Reckless Abandon

Ugh, anything but that. I squeeze my palm and think of the million reasons why I have been putting off asking Leah if I can bring him to the wedding. I want him to meet my family but I’m not ready for their opinions and glares. Going home is going to be hard enough. I don’t need Alexander witnessing the uncomfortableness that is me being in the same house as my parents. Even still, the real reason, the only reason that matters is, simply, Leah.

“It’s her big day and you are not on her list of favorite people. This is the one time in her life that is all about her and I’m not going to ruin it by making it about me. I’ve done enough of that this year. Hell, she postponed her first wedding date because I was too mentally unstable. I’m not doing that to her again.”

“You’re a grown woman, you should be able to bring a date to your sister’s wedding.”

I let out an unattractive huff. “You’re not just anyone. You’re the yacht sex guy who deserted me in a foreign country without saying good-bye.”

“Yacht sex guy?” Alexander asks with a puzzled look. He would have no idea if that term is a compliment or a criticism. I never told him how we saw him having sex with another woman the day before we met him. It’s actually something I’ve been avoiding.

“It’s not a good thing. I have something I need to ask you and I want you to be honest.”

Alexander crosses his arms over his broad bronzed skin, ready for the question.

“The day before I met you, Leah and I saw you with a woman on your boat. We didn’t know it was you at the time. Leah had these, crazy binoculars and . . . anyway, that doesn’t matter. She recognized you when she met you. Not as Alexander Asher but as the guy on the boat.

“When she found out you were lying to me about who you were, she painted this picture of you in her head as this awful person. A womanizer. Later I did too. She said she’s seen you in articles since with other women and, well, she just doesn’t like you.” When the last words are out of my mouth, my shoulders are so tense they’ve risen up to my chin. We’ve come so far, I don’t want to rehash the past and make him feel awful but he deserves to know why Leah doesn’t want him in Cedar Ridge this weekend.

Alexander’s mouth is set in a grim line yet he’s looking straight at me, piercing me with a look of sheer determination. “She’s right. I was a womanizer. Was being the operative word. I used women and they used me right back.”

I let down my shoulders. You have to give credit to a man who can admit his mistakes. “Malory was the woman I saw you with on the boat, wasn’t she?”

Alexander lowers his head and grunts. “Yes.” He looks back up and his pupils dilate. I know it’s because he can see mine are wide as well. “Emma.” His voice is thick and desperate with meaning. “I haven’t been with anyone since I met you. Even when we were apart.”

I open my mouth to say something but he cuts me off.

“Going to a party and being photographed with someone doesn’t mean we were together. You ruined me in Italy. I haven’t been able to think of anyone else. I was just too stubborn to go after you. Then fate brought you to me, and that’s when I knew for sure. Anything that happened before us is obsolete. I need you to believe me.”

Fate is a tricky bitch. What would life be like if I’d never come to New York? If I decided to stay close to my parents and let them dote on me? I might have never seen him again.

If I want to get real morbid I could think that if Parker never dumped me, Luke would still be alive, and Leah wouldn’t have called off her wedding, and I never would have met Alexander at all.

I can’t go there. The reality is I did meet him and here we are trying to move forward, but constantly being pulled back.

“I believe you. I do. This weekend is just not the time to bring you home. My family . . . they worry. They have questions and they hover and they—”

“You don’t think they’ll approve of me?” Alexander pushes the blanket away from him and rises. His glorious body is naked and hard with anger.

“That’s not what I mean—”

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