things don’t happen overnight. Interviewing is time-consuming, not to mention finding someone I can trust my baby with.”
“Perhaps it’s you you don’t trust.” Nik’s softly worded challenge brought her chin up. “When you want something badly enough, you make it happen. There are no can’ts in life, only barriers we create for ourselves.”
“I’m getting there.” She hated the defensive note in her voice. “We don’t all cut a swath through our lives like you do, Nik, impervious to anything or anyone but the end goal.”
His gaze sharpened on her face. “Is that how you see me?”
“Isn’t it true?”
He studied her silently for a moment. She looked away, his criticisms broaching an uncomfortable truth, one she’d been avoiding examining too closely. Putting off the designing had been practicality in the beginning when establishing Carlotta and finding a steady clientele had been a matter of survival. The problem was the longer she put it off, the harder it was to pick up her sketch pad again. Doubt had crept in as to whether she had what it took.
“You know what I think?” Nik said finally. “I think you’re scared. I think you talk a good game, Sofía, but you aren’t nearly as tough as you make yourself out to be. I think you’re scared of investing yourself in something you care so much about because there’s a chance you might fail. And it’s personal, isn’t it, designing for you? You’re putting yourself out there. What if you do and New York rejects you? What if it all falls apart?”
She blinked at how scarily accurate that was. “I think that’s a bit of a stretch.”
“I don’t.” He stepped closer and reached up to trace a finger down her cheek, an electric charge zigzagging its way through her. “I know how easily it can all fall apart. Your words, not mine.”
“Philosophical musings,” she denied.
His fingers dropped to her mouth, tracing the line of her bottom lip. “I think my first impression of you at that benefit that night was right. You don’t fully engage with life, you hold a part of yourself back so you won’t get hurt. So there’s no chance it will fall apart. But that’s a delusion you feed yourself. Nothing can prevent a tragedy or a failure or someone walking away because it isn’t right. To reap the reward you have to take the risk.”
She had no answer for that because she was afraid it was true. All of it. But if it was true about her, it was equally, if not more so, true about him.
“And what about you?” she countered. “You hide yourself under this smooth veneer, Nik. No one ever really gets to know the real you. What you dream of. What you hope for. Tonight, what you said about winning, about not knowing what happens when it isn’t enough anymore, it was the first time you’ve admitted anything truly intimate about yourself to me. And soon, my time will be up, won’t it? You’ll decide I’m getting too close, your attention span will wane and I’ll receive a very nice piece of jewelry to kiss off and fade into the sunset.”
His gaze darkened. “I never promised you more, Sofía. It’s the way I am. You knew that.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “I did. We are two birds of a feather. Unwilling or unable to be intimate with someone else. Which is why I think we should end it now while it’s still good. While we still like each other. So it doesn’t get drawn out and bitter. We did promise ourselves that, after all, didn’t we?”
His eyes widened, then narrowed. “You arranged to meet me tonight to end things between us?”
She forced herself to nod. “Be honest. You were going to do it soon, weren’t you? Your silence this week was your way of demonstrating to me I can’t depend on you.”
His mouth tightened. “I was swamped this week, Sofía. But yes, I did think we should end it soon. I was waiting for the chemistry to burn its natural course.”
Which it hadn’t. She had a feeling it would be a long, long time before that happened. But it was about more than that for her now, more about who Nik was and how they connected on a deeper level. She’d thought it might be more for him, too, sometimes she could swear that it was, but apparently she’d been wrong.
She lifted her chin, her chest tight. She’d wanted to be different from the rest. Realized that’s what tonight had been about. Wanting him to say they were different. And now she knew her delusion had been complete.
Nik closed the distance between them. There was a dark glitter of emotion in his eyes she couldn’t even come close to identifying. “It was good, Sofía.”
“Yes,” she agreed, shocked at how steady and resolute her voice was. “We were.”
His gaze held hers—probing, searching. “Is this how you want to end us?”
“No.” She stepped closer and lifted up on tiptoe, her eyes on his as she cupped the hard line of his jaw. “I wanted to end it like this.”
HEAT FLARED IN Nik’s gaze, wiping out the cool blue perusal that was his default expression and replacing it with a banked fire she knew preceded extreme pleasure.
He kissed her then, his lips parting hers with none of his earlier gentle coaxing. This time he demanded her acquiescence, insisted she give in to the electricity between them, and despite her better sense, she wanted this. She had known it would end like this, known it would have to end like this between them because their chemistry had always been beyond compare.
She sank into the kiss, gave herself permission to taste the lush depths of his mouth. The familiar, intoxicating flavor of him, enhanced by the wine, was deadly to her senses. She slid her arms around his waist to rest against the smooth fabric of his shirt. His hand came up to cup the back of her head, every bone in her body going liquid at the sensation of being back in his arms.
He released her lips to explore the curve of her jaw with butterfly kisses. She arched her neck to give him better access, sighing as he found the ultrasensitive spot between neck and shoulder. His fingers found the zipper of her dress and pulled it down, his palms sliding beneath the fabric, the heat of his fingers on her skin a brand she craved.
She pressed closer as his hands shifted lower to shape her hips against him. The heavy, potent force of his arousal imprinted itself on her; stirred a sweet, deep ache low in her abdomen.
“Nik...”
He pulled away from her and reached up to tug his tie loose. “Take off the dress.”
She eyed him. “Was that an order?”
“What do you think?”
She couldn’t deny the command was a turn-on. Power and his outrageous sex appeal were a lethal combination.
Electing to acquiesce, she slipped the straps of her dress off her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. Nik stripped the tie off and reached for the buttons of his shirt. His eyes never left hers as he worked his way methodically down the row.
She stepped out of the dress. He crooked a finger at her. “Come here.”
“I
