by Dana Marton
Then she went back to her old room—everything still as she’d left it—and browsed through her bookshelf, pulling out the books she wanted.
She ended up with a bigger pile on her bed than she’d anticipated. She went to look for a cardboard box. She didn’t find any.
She did find Ian’s gym bag. He wouldn’t mind if she borrowed that. She’d bring it back. They’d probably meet up anyway when he finally returned.
She packed the bag full of books and set it by the door. Then she grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge. Of course, since the fridge was unplugged, the water was warm. She didn’t care.
She walked into Ian’s bedroom and regarded his empty bed.
Old emotions, needs, dreams bubbled up. She fought them back, but she did walk over and sit on the rumpled cover. She put the water bottle on the nightstand. Lay down. She turned her head and inhaled. Even after months, his pillow still smelled like Ian.
Longing washed over her, so strongly that it stole her breath. Stupid, stupid, stupid. She shouldn’t have come here.
But she didn’t leave. She curled up in Ian’s bed and fell asleep.
Chapter Twenty
Ian
“Case is rolled up. I’m heading home,” Ian told Daniela over the phone. Man, he was ready. Russia was great, actually a lot better than he’d expected, but he couldn’t wait to sleep in his own bed again.
“When?”
“Tuesday.”
“That’s the day Bobby is coming back from Montreal.”
She sounded happy. He found himself carefully listening to her voice every time they talked.
“How is that going?” he asked.
“He’s been hinting that he wants us to move in together. Crystal says he’s going to propose.”
A crack formed inside Ian’s chest, rapidly growing into a sinkhole. “You should follow your heart.”
“I will.”
“Congratulations.” He winced. He should have said that first. He wanted nothing but the best for her.
She laughed on the other end. “Let’s wait with that until the engagement actually happens.”
He tried to imagine her with Bobby. Wasn’t hard. She had pictures of the two of them posted to her social media pages. Bobby wasn’t an ugly kid. They looked good together.
Kid had had good grades in law school. Good job now, with good prospects. No red flags. Ian had run a background check on him and his family. Upper-middle class, decent people.
Ian was going to support the relationship if it killed him.
* * *
Eduardo
Eduardo watched the apartment across the courtyard. No lights on tonight.
There’d been lights a week ago. Not Ian Slaney. A young woman. The cleaning girl? A girlfriend?
He didn’t go over. He didn’t want to show himself to her. She might tell Slaney that a stranger was snooping around, and then Ian might never come home. Or he’d come prepared. Eduardo wanted to catch the bastard unaware.
Like Marcos had been caught unaware. Never knowing death would pounce, until they’d brought out the machetes.
* * *
Daniela
“Dinner was perfection.” Bobby leaned back in his chair. “Thank you. Are you ready for your presentation Friday?”
See-Love-Aid was having a big conference at the convention center on human trafficking. The goal was to solicit funds for dissemination of information so people would recognize signs of trafficking and report it. See-Love-Aid was making flyers for truckers and managers of large farms who regularly came in contact with migrant workers. When, months ago, See-Love-Aid was looking for corporate sponsors, Daniela brought the issue up at the law firm where she and Bobby worked.
The firm agreed to a very generous sponsorship. As a result, they were invited to give the introductory speech. But since the lawyers billed about a gazillion dollars a second and didn’t have the time to hang out at the conference, they were sending Daniela.
“I’m ready.” She put the dirty plates in the sink. “It’s just a ten-minute little thing.”
Bobby stood to help with the dishes.
Daniela tried to wave him away. The kitchen in her apartment was tiny. “It’s your welcome-home dinner. You’re not allowed to work.”
He snuck his hands around her waist from behind and dipped his head to kiss her neck. “Am I allowed to do this?”
She could feel him harden against her backside as he kept kissing her.
She filled her lungs. Either she was doing this or not.
Doing it. Definitely doing it.
She turned off the water, dried her hands. Dishes could wait.
She turned around and gave him access to her mouth. “Everything is allowed on the day of your return.”
His blue eyes filled with hope and desire. “Everything?”
She smiled. “I’m prepared to be fully welcoming.”
“Naked and welcoming?”
“If that’s how you like it.”
“That’s how I like it,” he said so fast, it sounded like one word.
And then he was kissing her, lifting her, her legs around his waist as he carried her to her bedroom.
Somehow, he got them on the bed without ever letting go of her. And she smiled at him because, maybe, just maybe, this could work.
He was yanking up his shirt when she could finally break their lips apart for long enough to say, “I need to tell you something first.”
He pulled back. Searched her face. “You’re not a virgin, are you? I mean, I don’t care. I don’t mind. I already knew that you’re kind of old-fashioned about sex. I like it. I love you.”
And she still couldn’t say I love you back. Maybe after she came clean.
She sat up against the headboard, tucked her feet under herself, and clasped her hands together on her lap. Drew a deep breath. They needed to get this out of the way. She met his patient gaze.
“I’m hardly a virgin.” And then she told him everything, starting with her mother.
He stared at her openmouthed, a horrified look settling over his face.
