Heaven Beside You

by Christa Maurice

  The police had dragged him home at three in the morning after a fight in a pool hall. The next day he’d gone to school with no sleep, two black eyes, and a split lip, and he’d managed to keep the truth from his family, the police, and the school counselor.

  Jason shifted and Cass moved, moaning in her sleep. She rolled away from him and lay with one arm and one leg dangling off the side of the bed, facing the glowing remains of the fire. He sat up and looked at her. Her face in the firelight was flushed with sleep and tendrils of hair stuck to her forehead.

  He trusted Cass. She loved him, but she wouldn’t for long. Not now that she knew the truth. Soon she’d start wondering what his father saw that made him leave. He hadn’t left when the girls were born. When the boy was born, he’d packed up and left.

  She’d see what had made his father leave, or her father would. And by then, he would need her too much to lose her.

  He slipped out of bed and picked up her yellow silk dress, draped over the chair in the corner, and pressed the material to his face. It still smelled like her. A faint scent of vanilla, ginger and hope. That night two nights ago had been one of the highlights of his life. The little church dance and taking a turn around the dance floor with the town’s one gay man and most of the matriarchs. The hillbilly jam session in the chapel. He’d felt so much like he belonged here. And he wanted to. He wanted to watch Kady and Cori compete for the attentions of some man who wasn’t him, learn Maybelle Carter’s fingerpicking technique from Cass’s father and memorize the words to that haunting ballad Cass’s mother had sung. Most of all, he longed to dress Cass up in beautiful clothes just to have the right to take them off her. He ached to come home once in a while to find her standing in the living room looking so beautiful, his heart wanted to stop beating.

  It wasn’t fair. He couldn’t have any of those things. If he tried, when Cass abandoned him for a better sugar daddy, he’d end up even lonelier. Or she’d figure out why his father rejected him and then she’d reject him too. It didn’t matter. She wouldn’t stay. They never stayed. Only his mom and his sisters would remain with him, and they depended on his money and his connections. The guys in the band needed him because he was a great guitar player. None of them liked him. His father was right all those years ago.

  He knelt in front of the fire and fed a few small sticks into it. As he moved, trying to get closer to the heat, his foot caught on something poking from under her bed. Leaning down beside the bed, he tugged on the corner of the box.

  The banker’s box held carefully filed magazines. He pulled out one from the back and recognized his own smiling face from several years ago. Drawing out another, he saw himself again. Sifting through it, he found the infamous issue of People magazine. On page thirty-seven, he found a picture of himself and Stella, smiling on the red carpet of a movie premiere with an artful tear separating them. Cass had everything in that box. So it was a con. She needed him. Nobody could love him.

  Something sour coiled in his stomach.

  “Jason?” Her voice was heavy with sleep, but still so sweet.

  “Yeah.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “The fire was going out.” He glanced up. Her eyes were closed, so he jammed the magazine back into box and shoved it under the bed. She’d studied her prey. Part of him wanted to keep being conned. Even if it only lasted for a little while, it might be worth the ride.

  “Come to bed. It’ll be fine.” She opened one eye.

  “I heard what you said.”

  “About the fire?”

  He didn’t want to continue and couldn’t stop himself. “You said you loved me the other night.”

  Stiffening, she sat up, clutching the blankets over her breasts, looking impossibly small and fragile. Either she was really hurt or she was a really good actress.

  “We weren’t going to get involved.”

  “I know,” she said. “I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry.”

  “Are you?” Hardly aware he was wearing nothing, he stood. “After all, if you were to manipulate me into loving you, it would get you out of this little burg and you’d never have to worry about money again.”

  “What?” Her voice had no strength. “I wasn’t manipulating you.”

  “Oh? The nice cozy dance, the little jam you arranged, the dress you surprised me with, the very convenient timing of your confession.”

  “I thought it would please you.” Her voice tightened.

  “You even conned me into telling you a lie to further soften what I thought was your soft heart.”

