“Yes?” I said softly.
“Do you love me, or the idea of me?”
I stiffened, and he stroked the tops of my fingers with his thumbs.
I tried to pull my hands away because I wanted to see his face, but he held them firmly, not letting me go.
“Just answer the question, love.”
“I love you,” I said with certainty. “Do you … do you not feel the same?”
Oh God. He was going to call off the wedding.
I felt my throat constricting. I dropped my head, pulling deep breaths.
“I love you, Leah. I wouldn’t have asked you to marry me if I didn’t.”
Then why are we having this conversation?
“Then why are we having this conversation?” I had sounded surer in my head. My voice quivered.
“Love isn’t always enough. I just want to make sure…”
His voice trailed off. Was he talking about Olivia? I wanted to scream. She was here with us on our wedding day. I wanted to tell him that she was gone! She’d moved on. She was … she was … a worthless bitch that didn’t deserve him.
Did I love him?
I lifted my chin. Yes, I did — more than she did, anyway. If he needed me to talk him through this, I would.
“Caleb,” I said, my voice soft. “There is something I’ve never told you. It’s about my family.”
I took a breath and allowed the truth to seep from my lips. It was now or never. My words were laced with shame and hurt. Caleb, sensing something, gripped me tighter.
“I’m adopted.”
He made to spin around, but I held him in place. I couldn’t look at him just yet. I just needed to get this out. Any minute they were going to come looking for us, and I needed to finish before they did. “Just, don’t turn around, okay. Just … listen.”
“Okay,” he said.
“After my parents got married, they tried for three years to have a baby. Doctors told my mother that she couldn’t have children, so they reluctantly decided to adopt. My father is Greek, Caleb. He needed a son. They decided not to wait for a domestic adoption, which would have taken years. My father had connections in the Russian embassy.
“Leah…”
My heart almost caved at the sound of his voice. “Just shut up,” I said. “This is really hard, just let me say it.”
I fought the tears. I wouldn’t sacrifice my makeup for this.
“My real mother was sixteen and she worked in a brothel. I wasn’t the boy they wanted, but they brought me back with them. I was six weeks old. A month later, my mother found out she was pregnant. She had a miscarriage … I guess it was a boy. My father blamed the stress of the miscarriage on me. I was apparently very difficult, colicky and whatnot. She got pregnant with Courtney a few months later, but my father had lost his boy. I guess he’s hated me ever since. I went from the baby they wanted to the baby that killed the wanted baby … to the inconvenience — a prostitute’s baby.”
There was a loud rapping on the door. “A few more minutes,” I called out. I spun around and made Caleb face me. He took me in his arms, his eyebrows drawn. I felt his warmth seeping into me. He was quiet for a long time.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“God, Caleb. It’s my family’s dirty little secret. I was ashamed.” I had to bend my head all the way back to look into his face. He made me feel small and protected.
“You have nothing to be ashamed of. It’s them — I can’t even imagine.”
He shook his head. “Is that why your father won’t walk you down the aisle today?” He narrowed his eyes, and I blushed. I’d told him that my father’s gout was acting up. No holds barred. I nodded. My father had told me a week earlier that he would not be escorting me down the aisle. I hadn’t really expected him to.
Caleb swore. He hardly ever swore in front of me. I could see how angry he was. “That’s why he gave you the job.” It wasn’t a question. He was piecing things together. I nodded. He looked so enraged; I knew my plan was working.
“Caleb … don’t leave me,” my lip quivered. “Please … I love you.”
He grabbed me almost roughly and pulled me into his arms. I clutched him, not caring about my makeup or my hair. This was the way into his heart. I played his compassion, and I played his need to protect things that were broken and lost.
The knocking on the door resumed. Caleb held me at arm’s length and looked at me. Something had transitioned in his eyes. I’d become something else to him in the moment I’d shared my secret. Had I known that would happen? Had I intentionally held off on telling him the truth in case something like this ever happened?
