Burn (Indigo)

by Hubbard, Crystal

  “All right!” he screamed. “Fine!”

  “Get your crap and get the hell outta my dojo,” Gian ordered.

  Karl stood and went to his desk. Angrily, he threw his belongings into his duffel bag and stormed out of the office, sharply catching Zae in the shoulder with his bag on his way to the lobby.

  “You big—”

  “Just let him go,” Cinder said, stopping Zae from pursuing Karl.

  Chip left the office with Gian close behind him. Gian seemed surprised to see a bunch of people in the corridor. He briefly cupped Cinder’s cheek and said, “Would you wait for me in there?” He nodded toward the private studio. Without waiting for her answer, he fell into step beside Chip.

  “I just want to make sure he leaves,” Gian said. “Without breaking a window or kicking a hole in the wall on the way out,” Chip added.

  Cinder sat alone in the private studio long after Chip had escorted Zae into the women’s locker room to ice her shoulder. The longer she sat, the more confused and angry she became. When Gian finally entered the room, she stood and greeted him with a hard push and an even harder demand. “Who do you think you are?”

  “Cinder, what—”

  “I told you I didn’t want to be in a group class, I told you I wasn’t ready, but you insisted! And then you weren’t even here at five-thirty!”

  Gian’s solid figure didn’t budge under her first push, so Cinder planted her feet and gave him another hearty shove. She smiled inwardly at the way he had to take a step back to maintain his footing.

  “If you had been here for our class, I wouldn’t have run into Karl,” she continued. “I pay you for private lessons specifically so I don’t have to deal with humiliation!”

  “You held your own against Karl,” Gian said proudly. “He humiliated himself, not you. You don’t have a damn thing to be embarrassed about. You’re one of the most courageous women I’ve ever met.”

  Right then, staring into his eyes, she knew he wasn’t talking about what had happened in the group class. “Who told you?” She wanted to push him again. “Was it Zae?”

  “Told me what?” Gian braced his hands in front of himself to ward off another attack.

  “Is that what you do when I’m not around? Talk about me like I’m some kind of victim who needs to be protected?”

  It took Gian another couple of seconds staring into her feral brown eyes before he figured out what she was referring to. “I Googled you.”

  “What?”

  “Last night. I couldn’t sleep, and you said some things that got my curiosity going. So I Googled you. But I couldn’t find anything, so I Googled your ex.”

  She swallowed hard. “Then you know all about what happened back East.”

  The disappointment and finality in her voice weighed on Gian’s heart, bringing back the hurt and helplessness he’d felt the night before. “At first I couldn’t sleep because I couldn’t stop thinking about the time I’d spent with you,” he confessed. “Then it was because I couldn’t stop thinking about what your ex-husband did to you.”

  “That makes two of us then,” Cinder snapped. Her lower lip quivered, but she held her tears. “I wanted to tell you. I would have.”

  “I know.”

  “I don’t need to be rescued.” Her tone defied him to contradict her.

  “I know,” he agreed. “But that won’t stop me from trying to be your hero.”

  “I said too much,” she chuckled sadly. “When I got home last night, I knew it. I told you just enough to give you a pry bar to open all the doors I’ve tried to keep closed.”

  “Cinder, I’ve never known anyone so . . . so . . .” “Stupid?” She attempted to finish his sentence for him. “Gullible? Blind?”

  “Strong.” He caressed her shoulders, working his hands up to cup her face.

  Cinder’s anguish vanished. She covered his hand with hers, turning her face to press her lips to his palm.

  “It would have been different if Sionne had been teaching the class,” she conceded.

  “Well, according to Chip, Karl told Sionne that he’d cleared the switch with me. Karl wanted Sionne to take his class tomorrow night. Apparently, he was planning a big date.”

  Cinder’s lips parted. “Karl asked me to dinner for tomorrow night.”

  “I hope you said no,” Gian remarked.

  “I did. That’s when he got mean. ”

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t here for you.”

  “I can take care of myself. I might not need you to rescue me, but I do need you to keep teaching me.” “That would be my absolute pleasure.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  “Okay. How ‘bout dinner?”

