I checked my hair and makeup in my car before taking a deep breath and throwing myself out into the lukewarm September night air. In the
elevator, I stupidly wondered if I should ring the bel or use my key. I was stil asking myself that question when I got to the door.
"Stupid," I muttered and hit the doorbel .
The door opened almost immediately, as if he were waiting just on the other side of the door.
He smiled down at me.
"Why didn't you use your key?" Kyle asked, as he stepped aside to let me in. "Or do you not have it anymore?"
I held up my spare key. "Right here. I wasn't sure if I should use it or not."
I looked around. There were boxes everywhere, some ful , some in the process of being fil ed. Other packing supplies were visible.
"Are you moving?"
"Yeah," he said, standing beside me surveying the room. "Going back over the bridge. I bought a real y great apartment not far from work. It has
three bedrooms, two and a half baths, and a lot of space."
"Why do you need so much space?"
He shrugged and then looked at me. "Maybe someday I won't be by myself."
I looked away, feeling slightly flustered.
"Are you hungry?" He asked. "I can order something, or we can go out. I have stuff we can make."
Just do what you came here to do and leave.
"We can cook," I said, tossing my tote bag on the couch.
"That's a big ass bag," he said as I fol owed him into the kitchen.
"Yeah, I am usual y carrying diapers and sippy cups and little annoying toys in it. I just didn't feel like changing over to a smal er bag."
He stood at the open refrigerator. "I have steaks, I have fish, hotdogs, chicken and some other unidentifiable items."
I slid in close to him and also looked at the contents of the fridge.
"Do you have ingredients for chicken parm?" I looked up at him and his eyes were on me.
"I think so," he said in a distracted tone. "Your hair..."
"You have a hair fetish," I said. "You may need to seek professional help for your addiction."
"It's not
everyone's
hair that I have a thing for, it's yours and yours only."
"Would you like me to give you a lock of it?"
I looked away from him and started taking items from the fridge and freezer. Together we prepared dinner, talking about minor things while we
worked, nothing too heavy. Despite the rift between us, it felt comfortable moving about the kitchen with Kyle, felt like old times, maybe better than
that. When he touched me, it didn't nearly incapacitate me like it used to, but it did feel warm and tingly.
When dinner was put on the table, Kyle poised a bottle of wine over my glass and looked at me for permission. I nodded my consent.
"Are you sure?" He asked in a teasing tone. "I know you feel vulnerable with me when you drink."
"Pour," I demanded.
When dinner was finished, we carried our glasses and our second bottle of wine to the living room. After smal talk, I asked the question I've
been wanting to ask.
"Kyle, what happened with you and Jessyca? I've heard bits and pieces, rumors mostly, but I haven't been able to confirm anything."
He sighed and sat back.
"It got ugly," he nodded. "Long story short, I broke up with her about a month after...after you left. Jess had some dirt on my dad's personal life and some of his il egal business practices, and she had been holding me down with it for a long time, but I just didn't care anymore. I had already
lost the most important thing in my life," he brushed the back of his hand against my cheek, making me shiver.
"Jess's dirt definitely ruined the connection Sterling Corp had with her father's business, and we lost a lot of perspective clients. My dad went
on a rampage, fired me, cut me off financial y, and banned me from al things Sterling, but then he had no choice but to resign. I was hired back into
the company by my more honest family members and other board members, and my parents got a divorce. Since my mom took practical y
everything, he's now the one banned, and on house arrest for a few years."
"Wow," I said, because I felt that I had to say something. I readjusted myself so that my face wasn't so visible, because I was feeling...slighted.
Kyle kept me hanging by a thin thread for a long time because of Jessyca's dirt on his dad. While I understood the desire to protect one's family, I
thought he should have immediately let me go, or immediately accepted the fal out from such dirt being dished. His decision to try to have both
nearly ruined me, and maybe him, too.
