Toronto Collection Volume 3 (Toronto Series #10-13)

by Heather Wardell

  I wasn't remotely in the mood for 'fooling around', since I could barely stand to look at him. Besides, I hadn't fallen asleep with another person since I'd passed out from Christophe's drugged champagne, and I would not take that risk with someone who thought he could decide for me when I was ready to have sex.

  I'd told him to leave me alone, several times, and eventually we'd started to attract attention from other people on the sidewalk and he'd said, "Fine, okay. I give up." I'd kept walking away from him and he'd said after me, "I'm sorry, I really thought--"

  Without stopping, I'd called back, "You were wrong."

  And he had been. But as I walked as slowly as I could along the street before the one that held our office I had to admit it was partly my fault. I'd told him I wanted to be ready.

  I did want to be ready. His kisses and caresses had left my body throbbing for a release I couldn't get without letting him go further, a release I wasn't ready to let him give me. But I so wanted that release. I wanted to be ready.

  By telling him that, though, I'd made him think the hotel room was a good idea. But I'd thought he'd want to know I was longing to improve and doing my best to make it happen. I'd thought he would understand that I meant I wanted to be ready, not that I was.

  Of course, I'd also thought he would call me on the weekend, or even text me, and I'd been wrong about that too.

  I rounded the corner and began walking past the three buildings before ours.

  Then I stopped dead.

  Two people stood locked in each other's arms outside our building, kissing passionately.

  Carly, with her long dark hair spilling over her back instead of restrained in its usual ponytail.

  And Howard.

  I stood staring, sure I couldn't really be seeing what I so definitely was seeing, then heard someone stop behind me and mutter, "Holy shit."

  I turned back and my eyes met Jake's. "Yeah," I said, knowing I should be reacting with his level of shock but not feeling anything at all. "That about covers it."

  He glanced from me to them and back again. "I... what's going on?"

  "We had a fight Friday night," I said. "I guess he's moved on."

  Jake gave a grim laugh. "Looks like it. Are you okay?"

  I nodded, then shrugged. "Ish. I don't know."

  He gave my shoulder a quick squeeze. "Can you handle going by them?"

  I looked into his eyes and saw he wouldn't judge me no matter how I responded. "Yeah." With how numb I felt, it shouldn't be that hard.

  "Okay." He squeezed my shoulder again, and we started forward.

  Howard and Carly broke apart, with an unnecessarily loud smacking sound from Carly, when we reached the bottom of the walkway to the building.

  "Excuse us," Jake said, his voice expressionless.

  Howard said, "I..."

  We all stood waiting, but he didn't finish his sentence. Instead he hung his head and moved aside so we could get by.

  As Jake pulled open the door for me, Carly said, "Alexa, wait."

  I turned around, trying to keep my face as neutral as Jake's voice had been, and she said, "You're mad at me, right?"

  I shrugged. "Haven't given it much thought."

  She winced as if I'd slapped her. "You are, I know it. Howard and I... it just happened. There was certainly nothing going on while you guys were together, if that's what you're thinking."

  I hadn't been, but her unprompted denial made me start thinking it.

  When I didn't respond, she said, "Look, I'm sorry. You've been through so much. So much awful stuff. If me with Howard hurts you then..." She gave me a brave smile. "Then I'll break up with him."

  Howard turned toward her, looking surprised and annoyed, but before he could speak I said, "I don't care either way," and walked on into the office.

  Rosanna had seen Howard and Carly cuddling on the sidewalk a little down from our building when she arrived for work, and she leaped from her chair when I appeared and clearly expected me to break down. I didn't, though. In fact, I was so calm she insisted I drink a hot cup of extra-sugary tea because she thought I was in shock. It did taste good but it didn't change anything.

  Howard and Carly came in when my cup was half empty, then he immediately turned around without speaking to or even looking at me and left after mumbling that he had "a meeting" I suspected he'd invented on the spot to get himself out of the office.

  Rhonda watched his shamefaced departure then asked the group at large, "What's up with Howard?"

