The Hookup

by Zante, Lily

  He laughed. “Oh great,” he chuckled. “Now you’re analyzing me. Make it mean whatever you want, whatever makes you feel better about yourself.”

  “You’re heartless,” she said, her voice shaky. “I don’t know why you’re doing this. When we got together, it wasn’t like that. You know it wasn’t.”

  Tell her it was. Tell her. Do it now. “Who are you kidding? It was exactly like that. I knew that if I fucked you, and humiliated you like that, you’d have enough dignity to know you didn’t want to come back for more.”

  Her eyes glassed over, and she fought back tears.

  “But I couldn’t shake you off,” he said, watching the tears in her eyes and hating himself. But he took that hatred and turned it back at her. “You settled for it. You agreed to it.”

  “It was never like that. Never. You’re scared, and you’re lashing out, and you don’t mean what you’re saying.”

  “I do mean it, and I’m doing you a favor by telling you now.” He attempted a shrill laugh. “Your nickname is written all over your forehead. Good Time Kay. Guys see you coming a mile off. If you played hard to get, you might get some respect from guys, instead of letting them do what they want to you, and you pretending you’re okay with it.”

  She gave him one final mournful look—a look that told him he’d all but destroyed her. And then she slipped out of the room.

  He would never forget the look on her face for as long as he lived. It reminded him of his mother, and how she had looked at the man who had all but killed her.

  The room fell silent then, leaving him feeling more wretched than ever. He had taken her goodness, and her concern, and turned it to dust. He sank back into the bed, wanting to double over, regret and anger racking his body.

  Reality struck, like a bolt of lightning. He’d gone too far this time.

  ~ ~

  He’d taken a sledgehammer to her heart.

  She couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Flying out of the double doors of the hospital, she ran straight into one of the doctors, knocking his folder to the floor.

  “Sorry,” she gasped, her mind a riot of confusion as she bent down to pick up the file.

  He bent down at the same time, looked directly into her tear-stained face. “Are you okay?”

  She straightened up. “I’m fine,” she replied, clasping a hand over her heart, hoping to still her heartbeat.

  “You don’t look so well,” the doctor remarked. “Let me get you a glass of water—”

  “No,” she replied, forcing the breaths to still in her chest. “I’m fine. I was visiting … a friend.” She attempted a smile. “It was the shock of seeing him.” She tried to pull herself together, but it still hurt. He’d stabbed every vital organ in her body, and she was starting to shut down.

  “Some visits can be like that.”

  “I wasn’t prepared for the shock,” she told him. Only when she was outside the hospital, did she stop by a wall to catch her breath.

  A pity fuck?

  Her mind was in disarray, and a montage of their entire time together suddenly flashed into her head.

  It hadn’t been like that. It hadn’t.

  Luke had ripped her heart away with his cruel words. He’d spoken with so much vitriol, that she had felt physically attacked.

  It took a few moments for her to collect herself, before she could walk towards her car, get in, and drive away.

  Chapter 31

  “How are you feeling?” Marie asked.

  Like shit. “I’ve never felt better.”

  Marie gave him a sad smile.

  “Quit looking at me like that,” he said slowly. “Like you feel sorry for me.”

  “Me? Feel sorry for you?” She quirked an eyebrow, but he knew her. Knew she was concerned. “How was the surgery?” she asked.

  “Better than sex.”

  She glowered at him. “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that.”

  He closed his eyes, and smiled. He wasn’t sure why he said that. The nausea had subsided, and the effects of the general anesthetic were starting to wear off. Even the surgical site wasn’t that painful, but the nurse had warned him that it would feel tight as the skin healed.

  “What time did Kay leave?”

  “Soon after she got here.” He opened his eyes to take in Marie’s response.

  “Why? What did you do?” she asked in a disapproving voice.

  “Just told her a few home truths.”

  Marie angled her head, looking distinctly annoyed. “What did you do?” she asked carefully, as if he’d left an explosive device in a public area.

  “Told her what she needed to hear.”

  Marie shook her head. “You upset her, didn’t you?”

  “My neck hurts,” he replied, closing his eyes, not wanting to think about it.

  ~ ~

  “What the fuck happened?” Remington’s voice cut through the air like a heat-seeking missile.

  “I—I got the dates messed up. I’m sorry.”

  “Jesus Christ, Kay. What’s the matter with you?”

  She swallowed. “It’s turned hectic all of a sudden—”

  “You’re fucking paid to deal with hectic,” he roared.

  “It won’t happen again.”

  “It fucking better not,” he growled, “because if you mess up again, I’ll take you off this so fast you won’t know what hit you, is that clear?”

  “Yes.”

  She couldn’t sleep last night. She couldn’t get Luke’s nasty, vindictive words out of her head.

  A pity-fuck.

  That’s what he’d told her she had been to him. She had been wide awake until the early hours of the morning, watching the clock blinking in the new minutes one by one.

  She had gone over every conversation, and every interaction with Luke from the moment they had first met.

  The logical part of her brain told her that he was lashing out. That Luke was angry, and bitter over his illness, but her heart told her otherwise. It convinced her that he was speaking his truth, that this so-called relationship of theirs, the one where she had hoped to change him, and slowly win him over—had been nothing but a farce.