"I looked for you after everything went down," he said softly. "I looked al over for you. Your family wouldn't tel me anything, Donya wouldn't tel me anything - except to fuck off. I hired someone to find you, but your trail ended in London. I didn't hear anything again until after you settled in
Chicago. I figured you were with Luke, so I let you go. Again."
I gave a short nod, acknowledging I heard him, but didn't trust myself to speak.
"You hate me for what I've done to you," Kyle said.
"I hate myself more for not having enough of...whatever it is I needed to resist you in the first place," I said in a shaky voice. I stood up to get
away from him. "I wish you never found me in the bar."
I stood in front of the window with a distant city view, trying to get myself together. I could sense him standing behind me, and then I felt his
breath on my neck and his hands on my hips.
"If it wasn't there, it would have been somewhere else," he whispered in my ear.
For a moment, I froze, and for a moment, I was vulnerable. If he kissed my neck, I would surrender. If his hands moved to the front of my body
and touched me in sensitive places, I would have given in. If he even wrapped his arms around me, I would have wil ingly become his slave. But it
was only for a moment that I felt so impressionable. The window of opportunity closed, my vision cleared, and the fog in my brain dissipated. I
realized my near fol y and hastily stepped away from Kyle.
"I should go," I said and made a beeline for my giant bag.
"Emmy," Kyle was on my heels, and stopped me at the door. "I can't deal with losing you again. What do you want me to do?"
"I don't think..." I shook my head and stared at him.
"Nothing I can do? We just had a real y nice night. I know you don't real y mean that. You had a good time."
"I did, but...it's not enough."
"Kiss me."
"No," I said and started to move away, but he grabbed a hold of my shoulders. "Kiss me, and then if you stil want to walk out of the door, I wil
let you."
"I can't," I whispered.
"Because you know how it wil make you feel," he said and pressed me against the door. "You
want
to kiss me, though. Don't you?"
His lips drew so close to mine, I could feel his warm breath going into my mouth. It had a taste, a familiar taste, the taste of Kyle's mouth. I was
centimeters away from tasting him again. I closed my mouth tight. His tongue flicked across my lips, but my lips were sealed.
"Open," he whispered and pressed his tongue on my lips, trying to pry them open. "Open your fucking mouth. You want to kiss me. Open."
He again tried to force his tongue through my two lips, but failed. I started to feel a little triumphant until his hand went up my skirt faster than I
could react, and his fingers made contact with my sweet spot. I gasped and in that moment, his tongue was in my mouth. I wanted to ride his hand
and suck on his tongue, but I forced his hand out of my skirt, and broke free of the kiss.
"You want me," he whispered in my ear.
I bit my lip to the point of pain, and with an extreme amount of effort, pushed him away from me.
"I didn't come here for this!" I cried out.
"Then what did you come here for?" He barked back. "Did you think that we could just pretend that nothing ever happened between us?" He
closed the distance between us again. "I know you love me, Emmy."
He reached out to touch me, and I almost let him, but I shoved him away. I couldn't control how my body temperature rose in his presence, or
how moist it made me when he touched me, but I could control almost everything else.
"You hurt me!" I screamed. "You put your hands on me and you hurt me."
"I was fucked up on drugs, Emmy. I'm sorry. I don't even remember it."
"It's not just the drugs and the abuse, Kyle. You weren't strong enough to stand up to your dad and to Jessyca."
"But I eventual y did!"
"Eventual y was not soon enough, Kyle," I said bitterly. I reached into my bag and produced the bracelet. I held it out to him, but he stepped
back.
"That was a gift. I don't want it back."
"You need to take it back," I said. "This is why I'm here. I've been holding onto it, in essence holding on to you. I have to let you go."
"You don't have to," he said, and I could see the hope in his face.
