He walked out.
It was dawn on the first day of the New Year when Joaquin entered his empty penthouse in Barcelona.
He was exhausted, but he didn’t stop to sleep. He only confirmed that Siobhan had actually left him, retrieved a box from the safe, then headed back to the airport.
He had the sense to check the security log before he filed his flight plan and learned Siobhan hadn’t flown to Marbella as he’d thought. She had gone north, to London, so that was where he told the pilot to aim his plane.
It should have been a straight shot. New Year’s Day was a slow day for travel. Half the world was sleeping off their celebrations from the night before, but a freak snowstorm over France forced his plane to land at the private airfield in Paris.
Swearing wearily, he disembarked and had the concierge book him into the onsite hotel. It catered to traveling VIPs like himself so his luggage was handled for him and his room details weresent to his phone. He would catch a few winks until the skies cleared then finish his trip.
As he walked into the lobby, he texted Siobhan.
I’m on my way to London to see you.
No. Don’t come, she replied.
He stopped in his tracks, immediately swamped by grief. Not the grief that accompanied death, like Fernando. Not the loss of something taken, either. It was the loss of giving up something within himself, making himself vulnerable. Making his needs known. It was the grief of offering himself and knowing he would never be whole again because a piece of himself was hers now.
And she didn’t want him. He was being discarded.
His phone pinged. He almost didn’t look at it. It was all he could do to stay on his feet.
I’m on my way back, her text read.
To him?
For one second, he experienced that old feeling of desire. The one he tempered out of fear. What if he only lost her again a different way?
Hell, he might, he realized.
Don’t go to Barcelona,he quickly texted.I’m grounded in Paris.
In the same second that he heard a distant ping, he heard a feminine voice say a confused, “What?” It came from around the corner. “So am I,” she murmured. “Where in Paris?”
He took three long steps forward. His phone dinged in his hand, but he didn’t have to read the message because there she was, standing in front of the elevators, staring at her phone. She wore a pink puffer jacket and jeans stuffed into boots rimmed in faux fur. Her hair was sparkling where snowflakes had landed and melted.
“Are you at Charles de Gaulle?” he asked her, voice rasped by disbelief.
She picked up her head and her eyes welled as she stared at him. Her lips began to quiver and her voice hitched. “No. I’m here.”
He walked forward and snatched her into his arms.
They kissed forever. Hard enough to hurt, but it was a good hurt. It was the kind of hurt that uncramped muscle and knitted bone. It was the hurt of thawed flesh warming and prickling back to life.
It was the agony of apology and remorse and forgiveness.
“Um. Excuse me?”
They broke apart to see the doors had opened and a pair of well-dressed older women were trying to step out.
“We have a flight,” one said.
“Of course.” Joaquin steadied Siobhan as they stepped out of the way, then they both stepped into the empty elevator. “Have you been to your room? Come to mine.”
“Heard that before,” she said under her breath, then gave him a helpless, befuddled look. “I can’t believe we’re bothhere.”
“No? I’m not surprised.”
