Damaged Goods

by Dane, Cynthia

  “Damn. Surprised you’re not doing that instead.”

  Joseph blankly stared at his salad and enchilada, fingers drumming against his beer bottle. “I wanted to, when I was a kid.”

  He tried to keep his voice level, but Sylvia heard it: the briefest blip of a falter, followed by a slight clearing of the throat that was quickly washed away by beer. Sylvia picked up her fork and poked her enchilada. “Bad blood?” She waited for him to tell her it was none of her business.

  “Let’s say that my father’s extended family made it clear there wasn’t much room for me in the company.”

  “Ah…” The first bite of enchilada was peppered with a variety of spices that Sylvia couldn’t name. But, damn, was it good. Sauce and cheese melted on her tongue and slipped right down her throat. “Your parents were never married, right?”

  Joseph’s hand stiffened around his fork, halfway through cutting up one corner of enchilada. “No.”

  That would do it. Many rich families, especially those reeking of money going back generations, were traditional to a fault. It didn’t surprise Sylvia to discover that the Montoyas were such a family. The only way Joseph would get any stake in his father’s company was if he were the only son at all – or if he outright bought it one day. He must have brothers. Legitimate ones. Maxwell Carlisle had a little brother who was always trying to weasel his way into the family business so he could have more money. But the boy had a serious gambling problem. No one, especially Maxwell, was going to give him more than the trusts he had already squandered away. “Sorry to hear that.”

  “And what about you? You never talk about your family.”

  “What is there to say?” Besides how delicious this food was? Because damn. Sylvia couldn’t cook for shit, but she wanted this recipe to hand off to her future personal chef. Because one day I will have a personal chef again. Get outta here. “They’re Vermonters who moved to Boston when I was a teen. Nothing special.”

  “You got any siblings?”

  “Yeah. Two brothers. One older and one younger.” She left out the other details. Joseph didn’t want to hear about schizophrenia and Down’s, or how during one very stressful Christmas her mother lamented that “the only normal child I had turned out to be a hooker!” There was a reason Sylvia didn’t go home often. It was a miracle it took her mother that long to snap, since she had borne the brunt of her children’s issues for most of their lives. My father made the money to pay the bills. She was lucky if he ever came home, let alone on the weekends.

  They picked their food after that. The sun was quickly setting, leaving them with only the soft lights of Joseph’s apartment. Should they turn them off so they could watch the fireworks? No, no, that would be awkward. That was the sort of thing they could only get away with if they were good friends… or lovers.

  Sylvia almost choked on her salad. We are not lovers, oh my God. Even though the man’s magnetism was like playing chicken with fate. He was a cop, for fuck’s sake. A cop she was currently working for. And what did she do for one of her livings, again? One had to be real here: she knew what she was signing up for when she walked through his door.

  Oh, crap.

  She hadn’t even realized that was the thought lurking in the back of her mind: that she had treated this as a gig from the moment Joseph invited her back to his place.

  Because that’s how it worked. Sylvia hadn’t been with a man for no pay since… Maxwell. Since Maxwell.

  “You okay?” Joseph asked. “You look like you’re in pain. Is it the food? It is a little spicy…”

  I am in pain. Sylvia couldn’t avoid it. This day made her think of Maxwell, the first man she truly loved. The man who promised to make her Cinderella dreams come true. He said he loved me. He said I was beautiful. He said I was his fantasy come to life. He loved that I loved the 1920s and wanted to throw me a Gatsby party every summer. We were going to be together forever. We were going to have kids and name them George and Gretchen. I was going to spend my days socializing with other wives and running a beautiful mansion in the Hills. Then she found out about the other women he had promised the same thing to. At the same fucking time.

  Sylvia may have been the one who moved into his house, but it was only a matter of time before she was thrown out because she didn’t support her fiancé’s philandering. He told me I shouldn’t care, because I was a whore, and I had no room to talk about how many people one slept with.

