Page 64 of Tempting Eden

I was relieved to get away from the one person in this town, in the state, who knew the real me. Bess had seen me with Eden, knew what sort of man I could be. Diana, on the other hand, fell for my façade.

I drove home, fighting the traffic that snarled the city streets. The night was cold, though the days were getting warmer as spring approached. The earth didn’t stop spinning, the seasons didn’t stop changing, just because a part of me was broken.

I showered and changed into some more casual clothes—jeans and a polo—for the evening. Diana wanted to see the newest haunted house flick that just came out. I didn’t mind taking her. It was a welcome distraction.

I walked down the flight of stairs to her floor and rang her doorbell at a quarter to eight. She invited me in and kissed my cheek before she trotted back to her bathroom to finish getting ready. She was a knockout. Tall, maybe five-foot-ten or so, long legs, round ass, and decent breasts. She was mixed like me, though half black and half Japanese. Tonight, she wore an emerald green sweater and a short skirt with tights underneath. Her curves were on display.

“How was your day?” she called.

“Fine.” I opened her refrigerator and pulled out a beer. I popped the cap off on the edge of the counter and took a long pull. I’d need at least two more before we left, just to take the edge off, same as I’d done for the past six months. “How about yours?”

“Busy day. We had an influx of new patients from St. Mary’s since the city stopped funding them. The shutdown has hurt the poor something terrible, just like we told them it would.” She sighed. “But they don’t listen. All about that bottom line to them.”

Diana was an administrator at one of the smaller hospitals in town that was devoted to helping people who couldn’t afford medical care. She had a particular fondness for lost causes, myself included.

“If you’re too tired to go to the mov—”

“Don’t even think about it, Mr. England!” came her sharp reply.

I dragged another bottle from the fridge and popped the top. “I was just saying…”

The sound of a zipper cut through the air. Then another. She came out of her bedroom in knee-high fuck-me boots. She was trying to tempt me. In the time we’d been dating, I’d never bedded her, despite her efforts. I couldn’t. I should have. I should have fucked her until all my misery was covered over by the feel of someone else’s pleasure. But I couldn’t. As much as I’d tried to leave Eden behind me, she lingered, somehow tied to me, though now the string between us was a knotted mess.

Diana raised an eyebrow at the bottle in my hand, the third now. “Going to be one of those nights again, is it?”

“Just thirsty is all.”

“Water’s in the tap, sugar.” She looked almost sad.

I smiled and downed the rest of the bottle. She shook her head before leading me out into the chilly night. After a quick dinner with a few more drinks, we settled in at the movie theater.

The movie was dull, though I didn’t give it much of a chance. I couldn’t concentrate. It was like this whenever I had time to sit and think, to take a breath. Even with the alcohol and the beautiful woman clutching my hand and leaning into me at all the scary moments, I couldn’t shake the thoughts that tumbled through my mind. Eden, Adele, Mason, Thornfield—all of it. The memories were impossible to stamp out, no matter how hard I tried.

After the movie’s ghost antagonist was revealed and the final credits rolled, Diana dragged me back to her apartment. I was still drunk, stumbling in through her front door and steadying myself against her small kitchen island.

She came to me and brushed her lips against mine. Her eyes were large and dark. “Why do you do this to yourself?”

She kissed me again, eyes closed, heart open. I was starved for the touch, but not from her. I kissed her back, trying to make it work, forcing the puzzle piece where it didn’t fit. She ran her hands up under my shirt, feeling my abs, my chest. She was so warm, so inviting.

She took a step back and pulled her sweater over her head. She wore a lacy pink bra underneath. I could see her nipples, dark and rigid beneath the fabric. She reached behind her back and unclasped the bra before letting it fall, revealing the beautiful swells, curvy and plump.

“Come into the bedroom.” Her voice was low, almost a rasp, as she turned, hips swaying hypnotically, and disappeared from view.

I followed.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

EDEN

“AND THEN WHAT HAPPENED?”Claudia asked.

“He took me to his apartment.” I looked up at the judge. She wore tiny glasses, pushed far down on her nose. She couldn’t have been more than forty years old, but she had a harsh tongue and a clipped manner. She ran her courtroom in a hellishly efficient manner.

“Then what did he do?”

“Judge, I have to object to the relevance of this testimony.” Mason’s lawyer stood up, his wrinkled suit and clip-on tie making him look like a kid who dressed up as his daddy for a day. “We already have the paternity results back. The child is his. We don’t need this little demonstration of the details to prove any of that.”

My attorney Claudia never looked at the schmuck, just kept her eyes on the judge. “Judge, if you’d give me a little leeway here, I think you’ll understand why I’m going down this road.”

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