I’m slapped, my head jolting to the right. “Get out,” she shouts. As soon as she says it, her mouth pops open in surprise. “Alex. I didn’t see you there.”
I whip around and find him standing at the front door. When our eyes meet, I see the fury flickering in his irises. They divert to the bitch that hit me. “Did you just touch my girlfriend?”
“It was an accident,” she replies with arrogance and a small laugh.
Before the laugh reaches her smile, he’s in her face, so close she can probably taste what she’ll never taste again—his breath. “If you were a man, I’d level you.”
“Alexander?”
When he looks my way, the lines in his forehead soften, and he smiles gently. He seems to collect himself, his disposition lighter. “Are you ready to leave, Sara Jane?” He reaches out and turns his palm up to me.
“I’m ready.” I rest my hand in his and go to him.
His arm comes around me, protectively putting himself between the jealous whore and myself. We start to walk, but he makes a point of stopping, and turning back. “And Lanie, go fuck yourself. Your mother was better.”
. . . That was the first time I ever saw Alexander hurt somebody—purposely hurt someone. Her reputation and pride were more damaged than she was.
The skirt of my dress is hiked to my waist, two of his fingers sliding between my exposed cheeks. “So pretty. So soft. You make me so hard. You’ve teased me too long. Have you ever been taken here?” I hear the zipper of his pants . . .
“Stop.”
I halt when he says to, not sure where to run to anyway. My hurt, my anger kept my feet running, but the burning sensation inside me isn’t from running. It’s from the truth piercing my heart. “You slept with her and her mother?”
Alexander bends, his hands resting on his knees. His breathing is as strong as the regret that rolls off him. His hands go to the top of his head, and he shifts. “I’ve told you I’m a fuck-up.”
“No, that’s an excuse you hide behind so you don’t have to expose real feelings. You tell me to bury my feelings, that they’ll hurt me, but it’s not my feelings that hurt me. It’s you.”
This is the first time I’ve ever seen him worried, worried he’ll actually lose me. “What do you want from me, Sara Jane? Tell me and I’ll do it. I’ll do anything to make this right.”
My tears were lost to the rain ten minutes prior when I ran away from him. Now standing before me, and me before him, I feel my age. I feel unworldly and inexperienced as the adrenaline drains away. I feel cheap and not worthy to be with the beautiful man whose secrets and lies cut deep. “I want you to love me.”
“I do, but I’m bad and you’re good.”
“What makes you so bad? What makes me so good?”
“Your heart. Yours beats strong while mine only murmurs. God, I love you so much, but love like ours is only meant for fairy tales. We live in reality.”
“We live wherever we want to live—fantasy, reality, fairy tales, happily ever afters—”
“Nightmares, horror stories, star-crossed—”
“Star-crossed doesn’t have to mean doomed.”
Holding my face carefully in his hands, he says, “Don’t you understand; that’s the very definition of star-crossed? Doomed from the beginning.”
“Then we won’t be star-crossed. We’ll be destined.”
“Don’t live in a fantasy world, Sara Jane. I will do anything to be with you. Anything. I love you that much, but for us to be together, I need you to do something.”
“Anything.”
“Live with hope, but be strong. Promise me you’ll be strong when you think you’re weak. Promise me you’ll be strong when you no longer hold on to hope. Promise me you’ll be strong when there is no other way to be. Promise me.”
“I promise. I’ll be strong when I need to be.”
. . . My chest shudders with a cry, my tears puddled on the glass in front of my face. My scrambling thoughts settle. I refuse to be weak any longer. I will not be a victim to this man, so I grab the only thing I can reach. “Stop!”
“Or what?”
Summoning Alexander’s anger when something of his is threatened, when something precious that only belongs to him has to defend itself, I push off the desk and turn around. With the expensive gold-tipped pen prodded against his neck, I come face to face with pure evil, but this time I use Alexander’s words, his strength, and my power to keep my promise.
“Or I’ll kill you myself.”
21
Alexander
“We’re late.”
April doesn’t say anything. I’m sure being prompt isn’t something she generally concerns herself with. For the last two nights, she’s been in a hotel with Cruise checking on her almost hourly. I’ve not spent much time with her, but enough to want to help her clean up, something she says she wants. Two days—it’s working so far, even if she did pull a butter knife on Cruise at two in the morning when he busted her trying to slip out to find a hit of anything.
I’ve paid for the hotel. I’ll pay for her rehab. That’s the deal. I’ve been impressed with her determination to clean up, pretending the one incident didn’t happen. Something unexpected did happen though. Underneath the drug-induced filth and toil of her life, she’s a stunning woman. And fortunately the usual side effects haven’t become the main effects of her existence. I think there’s hope when the drugs clear from the striking blue of her eyes.
In the quiet of the elevator, I say, “You look beautiful, April.” I say it not because I have to, but because I want to. I have a feeling she doesn’t hear many nice things these days. When was the last time anyone said anything nice to her?
A smile, though small and shy, makes its way across her face. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
“You’ll still pay for my rehab and set me up with an apartment like you said?”
Stepping off the elevator, I stop to finish this conversation before we go any farther. “I will. Full rehab and one year of apartment rental. The rest is on you.”
“Thank you for helping me. You’re kinder than your father.”
I’ve visited her twice in the last two days. She wouldn’t talk at all the first day. The second she talked about a family she once had. I don’t know what it’s like to lose everything, but she gave me an idea. What she refused to talk about was my father. It was frustrating, but she doesn’t owe me anything. I’m hoping tonight will change things. Remind her of what I need without causing too much pain in the process for anyone. It’s a move my father would pull, which worries me. I don’t want to be like him, but sometimes we have to be what we aren’t to get what we want. I try again by asking, “You seem to know a lot about him. How do you know him, April?”
She looks away from me. “Everyone knows your father.”