Horrified for her? Because she’d been through a lot growing up? She couldn’t tell. She went on with her story, barely paused long enough to draw breath. She wanted it all out. No more secrets. She wanted this relationship to have a chance.
When she finished, she wrapped her arms around herself. “So that’s it. That’s me.”
"Are you kidding me?” His eyes narrowed, his voice harsher than she’d ever heard it. He sounded angry and, at the same time, ready to cry. “Why would you make up something like this?"
She shook her head.
"Seriously? Dani? You used to be a prostitute?" He drew farther away from her, as far as he could get without falling off the end of the bed.
Her heart sank. “Yes.”
He gave a shaky, incredulous laugh. "Man, I respected you enough to wait. I mean… I thought this was it, like I was going to propose.” He reached back to scratch his neck. Dropped his hand. “Shit. I’ve been looking at rings online.”
He jumped up, then he backed away from her as if she was contagious. "So you, like, fucked dozens of guys.” Hurt and revulsion mixed in his eyes. “For money."
“Probably hundreds.”
She shut off all emotion. If she allowed herself to feel now, she would shatter. Her skin felt incredibly tight, her heart cold and hard, as if made of glass.
She’d been prepared for a long talk, lots of questions and explanations. She'd thought the night might go badly, but not this badly. Not with this much loathing on Bobby's face, loathing that was quickly turning into hate.
“You almost fooled me.” The words snapped with hard clicks, like armor snapping into place.
“I’m sorry. I wanted to tell you, but it never seemed like the right time. But I’m right here, right now, telling you the truth.”
He half turned from her. He had a faraway look in his eyes, as if he was no longer listening. “I can’t
do this,” he said at last. “It’s too much for me. I’m sorry. I can’t imagine having sex with someone who…”
He didn’t finish.
And then he was walking out, without saying good-bye, without saying anything else.
Daniela curled up into as tiny a ball as she could manage. The old numbness came back. She felt as violated as when that first logger had come up to the bamboo hut and pushed her on her back.
She hadn’t expected Bobby to be happy about her past, but she hadn’t expected pure revulsion, not this much hate.
Ian had always accepted her, never made her feel dirty, never made her feel worthless or that she should hide anything about herself.
Of course, Ian didn’t want her either.
Bobby’s leaving didn’t make her cry, but that thought did. Because all this time, she’d been only pretending she didn’t care that Ian didn’t want her. And she wished she could keep on pretending, because once she began crying, she couldn’t stop.
In the morning, she had to spend an extra hour on her makeup to hide the redness and swelling around her eyes.
When she walked into the office, hoping against hope that she could avoid Bobby, the first thing she saw was a note on her desk. “Please see Lucy in HR.”
So Daniela went, a sick feeling spreading in her stomach.
Lucy was waiting for her. The grandmotherly Korean-American woman ushered her to a chair. “I’m afraid I have bad news for you. You know you were here on a probationary period, and I’m sorry, but decisions have been made, and this position will not be made permanent. Nothing that you did. They’re just not going to need as many people as they thought.”
Daniela nodded numbly. She didn’t fight for the job. It hadn’t been Lucy’s decision. Lucy didn’t even have to explain it, really. With at-will employment, any company could fire any employee without giving a reason.
Daniela went home, went to bed. Since she hadn’t slept all night, she passed out eventually. When she woke, the sky was dark outside.
She washed her face, went out, drove to the nearest bar, and ordered whiskey. Ian had told her once that oblivion lived in a bottle. Tonight, Daniela needed oblivion.
Men came up to her; she ignored them. When the bartender cut her off, she stumbled outside. She knew she shouldn’t drive, so she walked toward home, still remembering the horror and revulsion on Bobby’s face. When she saw a drunk a block over with a bottle in a paper bag, she bought the bottle off him for twenty bucks. To hell with the bartender.
The booze tasted pretty bad compared to the bar’s top-shelf whiskey. She thought it might be gin. She drank as she walked, barely feeling the chill in the air.
A car passed her. Backed up. Two guys who’d hit on her in the bar earlier grinned at her as the one on the passenger side rolled down his window. Blond, scrawny twenty-something. The other one could have been his twin, only bulkier in the chest and belly. In dress shirts with ties, they were office types, possibly even other lawyers.
“Hey, pretty thing, want a ride?”
“I don’t want anything.” But that wasn’t true. She wanted one thing, one man, had wanted him for years, but she couldn’t have him. She was still in love with Ian Slaney.
She was just drunk enough to admit it finally. Maybe she should have gotten wasted sooner. The whole fiasco with Bobby could have been avoided.
She looked at the men.
“A thousand dollars,” she said.
They glanced at each other. Laughed. The one on the passenger side said, “Okay, babe.”
She could have said five thousand. The amount wouldn’t have mattered. They would have agreed. They had no intention of paying, just taking her, using her, and dumping her on another dark corner.
But she wasn’t that Daniela anymore.
She might be drunk and heartbroken, but she was nobody’s victim, not ever again.
“A thousand dollars and I won’t kick your ass,” she said.
The men weren’t happy with that.
