Rhapsody

by Heather McKenzie

  His breath, hot against my skin, was a vivid reminder. Not that I would ever forget.

  “Imagine what that would be like now that you’re in love with me,” he said. “Imagine how I could make you feel.”

  Oh. My. God. “I… I am not in l-love with you,” I stammered.

  He leaned back to peer into my eyes. Smiled. Then reached down to roam two shiver-inducing hands down my thighs. Before I knew it, I was lifted. I wrapped my legs around his waist—apparently my legs had a mind of their own?

  “Yeah, you are,” he said, breathing hard, pushing himself against me, turning on the hand dryer again. “You’re just too scared to admit it.”

  I was a fly stuck in a glue trap, stuck in the realization that he was right… and stuck in the ladies’ bathroom in a coffee shop with a gorgeous man who I wanted to touch every inch of and get to know in every way possible which was wrong… so wrong…

  “You’re wrong,” I said.

  “Am I?

  His mouth moved over mine desperately, eager to show me what he knew to be true. I was so overcome with physical desire for him my control was slipping. I had to remind myself if there was one thing I had learned in my short teenage life so far, it was this…

  Lust Was Not Love.

  “Kaya…” Thomas breathed, “You know you want me, the same way I want you. It’s okay to admit it. You’re not cheating on anyone. You’re not betraying… him.”

  “We have a friendship agreement, remember? You’re, um, c-crossing the line and making it increasingly impossible for me to resist. And I need to resist.”

  “I can give you more than friendship,” he said eagerly.

  Lust was not love. Lust was not love. But was this lust, or love?

  My heart skipped, flipped, pounded in my throat.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said, unwinding myself from him and adjusting the scarf across my red cheeks. “I can’t give you what you want.”

  He turned away, cursing the dryer when it came on again. “We better get going then. Someone keeps knocking on the door.”

  I hadn’t heard a thing, but I turned to leave anyway, desperate to escape.

  “Oh, but wait…”

  He reached for my arm and held it, turning me to face him. The turmoil on his face made my chest hurt.

  “Gimme the glasses,” he said, choking slightly on the words, and after popping out the yellow lenses, he handed me back empty, thick black frames. “Here. Now they look like regular glasses.”

  They did. I was unrecognizable now. The parka completely hid my shape, the scarf fully concealed my hair and my heated cheeks, and the glasses obscured my eyes.

  “Oh, and hey,” Thomas continued, gulping, “if we’re pretending that you’re my wife you should probably have some bling.”

  He dug around in one of the bags until he found what he was searching for—a huge diamond ring with stones all around the band.

  “It’s fake—obviously—but I think it’s kind of pretty.”

  “Oh,” I said, desperate to keep my face emotionless.

  He made a show of ever so slowly slipping the ring onto my finger. I barely registered an actual knock at the door as everything about Thomas consumed my senses. I held back tears when he raised the back of my hand to his mouth, just like he did in the store. But this kiss was different. It was a kiss that said I could have him for eternity if I wanted.

  But I was Luke’s, and Luke was mine. And Thomas… Thomas was…

  “I’m sorry I said I hated you.” I had to fill the air between us.

  His breath caught. “It’s okay. I deserved it.”

  “And I understand why you did what you did. I’m not angry anymore.”

  He bit his lip. “Thank you.”

  The knock at the door grew louder. Urgent.

  “You know,” he said, staring at the ring on my hand glittering madly in the bathroom lights. “I’m going to do this for real someday.”

  “Do what?”

  He smiled. “Marry you.”

  We immersed ourselves back onto the crowded streets, holding hands like we were a regular couple, sipping coffee neither of us wanted. Lisa followed, impatiently hissing at us to hurry up, while Thomas hissed back at her that it would cause attention. I felt as if in a dream playing the role of a tourist, buying chocolate marshmallows and posing for a picture next to a life-sized plastic moose, all while my heart was in my throat with worry and guilt and mounds of confusion.

