by Cara McKenna
He’d heard his wife say that once, to his brother. She’d been on the phone, talking in hushed, defeated tones. Christ, he’d forgotten about that until just now. He’d been drunk as ever, but he remembered her final words, the ones that’d had him slamming his office door and reaching for the bottle, eager to drown the truth before it could set down roots . . .
Get me out of this, Tom. I need you. I can’t do it on my own.
A white knight, rescuing the damsel, if not slaying the monster. Had that been Rob, truly? The monster? It had felt so like a possession. A nightly body-snatching. A years-long bad dream.
Black sky. City lights.
Those things meant alcohol. Those things meant he’d survived another day going through the motions of a business owner, an employer, a provider, a functional person. He’d probably not seen city lights against a black sky through sober eyes in five years or more. Not even through the window of the hospital room, the night his father had died.
The bathroom door opened, the hum of the fan and the smells of soap and steam escaping.
“You’re up,” Merry said brightly, exiting with a perfect white towel knotted at her chest, twisting another around her hair. Her cheeks were flushed red from the heat or a violent scrub, making her look hearty and healthy and vital. Maybe a bath would do the same for Rob—wash away the temptation and the worry and the memories.
He stripped and filled the tub, shocked anew by the whiteness of the tiles, the heat of the water, the contours and cleanliness. As he sank into the hot bath, a moan escaped him, like a freed spirit bound for heaven.
“Fuck me, that’s good.”
Merry laughed from the next room, entering a minute later to dry her hair. Rob watched, thinking she was the most delightful creature ever put on this earth.
“I’m going to run out real quick,” she said.
“Where?”
“I don’t know when the stores close, and I’m not risking my chance to grab condoms.” She bobbed her eyebrows at him conspiringly.
“I shan’t stop you.”
She moved to crouch by the tub, a lock of her freshly dried hair dipping into the water as she kissed his forehead. “Back in a bit.”
“Not soon enough,” he countered. “Do me a favor, and switch off the light, please.”
She did, closing him in the dim, calming space, surrounded by liquid heat and the soothing hush of the tap.
He heard her return perhaps twenty minutes later, just as his bath was growing tepid. It had done its job, anyway—melted him like a spring thaw. The nerves would return when they ventured out in search of dinner, but for now, he felt incredible. Immune to it all, even the little bottles surely hidden away in that fridge.
“Success?” he called, standing from the bath.
“Oh yes. As long as six is enough, I’ve got us covered. As it were.”
He laughed, drying himself with the softest towel he’d felt in years. He exited into the cool, dry room, finding Merry idly organizing her pack, eyeballing some printout—a train or flight itinerary, he bet. Some contraption or other, hell-bent on taking her far, far away from him.
Stay forever, he wanted to say. Be in love with me—by some miracle capable of making me believe in God—and stay.
But she merely sorted her things as Rob dressed in clean clothes, and said, “There’s another Indian place, right across the street.”
“Perfect.”
“Hygiene and food,” she mused, “and then nothing but the fun human needs left to take care of.”
He felt his face heat, from his neck to his cheeks to his damp temples. Had she packed any rope? Of course she had. That was exactly the delicious flavor of evil she was. “I’ll just shave and I’m ready.”
“No, don’t shave!”
He laughed. “I’ll tidy this mess up, at least.” He smoothed his palms over his beard. “Who knows when I’ll next have access to a bathroom mirror.”
“Fine. Just don’t go crazy.”
He found his razor and returned to the bathroom to force some kind of order.
“I got us something else, when I was out,” Merry said amid the sound of crinkling paper.
“What’s that?”
“You’ll see.” The wicked note to her voice had Rob picturing coarse twine and duct tape and carabiners, had blood flowing south with hard, eager thumps.
He patted his cheeks and neck with lotion from the complimentary packet and shut off the bathroom light. “Now, dinner.”
Merry came close to wrap him in a tight hug. He returned it, clutching that smooth hair, memorizing its texture, breathing in that heady, tropical smell of her perfume. “What’s this for?” he murmured.
“For being here. For finishing this journey with me.” The words warmed his neck and melted his heart.
“It was an honor. Thank you for inviting me.”
She pulled back, smiling, and he kissed her. Tender to start, light and playful, until lust crowded fondness aside, darkening the contact.
Very dark.
As his tongue slipped past her lips, arousal like an electric shock zapped him. At first he reeled, startled a mere kiss could affect him so, or perhaps it was the time apart, missing her, for even this briefest of separations.
But a second later, he registered the true heat of what he was feeling.
The sharp, hot kiss of a long-spurned lover—spirits. Whiskey. He pulled away, clasping her arms, eyes darting all over her face. His body went stiff as a corpse.
“Have you been drinking?”
She smiled and nodded over her shoulder, to a bottle and tumbler set on the bedside table. “I should have waited for you, but I couldn’t help it. I promised myself when I finished this ridiculous trip, I’d blow some of the vacation money I saved on soft beds and hot meals on the most expensive Scotch I could afford. Let me pour you a gla—”
“No.” His heart was thudding, grip tightening, his voice high and fearful and seeming to come from somewhere deeper than his throat. From some terrified well, a hollow dug inside his belly. The bottle glinted amber in the low light, ten times as mesmerizing as any length of rope.