  Maxwell had proposed to her exactly one year ago, on his yacht beneath the fireworks as they fired over the Atlantic Ocean. Bright, golden lights fizzled in the starry night sky when he got down on one knee and presented her with a vintage Tiffany diamond ring.

  The first firework went off down the river. Sylvia glanced up and caught the sparkles in the sky as they dissipated.

  “Hey,” Joseph said again. “You okay?”

  Sylvia was transfixed on the next set of fireworks. “You’re missing the show.”

  Joseph looked over his shoulder. “It looks the same every year. Pretty, though.” He said that while gazing at her. “I mean the fireworks, of course.”

  Their eyes briefly met. Something simmered in Sylvia’s chest, threatening to expand and hit her in the heart if she wasn’t careful. It wasn’t his contemplative demeanor, that was for sure.

  “You ever see something nice like that and try to appreciate it, but can’t?”

  Joseph still was not looking at the fireworks. “Yeah. All the time.”

  “Really?”

  “I think that’s normal.”

  Blue and red entered the explosive fray behind him. “You sure you don’t want to watch?”

  His hands folded before his face. His elbows braced against the table. His arms were strong and sturdy, white sleeves falling far enough to reveal the sort of fine hairs Sylvia loved to rub her face against. Ow. My everything. “I don’t like fireworks.”

  “Scared of them?”

  “Bad memories.”

  “Me too.”

  Joseph looked as if he no longer had an appetite. Sylvia swallowed, but it wasn’t food or Coke in her throat. Just the bile of lingering foul memories.

  “My ex-fiancé proposed to me a year ago. During fireworks.” Sylvia absentmindedly scratched her arm. “It was the happiest night of my life.”

  “But not anymore.”

  He said it with the self-assuredness that claimed he knew he was right. “There’s a reason we’re not together anymore.”

  Joseph’s arms trembled for half a second. “Yeah. This day last year was my last date with my ex-girlfriend, although I didn’t know it at the time. Not the best memory now.”

  “Stella?”

  That got her a half-comedic scoff. “No. Before her. I had the same girlfriend off and on since high school.”

  “Holy shit.” Why hadn’t Sylvia known that tidbit about him? “Really?”

  He nodded, his somber face a terrible contrast to the fireworks firing in the distance.

  “You never got married?”

  “Like I said, it was on and off over the years. I thought we were heading in that direction when she broke up with me, but…” He laughed. “Turned out she had another man waiting to marry her.”

  “That’s terrible!”

  “It sure didn’t feel good.” Joseph lowered his arms and took an uninspired bite of his food. “Well, I should have anticipated it. We certainly had our heartbreaks over the years.”

  “I’m sorry.” Now Sylvia didn’t have any appetite. A shame, too. The food was good. Didn’t feel right to let Granddame Montoya’s recipe go to waste. “What was her name?”

  He didn’t reply for more than several seconds. “Angelica.”

  That tongue of his rolled across his ex-love’s name as if it were fine wine. His tone, his whisper, his body language all screamed that he had loved this Angelica more than anyone else in his life. More than his mother. More than his whole family. More than Stella, for sure…

  More than Sylvia, no
t that she ever considered what they did love.

  The way he said Angelica’s name was more than long-term girlfriend. It was wife. It was mother of his children. Sylvia had heard many clients over the years say the names of their beloveds like that, even if they were paying her for her time and skills on the side. Joseph said that he and this Angelica had never married, but the connection between them was there.

  “You lost more than her, didn’t you?”

  He half-heartedly chuckled. “You’re observant, aren’t you? Obnoxiously so.”

  “You have to be in my world. Don’t forget. I’m a high-priced escort at night. I’m good enough to stroll up to billionaires and get their money within an hour.” And tomorrow that skill would be put to the test.

  “I suppose.” He tapped his fork against the table. “Yes. We went through a lot together. We, um…” He swallowed. Goodness. What in the world was he going to confess to her? “She had two miscarriages while we were together.”

