Eric stripped off his wet clothes and replaced them with a pair of gray joggers. He ran his hands over his stomach, then, out of pure impulse fell to the floor and pumped out twenty pushups, followed by another set of sit-ups. He hadn’t been at the gym as much as he wanted, and he was starting to feel it. He didn’t want to get soft. He wanted to feel…ready.
When he stood again, the sudden activity cast his muscles in high relief. Eric considered walking out with his shirt off. Jane never could resist the sight of his six-pack, which is why he deployed it sparingly, not wanting to cheapen its hard-won value.
Eric shook his head and pushed back his rain-slick hair. No, now wasn’t the time for flirtation. He had managed coaxed her out of her shell a few times today. He could do it again. Compassion. That’s what was needed. And then, once she’d softened, maybe another go with her lipstick just to make her smile.
He shoved on an old Harvard t-shirt. It wasn’t until he had towel-dried his hair that he realized he hadn’t heard the telltale thumps of Jane’s boots or rush of running water in the bathroom. The apartment was still silent.
Too silent.
Every hair on the back of his neck stood up.
“Jane?” he called. “Are you in the bath?”
There was no answer.
“Fuck,” Eric muttered as he walked out of his room, still barefoot. “Jane?”
He found her standing at the kitchen sink in the kitchen. His heartbeat quieted when he saw her standing there, straight-backed. Just what had he thought had happened? He really was becoming paranoid. Maybe he wasn’t the only one struggling with shock or PTSD.
“No, no, no,” she was muttering to herself. Her shoulders tensed, like she was working on something, with the same posture people had when they were grating vegetables or scrubbing a pan. “I can’t. I c-can’t.” There was a loud sniff. “I can’t do this anymore.”
Eric approached. “Can’t do what?”
“Ah!” Jane shouted as she whirled around.
“Oh, Jesus! Jane!”
She was bleeding. The white shirtsleeves under her wool dress had been hastily pushed up to her elbows. One had come loose, however, and was stained with rows of bright crimson stripes that mirrored those slicing the skin of her other forearm. She held a knife in one hand, and her eyes, were swollen and red-rimmed, like she was just about to start bawling.
For a moment, all Eric could see was Penny. Lying in the bathtub, the long, nasty cuts in her arms raw and cold. Water the color of a dusty red rose.
His heart practically stopped.
“Eric?”
Jane’s voice, so weak and threaded with confusion, knocked him out of his stupor.
“Jane.” Suddenly, he was all movement, scrambling across the apartment, knocking over one of his barstools in his hurry to reach her. “What happened? Holy shit, I’ll call 911.”
“Eric, d-don’t.” Her voice was thick with stifled tears as she held her arms in front of her, like she was preemptively pushing him away. “It’s fine, I promise. I’m o-okay.”
“What in the fuck?” Eric’s mind whirled as he grabbed one of her hands so he could examine her arm. “What the hell is this?”
The cuts on her arm weren’t deep, like he’d originally thought. They were horizontal and shallow, neat stripes across porcelain skin. But a violation nonetheless.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he demanded over and over again as he pulled Jane into him, uncaring for the blood staining his clothes. “What in the hell were you thinking?”
“I just—oh, God, I just—” She hiccupped over harsh, dry sobs. She wanted to cry. Maybe she was trying to cry. But she wasn’t still. “I just couldn’t take it anymore.”
“Couldn’t take what?” Eric reached around her and yanked a stream of paper towels from the counter and pressed them to the wounds, most which, he realized with relief, had already stopped bleeding.
But they were still wounds. That Jane had given to herself.
He hoisted her easily onto the counter. Fuck, she was so light. Too light. Jane folded over, cradling her wounded arms in her lap while he wet another few towels to clean her up. They didn’t speak, both of them entranced with his brisk, careful movements. But that didn’t mean the energy in the room had dissipated. Eric vibrated as he worked.
“Why?” he finally asked once he was sure he could speak calmly. “What couldn’t you take?”
