Struck from the Record (16 page)

“No, you don’t,” she said firmly. “You keep saying
I
. I want this. I want that. Well, I don’t care what
you
want. What about what
I
want?”

“Fuck, Andrea, what do you want?” he asked, running a hand back through his disheveled hair.

“It doesn’t matter because you can’t give it to me.”

Clay cringed, glad that she couldn’t see him. He hadn’t had enough alcohol for this. “How do you know I can’t give it to you if you don’t tell me what it is?”

Andrea laughed. “I told you already, Clay, and you made your choice perfectly clear. So, I’m going to go now.”

“Andrea,” he said, keeping her from hanging up on him in anger.

“What?”

“Why’d you really pick up?”

“I guess I’m just a masochist,” she murmured into the phone.

“You’ve always been one of those, but that’s not it.” He could sense there was something else.

“Fine. It’s late, and I still worry about you.” She sighed, as if the admission hurt her. “So, don’t call me again unless you’re really in trouble.”

The line went dead in his hands, and he felt like chucking his phone across the room.

Well, that hadn’t gone as he’d planned. He was pissed and frustrated and didn’t know what the fuck to do. Sleeping around hadn’t helped. Drowning in booze hadn’t helped. Talking to her definitely hadn’t helped.

Maybe it was time to just let the bullshit go.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Gigi asked him.

She held a crisp white envelope in her hand. The Cooper & Nielson logo was embossed on the front. A gold foil sticker had been placed over the flap with a raised C&N. The party invitation was sleek and powerful and the absolute only way to get into the exclusive annual event.

“I’m sure.”

“I thought that, when you called me to pick you up the night you talked to Andrea on the phone, you were a real idiot, but this…” She plucked the other invitation from his hand and held the pair aloft. “This is mental.”

“It’s my chance.”

“You broke up two months ago, Clay,” Gigi said softly. “I hate to say it, but the likelihood of her, one, being excited that you’re randomly showing up to see her, and two, accepting your invitation to a gala event are pretty slim.”

Clay shrugged unperturbed. “Big gestures run in the family.”

“Oh, so,
now
,
you want to be associated with your family?”

“What do you want me to do, Gigi? Do you think I should just let her go? Wash fifteen years down the drain?” he asked.

“I didn’t say that, idiot. I just want to make sure you know what you’re walking into.”

“Well, thanks for your kindness, De Rosa, but I have a feeling that I’m just going to have to be an idiot either way with her.”

“Not sure you know how to be anything else.”

“Now that, that’s settled,” he said with a grin.

He should have been wallowing after that conversation with Andrea. It should have turned him on his head and made him dive headfirst into a drunken pit. That was how he had always reacted to bad situations in the past. He was practically an alcoholic with his drinking tendencies. He never went anywhere without a drink in hand.

But something had clicked when he talked to Andrea.

She’d admitted that she worried about him.

And, if she worried about him, that meant she thought about him.

And, if she thought about him, that meant there was hope.

And, if there was hope, then the shit he’d been pulling the last couple of weeks needed to stop.

When he’d asked Gigi for her help, she’d looked at him in wide-eyed wonder. He was pretty sure she legitimately thought he was insane.
But who else could I ask?

She was the closest thing he’d come to know as a friend in a really long time. Liz was on Andrea’s side at this point. Brady was too busy with work, not that Clay really wanted to ask for his help. And the guys were against him ever seriously dating again.

So, Clay had decided to take matters into his own hands.

He’d cut back his drinking habits. Stopped fucking around. No more revolving door of women.

And it’d been easy. Well, easy enough at least.

“Do you want me to go with you?” she asked. She looked nervous for him. “I could drive you.”

“I appreciate it, but no. I need to do this alone.”

She shook her head and straightened the bow tie of his suit. “Well, at least you look hot.”

“That’s a constant.”

Gigi smacked his sleeve. “Just go get your girl.”

Clay retrieved the gala invites from Gigi, and she shot him one last anxious look.

“Let me know how it goes.”

He shot her a dimpled grin. “Will do.”

Then, he left the office, took his Porsche uptown, and parked in front of a small modern-looking building. He knew he was in the right place by the other cars he followed into the lot. High-end clients were here to purchase expensive artwork. The pulse of the most privileged and influential in D.C. were in one building. But he wasn’t here for them.

He was here for her.

He stepped out of his car, straightened his bow tie one more time, and then walked toward the building with newfound hope to correct his errors.

Chapter 15

HIS MOMENT

Clay’s feet carried him into the building. It looked much the same as the last event he’d been to. Crowded with people, the walls lined with artwork, the bar line being the longest thing in sight.

As he entered, a waiter approached him to offer him a glass of champagne on the house.

Clay smiled at the man and shook his head. “No, thank you.”

He’d declined a drink. Champagne, sure. Something he rarely, if ever, drank to begin with. But, hey, it was a start. He really wanted to be sober for this.

On the walls, there were so many pieces of art that he’d never seen before. Either Andrea had been hoarding art more than he knew, or she’d been traveling a ton to procure pieces for this exhibit. She had a collector’s eye for it. That was for sure.

As he scanned the opening line of pieces, he read the tags that said where the painter was from, and they hadn’t been to a number of these places in years. Marseilles, Barcelona, Vienna, Venice, Amsterdam.
Had she taken a European tour in the time that we’d been apart?

As he scanned the paintings, he kept one eye open for Andrea. He didn’t want to run into her without some forewarning on his part. He wasn’t here to embarrass her or make her uncomfortable. He didn’t want to put her off her step when she finally saw him. It’d be better to talk to her in a more secluded area. But he wanted to be here for her even if she didn’t know the extent of it.

