“If she’s hurt, man, I’m going to—”
“Cool down, Captain. I promise. She’s fine. I’d never hurt her. She’s my employee, damn it.”
That wasn’t exactly true, but maybe he was saying it for the burly guys. The bouncers bookended Kyle to make sure he was okay. He swatted them away.
Evan went around the side of the couch and scooped Lia into his arms. He couldn’t leave her here another second. He didn’t care if this guy had five Harvard degrees. They probably just helped him get out of jams like this.
Lia’s head rolled into his chest as he lifted her, then fell back, her hair all around her face. Her limbs fell over the side of his arms.
“I’m taking her home.”
“We’ll take care of her.” Kyle scowled. “I have a doctor on staff, and I can bring her to my place and—”
“No.” Evan started for the curtain toward the dance floor.
“Hey, hey, hey! Not that way.”
Evan turned, and Kyle indicated the back door. “We’ve got a hallway here. Take her all the way down, to the right. Tom will be there. He’ll bring around another car.” He pulled out his cell phone.
Evan didn’t wait for the call. He kicked the door open with his foot and charged into the hallway, which was narrow and cinderblock sided. He followed it all the way to the end, cold air and muffled music pounding through, where it opened into the concrete hall at the back entrance.
Tom’s face screwed into anger when he saw him. “Damn.” He shoved Evan back into the hallway. “Don’t hold her out in the open like that!”
He marched Evan toward a separate exit farther down. When they all stepped out into the sprinkling rain, the car squealed up immediately. “Get her out of here,” Tom said, yanking the door open.
A light drizzle of rain covered Cinderella’s hair as Evan slid her into the backseat, then landed in behind her. He told the driver the address he remembered, and put his arm around her, letting her lifeless body slump against him.
Before they’d even pulled away from the curb, he ran a shaky hand down his face.
As images of Renece’s ravaged body floated through his mind, and as the familiar sense of helplessness filled his body, he stroked Cinderella’s hair and let himself cry for the first time in two years.
CHAPTER
Thirteen
Light assaulted all her senses as Lia slammed her hand against the screeching alarm clock that bounced along the table. It toppled to the ground, its screech muffled into the white shag rug beneath the side of her bed. She tried to peel her eyelids off her eyeballs, but it felt like they were attached with fur. Her fingertips went up to check.
Every millimeter of movement caused another sharp pain. She gave up on the alarm clock and kept her eyes closed, trying to remember what day it was, what time it might be, how she got here last night. She could hear rain against her window. Last night wouldn’t even come into focus.
Then—oh, yes! Kyle’s club! She remembered the rain, the darkened bar, the ice figures. She had flashes of Evan’s forearms along the bar top, his intense blue eyes underneath black eyebrows. She remembered the cigarette girl, Evan with Avery—was that right? And then . . . Kyle? . . . at the bar again? . . . And then . . .
She strained for more details. The clock’s muffled screeches continued. The rain came down harder against the panes. She struggled again for memories. And then what happened? . . .
Nothing came to her.
Her hand slithered under the sheets to her body. Her dress was off. She seemed to have some kind of . . . She wriggled to see what she was wearing, but the vise around her brain tightened. It was some kind of . . . Oh, okay, her camisole and slip . . . Was she even wearing this last night? Her bracelet was still on. And she had a . . . Dang, she had a cotton ball taped to the inside of her arm. Did she give blood? Her shoes . . . She made a small movement with her legs. Yes, her legs still worked. Her shoes seemed to be off. Did she just fall into bed last night, without—?
“Mornin’,” came a deep voice from her bedroom doorway.
Adrenaline shot through her as she snapped her head toward the door. The sudden movement sent fireworks off behind her eyeballs, but she could barely make out Evan leaning against the frame, wolfing down a bowl of cereal.
“Want me to turn off that alarm for you?” he drawled.
“Wh-wh—What are you doing here?” She snatched the sheet up to her chin.
He set the bowl down on her dresser and sauntered into the room, keeping his eyes averted but snaring the alarm clock off the floor and snapping it off. Then he returned to the doorway and his cereal.
He had on the same clothes from last night, but the navy shirt was untucked, partially unbuttoned, and even more rumpled than last night, if that were possible. The stubble was back across his jaw, and his hair fell in disarray. While he resumed his cereal shoveling, Missy rubbed against his jeans and bare feet.
“Who’s Elle again? Did you say she was your boss?” he asked.
Elle? Oh, God.
“Did she call?” Lia croaked. She struggled to sit up. “What time—” She yanked the clock off the nightstand with an arm that felt dead. The tape around the cotton was itchy. “What is this?” She tried to peel it off.
“I’ve got a lot to tell you, but honestly, you’re not going to be feeling very well for the next few hours, so I recommend you go back to sleep for now. I just need to understand who Elle is.” He gulped down another spoonful of cereal. “And I need to know if that boyfriend of yours might be coming through that door anytime soon. I don’t need another fist in my eye.”
“Fist in your . . . ?” Her mind made an attempt to put all the pieces together, but it just wasn’t happening. “What—what time is it?”
She held the clock in front of her face.
Eight o’clock! . . .