  Carly, not seeming remotely ashamed, began explaining how he'd called her Friday night so upset and confused that he'd hurt me, and she'd felt horrible for him and had gone to meet him to comfort him. "It just happened," she said, shrugging her shoulders and widening her eyes as if she were describing a tornado or tidal wave, some force of nature that could never have been controlled or resisted. "One minute we were talking and the next he was kissing me."

  I felt the order of her words like they were pecking at me, but they didn't hurt even though part of me thought she'd wanted them to. He was kissing her. He'd started it.

  Rhonda picked that up too and she wasn't impressed. "Regardless of what he did, why didn't you stop him? You knew about him and Alexa."

  Carly's big eyes filled with tears. "I know. But he'd already told me Alexa had left him and he didn't think she'd come back, and..." She turned her sad face on me, swirling her long hair around her shoulders as she did. Howard, I remembered suddenly, had once told me he wished I'd grow my hair out. He didn't have to wish that with Carly. "I didn't think you'd go back either. It was stupid of him to get that hotel room. So stupid. I told him..."

  I didn't respond, because the way she left her sentence hanging made me think she was going to say something else.

  She didn't, but Rosanna said, "Hotel room?"

  Carly looked at me. "Oh, God, I did it again. I guess you'd rather I didn't tell, right?"

  "Ship's sailed on that one," Jake said, his voice cold, before I could answer.

  She glared at him and I said, "I don't care either way. I have work to do," and went off to my desk.

  I tried to concentrate but I couldn't block out the sound of her whispering, which somehow carried far more than her normal voice would have, as she explained that Howard had booked us a hotel room for our first time, my first time since "all that stuff happened", and I'd "freaked out" on him.

  "No wonder," Rhonda said. "But at least that's a nice hotel. He's got taste, if no judgment."

  I had to smile a little at her wry tone, but the smile collapsed when Carly said, "It's a gorgeous hotel. The room was on the thirty-eighth floor overlooking the lake. I've never eaten breakfast with a view like that but I hope I do again."

  Nobody spoke. I had no idea what was going through what passed for Carly's mind but I knew that Jake and Rhonda and Rosanna and I were all thinking the same thing: he took Carly to the hotel room he'd booked for us and they spent the night there.

  After a long awkward pause, Rhonda cleared her throat. "Time for work, I think."

  Rosanna and Jake muttered agreement and returned to their desks. Carly didn't speak, which surprised me because I'd expected another of her elaborate apologies that somehow made everything worse.

  The office fell silent as the others got to work, and I plugged along with Mike's book and didn't find it as painful as usual. My numbness seemed to insulate me from the vivid descriptions.

  I didn't even react when Howard came slinking back into the office at lunch time, though I could feel his and everyone else's eyes on me.

  Rosanna said pointedly, "Alexa and Jake, do you two want to have lunch with me?"

  Jake did, but I shook my head without raising my eyes from my computer. "Thanks, but no. I'm making lots of progress here."

  "I could pick you up a sandwich then?"

  I did look up then, to smile at her. "That'd be great, thanks."

  I gave her some money, over her protests, then she futzed around tidying up her
desk and organizing her stuff until Carly and Howard had left together.

  "I wouldn't leave you alone with them," she said. "That would suck."

  I shrugged. "I'd just ignore them."

  "I wouldn't be able to." She shook her head. "You're so... stable. I envy you."

  "I wouldn't," I said, then made myself smile at her. "I'll probably just go to pieces later."

  She smiled back, a bit of the worry leaving her eyes, and she and Jake headed out after Jake checked again that I didn't want to join them.

  I was glad they'd left, and glad they both seemed to know I was joking about going to pieces. Of course I wouldn't. I was fine.

  I'd just been wrong to trust Howard. I wasn't ready to trust anyone.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  At around three o'clock, when Howard and Carly were off in the little conference room supposedly working, Rhonda called Rosanna into her office to discuss her request for a new computer. As the door closed behind her, Jake got up and came to me. "Want to have coffee?"

  The sympathy and concern in his eyes made something deep in my chest twinge uncomfortably. "No. Thanks, but no. I'm fine."

