Coming Back To You (14 page)

How was she expected to work with Mark given
their past? She would just have to lay down the law immediately and
make Mark understand she was with Brad now. She wasn’t interested
in getting caught up in any more of his “lessons.” She no longer
needed him to teach her how to be with a man, or how to talk to
one. She no longer needed him to boost her confidence and make her
feel beautiful. Been there, done that.

After the meeting, she bolted out of the
conference room before Mark could stop her, rushed upstairs to grab
her purse, then met Lisa outside by her car.

“What is he doing here?” She thumped her fist
on the door panel as Lisa pulled out of the parking lot.

“Taking Don’s job,” Lisa said
matter-of-factly.

“It’s not that simple. Nothing was ever that
simple with Mark. He’s up to something.” She crossed one arm over
the other and nibbled her thumbnail. What angle was he playing?

“Maybe the opportunity was simply too good to
pass up.” Lisa turned up the air.

“Huh-uh. I’m not buying it. He came back for
me. He came back to mess with my head.”

“Karma—”

“No, Lisa. I know him. If he thinks I’m just
going to fall back into his bed, he’s got another thing coming.”
She smacked her fist against her thigh. “Damn it, Lisa. You know
how long it took for me to get over him.”

“Sounds like you’re still not,” Lisa said
under her breath.

“What? What did you say?”

Lisa took a left into the parking lot for
Café Nine. “Listen to yourself, Karma. Would you really be this
upset if you were honestly over him?”

Karma ricocheted back. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, I’m serious.” Lisa parked the car, shut
off the engine, and turned toward her. The look in her eyes made it
clear Lisa was about to give her a reality check. “You’re not over
him, are you? Tell me I’m wrong.”

“You’re wrong.”

“I’m not buying it.

“Why not?”

Lisa’s jaw clenched as if she didn’t want to
say what was about to come out of her mouth. Then she took a deep
breath, held it for a second, then blurted, “Because if you were
really over him, you’d be happy to see him.” Before Karma could
protest, Lisa held up her hand. “Look, it’s okay if you’re not over
him. The two of you shared an amazing summer and you fell in love
with him. I’ve read your blog. I know what he meant to you. You
have a right to be angry right now, but—”

“But what? But maybe I should cut Mark some
slack? Is that what you think I should do?”

“No.” Lisa sighed. “But you’re being
irrational.”

“Damn straight I’m being irrational.” She
pointed in the direction of the office. “That bastard just blew my
entire world apart back there. I’ve moved on, and now he comes back
and saunters out of Don’s office like everything’s the way it was
between us, and all I wanted when I saw him was to…” She met Lisa’s
gaze as the wind blew out of her sails. In her tirade of tumbling
thoughts, she’d been about to say that when she saw Mark all she’d
wanted was to kiss him. The moment he emerged from Don’s office,
her heart skipped a beat then unfurled as her body instantly
heated. Arousal flooded her lower belly, and all she’d wanted was
to touch him, be touched by him, and taste his skin. Mark still had
that effect on her, but she couldn’t bow to it. She had to
resist.

Lisa tilted her head as if she’d read Karma’s
thoughts. “You know, all this time I was worried you were just
frontin’ with Brad. That you’d latched on to him because you
thought he was your only shot at happiness after Mark left.” She
paused. “I think you just confirmed I was right.”

“I love Brad,” Karma said a little too
defensively.

Lisa smirked like she didn’t believe her then
got out of the car.

“I do.” Karma hopped out and followed her
into Café Nine. “Do you think I don’t?”

“Oh, I’m sure you love him.” Lisa stepped up
to the counter to order then looked over her shoulder and said, “I
just think you love Mark more.”

The words hit her like a shot to the gut,
rendering her speechless. But really, hadn’t she realized during
the meeting when Mark’s gaze met hers that she was still in love
with him? Lisa was only stating the obvious.

After ordering, Karma sat down across from
Lisa at a patio table. “Fine, maybe I’m not over him, and maybe I
do still love him, but, Lisa, he’s never going to be what I need.
He’s never going to be able to commit, let alone marry me. If I
learned nothing else from our four months together, I learned that
much.”