  She frowned, pulling the sheets higher around her neck. “A lie?”

  “My father never walked out on me.” He grinned cruelly, and hated himself for doing it. That story would be worth a lot to the tabloids if they got hold of it. She couldn’t know he’d given her anything worth selling. “I can’t believe you bought that. It works every time.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged. “Why not? You were conning me into believing you loved me.”

  “I wasn’t.” Cass bit her lip. “I do love you.” Tears glistened on her eyelashes.

  He sneered, fighting against the urge to gather her into his arms and hold her. That was what she wanted. “I have to go. This whole act is getting to me.”

  “Act?” She gasped.

  He snapped on the light.

  Blinking against the sudden brightness, she said, “What are you doing?”

  “Leaving.” He picked up his discarded clothing and dressed.

  “Why? Why now? It’s the middle of the night. You have another week.”

  He paused, searching for a sweater. “That is true. I have another week of your tender attentions.”

  Her face stiffened with fury. “Of course. You have paid, haven’t you? If you are set on leaving tonight, maybe you’d like another tumble before you hit the road. After all, it’s a long flight. Though one of the stewardesses might be willing to initiate you into the mile high club.”

  “I’m already a member,” he snapped from the depths of the sweatshirt he yanked over his head.

  “I don’t doubt it. You’ll sleep with anything that’s handy.”

  “And I slept with you.”

  The look on her face stopped him. Some deep hurt cracked open inside her and spilled across her cheeks. Tears ran down the sides of her nose and across her lips.

  He wanted to drop to his knees and apologize. Anything, to stop that pain. Instead, he picked up a pair of jeans, jammed them into the suitcase and snapped it closed. He stalked into the living room, picked up his guitar and carried it into the bedroom, where he’d left the case.

  “Jason, please don’t go,” she begged. Tears ran down her jaw and neck. “It’s late and you’re tired.”

  “You sense me getting away, is that it?”

  “No, it’s—”

  “I’m already gone.” Hefting the suitcase in one hand and the guitar case in the other, he walked toward the door.

  Cass lunged off the bed. Her legs tangled in the sheet, bringing her crashing to the floor. “Jason, please. I don’t know what’s wrong. I don’t know what I did, but I’m sorry. I didn’t mean what I said.” She snatched up a robe and pulled it over her shoulders as she chased him down the hall.

  “So now you don’t love me?”

  “That’s not what I mean.”

  Jason shrugged on his coat. “When did you start planning, Cassie? Was it the minute I walked in the door, or later? You must have been so happy to see me coming. Your ticket out of here.”

  “I never thought that. Please. You can’t go like this. The roads are bad.” She grabbed his arm. “Just stay until morning.”

  He shook free. As he stomped down the garage stairs, he hit the door opener. Cass followed him.

  “Can’t we talk about this?” She sobbed.

  “No,” he said over his shoulder. He stomped around the roadway to his rental car. His head spun. The wi
nter wind reached icy fingers into his coat as he dropped the suitcase and guitar in the trunk.

  “Jason, be careful on the roads,” she called.

  Seated behind the wheel, he slammed the door and started the car, revved the engine. He reversed too fast and slid a few feet into deep snow, but when he put the car in drive and floored the accelerator, the car jerked free, fishtailed around Cass’s house and shot down the drive. In his rearview, she stood on the road in her bare feet, clutching her robe closed against the cold, eyes round with shock. It was almost enough to make him stop and herd her back inside.

  Almost, but not quite.

  * * * *

  Cass staggered into the house trying to get her breath. The house rang with silence. She’d once been a passenger in a car accident. A friend had been driving and lost control on a frozen road. The car slalomed into a tree and then bounced sideways into another. Neither of them had been hurt beyond bruises, but the feeling of the abrupt, slamming halt came over her again. Like every cell in her body had been slammed against something immovable, rattling her from teeth to toenails.

  One hand on the wall to guide her, she made her way to her bedroom. All the blankets lay on the floor in a tangled heap. How had they gotten there?

