by Rinyu, Beth
“Please leave now! Or—” Bridgette started with her quivering voice barely audible.
“Or you’ll what?” He raised an eyebrow. “Call the police? Have me thrown in jail?” he shouted, his rage intensifying with each word that spewed from his mouth. “Don’t you fuckin’ threaten me!”
I pushed Bridgette behind me, coming between him and her when he started to charge at her.
“Don’t even fuckin’ think about it! She told you to leave, now get the fuck out!” I shouted, grabbing him by the shirt and pushing him against the wall. The anger I was feeling all day long was finally coming to a head and this guy was about to get the wrath of it if he kept up his threats.
I loosened my grip once I was certain he was backing down. He took a deep breath and focused his attention on Bridgette, pointing his finger at her. “Next time you involve yourself in someone else’s business, you won’t be so lucky to have someone here to rescue you,” he hissed, still glaring at her with fire in his eyes. Bridgette let out a relieved breath when he made his way to the elevator. It was obvious this guy scared her. “Does your husband know he’s fucking you?” he shouted, turning around, looking at me and then back at Bridgette as the elevator doors opened. “Maybe I should tell him and ruin your life like you did mine.”
He actually thought I was fucking Bridgette? This guy was more delusional than I thought. He scowled at Katie one last time before disappearing into the elevator. Bridgette rushed to Katie’s side once he was out of sight. I looked around to find half of the HR and marketing departments taking in the show. Great, now they all thought I was fucking Bridgette too.
“Just to set the record straight before any rumors get started. I’m not sleeping with Bridgette. She’s married, and I have a girlfriend I care about very much,” I announced, causing them all to scatter like ants.
Bridgette shook her head and managed a laugh even in her flustered state.
“Are you okay, Katie?” I asked.
“Yes, I’m so sorry about all that.” Her hands were still shaking as she pushed her hair behind her ear and wiped away the tears that were streaming down her face.
“Katie, why don’t you go hang out in my office until you calm down a bit.” Bridgette’s tone was soft and gentle.
Katie nodded, taking the tissue Bridgette was offering before heading into Bridgette’s office.
“Is she going to be okay? He’s not going to be waiting for her at home with a gun, is he?” I asked Bridgette once Katie was out of earshot.
She shook her head, but still seemed a little unsure of her reply. “I’m not gonna lie, he’s a little out there. He’s roughed her up pretty bad a few times that I know of, and when he drinks it’s ten times worse,” Bridgette whispered. “He hates me because I was the one who finally talked her into leaving him. Her boys are at her brother’s house with her sister-in-law. Her brother is a cop. He’s been trying to talk her into getting a restraining order against him for months, but she feels bad doing it because of her boys.”
Guess everyone had family problems, and right now Katie’s seemed a lot worse than mine.
“Is everything okay up here? Someone called a few minutes ago?” One of the security guards from the lobby interrupted as he stepped off the elevator.
“Yeah, it’s under control,” Bridgette replied.
“No…” I shook my head. “There was a man who just left here. Dark hair and a white shirt. He’s not to be let up here again.”
“About how long ago did he leave? I’ll replay the video and get a still photo of him,” the security guard asked.
“About five minutes ago,” I answered.
“His name is Damon Lanslow,” Bridgette chimed in.
“Got it. Let me go review the video. I’ll let my guys on duty know, and we’ll add him to the list,” the man advised.
Bridgette nodded, closing her eyes and letting out a deep sigh as the security guard walked away. “Thanks,” she murmured to me. “I don’t know where my head is. I should have told him not to let him back in the building.” It was clear that she was rattled by everything that had just gone down, but I was impressed by the way she handled it. She had seemed to be out of sorts all day long, spending most of the morning in the bathroom throwing up. I had only known that because I overheard one of the women from the marketing department offering her something to alleviate her nausea. But as she sat behind Katie’s desk, her skin paler than usual, her expression blank, it was obvious that this had taken a toll on her. “I’m going to have Katie call her brother and see if he can pick her up. I don’t want her leaving here alone.”
I nodded in agreement. “Not to freak you out, but I don’t think you should be leaving here alone either. I think he was angrier at you than her.”
“Yeah, I know.” She shook her head and raked her hand through her hair. “My husband is actually meeting me here in a bit for an appointment we have, so I’m good.”
I nodded. “All right then, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Lukas!” Bridgette called as I started to walk away.
“Yeah?” I turned around to face her.
“I do realize what he was capable of doing if you weren’t here to stop him, so thank you.”
There was a genuine sincerity to her words.
“No problem.”
I grabbed my phone from my pocket when I stepped onto the busy sidewalk, trying to clear my head from the commotion that had just taken place a few moments ago. I had just admitted to a few dozen people how I felt about Emmeline. It was no longer emotions kept between her and me. I was willing to tell the world how much I cared about this girl and just the mere thought of those people who didn’t even know her thinking that I was screwing around on her with some made-up rantings of a lunatic bothered me. I needed to talk to her and set things straight. I pulled her up in my contacts, toying with whether I should call her or not, when another form of peace offering occurred to me. I was never good at saying, “I’m sorry,” so I was hoping this would do.