  She smiled. “I don’t mean leave. Let’s go right now.” She bowed to him, and then struck a fighting stance. “Right here.”

  “I figured you had enough fighting for one night.”

  “It’s not fighting when it’s with you, it’s learning. Karl did things that I’ve never seen before. I don’t want to be surprised like that again. So start teaching me, sensai. I’m yours.”

  Gian spent a long moment just staring at her. In the quiet studio, with the sunset filtering through the sky light to brush Cinder in pale oranges and purples, Gian wanted to remember her as she was in this instant—the moment he knew he was in love with her.

  * * *

  Cinder paced before her living room, windows wishing she had been more specific. When she invited Gian to her apartment, he had asked what time he should arrive. “After six,” she had said.

  After six turned out to be an enormous place filled with imagined door buzzers, minutes that lengthened into years, and hallucinations of Gian’s car every time she poked her head between her curtains.

  A fresh loaf of herbed sourdough bread warmed in her oven; an antipasto tray, wine, beer, soda, juice, and bottled water chilled in her refrigerator. She had changed clothes three times, first wearing a pair of knit shorts, a matching tank top and espadrilles, then switching to white capri pants with a pink baby doll T-shirt and strappy sandals. She settled on comfort over cute, and put on a simple black dress, a sleeveless cotton garment with a straight bodice and a flared skirt. She looked a little like a chic nun. As much as she hated to admit it, the look suited her.

  Barefoot, she wore a path in the flooring at the window as she walked back and forth, nibbling the nail of her right thumb. She wasn’t nervous, exactly. It took ten more passes in front of the window and four more peeks out the window before she could name her feelings.

  Eagerness. Excitement. Beneath those, a layer of her favorite emotion—anticipation. Gian was the first man she had dated in almost eight years, and he stirred up all the best things she remembered about dating. Getting to know Gian was as easy as breathing and the most fun she’d had in a very long time. Unless she was mistaken, Gian was enjoying getting to know her, too.

  Her buzzer sounded, and she rushed to the console mounted beside her front door. Pressing the talk button, she spoke into the speaker. “Gian?”

  His voice sounded through the speaker. “Buzz me up before my ice cream melts.”

  “What kind of ice cream?” Cinder asked, smiling. “The sooner you buzz me in, the sooner you’ll find out.”

  Cinder leaned on the buzzer, and faintly, from three floors down, she heard the distinct click of the front door unlocking. Gian’s footsteps on the stairs grew louder as he got closer. So eager to see him, Cinder didn’t look through her peephole before she threw open the door.

  “Hey,” Gian said, the word stretching into a contented sigh.

  Every time he saw her felt like the first time. He wondered if he’d ever get used to her beauty, if there ever would come a time when the first glimpse of her smile or her eyes wouldn’t start his heart beating faster, or send the too-familiar ache of need flooding into his belly.

  She wore no makeup, no jewelry, not even shoes. Her sleeveless black dress with its straight neckline and bell-shaped skirt couldn’t have be
en more prim, yet she had never looked sexier. He handed her the condensation-dampened bag containing the ice cream so he could grab the waistband of his jeans, adjusting them to hide the growing evidence of his attraction to her.

  “The Dream Cream Shoppe?” Cinder read the print on the bag, ushering Gian in.

  “It’s in Kirkwood.” Gian watched her spend a good minute locking the deadbolts and fastening the chains on her door.

  “It sounds pornographic.” Cinder chuckled. She went to the kitchen to put the ice cream in the freezer, Gian following her.

  “It’s called Dream Cream because they’ll put any flavoring you want in ice cream,” Gian explained. “So what’s for dinner?”

  Cinder closed the door to her freezer compartment. “It’s so hot, I thought I’d do something light. Zae recommended an antipasto tray, so—”

  “I love antipasti,” he said. “Ever been to Favazza’s on The Hill?”

  Cinder quickly turned to grab two wine glasses from an overhead cupboard. “I’ve been there once or twice.” Just this afternoon, she added to herself. Zae had told her that Favazza’s was one of Gian’s favorites, and she’d gone there for her ingredients, doubling back within sight of her apartment when she realized that she’d forgotten freshly shaved parmesan cheese.

