I thought of Randall, but I’d never brought him home, and either way Alec had made it clear he wouldn’t try to contact me again. If he had, he was in for a world of hurt—Alec would make sure of it.
Another man’s words echoed through my head: I brought a box of chocolates—for everyone. I thought maybe you all might enjoy them.
Melvin Herman.
I pushed off the bed, grabbing my silk robe hanging over the couch on my way to the kitchen. Alec pulled on his pants and met me there, taking the note when I passed it to him.
I couldn’t be sure it was Melvin, but if it was, he knew where I lived. I hadn’t considered him much of a threat before, but following me home took on a whole new level of stalkerhood.
“Any idea who this is from?” Alec asked, looking through the box. The frown on his face was etching deeper.
“I have an idea.” I sat on the stool, head in my hands. “I’m not certain though.”
I described Melvin with as much detail as I could remember, while Alec placed the chocolates in a plastic bag from my pantry. I mentioned Randall, too, but Alec had already considered him.
“How many did you eat?” he asked.
“One.” I lied. “Two. Okay, three.” I regretted that now.
“How do you feel?”
I considered this, moved by the way he took my hands in his. Despite recent developments, my muscles were loose and my whole body felt like it was glowing.
“Satisfied?” I offered.
“Anna.”
“Starving?” I shrugged. “You wore me out.”
“Aside from that.”
Concern was starting to needle at my temples. I rubbed at them impatiently.
“Fine.”
“Not tired? No fuzzy memory? Not buzzed?”
“If it is Melvin, I don’t think he’s the type to mess with my chocolate,” I said. “If he thought that was going to win me over, he’s sadly mistaken. Anyone who knows me would know that’s an unforgivable sin.”
“Nothing else has been off lately? The locks haven’t been tampered with, none of your things are missing?”
I shook my head. “You’re starting to freak me out.”
He stepped closer and pulled my arms around his back. “There’s nothing to worry about. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
I closed my eyes, warmed by his words, but my gut sank all the same.
“I couldn’t find my scissors earlier,” I said. “You didn’t move them, did you?”
He took a step back. For the next few minutes, I walked him through everything that had been off over the past week—things I hadn’t worried about, because I thought he’d done them. He made me show him where the scissors had been left, what cabinets had been opened, the different place in my shower where I’d found the shampoo.
“I probably just misplaced some things,” I said, wrapping my arms around my waist. “I’ve been a little preoccupied with everything lately.” I motioned to his half-naked sex-god body.
He kissed my forehead. “Why don’t you call your boss at the salon and see if Herman’s stopped by while you’ve been off.”
I checked the clock; it was almost ten. Derrick would just be closing up.
“That’s a good idea,” I said, feeling heavy.
I found my phone on the table by the door and made the call. Derrick picked up on the last ring. When I told him what had happened, he got very quiet.
“You’re sure it couldn’t be someone else?” he finally asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “It could be.” I hugged the robe tighter around me. Alec was making his own call and speaking quietly enough that I couldn’t tell what he was saying. He’d already checked the dead bolt on the front door and was now inspecting the windows. I looked at my things, my furniture, and wished they made me feel safer.
Derrick sighed. “You better stay home tomorrow. In fact, take a few days.” The click-click-click of computer keys came over the line. “I’ll find someone to cover your clients. File a restraining order first thing in the morning.”
“You really don’t have to do this.” I bit my thumbnail. I was making a nice supplemental income through my home visits, but that didn’t mean I could just skip a few days of work. I’d have to pull money from my trip-to-visit-Dad fund to pay bills.
“I do,” he said. “You do good work, and I want you to keep working for me. You can’t do that if you’re afraid of your clients.”
“I don’t know for sure it’s him,” I argued weakly.
“Let the police decide what to do then,” he said. “I’ll call you if Mr. Herman shows up. Stay safe, Anna. I’ll see you soon.”
I thanked him, and, since Alec was still on the phone, called Amy.
“By any chance did you send me chocolates?” I asked when she picked up, groggy.
“Depends. What kind?”
“The really expensive kind that comes with a note that says I’m sorry.”
She hesitated. “Sure. What was I apologizing for again?”
“Nothing,” I said. Alec had finished his call and tossed his phone on my bed. “I’ll call you tomorrow. Bye.”
I hung up and met him in front of my dresser. “Who was that?”
“A guy that works for me,” he said. “He’s going to look into it.”
I wasn’t sure what that meant, but I was too unsettled to ask. “Doesn’t that seem a little extreme? Maybe I should try to find Melvin and Randall. Ask some questions.”
The whole situation irritated me. If either had been to my house, they had crossed a line, and I needed to make sure they wouldn’t do it again.
“It’s already taken care of,” Alec said, and when he registered my shock, he added. “Neither will know he’s being followed unless he does something stupid. Now pack a bag. We’re staying at my place tonight. We’ll fly to New York first thing in the morning.”
I planted one fist on my hip, feeling my mouth tighten.
“I can take care of myself, you know.”
“I have no doubt,” said Alec, opening drawers and tossing random pieces of clothing onto my bed. “But right now you’re going to let me do it.”