Jane’s arm quivered in his grasp. “The numbness,” she said finally. “I—it was back. You couldn’t tell?”
He dabbed at her other arm, hating the way the blood seeped easily into the wet paper. “I could tell. At my mother’s, you jus started to go somehow. But I thought—shit. Jane, everyone is helping. Things are looking up. Zola, my mother. We’re taking care of it. We’re coming through.”
“Not me,” Jane replied with a despondency that scraped his soul. “I—you were pulling me out of for a bit. When you took me to Astoria, showed me that past. I know how hard it was for you to do that. I know. I know.”
Eric’s chest swelled. “I know you know, gorgeous.”
“You were willing to do that for me. Show me your grief, your guilt. Accept the responsibility. You’re so much stronger than me.” Jane fingered his wrist, which was clean and smooth. “You could move through your past to make a better life for yourself. But I—I don’t think I can move past mine. Every time I close my eyes, I see her. The baby. What she would have been.” She closed her eyes, like she was in the worst kind of pain. “It swallows me up, and so I push it away. I numb myself, because I can’t take it otherwise. But I shouldn’t be allowed to feel nothing. I should feel every inch of pain that you and I and everyone else feels because of the man who gave me half my DNA. So I…”
She gestured weakly toward the paring knife in the sink. And then, as if out of curiosity, she picked it up again, holding it like she was testing the weight.
“Jane…”
“My dad,” she whispered as she held the knife to her thigh, pressing the tip into the white of her skin. “He used to tell me about some of his patients. The veterans. POWs. They would come back from war, and they just couldn’t deal with it. With life.” She took a heavy, staggered breath and squeezed her eyes shut. A drop of blood appeared under the knife’s tip.
“Jane!” Eric took the knife from her and set it on the island behind him, out of her reach.
“Don’t!” Jane exploded. “It was going to help!”
“Do you think this is going to bring them back?” Eric demanded. “Penny, my dad? The baby? Do you think that cutting yourself up like a piece of fucking meat is going to make a goddamn thing better?”
“Why don’t you blame me? You should. You should punish me any way you know how. Because if you won’t, I will!” She bent over, hands clutched at her heart, like its pounding was too much too take.
“I’m not going to punish you, Jane.”
“Then who?” Jane whimpered. “If not you, then who? I made the decision to go to Korea. I left you rotting in that jail. I made myself a sitting duck when everyone told me not to go. I didn’t know what else to do. But if I hadn’t, she would still be here, Eric. It’s my fault!”
She shrieked the last words at the top of her lungs and buried her face in her hands, her glasses slipping off and to the floor. Eric grabbed her shoulders to keep her from falling off the counter.
“Oh, God,” she said over and over again as her sobs shook through her like miniature cyclones, tossing her back and forth in a sea of misery. “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.”
Eric inhaled and exhaled with purpose. “Listen to me. You are not at fault, Jane. The only person who is responsible for anyone’s death here is John Carson. That’s it. That’s all.”
“I had a name picked out. You called her a girl, and so in my head, I thought we might name her Jaki Carol. Like—like our dads.”
And then, finally, she broke completely, her body, no longer hurt, able to withstand the gusting sob
s that nearly forced Eric back. But instead of letting her push him away, he wrapped his arms tightly around her frail body, clutching so hard he thought he might smother her. But the tighter he held her, the tighter she grasped, seeking purchase on his arms, his neck, his chest. She poured every drop of her misery and shame into his shoulder. And he never. Let. Go.
“It’s not your fault, Jane,” Eric said again and again as he rocked her back and forth. “Do you hear me? Baby, it’s not your fault.”
At the sound of the common nickname from Eric’s mouth—more out of desperation than because it was something he had ever said before—Jane’s sobs only worsened, turning into great, choking waves of pain. “Where is it?” she keened. “Oh my God, the knife. I swear to God, I want it right. Here.” She pounded on her chest.
