Ava Gray - Skin Tight

Her smile faded. “Are you ready to order?”

“Rosemary chicken. Mia?”

She closed her menu and handed it back, dripping dignity. “Soup of the day and a house salad, vinaigrette on the side.”

But when the waitress walked away, the nascent accord was broken. Though Mia’s body language didn’t change, she might as well have been sitting across the room at the bar. Her dark eyes focused on a distant point over his shoulder.

“I’m sorry about that. I didn’t know she was there.”

“So it’s fine to be crude as long as no one else hears it?”

“I don’t think it was the crudity you objected to.”

“No?” Her scorn was palpable as she took an angry bite. “And you know me so well, to make such a judgment.”

But at least she was meeting his eyes again. He refused to analyze his relief at such a small thing.

“I suspect I know you better than you think.” He’d spent the vast majority of his adult life observing people to better make them do exactly as he wanted.

“Prove it,” she challenged.

This wasn’t a good idea. To impress her, he would need to be analytical and precise, thus giving away as much about himself as he told Mia about herself. Nevertheless, he couldn’t resist the temptation to show off for her; it was an appalling and primitive impulse.

“You’re beautiful,” he said softly, “but you’ll never believe it. You pretend to a confidence you’ve never internalized, and your intellect separates you from your peers. You find yourself longing for something, but you don’t know what. How am I doing?”

“I could get as much from a fortune cookie.” Her tight expression had eased a little, though; it was now tinged with wonderment.

“Then I shall have to try harder. You’ve come farther than you thought you could, but it’s not enough, and that frustrates you, because you want, more than anything, to be happy. You secretly crave the approval of a man who would never have given it, even if you could show him how successful you’ve become. You’d love to hear him say, ‘I’m proud of you,’ even though it will never happen. So you are driven to new heights, knowing they will never bring the validation you desire.”

Her fingers trembled visibly on the stem of her wineglass. “And who is this man?”

He lifted his shoulders. “Father, grandfather? It is impossible for me to know more without being told.”

“It’s impossible for you to know as much as you do now. You are impossible.”

“I know.”

Dead men didn’t dine with beautiful, brilliant women. And yet, here he was. Once more, reality had shifted.

Her onyx eyes shone too bright. “Admit you didn’t learn all of that from watching me. Admit you’ve been digging into my past.”

He spread his hands, palms up. “But I haven’t, Mia. I don’t even know where you’re from.”

She sighed faintly as if she suspected him of lying. “Why are you here?”

“In Virginia, or here with you tonight?”

“Both. Either. But I doubt you’ll tell me anything that’s true.”

Stung, he said, “I’ve never lied to you.”

“Just when you said to trust you.”

“That didn’t end badly,” he bit out. “Your friend is safe, you’re safe, and the bad guy is dead. Tell me how I could’ve achieved that objective without more collateral damage if I’d tipped my hand to Serrano by going on the run with you. I hated leaving you there-do you not understand that? But it was the best option.”

In answer, she devoted herself grimly to finishing her mushroom. God, she made him want to shake her, and such heated reactions were foreign to him. He hadn’t cared about anything or anyone, except as a means to an end, for so many years. Not since Lexie.

He hated that Mia mattered.

“You promised me the next quote,” she said, after five minutes of silence.

“So I did. Is that why you’re here? To continue the game?”

“In truth,” she said softly, “I don’t know why.”

He ignored her confusion, as it echoed his own. Nothing he’d done since seeing her again made sense. Logic had fallen by the wayside; he only knew he wanted more of her. She shimmered with heat and color, when he had been living in shades of gray. What he wanted, he’d never been able to have-and she should prove no different-but he would indulge in pretense as long as she permitted it.

“There never was a mood of mine/ Gay or heart-broken, luminous or dull,/ But you could ease me of its fever/ And give it back to me more beautiful.”

“Sara Teasdale. The poem is called ‘I Remembered.’ ”

Surprise flickered through him. He’d taken the verse from a random poem generator, after assuring himself it had been written by an obscure poet. “You’ve read her?”

“She’s my favorite.” Mia propped her chin on her hand, eyes gone dreamy. “Her work is so underrated. Before I decided to go into forensic accounting, I considered doing a master’s in English Literature, just so I could write my thesis on Sara.”

“Tell me about her.”

With great alacrity, she did. “Sara was born in St. Louis, and she suffered from ill health as a child. I think it made her experience things more intensely because her childhood imbued her with an early sense of her own mortality. She fell in love with the poet Vachel Lindsay, but I believe she feared putting her faith in the caprice of another sensitive soul like herself, so she married a businessman, choosing security over love.”

“You think that was a mistake,” he said quietly.

“How can I not? Her marriage ultimately failed, and she committed suicide two years after Lindsay did. I think she loved him until the day she died.” The soft words revealed her to him as a secret romantic, whatever scholarly evidence might or might not exist to support her conclusion.

He encouraged her to share the bones of what would’ve been her thesis: The Allegory of Finance Versus Faith. Over dinner, he learned everything there was to know about Sara Teasdale. In between bites of her salad, Mia demonstrated the most passion he’d ever seen in a woman outside the bedroom. He couldn’t help but imagine this enthusiasm converted to a less intellectual pursuit.

God, he wanted her.

But he found it ironic that she had done the same as her beloved Sara, chosen her course based on a need for financial security. There could be no doubt; forensic accounting paid better than a degree in Literature. He listened, fascinated by her analytical mind, the comparisons she drew between Sara Teasdale and Elizabeth Barrett Browning: how the right love and support could make every difference to the quality of a woman’s life, and how every choice created forking paths.

When he interrupted at last to ask if she wanted dessert, she seemed to realize how long she’d been talking. She colored up again, as if ashamed of her delight. He’d like to kill whoever taught her to be ashamed of genuine fervor. Mia truly had no idea how rare she was.

“Yes,” she muttered, dropping her eyes from his. “I’ll have the berry cobbler.”

“Don’t do that.”

“What?”

“Act as if you shouldn’t have told me about something you love.”

“The whole point of meeting you here tonight,” she said with some asperity, “was for me to learn something about you. And yet, you’ve kept me talking about myself. Why is that? Could it be we had the same goal-we both wanted to assess our enemy?” She sighed. “If that was so, then I suspect you’ve come away the victor yet again.”

He couldn’t let her think that, not when it left her lovely mouth drooping so. “I wanted to have dinner with you. My aim is met.”

“You can’t expect me to believe that.”

Her lack of trust-however much he deserved it-roused a sharp, quiet pain beneath his sternum. “I don’t expect anything.”