by Tijan
And with that, we left.
25
Quincey
I’d never seen anything like it. Ever.
Nate almost dragged me to his vehicle because I was so stunned. I couldn’t move.
I held onto him with two hands, but as soon as we were seated, a laugh began low in my belly. It wasn’t a happy laugh. It was a WTF laugh with a hint of hysteria and an edge of something unbalanced inside me.
He—I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.
Calihan showed up when Nate was downstairs, and I knew the night would end badly. She came in and breezed past me without a hello. Her two friends followed, both giving me nasty looks. It didn’t help that both were dancers, and I’d beaten them out for solos over and over again in the ballet company. There’d been years of that, so Calihan fully knew who she had picked to bring to this dinner.
They were there to make me feel miserable.
It didn’t work.
Not this time. Holy moly, not this time.
Nate didn’t let anything happen. He said his piece, waited, saw that he didn’t get through to her, and decided not to waste his time.
My body was throbbing. I wanted him. Badly.
I was aching because I couldn’t go there. I wouldn’t be able to handle a fuck from him. I knew it. I just knew it. This man, he was too much for me. Too hard. Too sexy. Too demanding. Too commanding. Too, just too. He could become an addiction that I’d never come back from.
I couldn’t do that because of Nova.
The thought of her was like a cold shower hitting me, and the lust that he’d ignited was doused to a slow, smoldering fire. The embers were still going but just barely. They were smoking, but this way, they weren’t inflamed. I wouldn’t do anything that I’d regret in the morning.
He started the engine and pulled away from the curb. “You okay?”
My stomach let out a loud grumble, and I laughed. My hand covered it. “Yeah. I’m...I’m good.” I turned to him, a new appreciation brimming in me. “Thank you for that.”
He pressed his mouth tight. “That girl wasted my night. I’m pissed about that.”
Another growl from my stomach.
He threw me a slight grin. “Let’s have dinner before heading back. We’re already out. Emily is watching Nova. Let’s take advantage of the night.”
A sensation zinged through me, setting my insides awake and excited. I was trying to tell myself not to look into that comment, but I recognized the butterflies in my stomach for what they were. They were starting, and the few times they’d started fluttering before, I was already past the point of cutting someone off. The feelings were already in there and rooted.
This was so not a good idea, but I sighed. “That sounds like a good plan.”
Dinner, that is.
My feelings, not a good plan.
One meal wasn’t going to hurt at this point.
* * *
I was wrong. One meal hurt, a lot.
It was Keela, and that was the first moment I knew something was off.
Keela was expensive and exclusive. The clientele was wealthy and famous.
I loved Keela. I loved loved it.
It’d been kept for special events, so I’d only been there a few times. And part of that reason was because it was confidential. When you showed up, you called ahead. They waved you in using a few different entryways. We didn’t have paparazzi in Seattle, but there were gossip bloggers who sometimes hung out in the coffee places nearby, just to keep an eye out for who might be going to Keela. I never cared. No one in my family or life was famous. Principal dancers didn’t get a lot of attention in the mainstream media. That suited me.
They had us drive in using a back alley that dipped into a basement garage. That was new.
The greeter met us at the door wearing a professional smile with our menu already in hand. We were also greeted with two glasses of champagne.
“Mr. Monson.” The waiter nodded his head briefly to us.
Nate reached, taking my hand in his.
My pulse kick-started at the contact. I knew I should pull away, but when he laced our fingers, that died down. I couldn’t.
I didn’t want to stop touching him.
I only wanted more.
The inside of Keela was a fairy botanical garden. Trees. Lights. Actual birds. They had a whole fountain and a small river that ran through the restaurant as well. The sounds of trickling water soothed me as if somehow reaffirming the romantic notions I was starting to get regarding Nate.
Nate Monson.
I needed to remember his full name. It gave me a degree of separation.
Nova’s father.
That stung a little bit.
Valerie’s baby daddy.
There was a full knot forming.
Valerie. He had a relationship with Valerie, my half-sister, not me.
I was here because of Valerie.
I was an interloper. I was the outsider.
I almost stumbled when those thoughts hit me at full blast, reminding me that I was only here because of a piece of paper. Valerie gave me Nova, which must’ve been on a whim. It had to be.
I didn’t deserve to be here.
Gah.
I didn’t deserve to even have Nova, to even be in Nova’s life.
No.
I gritted my teeth, a selfish wave riding through me, firming my spine almost literally.
