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“Let me repeat my question,” he says. “What changed?”
“You took off without a word! That’s what changed. How is that not obvious?”
I can see the muscles tense in his shoulders, his jaw. He’s so built, so aggressively masculine, that I first think he’s barely holding himself back from biting my head off. Yet his voice is steady, not angry. “I wasn’t aware we had to check in with each other about our daily schedule. ”
“I didn’t ask for hourly reports. You left for weeks, and you never even told me you were going anywhere. ”
“The point was to remain strangers. Wasn’t it? To keep it . . . raw. ”
Something about the way he says that—raw—makes my breath catch in my chest. As angry as I am with Jonah, I can’t forget the way his touch makes me feel.
I can’t stop wanting him.
Jonah must sense my weakness. A slow smile begins to dawn on his face. Almost a smirk. “You can have neat, tidy, and safe. You can have tame. Or you can have what you really want. But you can’t have both, Vivienne. And I think we both know which one you’re going to choose. ”
Somehow I still have a scrap of pride left. “Where were you, that you couldn’t send an e-mail or text or make a phone call even once in three weeks?”
“Antarctica. ”
Smart-ass. I could slap him. Then I realize—he’s serious. Completely.
I repeat, “Antarctica?”
“Yes. ” Then his expression softens slightly, becomes less savage, more . . . human. “Well, Patagonia mostly. I was based in Punta Arenas, Chile. But from there I was able to charter a plane south for some flyover photography. ”
“Of Antarctica. ”
Jonah smiles, and it’s not a smirk this time. “We discovered a dormant volcano beneath the Antarctic ice sheet a couple of years ago. I’m a research professor—I only teach a class once every two years or so. Mostly I analyze findings from all around the world, and sometimes I collect data myself. Like any other scientist. My data happens to be found near fault lines and volcanoes. ”
The one place in the entire world that’s completely off the grid: That’s where he was. I tuck another loose strand of hair behind my ear. “I have to admit, that’s . . . a pretty solid excuse. ”
He leans against the nearby brick wall as he studies me. After a long moment he says, “I should have let you know. ”
“No, no, you’re right. I’m not your girlfriend; you’re not my boyfriend. You don’t owe me explanations. ”
“No, I don’t. But I owe it to you to protect you. After that night, you were vulnerable. I should’ve realized. ”
Just like that, Jonah’s no longer the remote figure I imagined rejecting me with contempt. He’s once again the man who asked how to make me feel safe, the one who brought me a glass of water afterward and kissed me as tenderly as any man ever has. I say, “You didn’t abuse my trust. We had—a failure of communication. ”
“We’ll have to do better,” Jonah says. The smirk returns. “Besides, I had no idea you’d want to go again so soon. That e-mail came not even seventy-two hours after I left you. ”
The wounds to my pride are still healing, so I’m not going to let him get away with that so easily. I lift my chin. “Didn’t you want it too?”
He laughs, low and rough. It’s just the way he laughed when he was inside me, glorying in having thrown me down. Wetness wells between my legs, and I want him to touch me so badly it makes me weak.
“I thought about you every night,” Jonah murmurs. “Most of the days. I dream about tearing that dress off your body. When I close my eyes I see you the way you were afterward. Wrecked. And what I want more than anything else is to wreck you all over again. ”
So much for Jonah “having limits. ”
Maybe I should feel powerful at this moment, when I realize that I affect him as much as he intoxicates me. Instead it’s all I can do to keep from trembling. I brace my hand against the fence behind me, the one that marks the boundary between this loud, brightly lit place and the darker alleys of the city beyond.
This is when a particularly enterprising member of the waitstaff appears. “What will you two be having tonight?”
“Whatever the lady wants. ” Jonah’s eyes meet mine as he smiles. “It’s up to her. ”
Not fair, Jonah. I manage to answer, “We’re still making up our minds. ”
Within another second we’re alone again, and Jonah raises an eyebrow. “That just means he’s going to come back. ”