by Lauren Wood
I couldn’t think of the consequences of that. No way, no how. I’ll keep Izzy with me twenty-four hours a day if I have to, and if Andrews goes for her, he won’t live long enough to regret it.
17
Izzy
Weird as it was, I already started thinking in terms of we. Not Jack and me. Me and the baby. I’d known I was pregnant for less than twenty-four hours, and now reconsidered every piece of food that passed my lips. I mentally tallied off a no-no list – alcohol, caffeine, sodas, junk food. Then I reconsidered. Junk food in small, moderate quantities. Let the kid get a taste for all kinds of things. I wasn’t much of a junk food junkie, anyway, but I did like chocolate. A lot.
“I want you to start staying at my house.”
I jerked my head away from my computer where I was researching good foods for pregnancies, especially those within my limited budget. I closed my search browser, then glanced at Jack. “What?”
“You know what I mean,” he said. “I need to protect you.”
Don’t you mean us? “I’m fine at Nellie’s. If Andrews wants to go head to head with her, bear spray is the least of his worries.”
Jack scowled. “I don’t need my sister in the line of fire, either.”
“She already is,” I replied. “Obviously, Andrews knows where she lives and that I’m staying there.”
“You think she can protect you and I can’t?”
I leaned back in my chair. “Jack. He’s already shot you once. He will not hesitate to do it again to get at me. Ever think that this next time he’ll kill you?”
His mouth thinned into a stubborn line. “Now I’m prepared. He won’t catch me by surprise like he did.”
Since yesterday, I’d begun to believe that Jack would drop me like a hot bag of shit if he learned I carried his baby. I felt the need to withdraw from him. Emotionally. If I wasn’t headlong in love with him, it wouldn’t hurt so bad when he said, So long, Izzy. The check’s in the mail. Withdrawing from him meant not staying under his roof.
“I’m fine, Jack. You don’t need to fuss.”
“Yeah, I do, Izzy.”
I considered blurting out that I was pregnant, just so he would dump be faster, and I could get it over with. But I couldn’t. This secret was mine, and I planned to keep it mine for as long as I dared. “No, Jack. You’re my boss, but you don’t own me.”
“Dammit, Izzy.” He glared at me. “I want you with me.”
You wouldn’t if you knew I was pregnant. “I appreciate you worrying, but I’ll be all right. If that moron gets close to me, I’ll spray him and that’ll be the end of that.”
Jack would have said more except his attention was caught by someone walking down the hallway toward our paired offices. Except that walking wasn’t exactly what I’d call what this woman was doing. I was reminded of the way women sashayed in the old classic movies from the forties and fifties. All that was missing was the fur coat and the cigarette in its holder.
“Hello, Jack.”
The woman actually purred. Jack gaped while I took a closer look at the familiar figure leaning seductively against Jack’s door. Oh, my God. That was Charlene Willis. She and Jack were an item back in school, and apparently still were. Instantly, the hurt that speared my chest at the expression of sheer lust on the woman’s face paid to the lie I told myself.
I’m not in love with him. Yes, I am. I’m carrying his baby, and all the while he’s banging his old girlfriend. I am such a loser. Tears stung my eyes and I quickly looked away, finding it difficult to breathe all of a sudden. Cold spread through my body to the tips of my fingers, making them numb.
“What the hell are you doing here, Charlene?” Jack barked.
“You missed your appointment with me, Jack,” Charlene cooed. “I came to see if we could do it here in your office.”
Oh, yeah, baby, Jack will do you in a heartbeat right there on his desk. He did me. Oh, and how did you manage to gain a hundred pounds? It looks good on you. Just like it does on a walrus.
Only then did she notice me. “Isabelle?”
I forced a smile. “Hi, Charlene. Nice to see you again.”
“You work with Jack?”
“As usual, your powers of observation are only exceeded by the excessive pounds on your ass.”
Her eyes narrowed and her mouth pouted. “Same old Isabelle. Always thinking you’re better than anyone else.”
