“You called,” I breathed in the quietness of the room and leaned my hip against the sink. While my legs wobbled under my weight, my heart pounded crazily in anticipation.
The cleaning woman glanced at me, undoubtedly wondering if lawyers sometimes went mad, then returned to folding towels and arranging them under each sink.
Without sparing another second, I bolted from the restroom in search of a quiet spot with better mobile signal.
Mitch Stewart and Vincent Cole were arguing less than five feet away from the ladies’ room. My feet dug into the carpet and my breath hitched.
Unlike the serene act he had put on up on stage, the mayor looked tense and slightly displeased. He was talking to Cole, while the latter listened, but the words didn’t drift to the small alcove where I was hiding. Cole nodded and peeked around before holding out his hand. The mayor told him something more then pulled out a banker envelope from the inner pocket of his suit jacket and handed it to Cole.
The mayor studied his surroundings like he wanted to make sure nobody had witnessed the exchange, forcing me to pull back into my nook. When I glimpsed again around the corner, both Cole and the mayor were gone.
Too drained to figure out what the whole incident had been about, I walked outside onto the terrace as fast as my feet would carry me.
The terrace had a magnificent view, embellished with painted floors and bordered by a sculptured marble railing that dipped down to guard a spiral flight of stairs that led to the back gardens where daisies and anemones bloomed.
I called Marcus as soon as the signal strength allowed it, but it went to voicemail again. Sometime between calling me and now, he must have switched his phone off. I felt like screaming in frustration, but when a waiter surfaced out of nowhere, I was glad I had refrained.
“Miss, are you Charlotte Burton?” the waiter asked.
“Yes.”
“This is for you then.”
He handed me a white banker envelope and left. There was no inscription on the envelope, and from the feel of it, it only carried a slip of paper.
“Wait, who asked you to give it to me?”
The waiter opened a glass door and disappeared inside where he mingled with the attendants of the gala and the staff. I examined the envelope and felt a cold grip get a hold of me. It was exactly like the envelope Mitch Stewart had given Cole.
I pulled out the card and stared at it, strangely detached and unfeeling. The text was made of letters cut out from magazines and glued to a hard paper sheet.
Curiosity killed the cat, it said.
“Charlotte, is everything alright?” Cameron called from behind and approached me with quick, decisive steps. “Your mother was worried.”
“I’m fine,” I said, hearing my voice as if it came from somebody else.
“What’s this?”
Drake stopped in front of me, bowing to study the card I was holding. The worry morphed to a look of shock, then anger. He looked around, circling me a few times in his attempts to peruse the terrace and the darkened garden.
“Have you been threatened before?”
I shook my head, not mentioning the time the mayor had threatened me in the middle of the day or that most probably he had just done it again.
“I’m going to call the police,” Drake said and pulled out his phone.
“No,” I protested in a high-pitched voice.
I gripped his wrist, not quite sure why I was stopping him, but before I figured out the meaning of this threat, I didn’t want anybody else knowing about it. I put the card back in its envelope and placed it in my clutch.
“Charlotte, this is very serious.”
“I know, but I don’t want to ruin tonight.”
That was actually my last concern since the night had been more or less ruined from the start, but he bought the lie.
“God, you’re shivering,” Cameron muttered, the frown between his brows deepening again.
He took his coat off and pulled it around my shoulders, keeping it closed with his fisted hands. He squatted just a bit so he could see my eyes. When he found whatever he had been looking for, he smiled and wrapped an arm around my waist.
“Don’t be afraid. Jase Parker is in prison. You will not be attacked again. I’ll make sure of that.”
He wrapped his other arm around me, then his mouth covered mine, and his tongue probed at my lips. I was so shocked and so repulsed by the slow and sloppy glide of his mouth that I remained immobile in his embrace. Then I heard a sound that blasted so familiarly and so dreadfully in my ears.
