by Lily Zante
“I don’t want you to help. I don’t need your help and I never asked for it. You’ve been on my back ever since we met.”
“I owe you for saving my life.” Those guys could have pulled a knife on me. I get that now. Rudy reminds me of that often enough.
She heaves out a breath and runs her hand over her hair. It brings my attention to her wrist again, only her jacket is thick, and the sleeves don’t ride up, so I don’t see those wounds even though I know they’re there. I know she does this to herself. I want to take away her guilt, bury her pain, and make her see that she did the best she could for her brother.
She was only a kid, for Christ sake.
“You know what I would love you to do for me?” she asks softly, her eyes turning glassy, making my spirits rise in hopeful want.
“What?” Anything. I’d do anything she asked.
“Leave me alone.”
I sink back in my seat as I stare out of the window. In the past, on the rare occasions it’s happened, I’ve been able to walk away when a woman hasn’t been interested. Twice it’s happened. Why can’t I do what Nina’s asking me? I feel a pull towards her that I cannot for the life of me understand. The attraction is nothing to do with looks, nothing surface level. It goes way deeper, and I don’t get it. I can’t walk away, and that’s what I tell her.
“Why not?”
“I don’t know. You’re different, and this is different, and I can’t walk away.”
“You’re a movie star. I’m a waitress. People like us don’t get together.”
She’s worried about demographics? Somehow, I don’t believe her, because if that were the case, it would be so simple.
“I’m not interested in people like you,” she tells me in that warning voice of hers. “You’re not my type, just like I’m not your type.” She throws back my words to Dottie.
“You don’t have a type,” I say foolishly, without thinking.
“How would you know?”
“I’ve spoken to your friends.”
She fixes me with a gaze that could shoot bullets. “Butt out of my life.”
I’m not falling for her tactics. “What happened to Elias wasn’t your fault, Nina. I wish I could make you see that.”
She scoffs and I start to wonder if I’ve got all this wrong. “Elias must never know,” she says. “Don’t go shooting your mouth off about it, like you did with the mugging.”
If Elias found out, he would only want to help her, surely? Her dark eyes are pinned on me, and she’s waiting for my answer.
“I promise. I won’t say a word to anyone. I can keep a secret.”
The cab comes to a stop outside her place, and she mumbles a goodbye and leaves.
* * *
NINA
* * *
When the cab pulls up outside my house, I don’t even bother offering half for the ride. Callum would only refuse, and I would have to end up talking to him, and I don’t want to.
He thinks I’m like this because of the guilt I’m carrying for what happened to my brother. Somehow that fills me with relief. If that’s what he wants to believe, it’s for the best. It would kill me for him or Elias, or anyone I know, to find out the truth.
I manage a ‘Bye’, then rush away.
Once inside, I change into my pajamas, brush my teeth and climb into bed. I think about the razor blade in the cupboard. It’s like a drug. Cutting makes me feel. Somedays I’m so numb inside, I don’t even know if I’m alive. I stare at the blade and it’s like a terrible itch I need to scratch.
But a part of me wants to hold back. I don’t want to give in. I want to get better. I was starting to. How easy it is for Elias to talk about Grampton House and what happened to him, and to someone like Callum, a complete stranger. He has gone from an angry man who would have punched anyone who dared to mention this, to someone calm and at peace. He’s so Zen-like now that I don’t even recognize him as the guy he used to be.
Happiness must do that to people; being happy, finding joy, being in love.
I know nothing about those things.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
NINA
* * *
I found a sweet.
I found a sweet, and then another and another and another.
I’ve found four sweets. This has never happened before.
But Swain is counting, and I start to panic.
I rummage around in the basement, looking for that last sweet.
How is it that I’ve never found any sweets before, and now I’ve found four?
I rush around, desperate to find it. If I do, he will let me go.
“A hundred!” he says. He always counts too fast. I want to yell at him and tell him, but I know it won’t make a difference. He’s the grown-up and grown-ups always get what they want.
My heart crashes into my stomach and everything in my body sinks. I start to shiver. I see the fifth sweet in his hand. I start to cry because I know what’s coming, and because it’s so unfair.
My lower lip wobbles, because he’s going to do that nasty thing to me again. I hear my breath hard and fast, and I start to cry.
“Stop your bloody crying,” he says, pulling down his zipper.
I throw the sweets at him and I step back. It’s the bravest thing I’ve ever done.
“Come here you filthy little swine,” he cries. He looks so horrible with those rotting yellow teeth. When he turns the light off, I run away, trying to escape. But he’s too big, and too strong. He grabs me with his big hands.
I scream.
And then I wake up.
I’m shivering.
It wasn’t real.
It was only a dream.
I sit up and feel the sweat between my armpits. I run a hand across my neck, and it’s wet. It takes a moment for me to come out of my stupor. My heart rate is thudding. I’m scared that my heart will burst out of my ribcage.
I hug my knees harder, and I cry, huge racking sobs shake my body.