  At a souvenir shop about to close, Thomas ducked in and bought me a little jade bear on a chain. For good luck he said when he hooked the clasp behind my neck. To the onlooker, and hopefully two of Henry’s men heading our way, he was a doting husband and we were a vacationing couple madly in love. No one knew that our entwined hands and plastic smiles were covering up increasing fear as we headed toward the last place in the world I should be. I was risking my life getting close to my former home. And so was Thomas.

  Lisa was doing this for Luke. I was doing this for Luke. But Thomas? He was doing this for me. That realization hit like a tornado.

  “Maybe we’ll get lucky and the perfect plan will unfold before our very eyes,” he said quietly. “I’m thinking the estate can’t be so heavily guarded with all these goons on the street.”

  “It’s worse than you think. I promise.”

  “Geez. More prison than castle, eh?”

  “Yup,” I nodded. “Inside, every hallway is gated and has guards posted, and there are men at each entrance, not to mention the training quarters where at the very least there are hundreds more. Henry’s minions are beyond loyal and will shoot on command without second thought. They’ll follow orders no matter what they entail.”

  Suddenly, my feet stopped dead in their tracks; how was I possibly so selfish that I allowed Thomas to come with me? To be out here in the line of fire? What was I doing? I had to turn back.

  But… Luke.

  The scale was balancing in the most gut-wrenching way, tearing me clean down the middle, perfectly in half.

  A crazy question popped into my mind.

  “What is it?” Thomas asked, noticing my cheeks pale.

  I shoved the question away and it came back and smacked me full on in the face. I removed my hand from Thomas’s and stared up at him, ignoring the steady stream of people having to go around us. I patted the jade bear, feeling it on my chest next to the maple leaf and the cougar tooth from Luke. Now the question was unavoidable; was it possible to be in love with two people?

  “Kaya, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Thomas’s dark eyes flooded with concern.

  Was I in love with two people? The thought of living out the rest of my days without Luke, or Thomas, made the future seem impossibly bleak and unbearable. My stomach twisted up around my spine.

  “Kaya… what’s wrong?”

  My mind was reeling. I had to focus on something else. Anything else.

  From over Thomas’s shoulder there was a familiar sign across the street. “That’s the Derrick Bar.”

  Thomas followed my gaze, confused, and pulled me out of the crowd.

  “I made a really good friend there once,” I said.

  His smile didn’t meet his eyes. “That’s nice, Hun. Let’s keep walking, shall we?”

  I stayed glued to the sidewalk, still split down the middle of whether to run away from the estate, or to the estate. A girl bumped into me and swore under her breath. “She was a waitress there, her name was Angela,” I said to Thomas. “She was amazing. Bold and strong. Colorful too, like one of those snowboards in that store.”

  Lisa had stopped a safe distance behind us and was pretending to check her cell phone. I heard her loudly clear her throat—a signal to get moving. We were being watched by two men across the street standing just outside the doors of the Derrick. Thomas faked a smile and pretended not to notice. He latched on to my hand again just as a young man in a ski jacket walked past and very blatantly took a picture of Lisa with his phone.

&
nbsp; “Creep!” she yelled, giving her unwanted photographer the finger, then she began shouting off every threat she could think of to take any attention from us.

  Ski jacket man bolted. Thomas motioned to go after him, but I had hold of his coat, digging my fingers in as I knew the picture of Lisa was being sent to Henry—we didn’t need Thomas’s picture taken, too.

  “She disappeared,” I said.

  “What? Who disappeared?” Thomas’s eyes darted between me and the man running through the crowd.

  “Angela. My friend,” I continued, holding Thomas firmly, pretending to only notice him and no one else. People rushed by and the men across the street were focused on us now, peering through the crowd of swinging arms and varying strides. “The last time I saw Angela was in that bar.”

  Thomas, confused, led us off the main street, around a corner, and into a shadowy store doorway. A small ‘closed’ sign in the window glowed gently.

  “Those men across the street… they’re watching us.” Thomas said.

