Perception: A Bittersweet Romance Suspense Novel

by Kendra Leigh

  I’d steered clear of makeup ever since, fear always reminding me to keep the drawer with my cosmetics firmly closed.

  But that was then and this is now. So with a sideways glance at the perfect black dress, I take the gloss from the drawer and glide it boldly across my lips.

  * * *

  I wait until the very last minute, when he’s shouting that the car has arrived, before I leave my bedroom. I want to make sure there’s no time to send me back to change. Avoiding his gaze, I rush past him on the front steps and get straight into the car while he locks the front door. When he joins me, he talks to the driver, an older softly-spoken gentleman, for a while, but I know from the way he taps his fingers against his thigh that he’s using it as a distraction to calm his irritation. For the remainder of the journey, he’s mostly quiet, speaking only when we pull up outside the venue in the heart of Greenwich Village.

  “Remember. Stick to chatting shit with the other wives. If I’m talking business, do not interrupt. Understand?” I nod as his gaze flicks disapprovingly over me.

  The venue has a charming cocktail bar entrance, the atmosphere taking you back to a bygone era with Jazz classics playing out over the sound system. Loud chatter and laughter make for a welcoming feel, the smell of expensive perfumes and colognes melding with delicious food aromas permeating the air. I feel a buzz inside. One I haven’t felt in a while.

  Nick’s group are already here, and I can’t help the joy I feel when Diane and Helen’s jaws practically fall open when they see me. Marian smiles widely, an approving nod along with a discreet wink, boosting my confidence even more. The men tell me how wonderful I look, and I feel Nick tense behind me, but I ignore him and sip the champagne cocktail I’m offered. It isn’t long before Nick and the others saunter off into the crowd to network, and I’m stuck with the wives. For a few minutes I watch Nick in action from a distance. He seems like a completely different man from the one I know, smiling and laughing, practically oozing with charm. The sight makes me shudder because I know of the monster beneath that false exterior. It’s like he’s pulled on a whole different skin, a chameleon hiding in plain sight, and for the first time I realize how hard it would be to convince others that he’s anything other than this perfect gentleman. If I ever told people my story, would they even believe it?

  Making my excuses to the women that I’m off to find the bathroom, I take the opportunity for a wander. Other than the park, this is the first bit of freedom I’ve had in ages. It feels good to be among other people being normal, looking normal; sometimes I forget that life goes on outside my limited existence.

  I feel a hand on my elbow and turn to see Ava. It’s the first contact I’ve had with her since that day, and although I’ve not actually done anything wrong, I feel guilty. She’s left me countless voice messages on the house phone, but I haven’t called her back. Her expression is filled with contrition, her eyes full of questions.

  “Savannah?” She leans forward to embrace me, and I accept. “What are you doing here?”

  “Oh. I’m with Nick. He’s networking, apparently.”

  She nods. “Liam too. Why haven’t you returned any of my calls, Savannah? I’ve been losing my mind over what happened. I just wanted to apologize, explain—”

  “You don’t have to, really. I understand. I’m over it.” I’m not, but there is no point in laboring over the whole thing now. “I just don’t want to talk about it. Ever. It never happened.”

  I’ve found it’s the only way I can set foot into each day as it comes is if I pretend like Jackson Dean never happened. And even then I struggle, because he’s my first and my last instinctive thought of every waking day.

  “I’ve lost my cell phone,” I add. “So I couldn’t call you back because I didn’t have your number.”

  “Right.” She nods. “You could have called the house.”

  I shrug.

  “Listen, Savannah, are you sure we’re good? I’d rather you—”

  “Ava!” Liam whisper-shouts her name from a few feet away then smiles and waves at me before motioning for her to join him.

  “We’re good, Ava. Don’t worry. Go.”

  “Are you sure?” She rests her hand on my arm, and I give it a squeeze to reassure her. “Don’t leave without speaking to me. We need to arrange lunch. The girls are eager to see you—”

  “Ava!” Liam seems excited to introduce her to someone.

