Once Upon a Time

by Luna Doerr

  Because I love her.

  But Kristin is right. That press release will not be good publicity for White Chocolate. Weston White is so perverted and callous that he would destroy his own company—the company his only legitimate daughter has dedicated years of her life to—just to fuck over me one more time.

  I pull out my phone. I have to do it. Much as I don’t want Caterine to ever know what my father did, don’t want to ever see that look of disgust on her face, I have to do right by my sister. Why did I ever entertain any other course of action?

  Kristin is right. Caterine Schwartz is just one employee, set against the hundreds of people that my sister employs, no matter how much some long-buried part of me wants her to be more.

  That part being my long-buried heart.

  I had broken my own rule, a rule set to protect myself. Never get involved with the assistants. That was Sim’s job. And I broke it seven ways to sunrise with Caterine. I’m in love with her. Not just with Erica, but with Caterine.

  And that is my price to pay, not my sister’s.

  The only consolation is that at least Caterine isn’t in love with me. Thankfully, she is too smart for that. She’s intelligent, educated, beautiful. She has better options in life than Alaric White.

  I scroll through my contact list. I will apologize to her on behalf of my father, pay her the rest of the money I had promised—bonus included—and let her get on with her life. Let her forget me and Sim, and the worst job she’d ever been offered.

  I will ignore the blunt object that is right now smashing my heart to bits.

  I listen to her phone ringing on the other end, simultaneously willing her to pick up and not pick up. On the fourth ring, she answers.

  “You could have just told me!” she shouts.

  And then there she is, coming through the waiting room door, like a green-eyed, golden-haired angel. An angel sent to dispatch me to hell.

  I stand. If I have to do this, I will do it like a man.

  She stops three feet in front of me. “Sim told me everything. So apologize.” Then she becomes aware of the other people in the room, and she whirls on my sister.

  “No, you apologize.” She points at Kristin. “If it’s for your inheritance. Why does it have to be him?”

  Is she standing up for me? Why the hell would she do that? And damn Sim. It would have been easier—if less manly— to do this over the phone.

  “I’m sor-“ Kristin begins to speak but the attorney interrupts.

  “It has to be Alaric.”

  Caterine turns back to me, her face impassive. I take her hand and gently lead her to an empty corner of the room. This is between the two of us, no matter what my father or his attorney might say.

  I run my hands up her arms. She crosses them tightly over her chest. My heart is burning with anguish now.

  “I am so very very sorry, Caterine,” I begin, my voice low and private. “I should never have done this. I should have let you go the minute I learned who your mother was. But I’m a selfish man, I admit that. I put my own desires ahead of what was right—for both you and my sister.”

  “You could have just told me.’

  I shake my head sadly. “You say that now. But you wouldn’t have felt that way back then. You would have left, and I would have had to look for another Erica or abandon the book. But those are my problems and I should never have made them anyone else’s. I’m sorry, Cat. I really, really am.”

  Then I turn toward the attorney and my sister, and speak my next words loud enough for them to hear. “On behalf of my father, Weston White, I apologize to you and to your mother for his actions.”

  The attorney tears up the press release, but I continue on. “I am happy she recovered and went on to live a happy life with you. You come from better stock than I do.”

  Then I let her go. It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. What I really want to do is wrap my arms around her, kiss her, beg for her forgiveness. But it’s a forgiveness I don’t deserve. I know that.

  She turns back to my sister and the attorney. “Is that enough? Do you need a notarized statement from me?”

  “We’re good,” the attorney says. “Thank you.”

  Caterine hurries to the door, like the room is on fire, like she can’t get out of there quick enough. Undoubtedly that is the case. But then she stops at the door and turns.

  “This was all about money. And the two of you are already rich.” She shakes her head incredulously. “I can’t even fathom how much money your family has. But I know one thing. I don’t want any more of it.”

