Love Beyond Words (City Lights: San Francisco Book 1) (31 page)

A thousand thoughts swarmed in Natalie’s mind like bees, stinging, buzzing; a chaos from which she could not possibly organize some coherent rationale with which to break Julian’s heart. Then her frantic gaze alit on the muzzle of the gun trained on her. The cold sliver of fear that slid down her back was oddly calming.

“The heart wants what it wants,” she murmured, “but the mind is afraid…”

“Call.” David wagged the gun at her. “
Now.
”

Natalie, feeling like a passenger in her own body, watched her fingers find Julian’s name in her phone and press it. She put the phone to her ear. Beside her, David settled himself to listen, his gun steady on her.

“Hey,” Julian answered brightly. “I was beginning to wonder what happened to you. Weren’t you supposed to come over tonight, or is that just my wishful thinking?”

Natalie froze. He sounded so natural. So unaware. As if he were on the other side of some alternate reality, one in which life was normal and free of gun-wielding maniacs, while she was on the other side, in a realm of terror and madness. She wanted to dissipate into a million pieces; disappear into the phone and reappear where Julian was, safe and happy.

“No, you’re right,” she told him, “I was supposed to come over.”

“Natalie, what is it?” The smile had left his voice. “You sound terrible. Please don’t tell me you’re sick now, too.”

Natalie pressed her lips together. David made a ‘let’s go’ motion with the gun. “Actually, I am a little under the weather. I have to cancel tonight.”

“I’ll come over. Can I bring you some soup or—?”

“No,” Natalie said. The concern in Julian’s voice was making it nearly impossible for her to continue. “No, you can’t come over. In fact…” She swallowed hard. “I don’t want you to come over. Not tonight, not tomorrow, not ever again.”

He laughed shortly, incredulous. “What?”

“This not a joke.”

A pause. “Okay.”

She closed her eyes and spoke. The words formed a split second before falling from her lips. “I’ve been doing some thinking lately. Back to the night you told me who you were. I told you that your books were more than just wonderful writing. I told you that they are my refuge.”

“Yes.” Each word dropped in her ear, heavy with dread. “And?”

“And so then you come into my life. You become the love of my real world,
and
you are Rafael Mendón, the love of my sanctuary. To know that you are the creator of so much of my happiness…it’s too much. I can’t put that much of my life into one man’s hands.”

“Natalie…” His voice trembled. “What are you saying to me?”

David nudged her with the gun to keep talking.

“You can’t be separate from yourself,” she said, her own voice vibrating like a broken guitar string. “I can’t have just Julian. But I can have just Mendón. I can read the books and keep that joy to myself. I’m sorry, but I’m just not strong enough to lose both of you.”

“Natalie.” Julian was breathing heavily now. “What is happening? What the hell is happening? I don’t understand. I don’t…
Over the phone? You’re doing this to me over the phone?”

“The heart wants what it wants,” she whispered, and glanced at the gun in David’s hand, “but the mind is afraid.”

“No.
No!”
Julian raged. “This is bullshit. This is…insanity. I will not be torn out of your life like this. I need to hear this from you. I need to
see
you say it.”

Panic lanced through Natalie. “What? No, don’t…”

“You can’t do this, Natalie! I
will not
let you! Not like this!”

“No!”

The call ended and Natalie stared at the phone in her hand, her heart thundering, her mind numb.
Maybe David didn’t hear. He’ll leave and Julian will come and I’ll explain. We’ll run. We’ll be safe.

David snatched the phone out of her hand and dropped it into his coat pocket. “He’s coming over, isn’t he?”

She said nothing.

“
Isn’t he
?” The gun pushed against her temple and she bit back a scream.

“Yes!”

“Okay, okay.” David withdrew. “That’s fine. We can do this. I’m going to stay out of sight—”

“I won’t let him in,” Natalie said. “I won’t—”

“You
will
. You tell him whatever it takes to end it forever. If I hear one word I don’t like…” He heaved a breath and held up the gun. “Him. You. Me. But him first, so you can see what you made me do. Understand?”

“You goddamn bastard,” she whispered. “Go to hell.”

It took Julian twenty-five minutes to show up at Natalie’s place. She felt every minute tick by with agonizing slowness and yet it seemed like it took no time at all. She spent it crafting more arguments to get him to leave fast.
Or else David will kill him. He’ll kill us all.

The buzzer buzzed and Natalie jumped.

“Let him in,” David said, slipping into her bedroom alcove and pulling the curtain. “And remember what I said. I’ll be listening.”

Natalie let Julian up with a shaking hand. He burst through the door a moment later, and she screeched, backing herself up against the curtain behind which David lurked.

“Where is he?” Julian demanded, storming into her living space. He dumped his messenger bag on the floor by the couch.

Natalie’s heart plummeted and blood turned to ice in veins. “Wh-who?”

“Your friend. Marshall. Or what’s her name…Liberty. There were here, weren’t they? Giving you bad advice? Telling you to get rid of me? They had to have been, since I cannot fathom what could have changed between
yesterday
and tonight.”

He spun around, his gaze searching, and Natalie was sure he’d go to her bedroom alcove and find David there, crouched like a villain in a bad movie.

“No,” Natalie said quickly. “It’s not them. I-I told you why—”

He whirled on her, his blue eyes blazing. “You
told
me the most inexplicable, atrocious bunch of
bullshit
!”

“It’s not bullshit!” she countered, even as her heart screamed the opposite
.
“It’s the truth and you need to get out. Now. I don’t want to see you again.”