Eric reached back and picked up the knife again. He examined its edge. A drop of her blood had dried on the tip.
“Is that really how you feel?” he asked as he stepped out of her grasp.
Jane hiccupped, found the knife in his hand, and stretched out her own.
“Yes,” she implored. “Please!”
“Fine.” The gravity of Eric’s voice echoed around the apartment, a growl from a cave. “But you’re going to have to do it to me first.”
At that, Jane’s mouth opened, but no noise came out. Her body gave one more great, silent, shaking sob.
Eric pulled down the collar of his shirt and pressed the tip of the knife to the base of his neck. “You want penance? Then you’re going to have to dispense it too.”
“W-what?”
The steel pricked his skin. He genuinely wondered if he would feel that twinge for the rest of his life. Moments like these tended to leave all number of scars.
“You think I don’t carry the guilt too, Jane? I was locked up for two fucking weeks because I was too naive to think one step ahead. I should have known what Carson was planning the second Jude suggested I share tips with the society. I should have anticipated everything.”
“But, but…” Jane trailed off, shaking her head. “No, it wasn’t your fault…” Her words were weak. Her eyes were round, wide pools of pain. And, Eric saw with a gust of relief, love.
“It’s all I can think about,” he said. “I’m obsessed. Just like you. She was our baby, Jane. We both lost her. Just like I lost my fiancée. My father. Everyone else I have ever fucking cared about.”
She was right. Sometimes it was too fucking much.
So he did it. He pulled the knife over his skin, allowing the blade to slice through him the way her actions had already done. The way this life had already done. Jane stared with horror as blood welled from the cut, gathering in a thick drop that fell over his collarbone and stained the white of his shirt, a blurry rose blooming across the snowy expanse.
“Eric, no,” she whispered as he drew the knife down his chest. “Don’t.”
“You hurt yourself, you hurt me too,” he said as he pressed the weapon over the cotton. “You want to stab yourself in the heart? Then you’ll do it to me first. Because we’re in this together, Jane Lee Lefferts de Vries. For richer or poorer. Better or for worse. Until death do us part.”
He allowed her to pull him back between her legs. Her hand rose, first to remove the knife from his hand, and then, to his relief, to toss it into the sink—the further one, where neither of them could reach it.
“This is so fucked up,” she whispered as she touched the cut on his collarbone. Blood stained her fingertips. “You and I—we are so fucked up.”
His hand closed over hers, and he kissed her. Not a light peck, or the careful brushes he had allowed himself today. But a real kiss, one that conveyed the intensity of everything they both felt. Not just now. But all the time.
“We are,” he agreed. “This shit broke me, Jane, just like it broke you. But I refuse—I refuse—to let it break what we are together.”
“Eric—” Her voice was cut off by another choked sob, but before he could ask her “what,” she was throwing herself at him, pressing her lips to his again in a muffled, stumbling, awkward display of passion, the likes of which he hadn’t seen from her in months. Maybe years.
Once upon a time, they had found each other through lifetimes of fury and estrangement from the people they loved. They had healed each other during those strange years, only to ruin each other again and again.
But it was the separations that really broke them. That had been the truth ever since they had met.
This woman might be the death of him. But without her, he was a corpse anyway.
“I love you,” he said between kiss after torrid kiss. “You are essential to me. Like the air I breathe. The water I drink. I can’t fucking exist without you, Jane. Can’t. Fucking. Live.”
Jane bit his lip, then groaned painfully as he bit hers right back.
“Do you?” she wondered. “Do you really?”
Her doubt nearly broke him all over again.
And so, Eric did the hardest thing he had done all day—which was really saying something, considering.
He pushed her back and stepped away.
“What? Where?” Jane sputtered from lips now swollen from kissing, not crying. “Where are you going?”
Eric held out a hand and helped her down from the counter, then guided her toward his bedroom. No, he thought stubbornly. Their bedroom.
