Page 74 of Heartless

Chapter Twenty-Four

Madison

Iwant to touch you everywhere.

Parker’s words from the moment he cornered me against the Pink Diamond’s door played on repeat in my mind for days. A week had passed since the night he kissed me against my mother’s kitchen counter and I could still feel his lips on mine. I still remembered his taste on my tongue. The memory alone sent shivers down my spine.

But it didn’t matter. And not because he was my boss. Not because we were fake dating.

It didn’t matter because Parker was still in love with his dead wife.

Thanks to the wedding video we watched, I knew that Ryan wasn’t simply Parker’s friend. He was his brother-in-law. And Jessica wasn’t his lover. She was his wife’s mother. And there was no point at all inwasting energy being jealous of Melany. Parker hadn’t gotten over his wife. He hadn’t moved on. And by the way he distanced himself from me in the past week, lost in his thoughts and probably guilt, I knew our closeness was too much for him to bear.

And I couldn’t blame him. I didn’t exactly think what he did in that villa was particularly healthy. There were so many pictures of Franny. And that wedding video he played over and over again, trying to remember what he said to make her laugh? He was still grieving and hung up on her. I didn’t want to get involved in that.

New Year’s came and went and the morbid feeling I had only intensified the following days. I constantly thought about death and tried to imagine what Franny had looked like her last days before she died.

One night I couldn’t sleep and I decided to try Parker’s way and go walk around for a bit. My feet led me to the gazebo.

One of my heels got stuck in a crack between two wood planks. Unfortunately for me I was wearing a pair with straps and I couldn’t just slip the shoe off. So I crouched down, trying to unbutton the stuck shoe.

“Need help?”

Parker’s voice startled me and I forgot for a second I was stuck. I shot up to my feet and tried to turn around, which led to me falling on my ass. I heard his dark chuckle, but at least he had the decency to try and hide he was laughing at me, when I shot him a glare. He crouched down next to me, his face lit only by the soft lights around the gazebo, but I could see one of the corners of his mouth was curved upwards.

“Why do I always end up around you when I’m at my worst?” I murmured under my breath.

“Karma?”

I ignored his comment and tried to get up without ripping my pencil skirt in the process. Parker reached over, his fingertips grazingmy ankle just for a moment before he took the buckle and tried to free my foot. Goosebumps, courtesy of his touch, covered my skin.

Desperate to hide the response of my body, because hello, the man was in love with his dead wife, he didn’t need me lusting over him, I pushed his hands away from me. “I can do it by myself.”

“Is there a problem with me doing it?”

“Yes.”

He stopped unbuckling my shoe, but his large warm hand wrapped around my ankle like he enjoyed touching me as much as I enjoyed being touched by him. “And what exactly is that problem?”

“I don’t need help.”

The fact that he pretended nothing had happened after yet another long period of him hiding away from me grated on my nerves.

“I didn’t say youneededhelp,” he argued but stood up and took a step back. “Have you ever thought about the possibility of me wanting to help you, because it would makemefeel good?”

“It's not my job to make you feel anything. My job is to plan weddings. That's what you’re paying me for.”

Yep. I went there. I had the right to use everything I could come up with in order to keep us at a distance.

He shook his head, turned and walked away without a word.

When I finally managed to free my foot from the shoe and stood up, I dusted off my skirt and looked around. He was gone. I pulled the shoe out and made my way back towards my villa where I could pace around without worrying Parker would show up around the corner.

I thought about him being alone, watching that video on repeat and for a brief moment I contemplated marching over to The Blue Diamond and apologizing for the way I treated him when he offered to help me with my shoe. I could try to distract him from his suffering.

But what did I know about the kind of pain he was experiencing? Just one thing I knew for sure. He needed more than I could offer.

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