Chapter 27
Emme
GET USED TO it. Emme, this is what it’s going to be like once your little secret is revealed. That was the best I could do to get me through Lukas’ silence. He was clearly pissed at me for meeting with his mother and obviously still wasn’t over it, and I wasn’t going to force him to get over it by calling or texting. What if he didn’t? What if I never heard from him again? What if all this time, I was worried about him shutting me out because of my little charade, and this ended up being the final nail in the coffin? The queen of overthinking was at it again.
“I think that glass is clean.” My father snuck up behind me, causing me to jump. He was right. My hands were shriveled-up prunes from over-scrubbing the glass in my hand while I let my thoughts run amuck. I rinsed it thoroughly and placed it on the drying board, trying desperately to put my mind to rest.
“Just making sure you maintain your A-plus rating with the Health Department.” I deflected from my misery with a little sarcasm.
“Can you go out to the front while I run to the basement?”
“Yes, boss.” I walked away and he playfully swatted me with the dishtowel.
My eyes swept left to right when I walked out to the bar area, stopping on the person who had been plaguing my thoughts the entire day. “Go on and be nice.” My father had a knack for sneaking up behind me. Clearly his need to go in the basement to get me out here was just a farce. I hadn’t told him about my little disagreement with Lukas last night, but I was sure my moping gave it away. I went around to the other side of the bar and cautiously approached him.
“Hey,” I whispered.
“You got a minute?”
I nodded. For him I had more than a minute. I had however much time he wanted or needed.
“I’m not good at this at all.”
“This being?” I gazed up at him, waiting for an explanation.
“Apologizing. Saying I was wrong.”
“I think you just did.�
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He remained stone-faced, still not seeming satisfied. “No, Emmeline. It was wrong of me to take my frustration out on you. My mother had no right dragging you into this.”
“It’s fine, Lukas. If you want, I can totally forget about everything she said.”
He shook his head. “That’s just it. How can you forget?”
“Because, really, it’s not my business, and I totally get where you’re coming from with your feelings. I was seeing someone seriously. I thought that maybe he was getting ready to pop the question. Turns out, he was getting ready to tell me he was sleeping with one of my best friends.”
His eyes softened ever so slightly.
“I know, it’s not the same as your situation, but I know how angry I was toward the two of them. I can only imagine how you feel with it being your brother.”
“You were angry. You’re not angry anymore?”
I shook my head. “Surprisingly I’m not. I don’t feel anything anymore toward the two of them.”
“What made you get to that point?”
“Not what...who.”
He cinched his eyebrows, seeming thoroughly confused.
“You helped me get to that point. I realize now that not all guys are like that and there was something better beyond him. I beat myself up for months, wondering where we went wrong or what I could’ve done differently to have made him choose me instead. But now I know, I couldn’t have done anything differently. At the time, I wanted to win so bad, I hadn’t realized I had already lost. If he had chosen me over her, I would’ve never been happy because he wasn’t the man I always thought him to be. The same way she wasn’t the girl you thought she was.”
His gaze dropped to the floor and he blinked hard before focusing on me once again. I took a step closer and grabbed his hands.
“You’ll get there one day, Lukas. One day when you least expect it, the sound of their names won’t be like a knife driving through your heart. The thought of them living out a happy life together won’t make you feel like you want to puke. That’s when you know you’re at that point. I’m not telling you that you should rush to your brother’s side because everyone is telling you that’s the right thing to do because of his accident. Don’t do it until your heart is ready to. It may be tomorrow. It may be next year. It may never be. But until your heart is there, nothing will be achieved for either of you. You’ll still be festering that anger deep inside you and hating yourself and everyone else even more for doing something you weren’t ready to do.” I found it ironic that I was giving him a lesson on forgiveness. Was I subconsciously hoping he’d use this same logic when it came to him and me?
“Wow, I wasn’t expecting—”
“For me to see your side of it?”
He nodded.
“Well, I do, and I don’t think you’re a horrible person because of it.”
“So, does this mean I didn’t have to do this to beg for your forgiveness?” He reached into his pocket and pulled out two tickets.
Tears pricked my eyes and flowed down my face. Two tickets for Saturday’s matinee of Beautiful on Broadway. He had no clue how much those two little tickets meant to me. Especially on the date that he unknowingly got them for—the one-year anniversary of my mother’s death. I threw my arms around him, letting out a deep sob.
“If you don’t want to go, or you don’t feel like you’re ready—”
“No, I’m ready…I’m ready to go with you.” I was unable to stop the flow of tears, crying for my mother, crying for the kind gesture he had just shown, and crying for the most perfect man in the world, a man who wouldn’t be mine for much longer.
_______________
It was 3:12 a.m., only seven minutes later than the last time I reached for my phone in the darkness, praying it would be at least 5:00 a.m., a more respectable hour to be getting out of bed and having coffee. I couldn’t sleep. My thoughts were filled with Lukas, the way he’d make love to me with just the right balance of passion and gentleness. The way he’d get that mischievous grin on his face, knowing what he was in for when my lips would trail down his stomach. The way our bodies would tremble together as they came down from the high we’d put each other in. The way I found myself needing him more than I ever needed anyone.