He lightly ran a finger from my hairline, straight down my forehead across my nose, over my lips and down my neck.
“You’re stunning,” he said. “Can I walk you down the aisle?”
My heart skipped, skidded, flew … did a fucking happy dance. He was going to marry me.
“Yes, please.”
“Leah…”
“Yes?”
“I won’t hurt you. I’ll take care of you. Do you believe me?”
“Yes,” I lied.
Chapter Twenty-ThreePresent
She looks the same. Raven hair hanging wildly to her waist. She looks almost gypsy-like in her teal linen pants and a cream sheath shirt that hangs casually off one defined shoulder. I eye her gold hoop earrings, which are big enough to fit my entire hand through. They make her look exotic and slightly dangerous. She has always made me feel plain.
Her eyes rove over the handful of occupants in the diner, searching for a face she recognizes: an old man, a couple who share the same side of a booth, two servers folding silverware into napkins … and me.
I see the shock overcome her features — the parting of her lips, the slight spreading of white around her irises. Suddenly, she stiffens. Her eyes chase to the four corners of the room, and I know she is looking for him. I shake my head to tell her he’s not here. I take a sip of my coffee and I wait.
She moves with purpose toward my table. When she reaches where I am sitting, she doesn’t sit but stares at me expectantly.
“An old client?” She says dryly.
“Well, I am, aren’t I?” I motion for her to sit. I’d sent an anonymous message to her office, claiming I was an old client in desperate legal trouble. I’d asked her to meet me at a diner named Tiffany’s. I had no idea if she’d come or not, but it was better than showing up at her office.
She slides cautiously into the seat across from me, never taking her eyes from my face.
“Well, what the fuck do you want?”
I flinch. Louboutins or not, she’s still the same crass piece of white trash she used to be.
“I thought maybe you could look over this document for me.” I reach into my purse and pull out the papers I’d stolen from Caleb’s filing cabinet. Placing them on the table, I slide them toward her.
“What is this?” she asks. She eyes me distastefully. How dare she look at me that way? She has singlehandedly ruined my life. I’d have everything if it weren’t for her devious, overreaching hands.
I’d probably also be in prison. I push that thought away. Now is not the time for gratitude. Now is the time for answers. I poke the document in front of her.
“Take a look. See for yourself.”
Without moving her head, she looks at the papers then back to me. It’s a smooth, hard, impressive piece of intimidation. The art of her body language is something to be admired.
“Why would I want to do that?” she says.
She’s making me feel chilled. I get a flashback of being on the witness stand, and my heart rate spikes. I practice to see if I can do it too.
“It’s Caleb’s,” I say, only moving my lips.
I don’t know whether it’s the mention of his name or if my imitation of her body language is working, but she tenses.
A server approaches our table. Olivia reaches for the papers.
“Get her a coffe
e, two creamers.” I say, waving him away. He hurries off. Olivia, who is reading, briefly glances up at me. I spent almost every day with her for nine months. I know what she likes.
I sip my coffee as she reads, watching her face.
Her coffee arrives. Without looking up, she pulls the lids from the creamers and dumps them into her cup.
She lifts the mug to her lips, but halfway there her hand freezes. Coffee spills onto the table as she slams the mug down. Abruptly, she stands up.
“Where did you get that?”
She is backing away from the table, shaking her head. “Why is my name on there?”
I run my tongue across my teeth. “I was hoping you could tell me that?”
She bolts for the door. I stand up, tossing a twenty on the table and go after her.
I follow her into the parking lot and corner her by the newspaper stand. “You are not getting out of explaining why your name is on this deed along with my husband’s!”
Her face is washed of color. She shakes her head. “I don’t know, Leah. He never — I don’t know.”
She covers her face with her palms, and I hear her sob. That only makes me angrier. I take a threatening step toward her.
“You’re sleeping with him, aren’t you?”
She pulls her hands away and glares at me.
“No. Of course not! I love my husband.” She is clearly insulted that I would even accuse her of such a thing.
“I love mine!” My voice cracks. “ — So, why does he love you?”