  Wait, she had fallen out of bed chasing Jason. She looked at her knees. They were red, but so were her feet. Had she hit her feet? She shook her head. It would come back to her later. The mattress still held the impression of their bodies. His pillow lay against the headboard. Hers was turned sideways and had been very nearly knocked off the bed.

  As she stepped over the blankets, reaching for her pillow, her thawing toe bumped into something. For such a small injury, a hell of a lot of pain. She looked down.

  Her box of magazines.

  When she’d awakened to the realization Jason wasn’t in bed with her, she’d heard him close by. She’d opened her eyes against the glow of the fire and seen his head bent over something.

  He’d found her magazines. That stupid magazine collection she should have thrown out years ago, but instead kept adding to. Manipulating. The act. The nice cozy dance, the little jam, the dress, the very convenient timing of her announcement. He’d found her magazines and thought she was doing what Stella had done.

  Cass seized the box. She threw it into the fire, nearly smothering the flames. The lid popped off and magazines spilled across the living room floor. She ran to the other room. Scooping them up, she dumped them into the flames. While watching to make sure they caught fire, she noticed her silk dress and velvet coat lying on the chair in the bedroom. Running, slipping on the floor and falling into the wall, she finally managed to propel herself into the bedroom.

  She snatched both of them and threw them on top of the fire with a screech of rage and despair. The flames leaped up, consuming the paper and cloth. Chest heaving, she stared into the blaze as the glossy magazine paper curled and blackened and the velvet charred. She sank to her knees, sobs shaking her body. Hot tears streaked her face, blurring the flames into a wash of red and orange. Unsure why she bothered, she reached out and shoved an errant magazine off the wooden floor so it wouldn’t end up burning down the house.

  * * * *

  Where the hell was he? His head felt like a dragon had attended a chili cook off and then died in his mouth. The rest of him more closely resembled a train wreck. He remembered charming drink after drink out of a plain, but kind, flight attendant. Later, she’d scuttled him out a back entrance at the airport and into a cab home to save him the humiliation of appearing drunk in People magazine.

  Cassie standing barefoot in the snow.

  He squeezed his eyes shut. How did he keep falling for these blood-sucking, gold-digging women? Wasn’t there a woman in the universe who would want him for himself instead of for his money, fame or connections?

  If Cassie were here, she’d be fussing at him to get up and drink some water because it was good for him. He rolled off the bed and stumbled to the bathroom. The harsh light was not flattering. His skin had the attractive pallor of rotting parchment and his eyes were so bloodshot, they glowed. He drank a glass of water, took a cold shower, and brushed his teeth. It didn’t help.

  Sitting down on the side of the bed, he looked at the clock. Eight thirty. Dark outside, so it must be PM. He’d misplaced a whole day at least.

  He picked up his cell to check his messages. When he’d moved into Cass’s house, he’d shut the phone off and hadn’t bothered to turn it on again. With her, staying in contact with anyone else hadn’t mattered. Everything outside Cass’s mountain and the valley below didn’t matter. It was a bad TV show about somebody else.

  The messages ranged from “Hey, what’s up?” at the beginning of the week to more frantic “Where the hell are you?” by yesterday. One near the middle from Tessa told him she had the dossier, what did he want her to do with it? She’d also left one of the later “Where the hell are you?” messages. Hopefully, they hadn’t sent the cops to Cassie’s looking for him, but if they had, at least he would know she was all right.

  What an idiot. Why did he care? He had to stop that. Cassandra Geoffrey wasn’t his concern. He dialed Sandy. “Hey, I’m back.”

  “Jason, you’re back early. Feeling better?” Sandy said.

  Jason squinted against the glare of his manager’s cheer. “Different, anyway.”

  “I see.” Sandy’s cheer withered. “Well, you have three weeks before the Grammys. Let’s try not to break up the band in the meantime, shall we?”

  “I just wanted to let you know I was back.”