Myra told me my heart would tell me what to do when it came to telling him the truth. My heart was screaming to me at that moment as I lay in bed in the middle of the night with tears saturating my pillow. You can’t let this go on any longer. You have to let him know, regardless of the outcome. You’re a better person than that. He’s a better person than that. A person you had misjudged so harshly, so wrongly. A person you wanted to see differently all because your sister told you to.
Chapter 28
Lukas
I STOOD OUTSIDE the bar and stared blankly at the email that had just come through on my phone, thinking maybe the words would change if I read it for a tenth time, but they hadn’t. They had taken my recommendation, and I was to return to Germany in one week. “Fuck,” I whispered.
Emmeline and I had only touched briefly on what was going to happen between us once I was gone, so briefly I couldn’t remember if we even really discussed it at all. I seemed to remember that four-letter word that complicates everything getting in the way, when I started to have that discussion with her. Still, understanding where I stood with her where that was concerned, knowing she had the same feelings for me as I had for her, should’ve been a weight off my shoulders. It wasn’t. If anything, I was more confused than ever about how to approach the situation. One thing was for sure. I couldn’t imagine my life without her in it. I wasn’t going to let it ruin the day I had planned with her. I knew how much those tickets meant to her, and after learning that it was the one-year anniversary of her mother’s death, today was going to be even more emotional for her. I wasn’t going to add to it by discussing our future plans. Not today anyway.
I put my phone away and walked into the bar where Emmeline was waiting with a mile-wide smile, but through that beautiful expression adorning her face, I sensed sadness in her eyes. She stood up and looped her arms around my neck once I approached her. “I’m so excited for this,” she said right before her lips meshed with mine.
“Are you guys off to the show?” Emmeline’s father appeared from the back, still managing a hint of his happy-go-lucky demeanor through his long, drawn-out face.
“We are, but we’ll be back around dinner. We’ll order pizza or something,” Emmeline replied.
She had asked me if I was okay with coming back here after to have dinner with her father. She didn’t want him to be alone tonight of all nights. I was more than okay with that. The love and dedication she showed toward him was admirable. I was surprised that her sister wasn’t around to be spending time with him today as well, but I didn’t question it. Emmeline never spoke about her sister, and I didn’t ask. I knew how sensitive sibling rivalry could be with my own brother, so I didn’t want to make her discuss it if her relationship with her sister was anything like mine was with my brother.
That was the thing about Emmeline and me, we seemed to have an unspoken agreement with each other. If something was too uncomfortable to talk about with each other, we just didn’t. We didn’t pry. We didn’t try to be each other’s shrink by giving unsolicited advice to one another. We just let it be. I wasn’t used to that. My entire life I was always made to feel like I should express my feelings, and then when I did, my parents were too busy to listen. My teachers were too rigid to care. Instead of guiding me, they’d lecture me into how they thought I was supposed to feel.
As a result, I shut down to everyone, with the exception of my brother. He was the only one I was never afraid to open up to. Was. Now, I saw where that got me. But sometimes, actually a lot of times, I felt as if Emmeline was filling that void he had left behind. I wanted to share things with her. I wanted to tell her about my day and how I was feeling, and even though I was initially pissed over that stunt my mother had p
ulled, I was relieved now that it was out in the open. Emmeline was the first person I truly felt was able to grasp the entire situation and exactly how I was feeling. She didn’t judge me for it, and her advice really helped me put things into perspective.
Emmeline pecked her father on his cheek, and we were on our way. She squeezed my hand when we stepped outside into the warm, soupy air and snuck in another kiss. “Thanks for making me the happiest I have ever been on a day I’ve been dreading the entire year.”
“Anytime.” I smiled, hoping I’d be able to do much more of it in years to come.
_______________
I couldn’t hold back my laughter as Emmeline bounced down the street doing her own theatrical performance of “One Fine Day.” She was like a kid in church during the entire show, dying to bust out in song. A few times she even did moving along to the beat. “Don’t quit your day job,” I teased.
She sang the lyrics to me, stopping in the middle of the jam-packed street, caressing the side of my face with her hand.
“Too late. I already do want you, and you already are my girl.”
Something in her expression had changed. The spark that was in her eyes moments ago seemed to disappear, gazing at me like she had something she wanted to say, but couldn’t find the words for. We flagged down a taxi and I slid in after her. After giving the driver the address, she remained quiet, a stark contrast from that girl singing and dancing down the busy Broadway streets a few minutes ago.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Nothing. Just hot.” She fanned herself with the show program and tried to play it off, but she was anything but believable. Her phone dinged with a text and I couldn’t help but notice the message across the screen when she pulled it from her purse.
Myra: Have you made your decision?
“Well, have you?” The words rolled off my tongue before I could even stop myself. But I had been dying to know the answer to that question ever since she had told me about the offer she had been given. “I’m sorry, that’s not my business.” I redirected.