I faltered—half-loving him for being protective, half-wanting to throttle him for being a caveman. But in the end, reason won. Tracking down a potential stalker, even one as seemingly benign as Melvin or Randall, was a stupid thing to do. And as confident as I felt defending myself, the thought of staying here alone right now made me nervous.
“So,” I said. “How’s the weather in New York?”
*
That night we ordered pizza and curled up on his couch to watch a movie. We didn’t talk any more about who had delivered the chocolates, though he kept his phone near him and left the room twice to check his messages. He seemed intent on keeping me distracted; I don’t think he wanted to scare me, but I kept hoping he would come back with answers.
Despite that, there was something romantic about those hours. The passion had been temporarily put on hold, and I was reminded how much I liked Alec, not just for the things he could do to my body, but the way he made me feel when I was with him. He smiled easily, and laughed as we recited lines from the movie. When I told him I wanted a Hawaiian pizza with extra pineapple, he told me it was a shame we wouldn’t last. And when I groaned because I had forgotten my toothbrush, he revealed that he’d picked one up for me earlier that day at the drugstore. He even acted shy when I noticed it was the same exact one I had at home.
Later, after he’d packed, we lay in bed, me in one of his T-shirts and him in his boxers, both staring out the window at the night sky. His thumb grazed absently over my stomach, and I could feel his warm breath in my hair. His touch was hypnotizing, and with his warm body spooned behind me, my eyelids started to droop.
“Anna,” he said quietly. “What are your dreams about?”
When I stiffened, he pulled me closer.
“What happened to you?” he asked.
I was qui
et for a long time. My chest had begun to ache, a dull, consistent throb, but the chill stayed away. Maybe it was because he was so warm that I told him. Maybe it was because I trusted him. Either way, when I opened my mouth, my voice was as thin as glass.
“My birth mother used to party when I was little. Hard stuff. She did whatever she could for it. It was that way as long as I could remember.”
I closed my eyes, seeing the pockmarks on her face and that crazed look in her eyes. “She was really pretty once; she used to tell me that’s how she met my father. He picked her out of a crowd at a concert. She didn’t even remember what concert it was. I guess it was fitting—she didn’t remember his name, either.”
I took a deep breath. “She used to set me up at the fast-food playgrounds while she went to find a date. They were always crowded enough that no one noticed I was alone. Sometimes she was gone an hour, sometimes longer. I was six the first time she didn’t come back. After a while I got scared and went looking for her. Child protective services found me first. They brought me home and gave her a slap on the wrist.”
“How?” he asked. His hand had gone still on my belly. “Why did they bring you back?”
“She put on a good show,” I said. “Our cupboards were never empty. I never had any bruises or marks. And I never, ever ratted her out. I became a social worker because I thought I’d be able to see through all that bullshit, that I’d be able to tell when people were lying. I could. But as long as they said all the right things, there was nothing I could do about it. I wasn’t any more effective than the workers who’d returned me that day.”
“That’s why you left the job,” he said.
“I did what I could,” I said. “But in the end that wasn’t enough.”
He considered this a moment.
“What did your mom do when they brought you back?”
I snuggled closer to him. “She was furious that I’d run away. She told me the social workers would feed me to the rats if they caught me again.” I tried to laugh, but it was a hollow, weak sound. “She locked me in her closet for the rest of the night.”
“Did she . . .” His grip tightened, then deliberately relaxed. “Did any of her dates . . .”
“Touch me?” I murmured. “Not that I can remember.”
He was quiet, waiting for me to continue. My throat was thick, and the words were hard to find.
“When I was eight, she left me for good. I waited all day—nine hours. The cashiers noticed me and said they were going to call my parents, but I said she’d be right back. After a while they called the police. One cop car came. Then a bunch more.” I rubbed the heel of my hand into my forehead.
He turned me to face him, sheltered me in his arms. “You don’t have to say . . .”
“She was dead in some john’s car in the parking lot.” I was unable to stop now. It was flooding from me like water from a broken pipe. “I waited all day for her to come, and she was right there, thirty feet away. Heroin overdose. I didn’t find that out until later. This cop sat with me until the manager locked up. He was the one who finally convinced me to leave. Benjamin Rossi. He came to visit me in foster care that week, then the next week he brought his wife.”
“They adopted you,” said Alec, filling in the blanks.
“Later that year. My mom—Katie, my real mom—she died a few years ago from cancer, so it’s just Dad and me now.” I took a deep breath, surprised by how much lighter I felt. “And now that I’m missing these next few days, I probably won’t get to see him for a little while longer.”
For a long time we said nothing. I could tell he was working through what I’d said; his heart beat quickly, and the thumb of his free hand tapped against his leg. I began to wonder if maybe I’d said too much and scared him off.
“My mom left us too,” he said quietly. “I’m not like that. I won’t leave. Not until you tell me to go.”
For the first time since I’d begun to tell the story, tears filled my eyes. My heart felt so full I couldn’t speak. And then, marking the end of the conversation, he wrapped me tightly in his arms and said good night.
