want this.”
His fingers stilled for a moment. He drew back enough to look down into her face, his own taut with desire.
“You do,” he said, and his gaze dropped to watch the rise and fall of her breasts, then lifted to look at her lips before he met her eyes again. “You want me. Don’t lie, Neely.”
She swallowed and nodded jerkily. “All right, yes. I want it. But not what will come after. I don’t want what you want!”
“What’s that?”
“Sex.”
“You don’t want sex?” He looked incredulous.
Of course she wanted sex, wanted to make love with him. But his words said it all. Not making love—sex.
“You know what I mean! We already discussed this. It’s why I said no kissing. No one-night stands!”
“I think I can guarantee it will be more than one night,” Seb said with smile.
But Neely’s eyes flashed fire. “Stop it. Stop willfully misunderstanding me. I want love. Maybe that sounds hokey to you. But it’s the way I think, the way I feel, the way I want to live my life. I don’t want just sex. I want a future. I want a relationship that will last.” To love and be loved.
“You know any of those?” Sebastian’s tone was bitter. But he stepped back a bit, put some space between them. His breathing was still ragged. “Max some sort of poster boy for long-term relationships, is he?”
“No, of course not. But my mother and John were. Or they would have been if John hadn’t died. What they had was deep and real and lasting.”
“You don’t know their relationship would’ve lasted.”
“I do. I know it. Here.” And she put her hand over her heart in a gesture that she supposed was corny to him, but it shut him up.
He grimaced, jaw tight, then shook his head and heaved a sigh. “You’re going to be a pain in the ass about this, aren’t you? You’re really serious.”
Neely nodded gravely. “I’m really serious.” She managed a faint smile, thinking how hard it was to be sensible when she really wanted to finish what they’d started.
At least Sebastian had stepped back far enough that they weren’t touching now. She pulled her knees together, sat up straighter on the countertop. “Why were you lying there in the dark?”
There was still barely enough lights from the moonlight and the lights on Queen Anne Hill for her to see his expression now that he’d moved away. He’d been staring out into the darkness, but now he looked back at her sharply. “What do you mean?”
“Just what I said. You don’t usually do that. You’re usually working.”
“I’ve been working. I worked all weekend, damn it. I got home looking forward to a little respite and damned if Vangie wasn’t here! No respite in that.”
“She thinks the sun rises and sets on you.”
He raked his fingers through his hair. “She’s wrong.”
“Obviously she knows she can depend on you.”
“For sensible things she can. Not for this.” And abruptly he turned and walked out of the kitchen.
Surprised, Neely jumped down off the counter and followed him. “You’re not going to do it?”
“Hell, no! If she wants the old man at her wedding, she can invite him.”
“I gather she tried.”
“Exactly. And he ignored her. Just the way he’ll ignore me.”
“She didn’t think so.”
“She thinks what she wants to think!” He was pacing around the living room now, cracking his knuckles.
And Neely, watching, could feel the agitation rolling off him in waves. “Is she the first to get married?” she asked him. “Of all of your brothers and sisters, I mean?”
“Yes. But what difference does that make?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know him.”
Sebastian snorted. “None of us knows him. He isn’t around enough.”
“I just thought, maybe he doesn’t know how to be a father. Maybe he feels awkward and—”
“He ought to feel awkward!”
“But maybe if you invited him—” she put the emphasis on you “—as opposed to Vangie, who is emotionally involved, you could tell him how much it means to her.”
“Like he’d listen,” Sebastian scoffed.
Neely shrugged. “You don’t know. He might. Even if he never did before, he might have changed. Max has changed,” she reminded him.
“Max is not my father!”
“No. But he wasn’t much good as mine, either, for a lot of years. Part of it was his fault. Part of it was my mother’s. But I’m not sorry I got in touch with him again as an adult. I’m not sorry I tried.”
Sebastian glowered at her across the darkened room. But it was true, what she’d said. She had been nervous when she’d applied to work for Max’s firm. She’d been worried about meeting him again, apprehensive about who exactly this man was who had fathered her.
Maybe if she hadn’t had such a wonderful stepfather in John she would have lacked the courage to try to become a part of Max’s life. Because of John, she knew what a good father was like. Because of John, she knew a father’s love.
She didn’t need those things from Max. It hadn’t mattered if he’d loved and accepted her or not because John already had.
That he did was her good fortune. And his, which she was sure he knew. But she didn’t know anything about Sebastian’s father.
Maybe it wasn’t fair to suggest that he try again. Still, people didn’t have to continue doing the same stupid things they’d always done.
“Maybe he’s changed,” Neely repeated quietly. “Only saying. Up to you.”
And Sebastian’s voice was flat when he replied, “Yes, it is.”
HE WASN’T going to do it.
And Neely Robson had no right to act as if he was betraying his sister and his family and the rest of the free world just because he wouldn’t.
His father wasn’t Max. Never would be. And there was no point in tackling Philip Savas on this topic. If he wanted to come, he would. If he didn’t…that