  Before I answer, she turns and is gone. Liam’s arm folds around her waist proudly as he welcomes her into the conversation, introducing her to his companion who kisses her hand. It’s every bit a conventional scene in this regular world, I’m sure, but seeing Ava with her husband being comfortably affectionate and inherently genuine reminds me that it is so far removed from what is normal to me.

  Swallowing the lump that’s formed in my throat, I move through the room, grabbing another cocktail as I go, and am drawn to a larger group of people who seem to be flocking toward a popular new arrival. I see the cause of all the fuss, a woman, and it’s not hard to see why she’s garnering so much attention. She is one of the most beautiful women I think I’ve ever seen: incredibly tall, her long limbs sleek and slender, perfect angular features and long, shiny, mahogany hair. She moves with grace, and whatever she is saying amuses her admirers as they step reluctantly aside to let her through. As she makes to move in my direction, I notice she’s on the arm of a man, a man who appears exceptionally proud to be accompanying her.

  My heart hurtles into the front wall of my chest as the familiar figure of the most perfect man I’ve ever known moves fully into view. He looks different, somehow, his hair is longer, his stubble almost a beard, but there’s no mistaking it’s him. Jackson Dean. Suddenly, I’m hit full force with all those old feelings and emotions that only minutes ago seemed so fragile they were dreamlike. And all I can think is how amazing they look together—my Bear and this beautiful goddess—a perfect couple—and my insides burn with a wild, raw jealousy I’ve never experienced before in my life.

  As much as my brain is telling me to run, I’m frozen to the spot, and within seconds he’s standing right in front of me, his stunned expression mirroring my own.

  “Sparrow.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Jackson

  “SPARROW.”

  The word crashes from my lips like a plea, without forethought or contrivance, the sight of her drawing every buried emotion to the surface in an instant. Who the hell am I fucking kidding? I’ve gone through weeks of suppressing every thought, every emotion, every hard-on, and every urge I’ve had to drive my fist through a wall. When it became difficult to picture the fine details of her face, I stopped trying to summon them. I just left them there in the hollows of my mind with all the amazing memories I have of us, and I grabbed a spade and buried them along with the horrors that resurfaced after finding Savannah’s folder. Then one single glimpse and I’m right back where I started—with this big ball of feelings blooming inside me and some inexplicable right I feel I have to take up space in her heart as she does mine. I feel an innate sense of belonging when I see her. But it’s the equally innate need to protect her and the worry that I’m not capable of doing so that keeps those very same feelings from spilling over the edge.

  I stand rooted to the spot as she swings around and heads off into the crowd away from me, my tongue feeling as if it’s bloating to twice its size inside my mouth, rendering me speechless.

  Angel elbows me in the ribs bringing me around. “Is that her? Is that Savannah?”

  I nod.

  “Well, what are you waiting for? Go after her.”

  Pushing all scruples aside, I follow in the general direction she went in, just in time to see her join a group of men and women. Realizing one of the men must be him, her husband—I’ve only ever had the briefest glimpse of him from a distance—I back off, mingling in with others so I can watch unnoticed. The one standing next to her seems like the obvious choice—right age, relatively
good-looking—although there’s an ugliness about him, something I can’t place but that I rapidly attribute to my mounting jealousy. He stands at a slight angle, almost with his back to her as he laughs with another woman. It seems dismissive and immediately irks me.

  I take the opportunity to study Savannah as she chats to an older lady to her right, her familiar and unique mannerisms reaching across the room and reviving every wonderful feeling she aroused in me. It’s strange to see her all dressed up like this. She wears the black dress like a glove, the fabric clinging to her petite frame and delicate angles, her calves toned and slender emerging gracefully from beneath the knee-length hem. I’ve never seen her in heels, always sneakers. She suits them. Even the way she holds herself—her head tilted slightly to the side, chin down, looking up through her hair—is instantly memorable, and the urge to touch her is overwhelming.

  “Have you spoken to her?” Angel appears by my side.