She sprang upward, but as soon as her head changed elevation, her stomach roiled. Her sights landed on a trash can by the side of the bed that seemed to be there for that very purpose, and she yanked it to the side of the bed, clutching it toward her chin.
Her head and eyeballs pounded as she listened to the rain against the window and waited for the waves of nausea to go away.
“You all right?” Evan said softly.
She closed her eyes and rolled back into bed. “I want to die.”
“I’m familiar with the feeling.”
“What happened?”
“Important thing to know is that you’re all right. We just need to keep you hydrated. Drink some of that water by the side of the bed.” He leaned forward, but seemed to refuse to step into the room again, as if it were filled with snakes.
She kept her eyes closed and stretched her memory again to the night before. She was at the bar with Kyle, right? Then what happened? She strained to remember music, conversation, anything, but kept drawing a blank. A strange metal pole stood next to her bed.
“What’s that?” she asked, staring up at it.
“I’m serious about the water. That glass there . . .”
“I see it.”
“Drink it.”
“I will. I just . . .” Her arm felt like it weighed a hundred pounds.
“Now.”
The last thing she wanted to do was move, and the second-to-last thing she wanted to do was put anything in her stomach, but she had the sense he wouldn’t drop this. She moved her hundred-pound arm and took a tiny sip.
“I have to go to work,” she croaked out.
“I don’t think that’s gonna happen, Cinderella.” His voice was almost a whisper.
She willed herself to sit up, to find out what was going on, to get to work, to remember what happened with Kyle—did he . . . Oh, wow, did he talk to her about investing in Drew’s boat? And then . . . Oh my God . . . kissing . . . Did he ask her to leave with him so she could kiss
him? . . . Did he . . .
Her hand ran up her camisole. . . . Did she do more than kiss? . . .
“Did I . . . Who did I come home with?”
“Me.”
That didn’t make her feel any better. The satin shorts that matched her cami slid to the left. She was naked underneath. She felt sick again. “I don’t remember anything,” she whispered.
As soon as she said it aloud, the reality of the situation hit her, along with the fear such a statement should bring, and tears sprang to her eyes.
“Hey,” Evan said gently.
She wanted to look at him, but couldn’t. She wanted to ask a million questions, but couldn’t. She wanted to know if she still had a job, if Kyle was still a client, if anyone was manning Drew’s boat, who took her dress off, why Evan seemed afraid to come near her, if she did anything . . . she gulped . . . if she had sex . . . if she would ever work in advertising again, if Drew would ever forgive her, and how she could have let absolutely everything, everything, slip through her fingertips. . . .
But she couldn’t.
All she could do was let the tears slide down her face toward her pillow and fall into the horrible, hopeless sleep that claimed her.
* * *
The second time Lia awoke, the light was against her east wall. It was still raining. Two aspirin lay on her nightstand with another glass of water and a hastily scrawled note.
Drink this. Whole glass, it said. Evan.
She took the aspirin, drank half the glass, and succumbed again to sleep. It was better than analyzing her life, which was clearly in its last few hours.
* * *
The third time Lia awoke, the light was gone from the room entirely, but the rain continued. Her nightstand lamp had been turned to the lowest illumination, a T-shirt she didn’t recognize wrapped around the shade to darken it even more, so there was just enough light to see the note below it.
Good job. One more glass. Whole thing. Evan.
P.S. Fed the cat.
P.P.S. Met your sister Noelle.
P.P.P.S. What’s with the shoes? Daily arrival.
She took the next two aspirin, drank half the glass, petted Missy who came to curl up in the crescent her body formed, and even took two of the orange segments that lay peeled for her on a paper napkin. She listened for any movement from the front room, but heard nothing.
Sleep seemed better than addressing her life right now, and she let it claim her.
* * *
The fourth time Lia awoke, it was the middle of the night. The rain had stopped. The vise was no longer squeezing her head. She was able to twist her neck all the way to the side to see her alarm clock. Two a.m.
She managed to stumble out of bed. The metal pole that had been in her room was gone. Instead of her zombie-walk to the bathroom, she shuffled out to the front room to make sure life was still as she knew it. Somehow, she half expected to walk into a different time-zone, a different era, a different life. But everything was as she remembered.
Except Evan’s huge form stuffed into her love seat.
He looked ridiculous on the small piece of furniture, the pillows lined up on top of his body like a desperate blanket. His shoes were off. He had different jeans on, and a different shirt, this one a gray tee that showcased his arms. One of his tanned forearms was thrown over another of her white-brocade fringed pillows. A white bandage was wrapped across his knuckles and through his fist like a boxer. She stared at it for an unreasonably long time, marveling at the cross between his masculine arm and her feminine pillow.
She knew a normal reaction here—upon finding a man you barely knew sleeping on your couch without your permission—would be fear. He obviously had her key. He’d obviously been here awhile. She’d obviously been passed out. But fear didn’t even enter her veins. Instead, she was flooded with a warmth, that a man she barely knew was sleeping on her couch because he was probably taking care of her. All of her annoyance earlier at Evan’s crazy protectiveness slid away, and she was now filled with gratitude. Along with that damned warmth that started in her scalp and oozed like honey through her body.