  “Wow.” Sylvia focused on the fireworks so she wouldn’t embarrass him by witnessing his discomfort. “I’m so sorry.”

  “First one happened when we were teens. We broke up for a few years after that, while I was at college. Hooked up a few times. Nothing serious. I thought she was mostly out of my system until I settled into my job here and we reconnected on a deeper level.”

  “I see.”

  “Then it happened again. It was worse this time. We had picked out a name, had the most amazing sonograms, were talking about getting married in the near future… it wasn’t meant to be, though. We took another break. Then another. Then another… apparently it didn’t matter how much we loved each other. I’d given her too much pain, so she went to another man who could give her the child she wanted.”

  “I highly doubt it was your fault.”

  “The doctors said that we were both fine, individually, but that this unfortunately happens between a lot of couples who aren’t compatible. He said we probably shared a gene that fucks shit up when they meet.”

  “Wow.”

  “Now she’s married to another guy and pregnant with his kid.”

  “I’m sorry, Joseph.” What did Sylvia have to complain about now? At least she had never been pregnant. Her heart had been smashed into a billion pieces, but at least it wasn’t that bad. Still… it certainly did not feel good to gaze at those fireworks and be reminded of the heartbreak that occurred not so long ago. “Guess we’re both fucked up assholes.”

  Their eyes met once more. Joseph placed both palms on the table, looking like the most forlorn man in the world. Or at least in Portland. That was a feat, considering the amount of revelers lining the waterfront, taking in the soulful music and the display of nationalism occurring in the darkness. Sylvia supposed that there was enough room in the world for a pair like them. Not everyone could be happy on such a festive day. They were probably regular riots around Christmastime.

  “Do you know how much I love you, Sylvia?” Maxwell’s voice haunted her memories. “You’re going to make me the happiest man alive. When we get married, we’ll have fireworks like these at our wedding.”

  She couldn’t help it. What did it matter if Joseph had a sadder tale than hers? That didn’t mean she hurt any less. It didn’t mean her heart could hold in every piece of sadness plaguing her soul. Man, she really hated fireworks. Really, really hated…

  Tears fell down her cheek. Where had they come from? Why were they here? Why now? Why here? Did she really need to cry in front of Joseph to prove that she was human? God, this is the last thing he needs to see the day before I go undercover for his investigation. Sylvia compensated by sitting still as death in her seat and staring teary-eyed at the dark river, stuffed full of private boats gazing up at the fireworks. All of downtown Portland was alive with good times, and here she was, sitting in some lonely man’s apartment, crying over enchiladas.

  It wasn’t fair. What the men of her life had done to her had never been fair.

  More tears. More embarrassment welling from within. If I don’t move and simply cry, I can save some face. What a way to be brave in front of a cop with a sadder story than hers. Damn cops always have sadder stories than I do!

  Joseph got up from his seat, snatching his own napkin off the table. Sylvia, still frozen where she sat, barely registered him standing next to her and lightly brushing away her tears with the napkin. Yeah. Embarrassing. That explained everything.

  “I’m sorry about what’s happened to you too,” he said softly. The napkin lingered on her cheek. “The world is not a kind place, even when you’re in love.”

  “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

  His fingertips brushed the stray hair away from her forehead. Was there anything he could do that wasn’t overflowing with tenderness? Don’t do this to me, Joseph. She had such a weakness for men like him: handsome, intelligent, confident… seemingly romantic, even if it turned out they were sociopaths who never gave a real fuck about her. She had sworn she would never fall for such false promises again. Never.

  So why was her heart quickening, her body throbbing with the need to hold and be held?

  Why was he touching her like this, as if he couldn’t hold himself back a moment longer?

  Ah, God. They were doomed.

  As soon as Sylvia accepted that truth, she nodded to Joseph, imploring him to change their memories of this shitty holiday, for better or for worse. Her nod was the final cue he needed to go ahead and kiss her as if he had never done it before.

  Fuck my fucking life. She had forgotten what a good kisser he was.