They got out of the car, looked up and down the abandoned sidewalk, then tried to drag her into the backseat.
Ian had trained her years ago for moments like this. She tossed the empty bottle and beat the men off, hurt them enough that they left, cursing her out and calling her a crazy bitch.
She swore after them in Portuguese. Ian had been right not to let her forget the language. The way the fiery words rolled off her tongue was immensely satisfying.
Then she fell over her own feet and scraped her hands on the pavement, banged her cheek. She pushed up, stayed on her ass, watched the blood run down her wrists. Her skin stung and burned.
A cab rolled down the street. She held up a bloody hand. The cabbie ignored her and kept on going.
She was completely drunk for the first time in her life, but she was still smart enough to know that sitting here, alone, in the middle of the night, was stupid. Crystal was in Boston, visiting her parents. Iris would have a heart attack. And she didn’t like to drive in the dark, at night. Her eyes were getting finicky. So Daniela swallowed her pride, pulled out her cell phone, and called Ian.
He answered on the second ring with “What’s wrong?”
“Why do you always assume that I can’t handle myself and need your help?” she mumbled.
“You’re calling me at past two in the morning.”
The blood trickled onto the phone from her hand. She stared at it with the rapt attention of a drunk. “I’m bleeding.”
“Where are you?” His voice turned sharp, full of tension.
“I’m on the street.” Right. That wasn’t helpful. She looked up, read the street signs, and gave him the intersection.
“I’ll be right there. Don’t move.”
“I don’t think I can.” A dull ache spread through her body.
She ended the call and slipped the phone into her back pocket…on the third try. It rang almost immediately, Ian calling her back. She ignored him. She was afraid if she picked up, she might tell him that she still loved him.
***
Ian
I’m bleeding. I’m on the street.
Ian had never been so scared in his life. Every muscle in his body was so tight, he thought he’d break. He could barely breathe.
He’d just gotten back from Moscow. He’d ended up having to stay an extra couple of days to tie up loose ends. He was loopy with jet lag. Then the call. What the hell happened?
I’m bleeding.
Had she been mugged? Shot? Raped?
I’m on the street.
He hadn’t seen her in six months, but she’d always sounded fine on the phone. Until just now. Now was the opposite of fine.
He drove twice the speed limit, through red lights. Thank God the streets were empty. For the first time in a long time, he was praying. He couldn’t imagine his life without Daniela in it.
Truth was, she’d saved him…
Before he could think more about that stun grenade, he was at the intersection, and he could see her. She was sitting on the sidewalk.
She raised her head and looked at him as he parked by the curb, then ran to her. She looked so lost, it shattered not just his heart but every organ he had. He felt liquefied inside.
He noted the blood and that she wasn’t too terribly hurt, nothing life threatening. He picked her up, carried her to the car, and put her in the passenger seat.
He didn’t go around. He knelt on the curb in front of her. “Who did this to you?”
The bastard was so fucking dead.
She flashed a goofy smile. “Hard liquor.”
He could definitely smell that on her. “Your little call knocked ten years off my life, you know that?” He could almost breathe normally. “What happened?”
“I’ll tell you later.” Her beautiful eyes hung on his face. “Could you please take me home?”
“Sure.”
“To your place,” she added.
He leaned in, fastened her seat belt, then closed the door on her
.
All the way home, she didn’t say anything. She just closed her eyes and sank into the seat, her bloody hands on her lap.
When he got to the condo, he lifted her again and carried her up.
She lay her head on his shoulder. “I can walk.”
“I don’t care.” He carried her straight to his bathroom and sat her on the closed toilet lid, rummaged around for peroxide in the mirrored cabinet.
He cleaned her hands, disinfected the scrapes, put on waterproof bandages. He brought her one of his T-shirts. “Take a shower.”
Then he left her.
Then he paced his bedroom, a million thoughts exploding through his brain.
She came out fifteen minutes later, the T-shirt hanging off her shoulders, the hem coming to her knees. She looked halfway between a sex symbol and a waif.
He stepped to his bed and pulled down the covers. “You’re sleeping here tonight. I don’t think I can stand letting you out of my sight.”
She climbed into bed.
He kicked off his shoes and got in next to her. He left the light on.
He tried to take her into his arms, but he was on top of the covers, so it didn’t work. So, with a muffled curse, he got under the covers with her. Then he did take her into his arms, and she turned into his chest, and his world began to reassemble itself.
“Now tell me what happened.”
She did. And then she made him promise that he wouldn’t kill Bobby. “You can’t kill him for not wanting to sleep with an ex-whore.”
He took her chin and forced her to look at him. “There’s nothing wrong with you.”
She rolled her eyes and parroted back the words he must have told her a thousand times after he’d first brought her to the US. “There’s not one thing wrong with me or bad about me.”
“Damn right.”
She lowered her head. “You don’t want to sleep with me either.”
Christ. He gently took her chin, brought her face back up again, and then he kissed her.
And kissed her, and kissed her, until they had their legs wrapped around each other, and he had his hand under her T-shirt, on her perfect breast, and he was so hard, he thought the top of his head would blow off from all the pressure building inside him.