“Why?” Julian’s face was a mask of fury.
“Why now? What happened? I need to see the words come out of your mouth.
Tell me
!”

Natalie recoiled, her numbed mind scrabbling for the reasons she’d come up with waiting for him to arrive. “Y-You’re planning on revealing yourself. That means press, publicity, travel. You’ll be gone for long stretches and you’ll meet many new people…Other women! Women who are more interesting and…and more exotic than I am. You’ll be tempted to live it up and I can’t handle losing you like that, piece by piece.”

“Live it up?” Julian spat. “You think the moment you’re out of sight, I’ll cheat on you? For what? To make up for
lost time
? That’s what you think of me?”

No! I know you never would.
“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know,” he repeated, mocking. “But you’re quite certain of my inability to be faithful to you. That you’ve seen written in the stars.”

“I don’t…I’m not saying that would happen, I’m saying it’s possible that things could go wrong between us and—”

“This!” Julian cried. “This is something going wrong between us!”

“I’m sorry,” she heard herself say, and the words sounded so small and weak. “But you need to leave now.”

Julian struggled to calm himself and took a step toward her. His voice was softer now, pleading. “No, Natalie. I don’t…Something’s not right. This isn’t like you. Please. Tell me the truth. Why are you wrecking us?”

The only thing preventing her from breaking down was the fact that David was not ten feet away, waiting for it to happen.

“I told you,” she said. “If I stay with you, I am putting my heart and soul into your hands. I can’t. I have to have my refuge, something that just belongs to me. To keep me safe.”

“Safe,” Julian said, tears outstanding in his eyes. “You want to be safe. But let me tell you something, no one is safe. You think that you’re the only one putting your heart and soul into another’s hands? You think I haven’t risked
everything
for you?”

Natalie, with a wail of anguish in her throat she couldn’t unleash, felt that no matter the danger, no matter that this was ‘pretend’, she was making a terrible, terrible mistake.

“Please don’t hate me,” she whimpered. “Please.”

His stony expression crumbled as he really looked at her. “What is happening, Natalie? You’re saying these horrible words, but your eyes…Your eyes are
screaming
something different.” He took a step closer, she took a step back. “You don’t seem sad or even angry…you’re
terrified
. Why?”

A sudden, vague suspicion crossed his face, and he turned to glance around her apartment. His gaze landed on the bedroom alcove, around the corner from the living area, hidden from view. “Is there—?”

“Yes!” Natalie burst out before Julian could move or say another word. “I am terrified. Of you. That’s why I did it over the phone. I didn’t want to suffer that terrible temper of yours. I was afraid…” She swallowed hard, the words stuck in her throat like knives.
Do it. Or he’ll find David and David will kill him…
“I was afraid you’d hit me.”

Julian staggered backwards, his suspicion forgotten. His face paled and she watched his heart shatter right before her eyes. “We…we talked about... I would never…”

“I’m not taking any chances.” Natalie squared her shoulders. “Now go.”

His eyes widened at the cold, callous tone of her voice.

“I can see I was horribly mistaken about you,” he choked. “I was a fool, blinded by a poor imitation of love, for how could you have ever loved me? Me, who is inconstant and…and
violent.”

He shuddered and staggered to his bag.

Natalie felt tears scorch her eyes, and she clutched herself to keep from flying at him, holding him, screaming that it was all a lie…

“I am not the man you accuse me of being, and I’m not going to be. I will not live in that ugly, suspicious perception.”

He pulled out the five composition books. His latest novel. Slowly, with trembling hands, he laid the books on her coffee table.

“You said you don’t want me,” he said brokenly. “You want him. So take it.” He turned away. “It was already yours.”

He shouldered his bag and walked out, closing the door carefully behind him.

The strength went out of her, and Natalie fell to her knees. In the second before David emerged from her bedroom, she swept the composition books under her coffee table where they scattered amid some accounting texts and loose papers. There was a chance he didn’t hear Julian give them to her. Natalie didn’t even know what prompted her to hide them from him in the first place. A sudden, strange instinct. And then the tears came. She knelt, hugging herself and sobbing, rocking back and forth, as David locked her front door and stood before her.

“That was better than I could have hoped,” he said with grudging approval. “It’s over, but I remind you: don’t think to call the cops. I’ll be staying real close to him. Real close. Living with him. We’ll be living together,” he said again, obviously liking the sound of it. “If I catch even a whiff that something’s up, that you warned him or are up to something, I’ll just…I’ll end it all. We’ll die together. He and I.”

Natalie said nothing, stared at the ground.

“Cliff and his cronies aren’t going to let it go, either. Let me handle it. You’re out now. You’re free. Go about your business. Forget it ever happened. Forget all about him.”

Natalie stood up as if drawn on puppet strings. She faced David, raised her hand and slapped him across the face. Hard. So hard that her own hand stung with the force of it.

Rage boiled in his eyes as her handprint bloomed hot and red on his cheek. He raised the gun as if he’d strike her with it, but laughed instead.

“Okay.” He adjusted his glasses that she’d knocked askew. “You can have that. I won, after all. I
won.
”

He left, shutting the door with a bang, and Natalie let out the wail of anguish she’d been holding in. He was gone. The gun was gone.

Julian is gone.

She staggered back to the coffee table and pulled out the stack of books. She clutched them to her, cradled them, sobbing, and waited until her racing heart and roiling stomach calmed down. It took a very long time.