It felt so real, being back in that basement. It used to smell. Like smelly clothes and cheese. And it was so cold that my teeth would chatter and I would get little bumps on my arms and legs.
I never even found one sweet, let alone four.
It was only a bad dream.
An hour later, and I’m still sitting in bed with my knees bunched up. I am aware that I need to get some help. Elias said that talking about it helped.
I need to get over this.
I lift my head and see the razor blade lying on my bedside dresser. Once again, I am so, so tempted. And then I look at my wrists and I see what Callum saw.
I wish he would leave me alone but I have a feeling he’s not going to. He seems to think he owes me a debt of gratitude for saving his life that first time.
I lie back in bed and pull the covers right up to my chin. I decide that I will call in sick today. I’ve hardly ever called in sick, and Frankie will wonder, but I can’t face customers today.
I can’t face myself today.
* * *
CALLUM
* * *
“Where’s Nina?” I ask, when her friend from the diner shows up.
“She called in sick.” She hands me my lunch, then gapes around my room in awe.
Nina is sick? “What’s wrong with her?” I watch as this woman walks around, running her hands over everything, my books, the clothes hanging on the rack, even the flowers in the vase aren’t spared.
She shrugs. “She’s sick, that’s all I know.”
“Sick? With what?”
“Jeez.” She stops short of picking up Elias’s biography which is lying on my dresser. She glares at me. “Why do you care so much?”
“She looked fine yesterday.” She didn’t, but I can’t think of something to say to this so called friend.
She picks up a paperweight off my desk. I’m surprised by her forwardness. “She must be really sick, ‘cause it’s the first time she’s ever done that.”
I know what Nin
a is capable of, and I’m worried. I can’t tell Elias or Harper because I promised Nina that I would keep her secret to myself, but right now she has no one to talk to about this. Except me.
Her waitress friend hovers around, and I don’t know what for. I do know that she’s irritating the heck out of me. I hope she’s not expecting a tip. “Thanks for my lunch.” I hope she’ll take the hint and get the hell out.
But she stands there, with a smug stupid smile on her face, looking around my room like she’s Alice in Fucking Wonderland.
“You can go now,” I snap. She’s gone too far. I need her out so that I can check in on Nina. I have one scene to shoot after lunch and then I’m free for the rest of the day.
Her gaze falls on the Leanne Rose autograph I managed to get for Nina. I was supposed to give it to her, but I keep forgetting to. Her inquisitive fingers lift up the sheet of paper.
“Don’t. Do. That.”
She looks at me guiltily. “Sorry. Any chance of you showing me around the set?”
“No.” Not a chance in hell.
“You must have showed Nina around.”
“She never asked.”
“But you would have, if she had.”
“I probably would.” Heck, I know I would.
Her face falls, and she looks pissed. “She gets it all, just ‘cause her brother’s a boxing champ. That’s why you’re interested in her, huh?”
“That’s not why.”
Her eyes widen, as if she’s picked up on my secret. Only, it’s not a secret. Even Nina knows I like her, heck, she ought to by now.
She leaves, and slams the door as if to make a point.
Pathetic woman.
I open the lunch bag, and take a peek inside. It’s my usual. Only ... it’s getting boring eating the same old thing day after day. I want to call Nina and see how she is but my gut tells me she probably won’t take my call.
I eat the wrap anyway, and figure out a way of getting into her good books.
And this time, I’ll remember to take the autograph.
Chapter Thirty
NINA
* * *
Callum Sandersby standing on my doorstep is the last thing I expect to see.
I’m wearing an old cardigan which is way too baggy for me. I pull it around me like a blanket. I also thank the stars the sleeves are extra long, in case Callum’s hawk eyes try to take another look at my wrist.
We blink at one another for a few awkward seconds.
“How are you?” he says, at the same time as I ask, “What are you doing here?”
“I heard you weren’t well.”
“From who?” I ask suspiciously.
“You didn’t come by the set to drop lunch off today.”
“Is that all you ever care about?”
“I care about you. Your friend Julie turned up.”
“Joni.”
“What?”
“Her name’s Joni.” I’m surprised he doesn’t know. She’s always managed to sneak in and get to his table whenever he’s come into the diner.
“Is she really your friend?” he asks.
“Yes, why?” I can only imagine that she must have done something stupid, and desperate to try to get his attention.
“She said you were off sick so I came to check how you were.”
But why? I wonder.
Why, why, why, why, why?
Callum is the last person I want to see. Ever.
“Didn’t I make it clear to you the other night?” I try to keep the anger out of my voice.
“I’m not so sure you mean it.”
“Oh, I mean what I say. No means ‘no’.”
He looks puzzled. “Aren’t you going to ask me in?”
“It’s daylight. You won’t get attacked and even if you do I’ll be right here to save you.”
He smiles. “I can trust you to have my back, Nina.”
“You didn’t need to come all the way here.”
“Is it so wrong that I’m concerned?”
