by C. C. Piper
Without hesitation, I began to share with him some of the songs in my repertoire. Moonlight Sonata and Killing Me Softly. I played Bach, Haydn, Vivaldi, Mozart, and more from Beethoven. I strummed through more modern songs by Katy Perry, Whitney Houston, Rihanna, and Ed Sheeren.
He listened with his whole body, leaning forward in his chair, his hands on his knees and his feet planted on the floor. Keeping his eyes glued to me and my hands as they drew the bow across Madison’s strings, I felt as if he thought what I was doing was the most important thing in the world. It warmed me from the inside out.
It also gave me the courage to do what I did next, which entailed presenting some of the songs I’d written. I’d never played them for anyone but Drew, not even Alicia. My twin always supported me, so that had felt safe.
But something about the way Chris looked at me, his crystalline green eyes focused so intensely on mine that I could feel his admiration, his encouragement, and more. What I felt coming from him was unconditional. Powerful. And I knew in that moment what it was because I’d felt that same emotion more than once in his presence, even though I’d refused to name it.
Love.
I loved him. And I was willing to bet that he loved me.
The revelation hit me in the last few bars of my song, and I fumbled out of key before recovering my rhythm. If he noticed my mistake, he didn’t act as if he had. Instead, he kept staring at me in that straightforward way he had, as if nothing else mattered.
And for one crazy minute, I hoped that satellite phone of his never worked again. I hoped we could remain here in our own tiny paradise so we could focus only on one another forever.
Away from the tedium of the business courses I still had to complete, despite finding them pointless and boring. Away from the wishes and directives of my parents, especially my dad. Away from anyone’s expectations but my own. With Chris, I was free to be me, and that was worth far more than the fortune built by Brisbane Industries, even if my parents couldn’t understand that.
Chris waited until I was finished before moving from his seat.
Then, he approached me, massaging light circles into my arms before following the movements of his hands with those amazingly full lips. His version of a raucous applause. He waited while I put Madison safely back into her case, then he took me by the hand, kissing my knuckles with both sweetness and affection.
This sweet affection evolved into ardor, and as we touched, our clothes wound up in a haphazard circle around us. But I didn’t care. All I cared about was getting closer to him. I craved that closeness.
I wanted to crawl inside him so deeply that we could never separate again.
Almost as if he was trying to do the same thing, our movements became synchronous, simultaneous, and in perfect tune. When completion came, we soared upwards together, higher than ever before. And I held onto him through every moan, every sigh, every gasp, never ever wanting it to end.
16
Christoff
We made love all night long after Rachel played her concert for me, christening the tub, the dining room table—after moving all those lit candles to another, safer location—and the overstuffed sofa, then slept much of the next day. I didn’t check to see if the satellite phone was up and running again once during that period. I didn’t want anything intruding on our time together.
But in reality, I knew it couldn’t last.
Although I wanted to pretend that we were two people who’d been fortunate enough to find each other by chance, that wasn’t the case. This had all been orchestrated, and my part in it—the part Rachel knew about at any rate—was a lie. She believed I was a guard for a criminal organization who’d hired me to keep her prisoner. She had no idea who I actually was, or about the responsibility I bore for her kidnapping.
I couldn’t continue to conceal this from her much longer.
I felt the impending truth coming down like a guillotine ready to chop off my head, the dread of it taking permanent residence in my brain. I did everything I could to draw this out, to ignore it, but it was always there, reminding me that my time with Rachel had a limit. No matter how much I might wish otherwise, the clock was ticking.
Astonishingly, I no longer cared about publicly humiliating Jack Brisbane. I no longer cared about Hannah Lawrence. I no longer cared about hurting Brisbane Industries or seeking revenge. And even though I did care about getting my hardware templates back, I cared about Rachel more. I’d let it all go for her. I’d allow my trade secrets to be stolen without consequence as long as it meant she’d stay with me.
But I knew it wouldn’t work that way.
Relationships were built on trust. On honesty. No one knew that better than me. It was why I’d been so livid about Hannah to begin with—her betrayal had been both personal and professional. So I knew Rachel was highly unlikely to take this well.
I wracked my brain trying to figure out a way to tell her about what I’d done without it causing her to hate me. I visualized one scenario after another, but each ended in the same result. Her being incensed and running out of my life.
My only hope was that I was overstating my portion of the transaction. If I explained that I had been furious and not thinking clearly when I went to see the Wish Maker, that I’d wanted to back out, maybe I could make Rachel understand. Maybe, at least at some point later on, she could forgive me.
I’d have to tell her all of it, though. All the specifics. Yes, I’d been wronged. There was no denying Jack Brisbane’s culpability. But my response had gone too far. To involve his innocent daughter, to put her, however unintentionally, in danger because I’d wanted to make a point. I’d wanted to seek revenge.
It hadn’t been worth it.
