“Maybe it’s time for both of you to start over,” Cade said. “It’s been ten years. You’re both different people than you were before.”
Maybe. He just didn’t know if Violet would ever give him that chance. He’d f**ked it all up ten years ago. There might never be a chance to fix it now.
—
Someone knocked at Violet’s hotel room door a few hours later, just before she was about to go to sleep. Curious, she pulled on a robe and peered through the peephole. Cade. Violet unlatched the door and opened it a crack. “Is everything okay?”
Cade flashed her a brief smile. “Well, he’s drunk again.”
“This isn’t surprising. He’s been drunk for the last few days. I’m pretty sure he’s spent more time drunk than sober since we’ve been together.”
“He’s pretty miserable at the moment,” Cade said, glancing down the hallway. Violet craned her neck out the door and caught sight of a man sprawled in a chair at the end of the hall, a bottle tucked under his arm.
“Yes, he looks quite miserable,” she said in a droll voice. “I’m sure he’s quick to blame me for all of this.”
“Actually, no. He blames himself.” Cade glanced at her, then down the hall. “He’s pretty sure he’s destroyed his own life and ruined yours, and places responsibility for his actions squarely on his own doorstep.”
She felt a twinge of pity at that. “Well, you can assure him I’m just fine.”
“I would if I could get a word in edgewise.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean he’s constantly quoting poetry at me. Watch.” Cade stepped into the hall a few paces. “Jonathan? Ready to go upstairs?”
“‘I was a child and she was a child,’” singsonged the drunk voice down the hall. “‘In this kingdom by the sea. But we loved with a love that was more than love—I and my Annabel Lee!’”
Someone in the next room banged on the wall in response.
Violet pressed her fingertips to her mouth to keep from laughing. It wasn’t funny. It wasn’t. “Is that Edgar Allan Poe?”
“Is that what it is?” Cade grimaced. “It’s godawful.”
“I think so. I took some poetry classes in college and it sounds familiar.” She’d been majorly into poetry back when she’d started college. She hadn’t known that Jonathan knew poetry. Was this another facet of him that had cropped up in the last ten years, or had it always been there and she’d never noticed? “So you couldn’t get him to stop drinking?”
“He was already wrecked, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to get a few more details out of him before I implement my plan.”
She tilted her head at him, curious. “Your plan?”
“Yes.” He grinned and rubbed his hands together, looking so utterly boyish that she wanted to smile back. “Phase one—glean information. Phase two—strategy. Phase three—execution.”
“It all sounds very corporate.”
“It does, doesn’t it?” He seemed rather pleased with himself.
Down the hall, Jonathan began to drunkenly ramble again, voice singsonging another poem that he was slurring too much for her to make out.
She glanced down the hall at him, and played with the high neck of her robe. “Should you, um, stop him?”
“Nah. I’m going to let him get it all out of his system. As of tomorrow morning, he’s not going to want another drink.”
“You sound very confident.”
“Trust me. I know what makes Jonathan tick. I just need your word that you’ll go along with everything I throw at you.”
“Me? What’s my part in this?”
“Just that. I’ll come get you for breakfast, and anything I suggest to you, just agree with it. We’ll get Jonathan out of his funk and back on the road with you in a heartbeat.”
She wasn’t sure if that was the case, but Cade seemed awfully confident. “If you say so.”
“Great. See you then. I’ll get that one off to bed.” He gestured at Jonathan, then walked away.
“Wait!” When he turned, Violet couldn’t help but ask, “So what did he tell you?”
Cade smiled mysteriously, but his words were blunt. “That he’s still madly in love with you and regrets that he’s lost you forever.”
For some reason, those words made her feel a sharp, unhappy little stab in her heart. He’s lost you forever. Of course she knew that was what this was about, right? Still, hearing the words spoken aloud made her feel anxious and a little unhappy. She wasn’t sure she wanted to be lost forever. “I’m fine with being friends with him,” she confessed. “I just can’t trust him with more.”
“I understand,” Cade said. “And I’m not judging. See you in the morning, Violet.” He gave her a nod and walked away. A moment later, she heard him moving to Jonathan’s side, encouraging the drunk man to get out of his chair and back to his room.
As she shut the door on them, Violet caught a few more lines of Jonathan’s drunken poetry spouting. “‘And this maiden,’” he rambled, “‘she lived with no other thought than to love and be loved by me.’”
“Come on,” Cade murmured, and then they were silent.
But Violet had the words ringing through her head for a long time afterward. She lived with no other thought than to love and be loved by me.
The “Annabel Lee” poem had a wretched ending, if she remembered correctly.
—
The next morning, promptly at nine, someone knocked at Violet’s door.
She answered it, her brain full of whirling, uneasy questions. She’d had a sleepless night, filled with more dreams of Jonathan and lovemaking, and it made her restless. There was a rational reason she kept dreaming about his mouth on her skin, she told herself. She hadn’t had sex in well over a year, and now she was hanging out with an ex-lover. It made plenty of sense.
Sensible explanation or not, she was still waking up aching and full of need every morning, and today was no different.
She’d dressed conservatively, though, since she didn’t know what Cade’s great plan was to get Jonathan out of his funk. She’d worn slacks and flats, along with a plain black boatneck sweater. It would be serviceable clothing for just about any situation. Still, when she answered the door and saw Cade standing there in another impeccable gray suit, she wondered if she was underdressed.