“Good. I’m getting fat.”
“Pfft.” She drew her eyes over me. “You’ve been eating like a bird since you got here. The only reason you’re not disappearing before my very eyes is my cakes.”
“Effie,” I whimpered like a child. “I need fresh air. At least let me go out on the balcony.”
To be fair I had been cooped up in Caine’s guest room for the last week. Effie stuck around the apartment while Caine was at work. I appreciated her help more than I could say. She was there to make sure I got in and out of the shower okay. She helped me change my dressing daily and proved herself once again pretty spry and strong for an old lady. Effie was also a great babysitter because she hung out with me, but she also hung out downstairs, giving us both space. Other than Effie I’d had Caine’s cleaner, Donna, for company the two times she arrived for work. It was my first time meeting her and I was more than a little uncomfortable with the circumstances. Along with Effie and Donna, I’d had Rachel and Sofie visit when they dropped by a few times. As did Henry and Nadia. They entertained me without even meaning to. I was fascinated witnessing Henry’s interaction with her. He constantly watched her—tender with her in a way I’d never seen from him before. As for Nadia, she was clearly really into him. I had my fingers crossed for them both, because I genuinely liked Nadia, and I’d come to care for Henry over the last few months. Someone had to get a happily ever after at the end of all this.
As for Grandpa, he called. Obviously it would be unfair to ask Caine if my grandfather could visit me at his apartment, so we just chatted for a little while on the phone. Grandpa was still dealing with the fallout of his family’s discovering I was in Boston and that he’d been seeing me behind their backs all along. Apparently there were a lot of discussions, but none of them reached a conclusion.
I think that was his polite way of avoiding telling me that the rest of the family, including my grandmother, didn’t want to have anything to do with me.
That stung. A lot. Along with Caine’s rejection, it pretty much could have threatened to bring on the great depression of the twenty-first century. But I had other things to worry about. For instance, the fact that there were still no leads on my attacker.
“You’re being a terrible patient. You know for your own safety we can’t let you out on the balcony,” Effie grumbled.
I scoffed, “We’re God knows how many stories high. Surely Caine doesn’t think my attacker can get to me on the balcony. I mean he’d have to have a sight gun.”
Effie blanched at the thought.
My heart pounded in my chest. “No. Caine doesn’t believe that’s even a remote possibility. Right? I mean … that’s … th-that’s crazy.”
“Sweetheart, it’s a little far-fetched, and Caine knows that. But right now he’s paranoid about your safety. You didn’t see him when he came home from the hospital that first night. He was wrecked. So you have to give him this.”
“Wrecked?” I whispered, my heart beating fast for a different reason now.
“I told you to keep fighting for a reason, Lexie. You really think a man like Caine lets someone infiltrate his life as thoroughly as you have because he ‘cares about you’?” It was her turn to scoff. “No. The feelings have to be a little more than lukewarm.”
“He let you infiltrate his life,” I argued.
She beamed. “Because he loves me.”
“He doesn’t love me.”
“No. He’s wildly and madly crazy about you. There’s a difference.”
“Don’t,” I pleaded. “He told me to my face that he doesn’t love me. I don’t need false hope from you.”
Effie scowled. “No, you need a swift kick up the ass. I told you to push him.”
“And I told you I’m still too pissed off to do anything else but be pissed off.”
“You need to get over that. It’s an ugly way to be.”
I narrowed my eyes in indignation. “You try getting over this kind of anger. Someone put me in this bed, someone who hasn’t been found yet. I’m sitting in this apartment feeling like a hunted animal. And all the while I’m being looked after by a person I love more than I’ve ever loved anyone and he rejected me. Please, tell me how not to be angry and I’ll do it.”
Effie leaned forward, her eyes kind. “You tell yourself that being angry and bitter and feeling hunted is giving the bastard that hurt you too much power. You shake him off, concentrate on staying safe and getting better, and force Caine to realize that he can’t live without you. Instead of pushing him away—yes, he told me you barely let him near you—you get in his face, you spend all your recuperation with him, reminding him just exactly what he’s giving up if he lets you go. And just when you’ve got him where you want him, you go in for the kill and you push him to give you the answers that you deserve.”
I let Effie’s advice wash over me, sinking into my gut.
We sat in silence for about ten minutes as I processed what she’d said. She leisurely flipped through a tabloid magazine like she hadn’t delivered the kind of profundity I had desperately needed.
Finally I said, my words soft, “How did you get so wise, Effie?”
“I’ve survived seventy-seven years on this planet,” she answered wryly, “and by making the right choices I even managed to live for most of them.”
The sound of Effie’s and Caine’s voices carried up toward the bedroom and I braced myself. I strained to hear what they were saying with no luck. I did, however, hear the front door shut and I held my breath. For the past five days when Caine returned from work, the first thing he did was check in on me.
Usually I grumbled that I was bored but fine; then he’d offer to get me something, to which I’d give him an errand; he’d complete the errand, and then leave me to it.