“Bet you were a surprise, huh?”
“You could say that.” He was working a pan with a spatula, a plume of thin smoke rising with each flip of his wrist. “It wasn’t bad. My brother was seven years older than me, and he helped raise me. We had a lot of independence, so we learned to fend for ourselves pretty early.”
“That’s the brother who’s a cop also?” She noticed him flinch as he turned quickly. “You told me that being a cop was a family thing and mentioned your brother,” she explained quickly. He turned back to the stove.
“He was a cop first,” Jack said, concentrating on the cooking. “I followed him into it.”
She picked up a picture on the shelf in the kitchen; a man who looked remarkably like Jack, only older, stared out at her from a typical suburban setting. He was laughing, the kind of full, open, consuming laugh that had an infectious feel to it, even through the picture. “Your brother, I presume?”
Jack looked up and moved behind her, looking at the picture. “Yes,” he said, taking the picture from her and holding it up in his hands for a long moment before replacing it on the shelf.
“I think I’d like to meet him,” she commented. “Get the truth on what you were really like growing up.”
“Maybe someday,” he replied. His voice didn’t invite further inquiry, though, so she decided not to pry.
She turned her attention to the pan on the stove. “What are we having, exactly?”
“I’m not sure it’s anything ‘exactly,’ but it approximates fried rice.”
“Fried rice?” Sydney was skeptical. “That doesn’t smell like any fried rice I’ve ever had.”
“Like I said, it approximates fried rice. There wasn’t a whole lot in the fridge that would have made a meal on its own, but there were plenty of things that looked good enough to toss in a pan with some rice and some spices. You’ll have to trust me on this.”
“I do. It smells great.”
“The secret is to fry up everything separately first, so it retains its own flavor. Then combine it at the last minute so that each flavor seeps out just a little bit into the dish as a whole.”
“Sounds . . . edible.”
“Like I said, you’re gonna have to trust me.”
She didn’t say anything for a moment. “I do,” she said at last. She wondered if the broader meaning would be lost on him, but she didn’t care. She wasn’t sure she’d ever trusted anyone the way she trusted him at this moment. Maybe it was just the stress of the past few days, but he had somehow made it through her defenses, and it felt good to her.
He turned and looked at her, and for a moment she thought she saw some acknowledgment in his eyes. Then it was gone.
S
HE SEEMED TO LIKE
the meal, he thought. Then again, he wasn’t sure when she had last eaten anything of substance, and his cooking might have benefited in her estimation from border
line starvation.
The conversation had grown stunted between them, cut off at the knees by a growing tingle neither of them chose to acknowledge openly. He felt so sure there was something between them—something on which they both knew they couldn’t act, but which neither of them could ignore.
Train had made it painfully clear to him that he wouldn’t tolerate anything unprofessional between them when he reluctantly agreed to allow Cassian to act as her bodyguard. “No fuckups,” Train had warned him. “Everyone’s gonna be watching this closely.” Jack had reassured him and promised to avoid any hint of impropriety. More than that, he was unwilling to risk the trust that Sydney had in him. If he ever tried anything and he was wrong about how she was feeling, he would shatter what little confidence she had left in the world. As a result, the tension continued to build.
“We talked to Leighton,” he said at last, breaking an extended silence, and hoping to stem the pace at which the wall
between them seemed to be growing.
“Sorry?”
“Liz’s ex. I wasn’t sure I ever mentioned that we talked to him. After we spoke and you told us about what happened between them—what he did to her—Train and I went out to see him.”
“And?”
“Didn’t like him.”
She stared at her fried rice. “Hope that’s an understatement.”
“I’m not sure he was exactly trying to impress us.” He watched her as she looked down at her food. It seemed as though the full weight of her ordeal was finally settling onto her, and he wanted desperately to comfort her. He knew that he was walking close to a dangerous line, though, and so he decided instead to press forward with the conversation as the only means of keeping a connection.