  The truth came out when people were in a corner, and right now for Luke, it was the worst corner he could be in.

  It seemed unfair, and her heart ached for him, but her sadness came in jolts because every now and then she would remember what he had said, and how he had said it all while lying in his hospital bed.

  She had looked it all up online, wanting to understand what he was going through. The search engine results wibbly-wobbly through her tearful eyes as she dug deeper and deeper into the dark bottomless pit of the ‘net. She found herself wading through graphs and cancer stories, fearing for Luke even though this was supposedly a common and curable type of cancer.

  Luke would be fine.

  He wasn’t going to die.

  And yet she was afraid, and hurt, and upset. She was torn between feeling sympathetic towards this man who was so hard to love, and equally as hurt by the way he had treated her yesterday.

  She had gone to bed in tears, and had completely forgotten to look over the reports for the client; reports which contained a few errors that had been picked up by one of their analysts. Remington had had to apologize on her behalf because she’d woken up late and missed the 7am meeting.

  She didn’t cry easily—a hardened woman like her. She was used to surviving in a man’s world and considered herself to be as able as the men. She had assimilated a man’s way of thinking because she’d had to in order to forge ahead with her career.

  But last night had set her back, and her mind was a barrage of torn emotions. She had rushed to the hospital forgetting the slights she had suffered at his hands, and had felt only concern that the man she had started to have feelings for, the man who was so wrong for her, might be gravely ill.

  And she had left that same hospital room deeply hurt by the nasty words Luke had hurled at her.
/>
  She had gone in worrying about him, and thinking long-term, as if he was her boyfriend, as if they had promised one another eternal life and togetherness forever.

  And he had told her that he’d seen her as nothing more than a pity-fuck.

  Against a background of such things, she couldn’t focus, at work, or at home. At work she was all over the place, and this morning it had culminated in Remington shouting at her across the open plan office environment because she had messed up big time. He’d yelled at her, ordering her to come into his office immediately. She’d rushed past the desks, feeling the heat of her colleagues’ stares on her face.

  Once inside, she was sure they had all heard his continued yelling, and the walk of shame back to her desk had been pitiful.

  She couldn’t afford to mess up again.

  And yet, Luke had his surgery today, and he didn’t want her anywhere around him. It didn’t mean that she didn’t worry about him.

  “What was that about?” Erin had crept up to her desk, and stood looking down at her.

  She wasn’t in the mood to talk. “I’ll tell you later.” She wanted to be alone, to get on with her work, to find something to focus on so that her mind didn’t hover over the dressing down to the dark places, of Luke in surgery.

  “Did you mess up bad?”

  “Yes. I didn’t check the reports before we sent them through.”

  “Ouch.” Erin made an appropriately sorry face. “We could hear him shouting.”

  Kay glanced around the open place office, and saw a few heads turn away quickly. “I hate it when he does that.”

  “The guy’s an ass,” Erin agreed. “He’s real mad.”

  “I messed up. It was my fault. It’s an important account.” Remington was level-headed, for the most part. She’d messed up bad, and she had to suck it up and make up for it.

  Only, it was almost impossible to focus.

  How could she?

  She wanted to speak to someone. She wanted to talk to Savannah, wanted some of that simple, no-nonsense advice that her cousin seemed to dole out by the bucketful. Only, this time, it wasn’t advice she wanted. She wanted to confess. Spill her guts out, and have Savannah make her feel better. Luke had humiliated her. He made what they had had seem shameful, and her out to be shameless.

  She was hurt by the difference in how they both viewed the same event.

  Trying to hide the sadness—for him, and for what he had said, as well as the work pressure, was killing her.

  If she wasn’t careful, she would implode.

  But even though Luke Hunter could be cold and uncaring, deep down she knew that the man who’d told her she had been nothing more than a pity-fuck was also an angry and frightened man.

  “Let’s go for a drink tonight,” Erin suggested.

  “You seem to want to go for a drink every night.” She lowered her head, trying to still her mind.

  “We all need a place to go and unwind. The bar is the perfect place.”

  “I can’t. I really can’t. I’ve got too much to do. You heard him. You all heard him. Remington’s going to be watching me like a hawk, and I can’t afford to mess up.”

  Erin didn’t force the issue further. “I don’t want to get you in more trouble,” she said. “Maybe another time.”

  “Another time,” said Kay, hearing her cell phone go off, and answering it.

  “I need to see you.” It was Marie. “I have Luke’s cell phone. He’s out of surgery.”

  She let out a breath she didn’t even know she had been holding. “He is? How is he?”

  “Heavily sedated, and completely out of it.”

  She could picture him now, sleeping, with his eyes closed, and that beautiful mouth, capable of inflicting the cruelest torture and the sweetest rapture. “So, it was successful?” she asked, suddenly overcome by a burning desire to be by his bedside. When she had woken up this morning, her initial thoughts—those first few fleeting moments devoid of yesterday’s memories—made her think of him, and she’d had the urge to rush to the hospital. Until she remembered how things had ended last night.

  “It seems to be. When are you coming?”

