush. I think the water was too little, too late. My filter disappeared somewhere around Sixth and Brazos, and I’m feeling both bold and amorous—a dangerous combination.

  Darian stops in front of my door and peers down at me with those arresting eyes of his. I swear this morning they were a light olive, and tonight they’re a deep forest green. I don’t know how long I stay lost in them before he whispers my name, releasing me from their hold.

  “Where’s your key?” he asks.

  “Don’t worry; I have it.”

  He laughs. “Well, I think we’re gonna need it.”

  “We?” I say, my face brightening.

  “You.”

  I frown. Quite possibly, I pout. “Thank you for tonight,” I say, “and today. Both actually. You’ve been amazing.”

  “You’re wel—”

  “A perfect gentleman. And you said you liked me. You said I was worth all the pennies.”

  Darian stiffens beneath my fingers as they glide across his chest and down the line of buttons on his shirt.

  “But you haven’t made a pass at me,” I say. “Well, except for that almost kiss at the restaurant. What was that anyway?” The memory makes me giggle. The giggling makes me sway.

  He closes his hands over mine and holds them against his chest.

  “Was it because we were in public? Because this isn’t public. Well, this is,” I say, peering down the corridor. I nod toward the door of my suite and smile. “But that isn’t.”

  I don’t think I’m slurring. I’m going to go on record and just say I’m not. Probably. But I can hear the desperate words leaking from my mouth, and I’m helpless to stop them. And what fun would this humiliation be if I didn’t at least try to make it worse? That’s when I decide to lean in for a kiss.

  Darian steps back, dropping my hands and cupping my shoulders. Holding me in place. Holding me away from him. “No, Francesca. I’m sorry. It’s just—I can’t. Let me see your key.”

  “I’m fine,” I say, pulling the key from my jacket pocket. “I don’t need to be tucked in.”

  I wake around three in the morning. I’m disoriented and my head is throbbing. What the hell did I drink last night that tastes like turpentine-flavored Kool-Aid?

  I make a beeline for the bathroom and brush my teeth. Twice. Then I gargle Listerine until my mouth catches fire. Much better. Holding my hair back, I wash the lingering makeup from my face. It’s then I notice the Doors vintage 1968 Strange Days concert T-shirt I’m wearing.

  Strange indeed.

  I contemplate how I wound up in Darian’s shirt as I journey back to bed. I’m fairly certain nothing happened last night because A.) it’s been an embarrassingly long time since I’ve had sex, and I’d probably be limping, and B.) so far, he’s been a perfect—

  Oh shit.

  My body freezes in place as the memories piece themselves together. “No, no, no. Oh God, no—”

  “Francesca?”

  I look up. Our adjoining doors are wide open. I pad lightly across the carpet and reach for the handle.

  I’m just a blubbering mess, wearing your T-shirt. Nothing to see here.

  “I’m sorry I woke you,” I say, pulling the door toward me.

  “I wasn’t asleep. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine. Bad dream.” I pull the door a few more inches and then stop. “I’m in your shirt.”

  “You couldn’t find your bag and I didn’t want to snoop, so I gave you a T-shirt. But you changed in the bathroom. Scout’s honor.”

  “Thanks,” I say, the memory returning.

  “You’re welcome.”

  “Well, goodnight.”

  “Wait, Francesca…come here. Please.”

  Reluctantly, I release the doorknob and walk toward him. He’s wearing a pair of sexy-as-hell black-framed glasses and a white V-neck T-shirt that glows brightly beneath the light of his bedside lamp. He’s leaning against the headboard with a tattered paperback perched in his hand. Dune by Frank Herbert. My dad had the very same book in hardcover; he read it all the time. Darian sets the book on the table, removes his glasses, and scoots to the center of the bed as I approach. I sit on the edge with my back to him.

  “Are you okay?” he asks again.

