Batty and I have had a weird relationship from the beginning. Sexual, yes. Hell yes. But seeing him with those kids brings out another side of him. Apparently, there are several, I think wryly. Just another reason for his nickname. Most would think it was because he dressed up as Batman, but the first time I saw him was through a tiny window. Yes, I was spying. He was laughing and it took my breath away. When he looked up and saw me, his expression went cold. It made me shiver, that look.
I used to watch FernGully almost religiously as a kid. Something about being able to experience a world no one knew existed fascinated me. He instantly clicked in my head as the crazy bat that had wires crossed on top of his head, changing a channel to be a completely different person. Guess that was more apt than I knew at the time. Yes, Finnigan Brennick would stay Batty to me.
~
WEDNESDAY
“How does that make you feel?”
“Oh, fucking please, don’t be that.” I roll my eyes and grab a pillow. I was actually sitting up and being a participant for the first time . . . ever in this office, and she wanted to go all shrink on me.
Dr. Pentir raises her eyebrows. “What am I doing, Sadie? My job?”
I sigh. Okay, so she is a shrink, but still. “I don’t even know if I can pay you! Now that I actually need you, don’t ask redundant questions, please.”
“Wow, two pleases. This must be serious. I can’t recall in our relationship that you’ve ever used that word with me.” She jots something down on her yellow legal pad. I’m buying the bitch an iPad just to spite her, finances be damned.
“I was mad as hell. He had to hold me back.” I know, legally speaking, I can’t touch them or they would have a leg to stand on, but I really wanted to fuck them up.
“So what do you do with that anger? You don’t have any concerts where you can throw bottles of water at unsuspecting audience members.”
I purse my lips and give her a look. Not. Amused. She holds up a hand. “Alright, fine. So he gave you a way out, right?”
“Batty? Yeah. Do a singing competition and make a fraction of what the other judges are getting so that I can keep my house for another couple months.”
She bites her lip and looks down. Damn it. “What? Just say it.”
Dr. Pentir takes a deep breath before laying it out like I wanted her to in the first place. “Most people would die to be in your position, Sadie. To even be on a show like that as a contestant? They would sell body parts. But only a few are talented enough. From what you’ve said, you get to cherry pick your team. The money,” she waves a hand, like brushing that monumental issue aside. “That’s not the point. You can take your experience with riffs and lyrics, melodies, and teach someone to be better. Maybe your time is up.” She shrugs. No big freaking deal to her. “You get to bring up the next generation of stars, potentially being the launching point of someone’s career. Be excited for the chance, instead of being marked a has been.”
I take a minute to process what she’s saying, instead of biting her head off for sweeping my problems under the rug. I think about Paula . . . okay, bad example. Christina? Better. An image forms in my head of the other judges saying someone would be a great fit for me. Who would that be? I can’t imagine. I did a benefit concert a million years ago with those guys. I remember beating James over the head with a bottle of water in the green room and then Pauly jumping Rolling Bridge’s drummer during their sound check . . . while he was playing. I’m so fucked.
Chapter 7
SUNDAY
I step off the elevator and salute the giraffe that’s sticking his tongue out at me on the wall before walking to the receptionist’s desk in front of the pediatric oncology ward. I raise my chin to the nurse and hand her my ID.
“Sup, Alyse?”
“Sadie! Girl, I am so glad to see you’re okay! Last week you were—”
“Something, huh?” I cut her off. My bruises have faded to yellow and are easily covered by makeup now.
“Yeah . . . something,” she trails off. I turn to the doors as soon as she gives me the visitor’s badge. I know she’s uncomfortable, and I need to get inside.
“Robin!” a little voice yells seconds before a little body barrels into me. It doesn’t even knock me back on my heels, she’s so frail.
“Paige! You look so good!” I say, smiling at the ten year old, hugging her back tight.
“We missed you last week, but Batman said you had a mission. Was it the Joker?” she asks excitedly.
