“And now you have this,” he said.
His aftershave hadn’t changed in all the years they’d been apart. Still a spicy, masculine scent that she knew he had custom blended in France.
“What do you want from me, Hayden?” she asked when she realized he was staring down at her.
He lifted one of his hands and stroked down the side of her face. His touch was gentle. She stood still, fighting the urge to close her eyes and lean into that hand. Hayden had always been so gentle with her.
Something few other men ever had been.
He’d wanted a wife and she’d left him to deal with their friends. She’d always felt guilty about that. She doubted that Hayden wanted her back in his life. Though now that they were face to face, she was beginning to realize that was something she wanted.
“The wedding night we never had.”
“Sex?”
He nodded.
Shocked, she didn’t know what to say. The same sensual spell he’d always cast around her surrounded her now. She felt the force of his will and his desire. She closed her eyes and opened her mouth, leaning toward him before she realized what she was doing.
In Alan’s words she was supposed to bring some closure to Hayden and get him ready to find a nice girl and settle down. Now that he was feeling his age, Alan wanted grandkids and for his son to be happy. But Shelby knew Alan didn’t have her in mind.
She scooted away from Hayden but he reached out for her again. The years fell away and she was suddenly that trailer-park girl wanting the golden boy once again. And there was a part of her who still wanted that man.
Since leaving Hayden she’d had two other relationships—both with wealthy men—but things had never really heated up. Her fault. She was the first to admit she didn’t trust her passionate side. Because the one time she had, she’d lost her heart.
“Are you really looking for sex?”
He cocked his head to the side. “Yeah.”
“Is this only a revenge thing?” she asked. Because she realized she wanted to say yes. She’d like nothing better than to go to bed with Hayden, even with all the years and anger between them.
“I’m not sure.”
“Thanks for not lying.” But then Hayden never had. From the beginning he’d said he was the spoiled son of a wealthy man. He’d been kind of immature in those days but so had she. Hayden had also seemed like a knight in shining armor. Shelby had known that eventually he’d wake up and realize he’d made a mistake in marrying her.
“I’ll save that for you.”
This was more what she expected. She wrapped her arms around her waist and backed farther away from him. She bumped into one of the packing crates and almost lost her balance.
Hayden grabbed her arm and held her until she was steady on her feet. She swallowed hard and tried not to flinch from his touch. But there was nothing harsh in his touch. Just a gentle hold.
“Okay?” he asked in that low, raspy voice of his that never failed to send shivers down her spine.
“Yes. Thanks.”
They said nothing for a few minutes. Shelby tried to marshal her thoughts. Tried to find her balance in a world that was suddenly out of whack. She glanced around her boutique, her gaze falling on the poster advertising Puccini’s Madame Butterfly at the Met. Slowly she let the familiar world she’d created soothe her troubled soul.
She took a deep breath and stepped away from Hayden. As tempting as it was to fall into bed with the one man who’d made her feel really feminine, really alive, she knew she couldn’t. She’d changed from the girl she was. No MacKenzie man was ever again going to make her feel embarrassed about who she’d been.
She’d been afraid of being like her mom and in the end that was exactly what she’d become. Someone who traded on her looks for money…for security. But she was a different woman now. She made her own way in the world. She was Hayden’s equal in every way that mattered.
“We can’t be together if you treat me, like…well, like I suppose you have a right to. I’m really not into that kind of pain.”
“I don’t want to hurt you, Shelby. I never wanted that.”
She believed him. Despite his seemingly shallow playboy attitude back then, he’d always treated her like a lady. She couldn’t really explain it to anyone who hadn’t grown up the way she had, but when your mother dressed like a tramp and you had a rotating stable of “uncles” in and out of your life, people treated you like trash. But Hayden never had.
“It’s been ten years, Hayden. Why do we both still feel like this?” she asked, realizing that Alan had done her a huge favor by sending her back here.
“Honestly, I don’t know.”
She tipped her head to the side and acknowledged that despite the years she’d never really forgotten him. “I came back because of you.”
He tipped his head to the side, not saying a word, just watching her with that electric gaze of his.
She spoke again. “I can’t…move on until I figure out what went wrong between us.”
“Hell, Shelby, that’s an easy one.”
“Please, don’t say it again. I wish I had the money to pay your dad back so that it wouldn’t be an issue between us.”
He narrowed his eyes and walked toward her. “So what do you say to some sort of compromise? You give me what I paid for.”
“What your father paid for,” she said.
“I paid for it in ways you can never understand.”
But she did and it made her ache to realize it.
“A night of sex? I don’t think I’m worth a million dollars.”
“What about a week?” he asked.
“Sex and money. They were my mom’s downfall. I— I couldn’t do that. If we’re going to try this again, I want it to be a real relationship.”
He nodded. She saw understanding in his eyes and she realized that if she was going to find any kind of peace with him, it was going to be through bonds of friendship. She wasn’t sure she could risk her emotions with him. He’d made her feel so vulnerable. And she didn’t want to be that woman again.
“Have dinner with me, Shel. Let’s figure this thing out.”
“I…”
“It’s just a meal.”
“I have a lot of work to do here and a short time to do it. I need to hire staff, finish unpacking.” The words sounded like an excuse to her and she knew they were. It was just that even though she’d planned to come back to resolve the past, now that the moment was at hand, she was afraid.
But her running days were over. And at the end of the day, Hayden MacKenzie was still just a man.
Yeah, right.
Hayden entered his office in the casino nearly an hour later. Kathy, his assistant, was gone for the day. The small desk lamp glowed at her workstation. She always left it on for him because she knew he kept late hours. There were two messages from his dad, and one from the star of his European-style revue, Roxy O’Malley.
He dialed the backstage number for the revue venue and got the director. “Roxy called me.”
“She’s onstage right now. Want me to have her call you back?”
“I’ll stop by after the show. Let her know.”
“I