All of Nothing

by Vania Rheault

  A noise behind him made him turn, and Raven stood before him in a burgundy off-the-shoulder cocktail dress. She’d left her hair down, but she’d added texture, the chunky locks framing a face that had been made up with a light hand.

  Jax approved.

  Nothing like Lucia’s made up features, Raven had added mascara to her eyelashes, a light sweep of blush, and lipstick. That was all.

  But it was all she needed. Already regular sleep and decent meals were filling out the hollows of her face, and the purple bruises that had been so blatant under her eyes were fading.

  She wore black pantyhose, her delicate calves accentuated by high heeled pumps. If she wasn’t used to wearing heels, her feet would definitely be sore by the end of the night.

  Raven held a small black clutch tightly in her hands. Her knuckles were white.

  She looked perfect, and she frowned when he didn’t say anything, simply stared.

  “This is all right, isn’t it?”

  Jax cleared his throat. “Yes. And you are on time. Thank you. Do you have a coat?”

  “Grace said they would be hung downstairs. Wherever that means.”

  “She meant in the foyer, with the rest of the coats and jackets for me and Lucia. My parents and Erik also keep a few things here. My mother stopped by?” Jax opened the closet and selected a black cape with fur trim.

  He draped it over her shoulders and secured the silver chain.

  “Your mother helped me put away all the clothes, going over again with me what was what,” she said.

  Justin waited for them, and Jax led her outside saying, “That must have been helpful.”

  After a long day at the office and the verbal sparring with Lucia, he wanted a drink and a good meal, and he took the stone stairs at a trot. When he reached the car, he realized Raven wasn’t with him. He looked over his shoulder in irritation.

  Raven stood on the top step, his house looming behind her in the dark, the stars bright pinpoints in the pitch black winter sky. Lights that flanked the house’s red double doors illuminated her figure.

  She’d stopped to pull the hood over her head.

  Jax caught his breath, but it wasn’t from a gust of wind that chose that moment to hit him in the face.

  He’d never been struck by a woman that way.

  His heart had never stopped mid-beat.

  Jax had effectively shut off his emotions, or, thought he had.

  Carefully, she stepped down the stairs, her gloved hand gripping the marble handrail covered with snow. “She helped me choose this, when I told her you’d ordered me to dinner.”

  That jerked him out of his stunned haze, and his mouth twisted. Pulling the car’s door open he snapped, “You said you wanted to learn. If you hadn’t wanted to learn how to behave in public, you should have told me.”

  “I may have come from a shelter, but I’m not a dog,” Raven retorted, stepping inside the car. “I know how to eat soup without letting it dribble down my chin. I don’t know what kind of life you think I’m going to be living once I leave here, anyway.”

  “You may be accustomed to the local Olive Garden, but I won’t lower my standards for you. I wanted to take you to dinner. We will go where I want to go.”

  He slammed her door shut and circled the trunk of the car. Jax settled into his seat and said, “Go,” to Justin who was used to his temper and did nothing but shift into Drive and pull away from the house.

  Jax settled into his seat and stared out the window.

  Looking as she did, she wouldn’t fit into an Olive Garden, either.

  She shone too bright for the rundown chain.

  When Justin parked in front of The Lighthouse, Jax said, “Let me help you.”

  “Help me do what?” Raven asked, but he was already stepping out of the car and rounding the back, the bitter wind fighting against his coat.

  She clutched the handle of the door, prepared to push it open, and he pursed his lips in annoyance. The woman simply didn’t listen.

  He yanked the door open. “Let me help you out of the car.”

  “What for? Are my legs broken?”

  “If the gentleman you are with doesn’t help you from the car, get rid of him.”

  “The gentlemen I see don’t even have cars,” she said, gripping his gloved hand and stepping carefully from the sedan.

  Jax kept his mouth shut. He didn’t want to hear about her “gentlemen” such as they were.

  Her shoe slipped on a patch of ice, and Jax steadied her, pulling her to his chest. A car pulled up behind them, and the headlights made her eyes glow soft, like the scotch he favored. A puff of white breath escaped her lips.