  I nodded and pulled the scarf down a bit lower over my forehead. “That could happen to you, you know. You could disappear, too.”

  Now I had his full attention. It started to snow. “Whatcha getting at, Kaya?”

  “You shouldn’t be around me.”

  Thomas shook his head, clueing in to what I was getting at. “Uh, uh. No way are you doing to me what you did to Luke. I get it. You’re worried about those you, er, care about. But I’m a big boy. I can handle myself. And if you leave me just to keep me safe, I swear, Kaya Lowen, that I will turn myself over to your father and offer my body in the name of whatever messed up science he’s into.”

  He was too close. Too close in every way. The question remained… and I had to get out of the shadows and be in the crowd again. That was the only way I could think, and I needed to think.

  But two steps out of the doorway, I realized the men weren’t across the street anymore—they were approaching us. Thomas must have noticed too because he pulled me back toward him with such force it knocked the air out of my lungs.Then his lips were on mine. His hand was at the back of my head, encouraging me to kiss him back. “Don’t look at them…” he whispered against my jaw. “Just make it look real.”

  I didn’t have to fake it. I let Thomas hungrily press his mouth against mine—his body, too—and I responded in kind. We were breathlessly wound up in each other as the men strolled past and wandered out of sight. Then we just stood there after. Unsure what to do. What to say. Stuck in our little cocoon of each other. Thomas had his hands on my cheeks as if he might never let go, his nose inches from mine. I could feel his heartbeat in his palms.

  “Tell me that you don’t love me,” he said, the glow from the closed sign in the window making obvious his flushed cheeks, lighting his dark eyes.

  “I don’t love you.”

  He jutted out his chin and dropped his hands. “You are one heck of an actress.”

  And then we were walking again—or were we floating?—toward the edge of town, hand in hand, quiet and confused. We became part of the crowd making our way toward the place I’d spent almost my entire life wanting to get away from. When we came to the bridge and could see the towering spires of the estate looming in the distance, Thomas had to pull me ahead. So often I’d stood on the fifth floor and saw the river and the bridge gapping the divide to the town, wondering what it felt like to go across it. Now that I was here, I still didn’t know how it felt—I was too wrapped up in whatever was going on in my heart to truly acknowledge where my feet were.

  But when the bridge was behind us, the flashing lights of fire trucks and police cars brought back reality with a slap. Gone were the metal structures meant to keep out armies, and twisted remains of the gates lay scattered about. Reaching up the mountainside was a swath of black where only ash covered the ground. Police had taped off the area, keeping people safely behind the lines, but reporters were lurking amongst them taking pictures of a truck—or what was left of one—and interviewing staff.

  “What the heck did Oliver do?” Thomas muttered.

  We stayed hidden within the crowd. Security were everywhere. Police were everywhere.

  “This is pretty nuts, eh?” said a man next to Thomas. He was one of many surveying the disaster, dressed in a brand-new parka—price tag dangling from his sleeve—and head covered with a hat that might have been roadkill.

  Thomas cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah. What happened? My wife and I came to take pictures. We weren’t expecting this.”

  “Well, they think whoever drove that truck into the gates was a terrorist.”

  “Oh my gosh,” I said, trying out a British accent.

  “That’s bloody awful,” Thomas said, mimicking me and giving my hand a squeeze. “Did the guy get caught?”

  The man was pleased to have our attention. A drip of water clung to the end of his nose. It was mesmerizing.

  “Nope. Police ain’t saying much.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “But my buddy was coming back from a hike and saw the whole thing. He says the guy was certainly trying to blow the place up. He was carrying a bomb or something when he ran off. Cops still haven’t found him. I bet he’s probably scoping out some restaurant in town. Terrorists like the crowds.”

  An older woman next to me was eavesdropping and couldn’t hold her tongue. “This wasn’t the work of a terrorist. We’re in Banff. That’s ridiculous!”

  The man leaned across us to address the woman, the drip still dangling. “I heard it first-hand, lady,” he said defensively.

