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He couldn’t wait to tell Erin how he felt. With all that feverish lovemaking, he hadn’t got a chance to tell her he had to go back to LA for a couple of days. Now the thought of being separated from her for even an hour seemed unbearable. He considered telling her he loved her. Were either of them ready for that yet? He wasn’t sure. He’d play it by ear.
He raced upstairs, eager now for some intense and passionate farewell sex, after which she’d go to work and he’d get on with his day. He entered the bedroom, full of desire and excitement, only to find no one there. Not even the dogs. He frowned and looked around the room, wondering if she was in the shower, but the ensuite was empty too.
And then he realized there wasn’t a single trace of Erin left. No clothes, no watch, no hair tie. She had even made the bed. On the table beside the Barbara Hepworth sculpture was a handwritten note.
Dear Mr. Malone,
I apologize for leaving without a farewell. If you could please grant me a few days to ruminate on the latest development in the script, I would greatly appreciate your patience.
Sincerely,
Erin Davenport (Ms.)
He shook his head in disbelief. She’d gone!
He read the note again. As much as he loved their cute notes back and forth, the formal tone of this one made his heart sink. They should have been closer now they’d made love, but it felt as though their becoming intimate physically had made her pull back emotionally. That couldn’t be good.
A man with a smaller ego might have worried that she was trying to give him the brush-off. But Jay was pretty comfortablewith his ego and with his appeal to women, and he also knew Erin very well. This was exactly like her—to take a moment, a step back, to think things through. It was one of the things he loved about her: she was a thinker. She didn’t rush into action, but instead took her time and contemplated the different aspects of every scenario.
He was going to have to make peace with the fact that she needed some space, when all he wanted was to put as little space between them as possible. The sooner he got used to not having things as quickly as he wanted them, the better.
That was the old Jay. The new one was patient and understanding.
He couldn’t help a tiny smile as he thought about last night. No wonder she wanted a moment to reflect—they’d rushed into intimacy with one another, and he imagined that acting on impulse was probably uncomfortable for Erin. She could use words likeruminateall she liked, but she’d been as hot and desperate for him last night as he had been for her. He didn’t have to worry about whether she was into him or not.
Although he’d obviously rather be having some seriously hot good-bye sex right about now, he gave the rounded top of the Hepworth a little pat and whistled a tune from an old Western movie as he got into the shower. Erin wasn’t fickle. If she’d turned up at his door, kissed him, and then had a glorious night of sex with him, it was because she had feelings for him. And if he could be the man she gave him the courage to be, then just maybe she could fall as hard for him as he had for her.
Besides, there were ways he could show her that she was on his mind without encroaching on her space.
So, bag packed and Nelson in tow, Jay left for the airport with a plan to make a quick stop at theSea Shelloffice. His private jet was waiting at Monterey, and he was very curious to see what Nelson would think about his first flight. At least, heassumed it was Nelson’s first flight; Nelson wasn’t big on sharing his past and Jay respected that. He suspected Nelson’s past and his own were kind of similar. They were both scrappy outcasts who’d managed to make good, mostly by the sheer force of their personality.
Entering the newspaper’s office, Jay was glad that in the haze of all that sex, he’d remembered that Erin said she was working from home in the morning to finish an article. He was carrying a handwritten note, one he hoped would show her he understood her need for space, but was also very much available when she was ready to talk.
The office was exactly as he’d pictured: small and cozy, with piles of paper and huge computer screens on each desk. The receptionist greeted him warmly and he told her he was just leaving a note for Erin Davenport. He fished the envelope out of his pocket and was about to hand it over and leave, when he saw a tall woman with cropped hair walking purposefully toward him, her gray slacks making a slight swish as she crossed the room.
She extended a hand as she neared and said, “Pat Sinclair, theSea Shell’s editor. Nice to meet the man behind the profile.”
Jay smiled and shook her hand. She had a firm grip. Everything about Pat Sinclair was alert—from her sharp, clear eyes to her military posture—and he liked her immediately. “A pleasure to meet you,” he said, meaning it.
“Thank you for allowing theSea Shellto profile you. I know you’re a busy man and we appreciate your taking the time out of what must be a busy schedule.”
“Anytime,” he said, realizing he meant it. He’d be happy to help out the local paper in any way he could. “Erin Davenport did a fine job.”
Pat nodded briskly. “TheSea Shellis lucky to have her. I’ve offered to introduce her to people atThe New York Times, oreven one of the big magazines, because she’s one of the finest writers I’ve ever come across,” Pat confided. “But she doesn’t want to move. She likes it here, and you have to respect somebody that young knowing so clearly what they want.”
Since Jay had read every article Erin had written in the last two years, he absolutely agreed that she was a fine writer and could turn her hand to any assignment at any number of places. But he was secretly pleased to have his own observations confirmed. Not that he couldn’t work pretty much from anywhere, but when he looked ahead at a future where Erin and he were together—ever since this morning he couldn’t seem to think of anything else—Carmel felt like the perfect place for them to call home.
He asked Ms. Sinclair to give Erin the note when she arrived, and the woman said she would. She might have the instincts of a hard-nosed news reporter, but he was fairly certain she wouldn’t open the note and read the contents. Even if she did, it wasn’t the end of the world, but he liked Pat and trusted his instinct about her. And then, with a final wave, he walked out.
As the door was closing behind him, he heard the receptionist say, “Who was that?”
Pat Sinclair chuckled. “Down, girl. I think he’s taken.”
He bit back a smile. Pat Sinclair didn’t miss much. And he very much hoped she was right.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Erin was more flustered than she cared to admit. A long walk with Buzzy, a hot shower, taking her time getting ready for work—none of her usual routines calmed her. She felt giddy. It wasn’t a word she would ever have used about herself. It was a word used in novels where young ladies met their beaux and all common sense flew out the window until they had a ring on their finger and their happily ever after was just around the corner. But there wasn’t a better word for how she felt.Giddy. As though her world were spinning and the ground didn’t seem quite stable under her feet. She was in love with the world and wanted to giggle.