“Because you owe me a story.”
“How do you figure?” she asked.
“I’ve told you lots of stories.”
She sighed. “That’s not why.”
“Fine. Lucas upset you today, and I guess I want to know why you let a guy who you don’t love anymore get to you.”
Her gaze flew to his, but there was no judgment there, nothing but genuine curiosity. “I didn’t know we were at the discussing-our-past stage of the relationship,” she said. “Especially since we’re not having a relationship beyond checking each other for ticks.”
He laughed, the sound low and sexy. In nothing but those board shorts and a whole bunch of really great muscle definition, he made her body come alive and ache, damn him.
“You want to check me for ticks right now, don’t you?” he asked.
“No.” Crap. “Okay, yes, fine, I want to check you for ticks.”
“Too late,” he said. “I want a story.”
“The Lucas story.”
“Yes.”
She sighed. “I told you already.”
“Fill in the blanks.”
She shrugged. “We met my freshman year of college. He was in law school, so a few years older, wiser, blah, blah. I was a…pleaser. I’d do anything for a kind word. I’m not exactly proud of that.”
Jacob shifted and started to speak, but she shook her head. “No, it’s true. I’d spent my entire life trying to please my dad and that hadn’t worked out, but I was determined to make someone love me.” She winced at how that sounded. “Lucas came along and paid me attention, and I was in hook, line, and sinker.”
“Not your fault,” Jacob said.
“Of course it was my fault,” Sophie said. “I don’t believe in being a product of my environment. And yet I played right into that. Poor little neglected Sophie, desperately seeking attention. And I found it too. Lucas was out of my league and I knew it, but he had this really great car…”
Jacob let out a low laugh. “So I wouldn’t have had a shot at you.”
“Which is kinda my point,” she said. “I was that shallow girl, which means I got what I deserved.”
His smile faded. “Maybe you should tell me the rest, because I don’t believe that for a second.”
She closed her eyes and remembered. “Lucas would see me walking to class and give me a ride. He knew money was a problem for me and he’d buy me things. A pretty dress. A fancy meal. I was young and stupid and I let his charisma turn my head even though I knew he was a player. I wasn’t the only one attracted to his showy ways. But I believed him when he told me I was the one.”
“And you married him.”
“Yes. I was twenty, way too young, of course, but no one told me I was being stupid.”
“Not even your parents?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Lucas was wildly ambitious and smart. He’d fast-tracked his way through college and law school, and they thought he was my last chance at succeeding at something. At first it was good. He liked having me in the background, taking care of everything for him, the house, his life, even some of his work. I did anything and everything he needed because I was still that pleaser. And it wasn’t until he got a promotion from associate to junior partner that he started to change.” She frowned at the memory and put her drink down.
“Change how?” he asked.
“He’d say things, things he never would have said before, to hurt me. And he knew exactly how to do that.” She hated this part. “And I let him. I’m not even sure why, but it made me try harder to please him. I should’ve known from experience that I couldn’t, but I was stupid. I stayed.”
“What happened?”
“He became unreasonable. Suspicious. A little verbally abusive. At first I thought reassuring him would work, but again, I should’ve known better. I couldn’t get anything right, and I got so frustrated I—” She broke off and shook her head.
He reached for her hand. “Did he hurt you, Sophie?”
She let out a choked laugh and shook her head. “No, you don’t understand. It was me. He’d been after me to put together this dinner party so he could impress some of the other partners at his firm. I worked my ass off on it until everything was perfect: the dinner, the decorations, the house…The next day one of the partners sent me flowers. Lucas accused me of sleeping with the guy. He’d been suspicious for a while at that point, accusing me of flirting with the mail carrier, the grocery store clerk, everyone with a penis, and it pissed me off. When it came out during that fight that he’d been the one sleeping with everyone in sight, I chucked the vase of flowers at him. I didn’t hit him, but he called the police anyway.”
“What?” Jacob said, straightening up with a frown. “Are you serious?”
“We were both arrested and hauled downtown for domestic disturbance and violence,” she said, shuddering in horror at the memory. “And while we were there, he managed to flirt with one of the desk clerks. It was kind of an as-low-as-you-can-get day for me. He bailed himself out and cleaned out the account I had access to so I couldn’t do the same. I had to ask my parents for bail money.”