Escaping Reality

by Lisa Renee Jones

  had I been in Liam’s room: bedding and pillows, as well as enough paper

  products, plastic utensils, kitchen items, and basic hygiene products to last

  me days. The list goes on, with a hair dryer, hotel slippers, and a robe, and

  my kitchen is stocked with canned sodas and a coffee pot with supplies,

  including cups. I am truly doubting my decision to stay here rather than go

  to his room, and not just because he’s likely spent a pretty penny on me.

  Because I am surely the talk of the hotel now and Liam is exposed by his

  connection to me.

  Dragging a hand through his thick, dark hair, looking tired but

  incredibly sexy, Liam walks back into the room. “The pizza smells good.”

  “Yes,” I agree, but my mind is elsewhere and I hold my hands out to

  indicate the apartment. “Liam, this, all of this you did, is too much.”

  “It isn’t even close to too much.”

  “It had to have cost you a small fortune.”

  “I have a fortune, Amy.” And he sounds almost…bitter? About being

  rich? He grabs the pizza boxes that are stacked with a couple of sodas and

  plasticware, and motions to the bedroom.

  “Let’s go eat on the bed.”

  Dinner in bed with the sexiest man I’ve ever known. I don’t have it in

  me to complain.

  “Yes. Okay, but thank you for everything. Thank you so very much.”

  “It’s not your thanks I want.”

  “Then what do you want?” And I don’t know why, but I hold my

  breath, waiting for his answer.

  He tilts his head and studies me a moment. “For you to share dinner

  in bed with me.”

  I let the air trickle from my lips. It is the perfect answer, even if I

  sense it wasn’t what he really wanted to say. “I’d like that.”

  I excuse myself to go to the bathroom and quickly change into some

  shorts I purchased when I bought my t-shirt, and while doing so, I begin to

  worry dinner is an opening for Liam to drill me with questions. But I don’t

  let myself linger in the bathroom, where I’m dodging the mirror. I won’t like

  what I see in it.

  Reassuring myself that I’m good at dodging what I don’t want known,

  I join Liam on the bed. With my legs curled to my side, and the pizza boxes

  on the mattress between us, I dig into a slice of pizza with a hunger, not for

  food, but for something no one can take from me. My love of cheese pizza

  is like every little personal part of me that no name or location change can

  strip away.

  “Why don’t I tell you about your neighborhood?” Liam suggests,

  dusting off his hands, after digging into his food with a heartiness that

  beats mine by double.

  “You know it well enough to tell me about it?”

  “Actually, yes. I consulted on a building project not far from here a

  few years back. I stayed across the street for a month. When you come out

  of the building, go right a block and then left, and there are two coffee

  shops and several restaurants. If you go left instead of right when you exit,

  two blocks down in a straight line is a mall. There’s a Whole Foods to the

  right of the mall and another grocery store to the left. You have everything

  from doctors to hair salons all in a small radius. A lot like New York. Which

  is good, since the city as a whole is not. Most people have cars, and I

  assume you don’t have one of those being delivered tomorrow.”

  My heart sinks at what I haven’t considered, and I fight the urge to

  set down my half-eaten second slice of pizza, afraid I will give away how

  rattled I am. Instead, I pause on a bite and say, “No. No car,” before

  chomping down on more than my food. I now have one more thing I

  haven’t thought about and will have to face tomorrow.

  “You do have your personal belongings being delivered, right?”

  On that question, I abandon eating, setting down my slice and

  reaching for my soda, effectively avoiding eye contact with Liam. “Yes. I’ll

  have my things tomorrow.” It’s not a lie, I tell myself. Whatever I buy will be

  here.

  He shuts the lid to his pizza box and I set down my drink and do the

  same with mine. I’m not hungry. That’s the thing about lies or almost lies.

  They make everything else harder to swallow along with them. I wonder if

  that is why he ignored the second half of his pizza. He can’t swallow it with

  my lies either. And now he’s just staring at me. He’s good at that, I’ve

  discovered, really darn good at fixing me in his bright blue stare and

  seeming to see right through to my soul. I almost think his silence is as

  dangerous as his questions. He’s analytical, a smart, calculated thinker. I

  see it in his eyes, and his job and his success backs up my assessment. I

  have to get him to stop trying to piece together my story.

  I scoot to the headboard, pull my knees to my chest, and work for

  diversion. “You don’t seem like a recluse.”

  “Subject of your belongings diverted,” he comments. “Check. That’s

  one of the ‘when you’re ready’ topics.” Blood rushes to my cheeks but he

  doesn’t give me time to reply, continuing, “I learned privacy from Alex, who

  was my mentor. He lost his wife and child in a car accident a year before I

  met him.”

  “Oh God. How old was the child?”

  He moves the pizza boxes to the floor and then sits against the

  headboard beside me, and we both turn to rest on one shoulder to face

  each other. “I never saw a picture. Looking back, I think seeing her hurt too

  much.”