He had his eye on the nearest exit when he felt hard eyes on the back of his head. He whirled around and saw a head of blonde hair walking furiously toward him in a tight blue dress.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Liz asked, Brady hot on her heels.

She grabbed Clay’s arm and started wrenching him out of the gallery. He easily followed her with a humorous glint in his eyes.

“You should leave.” She pointed toward the exit when they were far enough away from the main group of Andrea’s clients.

Brady had his huge mass mostly blocking them from view.

“I can’t leave,” Clay told her.

“Yes, you can, and you will.”

“Liz,” Brady said warningly.

She looked up at Brady with her big blue eyes, and for a second, her expression softened. “You know he can’t be here.”

“Andrea can’t keep running forever,” Brady said firmly. “This isn’t fair to him either.”

“I’m still standing right here,” Clay said.

“What are you doing here?” Liz asked. The edge was gone from her voice. She looked sad and resigned. Like she wanted to help him but thought the effort would be futile.

“I just came by to see how things were going for her.”

“Does she know you’re here?” Liz asked.

“No,” he admitted.

“No, of course not. She would have told me.”

“Look, I’m not here to cause her any trouble,” Clay insisted. He just needed to see Andrea and ask her a question. Then, he’d go.

“You can’t control whether or not it causes her trouble,” Brady told him.

Clay ran a hand back through his hair. “Yeah, but how much longer do I have to wait for her to come to me? She’s as stubborn as I am, and we both know that’s never going to happen. So, you’re telling me to just let her walk away, and I can’t do that.”

Liz straightened at the passion in his voice. “You really mean that.”

“Of course I do.”

“Look, I know you called and talked to her. Andrea and I have been hanging out since…the breakup. I know you have good intentions, but you being here is a
bad
idea.”

“For her, or for me?”

“Both of you!”

Clay shook his head. “You walked away from Brady, and he let you do it. How often did you wish for him to just come back into your life and whisk you off your feet?” he demanded. “How often did you think he’d just show back up, but he didn’t?”

Liz seemed to retreat into herself at the comment. It was as if she were going back in time and remembering something excruciatingly painful. She tried to clear her head from it, but the emotion was thick in her voice as she said, “More than I can count.”

“And you’re saying I can’t do that? When it was all you wanted?”

“Clay…”

“Let him go, Liz,” Brady said, resting his hand on her arm.

“What?” she asked.

“Just let him go. He’s right. He deserves the chance to talk to her.”

“Fine,” she said slowly. “Just try not to mess this up for her. She’s put a lot of time into the gallery.”

Brady clapped him on the back and smiled. “Go get her.”

“Thanks, man,” he said with honest gratitude he thought he’d never feel.

Clay left Brady and Liz behind, ignoring Liz’s words of warning. He just needed to find Andrea and invite her to the gala, and then everything would work itself out. They’d been through too much for the puzzle pieces not to fit back together again.

Then, he saw her.

She was standing in front of a trio of paintings of a landscape bursting in a rainbow of colors. It was a total contrast to the black lace dress hugging her frame and the stark honey color of her hair, which was hanging loose in waves down her back. The woman next to her was tall and lithe and kept gesturing to the artwork while shaking her head.

Clay had no intention of interrupting. It was just a marvel to see her again. His heart thudded, and something like panic flared in his chest.

Fuck
.

He felt like a pussy.

There she was, standing like a sculpted goddess across the room. As if she herself were the artwork to be admired, not the paintings hanging limply on the wall.

How had he forgotten how beautiful she was in such a short period of time?

It was the longest they’d gone without the other. He was blinded by the sight of her. Her ass straining against the confines of her dress. The toned long legs he knew barreled through Pilates and yoga five times a week. The perky breasts that she complained were too small, but he’d always thought fit her. The slope of her neck up to her gorgeous face to that smile that would bring him to his knees.

They’d gotten so comfortable. So easily forgotten why they’d been together in the first place. He’d let it get that way. Taken that beautiful body for granted. Fucked up, like he always had.

Now was going to be different.

He waited until the other woman disappeared. The room was mostly empty anyway. This was his moment.

He had been hovering in the shadows, just out of her line of sight. Just when he moved toward her, pulling the invitation out of his suit pocket, another person entered the room at a near run and collided with Andrea.

Clay’s feet stalled.

Bad Suit.

He wrapped his arms around Andrea’s waist, hoisted her into the air, and swung her around in a circle. She laughed against him and clung on to keep herself steady.

Fuck, she looks fucking ecstatic.

Happier than Clay had seen her in a real long time.

Bad Suit set her back down on her feet, and she steadied herself against his chest. He was speaking animatedly about something. The grin on her face just grew and grew.

Clay heard her cry out, “Oh my God!”

And then her hands wrapped around his shoulders and clung on to him for dear life.

Pain like nothing he’d ever known stabbed him in the heart. He staggered back a step, unable to believe what he was seeing. He clutched the invitation tight in his hand, the paper crumbling in his death grip.

She’d moved on.

Stupid.

Stupid.

Stupid.

Liz had been right.
What the fuck am I doing here?

He was just going to cause Andrea more trouble. Just going to fuck everything up for her. He wanted her to be happy. He wanted to go over there and punch the living daylights out of that guy. But he wouldn’t be here if she didn’t want him here.

He tortured himself, imagining her running back to him as soon as her things were out of their place. Him helping her change the locks. Running through Europe together to find new art pieces. Fucking.