“How did you know? Did he tell you everything?” I smile and walk with her to the common room. There he is, holding court with the little people in hospital gowns. Batty meets my eyes, his hands up as he tells some story.
“There she is. I told you she would be back.” His voice is certain, but after all of this time, and especially last week, he knew I would be here. “Come tell us of your adventures, Robin.” He has this thing he does with his mouth. It’s not a gasp, or a clicking of his tongue. But it’s a mixture that never fails to get my blood pumping at the wrong times. Like now.
“Right,” I sigh, a little breathless. He gives a little smirk, the ass. He knows what he does to me. Concentrate on the kids. My eyes widen as I take my place standing next to his chair at the front of the room, not knowing at all what was going to come out of my mouth. Nothing unusual there. “I got a tip, just as Batty was entering the hospital about a possible Joker sighting.” The kids gasp. I nod knowingly to them. “I couldn’t take us both away from you guys, so I told him to go on.”
“So noble,” Batty mumbles. I bump him in the shoulder with my hip.
“He was on the Pacific Coast Highway headed south. What if he got too far away? I couldn’t chance it. So I raced off after him.”
“What car did you use? Did you take the Batmobile?” a little boy asked in angst. Both Batty and I shake our heads no at the same time.
“No. I didn’t want to tip him off. I took the sidekick car. It goes super fast. Anyway, he caught on to me. He pulled into an alley, trying to trap me.” They gasp, some coughing afterwards. I don’t show any sign of hearing it, though. “A man got out of the car. He had a black coat on and laughed. You know the laugh,” I prompt them. They all give their versions of a crazy person on cue. “Yes! Exactly like that! I told him that he had done horrible things in our city, but I was there to bring him in. He has such a big smile, doesn’t he?”
All of the kids have watched the cartoons, some of the older ones watching the more adult versions of Batman. We were in high demand here and they knew their stuff. They nod. “He reaches out a fist, like he’s going to punch me.” I raise a fist in the air and out over their heads. They all flinch back. “I moved just like you and could feel the air where he barely missed me. I kicked him so fast he didn’t know what was coming. He fell to the ground and I told him, your time’s up Joker.” I’m looking at the ground in front of me, their wide eyes on me. “He jumped to his feet so fast I couldn’t believe it!” I bend back with my arms wide and the crowd reacts. “He got me good in the stomach.” I bend over and they groan for me. “I came up with a punch and kept at him, cornering him against the building. Punching and kicking—” Batty squeezes my knee from behind, and I lower my fist and other leg. Okay, too much. “He pushed me away and jumped on the fire escape,” I quickly conclude. “I lost him.”
They sigh, their shoulders visibly sinking. “It’s ‘cause you didn’t have Batman. He could have gotten him.”
Batty nods sagely. “Exactly, and next time I will. Robin did an excellent job, though.” The crowd claps and I give a fist pump as I curtsey. The parents laugh so I wink at them.
We quickly disperse after that. I have a gaggle of girls waiting to have their nails painted, as has become our routine. I started out with an absent color dropped into my purse and now come with a full cosmetology kit.
“How are you doing, Mara?” I ask, focusing on my brush strokes. The thirteen year old sighs through her nose.
“H
ow do you think I’m doing? I’m dying.” She’s always so frank.
“Don’t give up yet,” I say loudly, so that all of the other little girls can hear me. “And don’t scare them. What’s wrong with you?” I ask her quietly.
I see her grit her teeth. “I’m just tired. Tired of being here. Tired of everything.”
“You are only as strong as you’re head. That has nothing to do with your body. It can be sick, fine. But if you think you’ll get better, it will work harder. Do you think that thoughts of failure make your body work harder or make it give up too?” Yeah, okay. I can see that analogy applying to my life. I never said the kids don’t help me too.
“So I think I’ll survive and I will? Why didn’t the doctor say that?” she challenges me. God, I saw so much in her green eyes that remind me of myself.
