Page 51 of The Fall Before Flight

A familiar excitement courses through my veins. This is a game I know how to play, one that will hopefully take my mind off my own baggage for a little while. Leo thinks he doesn’t have any weaknesses for me to exploit? Bullshit. His weakness is that he cares.

I shrug, smiling blandly. “What’s the harm in letting off a little steam? Declan isn’t like Callum. Sex won’t hurt him.”

Leo sits utterly still, lips in a thin line. Finally, he releases a slow breath. The spark in his eyes fades. His shoulders relax.

Dammit.

I slump in my chair, defeated. “You’re a fucking fortress, Doc,” I grumble.

He taps his lower lip with his pen, eyeing me. “I know you didn’t have sex, Amelia.”

I huff. “No, you don’t.”

“Declan told me this morning what happened. That he confronted you about what you did.”

Jerk.

Yeah, it hadn’t been pretty. The man carried a serious grudge about me disappearing after our fling. And disappear I had—giving him a fake number and skipping town. I’d just graduated and nothing was keeping me in the Bay Area anymore. But if our middle-of-the-night reunion was any indication, Declan and I have about as much potential as Kinsey’s failed acting career.

We’ve both been through a lot in the last decade, and the sex-crazed maniacs we were in our early twenties are dead and buried—or at least whatever chemistry we had certainly is. He didn’t tell me why he’s in the Funny Farm except for a break from everyone. The yellow tint to the whites of his eyes nevertheless points to an addiction to drinks of the adult variety. He certainly wouldn’t be the first rock star to cross the line from parties to dependence.

After he tore me a new one for disappearing on him all those years ago and I apologized, he cooled off enough to thank me for inspiring several songs. I didn’t bother asking what they were about—not hard to guess they weren’t the flattering kind.

All in all, he was in my cabin for maybe a half hour. Once the past was out of the way, it became quickly apparent we had nothing to talk about.

I pinch the bridge of my nose, feeling a headache coming on. “I use people. You know this. I know this. What do you want me to say?”

“You avoid emotional intimacy. Why?”

My jaw clenches. “Oh, I don’t know… lack of examples in my life of healthy adult relationships. Romance books that offer unrealistic ideals. The media. My dad jumping in the sack with an endless stream of bimbos after Mom. Losing my virginity to a nobody, being cheated on, et cetera.” I jerk forward, jabbing a finger in his direction. “Or maybe I’m just a liberated woman. Why does sex have to be some big, emotional investment? Maybe you’re living in the wrong century, Doc. Slut-shaming is passé.”

Leo regards me a long moment with something akin to tenderness in his eyes. Or maybe it’s pity.

“Have you ever had sex with someone you love, Amelia?”

“Yes. It was appropriately mind-shattering. Emotionally orgasmic.”

He keeps staring, waiting.

I glare back.

Hooking the pen to his pad of paper, he drops both to the floor. The glasses follow, though more gently.

“Can I tell you a story?” he asks softly.

Bemused by the abrupt shift, I nod. When he starts talking, though, I immediately wish I could retract my assent.

“When I was in graduate school, there was a woman in one of my classes. Beautiful and bright. She smiled all the time and every day had a different flower in her hair. I finally found the courage to ask her on a date. We fell in love. It was the best year and a half of my life until she dumped me.”

I blink. “She dumped you?”

He smiles wryly. “As I’m sure you realize by now, I’m not the most flexible or easygoing man. She was a self-professed bohemian. She’d decided to drop out of grad school and pursue a longtime passion for sculpting. And women. I was devastated.”

I shake my head, dumbfounded. “Wait—women? Holy shit, that’s some serious drama.”

He just smiles. “As far as breakups go, ours was amicable. How was I supposed to fault her for following her dreams? Or for that matter, realizing she preferred having long-term relationships with women?”

I wince. “Ouch.”

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