“I meant the feel of it,” I elaborated. “The decor. Comfortable, yet chic. Luxurious, yet lived in. Bright whites, farmhouse furnishings.”
“What’s your apartment like, then?” Matthew wondered as he drew his knuckle down one of my arms. “Is it much like Eric and Jane’s place?”
I considered my cousin’s large townhouse on the Upper West Side, with its loft-like space and colorful, modern furnishings. “No. Jane has much more eclectic taste than I do. I forget that you’ve never actually been in my home.” I smiled to myself. “It belonged to some distant cousin who died a few years before I was married and then was gifted to me. I never changed any of the interior, so it looks very dated. And very formal.”
Matthew lay on his side, watching me carefully. “You never wanted to change it?”
I shrugged. “It was never my home.”
He remained quiet, watching our fingers toy with each other against the soft white sheets.
“It’s a wreck now,” I said sometime later, “but the house you saw—the one in Newton—that was my dream home. When I bought it, anyway. I imagined Olivia there. The backyard was this lovely meadow. You couldn’t see it through all the overgrown grass, but there’s actually a creek running through the far corner, with a willow tree and a thicket of raspberries alongside it.” I closed my eyes. “I used to imagine sitting in the back, living this idyllic—not quite rural, but something calmer—life. I even had a place secured for Coral, my horse, at a farm in Concord.”
“It sounds like it would have been nice.”
“It would have been safe.” And then, because for some reason, I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it: “How long did Skylar nurse Jenny? Do you know?”
Matthew screwed up his brows. “Ah…”
I giggled. “I’m guessing you didn’t keep track?”
He snorted. “No, I don’t really ‘keep track’ of what Skylar does with her tits, doll. And if I did, I’m pretty sure Brandon would kick my ass.” He lay back in the bed, looking up at the shadows from the ceiling fan that striped the plaster. “It’s hard to say. I’d guess around the same amount of time Lea does, which is about a year and a half, maybe longer. I remember her leaving the room to do it when Jenny was about to walk. That was around fall, when I visited for Thanksgiving.”
“They made me stop,” I said.
His whole body stilled. “What do you mean, they made you stop? Who’s ‘they’?”
“My husband. My grandmother. I don’t know. People.”
He sat up, causing the sheets to fall down his broad chest, like Dionysus rising from his slumber. “How does someone make you stop feeding your kid?”
I shrugged. “It’s hard to explain. You didn’t know my grandmother, but—”
“I’ve heard enough stories and met your family. I have a pretty good idea.”
I swallowed. “I was really young, remember. I had a hard time speaking up for myself.”
“You don’t seem to have a hard time doing it around me.”
I smiled. “I—you seem to bring that out in me. I’m not sure what I think about it.”
“It’s good. Very good.”
“You like that I’m difficult?”
Another kiss. “I like that you’re you.”
The kiss deepened. And maybe I would have let it sink into something much more, but my mind was still lingering on the topic at hand. Matthew seemed to sense it, and eventually, he released my chin and settled us both back onto the blanket while he pulled me close.
After a few minutes, I finally spoke again.
“She was almost six months old. The doctor said she could eat. I fought it until then. My grandmother never nursed either of her children—a lot of women didn’t back then, and she said it would ruin my figure. And my hus—Calvin, he…well, he just didn’t like it. Maybe it meant I would not be available to him for even longer. I honestly don’t know.”
Matthew didn’t say anything for a long time, just kept his dark eyes trained on me in the dim light. I didn’t look away.
Then, he reached out and drew the sheets down to my waist, baring my breasts again in the moonlight. He took a long time to examine them, cupping each small, pale globe in his hands, brushing his thumbs lightly over the coral pink topography of areola and nipple. Then he leaned down and pulled one of the tightened buds between his lips. His mouth worked in long, slow sucks, once, twice, three times on one side, then repeated the motion on the other. With each tender pull, something inside me opened up. More keys turned in the secret locks that had been closed my entire life. This wasn’t about sex; it was about truth. Compassion. Love.
A tear trickled down my cheek, followed by another. Then another.
“Baby,” Matthew whispered as he gathered me close again. “Why are you crying?”
“It’s silly,” I said, wiping the tears from my eyes. “I haven’t thought of it in years. But at the time, I was so crushed. I—I wanted so badly to give her s-something, you know? And I couldn’t. I couldn’t…”
“You gave her a lot, Nina. You gave her all the opportunity in the world. You kept her safe.”
“I tried,” I said sadly. “But I never gave her what I wanted. Never a home. And how could I? I never had one myself.”
“You could have done it. You still can.” He brushed the hair out of my eyes and continued to stroke my cheek, wiping away a few more errant tears.
“I went from my mother’s to my grandmother’s and back, these great, formal houses full of priceless antiques and immaculate surfaces. They groomed me and dressed me like I was just another fixture. I think that was why they made me stop feeding her, you know. Too messy.” I sighed. “But I also think that was when I really wanted out. Not just of my marriage, but of all of it. So I decided to go back to school, bought the house, had the papers drawn up.”
“So, what happened?”
I swallowed. “Well, you know what happened. Giuseppe died, Matthew. I had no reason to go back to Italy then.”