  41

  Caterine

  It’s lunchtime and the library is blissfully quiet. There are no kids whispering in the stacks, no clacking of tiny fingertips on computer keys, not even the occasional whump of a book being dropped to the heavy carpeted floor.

  This is the most dangerous time of the day for me. The quiet and solitude of the elementary school library where I work lends itself to daydreaming … and remembering.

  I don’t want to remember. Not the day I walked out of the hospital in Harrisburg, leaving Alaric White and his sister and his family’s problems behind. Not the two weeks I spent in Maine with him. Two confusing, exhilarating, heavenly weeks where I experienced more pleasure—and more sin—under the hands of a man than I expect I ever will again.

  That’s all in the past for me. Last summer feels like years ago. It’s March now and I’m living and working in Ashburn, Virginia, an outer suburb of Washington, DC. It’s where I met Alaric originally, but I avoid that coffee shop like the plague. It’s easy enough to do, actually. No shortage of drive-through coffee places around here. No need to even get out of your car.

  Best of all, Zoe is here too. She moved to Virginia with me, easily scored a waitress job at a high-end restaurant in Tysons, and co-signed an apartment lease with me. We are working and having the time of our lives, having all the fun two young women in their mid-twenties are supposed to have.

  I stroll down the aisles of books, straightening spines as I go. This is a job I love. I’m turning the corner into the next aisle when my phone vibrates in the pocket of my tasteful, professional, career woman dress. And of course, my heart skips a beat as it always does. For months after I quit working for Alaric, he called me. Day after day, the messages piled up.

  Pleading, begging, sometimes even tearful messages.

  Day after day I ignored them all. Until the days were weeks and then months. Finally he stopped. There had been days when it was nearly unbearable not to answer when I saw his name on the screen. But I couldn’t let myself do it.

  His father had tried to kill my mother, a fact Alaric had known almost from the moment we met. Not the very first day, but by the time we were driving to Maine he had known. And he hadn’t said a word. He planned to use me to finish his book and then when it was done, apologize to me to fulfill his father’s dying wishes and preserve the White family fortune.

  To think I once fancied myself falling in love with the guy.

  Well, I had been in the process of falling in love with him. Falling hard. No question about it. But not anymore. I gave my heart a stern talking to. No thinking about Alaric White. No remembering the way he had touched me. No fantasizing about him in bed or otherwise. None.

  Still, it’s hard. Alaric White is a hard man to forget.

  My phone vibrates again. Oh right. Someone had texted me. See? It takes barely anything to launch me down memory lane. Or more like down memory’s back alley.

  I dig the phone out of my pocket. Got a surprise for you. It’s from Zoe.

  Intrigued, I text back.

  A moment later, another text from Zoe. Bring home a bottle of wine.

  At four-thirty, after a typical afternoon of trying to keep second and third graders from destroying the library, I turn off the lights and drive to a fancy, gourmet grocery store to pick up a bottle of wine. Zoe didn’t specify red or white so I buy one of each. Zoe is knowledgeable about wine since
she works in a restaurant, but I am totally clueless. A nice store employee recommends two bottles to me, and I take his word for it.

  The days are getting longer even though it’s still March. I pull my car into a parking spot near the entrance to our apartment. The apartment I share with Zoe is a two-bedroom in a typical suburban garden-style apartment building. It’s small but it’s ours.

  We spend many weekend afternoons scouring thrift shops and outlet malls for furniture and other items to make it feel like “home.” I finally sold my mother’s house just after Christmas, giving me a tidy little nest egg and some financial breathing room for the first time in my life.

  Alaric had sent several large checks, covering the full amount he had promised me plus the bonus I would have gotten if I had gone on his book tour with him. The checks lay uncashed at the bottom of a drawer in my bedroom. I was dead serious when I told him I didn’t want his money.

  I unlock the door to the apartment and immediately stop simply to inhale. The entire place is filled with the aroma of Zoe’s homemade marinara sauce—tomatoes and garlic and basil. If this is the promised surprise, it’s enough.

  I hang up my coat and carry the bottles of wine into the small kitchen.