Sometimes I wondered if it hadn’t been for the Wish Maker placing Rachel here on this island, if I ever would’ve met her. Would I have bumped into her somewhere in passing? We both lived in Chicago. We were both in our twenties with only seven years difference in our ages. Wasn’t it possible that at some function or happenstance we would’ve crossed paths? That I would’ve recognized the woman I was meant to be with on some inexplicable, cellular level? Or maybe she would’ve been the one to seek me out. Maybe she would’ve dragged me from my endless hours of toil to show me her music and vitality. To show me her beauty and grace. To fall in love with me as I had with her.
Now, there was no way of knowing. The chips had fallen where they lay, and I couldn’t alter any of what had already transpired. There were huge swaths of it that I didn’t want to change. I only wished it had come about in a way that wouldn’t be a deal breaker the second she heard about it.
The ransom letter the Wish Maker had originally sent to Jack Brisbane had issued the cut-off date as six weeks from the day of Rachel’s capture. It was now just short of five weeks, giving us about eight days to deal with the consequences. The likely fallout.
I knew I couldn’t wait that long to tell Rachel everything. She deserved to know not only what I’d done—idiotic as it was—but also what everyone else’s roles had been, including her father. I’d considered not disillusioning her where he was concerned. I knew she loved him, but when I came clean, I’d come totally clean. It’d be all or nothing.
Jesus.
A pit of icy dread had been stationed in my stomach the moment I’d discovered that the Wish Maker had followed through on my plan. It’d started out as an ache the size of a fist. Then, the ache had grown sharper, more like a burning sensation the size of a frisbee. Now, the pain had transformed itself into a stabbing feeling, like someone was piercing everything from my stomach to my heart with an ice pick, over and over again. I didn’t even want to think about how it’d feel to actually break down and tell her.
Rachel had taken over the duty of trying out the satellite phone. “You know,” she began one morning as we ambled along the cliffs, hoping to spot some orcas again. Her shoulders were squared off as if she’d had to brace herself to initiate this conversation. “I think you could do
better. I think you should leave this life of interacting with dangerous people behind.”
“I will,” I said, matter-of-factly. I would never do something like this ever again.
“You will?” She’d been dumbfounded.
Maybe she’d believed the decision would be harder for me. That I’d fight her on it more. No chance of that.
“Yes.”
“Well, in that case, there’s no reason why we can’t continue our relationship when I go back to Chicago.”
“I’ll be going back to Chicago with you,” I told her. She’d been staring out at the sea, her gaze following the seagulls as they flew along the air currents, dipping and diving in their search for food. But at my words, she turned to me.
“You will? You’d do that?”
“I want to be with you, Rachel. I’d do anything to stay with you.” All true. Even if what she knew about me was more of an illusion than anything else.
“Oh my God. Seriously?” She raised her hands to her face as if this was more than she could’ve hoped for, smiling in surprise.
“Yes.” I paused, wondering if continuing this discussion could possibly be appropriate under the circumstances. I couldn’t play with her feelings, not in good conscience. I shouldn’t give her false hope. And yet, I needed to reveal at least one truth to her. The biggest and most vital truth. The odds had been stacked against me from day one, but despite this, telling her now felt necessary, even if there was a bit of desperation behind the declaration. “I love you.”
Her smile widened, making her entire visage brighten. “You do?”
“More than anything.”
She closed the distance between us, nuzzling her nose against my chin. “I love you, too.”
It was what I’d yearned to hear from her, but my joy was tempered by the knowledge of what was coming. Still, I tried not to let any of the dread I felt crushing me show. She deserved this moment of happiness, even if it would be short-lived.
On returning back to our little home away from home, we’d made love again, and the whole time I’d been silently cursing myself. I wasn’t being fair to her. How long would I be willing to let this go on? Would holding back the truth at this point make everything worse once it was delivered?
Yet, I still didn’t tell her.
It wasn’t until that night, after she’d nodded off, that I’d gone for the satellite phone. I made a vow. If it was working again, I would contact my pilot and get Rachel out of here within the next twenty-four hours. And before we took off, I’d lay everything on the line and reveal each twisted detail.
I clicked the power button, then hit the number on speed dial. The screen no longer displayed the “Please try your call again” message. The call was going through. I disconnected before the call could be completed and sat right there on the floor of my bedroom. I attempted to get up but couldn’t seem to. My knees had dissolved.
From my vantage point on the floor, I glanced over at the woman I loved. The three-quarter moon shone down on her through the window, casting her alabaster skin and cinnamon hair in a spellbinding light. She looked like a mystical being, a goddess lying there, and my heart was so full of love for her I could scarcely breathe.
She was mine for now, and I continued to pour over her features, knowing this might well be the last night she would ever spend in my arms.
My time was officially up.
I stared at her all night. I didn’t sleep. Couldn’t sleep. I didn’t want to waste a moment doing anything but memorizing every flawless feature. The infinitesimal mole perched a half-inch to the left of her nose. It reminded me of photos I’d seen of Marilyn Monroe. The curve of her hip. The delicacy of her hands.
Hands full of talent.
Hearing her play her cello had floored me. She performed with the same passion she made love with; it transported me as I watched and listened. And when she’d switched to the songs she’d written herself, her own personal compositions, a lump had risen in my throat. I’d never been so moved by a piece of music before, yet the notes coming from her cello brought me right to the edge.