  “No. I can’t. She’s with her husband. That’s him to her left, I think. The fucker.”

  “Jackson! You can’t say that, you don’t know him,” Angel warns.

  “I don’t need to. I know an arsehole when I see one. What are they even doing here? Is this something to do with you?” I turn my accusing glare on her.

  She doesn’t even look contrite, she just shrugs. “Someone had to intervene. You haven’t been yourself in weeks. You need to know if there’s a chance for the two of you. You need to understand what’s going on with her and if feelings are mutual. This is the only way we knew how.”

  “We?”

  Smiling, she nods toward her husband, Ethan, across the room, who, despite being engaged in conversation with a man, responds to his wife with a furtive smile. Their exchange is typical of them, as wherever they are they always have one eye on the other.

  “Of course, we,” I mutter under my breath. It was a stupid question. I should know she shares everything with Ethan. It’s the way it should be.

  “And how did we think it would help to invite Savannah and her husband to a business networking event? Unless you just wanted to see me do my Bruce Banner turns Hulk impersonation.”

  “Not sure green’s your color, but before you start bursting out of your three-piece, listen to this. Ethan looked into his business, which, by all accounts, is technically Savannah’s, but she takes no part in the running of it. It’s been slowly sinking for the past several years but now its head is barely above water. One whiff of Ethan showing an interest in investing and Mr. Nick Harper will be eating out of his hands. It should keep him busy for a little while. At least give you the opportunity to say hi.”

  “Well, well, we have done our homework.”

  “Like I said, someone had to.”

  I had, of course, thought of Googling Savannah and Nick Harper myself many times, but I’m not a lover of self-inflicted torture, and the risk of seeing them pictured together as a happy, loving couple twisted my gut some. I guess I should be mad that Angel and Ethan have engineered this meeting, but I’m not. And I’m certainly not going to pass up the chance to speak to Savannah, even if saying hello is all I get to do.

  “So what’s the plan?”

  * * *

  I wait until Ethan approaches Harper and then move into Savannah’s line of vision. She spots me instantly, and before she has time to look away, I nod toward the exit leading to the bathrooms and cloaks. At first she ignores me, trying to look like she’s interested in what the rest of her group is saying, but when I make out that I’m heading her way, she excuses herself quickly and walks toward the hallway.

  After a few seconds, I follow her, quickening my pace so that I’m right behind her. Taking her elbow, I steer her toward the empty coatroom, unused as it’s such a mild evening. It’s a small room and there’s no door, so it isn’t ideal but at least there’s no traffic. Once inside, I urge her to stand up against the wall next to the opening to the corridor so that we can’t be seen by passersby.

  The close proximity to her takes my breath away, her natural peaches and cream smell reaching up into my nostrils, triggering memories of hours spent buried deep inside her, basking in that scent. My body reacts immediately, blood pumping to parts of my body I’ve been ignoring for too long. For seconds, neither one of us speak, we just stare into each other’s eyes, a thousand unspoken questions, declarations, and accusations floating around us. It seems like this thing between us is too big. A two-minute conversation way too inadequate to begin chipping away at the obstacles that separates us. I can sense unformed words faltering on her lips, and I instinctively reach out, brushing them lightly with my fingertips to tempt them into the open. I can feel her breath against my skin, tiny rapid puffs of air betraying her elevated heart rate, a beat that ticks away these few snatched minutes all too quickly.

  “It was real. All of it.” The words blurt out in a sudden rush before I can even filter them to make sense. “Everything that you think happened between us was real—for me. For me, it was real. I don’t regret the way it happened, because if you’d known who I was, we’d never have made it past your sprint through the woods, and you’d never have gotten under my skin the way you have. It wasn’t supposed to happen, but it did. Bear and Sparrow. They happened. They’re real. For both of us. Tell me I’m wrong.”

  All her resentment and restraint seems to melt at my words as her face leans into my touch. “You’re not wrong,” she whispers.