Twenty-one
It turned out Alec was crazy. There was no other reason for him to wake before dawn and go down to the building’s gym to exercise. He seemed nervous about the day, like he needed to burn off steam. And though I didn’t know what kind of work he had to do in New York, I wasn’t alert enough to ask. While he burned, I slept, and an hour later he was practically rolling me out of bed.
Just after six a.m. we were headed toward the airport down side roads. I was wearing black jeans and a bright pink halter and had dug a sweater out of my Baltimore box in anticipation of the cold weather. I glared at him across the car, clean-shaven and gorgeous in his tailored suit, and silently cursed people who didn’t need caffeine to form coherent sentences before noon.
When we reached the airport, he drove behind the terminals, in through a back gate where he had to show his ID, and then on a narrow road that cut across a runway. Before us, giant dome-shaped hangars had been opened to reveal jets of various sizes and schematics. Some were silver, others black. The wings on some fanned up at the ends, while others had broader bodies and round noses.
“We’re taking one of those?” I asked, no longer in need of coffee. I was definitely awake now.
“Have you ever been on a private jet?”
I turned to look at him. “Aside from the last time I went to Tahiti for the weekend, no. Normally I stick to travel by Kia.”
I expected him to laugh, but instead he exhaled, shoulders falling an inch. I hadn’t realized he was so tense. Maybe there was more to that morning sweat session than I’d thought.
We passed a black limo, parked right beside a sleek silver plane, and a man in a suit opening the door for two women.
“Celebrities?” I asked, wishing he’d slow down.
“Probably not,” he said. “These planes are all owned privately. The ones down there,” he pointed down the row, “are chartered by individuals and corporations for events.”
“Rent-a-jets,” I said. He chuckled. “Are these all owned by Mr. Stein?”
A serious look came over him. “No, these are our competitors’.”
We passed three more hangars with sleek silver planes inside. They may have been smaller than the rest, but they looked fast and powerful.
“Private aviation is cutthroat right now,” he said. “Manufacturing was expensive even before the price of oil went sky-high. A lot of U.S. clients have turned to commercial travel to cut costs. Some of these people would pay a lot of money to bring down Force Enterprises.”
The underground world of plane wars. I imagined men in thousand-dollar suits sneaking around with shiny silver guns like James Bond.
“Do they want to buy the company?”
“Or steal it.”
“Is that what your meeting is about today?”
His head jerked in my direction.
“Is the company in trouble?” I clarified. “You said you’re losing clients.” That would explain the tension.
“No,” he answered quickly. “A lot of our biggest clients are oil manufacturers. As long as planes need gas to fly, we’re in good shape.”
“What else would they use?” I asked. “Fairy dust?”
He smiled tightly.
“So what is this meeting about?” I wondered if he was being purposely vague.
“I’m checking in with one of Max’s lawyers.”
I waited for more, but he was obviously preoccupied. According to Ms. Rowe, Maxim’s wife stayed in New York; maybe he’d sent Alec to negotiate his next divorce.
A small plane facing the opposite direction accelerated down the runway beside us. The sound of the engine was loud enough to make me clap my hands over my ears.
Alec shifted in his seat, keeping his eyes on the road. His thumb had begun to tap the steering wheel. It became clear to me then what the problem was, the source of his anxiety.
The man who worked for a company that built jets was afraid of flying.
Curiously, I examined him as he pulled into the next hangar, one that boasted a large sign over the entrance, ten feet in diameter, of a jet flying through a black circle. Alec was definitely pale, and though he leaned back in his seat, a thin line of perspiration had dewed on his hairline.
Well, this is going to be interesting.
Before us was a white jet, sleek and powerful with its twin engines and nearly eighty-foot wingspan. Six oval windows lined the body of the aircraft, and the tail fanned like that of a whale. The door to the cabin was already open, and a male pilot in a blue suit waved from the steps that unfolded to the ground. Max returned a curt nod.
“It’s a Force 250,” he said as he parked near the edge of the large steel garage. “Max’s personal jet. It can travel from here to India without refueling.” He didn’t sound particularly enthusiastic about this statistic.
“It looks fast.”
He took a deep breath. “Mach .88.”
“Okay. That’s fast.”
We admired it from the safety of his car for one more moment, listening to the powerful thrum of the boosters. The plane appeared to be all ready to go. I assumed all the pilot was waiting on was the passengers.
“Does Max know you’re afraid of flying?” I asked.
He glanced at me, then back to the plane. After a moment he laughed dryly and raked a hand over his skull.
“No, I don’t suppose he does.”
If there had been an option to drive, I was certain Alec would have explored it. Clearly, since we were still here, we were getting on the plane. I felt a little guilty for my excitement, knowing how Alec felt about it. Without another word, he got out and carried our bags from the car—my suitcase, his duffle bag, and a leather briefcase that added a sexy nerd appeal to his animal magnetism.
I followed Alec up the stairs of the plane and smiled as he introduced me to the pilot—Jim, a thin man in his fifties with a sunburned nose. He took our bags and retreated to the cockpit, and I took a look around the cabin. On one side stretched a long beige leather couch. On the other, matching recliners faced each other. Small wooden tables were fixed to the walls, and the windows were adorned with curtains—real curtains, not the pull-down screens like on commercial flights. Even the floor was carpeted.
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