Love Beyond Words (City Lights: San Francisco Book 1) (20 page)

“Excellent. We’ll be just in time. Are you hungry?”

Yes, for you,
she thought and her cheeks grew hot.
He’s turning me into a fiend.
“Maybe. First we need to talk about this.” She held up her new phone.

“That’s nothing. Something you needed. It doesn’t even count.”

“Doesn’t it?”

“Nope.”

“Julian, it’s not just the phone. It’s the plan, the cost of the data and all that—”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ve got it covered.” He turned in his seat and faced her, his expression serious. “Please let me indulge a little. I have all this money but what am I using it for? I have all the stuff that I need. I don’t need more
stuff.
I want to take you out, buy you pretty things. Please let me, okay?”

“I don’t need
stuff
either, Julian. Experiences, yes. And you. That’s all.”

His mischievous expression returned. “All the experiences you can handle and a few gifts besides. Sorry. Comes with the territory.”

She smiled despite herself and laced her fingers with his as the car took them through the city.

There were no more gifts that night, but an experience Natalie knew she would never forget. The reservations she had unwittingly “confirmed” were for a private yacht that took them out onto the bay at sundown. There was champagne, finger sandwiches, entrees of exquisite seafood, and delicate desserts. After, they slow danced alone on the deck with the city glittering behind him and the lights of the Golden Gate Bridge glowing over them. On the way back, they huddled under a blanket together at the prow, her back to his chest and his arms around her.

This is perfection,
she mused, while a tiny voice whispered that she loved him too much. That this sort of bliss could be taken away, like a rug swept out from under her feet, and the gaping hole that remained would be too deep and dark to crawl out of. But back at his apartment, he kissed her in front of the city panorama and made love to her, slowly and languidly on his soft bed, and the voice was silenced, buried, its words forgotten.

The next day they had lunch at a dim sum restaurant called Yank Sing, south of Market, and Natalie thought she had never had a more delicious meal in her life. As they sat sipping tea, she watched that sly smile come over his face again.

“I hope you’ve nothing more planned for this afternoon than a nap,” she said. “I’m stuffed.”

“No naps. No time. I’m taking you shopping.”

Natalie pursed her lips. “What, for clothes? Like in
Pretty Woman
?”

“Not quite.”

#

The sedan pulled up in front of City Lights Bookstore, and Natalie felt her heart stutter excitedly and then slow with a clang of uncertainty. “Julian, no…”

“
Yes.
” He turned to her once again. “Let it go, Natalie,” he said gently but firmly.

She looked down. “I’m just not used to it. It doesn’t feel wrong, exactly. Just…strange.”

He didn’t answer right away. She heard him sigh and a quick peek revealed him staring out the window.

“My mother worked her fingers to the bone raising me by herself,” he said, his voice hard. “Folding laundry, cleaning hotel rooms, cleaning
toilets
. The cancer got her before she could retire and enjoy one iota of rest.”

He turned to her, lowered his voice so the driver couldn’t hear. “I told you that
I took my mother to the Bahamas with the advance for
Above
. There, people did
her
laundry, and cleaned
her
hotel room, and brought
her
fresh towels and food and frothy drinks on the beach. That money was the best I’ve ever spent. A close second is what it cost to charter that yacht last night and see the city’s lights reflected in your eyes.” He held her face in his hands, his tone softening. “Both sums are a pittance from where I’m sitting. Okay?”

“Okay. But Julian?”

“Yes,” he said, wary.

“I hope you brought enough money for a forklift. Or maybe movers? I’m likely to clean out the entire store.”

He relaxed and kissed her. “Now you’re talking.”

In the bookstore, Natalie inhaled deeply. The night before, Julian had showed her the ins and outs of her new phone, one perk being she could read books on it. Convenient, she thought but nothing could ever replace the weight of a real book in her hands or the smell of its pages. And City Lights was the crown jewel of bookstores. She shivered in delight as they crossed the threshold and stepped onto the black-and-white checkered floor.

Natalie’s heart leapt to see that a small table near the front was dedicated to the works of Rafael Melendez Mendón, with
Coronation
front and center. She elbowed Julian, but he made an inscrutable face and walked past. Natalie lingered, trailing her fingers along a copy of
Above
, thinking of the black and white comp books that bore the same title. A smile touched her lips as she found an employee recommendation for
Coronation
that read in part:

“I wish Mendón would materialize from his seclusion just long enough for me to thank him for
Coronation
, that’s how incredible this book is.”

She contemplated showing that to Julian but had disappeared into the stacks.
He’s not ready yet.

Natalie soon became lost amid the shelves herself. Book buying had always been an event for her, something she worked hard to save for. Libraries filled in the gaps, but she wanted the new releases of her favorite authors on her own shelves, and hardcovers were a luxury she couldn’t often afford. Now, she could choose whatever she liked but despite Julian’s assurances, she still felt reluctant and picked out only five books. The first four were at the top of her lengthy To Read list:
The Goldfinch
by Donna Tartt,
All Fall Down
by Jennifer Weiner,
The Children Act
by Ian McEwan, and
The Bone Clocks
by David Mitchell. The fifth,
A Prayer for Owen Meany
by John Irving, she’d read at least fifteen times but she had lent her one and only copy to Liberty who had promptly forgotten it on the Muni.