“Do you know what you need? You need to get angry. I, Robin, prescribe you a playlist of angry music.” I tap her nose and she jerks back, offended.
“You don’t think I’m angry?”
“Of course you are. But you’re the one that just said you’re giving up.”
“I’m not giving up. I’m here. I just don’t think it’s helping.” She looks down at her nails with tears in her eyes. I do the only thing I know to do.
“Do you have in iPod?”
“What are you going to do with it?” she asks warily.
“You need to get angry at cancer. Say,” I whisper the rest, “F that. Think the whole word in your head. Scream it in your head. Do it now,” I demand.
I watch her eyes go unfocused and some color come to her cheeks. She meets my eyes again. I put my hands slowly onto her cheeks and get close to her. “I know you’re tired, pretty girl. You don’t have to do anything but yell in your head.” I let go and move to the last pinky nail. “I’ll get you some songs before I leave. Let me get these beauties’ nails first. Two weeks with the same color? Unthinkable.”
Chapter 8
I watch Batty’s back as he walks away. Sighing, I shift my weight to one foot and move my hands nervously over my hair while he can’t see. Finally, after a fucking age, when he’s almost to his car, he turns slightly to ask over his shoulder, “You coming with me?”
He’s changing the script all up. I walk past him, sliding into the car and quickly crossing my arms. Yes, like a child. I feel Batty’s eyes as he looks me over before turning the key. I can’t see it though, because my eyes are firmly trained out the window.
“What is this?” Batty asks as he slides his mask off and tosses it in the backseat.
I take mine off too and shove it in my purse before taking out my phone. “What do you mean?”
“Did something happen with one of the kids?”
“No.”
“Sadie, tell me what’s got you in a snit,” he orders, like a boss . . . or a CEO used to getting his way. I roll my eyes.
“I’m still pissed at you.” There. I can sense him rolling his eyes back at me, even though I can’t see it.
“I apologized, but really it wasn’t my fault. Your stubborn ass refused to take my calls.”
I scoff. “Oh, believe me, if I knew it was Batty calling I would have answered a lot faster than Finnigan fucking Brennick,” I say sarcastically. I finally shift my body to lean against the door and watch his shrug.
“So you like the Batman guy, but you don’t really know the CEO, either.”
“I know exactly what your type is like. I’ve been in this business a lot longer than you, as I recall.” I remember my brother and sister loudly lamenting the change in command from his brother to him a couple of years ago.
“I had to feel my way through the minefield that is musical artists. Hell, any celebrity that gets their fifteen minutes thinks they shit gold. You’re not all that different.”
“Ohhhh!” I trail off loudly. He doesn’t let me sit in indignation for long.
“Oh, please. You’re Popper from Chimera. You spit and throw things and think people love you for it. There was a reason you didn’t want to come to my office. Let’s have it.”
“Fuck you,” I growl.
He looks over at me with a smirk as his eyes hit the street lamps just right. “Baby, you’re about to. What was so scary about my office? You don’t like the big man, is that all?”
He’s being such a douche I don’t respond, instead focusing on unlocking my house and turning the lights on from my phone. His big hand wraps around my thigh and gives it a squeeze and a shake simultaneously, bringing my eyes back to him. He gives me glances in between watching the road, but doesn’t moves his hand for several minutes, until I cave.
“I thought you were going to let me go, or at the least suggest I have surgery,” I mumble.
“And that’s not an option.” He says it like a statement, but I shake my head in answer anyway. “Why?”
I grab his wrist to try to remove his hand. “Stop.” He doesn’t move, just releases his grip to trail down to my knee and back up, very close to the juncture of my thigh. I stare at that hand and trace the long vein running up his forearm with my eyes before giving in. Again. “I won’t have the surgery.”
“Why?” he immediately shoots back.
“I guess I just don’t love the band enough to go through having my neck opened up.”
