by Liv Bennett
I turn to Nick and force myself to smile, and somehow that coerced smile warms me up from inside, especially because Nick glances back at me with a curious yet affectionate grin.
“Do you want to leave?” I ask.
He shifts his position to lean in and whisper in my ear, “Depends on where you want to go.”
“To my place?”
“Always.”
CH 7 - Old Flame
~
“I seriously have no idea what she sees in that man.” My eyes locked on Julie and Nick, I fist my hands into hardballs.
Scarlet moves closer to me in her chair and covers one of my hands with hers, giggling with her usual high-school girl laugh. “You’re so sweet when you’re acting like a caveman. Just look at how happy she is and how she can’t keep her hands to herself, how her eyes are locked on his most of the time. That, my dear fiancé, is a sign of love. She has feelings for him, and she can’t even hide them.”
That’s exactly what I’ve been afraid of. She’s falling for Nick, whom we basically know nothing about. Well, he might have been working as an actor for Frat House since day one and probably never missed a shooting. Also, I never heard him badmouthing a colleague or saw him disrespecting others, but still.
Where does he come from? How are his parents, his family, and the neighborhood he grew up in? No crime showed up on his background check, but that’s not hard to pull off if you’ve got money and know the right people.
My anger flares as Nick spins Julie around on the dance floor, and Julie bursts into happy laughter. I can’t help the feeling that she’s falling for a psycho who tortures little girls in the basement of his house.
“Enough frowning,” Scarlet chirps in my ear. “He’s a good guy.”
“Fine.” I stand abruptly. “I need to use the men’s room.”
“You know where to find me.” She smiles and stares at me with a seductive glance, taking my breath away and pushing away all disturbing thoughts.
Nodding, I round our table and head right to the bathroom. A tall, lean silhouette of a woman at the dark end of the hall catches my attention. Soft, repetitive noises of sobs tell me she must be crying.
“Is everything all right?” I call out and when she doesn’t answer, I walk to her.
Her strapless long, red dress reaches the floor and hides her shoes. Her body is certainly that of a fashion model—very, very thin. Unless she has boobs to make up for it, her body fat ratio must be below six percent. Her dark brown hair is gathered up in a low bun, and a pair of golden earrings reach down to her bare shoulders.
She continues sobbing, ignoring my questions about her wellbeing. Only when I stand behind her, does she turn toward me and throw herself at me.
“Penelope?” I mumble, surprised at how much she’s changed in the short time since I’ve seen her. She must have lost fifteen, twenty pounds. That’s a lot, considering she was already very slim to begin with.
“Zane, baby!” She tilts her head back to look up at me. Her eyes are red, and her beautiful face is smeared in makeup and tears. “Why are you doing this to me?”
“What? What am I doing?” I ask, because I’m literally clueless as to how I could have upset her so badly that she’s crying her eyes out and hiding herself in a dark corner rather than showing herself off at a popular charity gala.
She blinks and wipes some of the tears off her cheeks. “How can you propose to a girl so soon into your relationship? I gave you nine years of my life. Nine long years, and you didn’t even ask me to move in with you. You’re going to marry her after just six months of dating. I thought I made you happy. I thought you loved me. What does she have that I don’t?”
“Penelope.” My hand automatically reaches for her chin, and I slide a finger along the beautiful and smooth curve. “I’m very sorry. I never wanted to hurt you.”
She raises her hand and covers mine to hold it in place and looks deep in my eyes. “Your marrying someone else breaks my heart, Zane. I still love you.”
“How about Emmett Nielson? I thought you were with him.”
“He’s a nice guy, but I don’t love him the way I love you. You’re the only man my heart is beating for.” Slowly, she moves her head until her lips are beneath my hand, kissing it softly, touching my skin and my soul.
The mistakes of my past will never stop following me, I can see it now. I broke Penelope’s heart and now she’s paying for my callousness with her tears and pain.
CH 8 - JULIE
~
Tears blur my sight, and I squint down at my phone while I dial Zane’s number with my trembling hand.