  “That is why you accept help. You would have been down on your ass in three seconds flat. Now hold onto my arm, and I’ll assist you into the building.” He pushed the car door shut and pounded on the side, letting Justin know he was free to pull away.

  “I feel like a little kid. I’ve lived on the street for thirteen years, Jax. I can take care of myself.”

  Her scent tickled his nose, something light, something that smelled vaguely of cinnamon and apples, and Jax unstuck his tongue from the roof of his mouth. “There will be a day you won’t be alone, Raven.”

  “A woman is always alone.”

  Jax didn’t have a chance to respond. The hostess recognized him and immediately motioned for the coat check girl to take their heavy winter jackets. She didn’t give Raven a moment to even fluff her hair before she stepped away to lead them to a table. When his assistant called to make the reservation, he’d instructed her to ask for a table in the back, somewhere in a corner, but the hostess, a curious glint in her eye when she looked at Raven, seated them in the center of the room.

  He wouldn’t argue. Not tonight. But any other evening, especially with Lucia, he would have asked for the owner—the chef indebted to him. Jax had invested in this restaurant many years ago, and his friend had never forgotten Jax’s support. Tonight’s date with Raven wasn’t important enough to go over the hostess’s head.

  Raven was about to take a seat, and Jax growled under his breath, “Don’t you dare.”

  People stared.

  Jax wasn’t a stranger to the clientele, and his cheeks warmed. “You let me pull your chair out for you.”

  “I can’t even sit without help?” Raven whispered, leaning in, her eyes darting every which way. “Are you going to cut my meat, too?”

  Deliberately, he walked around the table and pulled out her chair, where she plopped in a cloud of burgundy skirt.

  The moment Jax sat, a waiter brought them menus encased in thick leather binding.

  Raven opened her menu and ran her finger down the list of entrees. “Where are the prices? How do you know how much everything costs?”

  “They bill my company,” he said, perusing the menu.

  “That doesn’t answer my question. How do you know you can afford it?”

  Jax closed his menu. “Raven,” he said gently, “if you have that worry, you wouldn’t eat here.”

  “What’s the cheapest thing?” she insisted.

  Raven looked down at her menu, and Jax missed looking into her eyes. He reached across the table and took her hand, and her gaze flew to his face, startled. “Order what you think you’ll enjoy.”

  “Well, well, what do we have here?”

  Under his breath, Jax groaned, and he casually let go of Raven’s hand. Of course, Margo Brentwood, Lucia’s best friend, would be here. At least he hadn’t lied to Lucia about where he was going—the news would be in Lucia’s ear in five seconds. Providing she wasn’t . . . busy.

  Jax stood and gave Raven the eye, warning her not to follow suit, but Raven set aside her menu. Jax, muttering under his breath, quickly stepped around Margo, rested his hand on Raven’s bare shoulder, and held her in place. Men stood. Women did not. With her skin warming his fingertips, and the ends of her hair skimming the back of his hand, small facts that made Margo arch an eyebrow, Jax said, “Margo
, this is Raven, Raven, Margo. I’m helping Raven get settled into the city. She’s . . . new to the area. Raven, Margo is a friend of Lucia’s.”

  Raven only nodded.

  “It’s . . . kind of you to help,” Margo drawled, taking in as much of Raven as she could. “She’s very . . .” Margo tilted her head, “. . . melancholy. I can see it in her eyes. You don’t like the area, Raven?”

  Raven stared, unflinching. “It’s very cold.”

  Margo’s smile turned smug. “That is a problem.”

  “Indeed.”

  Jax tried to hide his smile and failed. “Good evening, Margo.”

  After he took his seat, he motioned for the waiter. “I need a drink.”

  “What was she talking about?”

  “That cold bit? She thought you were talking about me. She doesn’t like me much.”

  “I was talking about her. She’s not very nice.”

  “No, she’s not, but she’s receptive. She could see you’re sad.”