  My shoulders curled in, my spine bowed, I stare down at my feet. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Francesca—”

  “I can’t believe—I mean—I’ve never—I’m so embarrassed,” I stammer, my fingers gripping the edge of his sheet. “I had way too much to drink—obviously. I got upset with you for making me feel like a child, and then I went out of my way to prove you right. I am young, and I am alone in the big, bad city. Not that it matters. I’m alone all the time. And I don’t mind being alone, except being alone is so…lonely. Jane says all I need is a herd of cats—and now I can’t stop talking. Oh God. Just kill me.”

  As I start to stand, Darian’s fingers circle my wrist. “Don’t go.”

  He draws the bedding back, making room for me. I hesitate.

  “Just sleep,” he says in a low voice.

  I lie down beside him, my back to his chest.

  He wraps his arm around me. “I’m familiar with lonely.”

  CHAPTER 4

  Do It

  Darian: You up?

  Drew: Yep. Can’t sleep. Watching a Sex and the City marathon.

  Darian: Just once can you lie and say you’re watching Scarface or something?

  Drew: This is educational! Why can’t you sleep?

  Darian: That girl I told you about came on to me and I shot her down. I think I hurt her feelings.

  Drew: See? If you watched more chick shit you’d know it’s OK to have a one night stand occasionally. Girls like one-night stands. Well, not Charlotte. Samantha though…

  Darian: Been there, done that.

  Drew: That’s why I said occasionally.

  Frankie

  Darian’s chest rises and falls beneath my cheek. Our legs are tangled together. His arms are wrapped around me. I’ve never felt this content, this at peace. Lonely is so much lonelier when you realize what you’re missing. And this is what I’ve been missing.

  Come Sunday, I’ll be missing it again.

  I’m careful not to wake him as I unravel myself from his body. He moans softly as my toes touch the carpet. He rolls over as I pad back to my room.

  Memories of my behavior last night come and go in flashes. I know weeks from now, Jane and I will have a big laugh over a giant vat of ice cream when I tell her all about how I threw myself at Darian like a lovesick teenager. But today, it isn’t very funny. It’s humiliating.

  I don’t want to venture out today. I think I’ll skip the bands—and certainly the free drinks—and hide out here with room service and a book. Get lost in someone else’s romantic woes for a while. Maybe reread The Time Traveler’s Wife. Nothing’s more woeful than a disappearing husband. I’m sure, at some point, Darian will come by, and I want to be here when he does.

  So I can apologize—again.

  But he doesn’t come by.

  He’s here on business, Frankie. You keep forgetting that.

  When the room darkens to match the sky, I close my book. I set it on the coffee table and stretch out along the sofa beneath the comforter from the bed. Just as I’m drifting off, I hear a loud commotion in the hallway, and even though I know I should mind my own business, I can’t stop myself from opening the door.

  Darian glances up at me with an apologetic grin. “I’m sorry. I hope I didn’t disturb you,” he says, stacking CDs in a beat-up cardboard box. He shrugs. “No one listens to these things anymore.”

  “I do…sometimes,” I say, bending down to help him. My fingers brush against his, and there’s a staticky crackle, like a sheet from the dryer without softener.

  He gestures to the CD I’m holding. “Help yourself then.”

  I pick up a few more, qui
ckly scanning the covers. “Oh, I’m not really familiar, but…maybe you can introduce me”—heat crawls up my neck the second the words leave my lips—“sometime?”

  Darian lowers his gaze to the mess on the floor, and mine falls to the white cotton shirt stretching across his back. He’s wearing dark navy slacks and polished brown dress shoes. His matching suit coat and a lavender tie are stuffed in the crook of his arm.

  “Sure. Sometime.” He gathers the last of the discs and stands with the box. He smiles tightly. “Thanks for—”

  “Darian, about last—”

  He lifts a hand to my face and holds his thumb over my lips. “Have a good night,” he says and then disappears into his room.

  Isn’t it funny how guilt and embarrassment feel so similar? Physically, I mean. A hollow feeling that can only be filled by reassurances like, It’s okay; I forgive you, or, You have absolutely no reason to be embarrassed.

  I felt bad before, but after that awkward exchange last night, I feel terrible today. And the truth is, I don’t even know why I feel this way. Is it because I keep making a fool of myself or because I was rejected?