“He made an interesting comment,” he said, searching for something to say. She looked up at him expectantly. “He asked us whether your mother had sent us.”
She frowned. “Why did he ask that?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I was wondering if you had any thoughts.”
She was no longer eating; just pushing the small portion that was left on her plate in a circle with her fork. She followed the path of the rice with her eyes, the furrows deepening in her brow. Then she looked at him again. “I don’t know. My mother and Leighton were close to each other when he married my sister. I think he was exactly the kind of man my mother thought would be perfect for our family. They obviously haven’t been close since . . . since the divorce, and it would surprise me if they’ve even talked in the last few years. I can’t think of any reason why he might think my mother would send someone to him.” She sat back in her chair and sipped her
wine.
“Nothing comes to mind?”
She sighed. “Nothing. Who knows how his mind works? He’s the kind of man who marries for money. The kind of man who rapes his wife. That’s someone I can’t pretend to understand at all.”
“Me neither.”
She took another sip of her wine, a gulp really. “That was one of the best things about living on my own in California.”
“What was?”
“The anonymity of it. No one knowing who I was or what I was worth. I never had to worry whether someone was interested in me because of my money or because of my family or because of what they thought I could do for them. I was just a normal person living off what I made myself.”
“Do you worry about that still?”
“What?”
“The money. The way it affects the people around you?”
“Like I said, I haven’t had to in a while.” She brushed the hair out of her face. “But yes, I do. Wouldn’t you?”
Jack shrugged. “Don’t know. I’ve never had to think about it.”
Sydney turned and looked out the window, her sights focusing on something on the street. Cassian followed her gaze and saw a young couple walking hand in hand on the sidewalk across the way. In the dark, their features were obscured, but they were leaning into each other slightly as they ambled along, in a posture of mutual dependence.
Sydney turned back to him. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
She looked out the window again, and it seemed as if she was trying to formulate the question in her own mind. After a moment, she turned back to him and took a deep breath. “Is it . . .” she began, but then got stuck, letting the air out of her lungs in a long sigh. She started again. “I mean, do you . . .” She shook her head and laughed. Jack thought it was the saddest laugh he’d ever heard, and when she looked back up, there were tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“Don’t be.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.” She looked at him for a long minute. “I think I should go to bed.” She got up quickly, grabbing her plate and glass to clear them.
Jack stood up as well. “Please, let me clean up.”
“I’m just clearing.”
Jack reached out and took hold of the plate. “I’ve got it,” he said.
She turned and collided with him, sending her wineglass to the floor, shattering it as it hit the hardwood. The two of them were silent, looking at the shards spread out on the floor in front of them. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I . . .”
He stopped short when he saw her eyes. She was inches from him, their fingers touching lightly along the edges of the plate they both still grasped. He could smell her hair, his own shampoo, which she must have borrowed, but mixed with her own scent, warm and comforting and powerful. He didn’t want to move. He thought that if he could just stay still forever he might be satisfied.
Then it happened. She leaned forward slightly. Had they not been so close together, the movement might have gone unnoticed; it was barely a movement at all, just a slight shift in body weight that narrowed the gap between them. Her head was upturned, eyes closing.
He kept still, petrified. A screech of thoughts and emotions echoed confusingly in his head, snatches of phrases lost in the noise, warnings of consequences empty of meaning and drowned out by his heartbeat.
Her lips touched his, and the screaming in his head ceased. All he could focus on was her lips, soft and warm and inviting; perfect in every way. At last his body moved, drawing her to him, his hands caressing her with patient urgency. His thoughts lost all structure and language.
As their embrace crisscrossed the line between passion and tenderness, one word seemed to repeat itself over and over in his head, echoing endlessly until he surrendered to the lure of its simplicity. And even, hours later, when they both collapsed, exhausted and sated and happy, too tired for thought or worry or talk, the word remained in his head, a whisper now, soft and reassuring.
Home.