  I returned my attention to my screen but he didn't leave, so I looked at him again and said, "Was there something else?"

  He put his hand lightly on my shoulder, and at the contact that twinging spot seemed to gasp.

  "Jake, please," I said, nearly whimpered. "I... it hurts..."

  He let me go at once, and perversely I was sorry.

  "Not that. Inside." I pressed my hand against my chest, trying to soothe the pain. "I have to not think about it."

  But that wasn't working any more, and now I wasn't sure it had been working at all. Images and feelings were dancing through my mind. Howard and me kissing, his hands roaming my body at my invitation. How happy I'd felt to know I could still be turned on, still had a chance to be normal someday. The guy I'd thought I could trust having sex with another woman mere hours after telling me he wanted to be with me. How stupid I'd been to trust him.

  I heard the conference room door open and jumped up. "Can we go? Please?" I didn't want them to see me upset.

  "After you."

  I grabbed my purse and raced to the door, and Jake followed. I heard a faint "Wait" from behind us but I didn't stop. If Carly honestly thought I wanted to hang out with her she was a bigger idiot than I'd ever imagined possible.

  Jake must have heard her too, because once we were on the street he said, "Up for trying somewhere new?"

  "Definitely," I said, and we hurried off in the opposite direction from the usual coffee place.

  He found us another spot, where he bought me a cappuccino and just smiled and shook his head when I tried to pay. The tables were all in use, so we went outside and walked through a tiny nearby park. It was pretty, but I couldn't relax because it reminded me far too much of walking through High Park with Howard the first time we went out.

  He'd kissed me, then, without asking. And I'd liked it. But maybe that had been my first sign that I was wrong to trust him.

  I took a long deep shuddering breath and let it out in what was nearly a sob. "Oh, Jake. What the hell."

  He sighed. "I know. I'm so sorry."

  "I trusted him," I said. "I really thought he liked me. But he just wanted to... and when I wouldn't he got Carly to..." I shook my head. "I was stupid to think anyone could like me after... everything."

  "I'm sorry," Jake said, "but it sounded like you said you were stupid to think someone could like you. What did you really say?"

  I shot him a look. "You know damn well."

  "I can't possibly. You're smarter than that."

  I turned on him. "Am I? Maybe I'm smarter than you think. I'm messed up, Jake. I'm used up. Christophe marked me and that's never going to change. I'm broken inside, I'm not ready... Howard couldn't deal with it, so why would anyone else bother?"

  We stared at each other. He took a breath to speak but I cut him off. "Jake, it's not that. I can't deal with it." The pain from before rushed through me, but instead of a twinge it was agonizing. "I want to be normal. And I can't. I never will be. I've got his words on me and in me and I'm never going to be the same."

  I hung my head, my eyes filling with tears and my throat so tight I couldn't say another word even if I'd had anything to say. Words. I had way too many of them, and none were the right ones.

  Jake set his cup down at our feet then rested both hands lightly on my shoulders. "Is this okay?"

  I nodded without looking up. This time, somehow his touch was relieving the pain instead of bringing it out.

  "Alexa, you are so much more than those words." His grip tightened a little. "Yeah, he put them there, but he did that because he thought that was the only way to control you. Because he knew how strong and smart and special you are, and he knew that his only chance to really mess with you was to make you mess with yourself."

  "Mission accomplished," I mumbled.

  "Look at me," he said softly. "If you can."

  I raised my eyes to his. I couldn't identify all the elements of the mix of emotions in his expression, other than anger and sadness and that same concern from before, but the obvious strength of his feelings took my breath away.

  "Howard screwed up. He didn't get you. But that doesn't mean nobody else will. You might not ever be the same but that doesn't mean you'll be worse. You can be whoever you want to be."

  Except who I was before.

  I almost said it, but before I could he gave me the saddest smile I'd ever seen. "Well, almost. You can't be who you'd have been without all of this happening."

  "No," I whispered. "I know."

  "I know you do." He took a deep breath. "But please, don't think nobody will ever want to be with you just as you are now. Please, don't."