“Maybe he’s changed.” Lisa sipped her
tea.

“Yeah, and I’ve got swamp land in Iraq I can
sell you.” She wadded up her straw wrapper and tossed it on the
table. “That man will never—and I mean
never
—get over what
his ex-fiancée did to him. And I can’t sit around waiting for
something that will never happen.” She eyed her engagement ring.
“Brad’s good for me. He’s not afraid to put his heart out there and
make what we have permanent.” But in the past five months she’d
learned that Brad wasn’t the most passionate bedmate, and she’d
hinted as much to Lisa in a few of their “girl talks.”

“Is that enough?” Lisa fixed her with a
skeptical stare.

“It has to be.”

“It doesn’t
have
to be, Karma. You
can
have both, you know. Both the passion and the
commitment.”

Karma shook her head. “In my experience,
that’s not how it works. You get one or the other. And what I want
is the commitment. Passion is nothing if there’s no certainty it
will still be around in a year.”

“But, Karma, come on. You’ve been dating Brad
what? A whole five months? And you’re already engaged? Why the
rush? I think you’re taking things too fast. I don’t think Brad’s
the guy for you, Karma.”

Karma shook her head. No way would she let
Lisa talk her out of this. “He and I started hanging out in
February, almost eight months ago. We were friends before we
dated.” They’d made good friends, too. And a good friendship was a
solid foundation for a good relationship. “I’m not going back to
Mark.”

Mark was a flight risk. Even if he said he
wanted a commitment, he could still flee when the heat turned up
too high. She would be stupid to walk down that road again, only to
have her heart obliterated the same way it had been a year ago.

Lisa huffed. “I didn’t say you had to go back
to Mark. Just that I don’t think Brad’s the right guy for you.
First, there’s Jade. She hates you. How will that work? And then
there’s the stuff you told me about…you know…the way he’s just not
very
imaginative
in the bedroom.”

She wished she’d never told Lisa about that.
Then again, who would have thought her words would come back to
haunt her?

“I’ve got this, Lisa. I’ve made my
decision.”

Lisa gave her a resigned nod. “Okay, okay.
You’re right. It’s your decision. Just know I’m here for you if you
ever need to talk.”

“I know.”

As their food arrived, Karma glanced back at
the diamond on her finger. Brad was enough. She could make Brad be
enough.

Chapter 17

After returning to Solar, Karma fumed at her desk
while Don and Mark spent the afternoon in his office. Don asked her
to make travel arrangements for him and Mark to fly to the East
Coast location next Monday then down to the Atlanta office. They
would return to Indianapolis on Friday.
Tour de Mark.
She
finalized their itineraries and e-mailed them—and, oh, how
efficient, Mark already had a company e-mail.

Around four o’clock, Mark exited Don’s office
and flashed her a wary smile on his way to the conference room.
Good, he could tell she was angry. Good for him. He needed to know
she wasn’t going to be a pushover and allow him back into her
bed.

Her phone dinged, and she glanced down to see
a text from Mark.

Oh,
now
he could text her. Where had
he been a year ago? Hell, where had he been a month ago to warn her
he was returning. Talk about being tardy.

She refused to look at him, turning away from
the conference room.

Her phone dinged again.

Please answer me.

Her heart melted just a little bit at the
please
, but then she set her jaw and squared her
shoulders.

A member from IT stopped by Don’s office and
began dismantling his computer, preparing the space for Mark.

Finally, she typed out a response.
If you
want to discuss this with me, schedule a meeting.

She pulled out the hard copy of last
quarter’s presentation and began marking it up.

“Hi.”

Karma lifted her gaze to find Mark standing
at her counter, and every bone in her body melted. Up close, he was
even more stunning. In addition to letting his beard and mustache
grow in, his hair was longer. A tuft hung over his forehead and
curled inward toward his eye. And his face was even more chiseled
than it had been a year ago, as if he’d spent several hours a week
in the gym. Probably to look good for all his ladies back in
Chicago.