I pursed my lips and blew her a kiss. “Because I am, sweetheart.”
“Charlene, what the fuck are you doing here?” Jack roared, standing up.
“She’s here to fuck you, Jack,” I said, also standing. I opened my desk drawer to grab my purse. “I’ll leave you to your privacy. Though I can’t say the same for those guys.”
I walked out of the office, passing the curious faces of both Leo and Benjamin as they stared in the direction of Jack and Charlene. Behind me, I heard Jack cussing the shit out of Charlene, heard her protests, but I ignored them. The hurt in my chest blinded and deafened me to anything else except its own strident voice.
“Izzy?”
“I’m done here, Debbie. Sayonara.”
“Izzy!” Jack yelled my name, but I was out the door and headed toward my car when he burst from the office.
“Izzy, wait.”
I ignored him. The pain and cold from my chest radiated outward, and I felt nothing else. This can’t be good for the baby. Jack seized my left arm. I wheeled, and punched him hard in his face, my right fist connecting somewhere between his nose and his cheekbone.
Being a former football player, my blow hardly fazed him. But he took his hand from me, which is what I wanted.
“Izzy, it’s not what you think.”
“You have no idea what I’m thinking.”
I jabbed my key in my car’s door, and managed to hit it the first time. What a shock. I opened my door, and put it between us. “By the way, hero, I quit.”
“No, please give me a chance to explain.” His voice all but begged me, and I almost reconsidered. The memory of Charlene sashaying down the hall to his office kept me on track.
“I’m sure you can find your own way home.”
I slammed my Mustang’s door and locked it. Jack stood outside my window, his expression desperate, pleading. I started the engine. Not caring if I ran over his toes, I backed my car from its slot. Without looking back, I drove away.
I didn’t go to Nellie’s.
I drove back to my apartment, and walked into my faintly musty home, a little warm with the air conditioning off. After locking my door, I switched it on, then opened the door to the tiny patio to let some fresh air in. Everything looked the same as it did when I left the morning Andrews deposited the roadkill on my mat.
Stepping onto the patio, I leaned against the rail, and looked down for any sign I’d been followed. I saw nothing. No silver Beemer, no beat up truck, no stalker. That didn’t mean Andrews didn’t witness my fight with Jack, my punch to his face, and knew that everything was over between us. My fingers touched the bear spray in my pocket.
Right now I’d welcome a good fight and the opportunity to spray that mother fucker right in the eyes.
My hurt turned to anger as I’d driven home. Of course, Jack hadn’t changed. He still looked to conquer anything with a pussy, and I fell smack into that category. Oh, Izzy? Yeah, I did her. Drilled her good. Added her notch to my belt.
“Thanks, Charlene, for showing me I can attract nothing except assholes.”
In my purse, my cell buzzed. I ignored it. I dared not shut if off, as I’d need it on if Andrews stalked me here. The phone chimed its indicator that I had a message, but I ignored that, too. Jack, Roger Andrews, it didn’t matter. Either one of them could leave a message and it was all the same to me.
I did, however, owe Nellie a call. She’d worry if I didn’t come back to her house. With a sigh, I went back inside my seedy apartment, closing and locking the sliding glass door. Sure enough, my call was from Jack. I clicked Nelli
e’s number, and sat on my couch while I waited for her to answer.
“Izzy? Thank God!”
“I’m at my apartment. I just wanted you to know where I was.”
“Jack is frantic about you. What the hell happened?”
My chest ached again, and my throat closed with tears I refused to let fall. I swallowed hard. “Jack is being Jack,” I said calmly. “He’s fucking
Charlene Willis. And I quit the job.”
“Izzy, no, that’s not what’s going on.”
“You weren’t there, Nellie. I was. She was there to fuck him. But why should I care? He can screw who he wants.”
“Izzy, please listen to me. He –”
“I have to go, Nell. I just wanted you to know I’m okay.”
“Izzy –”
I clicked my phone off, hanging up on my best friend. I knew Nellie would side with Jack, and she should. He’s her older brother, after all. Setting my phone on the table, I rubbed my hand over my still flat belly. “Just you and me, kid,” I murmured.