I did deserve to be here. I did deserve to have Nova in my life, and if the only reason was because of Valerie’s whim, then so be it. I was too selfish to step back.
I needed Nova, not the other way around.
Nova would be loved by anyone, possibly everyone, but I needed her. Me.
She was saving me. I wasn’t saving her.
Was that a fair thing to do to a little girl? Use her to save me? Give me purpose?
Dancing had been my purpose, but if I was being honest, dancing had been my escape from Duke. Always had been. It was the one thing he allowed me to keep in my life, and I persevered. I went to the top.
Then Nova came, and the world had meaning for the first time. Dancing had been my path until Nova happened.
“You look like you’re having deep thoughts.”
We’d arrived at our private alcove. We had the corner of the river running around us, trees blocking our view from others in the restaurant, but I could hear the glasses and silverware scraping over the plates. It was slight, but there. The murmur of conversation was almost soothing as well.
I shook my thoughts clear. It wouldn’t change a thing anyway. “I’m fine.”
I gave him a small smile as the waiter held my chair for me.
Water was already on the table for us, and our server disappeared. He’d be bringing bread and wine when he returned. Or she. They usually had a full team taking care of the tables.
“You like Keela?”
Despite my heavy thoughts, I did relax, the feeling that this place always gave me. Or how I remembered it from the few times I’d been here. “I do. I think the last time I was here was the night I danced in Seattle’s Nutcracker. I came here with my father and my agent.” I had to laugh. “My agent dropped me when he found out I was quitting dancing to raise Nova.”
“Then he’s a shitty agent. You can get a better one.”
He sounded so sure, and he was looking at me as if he believed what he said because it was the most sensible thing in the world. I almost had to laugh at that, too.
I realigned the cloth napkin on my lap before raising my face. “That world doesn’t work like that. You get what you get. Sometimes you have to shut up and take what’s dished to you.”
He raised an eyebrow with a smooth chuckle. “No offense, but that’s bullshit. You’re talking like I don’t know the world of agents.” He leaned forward, dropping his tone, but his eyes took on a whole smoldering effect. “I think you’re forgetting who my best friend and brother-in-law are.”
Right.
God.
Right.
I had forgotten.
“I feel a little foolish.”
“If you want a better agent who will work with you through your life transitions, I can put some feelers out. I have a feeling you’ll be snatched up within hours, so heed my advice? Pick who you want. Put a list together of a few options, and we can strategize on how to make that happen.”
“I got my last agent through my father.”
His mouth flattened. “I’m not surprised by that. I more wonder who he didn’t pick for you.”
“You think there were others interested in representing me?”
He gave me another look. “I’m willing to bet money there were.”
I…I’d never thought of it that way, but deep down, I knew he was right. Again.
A surge of anger flooded me, and I had to grab my chair’s armrests. My fingers dug in.
My father had totally and completely done that to me. I even had others approach me. They asked for a phone call, handed me their card, and what had I done? Nothing.
Because I went with who my father wanted.
And I never considered the other options. They’d barely registered in my head.
A slight gurgle rippled up my throat. “Ever feel like you’ve been on a train all your life, and you’ve been staring out the same window the whole time because that side has trees and forests and they are familiar, but something happens to draw your attention away, and you get a glimpse of the other side of the train, and you realize you could’ve been watching the ocean instead? That was a whole long sentence, but while you love trees, you might’ve seen some whales? Or dolphins? Or just cute seals.”
He glanced around us. “I don’t know. I’m preferable to the trees right about now.”
I grinned, a sudden ball of tension expelling from me. It left an imprint inside, one that was lined with sadness.
I’d missed so much, and I was just starting to realize it.
Bread and some wine were brought over. We gave our orders not long after, but I was distracted. I didn’t remember what I ordered. I pointed and said, “I’ll take this, thank you.” As soon as he had gone, there was a pulse between Nate and me.
He was watching me, waiting.
I had more to say, but I needed to say it in my own time. He was unnervingly able to read me, so I’m sure he also knew that, too.
I took a sip of my water, passing on the wine. “Ever been around someone who was emotionally manipulative? Or maybe it’s mentally manipulative?”
He grimaced, taking a sip of his own water. “I’ve been around people who’ve been around people like that. My parents and I butted heads when I was young, but it was more of a direct and blunt disagreement. I knew what they wanted, and they knew I wasn’t going to do what they wanted. There was no manipulation about it, just straight control.”
He hadn’t mentioned his parents this whole time, and I realized how odd that was. His friends, yes. His sister, yes. Not who he should’ve mentioned, though.