  “Would you like wine?” Cinder asked. “I’ve got—” “Anything is fine.”

  Taking a muscato d’oro by its neck, Cinder drew it from the fridge and set it on the counter.

  “Do you have an opener?” Gian asked.

  “Sure.”

  Cinder reached for the magnetic strip mounted along the wall behind the counter. She took a red-handled corkscrew from it and held it in her hand, staring at it for a moment before handing it off to Gian.

  “You okay?”

  She nodded. “My ex-husband never . . .” She touched a hand to her face, her throat, tamping the anxiety that always threatened when random thoughts of her past invaded her present. “He would never have volunteered to help. He thought it was my duty to wait on him. I thought so, too. I mean, I didn’t mind doing things for him. I didn’t realize until after everything happened that I did so much for him because I was afraid of disappointing him. Literally afraid.”

  “My parents taught me that a husband should worship his wife,” Gian told her. “That a family’s true wealth is its happiness, and if mama ain’t happy—”

  “Ain’t nobody happy,” Cinder finished with him. She smiled, her anxiety dissipating before it could plant roots.

  Gian filled their glasses and carried them into the living room while Cinder brought the antipasto tray, saucers, and cutlery.

  “This smells so good.” Gian took a seat on the shorter section of Cinder’s L-shaped leather sectional.

  Cinder placed the tray on her coffee table, edging it close to Gian. Tucking her legs beneath her, she reclined on the long section of her sofa, her wine glass in hand. “Please, help yourself,” she offered.

  Gian’s gaze moved from Cinder to the tray and back again, the sight of both making his mouth water. She had outdone herself with the antipasti, presenting many of his favorites—mortadella, prosciutto, roasted red peppers, black and green olives, sweet onion slices, crostini, and a finishing touch of wide, freshly shaved parmesan reggiano ribbons.

  Gian spent a minute preparing the perfect bite, a crostini layered with all the flavors and textures before him. He offered it to Cinder, his hand cupped under her chin to catch crumbs.

  She felt a little silly being fed, but the gesture gave her pleasant goose bumps nonetheless.

  “Good, isn’t it?” Gian asked proudly.

  Her mouth full, Cinder grinned, nodding. Once she’d swallowed, she said, “It’s so different from the antipasti I had in Boston, in the North End. I asked the counter guy at Favazza’s to recommend items, and he chose so many different meats.”

  “Us landlocked Italians have a slightly different palate than those seaside guineas,” Gian said. “We like our meat down here same as those Boston Eye-talians like their seafood.” He chomped into his own crostini, which was loaded high with meat, cheese, and vegetables. Speaking around it, he said, “The wine is nice. It really complements the food.”

  “I was worried that you wouldn’t care for it,” Cinder admitted. “It’s kind of a girlie wine.”

  “I didn’t know wine had genders.”

  “This muscato is light and sweet, and it’s got a little bubble to it,” Cinder explained. “Its notes of vanilla, honeysuckle, and peach remind me of perfume, something feminine. It’s the opposite of a shiraz, for example. A spicy, masculine red like that is something I’d serve with barbeque or Mexican food.”

  “The sweetness of the muscato is what makes it work with the saltiness of the antipasti. How did you come to know so much about wine?”

  “My ex used to collect it.”

  Gian slowly wiped his hands on a cloth napkin. “What happened to him after the trial?”

  Cinder swallowed a big gulp of wine, steeling herself. “He was sentenced to three years in prison.”

  “Three years?” Gian nearly shouted. “For attempted murder?”

  “He was charged with assault, not murder. The jury bought his psycho-emotional breakdown story and gave him a lighter sentence. The prosecutor didn’t want to take the risk that another jury at appeal would let him off altogether. The defense argued that Sumchai posed no danger to anyone but me.”

  Gian quickly calculated the math. “So he’ll be out in about eighteen months?”

  “Half that, if he gets credit for good behavior and parole.”

  Gian, hands on knees and elbows wide apart, studied Cinder’s apartment. He’d noticed all of the locks and chains on her front door and the wall-mounted console for her security system, and now he noticed armed motion sensors blinking in the corners of her living room windows.