Merry’s smile faltered. “I’m guessing you don’t drink.”
He shook his head, panic rising, blotting out sense. He let her go, stepping back a pace, then another, fighting two urges—to rush to the bottle and tip it to his lips, and to rush to the door and run the way a man would to escape a charging bull.
Irrational thoughts grasped at him like pawing hands. She’s tainted, one whispered. This woman he’d come to view so fondly as temptress—and how right he’d been. There was vice in those hands and eyes and now burning on her lips. Stop it. You’re being mental.
“N-no,” he managed. “I don’t drink.”
“Sorry. I can tell it’s . . . upsetting you.” There were questions in those dark eyes, and they deserved answers. But Rob couldn’t seem to force the truth from his throat.
She nibbled her lip. “I’ve put my foot in it, haven’t I? Should I brush my teeth? Would that help?”
Without waiting for his answer, she disappeared into the bathroom. He wanted to run away, but he was frozen, body locked in a tug-of-war between the craving and fear of it.
He heard the water run, heard her brushing.
Under those bright lights, before that smooth, perfect porcelain.
Everything so clean, as clean and white and Rob’s insides felt dirty and black and toxic, like steaming tar. He wanted to run.
He wanted to run away so, so badly.
Wanted to run nearly as much as he wanted to empty that bottle.
Chapter Sixteen
He didn’t run.
He didn’t take a sip or gulp or empty the bottle down his throat. His feet were rooted to the carpet,
unseeing gaze locked on the door. He was frozen like a deer on a motorway, aching to flee but paralyzed by some perverse instinct.
Merry emerged from the bathroom with a tumbler of water and took a seat on the end of the bed. She patted the spot beside her, and Rob obeyed. They sat cross-legged, facing each other, but Rob only dared stare at the bedspread.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to alarm you.”
“Are you recovering?”
The shame burned, but he was almost relieved to have been found out. Almost.
“Not really.” Abstaining, perhaps. He hadn’t done a thing to address his addiction, aside from move too far away to have to confront it. “I’ve never really recovered.”
“I haven’t seen you drink.”
“And I haven’t, not in two years.” Fuck, he was shaking, fingers drumming at his shin. He was shaking with anxiety, the way he used to shake in the mornings, body threatening to shut down if he didn’t give it what it demanded.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked. “I never would have gone out and bought something if I’d known.”
“I was going to. At the restaurant. When it came up, just naturally.”
“You could’ve told me whenever, and it would’ve been fine. After everything else we’ve shared with each other . . .”
“This is different. To me.”
This was the ugliest thing about him. Not because it turned him into a terrible person. It was simply a key, one that unlocked that cage inside his brain or body or soul and let that other man out. That man was Rob. He was done feeling like a victim to his addiction, pretending it was the gin that made him how he was. All the gin did was wash away the thin film of civility he managed to paper himself in. That horrible man was him, as much as the outcast child or the self-sufficient loner. More so. That man was Rob without inhibitions. The real Rob, unfiltered.
He’d never wanted to run away from a place so badly. Run all the way back to his home and barricade the doors.
He was scared of these feelings, at least. That was something. In his drinking days, he’d ached for the next moment he could surrender to the urges. With sobriety, at least the cravings were as repulsive as they were seductive.
She touched his wrist, and he let her—let her feel the way his body was rattling apart at the joints from fear. “I should never have tried to come here.”
“You never had to,” she said gently. “And I wouldn’t have invited you, if . . . if I’d known.”
“I should have told you.”
“Probably.” She pried his hands from his shin, holding them in her own. Christ, she felt so soft and clean. He wanted to push her away.
She squeezed his fingers. “You can tell me now, though.” When he didn’t reply, she prompted, “So you were an alcoholic? That’s what you meant, about being awful to people, back in England?”
“I wasn’t just an alcoholic.” Not the way a middle-aged housewife might knock back half a bottle of wine and fall asleep in front of the evening dramas. Not the way some infamous uncle got sloppy at family functions and spoke too loudly, recounting the same stories on an endless, embarrassing loop.
“I love alcohol the way a fire loves petrol,” he said, hands shaking harder. He slid them from her hold, not wanting her to feel this any more than he could bear being trapped inside it. He made himself rigid, a robot, so the words wouldn’t hurt so much as they left his body. He’d never actually admitted this to anyone before. Never when confronted. Deny, deny, deny.
“There’s no sip or sniff that doesn’t lead to me blacking out, or waking up behind the wheel of a car, or in a puddle of my own vomit.”
He hazarded a glance, finding Merry’s eyes wide—from the confession or his hard tone, he couldn’t tell. He forced himself to hold her stare, to be brave enough to at least look at her as he said these things.
“Rob.” She tried to touch his hand but he jerked it away. He hadn’t meant to, but he felt so . . . soiled.
“Don’t.” It was barely a whisper, and he clutched his arms as though protecting himself. As though she’d tried to strike him. He felt cold. She scared him so much. Like she might catch this pain if she touched him. His jaw ached from saying these things, and he flexed it, took a deep breath, then met her dark eyes again.
