working because she didn’t feel remotely in control. She felt as if she were teetering on the edge of an abyss, about to fall, and she didn’t know what waited darkly beneath her.
Maybe this whole thing had been a mistake. Trying to change. Wanting to be different. The audiences weren’t going to accept it. Her. And, no matter how he fussed and fumed, neither was Luke.
Drawing another deep breath, Aurelie reached for her bag. She’d fix her make-up, and then she’d go out and mingle. Smile and chat. She’d get through this day and then she’d tell Luke she was going home. She was done.
Four hours later the opening was over and Aurelie was back in her suite at the Mandarin, exhausted and heartsore. She’d managed to avoid Luke for the entire afternoon, although she’d been aware of him. Even as she chatted and smiled and laughed, nodded sympathetically when people told her they didn’t really like the guitar or the jeans, she’d been watching him. Feeling him.
He looked so serious when he talked to people. He frowned too much. He stood stiffly, almost to attention. Yet, despite all of it, Aurelie knew he was being himself. Being real.
Something she was too afraid to be.
She’d been resigned to giving up the rest of the tour and going back to Vermont. Staying safe. Being a coward. Yet four hours later Aurelie resisted the thought of slinking away like a scolded child. Never mind what Luke thought, what anyone in the audience thought or even wanted. She needed to do this for herself.
Yet the realisation filled her only with an endless ache of exhaustion. She didn’t think she had the strength to go on acting as if she didn’t care when she did, so very much.
Wearily she kicked off her heels and stripped the clothes from her body. She needed a stingingly hot shower to wipe away all the traces of today. She knew Luke had said he wanted to talk to her, but the last time she’d seen him he’d been in deep discussion with several official-looking types. He’d probably forgotten all about her and the things he supposedly needed to say.
Fifteen minutes later, just as she’d slipped into a T-shirt and worn yoga pants, a knock sounded on the door. Aurelie sucked in a deep breath and ran her fingers through her hair, still damp from her shower. A peep through the eyehole confirmed her suspicions. Luke hadn’t forgotten about her after all.
She opened the door and something inside her tugged hard at the sight of him, his hair a little mussed, his suit a little rumpled. He looked tired.
‘Long day?’ she asked and he nodded tersely.
‘You could say that. May I come in?’
He always asked, she thought. Always asked her permission. Strangely, stupidly, it touched her. ‘Okay.’
She stepped aside and Luke came into the sitting area of the suite. She saw his glance flick to the bedroom, visible through an open door, the wide bed piled high with silken pillows.
Then he turned back to face her with a grim, iron-hard resolution. ‘We need to talk.’
With a shrug she spread her hands wide and moved to sit on the sofa, as though she were actually relaxed. ‘Then talk.’
He let out a long, low breath. ‘I’m sorry about the way things happened back in Vermont. I didn’t want it to be like that between us.’
He looked so intent, so sincere, that mockery felt like her only defence. ‘Us, Bryant?’
‘Don’t call me Bryant. My name is Luke and, considering we almost slept together, I think you can manage my first name.’
She tensed. ‘Almost being the key word. That doesn’t give you some kind of right—’
‘I’m not talking about rights, just common civility.’ He sat across from her, his hands on his thighs, his face still grim. ‘I’m being honest here, Aurelie—’
‘Sorry,’ she drawled, ‘that doesn’t score any Brownie points. I already know you can’t be anything else.’
‘Just stop it,’ he bit out. ‘Stop it with the snappy one-liners and the bored tone and world-weary cynicism—’
‘My, that’s quite a list—’
‘Stop.’ He leaned forward, his face twisting with frustration or maybe even anger. ‘Stop being so damn fake.’
She stilled. Said nothing, because suddenly she had nothing to say. She’d defaulted to her Aurelie persona, to the bored indifference she used as a shield, but Luke saw through it all. He stared at her now, those dark eyes blazing, burning right through her. She swallowed and looked down at her lap. ‘What do you want from me?’ she asked in a low voice.
‘I want to know what you want from me.’
She looked up, surprise rendering her speechless once more. Her throat dry, she forced herself to shrug. ‘I don’t want anything from you.’
‘Why did you want to sleep with me?’
She tensed, tried desperately for that insouciant armour. ‘Why not?’
‘Well, obviously not because you were enjoying it.’
She lifted her chin. ‘How do you know I wasn’t enjoying it?’
‘I don’t know what your experience with men has been, but most of us can tell when a woman is or isn’t enjoying sex.’ Luke’s mouth quirked upwards even as his eyes blazed. ‘Generally when a woman enjoys sex, she responds. She kisses you and makes rather nice noises. She wraps her legs around you and begs you not to stop. She doesn’t lie there like a wax effigy.’
Aurelie could feel herself blushing. Her whole body felt hot. ‘Maybe I thought I would enjoy it,’ she threw back at him. ‘Maybe you were a disappointment.’
‘I have no doubt I was,’ Luke returned, his tone mild. ‘I confess I was a little impatient. I haven’t had sex in quite a while.’
That made two of them. Aurelie swallowed. ‘I don’t know why we’re having this conversation.’
‘Because if we’re going to work together for the next nine days, I need to—’ He stopped suddenly, shook his head. ‘No, that’s not the truth. This isn’t about forging some adequate working relationship.’
Aurelie eyed him uneasily. ‘What is it about, then?’
‘It’s about,’ Luke said quietly, ‘the fact that I can’t stop thinking about you, or wondering how it all went so terribly wrong in the course of a single evening.’
She had no sharp retort or bantering comeback to that. She had no words at all. She made herself smile even though she felt, bizarrely, near tears. ‘You are so honest.’
‘Then be honest back,’ Luke answered. ‘Did you sleep with me to prove a point? To show me I was like all the other men you’ve ever known?’
‘No.’ It came out as no more than a whisper. Lying no longer felt like an option, not in the face of his own hard honesty. ‘It was because I wanted to. Because I didn’t want you to go and I … I liked being with you.’ Her voice came out so low she felt the thrum of it in her chest. She stared down at her lap, wondered why anyone ever chose to be honest. It felt like peeling back your skin.
‘Then what happened?’ Luke asked, and his voice was low too, a gentle growl, a lion’s purr.
She shrugged, her gaze still on her lap. ‘Look, I’ve never enjoyed sex, okay? So don’t worry, it wasn’t an insult to your manhood or something.’ She’d tried for lightness even now, and failed miserably. Luke had fallen silent, and after a few taut moments she risked a glance upwards. He was gazing at her narrowly, a crease between his eyes, as if she was a problem he had to solve.
‘Never?’ he finally said, and he sounded so quiet and sad that Aurelie had to blink hard.
‘I