He answers on the first ring. “Yes.”
“Zane!” I shout, unable to stop a loud sob from escaping. “Can you come over to my place?”
“Julie? What’s going on?” Hearing his voice settles my agitated nerves despite the rough ups and downs of the night. “Did Nick hurt you?”
How can he know? “Please, come.”
“I will be right there!”
The line goes dead. I drop the phone next to me on the couch, resume my fetal position, and return to my self-pity session.
The zipper of my dress is unzipped, but I have no energy to pull it up. The memories of the last hour keep re-playing in my head, my stomach on the verge of expulsing its contents. The thought of Zane coming here is the only thing that keeps me sane. I need him to hold me tight and remind me how strong I actually am.
My eyes are locked on my watch as I count the seconds until I hear the knock on the front door. I stumble with dizziness as I try to push onto my feet. My hair is disheveled, and my makeup must be smudged. I must look like a mess. Regardless, I move to the door and push the handle down. As soon as it opens, I throw myself into Zane’s arms and start crying into his chest.
“What happened?” He closes his arms around me and walks me back into the living room. I notice he hasn’t locked the deadbolt, but his mere presence is enough to make me feel safe. He helps me back to the couch and encircles his fingers around my arms.
“Nick.” I start to speak, but words fail me as the shame hits me hard.
He jolts to his feet, leaving me agape with his sudden move. “I’m gonna rip his throat out with my bare hands. I’ll tear his skin off. I’m gonna kill him slowly for touching you.” He seethes with rage fuming in his expression; his eyes wide open and filled with hatred.
“No! No! No! It’s not what you think.”
He turns his fire-filled eyes to me, his frown making him look lethal. Thick veins bulge beneath the skin of his fisting hands.
“Calm down, please. You’re scaring me.” As soon as the words are out of my mouth, his whole demeanor changes, the sudden explosion quickly erased into worry and care.
I raise my hand to request his and he clasps his fingers around mine as he takes his place next to me on the couch. “Tell me what happened.” His voice is so soft and sweet, like honey, and calms me enough to get myself together.
“Oh, Zane. I’m so embarrassed.” I jerk my gaze away, my cheeks hot and wet with a fresh round of tears.
“You don’t have to feel that way with me. I’m your friend.” He reaches up his hand to my head and pushes the strands away from my face, wiping my tears away with his thumb.
“Nick and I came here after the gala. We started kissing, and things moved quickly…but I couldn’t—”
“Did he force himself on you?” His jaw tightens, his anger rising again.
I move forward and lay my head against his chest to calm him. Feeling his body wrapped around mine, hearing his heartbeats up close, his warmth slowly heating up my cold limbs…I almost forget what I wanted to say.
I inhale his scent and continue, “He’s been very patient with me. I can’t blame him for anything that happened tonight. It’s all my fault. I can’t get physical with men. I get panicked and start remembering those days where I had to—”
He cuts me off suddenly. “I know.”
How can he know
? I feel mortified, my cheeks burning. Has he known how Michael forced me to have sex with his clients all along?
“I’m sorry I couldn’t stop Michael from hurting you,” he confesses into my hair.
“It’s… No… There was nothing you could do.” Although I want to look up at him and smoother out the pained expression he must have, I remain lying on his chest. “I just can’t get past those awful memories. I did therapy. I joined a group of sexually abused women, but things don’t get better, Zane. I don’t feel any improvement. I’ll always be the same fearful, frigid woman. I’ll always push away good men out of my life. I’ll always be lonely.” I cry into his chest, and his shirt turns wet with my tears.
Nick is a great guy. He waited for me all these months. It’s only fair for him to get a little intimacy with the woman he cares about, but I scared him away with my fears, and he’s never coming back to me. Things will only get worse from here on. Very soon, I’ll turn thirty and then forty and my pain will solidify. What man will want an aging woman with a huge emotional package?