"What do you expect me to do, Kyle? Tear my son away from his father and move into your shiny new apartment with you? Tear him away from
his family and everything he knows? Is that what you want? It probably is, Kyle, because you don't give two shits about the aftermath when you get
what you want. You smooth talk your way into getting things your way and then when it gets too fucking hard you duck out or shove some meth up
your nose. You
beat
me and you could have kil ed me and Lucas. That
broke me
. I wil never be with you again." I shook the bracelet at him and shrieked "Take the fucking bracelet!"
In a stunned silence, Kyle reached out and gingerly took the bracelet.
"Thank you," I breathed.
I opened the door and stepped onto the landing.
"I am very sorry," Kyle said to my back.
I had nothing left to say and let the door close behind me, cutting myself off from Kyle forever.
"So what's up? What do you have to tel me?" My mom asked.
We were sitting out by the lake at the family house in Louisiana. Lucas and I drove in the Friday after Labor Day for a short visit before returning
home to Chicago. My mom had helped Grace get settled into her new place before returning back to Louisiana.
I took a deep breath and told her about what happened with Kyle. I wanted to come clean with her. I had a strange sense of obligation, like I'm
supposed
to tel her because she's my mom. I no longer needed her to kiss my boo boo and make it feel better and give me a cookie, but I needed
her to know because it was a secret too deep to keep from your mom, I guess.
Her face didn't change during the entire story. I wondered if she was real y hearing me. When I was done, we sat in silence for a ful minute,
staring at one another.
Abruptly she stood up.
"What are you doing?" I stood up with her.
"I gotta go," she said distractedly.
"Go where?"
"Kil that son of a bitch Kyle Sterling."
"No, no kil ing."
"He needs to be dead!"
"What is up with you and Donya and the death thing?"
She burst into tears and I again become the one to provide comfort. It took me awhile to convince her that she shouldn't go cut off Kyle's nut
sac, and awhile longer to convince her not to tel my dad.
"I need a drink," she said. "You want a drink?"
"No, I don't want a drink."
She was walking back toward the house but stopped and looked at me with her hands on her hips.
"Whaddya mean you don't want a drink? What's wrong with you? Are you in AA?"
"No, I'm not in AA. I have to stay alert for Lucas."
"Oh. Right."
I watched my mom drink until she mel owed out and then I went to check on Lucas. He was in the yard with my dad playing catch. It made me
think of Luke and a house. If we had a house with a yard, Luke could play catch with his son. Lucas stil couldn't catch the bal , but he could throw like
a pro.
I slipped away, back to the chairs by the lake and cal ed Luke at work.
"We need a house, with a yard, so you can play catch with Lucas," I said when he answered.
"That's random."
"Sometimes I'm random."
"Sometimes?"
This was our first real conversation since I yel ed at him when I was stil in Belmar. We had spoken briefly when I told him that we were flying to
Louisiana, and of course he spoke to Lucas daily.
"Are we stil fighting?"
"Depends. Do I have to fight anyone for you?"
"You would fight for me?"
"To the death."
I smiled, even though in a roundabout way, Luke was also associating death with Kyle. Disturbing.
"I'm sorry I was being an ass," he said.
"I'm sorry for giving you a reason to be an ass."
"You don't have to apologize, Emmy. I've been trying to get you to open up to me for months and I blew it the first time that you said something I
didn't like."
"Wel , I didn't exactly make you feel secure in our relationship."
"If I'm insecure, it's my own fault. I trust you, one hundred percent. Listen, I have to go. I have a client waiting for me. I'l cal you tonight."
"Okay. I love you," I said and held my breath.
"I love you, too, babe."
My heart flopped around happily in my chest.
Later that night, after Lucas was already in bed, Luke cal ed. I told him about the bar, how I had the remains leveled and then cleaned up and
put the property up for sale.
"You did al of that in a week?"
"The right amount of money can almost move mountains in a week."
"What's the rush? I thought you were going to think about it for a while."
"I had to let it go in order to move forward. My life isn't in Jersey anymore. My life is in Chicago."
"You sound sad about it."