  Her bone-colored walls and hardwood floors were bare, the sparse furniture elegant in its plainness. She had nothing of extreme value that he could readily see, and his only logical conclusion was that the high security was in place to protect one thing: her life. “You think he’ll come after you.”

  “I know he will.” Her dark eyes fixed on Gian, telegraphing her certainty.

  He leaned back into the sofa and stared forward. The hot, humid dusks of summer had given way to the arrival of early fall, and a cool, dry breeze moved Cinder’s sheer curtains in a mesmerizing dance. Everything about Cinder, from her social habits to her apartment, seemed temporary. In her year in Webster Groves, she’d made no new friends, left no mark of her presence anywhere other than at Sheng Li. She was preparing, and waiting, he saw that now.

  “Are you planning to leave, if he comes here?”

  “If I run from him again, I’ll have to keep running. But if I stay, if I face him, I might not live through it.”

  “You’re not alone.” Gian moved to her part of the sectional, sitting close enough to enclose her hand in both of his. “You don’t have to do any of this alone.”

  Pulling her hand gently from his grasp, she disagreed. “Yes, I do. I won’t have anyone else getting hurt because of Sumchai Wyatt.”

  “You changed your last name,” he said, varying his approach. “Why White?”

  “When I was recovering from the attack, one of the counselors at Project Protection told me that the best way to remember a new last name was to choose one similar to the old one. If I ever accidentally said ‘Wyatt,’ it would be easy to cover it with ‘White.’ I couldn’t use my maiden name because—”

  “Your parents had a sense of humor,” Gian interrupted.

  “Yes,” Cinder chuckled. “I can’t tell you what it was like growing up with a name like Cinder Bloch.” “You and my brother could trade war stories.” “Why’s that?”

  “Pio Piasanti?”

  After a beat of silence, laughter burst from Cinder. She threw back her head, laughing so hard that she couldn’t breathe. “I’m sorry,” she managed, wiping tears
from the outer corners of her eyes. “It’s just that I can totally imagine the names and jokes kids must have made about your brother’s name.”

  “Have you seen your parents since you moved here?”

  “No.” Her laughter tapered off. “But I talk to them once a week. They want to come visit, but they’re close to my former in-laws. They mean well, but I don’t want them to accidentally say something to the Wyatts that they might repeat.”

  “Your parents don’t know where you are?”

  She shook her head. “It’s better this way. For now.” “You amaze me.”

  Not knowing what to say in response to his heartfelt statement, Cinder said nothing. But Gian persisted.

  “I won’t lie and say that I know what it’s been like for you, but we have more in common than you think. The way I see it, you’re just as much a veteran of war as I am. The only difference is that you’re stronger than I am. I had the U.S. military behind me when I went into battle. You had to do it alone.”

  Just that fast, Cinder went from laughter to the verge of tears. So many people had told her in so many ways that she was brave, a survivor, but none so eloquently as Gian. She hadn’t cared for any other opinion as she cared for Gian’s. He was the first man she had grown close to since her divorce and the first she’d come to trust.

  Mostly.

  But she wanted to trust him completely.

  “I want to see you naked.”

  He had been drinking his wine, and her confession so surprised him that he sucked a little of the vino up his nose. Cinder dropped her feet to the floor to take a fresh napkin from the coffee table. She gave it to him, pressing back a tiny smile as he sputtered and blew his nose.

  “I didn’t mean to shock you,” Cinder said.

  “That wasn’t something I expected you to come out and say like that.”

  “Could I see you?”

  He gave his head a little shake of confusion.

  “I’d like to look at you.”

  She elaborated no further, but he saw something in her eyes that gave him a clear understanding of what she was asking of him. Vulnerability and fear mingled with hope and longing in her expression, and Gian knew then that he would do anything she asked if it removed any lingering doubts she had about him. He held her gaze as he unbuttoned his shirt and unfastened his belt, then stood to undo his button fly. With a self-effacing grin, he let his jeans fall to his ankles, leaving him with his shirt fronts billowing and the front of his sports briefs bulging.