I changed my clothes into sweats and a t-shirt, since the air conditioning worked it magic and cooled the apartment off nicely. Outside, the daylight waned into early dusk as I simply sat on my couch and stared into nothing. Well, that’s not exactly true.
I stared into a bleak future.
I saw myself living off of food stamps and WIC. I would get Medicaid for the health of my baby. Perhaps the county would see me into section eight housing. Perhaps I might qualify for welfare since I had a child to raise. Living in a piece of crap apartment, waiting on the check to arrive, the food stamps so I could buy food for me and my baby.
But we would be together.
I folded my arms protectively over my belly, thinking of the new life growing in my womb. I bet my baby is no bigger than my fingernail right now. I knew Jack would want no part of our child, but the law says he has to pay child support. A couple hundred bucks a month would buy diapers and milk.
Surely you can afford a couple hundred buck a month, eh, Jack?
Maybe I could find work from home jobs off of the internet. Yet, even if I stayed on welfare for years, scrapping for every penny, I would be there to raise my child. There were high interest funds for kids’ college available. I’d put aside a few dollars every week no matter what, and deposit it into such an account.
My phone buzzed again, breaking me from my thoughts. Annoyed, I picked it up. Jack. Go to hell. I tossed it back on the couch, realizing that it was now full dark and I hadn’t turned on any lights. Nor did I feel hungry, though my baby needed nourishment.
“You’ll be all right for now, kid,” I said. “You can dine off of what I had for lunch. You’re still little enough.”
I wasn’t hungry. My emotions were still in too much of a turmoil for me to want to eat. The feeling of betrayal still swamped me, the hurt that while Jack was making a baby in me, he was also fucking Charlene. “Jack, I seriously question your taste in your fuck partners. Charlene? Really? Jeez, her ass would make a Quarter Horse proud.”
A sudden pounding on my door brought me upright, my heart racing. Fearing it was Andrews, I felt for my can of bear spray, and realized I had left it in my bedroom after I had changed clothes. But Jack’s voice came through the stout wood.
“Izzy? I just want to talk.”
“Go fuck yourself,” I yelled back. “Better yet, go fuck Charlene.”
“I am not fucking her, Izzy,” he said, his voice low. “She’s my physical therapist. Or she was. When she came on to me, I decided I wasn’t going back.”
The weak part of me wanted to believe him. I almost ran to the door, threw it open, and flung myself into his arms. The cynical part of me, the one that knew of Jack’s reputation, coldly informed me that he hadn’t changed, and never would. He lied as easily as he screwed anything with a pulse, and that he’d think it would be what I wanted to hear.
“I thought you’d changed, Jack,” I said. “I started to fall in love with you. Now I’m glad I see what you really are.”
“Izzy, I have changed. I’m not like I used to be. Charlene didn’t know that, and when I didn’t go for physical therapy, she came to me. I am not screwing her and never would. Not now.”
“Right,” I sneered. “You love me. How stupid am I to believe that?”
“Izzy. I do love you.”
18
Jack
I listened at the door, but heard nothing.
No television, no radio, nothing but silence. “Izzy, please, I do love you. Will you just give me a chance to explain?”
Still she said nothing. Across the hall, the door opened and a guy stuck his head out. “Wanna tone it down, buddy?”
“Get back inside,” I snarled, and the man retreated instantly.
He might be busy calling the cops, but I didn’t care. Nothing mattered except Izzy. Leaning against her door, I felt despair creep inside me, an emotion I wasn’t acquainted with much. It was my fucking reputation that Izzy remembered now. And why should she believe me? I was a playboy back then, and everyone, including Izzy, knew I was screwing Charlene.
I knocked softly on the door. “Izzy, let me in. Just for a couple minutes.”
I heard something – movement, the faint footfalls on carpet, and I held my breath. She would open the door, let me in, and I’d hug her, kiss her, and tell her the truth. I wasn’t fucking Charlene because I was in love with Izzy. Her voice spoke just beyond the door.
