Chapter 26: Chapter 26

“Dear, I didn’t just know your mother. At one time long ago, we were best friends.”

“What?”

Barbara sighed and closed the album, as she seemed to slip off to some faraway time and place that from the look on her face pained her to return to.

“Your mother and I knew each other from the time we were seven and we remained dear friends until the end of my freshman year in college, which was right around the time she met that no good father of yours. I tried to talk her out of dating him, but she wouldn’t listen and eventually we drifted apart. I returned to Bayside right after college, and by then your mother had turned into a person I didn’t even recognize,” she said sadly, and Natalia knew she was speaking of her mother’s addiction to drugs and alcohol that would eventually lead her into a life of prostitution.

She sat there in shocked silence, struggling to wrap her mind around everything as she stared at this polished and elegant woman who was so far from the woman she knew her mother had been. “B—but I got the impression that my mother was kind of wild in high school.”

Barbara clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and grinned. “Oh dear, she was, we both were. Luella and I used to do everything we were told ladies weren’t supposed to do—”

“You? You and my mother? B—but you and my mother seem so….different.”

Her eyes were gentle as she clasped Natalia’s hands within hers. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you Natalia. When I left Bayside for college I was a very different person from the one that returned. Some people accepted that and some people didn’t—”

“Does Brad know any of this?”

“Of course, dear. Kids can be cruel. I didn’t want him to hear things about me from some kid on the playground. I wanted him to be

armed with the knowledge so that it didn’t have the power to hurt him. Granted, I didn’t tell him everything. But he knew enough to realize that his mom was a very different person before she became his mother, and

that that was alright, because as time passes people mature and they evolve. Just as you have, Natalia.”

*****

Natalia was still reeling from the shock of the revelation that Barbara, the Barbara Wellington, had been a self-proclaimed “hellion harlot” years ago. It seemed unbelievable. But Barbara had recounted

tales about when she and her mother had been in high school that still had her ears burning.

The sound of a sharp rap against the door drew her attention and she glanced up from straightening a magazine on the coffee table.

Instantly, she pushed aside all thoughts of the wild women Barbara and her mother had been all those years ago. But she definitely planned to revisit them later, she thought, as a smile crossed her face.

She chanced a final glance at the room service table, which was laden with food, and then crossed the room toward the door.

Stopping to check her reflection in the full length mirror one last time, with nervous hands, she smoothed her palms down her soft linen cream A-line dress with its scoop neck that gently hugged her curves. She’d been going for sensual elegance, and was happy to see she’d achieved it with the tasteful and flattering dress. Satisfied that everything was in order, she finally opened the door.

She should have been prepared for the overwhelming tide of emotions that always swamped her when Brad was near, but as usual she wasn’t. Dressed in a dark beige suit, he was breathtakingly handsome.

Her heart fluttered in her chest as she stepped aside to let him in. She’d been so focused on drinking in the beauty of his broad shoulders and muscular frame that it took her a second to realize he held a bouquet of red roses in his outstretched hand.

“For me?”

“No, they’re for the bellman downstairs. I just brought them up here to see if you thought he would like them. What do you think?”

Natalia rolled her eyes as she plucked the flowers from his hand. “Come in, smarty pants while I put these in water.” She glanced back over her shoulder before she disappeared into the kitchen area of the suite. “And, thank you. They’re lovely. I think the bellman would think so too, but I’m keeping them so you’ll just have to buy him something else.”

He chuckled and she smiled at the rich timbre of his voice as chills slid across her skin. Damn, even his laugh was sexy.

She put the flowers in a vase and set them on a table as she entered the living area again with a smile on her face.

“Are you ready to eat?”

He returned her smile. “Always.”

She shivered slightly at the wolfish look he gave her when he spoke.

She got the distinct impression that at some level he wasn’t just talking about food.

She did her best to ignore the undercurrent of attraction that pulsed between them as his hands brushed against her shoulders when he helped her into her seat. She wondered again if maybe she’d made a mistake by inviting him to dinner at her hotel and not having dinner out at a public restaurant. At the time it seemed like a good idea. She didn’t want to chance running into more former classmates and face their judgmental scrutiny. But now she questioned whether she should have just taken the chance of running into them because they would have been far easier to deal with than battling her all consuming attraction to Brad.

“What are you thinking?”

Her gaze snapped to his face as he leaned back in his chair, studying her with piercing eyes the color of rich turquoise.

She smiled weakly. She didn’t really want to tell him the truth, but she knew he was relentless if he thought someone was lying to him. “That maybe we should have gone out for dinner after all.”

He arched a single brow. “Why?”

She released a jagged breath, hoping he wouldn’t be too put off by her honesty. “Because it’s hard to ignore this—this thing between us when it’s just us.”

He quirked his lips into a lopsided grin. “This thing? That’s what you’re calling it?”

“What else should I call it?”

“How about attraction, longing, lust,” he said quietly as he stood to his feet.

Natlalia’s heart plunged to her stomach as she followed him with her eyes. She thought he would cross the length of the table toward her, but instead he walked to the window of her room and stood before it, looking out over Bayside.

“When I discovered that you were coming back I wondered what I would say to you—,” he spun around then to pin her with his gaze. “I wondered if the attraction we felt toward each other all those years ago was still there and if it was then what would it mean.”

She stood to her feet and on shaky legs slowly crossed the room toward him, dinner long forgotten. It scared her to realize just how in sync she and Brad truly were, even after all these years. His words echoed the thoughts that had raced through her head when she made the decision to attend the reunion. What she felt for him all those years ago had not been imagined, but was it still there, and if it was then she too wondered what it meant.

She reached out one hand to press her palm flat against his hard chest, the steady thump of his heart pumping beneath her fingers. “And what do you think it means?” She asked softly.

“Since it’s obvious that we’re still attracted to each other?” He settled his hands against her shoulders and pulled her closer. Her next

breath caught in her chest as she waited for him to speak. “I think you know what it means, the question now is what do we do about it?”

She tilted her head back to meet his gaze and knew that the conflicting emotions that crossed his face were mirrored on her own.

“I want this, Brad.”

“I’m not just talking about making love, Natalia. I want that too, but—”

She silenced him with a single finger to his lips. “I can’t make any promises, my life is so complicated right now—”

“You said that before and what did I tell you then?” He frowned down at her and tried to set her away from him, his eyes full of disappointment, but she balled her fists, gripping his shirt beneath her clenched hands.

“I’m not going to let you walk away from me again. This time I’m prepared to give you all of me, but you have to know that what you’re asking for is very difficult for me.”

“I know it is, but I’m not asking anything of you that I’m not prepared to give myself. I never was,” he said quietly.

The truth of his words was written right there across his face, and she didn’t hesitate another moment as she lifted on her tiptoes, at the same time she reached up to grip the back of his head, pressing her lips against his.

The second their lips touched, her body ignited. She teased her tongue along his full lips until he parted them, allowing her access inside his mouth. Their tongues dueled as they kissed each other with a fiery hunger and she poured all of her pent up longing for Brad in the heated kiss.

Without breaking the kiss, she slid her hands along his chest up to his shoulders and pushed his suit jacket down his arms until it fell from his body. Tugging at his tie she quickly discarded it before turning her questing fingers to his dress shirt. One by one she undid the buttons of his shirt until it hung open.