Chapter 3

THREE

O h, God. Oh, God . I stared at my drink. The bubbles ran to the top of the glass with the same urgency I had to run out of this party.

But my feet didn’t move.

When had my feet stopped moving?

When had my body stopped listening to me?

Maybe when I started hallucinating the father of my child suddenly appearing at a random party? Yes, that was it. I was cracking up from lack of sex and fun. Kate was right. I was too hard up to think straight, and celibacy had finally taken its toll.

“Francesca.”

Oh. My. God.

Gradually, I looked up. And up. And up. I was five three plus heels, and just like before, he was a wall of lean muscle swathed in a black suit that perfectly fit a pair of impossibly broad shoulders, a tapered waist, and long legs that stretched for miles. His square jaw was dappled with stubble, shadowing full lips and high cheekbones topped with a shock of inky black hair that shone under the lights of the party.

He cleared his throat and tugged at a tie that matched his eyes. Oh, those eyes . Dark blue pools of charisma that I had wanted to dive into the moment I met him in a crowd thicker than this one, though much less formal. That was when I knew it was really him. They glimmered with promise and mischief, with the confidence of a man who knows he’s attractive and knows the woman he wants thinks so too.

They glimmered like the last five years had never happened. Like he’d never sent the letter that broke my heart. And I’d never had his baby without telling him.

I swallowed. Opened my mouth.

Absolutely nothing came out.

“Frankie,” Matthew was saying as he looked between Xavier and me with growing recognition. “Do you know him?”

Shit. Oh shit . Sofia might have been a secret from Xavier, but she wasn’t from the rest of my family. Back then he was Xavi to me, but at home he was “the devil incarnate,” “good for nothing shitstain,” or “dickhead,” depending on who you were talking to. You try keeping so much as your diary a secret when you share a room with at least two other women at any given time.

All I needed now was for my brother, already strung tight as a violin, to realize this was the Xavier who had knocked up his baby sister out of wedlock and given him two extra mouths to feed on his public servant’s salary.

Xavier might have been a giant, but Matthew was a former Marine and he grew up in the Bronx. He knew how to fight dirty. In the mood he was in tonight, I doubted he would hesitate.

And so it was for that reason, more than any other, that my body somehow found its power of speech and movement again.

“Get lost!” I hissed as my hand flew out and shoved Matthew back a few steps.

His brow furrowed in surprise, but I gave him my best “don’t cock block me” look. His expression morphed from confused to knowing.

“Going,” he said, but not before he gave Xavier his patented big brother glare. “But my two cents? He’s too tall for you anyway.”

Before I could snap that my height or anyone else’s was absolutely none of his business, Matthew disappeared into the crowd, sure-footed as a cat.

“Francesca? Is it really you?”

Trying not to shake, I turned. Around us, the party was launching into full swing. Champagne glasses were clinking, people were laughing a little too loudly. It should have been fun, like one of the balls Austen wrote about so much. But I couldn’t hear anything other than Xavier’s deep voice, Queen’s English heavily overlaid by South London. Yes, I knew the difference. That’s what twenty-five years of being an Anglophile gets you. Way too many Saturday nights binging BritBox. I don’t even want to get into my obsession with Regency adaptations.

“Hello, Xavier.” My voice was low, barely a whisper. Oh my God, Frankie, talk . He’s a man, not a phantom.

And yet, was there a difference when it came to him?

He looked good. Edible, even. Somehow better than I had imagined over the last five years.

I shifted from one foot to the other. Suddenly, my dress was a bit too tight, and my skin tingled with anticipation. I felt drunk, despite only one glass of champagne.

“What—what are you doing here?” I managed to get out.

Stupid question. Xavier quirked a black brow and glanced around as if the answer was obvious. I suppose it was. It was a party. Why else would he be here if not to enjoy himself like everyone else?

Most of the guests were too absorbed with the free-flowing champagne, music, and well, themselves to take interest. A few, though, had definitely noticed him. More than one woman was eyeing Xavier over their flutes of Cristal.

“Business.” Xavier pulled me back with a smile. It looked like he was trying to be nice, but something about his expression looked forced, like it didn’t come naturally. It was distinctly…predatory.

What did that make me? His prey?

“I’m finally opening that restaurant in New York,” he continued. “De Vries is one of my investors, and he invited me tonight.”

“De Vries?” I frowned.