“No,” Izzy snapped. “Now get out of here before I call the cops.”
That was it. I’d lost her before I’d had a chance to really get started with her. My despair turned to grief, and I wanted very much to simply sit on her mat with my back against the door, then bury my head in my arms. I loved her, and maybe if I had told her earlier about how much she meant to me, she might be more willing to listen to me now.
I didn’t sit on her mat. Instead, I walked away, down the cement steps to the ground. Nell had come to get me from the office, then I’d borrowed her car to drive here to Izzy’s. Sitting behind the wheel, I looked up at Izzy’s darkened apartment. She hadn’t turned on her lights, and obviously sat on her couch up there in the dark.
That clued me in as to how deeply I had hurt her. I recalled her devotion when I lay in the hospital, sitting there beside my bed whether I was awake to talk to her or not. Hour after hour she sat with me, and people did things like that for love. Friends brought flowers and visited for a short while.
People that loved you gave you everything.
Picking up my cell, I called Nell. She answered on the first ring. “Did you work it out with her?”
“No.” I stared into the night through the windshield. “She won’t let me explain. She thinks I’m fucking Charlene.”
“She said the same thing to me,” Nell replied on an explosive sigh. “I really think she is in love with you, bro. But your rep.”
I shut my eyes. “I know. I’m not that same guy anymore, but Izzy doesn’t see it.”
“She might. Don’t give up on her yet. She’s feeling hurt right now, maybe betrayed, but give her a day or two, and she’ll start talking.”
“I don’t think so, Nell. You should have seen her face when Charlene showed up at the office. It was like I’d slapped her across her mouth.”
“Well, that Charlene is a real piece of work to show up at your office like that. Bitch. Even after high school, she’s acted like a slut.”
“That doesn’t matter now,” I told her wearily. “I’ve lost her.”
“Don’t say that,” Nell snapped, her tone fierce. “She loves you. I’ll keep trying to get that into her head, and you keep trying. Don’t give up.”
I looked up at Izzy’s window again, and I thought I saw a shadow move behind the glass door. “I’ll bring your car back, but will you give me a lift to my place?”
“Yeah.”
“My truck will be ready tomorrow.”
“Okay.”
I clicked the p
hone off, and looked up again at Izzy’s apartment. Nothing. Still no lights, and if there had been a shadow, it wasn’t there now. I started the engine, and pulled out of the parking lot. I drove slowly, reluctantly, half inclined to go back, park the car, and pound on her door until she either answered it or called the cops.
Leaving her apartment building, I drove slowly down the street, my arm throbbing and my heart in tatters. I hadn’t gone very far toward Nell’s neighborhood when a battered and rusted out truck passed me going the other way. Too swamped in my own miseries, I hardly paid it any mind.
Yet, oddly, the memory of it niggled at me as I drove. Andrews had a silver Beemer, and Izzy had seen a beat up old truck outside that house she photographed. A truck answering that description just drove toward Izzy’s place. Surely Andrews doesn’t know that Izzy is back at her apartment. The guy would have to have a bug on her to know that so quickly.
“What are the odds he somehow did put a bug on her?”
While I doubted that scenario, I didn’t like the idea of that type of a truck heading toward Izzy’s place. It was probably all innocent, and the driver was some old coot driving to the liquor store. Even so, I pulled a U-turn and speeded up.
19
Izzy
I knew Nellie’s car as well as I knew my own. It sat down there in the parking lot, Jack behind the wheel. It looked like he was on the phone, but I couldn’t really be sure. My own phone hadn’t rung, so he hadn’t called me. I turned away from the sliding glass door and sat back on my couch in the dark.
The darkness comforted me, kept me enveloped in its embrace. No one could see me, and I liked that. Though I didn’t look at the time on my phone, I suspected it was around eight or so. I drew my knees up against my chest, my arms around them as I simply let my mind blank out. Worry and fear was for tomorrow. Tonight, I simply wanted to be.