  I consider taking the easy way out—packing my bag and slinking home—but knowing what Darian spent on my badge, that would be a pretty shitty thing to do. So I decide to stay even though I avoid the parties that would require me to use it—the parties where I might run into him—and I slum it with the rest of the non-badge-holders at an unofficial showcase. I make it a whole two hours before I give up and go back to my room.

  For the rest of the day and well into the evening, I stay curled up in bed with my book, reading until the lines blur together on the page. I wake with it tented over my face, my nose wedged in the binding, to Darian’s soft tapping on the door between our rooms. I fly out of bed and send the book skating across the floor.

  “Hey,” Darian says, holding a bottle of Bordeaux and two glasses. His gaze travels my body before settling on my eyes. His lips lift in a grin. “I took a chance you’d be here.”

  I glance down at my attire and turn as red as the wine. I’m in my underwear and, as if that isn’t bad enough, Darian’s Doors T-shirt. “Oh no. Hold that thought. I’ll be right back. I mean, come in.”

  I rush to the bathroom and pull on my sweatpants, and just as I’m about to walk out the door, I grab my bottle of honeysuckle oil and dab some on my neck.

  Well, that was stupid.

  I saunter into the sitting area in my shabby sweats with my head held high, like it’s perfectly normal to smell like a flowering vine while dressed for the gym.

  Darian’s amused grin returns and he holds up the bottle of Bordeaux. “Nightcap?”

  I sit beside him on the sofa. He’s dressed casually in worn jeans and a Jethro Tull T-shirt. His tanned feet are bare. He hands me a small pour of wine, and I relax as the first sip slides down my throat. It’s warm, soothing, and tastes like tart cherries. I set my glass on the coffee table in front of us. Now unsure of what to do with my hands, I pick at the edge of the cushion and then finally place them in my lap with my fingers linked together.

  “I haven’t seen you much in the last day or so,” I say. “Any more cardboard box malfunctions?”

  Cardboard box malfunctions? My God, Frankie, stop talking.

  Darian smiles. “Nope. Malfunction free.” He slides his hand in his back pocket. “I stopped by for a reason actually,” he says, pulling out a single ticket and handing it to me. “Glass Surface has a show tomorrow.”

  “Glass Surface?”

  “One of the bands from last night. You know, that I had CDs for? The ones with the weird-looking solar system on the insert?”

  “I remember,” I say, looking at the ticket. “VIP?”

  “Yeah, killer seats, backstage access…” He takes a sip of his wine. “I thought maybe you’d like to check them out…with me.”

  Is he asking me out? Is this an actual date?

  “I’m on a tight schedule tomorrow, so I’ll have to meet you there,” he says. “I mean, you know…if you want to go.”

  Maybe not.

  I hold the ticket between my fingertips, mindlessly thumbing the surface as I reach across the sofa to set it on the end table. “Sure. Thanks. Sounds like fun.”

  “And I was thinking maybe we could grab a late dinner after.”

  Maybe so.

  I turn my head toward him. His gaze is trained on his glass, on the tip of his middle finger absently sliding up and down the stem. Long, silent seconds pass. Then he tosses back the rest of his wine and sets his glass on the table.

  “So, what do you think about the Bordeaux?” he asks, looking over at me. “I picked it up at that French restaurant we went to. The sommelier recommended it.”

  He reaches for the bottle, and I quickly place my hand over my glass.

  “I love it but no more for me.” I smile nervously. “I’m taking it easy. I don’t think my ego can handle two rejections from you this week.”

  He sets the bottle back on the table without pouring any. “Do you really think that? That I rejected you?”

  I tilt my head from side to side with my nose scrunched. “I know I wasn’t the epitome of sexpot, all wobbly and slurry, but—”

  “Francesca…you’re…well, you’re you. And I’m…I’m thirty-six. I’m closer to forty than you are to thirty. And you were—it was the alcohol talking, not you. I wasn’t about to take advantage, which is exactly what I would have been doing.”