“I have to show you something. And after I do, I never want you to ask that question again.”
27
Eric’s heart beat like a drum as he unlocked the safe next to his side of the bed. It was new, purchased just a few weeks ago.
It took him two tries to even get his fingers correctly placed on the fingerprint reader, another to get the stupid door open. He had never been so nervous in his life. Not when he had asked either woman in his life to marry him. Not when he had taken the bar exam. Not when he had officially been voted chairman of the board of his family’s company.
Nothing compared to this moment.
He pulled out one of the several Moleskine journals and left the others inside, along with the rest of the safe’s contents: his passport and vital documents, the collection of evidence against John Carson, spare cash, and the pistol he had purchased from the Beretta Gallery on Seventy-First and Madison a few days ago. A few well-placed donations had sped up his license applications from three months to two weeks. He really wasn’t sure anything could overcome the surreal feeling of walking into a gun shop on the Upper East Side.
He closed the safe and turned around to face Jane, who sat on the bed with her knees pulled into her chest, her glasses back in place over her reddened nose.
“Do you remember when I found you, Skylar, and Brandon snooping in my place?” he asked.
Jane nodded wordlessly.
“Do you remember when I grabbed something out of the safe?” He quirked a brow at her. “The combination is eleven twenty-eight eighty-seven, by the way.”
Her full mouth fell. “My birthday?”
He allowed himself a small smile. He’d surprised her. That didn’t often happen. “I should probably change it now that we’re married. It’s too easy to guess.” He looked down at the journal, then held it out to her.
Tentatively, she took it. “In Boston, I assumed this had something to do with the society or my father. It looked like you were hiding something more in there.”
But Eric just shook his head. “No, gorgeous. It had to do with you. After Carson took me, I needed to remember us, Jane. What we meant.”
“But you were so awful to me,” she murmured. “You acted like you hated me.”
Guilt shot through him. “I was trying to protect you. And I think we both know how long that lasted.”
She blinked at him. His guilt grew.
Eric edged toward her and nodded at the journal. “Open it, pretty girl.”
After another moment, Jane opened the book. A lock of purple hair fell into her lap. She held it up. “Is this…is this my hair?”
Eric smiled bashfully. “It is. You gave it to me, remember?”
“Yes, but…oh my God, this is your number! You stalker. You actually kept these? Do you have a shoebox full of my nail clippings too?”
This time Eric smirked at the insults. Her face was still tear-streaked, but she was rebounding quickly. Another good sign.
“I told you,” he reminded her. “It’s a talisman. I wanted to keep your bravado with me.”
Jane hiccupped back a laugh, then continued to page through the book, stopping every so often to read the poems, entries, and anything Eric had recorded over the years.
“I wondered if you kept writing after I read that other journal,” she said.
“After Penny died, I didn’t write anything for a year. I just…didn’t care. I traveled, I ignored my friends, my family. I pretended to be anyone but Eric de Vries, family heir. But when I met you, it was like someone jerked me back to reality.”
Jane continued scanning the pages. “But you—Eric, I’m not being jealous here, but you dated so many women in Boston. How do I know that these are about—”
“Just turn the page, Jane.”
To his surprise, she did as he ordered. Out dropped a note written on a coaster, along with a napkin, creased and grayed a bit with time. Jane flattened it against her thigh, whispering the words Eric knew by heart.
“It’s our poem. From the bar.” She looked up. “You kept it too?”
“I kept everything. Keep reading.”
So she did. She lingered over a photo of their first-year study group at the library. Notes passed during Torts and Con-Law. Ticket stubs from that show at Great Scott for her birthday. The receipt from a book of love poems.
Every single remnant of their initial go at it, plus others from the next one, and the one after that.
He watched her page through the intervening years, filled with poetry he’d written, mostly about her. Watching from a distance as she pillaged half of Boston, a mirror image of his own attempts to forget her and move on.
The Love Trap (Quicksilver Book 3) Page 26