  Chapter 10

  Sylvia

  She knew that if they were going to do this, it had to be done now. No thinking. No worrying. No talking and no contemplating. From the moment Joseph kissed her, they were only allowed to act on instinct and do what was necessary to get this shit out of their systems. The fact it occurred on such a fortuitous day only made it better.

  Don’t say a damn thing. That was projected at both herself and Joseph, who lifted her off her chair and half-dragged, half-carried her to his bed in the far corner of the studio apartment. It was such a rich person way of laying out an apartment, too. Who the fuck didn’t want to lay on their king size bed and take in two full walls of floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Willamette Valley and the greenery sparkling on sunny days? This high up, nobody could look back through the windows. Joseph could bring his dates back here and fuck them in style.

  Sylvia didn’t want style, though. She wanted carnality. She wanted to feel his body consume her and make her forget the heartbreaks she had endured in such a short amount of time. I want to feel like I matter, even if it’s only as a one night stand.

  She disappeared behind the half-wall separating the bedroom area from the rest of the apartment. It was so dark over here. Sylvia rather liked it. She was content to have sex in the dark, with only the fading fireworks in the distance to light up the world.

  Then Joseph turned on one of the lamps on a nightstand, driving the shadows away from his bed. And from Sylvia, whose skirt was already bunched around her waist and whose shoes dropped to the floor.

  “This is crazy,” he muttered, standing beside his bed. “We shouldn’t be doing this.”

  Hell no. This may not have been for a monetary transaction, but Sylvia jumped into sexual survivalist mode. Don’t turn back on me now, Agent Montoya. She knelt before him, pulling open his shirt and running her hands along the kind of body a young agent of the law was expected to keep. She licked her bottom lip, forgetting her problems in favor of savoring the feel of his taut, golden skin beneath her hands. “That makes it hotter. Come on.” She wasn’t going to unzip his trousers to get her way, but she also wasn’t above it. The first and last time I blew him, he came so hard it was a miracle he could get it up again to fuck me. Considering the amount of thrusting she could use right now, Sylvia didn’t want to risk draining him so quickly. “Don’t you want me?” She batted her eyelashes like
she had batted them at men a million times before.

  He clamped his hands on her shoulders, easing her down onto her back again. The way he loomed over her, his chest brushing against her, his teeth aching to nip her skin and his hips primed to thrust against hers… ah, fuck, it was hot! Made only worse by the fact they had a history together. Only this time? There were no lies or secrets between them. She knew what he was, and he knew what she was.

  “How can you ask me that?” Joseph asked, his voice so deep and low that it hit Sylvia right between the legs. She couldn’t refrain from drawing her nails lightly down his chest. These fucking pecs. These fucking abs. This God forsaken happy trail leading to his cock. Somewhere between turning on the light and shadowing her, Joseph’s zipper had fallen, his hair poking out from the waistband of his trousers. The man was halfway to too hard to function. I want him so hard he has to mindlessly fuck me until he comes. “Of course I fucking want you. It drives me so damn insane to suffer through how much I want you. Jesus, Sylv… have you ever looked at yourself? You’re sex on legs.”

  “Do you only want me for my body?” Not that it mattered. She was close to saying that she only wanted him for his body, so there.

  He tugged on her plaid shirt before ripping it open with one hard pull of his fist. Sylvia gasped, her chest on the fast track to being devoured by this man. “Right now? Jury’s still out. Let’s not think about it.”

  “Yeah. Let’s not think about anything. Good plan.”

  Joseph tensed. Even when he was grabbing her breasts and stimulating her hardening nipples through her bra, he was tense. It reminded Sylvia of the type of man she usually encountered for one night stands. Men who bought her services because they were stressed out of their minds and needed to forget about them for a while. Joseph was different, though. He wasn’t simply stressed. He was upset. Yet what man had been trained to release his emotions in a healthy way? Not that Sylvia was about to tell any guy that sex wasn’t healthy.