  “It’s fine—really,” I say, waving off his explanation. “I was in no condition to be doing anything anyway. I didn’t even need to be upright at that point. Not that I’m saying I needed to be horizontal. Well, I did need to be horizontal but not horizontal like that. Oh dear God, what am I saying?”

  A slow smile builds on Darian’s face, and I take a very unladylike gulp of wine.

  “I get and appreciate why you didn’t stay. But yes, I thought it was me. I thought you were rejecting me, even before the embarrassing display.”

  “I wanted to kiss you,” he says. “I almost kissed you.”

  “You did? I was beginning to think I’d imagined that.”

  “Jesus, Francesca.” He takes my glass and places it on the coffee table next to his. “Get up.”

  My toes barely touch the carpet before he’s dragging me into the bathroom. “What are you doing?”

  “Showing you what an idiot you are.”

  Oh, I’m fully aware.

  Darian stands behind me and our eyes lock in the mirror.

  “Is this where you tell me how beautiful I am and how any man would be lucky to have me?” I ask. “Or is this about you? Because you’re so old and gangly?”

  “Are those my only two choices?”

  I shrug.

  “I didn’t want to say no to you the other night, Francesca.” He pulls my hair away from my neck and skims his fingertips down the side of my face. “It took every ounce of self-control I had.”

  A charged silence fills the bathroom. I feel the warmth of his hands as they close over mine, and despite the butterfly Olympics his touch sets off in my stomach, I feel brave…ish.

  A long swallow rolls down my throat, followed by a steadying breath. “Darian, the alcohol didn’t make me want you. It just gave me the nerve to tell you.”

  His gaze falls to his feet and I cast a nervous smile which he fails to see with his head down.

  “So I guess what I want to know is, if I threw myself at you again, right now, would you shoot me down?”

  A quiet laugh escapes him. I turn around and push myself onto the counter.

  “Francesca, I—”

  “Darian, I like you. I think you’re pretty hot—in spite of your AARP eligibility. I’m not looking for a two-carat ring and a white picket fence. I’m on vacation. I’m trying to live a little.” Sitting between his outstretched arms, my eyes holding his, I lift my T-shirt—his T-shirt—over my head. “It’s just sex, Darian,” I say with this newfound bravery. His five
o’clock stubble tickles my hands as I bring his face closer. I gently brush my lips against his. “No strings.”

  Stepping between my legs, he pulls my hips forward. Finally, he kisses me. Really kisses me. He holds my head still as his soft lips press against mine. He parts them, sweeping his wine-laced tongue into my mouth. I kiss him back and an unfamiliar tingle spreads through me, circling my heart and whirring in my stomach.

  Is he feeling what I’m feeling? This overwhelming sensation so strong, it reaches all the way to my dangling toes?

  It’s just a kiss, Frankie.

  Then why is the room spinning? Spinning and…moving.

  Darian carries me across the suite to the edge of the bed, finally releasing my swollen lips as he lowers me to the floor. He pulls the drawstring on my sweats, and his gaze travels my body as I wiggle out of them. He removes his shirt and then my bra. Diffidence and desire swirl in my stomach as I watch him watch me. Holding my breasts in his hands, he drags his tongue across a nipple. It hardens, and he draws circles around it. Then he takes it between his teeth and sucks it between his lips.

  “I do want you.” He feathers my skin with kisses, working his way down my body until he’s on his knees, staring up at me. “Don’t think I don’t.”

  His words swell in my brain until I can’t think at all. Raspy moans spill from my lips as he pulls my panties down.

  “Lift,” he says simply.

  I pick up one foot, then the other, and a bright pink scrap of lace tumbles from my toes. My breath leaves my body and my heart bounces in the void like a ping-pong ball. I’m nervous. I’m excited. I’m…

  “Ohh…”

  Darian touches me. Slowly. Softly. I arch my back and push against his hand, against the teasing kiss of his fingers. My legs struggle beneath me and I grab his shoulders.

  “Darian, I need…”

  “Tell me what you need.”

  It’s strange—this mix of bravery and fear. It’s…exhilarating.