  “It’s a lot to take in,” she mumbled.

  Jax took a moment to order for them. Salad to start, then mushrooms stuffed with crab and cheese. Filet mignon, twice baked potatoes, and green beans with almond slivers, cheesecake for dessert. Appropriate wines for each plate, espresso with the cheesecake. Jax thought she would appreciate the simple meal.

  Not wanting the topic to slip away, the moment the waiter took their menus, he said, “My mother told me you almost changed your mind yesterday. What upset you to the point you would want out of our deal?”

  “Grace told you that? Aren’t I going to have any privacy?”

  “Do you think I have any?” Jax asked, amused. Of course she wouldn’t have any privacy. If anything, he would continue to watch her like a hawk until the minute she stepped out of his house for the last time.

  “You can have whatever you want.”

  Jax lowered his eyes. If that’s what she truly thought, she was mistaken.

  “No one can have whatever they want. Not even me. Especially me. Things have a way of happening that can ruin any chance at happiness.”

  Raven snorted, and Jax wanted to kick her for being rude. Though kicking her wouldn’t have been the best way to demonstrate manners.

  “Like I feel sorry for you. Your mansion, your fancy job, whatever it is you do. A family who loves you. Like you have problems.”

  “Is that what you see when you look at me?”

  Raven leaned closer, shoving her elbows onto the table.

  Jax winced.

  “What did you see when you first looked at me? Did you see a woman down on her luck, cleaning a church, trying to make ends meet? Did you see a woman, someone’s daughter, someone’s,” her breath hitched, “sister, struggling to pay rent? Keep a roof over her head? What did you see when you looked at me, Jax? You saw a druggie, didn’t you? You saw a strung-out whore. And you used me like one, too. Go ahead and play victim. Whatever happened to you, go see a fancy shrink, and leave the pain and suffering to the people who really know what that is.”

  The sommelier presented Jax with a white to accompany their salads and the mushrooms. Jax nodded stiffly in agreement after the first sip.

  He stung. There was no doubt about it. He stung. Because never in his life had his words and actions been flung back in his face.

  At times, Erik tried to make Jax see reason. Other people had problems. Jax’s accident wasn’t the worst thing someone had gone through. But he was consumed by what he’d done, the family he’d destroyed through a simple act of carelessness, and he couldn’t listen. Guilt ate at his insides like cancer, and the only way to keep his remains intact was to close himself off. Close himself off from love, from friendships. Only this woman sitting in front of him had, in the sixteen years since he’d pulled the trigger, made him feel anything but misery and vehement hate whenever he looked at himself in the mirror.

  He’d thawed, in that church, just for a moment, and ashamed he’d felt anything, even for a second, he’d made her pay.

  “Then tell me, Raven. Why were you on the streets? What is your pain?”

  She sat back when the waiter placed her plate of filet mignon in front of her. The salad and the mushrooms had been taken away untouched and unnoticed.

  The people in the dining room faded away, and as Raven’s eyes filled with tears, her beauty struck him. In the dim light, she looked like a painting. Her eyes shimmered with unshed hurt, her skin twinkled with candlelight, her hair sparkled. She could crook her finger at any man, and they would kneel before her and beg. For one brief second, he pictured Erik there, and though his mind rebelled at the idea, thought he should let his brother have her.

  She lifted a trembling hand to her lips and took a sip of the red the sommelier had poured to accompany the beef. “I prefer red,” she said, carefully setting the wineglass onto the white tablecloth.

  He waited her out.

  Raven sighed. “I lost my brother when I was young. Not terribly young, but I was old enough that it hit me hard. We were close, and his death . . . was my fault. If I hadn’t been . . . well, that doesn’t matter, does it?” She met his eyes. “People can say all sorts of things, but that doesn’t absolve you of responsibility.”

  Jax nodded. He knew that all too well.

  “My parents couldn’t deal with my behavior, and pushed to their limits, they kicked me out. It doesn’t hit you all at once, you know? That you have no where to go. Until it starts to get dark and you realize you’re not welcome at home and you can’t go back.”