Or maybe that was Rachel herself.
I owed her. I owed her so much. Especially the truth. And now, as she blinked her deep green eyes and smiled at me, I was going to tell her.
“Good morning,” I said. Jesus, why did I sound so formal? “You look amazing.”
There. That was better.
In response, she ran a finger down my nose, over my lips, and across my chin. I closed my eyes instinctively, but I couldn’t allow myself to get swept away in the sensation again. I had to stay the course. I sat up. We were in my bed, so I went to my closet and threw on a long-sleeved t-shirt and jeans, both in plain black with no decals or symbols. Today wasn’t about expressing my personality but about coming clean. I sat back down next to her.
“I need to tell you something.”
She pulled herself upright, her smile fading a little. “Okay.”
I took a deep breath. Then another. “I…I’m not a guard.”
Rachel scooted closer, tracing a line over my chest where the superhero insignia was usually printed, glancing up at me through her lashes. “You haven’t been acting much like a guard with me, that’s for sure.”
There was a flirtatiousness in her words, and as much as I wanted to give into them, I didn’t. I couldn’t let myself be distracted, not even by her. I clasped her hand and set it at her side, away from me.
“Do you remember when I told you my name?”
“Yes. Chris Green.”
“My friends call me Chris, but the public knows me by another name. Christoff. I own Dodecahedron, the gaming software company.”
“Christoff Green. I’ve heard of you.” Her eyebrows scrunched up in bafflement. “You’re not a…. Why would you masquerade around as a guard for some creepy criminal network?”
“I didn’t want you figuring out who I really was.” I swallowed. “I didn’t want you discovering that I was the one who had you kidnapped.”
“You had me kidnapped?” The pitch of her voice became high and thin as she pulled the blankets up to cover herself.
“I hired this third-party organization to do it, to scare your father into returning my stolen technology, but I regretted it the second I realized they’d actually taken you.”
She sat up, her brows wrinkling as what I told her clicked into place. “Hold on. Let me see if I have this straight. You had me kidnapped to get back at my dad over some business thing?”
“The program he stole was worth over a hundred-million dollars. I created it from top to bottom. The only way he managed to secure it by sending in a spy. A woman who worked as my personal assistant. Hannah Lawrence. She…” Shame roiled in my gut, making me taste bile. “She seduced me. I didn’t realize who she was or that it was all a ruse to get what she wanted—what Jack Brisbane wanted—from me. I thought what Hannah and I had was real. It was real on my end. I was about to propose to her when I found out I was being lied to. We were together for three years.”
I’d expected the outrage that steamrolled me every time I thought about Hannah or Jack Brisbane to hit, to smash me into the carpet like a stain that wouldn’t come out, but it didn’t. Instead, I found myself concentrating exclusively on Rachel, observing her cautiously as I awaited her reaction.
She sat there, her mouth slightly agape. She was no longer looking at me; instead she stared unfocused down at the duvet. There was no sound in the room at all; all I could hear was my own heart racing in my ears. A minute went by, feeling more like a year.
“I realize trying to solve this issue by kidnapping you was the wrong thing to do,” I said into the weighty silence.
“The wrong thing? You hire someone to grab me, take me here, away from my family and everyone I know, and all you can say is that it was the wrong thing to do?”
“I tried suing him for the rights, demanding he return the stolen property, but he refused. He’s got so much more clout and connectio
ns than I do. I’ve got money, but he has a team of lawyers, city officials in his pocket, dirty cops and judges, including the one presiding over my case. I was upset. I wasn’t thinking clearly,” I explained, feeling defensive even though I knew I shouldn’t.
“You were upset? What if those men who knocked me out and took me here didn’t follow your orders? What if they’d raped me while I was out? Or killed me instead of taking me here, wherever here is…”
“We’re on an unnamed island off the coast of California. It’s normally uninhabited,” I put in, then felt like an asshole.
“Oh, well, thanks. That’s super helpful.” Her eyes threw contemptuous daggers in my direction.
“I know this was a mistake, okay? And I’ll never forgive myself for putting you in danger like this. When you got that fever and the phone quit working, I—”
“That’s another thing. You had a phone. If you knew this was such a massive mistake, why didn’t you call and end this, then?”
“I…panicked. I’ve never been in such an insane situation before.”
“Yeah? Well, join the fucking club!”
I’d never heard Rachel curse up until that moment. I knew it was a sign of just how angry she was with me. She got out of my bed, taking my duvet and wrapping it around her naked body like a parka.
I thought I’d prepared better than this. That I’d known how I’d explain everything. The order of each topic. The best way to approach it. But none of what I’d meant to say was coming out right. All the good times I’d experienced with her seemed to be slipping through my fingers like loose sand. Erased, as if they’d never existed.
“I’ve been stuck out here for five weeks. Five. Over a month of no contact with my family or the real world. My parents are probably going out of their minds, and I know for a fact that Drew is. They’ve probably had every law enforcement community in the country looking for me, fearing that I’m dead. And all for what? Because you think my dad may have taken one of your stupid computer programs?”