  I couldn't respond, couldn't breathe, couldn't do anything but stare at his eyes and what I now saw so clearly there.

  He wanted to be with me.

  Jake swallowed hard. "Alexa, yes. I do. I wasn't going to tell you, but yes. I think you're incredible, and beautiful, and wonderful, and no words would ever change that. And I promise you I'd never want you to be any different. Who you are is perfect."

  I believed him, and for one brief shining moment I thought I could throw myself into his arms and give myself over to him. He'd been nothing but good and trustworthy to me.

  But Howard had seemed that way too and I'd been wrong, and the idea of being wrong again, and of losing the friendship with Jake that had helped me survive the Rikers Island aftermath, hurt too much to bear. Plus, he hadn't seen the words on my thighs. He thought he could handle it, but what if he couldn't? I'd lose him for sure. I couldn't risk that.

  The pain inside me surged so high I could barely breathe, but I managed to mutter, "I can't."

  Jake touched my cheek gently. "If you ever can, if you ever want to, you tell me, okay?"

  "I'm sorry," I began, but he shook his head without breaking our eye contact. "You have absolutely nothing to apologize for. If anything, I do. I probably shouldn't have let you know how I feel. Can you forgive me?"

  I leaned forward and pressed my forehead to his chest. "Can we be friends?"

  His arms slid around me and he held me gently. "Yes. Definitely."

  I shut my eyes and relaxed into him, but though I knew it could ruin everything I had to say, "But if you... want more... and I can't..."

  "I want you in my life. I've got that. I'm good."

  I raised my head and studied his face. "Are you sure?"

  He nodded. "I promise. I won't say anything else, won't ever pressure you." He gave me a small smile, tentative but sweet. "Well, I might pressure you to come back here for another coffee some time. That's the best cappuccino I've ever had."

  I smiled back, then threw my arms around him. "I can handle that kind of pressure. Jake, you're the best friend I've ever had."

  "Ditto," he said, holding me exactly close enough.

  "Are you sure we're
okay?" I couldn't resist asking.

  "I am." He drew back and looked at me. "Are you?"

  "I'm not," I admitted.

  He sighed. "I'm so sorry. I wasn't going to tell you how I felt but I couldn't lie to you, and I didn't want you thinking nobody would ever want to be with you."

  "It's not that," I said, surprised.

  "No?"

  I felt my cheeks grow warm. "I kind of liked hearing that," I confessed. "More than kind of."

  "Okay," he said, sounding as embarrassed as I felt.

  "But I need you as a friend. Are we going to be awkward with each other now?"

  He chuckled. "Are you suggesting we've never been awkward before?"

  I ran through our history in my mind, how many times I'd stormed away from him, how many times we'd been shocked by each other's words and thoughts, and had to smile. "I see your point."

  "Good." He picked up his cup, took a sip, then grimaced and tossed it into a nearby garbage can. "I think we can be exactly as awkward as before."

  "Perfect."

  "To celebrate, why don't you buy me another cappuccino?"

  I gave him a mock frown. "You buy me one."

  "I did. It got cold."

  I wiggled my cup, which I still held, at him. "We don't know that."

  "Check it."

  I took a sip and couldn't hold back a shudder at the unpleasantly lukewarm coffee.

  "See?"

  "It's great."

  He laughed. "You lie like a cheap rug, Alexa."

  "An expensive rug, if you please."

  "Which I do not." We began walking out of the park and he said, "So you'll buy me a cappuccino then?"

  "Will you say I'm an expensive rug?"

  He laughed again. "Yes. If you insist."

  "Oh, I do."

  "Then consider it done."

  I bought us both new drinks and he called me every carpet-related name he could think of on the way back to work and he was right.

  We were exactly as awkward as before, and I loved it.

  *****

  Howard and I avoided each other for the rest of the day, which wasn't easy to do in such a small office, and by six o'clock I was exhausted. He left first, with Carly right behind him in a way that told me they were really leaving together but didn't want everyone to know, and Rosanna and Rhonda immediately began asking me how I was holding up.