“My understanding is they go through your mouth, but I wouldn’t want it either. It seems common for your genre, though.” I catch his eyes and quickly drop mine. No way in hell anyone is putting me under to work on my throat next to my windpipe. I thought that I would have money aplenty to fall back on when I refused, but hearing you’re not good enough without it stung. With it . . . well, he can kiss my ass.
“No.”
“Hmm.” I get another squeeze and mercifully he stays quiet for the rest of the drive. It’s pretty, the highway on the coast. When we pull up to my house in Malibu he starts walking around the hood, leaving me scrambling to exit so he can’t be the gentleman he pretends to be. I slam the door on his Lotus and walk toward the door with a strut in my step. I know he wanted to open that door. HA!
I sail through the entrance of my house and attempt to close it behind me with a flick of my wrist. My face contorts as I hear his palm slap the hard wood, along with his chuckle behind me.
I turn to see him sail past my kitchen and straight for the double doors leading to the deck. No one has ever walked out there since I took ownership of this house. It’s my place to decompress. “What are you doing?”
“I just want to look.”
“Why?” I ask as I trail behind him. He looks out into the night before turning and leaning against the railing, spreading his arms wide.
“You smell like the sea sometimes,” he says simply. That’s all. I’m looking out into the surf as he reels me in with a long arm. Patiently, he pulls the hair back from my neck and over my shoulder. “Right here,” he claims before opening his mouth onto the tendon straining at the side of my neck.
I blink languidly and move my head to the side to give him better access. This space is mine. I come here to connect with the most basic form of myself. I try to disconnect with my feeling for Batty by opening my eyes. All I see is black tipped with foam waves, and feel a velvety tongue I long to feel . . . everywhere.
“What are you doing?” I mumble.
“Exactly what you want.” I feel his hand snake inside of my jeans to squeeze my ass, pulling me toward his erection. As I rock against him, I find I can’t catch my breath, and hate myself for it. Why does he do this to me? I push against his chest.
“Knock it off.”
“Did you want to talk about something? Or did you want to feel about something?” he says against my neck, opening his mouth after he’s done asking his asinine questions and sucking on my neck, tonguing the tendon running there.
“Why are you doing this here? We usually fuck in the house.” My words try in vain to pull us away from the new moment he’s painstakingly creating.
“I like the way you
taste, Sadie. Let me taste you out here.” Shit. My mind blanks as I try to scramble for what I’m supposed to do next to thwart his sexiness from invading my space when I haven’t forgiven him yet. Despite me, he grips my thighs and I instinctively wrap my legs around his body. He walks us until he sits on my favorite lounge. As I move my feet to rest on either side of him, I pull back. Batty is resting on my favorite chaise like it was made specifically for him.
“What are you doing?” I grind out between my teeth. He smiles as his head rests on the back of the cushions and flexes his hips, licking his lips. “What you want me to do.”
I forcibly move my eyes to the few stars in the sky and the next building over, which is dark and empty. “You could have had me against the rail easily enough.”
My head is forcibly moved by his hand gripping my jaw. “You want me here. I want you here. Why don’t you take me here, Sadie?”
I swallow roughly at the look in his eyes. I never imagined someone out here with me, where I connect with the waves and let them wash away my metaphoric pollution, dirtiness, if you will. I bought this house for the sole reason of being alone. I’m never alone. That he’s invaded even this part of my life causes panic.
“Stop it.”
“Fuck me, Sadie.”
“I said no,” I say, straining against him. He shoves his hand down the front my jeans and I have the front row seat, watching his eyes turn gunmetal.
“Feels like you don’t want me to stop, baby. Are you going to say ‘Stop, Finn, don’t make me scream into the night’ or are you going to make me leave with this?” He pushes his length against me in emphasis of his words, as if I needed the visceral image of how hard he was for me. His cock springs forth in my mind, and I whimper against my will. It’s all the encouragement he needs. “That’s a yes. I know your body, Sadie.”
Forgetting Popper (Los Rancheros #3) Page 4