Julian frowned at her selections. “Only five?

Natalie affected a thoughtful expression. “Well, I could pick out fifty and spend every spare moment reading. Or I could be judicious, and spend that time with you. In your bed. Naked.”

“You win.”

He carried her books to the check-out, along with his selections:
Across the River and into the Trees
by Ernest Hemingway and some sort of Italian travelogue.

While they waited in line, Natalie watched a young woman approach the Mendón table and pick up
Above.
The woman flipped it to the first page and fell in; Natalie saw it happen, and she had to squeeze her lips together to keep from squealing with delight.

She nudged Julian. They watched as a slow smile spread over the woman’s face, an intensely intimate expression of satisfaction. Julian looked away, fixing his gaze straight ahead.

Natalie squeezed his hand. “That’s what happens.”

“It’s not why I write,” he said under his breath. “I don’t do it for her. For you, maybe, even when I didn’t know it…”

“Oh, love,” Natalie said, “that woman
is
me.”

#

That night, Julian kept things casual. They ate burgers at Mel’s Drive-In and then caught a movie. Natalie thought it was almost as fantastic as the yacht ride, just to stand in line waiting to buy tickets, Julian behind her, his arms around her, talking and laughing in her ear. A date. Dinner and a movie. She’d never had such a simple thing. The tiny voice whispered again in her ear that this kind of bliss couldn’t come without a price. But it seemed far away as he kissed her in the dark of the theater. She could taste the salt and sweetness on him, French fries and vanilla shake, and below that, his own delectable flavor that made every thing bad and ugly seem so far away.

They walked along Market Street after the movie, sat at a café and talked like they used to when he was coming to Niko’s and writing.

“I miss you so much at the café,” she told him, her fingers laced in his across the table. “It’s not the same.”

“I worry still,” he said. “I don’t want you to work alone at night. Not anymore.”

“I’m okay.”

“I can still come. Not to work, but to see you. The book needs time to breathe before I look at it again and start editing.”

“Time to breathe? Like a fine wine?” Natalie smiled. “Doesn’t sound too far off the mark.”

“If I let it alone I can come back to it with fresh eyes later. It puts distance between it and me so I can be a more ruthless editor.”

“I can’t wait to read it,” Natalie said. “And I’m not alone. You have a lot of fans, love. Like that woman in the bookstore.” She thought of the employee recommendation card and its fervent wish. “So many people who’d love to meet you.”

Julian frowned and turned his cappuccino cup in circles. “You think I should reveal myself?”

“Not unless you’re ready,” she said. “Not if it’s going to make you unhappy...”

“I just don’t see the point. I can’t imagine giving interviews and yammering about myself for an hour, or sitting at a table signing books. It seems so arrogant.”

“Not arrogant at all.” Natalie leaned over the table. “You don’t do all that stuff for yourself. You do it for us. The people who’ve read you and love you and want to thank you for what you’ve given them.” She hesitated, already feeling tears sting her eyes. “
I
want to thank you.”

“For what?” He leaned forward, alarmed. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, I…” She looked at him, held his hand tightly. “How do you do it?”

“Do what?”

“Write like you do?”

“I don’t know, love. I can’t answer that. I just put one word after another…”

“No, it’s more than that,” Natalie said. “It’s magic. That’s what it feels like, and I know you don’t want to hear this stuff, but I have to tell you…” The tears were building in her throat. “Jeez, I can’t even say anything without all this…old pain bubbling up.”

“It’s okay,” he said quietly. “You can tell me.”

She nodded. “Okay, well…When my parents died I was lost. I still feel like that sometimes. Alone. Or no…untethered. We had no other family but some distant cousins somewhere and so it was just us. And then my parents were killed and it was just me. I wandered aimlessly, and then I found your books. They helped me get through the worst days where it just seemed like the grief wouldn’t end, and they help me even now, when I have bad days…”

Julian silently offered her a napkin and she took it to dab her eyes. She heaved a sigh and rushed her words, trying to get them out before the sobs crashed in. “And your characters were my friends and my family when I didn’t have any, and when I had nothing and no one to talk to, I had your books, and I just want to thank you for that. Thank you,” she whispered, smiling through her tears. “Thank you so much.”

He came around to her side of the table and held her wordlessly, his chin on her head. She cried hard but quickly, like a rainstorm that bursts and then passes on. She felt better; as if some of the wound’s infection had been purged.

“I guess it’s official,” she said, pulling away and drying her eyes. “All I do is cry.” Julian didn’t reply but kept his eyes averted. She watched him return to his seat and turn his saucer around and around. “And I’ve made you uncomfortable.”

“Yes,” he agreed, his smile gentle for her, “but in the best possible way.”

The last night, Sunday night, Julian pulled out all the stops. After a late breakfast, and an afternoon spent strolling through Golden Gate Park, they returned to his place to shower and change.

Natalie stepped into the amazing glass enclosure and let the rainfall drench her as if she were caught in a summer storm. She’d wondered if Julian would join her, but he did not. Throughout the day, he’d kissed her numerous times but never let anything progress. Every touch was charged with electricity, building but never releasing; an unspoken promise that the end of the night was going to be spectacular. The water falling over her was hot, but she shivered in pleasant anticipation.