Xavier waved a casual hand toward the crowd. “Eric? The host? He and I were at university together when I did a semester abroad at Dartmouth. What did you do, sneak in with the caterers?”

I flushed. Did I stick out that much? I wasn’t dripping in diamonds or couture, but I thought I looked respectable. Audrey, Matthew had said. But maybe he meant like in My Fair Lady . Before the makeover, when she was still the homely flower girl with the Cockney accent and rags for wear.

“I—no,” I stumbled. “He—Eric—they’re friends with my?—”

I stopped, took a deep breath, then tried again. I could do this. Hold a conversation. I was a teacher, for goodness’ sake. I basically herded cats for a living.

“I came with my brother, Matthew,” I clarified. “The guy who was with me before. He’s friends with the de Vrieses.”

Translation: I’m supposed to be here .

Was it my imagination, or did Xavier’s massive shoulders relax a little? That smile peeked out again, this time looking a bit more natural. Still an imitation of a shark, though.

I suppose that made me the minnow.

I swallowed the rest of my third glass of champagne immediately.

“Your brother? Do I get to meet him?”

He swung around, looking for Matthew. But thank God, he had disappeared into the sea of glitter and money.

I shrugged, then lunged for a glass of champagne on the tray of a passing caterer. “Hold on there, buddy,” I said as he started to walk away. “One more for the road.”

The waiter took my empty glass with a wry look and moved on.

I turned to find Xavier watching me intently. One side of his mouth twitched, like he was about to smile. But he didn’t. I took another long draught of champagne. His gaze traveled with the glass to my lips and stayed there for several seconds until, again, he cleared his throat and pulled at his necktie.

“Too tight?” I asked.

He frowned. “What?”

I nodded. “Your tie. You keep adjusting it.”

His hand dropped. “Eh. Well. Hate these things, if you want to know the truth. Like a bloody noose.” He exhaled slowly through his nose. “Christ, what have you been up to? It’s been, what, five years?”

I took another deep swig of champagne. Feeling lightheaded was better than feeling starstruck. And for some reason, every time the muscles of his neck tested his collar like that, I didn’t quite feel steady on my feet. “Some-something like that.”

“Did you finish school?” he pressed. “You were studying literature, correct?”

“Um, yes. That’s right.” I stifled a smile. “Good memory.”

“You were writing your thesis on Austen. Something about Mr. Darcy and his evolution in the modern age, wasn’t it?”

My mouth fell open. “You remember that?”

He took a step forward, closing the space between us enough that I caught a whiff of his scent: a touch of cologne atop something clean and slightly spicy. A chef’s scent. Same as before.

“I have an excellent memory.” His voice rumbled low.

“Like…for what?” I knew I shouldn’t have asked. Or even cared. But his eyes were pulling me in—or up—and I couldn’t look away.

“You have a London Fog every morning,” he informed me. “Love peanuts, but hate peanut butter. Your favorite poem is ‘Frost at Midnight.’ In fact, you love all the Romantic poets except Wordsworth. Thought he was stodgy.”

I gawked. “How in God’s name do you remember all of that after five years?”

Again, that sharkish almost-smile appeared. “Oh, I remember everything about you, Ces.”

Ces. Pronounced “Chess,” a shortened version of my full name that no one had ever used but him.

My entire body shivered.

I was Frankie to everyone else in my life. Friends or coworkers, mostly. Frances sometimes (usually to a priest or my grandmother). Fran, maybe even Franny to Mattie or my sisters.

But with Xavier, there had been no in between. It was Francesca, my Christian name, when he wanted my attention. His eyes would glow, and his mouth would twist the word like it was wrapped around a ripe strawberry, luxuriating in each syllable with that wicked tongue.

And then there was this. When it was just us two, and he looked at me like he loved me, like I was the only one in the world. A nickname that belonged to him and only him, as intimate as anything else we had done together.

Ces.

As his gaze traveled up and down my body, it was quite clear just what else he was remembering.

I should have been appalled. But then again, I was remembering it too.

Xavier cleared his throat once more. Yanked the middle of his tie this time instead of the knot. “So. Are you a professor now? Should I call you Dr. Zola?”

I swallowed. Of course, it was that remark that made my cheeks flush again. With shame, not excitement. “Um, no. I, ah, actually left school to deal with some, um, family stuff. I teach third grade in Brooklyn.”