  “Smells awesome, Zoe.” I set the wine onto the square card table we use as a dining table. “Good thing I picked up a red.”

  Zoe smiles at the sight of the two bottles. “We may need both, anyway.”

  “So what’s the big surprise?”

  “Food first, then presents.”

  “Presents? My birthday’s not for another month.”

  “Do I need a reason to give my best friend a present?”

  “No. But you need an explanation.” I begin pulling wine glasses and plates from the cabinet. “Here. Let me help.”

  We chat about everything and nothing while we gorge ourselves on Zoe’s delicious pasta and garlic bread. Traffic. The crocuses poking through the winter-hardened ground. The cute sous chef Zoe is flirting with at the restaurant.

  Zoe is right about the wine, too. By the time I rinse the plates and put them in the dishwasher and Zoe brings out dessert, the bottle of red wine is empty. I uncork the white.

  “Oh my god, Zoe. Cheesecake? I need to go take off my shapewear if you want me to eat that.”

  “You go do that then because I do want you to eat this. And you don’t need shapewear in any case.”

  I hurry back to my room to change out of the offending undergarment and my work dress. I pull on yoga pants and an oversized sweater. Unfortunately, I really do need shapewear—thanks largely to Zoe’s love of cooking. But I also wear it because it helps me feel in control. It holds in not just some extra flab but also any errant emotions threatening to make a run for it.

  Back at the table, Zoe has plated the desserts and dribbled caramel sauce over each slice of cheesecake and poured more wine. In the center of the table is a small wrapped package with a neat red bow on top.

  “What’s this? I hope not chocolate. I’m going to have to buy bigger shapewear soon.”

  Zoe rolls her eyes. “Well open it and find out.”

  I glance curiously at my friend, who is practically bouncing up and down with barely-controlled excitement. I sit down, take a quick sip of wine and tear open the paper. My breath catches in my throat. Of all the things I imagined … this isn’t it.

  “Waiting for his Touch” by Alaric White. Part One.

  Part One? Well, that’s interesting. Wonder who he hired for the next book. Not that I care. Because I don’t.

  “Well?” Zoe says. “It’s your book, right? That’s the one?”

  “Yeah. This is the one.”

  I pick it up and look at the cover. A woman in a lush green velvet dress, her blonde hair tumbling seductively over creamy shoulders, and a bare-chested man, his face turned away from the reader’s gaze. I flip through the pages quickly and try to control my breathing so Zoe won’t notice my agitation. Zoe thinks she’s done something nice—and she has. I’ve only given her the summary version of what happened with Alaric, and a highly sanitized version at that.

  I told Zoe that Alaric was going through some family issues and had become too difficult for me to work with. I said we parted ways amicably. I didn’t mention my mother or Alaric’s father, or the calls and messages from Alaric.

  I suspect Zoe doesn’t entirely believe the story, but she’s a good enough friend to know when to push and when not to. I will tell her the whole truth someday, someday when I can talk about it without swinging wildly between anger and tears.

  “Have you read it yet?” I ask.

  “No. I wanted to wait for you.”

  “Here then. You go first.” I push the book across the table to Zoe.

  Zoe pushes it right back. “I bought myself a copy too. We can read it together, like a book club.”

  I laugh. The idea of reading this book with Zoe and discussing it like it is just any other fine work of literature is … well, there are really no words for it.