“But the rest? The house? School? You let it all go. For what?” His tone sharpened slightly—out of anger on my behalf, I thought.
I shrugged. “I was scared.”
“Because you thought they killed him.”
I closed my eyes, and for a moment, I was taken back to that terrible day in Calvin’s office. “Because I didn’t know what else they might do.”
Matthew remained quiet for a long time, holding me gently, brushing back my hair until both of us gradually dozed off in our lovers embrace. A temporary shelter for the rest of the night, but the best one I’d ever had.
When I awoke again, it was still dark outside. But Matthew wasn’t beside me any longer, instead he was sitting on the edge of the bed, broad back facing me, elbows perched on his knees, clearly in deep thought.
“Matthew?” I asked. “Are you—is everything okay?”
He turned around but remained where he was. His eyes looked hollow and worried. “This can’t wait until morning. I thought it could…but it can’t. Nina, I need to ask you something. And I need you to tell me the truth.”
I sat up too, clutching the sheets to my chest. “Okay…”
“Is the name Katarina Csaszar familiar to you?”
I frowned. “I already answered that question last week, Matthew. Why, who is she?”
Matthew’s eyes narrowed. “You’re sure? Never a Kate or a Katie? Nothing similar?”
I tipped my head as something occurred to me. “Well, the woman who answered the door mentioned a Kate, like I told you. Was she talking about this Katarina?”
Again, he didn’t answer. Just pressed on. “How about Károly Kertész?”
I couldn’t have said why, but something about the name sent a shiver running through me, like someone had run a wet finger down my back in the middle of a snowstorm.
I gripped the sheets harder. “Matthew, what is going on? Who are these people?”
Again, he didn’t answer my question. Instead, he just shook his head back
and forth and rubbed his face hard.
“It doesn’t make any fucking sense,” he muttered as he got up to get some water, but not before he grabbed his phone off the nightstand and took it with him.
“Matthew,” I called after him. “What’s wrong? Who is Károly Ker-Kertész?” I stumbled over the unfamiliar pronunciation.
My answer was the door shutting behind him. But instead of following, I remained in bed, content to ruminate. The names sounded vaguely Eastern European. Did they have anything to do with the people in my house?
My phone buzzed on the bedside table. The small clock next to it read sometime past one in the morning.
“What in the world…” I murmured.
Caitlyn: Drinks this week? I miss you.
I frowned at the text. I wasn’t sure why she had been so friendly lately, and now that I was away from New York, I wasn’t sure I cared enough to rehabilitate this relationship. Certainly not at one a.m. I thirsted for friendships, for a life that was real. It hadn’t happened yet, but strangely enough, here I felt support for those dreams from people who barely knew me, far more than those I had been around most of my life.
Nina: Sorry, classes start next week. I’m trying to sort out a place to live before then.
Caitlyn: You are awake! I thought you were coming back soon. Silly me!
She thought I was coming back? Why? I set my phone on the nightstand and pulled the blankets back over me, waiting for Matthew to return.
A few minutes later, my phone buzzed again. I scowled at it. It wasn’t like Caitlyn not to take a hint.
But it wasn’t Caitlyn. It was my husband.
Calvin: What in the hell were you doing in Newton today?
Immediately, I froze. How did he know about that? Calvin knew I was planning to go back to school, but I hadn’t said a word about moving back into the house I’d purchased years ago. There was no way he would have known I was there.
Unless…the man at the door had told him. Or he was having me followed.
And if the latter was true, he may have also known that Matthew was with me too.
But my heart iced over completely as something else occurred to me.
The foreign accents. The sleeping bags on the floor.
Calvin had lied all those years ago, and now he was using my sweet, small house as a stopover for smuggling people into the country illegally. The stacks of documents and passports I’d seen in his office that day reappeared in my mind’s eye. He had continued that business. He had built his own meager fortune on these illegalities. And what’s more, he was still doing it, attached to my name, despite everything he had promised.
At that moment, Matthew walked back into the room with three frown lines that looked permanently etched over his brow.
“All right,” he said. “If you tell me you don’t know anything more about these people or that house…I believe you.”
He was shaking his head with the look of a man still figuring things out. But then, all of a sudden, his expression cleared.
“I believe you,” he said again. “And I love you. Enough that you and I are more important than this case. Nina, I think it’s time I stepped back and—”
“I do know who they are,” I cut in before he could finish.
He blinked, stunned, then sat heavily on the bed again to face me. “You do?”
“I—” I shrugged. “I have an idea.”
He frowned. “Wait. You do know who Károly Kertész is or you don’t? Katarina Csaszar?”
“I’m guessing they’re illegal immigrants,” I said. “Smuggled in by my husband through one of those houses in Brooklyn. Or any number of properties he has around the tristate area that are likely owned by that company, Pantheon.”
Matthew’s jaw dropped.
“I have to tell you something else,” I said softly.
And then I proceeded to tell him everything I knew. I told him about the money I’d given Calvin out of my trust when I was young. The additional cash he’d requested, again and again, from my grandmother’s accounts. I told him about finding the cache of dirty documents and how many of them had my forged signature, along with the deeds and other property-based paperwork.