I shoved Cameron aside just in time to see the shadow of a slate gray Jaguar speeding from the driveway like hellhounds were on its tail.
“Marcus—” I breathed and covered my mouth with my hands. He had seen us.
“What is the matter?” Drake demanded, coming close again.
I finally exploded, and the civility I had struggled to keep up the whole night vanished.
“The matter is that you should have never kissed me,” I hissed. “And you will never do it again.”
“But, Charlotte, I thought you and I had something going on.”
He reached for my hand, but I pushed at him, exasperated. It felt wonderful to finally be able to tell him that I didn’t appreciate his advances. It felt wonderful to hiss and see the gallantry slip from his face.
“You thought wrong. Don’t touch me.”
Drake scoffed and cast me a look of disdain that felt more real than every word and every glance he had given me the entire night. He was not familiar with rejection.
“I don’t even know why I let your father get in my head. It’s evident you do not live up to my standards.”
“My father put you up to this?” I shrieked as I realized that James’s show of approval had had nothing to do with my award but with the man he had somehow convinced to conquer me. Sometime between yesterday and tonight, Isaac must have shared his concerns with my father about my relationship with Marcus, and together, they had decided it would be better to split us up.
I let Drake’s coat slip off my shoulders and ran down the stairs to the garden then out the back entrance and to the parking lot. My legs trembled, but they had purpose. I wasn’t going to let Marcus think for another moment that there was something between Drake and me.
I dialed a phone number I never thought I would ever use. Kai answered after the second ring, his voice loud but not loud enough to drown out the background noise or the soft giggles of a woman.
“Hello?”
“Kai, it’s Charlotte. I want you to tell me if there is a race tonight.”
He gasped, hesitated, and mumbled something incoherently, then a little louder he added, “Why are you asking?”
“Because I’m afraid Marcus is about to make a big mistake.”
Chapter 35
Charlotte
“There’s fun in the races too,” Marcus had told me, but he wasn’t racing for the fun or the adrenaline. He raced to purge the anger, the frustration, or the grief. He raced to quiet his thoughts and let his heart beat without hurting. He raced to forget, and tonight he wanted to forget me.
I could imagine the misplaced betrayal that fueled his anger and the rabid wish to drive it out. I suspected to some extent this outburst of his was meant to punish me, to make me feel the anguish he had felt when he saw Drake hold and kiss me like I was his.
I understood all that because I was jealous and possessive by nature, but most of all, I understood it because I had already experienced it when I found that redheaded woman in his apartment. The worst thoughts had come to my mind then, so I knew without a shadow of a doubt that Marcus was not in the right frame of mind to race tonight. His judgment was not soaked with alcohol, but it was equally inebriated.
I knew I had come to the right place when I heard the noise. It was loud and terrible. Music boomed from unseen speakers, and a cacophony of hoarse voices and liquor-fueled laughter mingled with the screeching of tires against the pav
ement.
I parked somewhere on the side of the road then hurried on foot, right into the middle of the unleashed crowd. My body wasn’t completely recovered from the last time I was attacked, and my mind hadn’t forgotten the dread or the despair, but the fear of knowing that Marcus could be in danger eclipsed whatever fear I had left for my own safety.
Men cast me vile and lewd glances while some drunken ones stumbled into me and slurred obscenities that had my stomach rolling. My skin crawled, and my heart pounded like it wanted to dig a hole through my chest. They hooted, and they laughed as I cringed, but I pushed forward until I finally saw him.
Marcus mounted a motorcycle that I noted wasn’t his. He arched his back and grabbed the handlebars with a sort of fury that couldn’t easily be curbed. I could only see the side of his face, but it was enough to confirm all my fears. He was mad and out of control. He wasn’t even wearing protection.
“Marcus,” I screamed. “Marcus, stop, please don’t do it.”
He didn’t hear me, or if he had, he didn’t even spare me a glance. It was Kai, who finally noticed me and came my way.