His grey-green eyes captured hers and held
on, forbidding her from looking away.

She blinked and bit her bottom lip before
recovering from the shock to her system his mere proximity created.
“What can I do for you?”

“I thought we might take a minute to get
reacquainted…now that we’re going to be working with one another, I
mean. Is now a good time?”

She glanced at the clock then at the open
door to Don’s office, where she could hear the sounds of equipment
being moved around.

She wasn’t looking forward to this discussion
but might as well get it over with. “Fine. Sure.” She stood and
grabbed her notebook.

She followed him into the conference
room.

He closed the door. His gaze stroked the wall
where they’d fucked one another last July. Then he cleared his
throat and gestured to one of the chairs.

“Have a seat.” He sat in
his
chair.

Instead of taking the chair beside him—the
one he had offered—Karma walked around to the other side of the
table and sat across from him. She would make it clear from the
get-go that she made her own decisions now and would set the tone
for this new dynamic in their relationship. She was no longer the
compliant, easily manipulated little girl he had met last year.

He pressed his lips together and narrowed his
eyes under a wrinkled brow before glancing toward the window.

Silence stretched between them, but Karma
refused to speak first. Her dad had taught her that he who speaks
first loses. So, she crossed her hands one over the other, making
sure her left hand and its sparkling diamond rested on top, and
waited.

After several long, quiet seconds, Mark
exhaled. “You’re engaged.” His voice fell flat.

Using that as his opener shouldn’t have
surprised her, but it did.

She raised her chin. “Yes.”

His head bobbed up and down shallowly, and he
looked away again. “Well, congratulations. You’re happy?”

She squared her shoulders. “Yes. Very.”

Another nod, a little bigger this time.
“I’m…glad to hear it.” His words sounded like he was squeezing them
through a strainer.

More silence. It was unnerving, but Karma
forced herself to remain composed. Part of her ego relished that he
seemed disappointed she was no longer available. That meant he
had
thought about her during the last year. Oh well, too
little too late.

Mark blinked and glanced down at his hands.
“I, uh…I didn’t expect…” His brow furrowed as if in frustration or
maybe confusion.

This was not the Mark she remembered. That
Mark had been full of confidence and bold. He had commanded the
room. This Mark seemed…disoriented. Maybe even a bit timid. As if
he were a small child facing a room full of strangers on his first
day of school.

“What? You didn’t expect me to be engaged?”
She blew out a derisive puff of air. “You probably expected to come
back here and find me still pining over you…sitting around like a
spinster waiting on you to save me from becoming an old maid.”

His gaze snapped to hers, and he frowned. “Of
course not. I’m glad to see you’re happy, Karma. That’s all
I’m—”

“Are you? Really?” She crossed her arms.

The scowl on his face said otherwise. It
deepened. “Yes, your happiness was all I ever wanted.” The words
sounded like he was forcing them out with a chisel and hammer.

“Which was why you called me every week after
you left.” She tapped her finger on her forearm.

He tilted his head to one side. “Why are you
so angry at me? I never lied to you. I told you up front how things
would be. I thought you understood—”

“Fine. I get it.” She held up her hand. “You
were only doing what you said you would. It’s not like you loved me
or anything, right?”

But she knew in her heart that he did, and
the way the skin around his eyes ticked and his mouth twitched
confirmed she was right. And yet that love hadn’t been enough. He’d
abandoned her, anyway. That shit hurt like a kick in the shin. He
was saying that she wasn’t worthy of his love. That she wasn’t
enough to pull him from the funk of his past.

“Karma. I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt
you.”

With a sigh, she leaned back in her chair.
“I’ve heard all this before, Mark.” He’d told her repeatedly that
he’d never meant to hurt her. “It’s getting old.”

They stared at each other for a long, silent
moment.

Then he cleared his throat and looked away.
“My apologies. I simply thought—”

“What are you doing here, Mark?” Being near
him was becoming painful. Just remaining across the room was an
exercise of willpower she wasn’t sure she could sustain much
longer. Every part of her wanted to touch every part of him so
badly it was excruciating.