  “Ugh.” This was going to be awkward to answer. “You are coming to see him, aren’t you?” Marie asked.

  “I don’t think he wants me there.”

  “You have to learn to ignore him, Kay.”

  She gave a subtle nod of her head, her eyes downcast. “He doesn’t want to see me. He made that perfectly clear.”

  “I know something happened, but he’s not so bad. He didn’t meant it, I’m sure that whatever he said—”

  “If you’d heard him, you wouldn’t doubt that he meant it.”

  “Don’t be like him. He has nobody else.”

  Chapter 32

  She returned to the hospital room she had fled yesterday.

  Marie gave her a tired smile as soon as she walked through the door. She rose from her chair. “Thank goodness you’re here. For a moment I was worried that you might not come, being busy at work and all that.” Walking towards her, she gave her a hug. “I was hoping he hadn’t scared you away. I’m glad he didn’t.”

  “I had to finish some things off,” she explained, walking towards the bed. Luke had opened his eyes at the sound of her voice.

  “See,” Marie said to Luke, returning to her seat by his bed. “I told you she’d come.”

  Kay looked at him, and he stared back, his face impassive. Hard to read. “I don’t think he wants me here,” she commented.

  “Nonsense,” replied Marie, dismissing her comment with a chuckle. “He can’t talk much at the moment, otherwise he’d tell you how happy he was to see you.”

  “He can’t talk much?” she asked, beaming. “Oh, what a shame. How was the surgery?”

  “According to the doctor, He’s got a sore throat, and his voice is a bit hoarse, swallowing food is going to be hard, but he should be fine in a few days’ time. Then he’ll be ready to go home and recover.” She pinned her gaze on Luke’s face. “No going into work or working from home for a couple of weeks. The doctor advises complete rest.”

  Kay searched his expression to gauge his reaction. A man like Luke didn’t sit still, couldn’t sit still. He was always on the go. She wondered how he would cope. Silent rage tainted that face of his, still so handsome despite him looking gaunt and helpless.

  “Is he in pain?” she asked Marie.

  “The nurse says he’s on heavy pain killers.”

  “He looks angry,” she said, enjoying the power she had over a silent Luke.

  “I didn’t want him to be alone, but now that you’re here, I need to go. My kids will need feeding, and goodness knows we’re low on groceries.”

  “Sure,” Kay replied, setting down her bag on the chair. She slipped her coat off. “I’ll stay a while.”

  Marie reached for her coat and her purse, then said her goodbye to Luke who nodded.

  “I’m glad you came,” she said, in a low voice, turning to Kay, and placing her hand on her arm. “Even though he can’t say it, I’m sure Luke’s glad you’re here.”

  Kay doubted that. She turned to him when it was only the two of them left. “You’re not happy to see me, are you?”

  His eyes met hers for the briefest of seconds and a flash of anger flickered across those cornflower blue irises. It was strange how angry a man could seem, even when lying in bed post-op.

  She had to have her say. “I came because I wanted to see you,” she said, holding onto the side of the bed and as she towered over him. “I came because I wanted to know you were okay, even though Marie told me the surgery had gone well. I came, because I care, and I’m not afraid to say it. We had something. You called it a pity-fuck, I called it a connection. I’m not hard and callous, like you, and you’re not the man I thought you were, but it wasn’t going to stop me from coming to see you. I might not have come today, had Marie not guilt-tripped me into it, but I would have come in a day or so, because
guess what, Luke? I’m not a bitch, and I’m not cold and unfeeling like you.” She paused, searching his face for signs of his reaction, and yet at the same time finding it odd that she was talking and he could not say anything back.

  He turned his face to hers and stared, then opened his mouth, but either the pain was too much, or he was still weighing up how he was going to respond, because he said nothing.

  She felt slightly silly, and yet emboldened. For too long, she had given way to this man, let him dictate the way their relationship went. For too long she had given in to him, letting him have his way, whenever he wanted. This was her chance to say it as she saw it, to let him know that she wasn’t a pity-fuck. Her esteem wasn’t that far in the gutter that she would willingly let a man use her and abuse her. She had seen something in Luke, something tortured, and dark, and understood now where that darkness came from.

  She had believed she could help him get over it, and help him heal, but just as there were moments when she thought they could salvage something together, she also harbored doubts.

  Now that this had happened, it allowed for some resting time. Breathing space. A time to assess things. She wasn’t going to abandon him now, not like this, but she wasn’t sure if she could save him, either.

  The nurse walked in again, the same one from yesterday, only this time, she glared at Kay as if she was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  “How long will he be here for?” Kay asked.

  “A few more days. Could be another day, could be a few more. It depends on when the doctors want to discharge him.”

  Kay turned to Luke, not daring to hold his hand, but stroking the side of it with her finger.

  “And how long before he’s back to normal?”

  “A few weeks, could be more. It all depends on his progress and how he heals. If he rests up, his recovery will be quicker. If he doesn’t, he’s only going to make things worse.” The nurse replaced the pitcher of water with a fresh one, and left.

  “You’re going to be fine,” Kay said to Luke. She waited for him to say something, but he didn’t. “I don’t know if I prefer you like this, not saying anything.”