“Charlotte, what’s going on?” he shouted.
“Kai, please stop him. He’ll get hurt.”
He stared confused at Marcus’s crouched back, then shaking his head, he returned his attention to me.
“He’s a damn good rider. Well, he’ll still lose, but he’ll be safe,” Kai laughed. “Why don’t you bet on him, and after I beat him, and you lose, you’ll let me paint you?”
“You don’t understand. He saw me kiss somebody else. He’s not thinking clearly.”
I felt the tears in my eyes and heard the trembling in my voice, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. Kai paled, then he glanced again at his cousin. He looked terrified like it wasn’t the first time he witnessed Marcus riding in this condition, like he was fully capable of predicting the outcome.
“Damn it,” he cursed and spun around.
People all around gave him a wide berth as he jogged to the booth where a man with a microphone was working the crowd. Kai wrestled the microphone from the man’s grasp, but it was too late to stop the race now. Marcus had already set off.
“King is cheating,” the announcer said with a gasp after regaining control of his mike. “That’s highly unethical, Mr. King, but two seconds advance won’t win you the race. Haralson and The Fox are hot on his tail, and oh, look at that, The Fox just outstripped him.
Kai ran back to where I was, his eyes fixed someplace over my shoulder. He shot a warning glare at somebody, but I lacked the strength to turn and check what was happening behind me. My full attention was focused on Marcus’s disappearing form.
“He will be fine,” Kai said, wrapping an arm around my shoulders.
I didn’t realize I had needed the support until I leaned into him and noticed that my legs were shaking so badly that my knees bumped against each other. It was suddenly very cold and very difficult to breathe.
“I cannot see Reed, however,” the announcer yelled into his microphone. “Oh, look, he’s in the crowd with a stunning lady. Hmm, now we understand why he is not racing tonight, but what will The Fox say about this? We have some interesting stuff to look forward to, people.”
Kai glowered where the scrawny man was gesturing madly and moving gracelessly to the music. He made a sharp gesture with his hand that effectively shut him up.
“Marcus will be fine,” Kai repeated, more to himself than to me, but he didn’t sound so sure of it.
I bounced on my feet, staring ahead but not quite seeing. If anything happened to him, if Marcus got hurt, I could never forgive myself.
“Looks like Haralson has a pretty good advantage now, while King is furiously catching up,” I heard the announcer saying like I was underwater, and he was talking from somewhere far off. “King has overtaken Haralson, who I think doesn’t like it very much. Hey, he should be disqualified. Haralson almost hit the back of King’s motorcycle.”
Time stood still, and so did my heart.
They were getting back now, and Marcus’s usual controlled way of mastering his motorcycle was lost. The bike wobbled as it moved at a blinding speed, and somebody sped past him, grazing his side and pushing him off the road.
A roar split the night, and it drifted to me like a punch to the gut. I bent at the waist and covered my face with my hands, sobbing quietly, uncontrollably.
“Definitely not the night for King. His motorcycle has a blowout. Why isn’t he stopping? That’s insane, he’s going faster. This can go very bad, very fast. People, move aside, he’s losing control of the bike.”
“What are you doing, you moron?” Kai muttered then cursed again and stepped forward, dragging me with him.
The bike rolled down the pavement like a bullet uncertain of its target, then it came tumbling to the ground in a cloud of smoke and gravel. A scream tore from my chest right before Kai let go of me and darted to his cousin.
I begged my feet to move, but they were firmly rooted to the ground. Marcus was trapped under that motorcycle, and he was not moving.
His limbs were lying askew, and his neck was bent at an odd angle. His head was resting on the cement, in a pool of his own blood. His eyes were closed, and his face was covered in more blood. His beautiful, cocky face was twisted in an ugly grimace that left his mouth half open but not speaking. He was quiet. Everything was painfully quiet.
“Charlotte, he’s fine,” Kai was saying.