He sucked in air and growled a bit, then turned his body as if he were trying to get more comfortable. Three of the pillows he’d been trying to balance tumbled to the floor.
Lia stumbled into the kitchen beneath what felt like cinderblocks on her shoulders and saw that Missy’s water and food bowls had been filled. She poured a glass of water and shuffled back toward the bedroom.
On the way, she stopped at her linen closet and took a blanket off the top shelf, then went back and laid it over Evan.
Almost back in her own bed, she realized she forgot her cell phone. She spun back for it, but her stomach violently rolled and she rushed the other way to her bathroom. She threw up the orange and the water. Wiping the sweat from her brow, she got up, brushed her teeth, splashed her face, and crawled back into bed.
She still forgot the cell. But it wouldn’t matter anyway. Her life was over.
* * *
The next day was a repeat of the last. Notes from Evan. Glasses of water. Aspirin. Updates on Missy. A note that her mom called, and her sister Giselle. Oranges followed by small bowls of broth. A small roll. Lia ate everything but threw up everything.
Her cell was missing.
Missy curled up with her, and Lia pretended to die.
* * *
When the light hit her next, she rolled over and marveled that she felt human.
The rain had stopped and was replaced by sunlight through her window. Morning sun. It must be mocking her, lovely light for a woman whose life was now darkness.
The vise was gone from her head. Her brain felt normal-sized. Her stomach didn’t feel like it was going to heave, and her mouth—while dry—didn’t feel like it was coated in cotton. Her eyes opened of their own volition.
But she didn’t want them to now. She could explain to the Vampiress if she were dead. The Vampiress would forgive her for that. Might even send a wreath of flowers to her funeral. But if she felt fine, she’d have another thing coming. Worse than death—failure, her desk packed up, a sense that the last decade of her work was for nothing. . . . Humiliation.
She stumbled into the front room, where the shades still seemed to be drawn. Someone had put socks on her feet. She had no idea what day it was.
She gripped the living room doorway as she rounded the corner, tumbled into the next room, and let out a shriek.
There, in the middle of her living room, was a naked Evan. He was hopping into his jeans—full frontal nudity. She threw her hands over her face.
Apparently, he went commando.
Who knew?
He spat an obscenity under his breath, and she could hear him hop in a circle and yank the jeans up. Zipper. Button. She could hear the belt clinking.
“Coast is clear,” he mumbled. “Sorry.”
She peeked through her fingers. He had his back to her now, looking down to fasten the last of his belt. His back was wide and tan, filled with the valleys and hills of muscles across the shoulders, the same back she’d admired that first morning she’d seen him in his sailboat galley. She watched his triceps flex as he finished the belt, then he leaned over to snatch his shirt off her ottoman. He still had the bandage wrapped around his hand. She flashed back to her peek at his privates, and a blush ran up her cheeks—Evan was strong and bullish everywhere, apparently.
He slid the shirt on, then turned and looked for his shoes, snagging them off the floor. “Sorry again.” He glanced up at her. “Gotta run. Tours today.”
“What is today?”
“Friday.”
“Today is Friday?” The blood that had rushed to her cheeks drained.
He straightened, and a corner of his mouth tilted up. “Maybe I should have been calling you Sleeping Beauty instead of Cinderella.” He buttone
d his shirt from the bottom while he glanced around for his other belongings. “But I’m glad to see you upright. You look great.”
Great? Her hand went to her rat’s nest of hair that hadn’t been washed for, apparently, three days, and glanced down at the slouchy socks, taking in her wrinkled camiso—
Crap!
She threw her arms around her body to block the view of her puckered breasts, now standing at attention beneath the champagne-colored top.
“Oh, I’ve seen more than that.” Evan lifted an eyebrow. “Sorry, Cinderella, we might have passed the modesty stage.”
His cell phone and wallet drew his attention, and he shoved everything into his pockets and turned to grab a jacket he’d hung by the door. “Who did all the drawings here?” He thrust his chin toward one of Coco’s crayon tire swings.
“My niece,” she answered absently. But she was still on “seen more than that. . . .”
“Nice. Well, you look good,” he said. “Compared to before, anyway. This is the first time I’ve seen you with any color in your face.”
Seeing a muscular, naked man in your living room will do that to you.
“I . . . um . . . where . . .” She had so many questions she didn’t even know where to start. “Do I still have a job?” she whispered.
He grinned while he shrugged his jacket on. “You just slept for two days straight, had an IV in your arm, had Kyle Stevens and his whole crew here in your apartment, woke up to a naked man getting dressed in your apartment, and your first question is about work? You are a workaholic, Cinderella. Hey, what’s with the shoes, by the way?” He cocked his head toward the six shoe boxes stacked by the door.
She steadied herself in the doorway. An IV? Kyle Stevens? . . .
“Did I . . .” She swallowed. “Who changed my clothes?”
“No worries there. Kyle sent a nurse home right behind us, and she came in and took care of you. She had you on an IV so you didn’t dehydrate. And she took care of . . . you know, all personal things. She put on your skivvies there, and took care of . . . well, you were doing a lot of vomiting.”
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