“I started modeling in high school. Local print ads, department store promotions, that kind of thing. I didn’t land my first national runway spot until I was twenty-one. Everything started moving really fast after that. I had an agent and a contract, and suddenly I was on the road every week, booked in one show after another.” She goes silent, and when I glance at her, I can tell her thoughts are miles and years away. “I was making more money than I’d ever imagined. But I was exhausted and lonely. I was scared and hungry and so very tired. I found ways to cope with the fatigue and anxiety. My agent helped there, arranging access to physicians and psychologists who knew just what to prescribe. When those weren’t enough, he had other contacts who were eager to provide whatever he thought I needed.”
“Narcotics?” I guess, and I don’t need to see her nod to imagine the scenario.
“The cocaine had the added benefit of suppressingmy appetite, and as my weight decreased, my bookings began to explode. Pretty soon, the cocaine wasn’t enough, so I started purging too. It was a vicious cycle, one I didn’t even realize was happening until one morning I collapsed on the verge of cardiac arrest in my hotel room in Paris.”
“Jesus Christ.” I can’t curb my shock, or my fury at her agent and everyone else in her orbit at the time who’d allowed her health to spiral that far down—or, hell, encouraged it because of their greed. If I’d been there, I would have killed the ones responsible for her decline. “What about your brother? Did Beck know any of this?”
She shakes her head. “He knew I was working too hard. Early on, he tried to intervene, but things weren’t so bad then. I thought he was just trying to hold me back. Later, as my career took off, I hid the truth from him for as long as I could. Paris was the end of everything. The paramedics revived me, and Andrew was on a plane from the States as soon as he was notified. He brought me home, then he and my father checked me into rehab, where they made sure I stayed for the next eleven months until I was healthy and sober.”
“And you never went back to modeling?”
“No. If I had, it would have killed me. Even I could see that. Andrew paid to bury all of the photos and gossip pieces that might have come out after what happened in Paris, or my rehabilitation afterward. So, as far as anyone else was concerned, ‘Eve’ had simply retired. No one knew I was fighting for my life. Some days, I didn’t think I had the strength, or the will, to make it. Some days, even after I was out of rehab, Ididn’t want to make it at all.”
“But you did,” I point out. Gently, because even though she’s strong, I can feel the pain still radiating from her. I can feel the undercurrent of doubt still living inside her, despite the confidence with which she carries herself.
I angle toward her, and this time I can’t keep my hand from reaching out. With my palm cupping the side of her face, I stroke my thumb over the velvet-soft skin near her mouth. “I’m glad you’re here, Evelyn.”
She nods, her gaze dusky now, those gorgeous green eyes drinking me in. “I’m glad you’re here, too.”
Standing here with her like this, it’s impossible to deny how much I desire her. With her lips parted on a soft exhalation, her eyes locked on mine, all of the denials I’d girded myself with when I first approached her crumble away.
My head dips toward hers, without a thought for honor or duty anywhere in my reach.
Until, from somewhere behind me, I hear the jarring sound of someone clearing their throat.
“Ah, excuse me . . . Gabe?”
O’Connor’s voice is tentative and quiet, but I swing around as if I just heard a gunshot. “Yeah. What’s up?”
“I’m sorry to interrupt your, ah, conversation,” she blurts, her gaze darting from me to Evelyn, before finally remaining glued on my face in a look somewhere between apology and utter shock. “The, um, catering service is about to start packing up, so the other guys on the team and I were wondering if you wanted to grab some chow with us.”
“No, thanks.” Ordinarily, I’d be tempted to joke with my buddy about her bottomless pit of a stomach,but I can’t even fake that. I sound guilty as fuck, and there’s no covering up what my friend and teammate just walked up on. And while I know she won’t mention my indiscretion to anyone else on the team or otherwise, that doesn’t make the whole thing any less awkward. “Go on without me. I’ll head that way in a few.”
She takes off without another word.
“I should go, too,” Evelyn says.
It’s probably a good idea, considering I can’t seem to keep my hands off her, even in full view of the public, not to mention risking being seen by anyone else from the company. I turn toward her and nod. “How’d you get here? Subway?”
“No.” Something dark, almost haunted, flickers in her expression. “No, I . . . I never take the subway. My car’s parked at the River lot.”
I know where it is, since that’s the same lot where I met up with my team when we arrived at the event this morning. “Come on, I’ll walk you there.”
“You sure? I don’t really need an escort if you have things you need to do.”
“Let’s go.”
It’s a decent hike from where we are, and although my leg will feel it later, I’m not about to let Evelyn make the trip alone. We walk most of the way in companionable silence, even though the air around us still crackles with the awareness of our intensifying attraction and the kiss that would have happened if not for O’Connor’s timely interruption.
“Why don’t you like taking the subway?” I ask as we near the crowded parking lot situated between the Bronx River and the Parkway.
“I just don’t.” She gives me a nonchalant shrug, buther expression is too carefully schooled for me to believe. I can also sense that the openness she shared with me back inside the zoo is behind us now, so I don’t press.
If she were mine, I wouldn’t rest until she laid all her demons out for me to slay.
I’d slay them all now, even though she’ll never belong to me.
We reach her Volvo and I stand back, near the front bumper while she takes out her remote and clicks the unlock button. If I get any closer, I’m not certain I can trust myself to let her go.