It was when he shook me a little that I realized all those lurid images had been glimpses from a dreadful, nonexistent nightmare, but one that could have been real.
“The motorcycle is a mess, but Marcus is fine,” he reiterated and glanced back where a few cars created a closed area that looked quiet and empty. “His left foot is a little banged up, so we pulled him to the side to—”
I stormed off, and Kai neither stopped me nor followed.
Marcus was leaning against a red Mustang with his left foot stiffly stretched forward and a scantily dressed blonde wrapped around him like a bandage.
Or scabies.
His arm was loosely curled around her waist, and with closed eyes, he was leaning against her invasive touch.
“Oh, you hurt yourself, babe,” she told him, stroking his hair. She kissed his cheek but was aiming for his mouth.
Worry switched to hurt and anger of my own, and I let it all out, lashing at the woman.
“Take your hands off him,” I rasped.
The blonde jerked and glanced at me, at first shocked, then annoyed that I was disrupting her fun. Marcus’s arm dropped from her waist, and in its absence, she lost the confidence that drove her to his chest, to the place she did not belong.
Scoffing and rolling her eyes, she finally got lost, leaving Marcus and me alone.
“You don’t like what you see?” he challenged, lifting his chin and regarding me with impenetrable, unfamiliar eyes.
“You are behaving like a little boy throwing a tantrum because somebody else took his toy.”
“Are you calling this a tantrum?” he barked, shooting to his feet. “I saw you in another man’s arms. I saw him touching you, kissing you.”
Limping, Marcus walked to me, his fists clenched, his teeth bared. He didn’t resemble the deadly image that had flashed in my head right after the crash, but as Kai had pointed out, he was a little banged up, with a few scratches on his jaw, above his left eyebrow, and around his wrists and certainly some bruises under his clothes.
“You’re trying to hurt me on purpose while I didn’t mean to hurt you at all. If you had stuck around just for another second, you’d have seen that I pushed Drake away and declined his attention. You’d have seen that I immediately ran after you. To you.”
We glared at each other, standing close but not close enough, our chests heaving, our mouths open but not talking, our hands half outstretched but not really reaching. When I couldn’t bear the distance anymore, I spun around and hugged myself. We were b
oth hurting now, and I was at a loss as what to do or what to say.
“You’re shivering,” Marcus said, and I could feel him stepping closer.
He wrapped his leather jacket around my shoulders and turned me gently to him. He looked nonplussed and ashamed and just as miserable as I felt. He opened his mouth, then closed it, then repeated the same process twice before he settled on hugging me. He kept me there, tightly pressed to his chest, a hand clenching my hair and the other arm circling my waist.
I let him hold me and kiss my temples, and I let myself feel with every bone and every cell of my blood that he was safe and whole. Then I disentangled myself from his arms and walked away.
At first, I thought Marcus would stay behind, but eventually, waddling on his feet and grunting every few steps, he did follow me back to my car and slid into the passenger seat without a word.
I drove to his apartment in silence, and when I pulled up behind his building, I squeezed the steering wheel and looked hesitantly out the windshield. It was easier to run back to the comfort of my shell and follow the patterns that were already familiar. It was easier to withdraw, but we had come too far, and our hearts were too deeply involved now to take the easy way out.
So I stayed. I stayed to fight and ache and finally mend.
I helped Marcus out of the car and all the way to his apartment. Kinga barked and scratched at the door the instant we stepped out of the elevator.
“Easy, girl,” Marcus muttered to her after we let ourselves in, patted her head, and gave her a handful of treats.
She sleepily returned to her snuggle sack, and it was quiet again save for her chewing and our ragged breaths.
I walked to the bathroom, and Marcus once again followed, not really knowing what to make of my mood. I turned on the water and looked for some ointment and hydrogen peroxide to clean his scratches. When I could think of nothing else to occupy my hands or my thoughts with, I turned around.
Darkside Love Affair Page 49