  “Ooh. Let me read this to you.” Zoe clears her throat. “Charles turned the knob and pushed open the door. Inside, the room was dimly lit and for an instant he forgot where he was. He has been going to his wife’s bedroom every night, every night making love to her from behind so she wouldn’t have to see his face. She says she loves him. Every single night she tells him so. And he loves her. Damnation, he loves her more and more all the time. But even if she could stand the sight of his face—or was willing to keep her eyes closed when they were together—he could never do with her the things he likes to do with the whores. He has ruined himself that way. He liked those things too much, even if there is no affection in them, no love involved. It was just pure pleasure that he could take and take, and he was addicted to it. He was powerless to resist the lure of the madam’s home. He was a weak man. That alone made him unworthy of his wife. His eyes adjusted to the low light and he saw the girl sitting on the bed, her legs spread wide the way she knows he likes it. There was no pretense here, no judgment. Or if there was judgment, the girls kept it to themselves. They were paid to. If ever he were to see a look of disgust or pity or disappointment on his wife’s face, he would never be able to go to her again. He was not the man she married, but there was nothing to be done for that. He began to unbutton his shirt, then stopped. He looked over the whore. He has been with her before. Her—“ Zoe looks at me wide-eyed. “Holy crap, girl.”

  I roll my eyes. “I thought you’ve read all his books.”

  “I have. But not out loud.” She reads a few more paragraphs. “And he’s in a whorehouse? Is that it?”

  “Um. Yeah. It’s historical romance. So men back then went to, uh, brothels and such.”

  “But this is near the end of the book. Isn’t there a happy ending? His books usually end with the couple together.”

  I pick up my copy. “I don’t know, Zoe. I left before he finished it.”

  I turn to the scene my friend is reading and skim the page. As I read, my anger grows. Zoe is right. This scene is awfully close to the end of the book.

  “Why the hell is Charles still going to the madam’s? After he’s been going to Erica’s room and making love to her? What a jackass! For her to open herself up to him like that—hell, to let him come to her every single freaking night—and he’s still dicking around with whores!”

  I take a big gulp of wine.

  “Whoa. You are seriously invested in these wholly fictional characters.”

  Right. Fictional characters. Wholly. I take a deep breath and a big mental step back. But yeah, I am invested in them. For two intense weeks, I had been Erica. Erica and Charles don’t feel fictional to me. They feel real, more real than most people I know.

  Zoe sets down the book. “Well, don’t tell me any more. I want to read it for myself.” She pauses. “So are you ever going to tell me which sex scenes you acted out for this?”

  I close my copy and set it down on the table, like it’s contaminated or radioacti
ve or something. “All of them. Well, not that last scene there. I don’t know when he wrote that.” Or with whom.

  Zoe lets out a long, low whistle. “Holy shit. Are you serious? Because his sex scenes are usually super crazy hot.”

  “Well, that’s due more to his writing than my acting. It was sort of clinical, actually. Alaric giving directions and sitting there with his laptop, typing away.”

  “But some were hot?” Zoe’s face is balanced on the knife’s edge between disappointment and eternal hope. “Please tell me you had some fun up there.”

  I laugh softly. “Yeah, some of them were hot.” I wonder whether I can burn the books without Zoe finding out. Having Alaric’s words in the house, a tangible reminder of our time together, will make it impossible not to think about him.

  I like to think of myself as a strong woman, but I’m not some freaking comic book superhero. When it comes to Alaric White, I’m more like a recovering alcoholic. I can’t have the poison that was him in the house, or I will take a sip.

  “Okay. Well good. Because if you didn’t have any fun with them at all, I will seriously have to kick their asses.”

  For a split second, a picture of Zoe kicking Sim Toro’s ass flashes through my mind.

  “You’ll drive all the way to Maine to defend my honor? Or my right to have blistering hot sex or something.”

  “No, I’ll drive to Tysons. They’re doing a book signing there Friday night.”

  “This Friday? And what do you mean ‘they?’”

  “Yes, this Friday.” Zoe speaks slowly, like she’s speaking to a toddler. “And they are doing a dual signing for Alaric White’s book and his friend’s book. Sim something or other.”

  “Toro. Sim Toro.” Sim wrote a book? Now that I think of it, I do vaguely recall Alaric mentioning that once. “Dark shit” was how he had characterized it.

  “So we’re going?” Zoe tops off our wine glasses.

  “Oh no no. You might be going but I definitely am not.”

  “Oh come one. You don’t want to shock the shit out of him by showing up?”