  “And the makeover, the classes?” Jax asked.

  “My parents won’t talk to me unless I’m ‘normal’. That’s what they say. ‘Normal’. Like anyone can be normal after something like that happens. But I’m going to try. I miss them. They lost their son because of me. I feel like I don’t deserve to be loved by them, but when I feel like that, I’m punishing them as well as myself. They don’t blame me. They never have. I’ve taken that burden onto myself.” She raised her hands to encompass the restaurant. “This is my ‘normal’. Learning how to live like this. When Grace took me shopping yesterday, that’s what I thought when I looked at myself for the first time. After the makeover. I thought, ‘this is a woman my parents would let into their house’. After thirteen years, it was a surreal moment.”

  “Yet you told my mother you had changed your mind.”

  “Asking you for classes, for new clothes . . . that’s just money, and you can spare it.”

  Jax’s mouth quirked. “Thanks.”

  Raven wiped her cheeks. “I mean, it wasn’t the money you were spending on me. It was everything else. Mariah cooking for me, your mom taking me shopping. Even Erik when he stayed with me while I was sick. I’m taking up everyone’s time, and I don’t deserve it. I didn’t consider that part of things, that’s all.”

  “So would you, right now, let me off the hook?” Jax asked, curious. “Sign the papers?”

  “Yes.”

  He let her answer hang in the air, the murmur of patrons buzzing around them. She didn’t want people to work for her, when that was one of many things Jax took for granted. He paid them, and he would have thought staying at his house would make her feel entitled.

  Lucia certainly felt that way and had taken over from the first morning she woke in his bed.

  But Raven would give up any chance of finding stability because she felt bad for Mariah cooking her a meal.

  “Where would you go?”

  “Just drop me on Z Avenue, and I would find somewhere. I’m good at it.” She tried to smile. “I won’t freeze to death.”

  “Would you feel better if you worked?”

  “Actually, yes. I need to feel like I contribute.”

  “That’s admirable. A work ethic is valuable. Some people go through life expecting others to work on their behalf. Do you get along with Mariah? You should eat before that gets cold.” He pointed at her plate with his fork.

  She picked up her steak knife. “We ge
t along, I think. I haven’t spoken with her much, but she did warn me to stay away from Lucia.”

  Jax nodded, in appreciation for Mariah’s advice, as well as for the piece of beef melting in his mouth. He swallowed and took a sip of wine. “Good. Why don’t we ask her to teach you to cook? You’ll be helping, but you’ll also be learning a skill. We’ll take it from there, okay?”

  “Why are you doing this when I just said I would give you what you want?”

  Jax didn’t answer, only circled his finger in the air, encouraging her to finish her meal.

  Raven fell asleep in the car on the way home, and her head lolled against the seat until it rested on his shoulder.

  Why was he giving her this chance?

  Because as she was telling her story, he realized just because they looked different on the outside, they were the same on the inside.

  The disgust he felt looking at himself in the mirror every morning was exactly how she thought about herself.

  They weren’t different at all.

  They were exactly the same.

  Chapter 6

  Raven settled into a routine of sorts over the following weeks. Tutoring in the morning and afternoon followed by cooking lessons in the evening took up almost every minute of her day.

  Her lack of education embarrassed her, and when the tutor gave her a laptop, she’d looked at it like it was an alien spaceship, afraid to touch it. Despite her lack of exposure to technology, tutors introduced her to several subjects, and she soaked up the knowledge. It amazed her that after all this time she still remembered her times tables.

  Homework assignments filled her evenings, and after eating a meal she helped Mariah prepare, Raven would lock herself in her room. She’d study late into the night.

  She rarely saw Jax, and only once or twice a week did Erik visit, saying Jax was keeping him busy at work.

  Raven knew the real reason, though—Jax didn’t want him talking to her. It hurt, but Raven could understand the reasons why. There was no point in becoming too close to any member of the Brooks family. Jax was making sure she didn’t feel as if she belonged in his house. Her stay was temporary.