  And I wish for a picture every day of those I’ve lost, and it terrifies me

  that I can no longer remember their faces. It terrifies me that Liam is so

  near, so able to read what I feel. It terrifies me that he won’t be tomorrow.

  “To lose a child must be the worst kind of pain.”

  His lips draw into a grim line. “I’m told it changed him, though I have

  no comparison. I didn’t know him before he lost them. He didn’t talk about

  them and he didn’t do press or make public appearances. When I began

  getting my prodigy architect buzz, he told me the hype could go to my head

  and ruin me, thus forbidding me any press as well. I deviated from his

  no-press policy one time, and one time only, when he was still alive. It was

  a hard lesson I’ve never forgotten. My ego and desire to share my success

  with the world was at Alex’s expense. His personal story ended up in the

  papers. He went crazy on me and then crumbled like I didn’t think he could

  crumble. That day changed me forever. I forgot about my ego and to this

  day I rarely grant interviews and I rarely do appearances.”

  A little part of me softens for Liam, and I don’t know what overcomes

  me. I reach up and touch his jaw. “Now I know why you’re so tight-lipped

  about your accomplishments.”

  He grabs my hand and I am somehow more complete because he’s

  touching me. “I keep my private life private and I let my work speak for me

  elsewhere.”

  I want to tell him how much I envy his confidence and sense of

  identity that he doesn’t appear to need anyone else to validate. But if I do,

  he’ll ask me about who I
am and who I want to be and even if I could freely

  talk, I couldn’t tell him what I no longer know. “That still doesn’t spell

  recluse to me.”

  “That started a couple of years ago when a particular reporter

  hounded me about an interview. When I wouldn’t give it, she wrote a

  scathing piece about me.”

  His thumb begins stroking my palm and heat is radiating up my arm

  and seems to have set my vocal cords on fire. “Scathing?” I choke out.

  “It read pretty much like ‘he’s rich, talented, and good-looking, but

  the man is a recluse with the social skills of an ant.”

  I gape. “An ant? No, she didn’t?”

  “I assure you, she did.”

  My lips curve and I fight my laughter, and lose. He leans in and

  brushes his lips over mine. “You think that’s funny, huh?”

  I curl my hand on his jaw and I am charmed at how easily he shares

  his story, how wonderful it is to talk to someone, to touch someone. To

  touch him. “I don’t mean to laugh.”

  “It just happened.”

  I nod. “Yes, but not at you. That description is so over the top it’s

  comical. And it’s not you.”

  “Not me,” he repeats, his hand sliding to my hip. “Are you sure about

  that?”

  I’ve spent my whole adult life reading people, sizing them up,

  weighing them by degree of potential threat, and I’ve trusted him from the

  moment I first found myself captured by his presence in the terminal.

  “Yes,” I confirm without hesitation. “Yes. I’m sure.” The air shifts around us,

  crackling with electricity, and I am empowered by how comfortable I feel

  with him despite my situation and the disparity of my experience to his.

  “You are rich, talented, and good-looking, but I forgive you all of those

  things because you’re charming and funny.”

  His eyes shadow, turbulence waving through the heat. “You were

  right earlier,” he says, and he pulls me close, molding our bodies together,

  his hands spread wide on my back.

  My hand lands on the hard wall of his chest and his heart thunders

  beneath my palm, telling me he is calm and cool on the outside, but I’ve hit

  a nerve and I don’t know why. “Right about what?”

  “When you said that I let you see—but Amy, I see more than you

  want me to see.”

  But not more than I wish he could see. “Then stop trying.”

  “That’s not going to happen.” He brushes his lips over mine, his

  tongue licking into my mouth in a slow, seductive caress. “We’ve already

  gone too far to turn back.”

  My hand is on his cheek, my legs intimately entwined with his,

  neither of which I remember doing. “Yes,” I whisper. “We’ve gone too far,

  Liam.”

  “And yet not far enough,” he replies, stroking the hair from my eyes,

  his voice rough sandpaper and masculine heat.

  The intensity of what I feel in this moment and for this man hits me

  like an earthquake exploding from somewhere deep inside, a deep, dark

  crevice of my soul. My emotions are all over the place. I do not know where

  this man is taking me, and I am as desperate to find out as I am to stop him.

  The need to run and hide or stay and fight is equally intense. He must read

  this in me because he softly orders, “Turn out the light, Amy.”

  Turn out the light. I do not question his command. I act on my need

  for self-preservation, and I turn over and flip out the lamp on the

  nightstand, relieved at the sanctuary that is the darkness. Even more so in

  the sanctuary that is Liam’s arms as he pulls my back against his chest, his

  hand splaying possessively on my stomach. My lashes lower and I relax into

  him. I do not know how this man is both the refuge I run to and the reality I

  am running from, but in this moment that is exactly what he is to me.