“What’s that, primary?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

My eyes darted around the room, looking at the splashy modern art hung on the walls. Toward the sound of breaking glass somewhere near the dining table. Anywhere but him.

When I finally found the courage to look back, his eyes bore down at me as intently as before. “Well, it’s still teaching, isn’t it? Do you read them any of your poetry? I seem to remember some rather racy bits in that journal of yours. Anything about me?”

Again, my mouth fell open. “You haven’t changed either, have you? Just as arrogant as ever.”

He was too. And I hated that it turned me on so much.

His sapphire eyes glinted, though suddenly, he turned away. “Well. I’ve earned it.”

Before I could ask how, another caterer appeared.

“More champagne?” she asked, tittering up at Xavier.

“Sure.”

I couldn’t help feeling slightly jealous when an actual smile appeared for the stranger carrying drinks instead of me. It wasn’t a real smile, at least. Xavier hadn’t smiled much when I had known him before, and it seemed like he did it even less now. The shark made yet another appearance, without an iota of warmth or kindness.

If it had been directed at me, I would have been terrified. And maybe the waitress was too. But she was also clearly entranced as she handed Xavier the drinks, unable to look away.

“When you take those back to the kitchen, can you just bring us a bottle? Thanks, babe.”

The waitress giggled and stuck out her considerable chest before turning away.

And just like that, his spell over me, at least, was broken.

Babe? Really? Sure, he had always used that term the way Americans say “man” and “dude.” And once upon a time, I had liked it when he called me that too, among many other things. It was the familiar. Open.

Right now though? It made me sick listening to him flirt so openly with another woman, even if with the warmth of a brick wall.

Frankie, stop. You have no claim over this man. You don’t want this man. You do not.

By the time I was done with my internal pep talk, I turned to find Xavier staring intently at my mouth. His smile had vanished, replaced now by a small indentation between his brows.

“What in God’s name are you looking at?” I snapped a little too harshly.

Again, one side of his mouth twitched. “You still chew on your lower lip when you’re thinking.” He leaned down as he traded my empty champagne glass with a fourth serving—or was it my fifth? His scent, that intoxicatingly spicy blend, wrapped around me like a mist. “And it still makes your lips look like strawberries.”

Another full-body shiver coursed through me. “I—you—what?”

His cheek brushed mine, and his voice dropped to a rumble only I could hear. “What do you say when that bottle returns, we find someplace a bit quieter? Somewhere we can catch up. Get…reacquainted.”

He stood up straight, expression as stoic as ever. At first, I wondered if I’d imagined it. There was no emotion in his face. No sign he had actually proposed what I thought he had.

But he had. His blue eyes dilated with clear, hypnotic desire as he waited out my response. And I knew the same expression was echoed in mine but couldn’t quite hate myself for it. Whatever pull he once had on me, it was still here. I was once again a moth drawn to a bright blue flame.

Slowly, as if to touch a wild animal, Xavier reached out a finger and hovered it over my jaw, above my chin, down my neck. I could feel goose bumps rising, despite the fact that he didn’t touch me. Not yet. It was a tease, a preview of what he might do. A reminder of what he had once done.

But as soon as his finger made soft contact, just in the hollow above my clavicle, I remembered.

This wasn’t a dream.

This was real.

Xavier was here and clearly as icy and dangerous as ever.

Touching me.

Wanting me.

And through this growing haze of champagne, there was absolutely no way I would be able to keep the secret I’d been holding for years if he did more than that.

I couldn’t just think of myself here, I had someone else far more important to protect. I had to think of Sofia.

“No,” I said clearly, jerking out of reach. “Oh, no . I?—”

I cut myself off, looking around. Lord, where was my overprotective brother when I needed him? But all I saw were nameless faces, people awash in alcohol and laughter, riches and wealth and confidence that had absolutely nothing to do with me.

I turned back to find Xavier still watching me with a different kind of expression. Not one of patient waiting. But instead, like a victor. Like he had walked out of one of my beloved Austen novels. But he wasn’t the hero. He was the villain who had just captured his prize.

“Shall we?” he asked as the waitress returned, giggling with the requested bottle.

I blinked between him and the girl, who looked like she would be more than happy to share the drink with him in my place. And he wasn’t exactly correcting her either.

“No, I don’t think so,” I said.

And then I turned on my heel and left.