She looks at me with true loathing.
“He doesn’t,” she says simply. “He chose you.” It pains her to give me those words. I can see the emotion spilling from her skin.
I hold up the deed and shake it. “He bought you a house. Why did he buy you a fucking house?”
She snatches the deed from my fingers and points to a date. “Did you miss this little detail? Long before you, Leah.” She shoves it back at my chest. “But, you know that. So, why did you really trick me into coming here?”
I swallow — a nervous reaction. She sees it and smiles cruelly.
“I should have let them throw you in prison, you know that.”
She turns away, walking toward her car door. Her statement infuriates me. I follow her, digging my fingernails into my palms, I breathe through my nose.
“So you could have him?” I blurt. My blood pounds in my ears. I ask myself that question all the time. I say it again. “You should have lost the case so you could have him?”
She freezes, looks at me over her shoulder.
“Yeah.”
I didn’t expect the truth. It frightens me. I open my mouth — force the words out. “I thought you loved your husband.”
She blows air through her nose. The action reminds me of an agitated horse. Her eyes rove from my shoes and land in disgust on my face.
“I love yours too.”
Chapter Twenty-FourPast
Before Caleb and I were married, I rarely allowed my parents to be around him out of fear that their opinions would rub off on him, and he’d start looking at me like they did. Most of my other boyfriends hadn’t caught on to their veiled insults and cold parenting. Caleb was smart, he’d see right through them, right through me — and start asking questions. I didn’t want the questions or the eventual resignation it would bring: Leah is a disappointment. She’s not the real deal, just the secondhand daughter.
I didn’t like anyone knowing my shit. So, for the two years of our courtship, I herded him in and out of social events with my family with meticulous precision. It was exhausting for the most part — making sure no one said too much, the conversations didn’t dip too deep. After the wedding, that changed. Maybe, I felt more comfortable since I had the commitment, or maybe it was the fact that I had finally told him the truth about where I came from.
We were formally invited to attend dinner at their house a week after we got back from our honeymoon. Caleb was still bristling over the fact that my father wouldn’t walk me down the aisle.
“I don’t want to go, Leah. What he did was disrespectful to you. He’s lucky I didn’t call him out at the wedding. I won’t let him treat you like that.”
I loved that. I felt more valuable in those five seconds than I had in years.
“Please,” I reached up on my tiptoes and kissed his chin. “Let’s just keep the peace. I love my sister. I don’t want to cause a rift.”
He grabbed my upper arms and squeezed gently, narrowing his eyes. “If he says one word, Leah, one word that I don’t like…”
“You’re going to punch him in the face,” I said firmly.
He grinned crookedly and kissed me roughly on the mouth — just the way I liked it.
“I’m going to punch him in the face if he serves duck. I hate duck.”
I giggled against his lips. “What about if he tells the scuba diving joke?”
“That too — he’s getting hit for the joke…”
We were moving toward the bedroom, our feet shuffling together, our lips never far apart.
I laced my fingers in his hair, the edges of my thoughts fraying until they fell apart, and all I could think of was his touch and his husky voice in my ear.
Later that evening, we walked to my parents' door hand in hand. Two weeks in the Maldives had left us tanned and relaxed, and we were still floating in our vacation lull, laughing and kissing and touching like one of us might disappear. Caleb was finally mine. As my hand sought out the doorknob, my thoughts fleetingly went to my arch nemesis. My lips found a smile so rooted in triumph that Caleb cocked his head at me quizzically.
“What?” He asked.
I shrugged. “I’m just happy, that’s all. Everything is perfect.”
I wished I could say: Dum, dum, the witch is dead…
But, the witch wasn’t dead. She was in Texas — which was good enough.
My parents and sister were in the family room. They looked at Caleb expectantly when we walked in, almost like they were waiting for him to announce he was leaving me. There was an awkward thirty seconds of silence before my sister jumped up to hug us.