  It’s all the words I need to hear before I cave in to the compulsion to kiss her. The taste and feel of her as I crush my lips to hers is like a drug that no other human contact with anyone on Earth could ever compare to. It’s at this moment I know I’m in trouble. I breathe her in, press her body against mine, consuming as much of her as I can before our time is done and I have to walk away.

  “Leave him.” The words are out there, and fuck they feel good.

  “Wh … what?”

  “You’re not happy, I know you’re not. Christ, whoever it was that bought you a sexual fantasy knows you’re not.” The second I utter the sentence I want to punch myself in the face. Where the fuck is my filter?

  “Nobody knows shit about my marriage.”

  “You’re right, I’m sorry.” I attempt to pull it back. “I just need you to know that you’re not stuck—”

  “You think you can just haul me in here and say ‘leave him’ and all my problems are solved? Meanwhile you carry on in your picture perfect relationship—the one you failed to mention, that is—because happiness was shining from you two like a goddamn beacon. You told me you were single or was that bullshit too?”

  “What? What relationship?”

  “Are you kidding? You just arrived with the most popular girl in town on your arm and you suddenly don’t remember who she is. That’s sweet, real gentlemanly.”

  “That’s Angel.”

  I’m about to elaborate when she pushes away from the wall into the glow of the light coming from the hallway. “This isn’t real, Bear … or Jackson, whatever your name is. Forget me—”

  “Savannah. What are you doing in there? Who are you talking to?”

  A female voice interrupts, and I pull back into the shadows to keep out of sight.

  Savannah flushes a little as she looks out at whoever is talking to her. “Me. I’m just talking to myself. Just saying how I would forget my head if it was loose. I thought the bathroom was in here.”

  The woman laughs. “No, sweetheart, that’s the coatroom. The bathroom’s down the hall.”

  “I know. Sorry, Marian, you must think I’m mad.” She glances once at me. “Maybe I am.”

  “Nonsense.” The woman laughs again, the sound becoming muffled as she moves off down the hall. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

  Savannah looks my way again, and I reach out, my fingertips grazing hers. “Meet with me. We can talk. I can answer whatever questions you have,” I whisper earnestly.

  “I can’t. I have to go.” She takes a step to leave.

  �
��Savannah, please.”

  “You are wrong, Jackson. Perception is not reality.”

  “What?” I’m confused, unsure as to what she means.

  “This. Us. We don’t exist. None of it was ever real.”

  Suddenly I don’t care who sees us, and I step toward her, leaning to whisper into her ear. “So why do I feel like this? Like my entire world just fell apart at the seams. How can I be grieving for something that never existed? Tell me that, Savannah. Tell me that.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Savannah

  MY RACING HEART JUST WON’T settle. It seems to stir the nausea curdling in my stomach. All I can think about are Jackson’s last words, and I just don’t know how to feel. Conflicting thoughts and emotions are hurtling through my brain, and I have never wanted to be somewhere else more than I do right now. When Marian and I returned from the bathroom, we found the others at our allocated table. It’s a stationed dinner, which means everyone can eat when it suits. It takes out the formality of a traditional seated dinner, leaving people to mingle at will, swap seats if they like, and eat in between making new connections. The food, I’m sure, is delicious, but I might as well be facing a plate of dried grass for all the appetite I have.

  I play each scene over and over in my head. When I first laid eyes on him, devastatingly handsome in his suave three-piece suit, his arm tenderly linked through the arm of such a stunning woman, his crinkly eyes smiling at her with obvious affection. I felt like I could actually die right there on the spot. That one simple word, Sparrow, seemed to melt through my pores, through flesh and blood to a secret place inside where only one man has ever been, and my body wanted nothing more than to crumple to its knees. It’s as if the sight of him actually validated his existence, and finally I could stop fighting alone because my steely knight was here to save me. But then reality shoved me hard in the shoulder, calling me a fool and pointing at the fair maiden by his side, and before I knew I was even moving, I turned and practically ran through the crowd of people back to where I last saw Nick.