  Thomas and I backed up a bit, giving them room to argue, and the woman—wide as a refrigerator—stepped in front of me. “Well, I heard it’s the work of the Right Choice Group. They’ve been protesting Henry Lowen for years. Can you imagine? What sickos. Can’t they see the good he does in this town?”

  “No way. This was terrorists,” Nose Drip countered.

  Then the arguing broke out. Team terrorist against team Right Choice Group. When someone else chimed in, Thomas and I moved through the crowd to get a better view of the carnage and hear other stories brewing amongst people. We avoided the eyes of Lowen security that were in full force at the ruined gates. For a moment I thought I’d been noticed when a guard stepped toward us, gaze centered on me, and I could tell Thomas thought the same by his sharp inhale. But the guard retreated, blank gaze returning to his face and focus drifting off over our heads.

  “Do they even know what you look like?” Thomas asked close to my ear.

  “A few might. I was kept in my room under lock and key. There are no pictures of me anywhere. Henry didn’t allow them.”

  Thomas sighed. “Your princess life was certainly no fairy tale, was it?”

  I shook my head.

  “I saw the guy who did it…” I heard a girl say from a few feet away.

  At first, I thought she was talking to me, but realized another girl was getting the info I was desperate to hear. I sized her up out of the corner of my eye. Short blond hair, and the worst teeth I’d ever seen, obvious even in the low light. Her friend had a blue haircut that symmetrically made no sense, was taller and probably very shapely under her puffy coat.

  “Yeah. He came out of the trees after that truck blew up and ran toward the estate. I know he got inside. And… I know who it was,” the blonde said.

  “Are you going to tell the cops?” asked the girl with blue hair.

  “I did. I told them everything and nobody cared. I tried to talk to one of those security guys too but was completely ignored. So, to hell with them. My dad used to work for the Lowens. They fired him, so I don’t give a crap what happens to that place.”

  I was gawking at the blonde now because she was oddly familiar. Then I realized it wasn’t because of the way she spoke, or her strangely curved nose—it was the sapphire earrings dangling from her ears that I’d given to her father years ago. Driver Dan—the gambling addict with all the kids who smuggled pizza in for me and snuck me out of th
e estate to meet Angela—had given them to this girl.

  “…and the guy who did it? He’s freaking gorgeous,” she continued. “Like, movie-star gorgeous. Absolutely dreamy. Once when Dad snuck me into the estate, we ran into him and I almost couldn’t breathe.”

  Well that confirmed they were talking about Oliver—the description was extremely accurate.

  “I got fired too,” I offered.

  The blonde was taken aback, obviously offended that I had been eavesdropping. “Uh, excuse me?”

  “Oh, sorry. I overheard you talking about your dad. I know him.”

  The girl didn’t give a crap who I knew. “All right then,” was all she said and rolled her eyes at her friend.

  “I hate that place too,” I said casually. “They fired me because I tripped and dropped a plate of mashed potatoes in Henry Lowen’s lap.”

  Now the girls giggled, either at my story or my pathetic desire to share it with them.

  “Where is your dad?” I asked. “Still in town?”

  Now I was getting the ‘she be crazy’ look. “Yep.”

  “I’d like to visit him. Where is he exactly?”

  Driver Dan’s daughter was having none of me. Her hands went to her hips. “Same place as always.”

  I hid my frustration. “And can you tell me where that is?”

  Dan had taught his kid some street smarts. “Listen, I’m not giving someone I don’t know my home address.”

  I put my hands up in defense—and the ring on my finger caught her eye. So I changed tactics.

  “Oh, of course! Sorry. It’s just that I got a huge promotion and sold my house. I have tons of clothes I don’t want anymore, so I thought I might bring them by before I head off to London.”

  I had Dan’s address and phone number two seconds later.

  “What are you going to do with that?” Thomas asked, eyeing the piece of paper in my hands.

  “I’m not sure yet. Dan could be an ally, though. He might come in handy if we need him.”