The Taking by Erin McCarthy Page B

since their brief meeting had been harsh and emotional for her, and as she tried to stay strong in her fight against Beau, and look down a future that might result in her never marrying again, the idea that there would be men like Felix, men she could feel desire for, intrigued her. At some point a year or two from now, she would date and have sex again, or at least Lord, she hoped she would. It was nice to know that fundamental spark in her still existed, because despite the circumstances of that awful night she’d met Felix, and the strange conversation they had shared, Regan had been attracted to him.
    She would never date Felix. Men like him didn’t have interest in plain, politically correct women, and given the fact that their worlds were wildly different, she doubted that they would have a whole lot in common. Yet the one thing she didn’t doubt was that he would be amazing in bed. It was the eyes, the way they had met hers without ever wandering away, the intensity in them, the focus. Eyes like that had to belong to a man who would give and demand a dedication to pleasure.
    Not surprising then, that in her dream she would cast him in the role of voodoo priest and forbidden lover, when she was clearly undersexed.
    And she would like to see him again, just once.
    Regan tried to close her eyes, but the image of the fictitious Camille, features indistinct, down on the cobblestones in front of her carriage, muddied and covered in sweat, full of triumph, kept her from relaxing back into sleep. It was unnerving, disturbing, the vividness reminiscent of a nightmare more than a casual dream, the clarity of the event not the usual mishmash of random thoughts, but purposeful.
    She had been under a lot of stress and had restructured her entire life. A graphic dream was normal.
    But that didn’t erase the unease she felt at the memory, nor did it settle her back into sleep. What if it was some horrible metaphor for her life, her marriage to Beau? The feelings of entrapment, the desperate urge to flee, the yearning for freedom . . .
    Disturbing. Plain and simple. And she didn’t want to think about the past, or the damage her marriage might have somehow done to her. Wide awake and tense, after another five minutes of staring at the ceiling, dream rewinding and rolling over and over in her head, Regan gave up and threw the covers back. If she wasn’t going to sleep, she might as well get some coffee and shake off the last remnants of the wine.
    Ten minutes later, she was dressed and checked out of the hotel, the doorman hailing a cab for her as she waited on the curb, the journal tucked in her overnight bag. The street was quiet in the shadows of the early morning, or the late night, depending on your perspective. They were only a block from Bourbon Street, after all. She pulled her sweater a little tighter around her against the chill and glanced down Royal Street, pleased to be back in the Quarter despite the tension the dream had created.
    Beau had disliked the French Quarter, thinking it was noisy and dirty and filled with undesirables. She would have never been able to convince him to live here. Yet she loved it for its authenticity, for its acceptance of all kinds of people, its tolerance of the unusual. It had always felt like home to her, though she’d never had the courage to live here before. Her parents would have found it odd, her friends would have raised eyebrows at her.
    But since she had left what they all considered the perfect husband after little more than a year of marriage, a few more raised eyebrows meant nothing at this point. So she had bought her house, and she was excited to fill it with furniture and make a home for herself.
    Jumping in the cab that pulled up in front of her, Regan tipped the doorman and settled on the seat, mouth dry from the wine the night before. She needed coffee. “Café du Monde, please,” she told the driver. It was open twenty-four hours a day, and she relished the thought