“I blacked out every night for three years. I gave myself the beginnings of cirrhosis, and ulcers. And I drove in that state, God knows how many times. I abused my wife, verbally. Emotionally. She’d been the happiest, most loving person when we met. And in five years . . .” If he hadn’t shut his body off to the feelings, he’d be crying. “I’m not a good person, Merry.”
“Not when you drink, it sounds like.”
“That is me. That’s me, in the proper circumstances. In the real world. That’s me, as much as any man you think you’ve met, this past week. I shouldn’t have come here . . . I was selfish to think I could. I should’ve let you go, believing I was that other man.”
“You are him.”
“I thought that, too,” he whispered, throat burning. “I let myself believe it. Until tonight. But I’m not. I can feel it now. I’m not.” He swallowed with a hard, aching, muscular effort, and shook his head. “I never wanted you to know any of this.”
“I’m sure you didn’t. I’m sor—”
“Don’t. Don’t apologize. How were you to know?”
“I’m still sorry that this has happened. I wouldn’t have asked you to come if I’d realized how upsetting it would be.”
He let his arms go, clasped his wrists and watched his hands.
“I never wanted to be this man again. I don’t know what made me think I’d solved everything, hiding myself away . . . except it’s worked. It had. But now I’m back in a city for an hour, and I’m back to square one.” He’d not taken a sip, but Christ, he wanted to. He really was flammable. What a fool he’d been to think that he’d doused himself, simply locking that flame away, far from fumes and oil. As though that would lessen the result the next time he inevitably encountered his favorite accelerant.
“You haven’t taken a drink,” Merry said. “You haven’t made that choice.”
It’s not a choice, a cruel voice nearly snapped. He pursed his lips until they stung, bloodless, not willing to let those words hit her.
He wasn’t better. Not even close.
He wanted to grab that Scotch from the nightstand and take the deepest, most glorious, burning gulp. He wanted to walk to that fridge and drain those overpriced little bottles, one after another after another, blot out this awful moment before it became just another memory, just another regret.
The exile hadn’t fixed him—not the abstinence or the peace of it. Merry—being with her, sharing with her—hadn’t fixed him, either. This addiction was no mere act of self-medication, one that would ease as he came to terms with his sexuality.
He winced to admit these things to himself, this emotional pain so much worse than any hangover he’d ever suffered. His hands were shaking so badly—fucking delirium tremens.
“I have to leave.” He let his wrists go, swung his bare feet to the carpet. “I’m sorry. But I can’t be here. Even if I don’t drink, I don’t want you to see me this way.”
She was up, trying to catch his arm, but he dodged her. “Rob, don’t. Not if you’re upset, or in danger of—”
“I am in danger. That’s why I have to go.”
“Please, Rob. This isn’t how I want to say good-bye to you.”
“I need to.” Better this way. And now, before the real Rob came out, spitting spiteful words at this too-lovely creature. Where had he kicked his goddamn boots?
“We can make it safe,” she pleaded. “For the night. No alcohol. We’ll just hole up in here. We don’t even have to talk anymore about it—just don’t go. It’s dark, anyway.
You couldn’t hike home if you wanted to.”
“It’s a full moon.”
“Rob.” She was exasperated now, concern sharpened by desperation. “Please. Look—”
She went to the mini-fridge. Just watching those little jewel-glinting bottles as she gathered them had the need roiling in Rob’s belly, real and hot as the most burning lust. Clutching them to her chest with one arm, Merry grabbed the barely touched glass and Scotch from the table. She marched to the bathroom, and he followed, tamping down an urge to stop her. To grab one of those little bottles and feed this fire.
But he merely watched. She emptied the whiskey first, filling the tiny space with its burning breath, an amber stream lashing the white sink, going, going, gone. She unscrewed each mini-bottle with a crack and poured its contents down the drain.
Even without a sip, that dark, mean man inside him wanted to slap at her hands, wrestle them from this sinful waste. But he held fast to his last scrap of rational, civilized thought, merely watching as she poured fifty quid’s worth of overpriced temptation down the sink, rinsed everything clean, and dumped the lot in the bin.
She even rummaged through her toiletries bag on the cistern and emptied a travel-sized mouthwash. Once done, she cinched the bin bag in a knot, hiding the triggering sights, then strode out of the room, dumping it all unceremoniously in the hall outside their door.
“Now stay,” she said, meeting him in the bathroom threshold, taking his hands. “Please. I won’t say good-bye to you like this.”
He didn’t respond, and she rubbed his knuckles with her thumbs.
“We’ll stay inside. We’ll order room service, or get takeout. We’ll just hole up here, and we’ll go south together. We’ll find you a bus that goes along Loch Ness. I’ll change my own reservations if I can, and go your way, whatever I need to do. But when I watch you walk away, I need to know you’ll be okay. That you’ll just be a few hours’ hike from home. Please.”
He considered it. If it were an early coach, he might be dropped in Drumnadrochit well before the pubs started serving . . . he could head straight for home and not look back. It might be okay . . .