“You have an ulterior motive.”
“You came to my aid when—”
Not that old thing again. “Can you stop going on about that?” I cry. “I was just as stupid as you to go into the alleyway. You’ve already thanked me for it about a million times. Please, can you drop it now?”
“Okay, I will. But you did go into that alley, and you did come to my rescue.”
“Unintentionally.”
He gives me a smile that would probably melt most women’s defenses.
Not mine, though.
“I have something for you,” he says, clearly in no rush to leave.
“What?” He doesn’t look like he has anything for me. But he’s clearly not giving up, even though he has Elias, and he has what he wanted, he’s at my door, allegedly to see how I’m doing.
“Can’t I come in?”
“Come in,” I say, reluctantly.
“Thanks.” I head into my tiny living room, and quickly check to see if it’s tidy. Too late, if it’s not, but I am strangely relieved that my clothes aren’t lying all over the place. Nor my blade.
“Here.” I watch, confused and enthralled as he pulls out a notebook from his jacket pocket, and then he whips out a sheet of paper from it.
“What is it?” I ask. He didn’t tear it out. It’s been placed in there. Now I’m really curious.
“An autograph from Leanne Rose. You said you liked her.”
The what? I try to remember when I said that. I never said I wanted an autograph. Or did I? I’m not a celebrity fan at all, and I must have been making polite conversation. I take the sheet from him anyway. I can’t help but wonder why this guy has gone to all this trouble to get this for me.
He hands it over to me, looking very pleased with himself.
“Thanks.” Another part of my brain reminds me that he’s a superstar, and that he’s probably good friends with Leanne Rose. He probably has her on speed dial. This is not as big a deal for him as it would be for us mere mortals.
I glance at the autograph.
This woman doesn’t know me but she’s written:
* * *
Hey Nina, Callum says you’re one feisty woman.
From one badass woman to another,
* * *
Leanne
* * *
The message touches me in a small yet significant way because he must have said something to her in order for her to write what she has.
“That’s...that’s sweet,” I say finally. I hold the paper in my hands, not sure what do to with it. I’m not going to frame it, but I’m also not going to throw it away.
I’m uncomfortable. I don’t like people doing things for me and even though I let him in, I’m still questioning his motives, because I don’t trust anyone. “Why did you go to all that trouble?”
“Because you said you liked her.” He looks sheepish now, and I feel bad for him. He shakes his head. “You’re one tough cookie to crumble, Nina.”
“Tough cookie to crumble?” I repeat, finding that an odd metaphor. “Is that what you’re trying to do? Break down my defenses in the hope that I’ll fall for your moves?”
“I don’t have any moves. Not with you.”
“This isn’t a move?” I wave the autograph at him.
“No.”
“You think I can’t see you trying to be extra nice to me for no reason?”
“How have people treated you that badly that you consider this to be extra nice?”
He might as well have punched me in my gut. I feel the pain of his words as surely as if he’d struck me. Feeling brave, I answer back. “Don’t expect me to go falling for your seductive eyes and … and … that … that … “ I lose my train of thought.
Seductive eyes. Did I actually say that to him? I remember reading something about him when I looked him up. Trust that to stick in my mind.
“Seductive eyes, huh?” He throws me a casual smile. “It’s funny you should say that because i
n a women’s magazine poll, ninety-five percent of women said it was my eyes and my smile they fell for.”
I let out a loud groan. “I’m not like those women.”
“Of course, you’re not like the other women. You’re something else. You stand out.”
My belly stiffens. “I don’t want to stand out.” I don’t want him to notice me, much less pay attention to me. But I have to be careful. Callum isn’t stupid and while he’s got the reason wrong for those scars on my arms, if I give him enough time, if I let him get any closer, he’ll figure it all out. And I don’t want him to.
“You stand out in a good way, I don’t mean like a sore thumb,” he says, as if he’s realized I feel uneasy. I am different to most women. Most haven’t had to go through what I did. Even Joni, with that asshole of a boyfriend. She wouldn’t know of the horrors I’ve lived through.
No one does, and that’s the way I like it.
“You shouldn’t feel bad about your past.” He speaks so softly that at first I think I’ve misheard. I pull the cardigan around me, as if it’s a protective shield, insulating me from Callum’s kindness, from his interest, and concern, all of which I don’t have any time for.
“What were you supposed to do?”
I want to fight back, and ask him why he’s asking me these questions. Why does he feel the need to make it his business? But, like always, I freeze up about my past. I can’t face it, I can’t deal with it, I can’t talk about it.
He takes my silence to mean that I’m listening.
I feel like I should offer him something but I don’t want him to make himself too comfortable. Maybe I should ask him to sit down, seeing that we’re both still standing and warily facing one another, as if we’re in an invisible boxing ring.
“Sit down,” I say, but it comes out stiff and awkward and doesn’t sound as if I mean it.
“I don’t want to take up too much of your time. I only came to see if you were okay.”