S
YDNEY OPENED HER EYES SLOWLY
. The tepid predawn light cast shadows in scarlet gray on the ceiling, and she let the shapes come into focus at a leisurely pace. She stretched her arms and legs, every muscle in her body recalling the prior evening in a dull, satisfying ache; every nerve resounding with an exquis
itely raw, electrified feeling.
She smiled to herself as she replayed their time together over in her head, movements of smooth skin running wild in an endless flicker of desire that made her blush. She had been surprised at her own aggressiveness, and at the way in which her body had been so demanding in its needs—and eager in its natural inclinations to satisfy both her cravings and his. They together had been neither selfish nor subservient, giving of themselves without hesitation, and receiving each other in pleasure devoid of guilt. It had felt, she thought, the way she’d always thought sex should feel but did with disappointing infrequency.
She rolled over and draped her arm over Jack, looking up at his face. He was awake, propped on the pillows behind his head, staring off into space, a look of deep concern etched into his features.
“Hey there,” she said tentatively.
He looked down at her, caught in the embarrassment of reflection. “Hey,” he said. “Sorry. I didn’t want to wake you, but I couldn’t sleep.”
“You didn’t wake me. Who could expect more than a few hours of decent shut-eye with all that’s going on.” She took her fingers and rubbed them gently over his chest. He didn’t move, and yet she felt him pull away from her. She sat up, pulling the sheets over her chest, self-conscious for the first time with him. “Anything you want to talk about, sailor?”
“I guess not,” he said, unable to look at her.
“You’d be surprised. I’m a pretty good listener.”
“Nothing about you would surprise me.”
She looked at him, and he avoided her eyes. “Are you sorry about this?”
“No,” he said, though she sensed some hesitation. “There’s just a lot of shit in my past. Stuff you should probably know, to be fair. I was just lying here trying to figure out how to bring it up without convincing you I’m insane.”
She put a hand to her forehead. “I’ve always thought the direct route’s best. Throw it out there and see how it lands; it’s better than hiding it.”
He looked at her again, his eyes searching. “Her name was Kelly.”
She blew out a heavy breath. “Go on.”
“We went to high school together, and she was beautiful in a sad, lost kind of way. I thought I could save her.”
“From?”
“Herself, I guess. She grew up in the same town as me; a nice upper-middle-class spot where everything was perfect. Except it wasn’t. I think that was a huge disappointment to a lot of the people I grew up with—finding out that things could get so fucked up when there really wasn’t anything to complain about. We dated back then, and then lost touch after high school until a few years ago, when she called me.”
“Looking for a reconciliation?”
“Looking for a way out. She never really figured out what was wrong, and by the time she called, she was heavy into drugs. She was living with this guy who was a dealer, and he had her so screwed up she could barely get a sentence out. My brother, Jimmy, told me to leave it alone, that she was too far gone, but I didn’t listen. There was still something in her eyes I thought I could reach.”
“And?”
“Things went well for a while. She cleaned up, went back to school; for a few months I really thought we had a chance.”
“You were wrong, I take it.”
“One night she disappeared. I was out of my mind. And then I got a call, and all I could hear was her sobbing. I swear, I can still hear her sobbing in my sleep, and sometimes I can’t tell whether she’s crying or laughing.”
“Did you find her?”
Jack nodded. “I knew she was with her old boyfriend. He’d been trying to get her back on the junk since she’d left him; even threatened to kill her. I didn’t know what to do, so I called my brother. He was a cop, so I figured he’d have some idea how to handle it.”
“Did he?”
He nodded again. “He and I went to the dealer’s house. My brother pounded on the door, yelled ‘Police,’ the whole deal. We could hear them in there; he was screaming at her, and she was crying. After a couple of minutes of that, my brother kicked in the front door.” Jack closed his eyes.
“What happened?”
“The guy had lost it. I mean totally lost it. He was ranting and raving—clearly high on something. He started shooting as soon as Jimmy was through the door; hit him in the forehead with the second shot.”