Trust Me on This - Jennifer Crusie [54]
It wasn’t easy leaving her, he thought as her door closed behind him, but he was going to see her again that night. And if he had anything to do with it, a lot of nights after that.
Surprisingly cheered by the thought of commitment, Alec whistled all the way back to his room.
Harry knocked on Victoria’s door at five-thirty with roses and Champagne, and when Victoria answered the door and saw it was him, she said, “I’m sorry I was so bitchy” and pulled him into her arms; he dropped the flowers and the Champagne and just held her until she pulled him toward the bed.
An hour later, Harry cuddled Victoria a little closer and said, “I was going to tell you something important when you jumped me at the door and then I forgot how to talk.”
“I think you should stop bringing Champagne,” she said into his chest. “We never drink it.”
“Will you listen to me?” he said, tipping her chin up so he could look in her eyes, but she interrupted him.
“I called the university and resigned this afternoon,” she said. “It took me all afternoon but I finally found the head of my department, and I resigned. I’m not even going back for next quarter.”
“You what?”
“I resigned,” Victoria said. “I bitched at you about your lousy priorities, and I knew the whole time mine were just as bad. So I picked love instead of work, and it’s okay. I’ve always wanted to write, and now I can live with you and write, and we can make love every night. I can’t think why I didn’t jump at the chance the first time you mentioned it. This is going to be wonderful.”
Her voice was relentlessly cheery, but he could hear the loss beneath the cheer. “It was tough, wasn’t it?”
Victoria buried her face in his chest. “Yes,” she said. “It was very tough. I’ve been teaching for forty years. And now I won’t be.” She pulled back her head to look at him. “Thank you for knowing that it was tough.”
He kissed her gently. “I know because it was tough for me too.”
Victoria froze in his arms. “What?”
“I called Chicago and resigned. Hardest thing I’ve ever done.” He put his cheek against her hair.
“You resigned?”
“I recommended Alec for my job.”
“Oh.” Victoria held him tighter.
Harry tried to sound cheerful too. “Maybe I’ll write my memoirs. I’ll tell you about all the brave things I’ve done, and you can be impressed and write them down.”
Victoria was quiet for a moment, and then she said, “You did the bravest thing this afternoon. I’ll be impressed about that forever.”
They clung to each other, absorbing their losses and comforting themselves.
“You realize we can live anywhere now,” Harry said after a while. “Anywhere at all.”
“I can get us a great deal on some land in Florida,” Victoria said, and they both started to laugh.
By the time dinner was over, nobody was laughing, and the only comfort Alec could take from the whole night was that at least he’d spent it with Dennie. She’d worn the red dress again, too, and every now and then he’d caught a flash of purple lace at the edge of her neckline. He’d been planning on catching more than a flash later, but that later was now, and they were still working.
Bond hadn’t been as greedy as they’d hoped he’d be.
“I can’t believe how slippery that little toad is,” Victoria said when they were all back in her room.
“Where’d we go wrong, Harry?” Alec asked him. “I was there and I couldn’t tell, but I might have been distracted. Did we say something that tipped him off?”
“If you did, I didn’t hear it.” Harry sat on the edge of the bed looking tired, and Alec thought that for the first time, the man looked his age. “You were all good. I don’t know what happened. Maybe he’s just a lot smarter than we figured.”
Victoria went over and sat beside him. That was Aunt Vic, always comforting people, even people she didn’t like. Alec felt a wave of gratitude toward her.
“I thought for sure when Donald agreed about the house that was it,” she said. “Donald is so clueless that Bond has to believe him. He couldn’t have turned us down because he didn’t believe us. It must just