  His hot breath fans my neck and his lips brush my ear, the delicate

  touch sending a shiver down my spine. I expect him to kiss me again. To

  touch me and to fuck me, as he’s vowed. I want him. I even need him

  tonight and I inhale, savoring the now-familiar spicy male scent of him, and

  this time there is no memory splintering through my mind. There is just the

  darkness I hide inside, the soft bed, and the hard man holding me.

  ***

  I blink into the light and don’t move, trying to process where I am

  and what is happening.

  An unfamiliar closet door becomes the first focal point I manage to

  identify and my brain processes where I am. New apartment. Denver. Liam.

  I jerk to a sitting position, searching the room to find he is nowhere to be

  seen. My heart twists in several painful knots. He’s gone. I glance at the

  digital bedside clock the hotel brought me last night and note the time of

  eleven o’clock. Of course he’s gone. I was one of his many flings and he has

  work to do. How have I slept this late? How did I sleep at all in my state of

  mind, and without any nightmares?

  I’ll keep Godzilla at bay, Liam had said on the plane . It had been the

  truth. He had.

  Somehow, some way, this stranger had given me enough peace to

  get through the night. And while I should be freaked out that I didn’t hear

  him leave, I’m pretty sure my mind used Liam as we had used each other

  for sex. For an escape. He had given me something else to focus on instead

  of my situation, and clearly allowed me to shut down mentally and hold

  myself together.

  Liam had been an unexpected gift. Who was gone.

  Standing up, I ignore the gut-wrenching feeling of being alone. I’ve

  done this for years.

  There’s no reason I can’t do it now. Besides, I was never alone or my

  handler wouldn’t have known when I was in trouble, but where the idea of

  his existence has comforted me in the past, it doesn’t work this time. I can’t

  go through this again. I have to have an exit strategy of my own.

  One that gets me off everyone’s radar, including my handler.

  I walk to the living room to assess the rest of the apartment in the

  daylight and my breath hitches as I spot a package sitting on the kitchen

  table with a note. I reach for the wall to steady myself, an icy chill sliding

  through me at what this means. My handler has a key to the apartment.

  Chapter Eight

  The air feels thicker, my breathing more labored, and I barely

  remember walking to the table. I am simply there, staring down at what has

  been left for me. The box is white with an Apple logo on the top, and this

  does not seem like good news to me. Is the new phone I received last night,

  and haven’t used, already compromised in some way? Am I moving again?

  Is this location unsafe? My adrenaline spikes and I grab the small white

  envelope and pull the card from inside out.

  Amy -

  It’s not safe to be without a phone. This is yours to keep and the

  service is paid for a full year. And don’t say “no” when I’m not there to

  argue the many reasons you have to say “yes”.

  Think about your safety and convenience. Besides, I selfishly do not

  want to wait to hear your voice until I see you again. My number is

  programmed in the pho
ne. Text me when you get this and I’ll call you at a

  break from my meeting.

  Liam

  A sense of relief washes through me and I become aware of my free

  hand balled at my chest, where my heart is beating like a drum. I inhale and

  will it to slow. I’m okay. Everything is okay. The note isn’t from my handler.

  I am not leaving another city. I am not running. I am only hiding. Or maybe I

  am running. I don’t know how to define what I am or what I do anymore,

  and suddenly I am exhausted when I’ve only just woken up.

  I sit down and touch Liam’s signature, blocking out everything else.

  He didn’t walk out the door today without saying goodbye. He doesn’t

  intend to say goodbye at all. I’m blown away that he took the time before

  heading to his meeting to go out and buy me a phone. No one has done

  anything like this for me since I was still living at home. Home. The word,

  the place, the past, crashes over me. Sometimes I dream of throwing away

  fear and returning. Sometimes I think that facing the danger rather than

  running from it is my better option. But how do you face what you do not

  fully know?

  My gaze falls on Liam’s neat, masculine script and my lashes lower.

  For a few moments, I let myself indulge in the memories of Liam’s velvety,

  warm kisses and sensual caresses. I remember the “pi” tattoo and the

  numbers that formed a triangle that disappeared deliciously below his belt

  line. I remember his husky voice when he’d said, “Baby, you can examine it,

  lick it, do whatever you want to do to it and me, after I feed you. I promised.

  I meant it.” A shiver of pure desire tracks down my spine, but my eyes land

  on the envelope with my lease inside and it’s like a knife has cut open the

  sultry veil of fantasy I’m hiding beneath. My handler wasn’t here today, but

  he could have a key. I wonder if he’d had a key to my first place in New

  York. I shiver again, and this time it is not with desire. I am creeped out in a

  big way, and I’m having my locks changed.

  I shake myself and stand up, setting the note from Liam back on the

  table, uncomfortably aware of my circumstances. Liam is a distraction and a

  problem I cannot afford. No matter how much I might want to see him

  again, I cannot. I won’t. Sleeping through the sound of a feather dropping