I felt almost shy asking, “Are you close to your parents?”
A thin line formed around his mouth. “Not really.”
I didn’t know what to say. I wanted to know about it, but it felt intrusive to ask.
Nate sighed, putting his water down. “They made mistakes. Or I was the mistake. I don’t know now, to be honest, but time’s passed. They went on a whole spiritual journey a few years back, trying to make up for things, but too much time passed for me. I’m cordial with them. I’ll call them if I need to, but I don’t look at them as parents anymore if that makes any sense?”
Yes. A whole resounding yes because I was there with Duke.
“It does.” My one hand had been digging into the armrest. I let it drop into my lap, my other holding onto my water like it was made of gold. “I’ve always known that my father was controlling, but I’ve always thought I chose to remain with him. Before I left to move in with you, it never occurred that maybe I’d been staying with him because of him, not me. Like I didn’t know I even had a choice not to live with him.” I cringed at that terminology. “To stay with him, to live with him, it means the same. To be on his team. And if I’m not on his team, then I’m out. That’s a form of manipulation, isn’t it?”
“That’s very controlling, yes, and emotional manipulation. I’m going to hazard a guess, but he made you feel guilty about loving your mother?”
Yes.
“Your brother?”
Yes.
“Both of your sisters?”
God, yes.
“And I bet you even like your stepfather, but you’ve barely had a conversation with him?”
My lips parted in shock. “How do you know this?”
He inclined his head, his eyes never leaving my face. “Because that’s a toxic, controlling relationship. You’re blind to it when you’re in it, but everyone else sees it.”
That had my whole face warming but from mortification. “Everyone?”
“Everyone.”
I was taken aback. By him. By the situation. By how he was even speaking.
I shouldn’t have passed on wine. I wanted the room to swim around me. I think I needed it at that moment.
I gestured to him, nodding, but I didn’t want to look at him. Anywhere but at him. “You say it all matter-of-fact.” I looked now, and I was angry. I was pissed. I wanted to hurt him, but I knew it wasn’t him whom I wanted to hurt. He was just the one here. “You don’t know me. You don’t know my father. You don’t know anything. You fucked Valerie, and your sperm attached to her egg during one of those bed romps, and here you are. You’re inserting yourself into my life, and you’re—”
I needed to stop.
My God, I needed to stop. I was so wrong, but the anger was still there. The words were still there, and I wanted to say them. I yearned to say them.
What was wrong with me?
The room was starting to spin now. It was about time.
I felt like I was dancing again.
For a moment, I closed my eyes, and everything was fine. Everything was right. Everything was how it was supposed to be, but I knew that wasn’t the truth. I was deluding myself.
I was doing what I had always done growing up. Lying to myself and letting myself believe the lie.
I wanted to lie to myself now. I wanted that so bad.
I wanted to tell Nate Monson to go to hell. I wanted to stand, call my father, and have him take Nova and me back to the estate.
I wanted to go back to that misery because it was the misery I knew. The misery I was comfortable with.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I was angry with Nate because he showed up and upended my life.
I wasn’t angry with him. I wasn’t even angry with Valerie.
I was angry with myself because I chose to believe my own lies for so very long.
I was such a screwup. “I’m so sorry. That was out of line. I was out of line, and I’m so sorry. This is all my fault.”
“What? No. How are you thinking that?”
But it was. Horror was starting to replace the anger, and I felt it starting to pummel my organs. The room kept spinning, spinning. I felt like I was doing a pirouette, and I couldn’t end it. “If I had fought him more. If I had begged Stephanie to take me in? Hell. I should’ve done something.” I felt wild inside. I was still spinning. I couldn’t find a stronghold, but I looked at Nate. “I should’ve made him hate me, or at least not want me. I could’ve done that. Instead, I was the perfect daughter. I tried to be the perfect daughter, the perfect everything for him. What was I thinking? Why wasn’t I thinking?”
“Okay.” Nate made to stand.
“No.” I was the one to shove my chair back.
The room was dancing, round and round.
The river was with it.
The trees were one constant blur. They were going around me, and I was still spinning.
I was going to be sick.
“Why is this a
ll coming out now?” a whisper from me.
Nate stood. I more heard him than saw him, and he walked around the table, touching my arm.
The touch was helping to steady me. Some of the spinning started to ease, but it was still going. It was moving at a slower pace.
I was going to fall.
I felt the crash coming.
I looked up as Nate drew even closer to me. I gulped. “I’m so sorry.”