“How was it? Tell me everything.” She grabbed my hand and led me toward the couch. I glanced at Caleb, who was shaking hands with my father. Daddy liked Caleb. He liked him so much that I wondered what he’d think about the fact that Caleb hated him. I felt a sick satisfaction knowing that I’d turned Caleb against him. My father thought he could have anyone, and he truly wanted everyone’s adoration … except mine.
“It was beautiful,” I assured her. "Very romantic.”
A quick glance at Caleb.
She leaned close to me. “They’ve been bitching all morning about how much the wedding cost them,” she said. “Don’t bring it up.”
I felt my cheeks grow warm. This was typical behavior for my parents. Of course they’d pay for their eldest daughter’s wedding. Of course it would be extravagant and over the top to impress their friends. Of course they would bitch afterward about how much money they’d had to shell out for someone who wasn’t really blood. But, what else could they do? No one knew I wasn’t really theirs. To do anything less would cast a shadow over their perfect image as loving parents.
Please, God, please don’t let them say anything in front of Caleb.
My sister was holding a glass of red wine. I took it from her and swallowed a mouthful.
My mother was walking toward us, each of her birdlike steps tugging a fresh strand of dread to the forefront of my mind.
“You should really stay out of the sun, Leah,” she said, sitting down across from me. I looked down at my bronze colored arm. Despite the fact that I was fair skinned and had red hair, I tanned like an Italian.
“You look silly with color — it looks like you went for one of those spray tans.”
“She looks fine, Mother,” my sister snapped. “Just because you’re afraid of the sun, doesn’t mean we have to be.”
I shot my sister a grateful loo
k and tensed for the next biting comment.
“Caleb looks well,” she said, glancing over to where he was still speaking with my father. “So handsome. I always thought he’d be a good match for you, Courtney.”
My head swam, my vision blurred. Courtney made an angry sound in the back of her throat.
“That is so wildly inappropriate,” she hissed. “Not only is perfect not my type, but Leah and Caleb go together better than any couple I know. Everyone says so.”
My mother raised her eyebrows. I found my tongue.
“Why would you even say something like that?” I said to her. “After everything you did to help me…”
She sniffed and took a sip from her own wine glass. “A woman shouldn’t have to fight that hard to be with a man. He should just want her…”
My sister was looking from one of us to the other. “What are you talking about?”
My mother’s eyes locked with mine in a silent warning. “Dinner should be ready,” she said. “Why don’t we head over to the dining room?”
Mattia still made most of my parents' meals. She’d been with my family since I was a little girl. I always looked forward to her cooking. Tonight, it was salmon with rice pilaf and a honey mustard glaze. She squeezed my shoulder as she set my plate down in front of me.
“Congratulations,” she whispered in my ear. I smiled at her. I’d wanted her to come to the wedding, but my parents thought it was inappropriate.
“I have something for you,” she said, “just a small something. I’ll leave it in the kitchen for you.”
I nodded at her, hoping my mother hadn’t heard. My mother had a gift for making heartfelt gestures seem silly and comical.
Mattia left the room after the last plate was laid, and I turned my attention to the conversation my father was having with Caleb. Despite his current feelings toward my parents, Caleb was composed and respectful, answering questions and delivering them in perfect sequence.
He was a social genius. I attributed it to the fact that he seemed to be able to get to the core of every person he met in one meeting, and from there on out, he automatically knew how to manipulate their moods. I’d seen him ask a stranger question after question, until he broke down their defenses. Initially, the subject of his interest looked mildly guarded, giving him censored answers. He timed his probing questions with jokes and self-deprecating comments that set the person at ease. He never judged. He narrowed his eyes when it was the other person’s turn to speak — a charming bit of body language that said: you are so interesting, keep speaking. I loved watching him speak to people. I loved watching them fall for him. By the end of a conversation with Caleb, people where so taken with him, they looked disappointed when the interaction ended. He really cared — that was the difference between Caleb and someone who was just being nosy. People picked up on that quickly.
Dirty Red (Love Me With Lies) Page 15