I didn’t mention the beating. I didn’t mention the fear. After all, he knew how terrified I’d been of my own family over the past ten years. I hoped that would be enough for him now to understand my motives.
He was quiet for a long time after I finished. I hugged my arms around my chest, waiting to hear him tell me it was over. That I wasn’t the woman he thought I was. That I deserved to be locked up with my husband and every other criminal in New York.
After all, he would have been right.
Instead, his response was the last one I expected.
“That’s it?”
I looked up in shock. “What do you mean, ‘that’s it’? I just told you I’m complicit in an illegal immigration scheme Calvin has been running for years. That’s very, very bad, Matthew.”
“It’s bad,” he agreed slowly. “But…Nina, you gave him some money and kept his secrets because he trapped you into this. And I don’t for a fucking minute believe it was just to keep your daughter’s home life intact. Not when you send her away for months at a time.”
“Andover is a very good—”
“You love Olivia,” Matthew interrupted me. “If I hadn’t known it before, I definitely do now, after seeing you with her. You had a broken heart when you got back into the car this morning. I knew then that you would never send her away if you didn’t believe she was safer somewhere else. Somewhere without you. I…” He squinted, like he was trying to see something clearly a long way away. “Look, I’ve already decided to recuse myself from your case no matter what.”
“What?” I reared. “I thought you were the only one who—”
“Derek and I have been making some contacts with the Newark PD and in Connecticut. Even here in Massachusetts. There are a few other white hats out there.” He shook his head, thinking. “I think it’s fair to say that if you did decide to turn yourself in, the DA is likely to grant you a pretty small plea deal. You’ll be forgiven pretty quickly, especially if you offer evidence against your husband.”
“Can I do that?” I asked. “I thought you said he would claim spousal privilege anyway about anything I said.”
“All bets are off if you’re an accessory or co-conspirator,” Matthew said. “But I still think you’ll be forgiven quickly. You might even be able to negotiate immunity, given everything you know.”
“And you?” I was almost afraid to ask. He was still so far away, on the opposite side of the bed from me. “Would you forgive me?”
He was quiet for a good while, making no move to reconnect. Every second that passed felt like a dagger to my heart.
“You promise that’s it?” he said finally. “That’s everything you know?”
I nodded, suddenly desperate for his touch. “Yes. Matthew, yes, I promise.”
“Nina,” he said. “If you tell me the truth, I’d forgive every mortal sin in the book.” Slowly, he reached out and took my hand, then placed a reverent kiss over my knuckles.
I melted, then pulled on his hand, urging him close again. Light shined within us both. This would be a hard road ahead for both of us. But if Matthew was there to support me, even if it was just with a small kiss like this, I knew I could do it.
“Come back to bed,” I said, tugging on his arm. “Please. I need you.”
He leaned in to kiss me again. But just as it was deepening into something much more, it was his phone that buzzed this time on the floor, still in his pants pocket.
Matthew swore. “I’d better get that. If someone’s messaging this late, it’s important.”
But, apparently, it wasn’t. Matthew stood up and shoved his legs into his pants as he read the text on his phone. Immediately, he swiped through and brought the phone to his ear.
“Derek, it’s almost two in the—” he started to snap, but then s
topped, eyes popped open. He then turned to me as he covered the mouthpiece. “I’ll be right back, okay? And then…we’ll come up with a plan, baby. I promise.”
I lay back down in the bed, wondering just why everyone we knew wanted to contact us in the wee hours of the morning. Eventually, though, my mind wandered. Back to the house in Newton, or maybe a red brick house in the middle of Brooklyn. To Olivia swinging by Matthew’s arms in a green backyard or nearby park. And maybe another dark-eyed baby nestled to my breast, cooing while we watched his beautiful father laughing in the sun.
I closed my eyes, and for the first time in many years, really let myself dream.
But dreams, as they say, aren’t real. And mine died almost as quickly as they were born.
The bedroom door banged open, and I turned to find Matthew striding in with a face full of fire.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, sitting up once more. “Is everything all right? Is Derek okay?”
Matthew snatched his shirt off the ground and began violently shoving his arms into it. “You. Fucking. Liar.”
I recoiled, almost as if I’d been struck. “What? Matthew, w-what are you talking about?”
He snatched his tie off the ground, scowled at it, then shoved it into his pocket. “I’m talking about the fact that your shitty house in Newton wasn’t the only place you visited on Sunday, was it? Derek just finished going through a ridiculous number of files sent over from the Hartford PD. Surprise, sweetheart. You’re on camera.”
He held out his phone, and I watched a video that looked eerily familiar. There was my Volvo, pulling up in front of a different New England house. And there, of course, was me, walking up the drive, knocking on the door, and delivering one of the envelopes Calvin had sent with me as a clear price of my limited freedom.
“Hartford,” Matthew said. “About two hours from here. One of your ‘errands,’ I see.”
“Matthew,” I said. “Please listen. Calvin sent me to give the tenants a notice to vacate. He’s planning to liquidate everything before the trial. He wanted to get rid of all the evidence, and—”
The Perfect Woman (Rose Gold Book 2) Page 36