  “I understand, son.” Sandy sighed. “You know I’m here if you want to talk about it.”

  “I don’t.” There was no reason to be a jackass. Sandy hadn’t done anything wrong. If not for him, all of them would probably still be back in Indiana working crappy jobs and playing bars on the weekend.

  Jason’s hands were sweating against the receiver and he wanted another drink.

  “Well, you should give Brian a call.”

  “Yeah.” Before he said something worse, he hung up. His credit with these people was going to run out. He dialed Brian, and Brian’s wife Bonnie picked up.

  “Hi, are you back already?” she greeted him. “I thought you were going to be out there another week.”

  “I came back early,” he grumbled. “Is Brian there or not?”

  “Yes,” Bonnie snapped. “Are you sure you don’t want to go back to West Virginia? You don’t sound like the week did you any good.”

  Without replying, he hung up. He rubbed his face. They were never going to forgive him. Sandy had asked him not to break up the band before the Grammys, and the best he could do was get himself kicked out. He should call Tessa and get his hands on the dossier. Then he would know everything about Cassandra Geoffrey and why she’d sunk her hooks into him. Instead, he stood to get another glass of water. The phone rang. Undoubtedly someone he didn’t want to talk to. “Hello?” he answered the call.

  “Hey, man, you called.”

  “Brian, this isn’t a good time.”

  “I know. There hasn’t been a good time for about two years now.”

  Jason ran his hand through his wet hair. “Yeah, I know. Listen, tell Bonnie I’m sorry I hung up on her.”

  “Already done. You hook up with the camp director?”

  Jason smiled, remembering Cass standing in her silk dress and velvet coat in the living room. Her hair up, showing off her slender white throat. Beguiling and beautiful. All for him. “Sort of, but it didn’t end well.”

  “Which explains why you’re home early.”

  He still wanted to drape a big glittery yellow sapphire around her neck. To feel her fingers tangling through his hair. To see her smile. A groan escaped him.

  “Jason, are you there?”

  “Yeah, sorry. It was a rough flight.”

  “Wow, two sorrys in five minutes. This is some kind of record.” This was why they’d
been friends since they were nine. Brian was impervious to his moods. “Why don’t I stop over tomorrow and we’ll grab some lunch? The suits want to know when we’re gonna get to work on the next record.”

  “Okay.”

  “Get some rest, man. You sound like shit.”

  “Thanks. See ya tomorrow.” After he hung up, Jason lay back on the bed. He should get another glass of water and get dressed. That would make him feel like a human being.

  Instead, he closed his eyes and remembered throwing snowballs at Cassie.

  * * * *

  When Cassie didn’t come down for her mail for two weeks, her mother started calling. At the beginning of the third week, Shirl sat in her kitchen, listening to the phone ring. Andy perched across the table as if he wanted to fly through the line to their daughter’s house and make her answer.

  “Hello, honey. Everything okay up there?”

  “Fine, Mom,” Cass said.

  “You know, Ben says your mail is piling up down here. I’ll bet you’ve got a bunch of reservations in there. Your dad and I were thinking about driving it up to you.”

  “You don’t need to do that.”

  “I know, sweetheart. We like to help out.”

  “I don’t need any help.”

  “We have your truck here. Your father fetched it from Bill before it ended up with wool in the gas tank. He’s gotten it all tuned up too. Do you want us to bring it up?” If they didn’t take the truck up the mountain soon, Andy was going to overhaul the engine out of sheer frustration.

  “No.”

  “You know your father really doesn’t like you up there all alone without any transportation,” Shirl said.

  “I know. I’m fine.”

  Shirl wiped a crumb off the kitchen table. Cass sounded fine the way the Titanic had been fine after its encounter with the iceberg. Across the table, Andy leaned forward, frowning. He looked about to shoot out of his chair and head up the mountain at a run. Shirl cleared her throat. “So what have you been up to?”

  “Stuff.”

  “Is the summer schedule done? Sue was asking.”