Zane doesn’t speak or move, but just keeps me tight in his arms, exactly the remedy I was needing to soothe my heartache. Like during those old times when he used to take Chloe into his lap to calm her down after Michael’s abuses. He has suffered enough—why did I think it was within my right to bother him on his special night?
Then suddenly I recognize how selfish I’ve been to him. Pushing my palms against his chest, I pull back and sit up. “Oh, God! Zane, I’m so sorry. It’s your engagement day and I’m ruining what should be a great night for you with my self-pity. You should go and celebrate with Scarlet.”
“Don’t talk like we’re just friends. You’re my family.” He moves his arm toward me in an attempt to hold my arm, then hesitates and returns it to his lap. “I wouldn’t feel comfortable partying while you’re crying all by yourself, anyway.”
“Still. It doesn’t feel right. Scarlet shouldn’t be alone on the night of her engagement.” I start to work on my zipper when Zane leans forward and pulls it up for me.
“She’s far from being alone. Her mother and grandma are with her.”
“She needs you. You should go back to her.” My voice is hoarse from crying, and my throat hurts when I speak. Reaching for my cheeks, I wipe my tears and brush my hair back with my fingers. “I’m feeling much better now. You don’t need to stay.”
“Are you kicking me out of your apartment?” he asks, the mischievousness in his voice stealing a smile from me.
“Yes. Please go and make your fiancé happy. I’m fine. Really.”
He stands, shaking his head, and heads for the kitchen. “I’m not going anywhere tonight.”
“What?” I stand and hurry after him, my eyes suspiciously following him as he pours himself a glass of water and gulps it down. “You can’t stay here tonight.”
“Why not?”
“Scarlet will be worried.”
“They’re preparing the house for the party tomorrow. Believe me, she and her mother would want me out of their hair anyway. Apparently, I distract them too much with my endless list of questions.” He sets the glass in the sink and glances at me pointedly. “So, either I’ll stay here overnight, or I’ll book a hotel room. You can guess how well that’ll go over with the paparazzi if they find out I’m spending the night alone in a hotel room right after announcing my engagement publicly. And believe me, they will find out. They have an army of people reporting to them from every major hotel. TMZ people will know the second I check into a hotel tonight. You can guess what the headlines will be tomorrow? Zane Hawkins spent the night in a hotel room hours after announcing his engagement to super star Scarlet Boehm.”
“That’s not half as bad as the headlines; Zane Hawkins spends the night with a coworker alone in her cozy apartment.” I smile shyly.
“Nobody will know I’m here. Besides, you and I grew up together. You’re like my sister.”
Sister? Right, that’s how he sees me, while fireworks are set off inside me each time he’s around.
“If it’s okay with Scarlet, it’s okay with me, too,” I answer defiantly.
He takes slow steps toward me and ruffles my hair. “You look cute with your raccoon eyes and messy hair.”
Raccoon eyes? Shit! I forgot about my makeup. I had thick, dark makeup around my eyes, and now I must look like a crack whore. “Oh, no!” I try to wipe away the smeared makeup as much as I can on my way to the bathroom while Zane laughs behind me.
I startle when I see my reflection in the mirror. My face looks worse than I expected. The gray and black combo on my eyelids is all over my face now, and somehow my lipstick managed to spread across my cheeks, too. With my look, I’d make a better Joker than Heath Ledger ever was.
Closing the bathroom door, I slide out of my dress and get in the bathtub for a quick but deep-cleansing shower. Without bothering to dry my hair, I pull a bathrobe over my shoulders and hurry to my bedroom to change into a t-shirt and yoga pants.
Zane has turned the couch in the living room into a bed and is already sleeping under my navy-blue bedsheets. His feet are bare and stick out from the covers, but he still has his shirt and dress pants on.
Feeling guilty for stealing from him the chance to a comfortable night in his own king-sized bed and plush pillows and comfortable sleepwear, I settle on the chair beside him and pull a blanket over me.
My thoughts drift back to the earlier hours of the evening, when I was shocked by Zane’s engagement news but still hopeful for my future with a loving man.
