Page 107 of The Cruiser
It gets cold in Los Angeles come December, despite what everyone thinks. I’m in dark jeans and slouch boots. I wore my favorite cashmere sweater to fend off the chill, but it feels scratchy instead of butter-soft from all the nerves dancing on my skin. Morgan sits on the same sofa as before, in jeans and a light jacket, a linen scarf nattily tied. But he’s not wearing socks. That will never change. My bravado shrinks seeing him, although it’s too late to back out. He sees me and stands—or gets up awkwardly is more like it. I can tell he’s unsure whether to greet me his usual way.
“You came,” he says. No kisses.
“I can’t stay long.”
“Of course. I’m sure you’re busy. One glass of wine?”
“Half, for now.”
The same Barolo from last time stands on the table. We take our seats and he fills my glass exactly halfway. It’s busy tonight despite the weather, and having more people around makes me feel secure. My resolve is a slippery slope, and the mere act of breathing him in pushes me toward the wrong side of the slide. It’s hard enough to find his eyes.
“À votre santé,” he says.
I clink his glass. Take a careful sip. He’s thinner. Wound very tightly. “What brings you to LA?”
“Another client, by way of Texas. Dorothy and Frankie say hello.”
“Things going well with them?”
“As expected,” he says, the ghost of a smile inferring Dorothy. “And you? How are things going here?”
“Business is good. Great, actually. Busier than ever.”
“Good to hear.”
His smile disappears as he takes a long pull of wine and re-arranges himself on the sofa. Repositions his scarf and wipes imaginary dirt off his jeans. He’s fidgety tonight, more so than I remember. What I remember with absolute clarity are those strong hands—perfectly manicured and perfectly capable of tying ten different types of knots. Perfectly capable of tying me into knots.
“I heard through the grapevine Khaled kept his word,” I say as if I saw a random headline and haven’t been online stalking him. “Must be exciting times.”
He stares at me with a strained look. “I have you to thank for the Delmars and Prince Khaled, among other things. Their yachts will make my career.”
“Your work is amazing, Morgan. I didn’t have to do much.”
“You did everything,” he insists.
“If you’re hoping to hire me again for PR, the answer is no.”
His laugh is flat and humorless. “That’s not why I’m here.”
A fluttering sensation starts at the back of my throat. He exerts the same gravitational pull as always, and knowing what it’s like to fall into his black hole is a scary thing. I inch backward and cross my legs to stop the jitters. “What are you hoping for, coming here after all this time?”
His eyes flicker off mine to look at the ocean as if it somehow holds the answer. “What every man hopes for,” he finally says. “That the woman of his dreams doesn’t slip through his fingers.” He finishes his wine and turns to face me. “To answer your question more thoroughly, I came here to ask for your forgiveness. Every waking minute of every day I think of you, and I go to bed miserable, with the hope that maybe I’ll wake up and stop thinking about you. If I had the guts to come sooner, I would have, but I also needed to clean up the mess I created.”
He says it simply and candidly, no clue it’s the reason behind my sleepless nights of self-doubt. “So what exactly was the mess?” I ask.
“My behavior, for one,” he says. “I’ve made many mistakes and I’m sure you can guess most of them. As far as Olivier goes, it was far uglier than I imagined. He was drowning in debt and running side deals, siphoning money from the company. Renan knew Olivier was in debt and knew the mobster who could forgive it. He also wanted the Khaled commission, so he strong-armed Olivier to bring him into the mix, and it all spiraled into a messed-up scheme. The worst thing is you got dragged into it, and I’m so sorry.” He looks at me, gutted. “I can’t believe how blind I was. I trusted him.” His jaw squares, holding back what’s trying to break through, and I catch a glimpse of the wreckage, what he’s overcome in my absence.
“Trust is pretty important between people.”
“I know,” he says. “And I abused yours at the beginning. There is no excuse for my actions that night, and please know the intention was to hire you. That is the honest truth.” He leans forward, setting the wineglass down to clasp his hands together. “If you can forgive me, I’d love to start over. If it means I need to get a place here, I’ll do it. You can continue to do your thing. No pressure.”
The beautiful amber in his eyes starts to swirl and fighting against the pull of it is hard. But I’ve had time to think things through and it makes what I have to say a whole lot easier.
“It’s been an emotional couple of months for me, too. I think about you all the time. The thing is, I’ve been doing my own thing for too long. Living a life without my partner in it. I want someone in my life. With me. And honestly, I don’t know if that’s going to be in LA.”
He’s not expecting this. “What do you mean?”
“I’m not sure what it means,” I admit. “I’m taking time off to figure it out. Three or four months. Derek and I separated. We put the house on the market. Lots of changes.”