Nick.
He was extra sweet at the gala. Dancing with him and feeling his body close to mine didn’t bother me initially, but being alone with him in my apartment and kissing him did. His hands moved a little too quickly for my unstable nerves; his lips got a little too adventurous, but he stayed within the limits. It was when he slipped his hand between my thighs, a switch flipped inside me, and all I could see was Michael’s clients ordering me to please them.
I wish I had better control of my nerves and could explain my fears to him without going into a hysteria of tears and sobs.
A tear rolls down my cheek, my eyes moving to the man sleeping peacefully on my couch. Perhaps, the night wasn’t all bad after all. Nick is great, but my heart doesn’t belong to him. I’d be doing a disservice to him by giving him the illusion of love while Zane fills all my thoughts.
CH 9 - The Real Scandal
~
With the horrible news regarding my sex life averted in the last second, my new life can begin now. I’m a completely different man now.
Zane the second edition. The special edition.
More focused and more cautious in every step I take. I might have overthrown Michael, my father, possibly the most vicious and vindictive person on the planet, but tackling the issues that comes with being a man engaged to be married is a whole different animal and requires a sharper set of skills.
Lucky for me, my fiancé is sweeter than Godiva truffles and makes my life easier and stress-free. Julie sets up an urgent meeting with my lawyers to draw up a prenuptial agreement. Scarlet’s lips tighten briefly at the mention of that instant passion-killer word, but she’s going to have a money-machine as a husband. An agreement to protect each other’s assets in case things go downhill in our relationship is only fair for both of us.
Julie sits with me while my lawyers go through every possible way Scarlet can screw me over. I guess the chair next to me is the safest place for her to avoid eye contact with me. She’s been oddly distant since the incident with Nick after the gala and even came up with a silly excuse to skip the engagement party Scarlet and her family threw at her place the next day.
While the lawyers argue over how much Scarlet should get if our marriage fails within the first five years, my eyes fall on Julie, specifically her crossed legs barely showing beneath her dark skirt and her knees pointing in the opposite direction. She’s clearly avoiding me and doesn’t even pretend to hide it.
Why? Is it because I’m a man and hence I might force her to do things those savage animals forced her to do? Or is it because she feels embarrassed about having shown me her vulnerable side? I’d like to believe it’s the latter.
I wish I could tell her she doesn’t need to hide from me and can tell me anything she has on her mind or in her heart. I haven’t realized it until now, but she’s not only my best friend, she’s my only friend. Whatever it is that she needs, I’m ready to give it to her.
However, I guess the closeness of our friendship will have to be tempered soon anyway. I doubt Scarlet will turn a blind eye to nights like Saturday and tolerate my platonic relationship with Julie. She might have grown up in the same home with me, might have seen my mother as her own mom, too, but we’re not siblings. She’s not Chloe, and once I’m married, I can’t tend to her needs and her broken heart without getting Scarlet jealous.
Scarlet hasn’t said a word about my spending the night at Julie’s home, but I could see the disapproval in her mother’s eyes. Sleeping in another woman’s house isn’t something an engaged man should do. I wouldn’t want Scarlet dropping everything in the middle of the night to run to a male friend in need, either, no matter what kind of history they might have shared.
The decision to get engaged was clearly too early. Without the sex scandal, I’d have taken at least two years before even broaching the subject. I’d have had more time to help Julie resolve her issues. I wouldn’t have felt disloyal for having to abandon her when she needed me most.
Julie’s phone rings, pulling me away from the dilemma running amok in my mind. The lawyers are now in a deep discussion about my future children, but my ears prefer listening to Julie’s musical voice rather than how many hours I’ll spend with my kids in the event of a divorce.
“What?” Julie jerks in her chair and covers her mouth. “Are you sure?”
My curiosity raised, I move over and nudge her arm. “Everything okay?”
“I’m not sure.” Her mood visibly sours as she rises from her chair and stalks out of the room.