Ruined With You

by J. Kenner

  “Christ. Good for you.”

  I exhale, only then realizing I was afraid he’d chastise me for banging the fucker over the head with a rock.

  “I didn’t kill him, but he was out cold when I ran. I took his jacket, and my dress was short. So I was mostly invisible in the dark woods. And I worked my way around the house to the side lot where the valets parked the guests’ cars. I found an unlocked SUV, got into the back, and waited, terrified someone would find my guy or realize I was gone. But it worked out. The SUV’s owner came out with one of the few female guests at these things, and they drove off. Neither of them looked in the back, and she spent the entire drive to Manhattan giving him blowjobs.”

  “You’re pretty damn lucky.”

  “Don’t I know it. It was a huge risk, and I was sure I was done for, but I was desperate, and they didn’t catch me, and I ended up in a car park in Manhattan, and suddenly I was free.”

  Even now, that sounds amazing to say, despite the fact that I was beyond terrified for months after that. Liam asks me how I survived, and I tell him I stole a woman’s wallet—something I’m still ashamed of—and she had over five hundred in cash and an ID that was passable enough for me to use. I bought sweats and a T-shirt from a place that was open in Times Square, and hair dye from a Duane Reade. Then I got on a train and went to Pennsylvania. And from there I hitchhiked to Los Angeles.

  “And Ella doesn’t know any of that?”

  I shake my head. “As far as she’s concerned, I was a runaway turning tricks in Hollywood. And that’s not really a lie, either. I did run away. And I did turn tricks.”

  “And you survived.” He cups my face, then kisses me gently. “Baby, you are an amazing woman.”

  “No, I’m not. But I guess I am a survivor.”

  He strokes my hair, my shoulder. It feels nice, as if he’s trying to reassure himself that I’m here and I’m whole. As if my story has broken him a little, too.

  He asks me questions about the sex scheme. The names of the men, the location of the buildings. I tell him what I can, and he seems to absorb it all.

  “But now they’ve found me,” I say with a shrug. “I guess I always knew they would.”

  “It’s good that they did,” he says firmly. “Because now we can take them out, and you won’t have to worry about them anymore.”

  “I’m scared.” My words are a whisper, and I feel weak even saying them.

  “I don’t blame you,” he says. “But I’m with you now. And just remember what you already told me. You, Xena, are a survivor.”

  Chapter Twelve

  A survivor.

  “I am,” I say. “But that doesn’t mean I want to be. I thought I was past it when I was with Ella. But then one stupid picture, and every horrible thing I did to survive suddenly means nothing anymore.”

  “It means everything,” he says. “Because you did survive. And you have those skills—that grit—to keep you going now.”

  I screw up my mouth and shrug. “Sometimes it all feels so futile. And random.” I reach for the cup and the dregs of cold coffee, but he takes it from my hand with a shake of his head.

  “Random how?” he asks, as he goes to the bathroom and fills the coffee maker.

  “Do you know how I became Susie Morgan?”

  He looks at me over his shoulder. “I’ve seen some of the world you lived in, Xena. So yeah, I can probably guess.”

  “Try.” I hear the challenge in my voice, because there is no way he’ll guess the depths of my shame.

  “She was a hooker,” he says. “Parents dead. Ran away from foster care. Ended up turning tricks in the City of Angels. Not an uncommon story, really.”

  My mouth is dry. He’s dead on point.

  “How am I doing so far?”

  “You cheated.”

  “Rye told me some—he checked you out years ago. I did a bit more on my way to the cabin. Or I had my team do it. Of course, those are the dry facts. For the rest, I’ll have to be a little more creative.”

  “All right. Go on.”

  “You met her in LA, somewhere near Hollywood Boulevard. Maybe at a diner. A laundromat. She may have even been the girl who showed you the ropes. Who taught you how to survive without a pimp, because after what you went through, you wouldn’t have gone that route.”

  “No.” My voice is thin. “I definitely wouldn’t.”

  He brings me the cup of coffee, and I blow on it before taking a tiny sip.

  “I can’t guess what happened, but somehow she died. And you assumed her identity, because you needed a clean slate, and you knew she would have wanted to help you.”

  My eyes are welling up again, but I nod. “She was a user. It was the one thing we fought about. And she got in deep with a dealer—owed him a lot of money. He decided to make an example of her.”

  “The cops never ID’d her?”

  “As far as I know, her body was never found. I got one of those concrete garden marker kits and made one in her honor. Then I buried this goofy stuffed cat she loved and her lucky rabbit’s tail.” I look at him defiantly. “But I kept her life. She would have wanted me to.”

  “No argument from me. Did you keep turning tricks?”

  I nod. “I didn’t like it, but it was like being the CEO of my own business compared to the life I had before. But I also enrolled in school, because I wasn’t going to turn tricks forever. I’d have to lay low no matter what job I got—I knew that. But I also knew that if I couldn’t have a family, then I at least needed a job where I didn’t have to sell myself.”

  I wait for him to ask why I had to be alone, but instead he tells me the reason.

  “Because they’d never stop looking for you. Because your past—your life—could put them at risk.”

  “Yes,” I whisper, hating that basic truth. “No way would I—” My voice breaks, and I force myself to go on. “I saw my father murdered in front of me. And I knew they’d do the same thing to anyone else I cared about. If they found me—when they found me—they’d kill everyone I loved in front of me.”

  I take a deep breath, certain he’s going to try to placate me. Tell me that I shouldn’t distance myself or that love is worth the risk or some such bullshit.

  He looks right at me, but I don’t think he sees me at all. And he whispers, “You’re right.”

  The words linger between us, dark and horrible. I fight the urge to ask what’s in his head, because I’m certain it’s more than just me and my problems. He’s seen tragedy, too, and in that moment, I want to hold him. To share what little strength I have. Right then, I think he needs it.

  But then he stands, his hands in his pockets, as he goes and looks out that small slit in the curtains. “So you went to school.”

  I hesitate, wondering if I should push, but I don’t. It’s not my place, and what would be the point? This man is here to protect me because Ella wants him to. And I want it, too. I want him and his friends and the fucking National Guard if he can arrange it to be on my side. I want him to find out who’s after me and I want him to make them go away.

  And then I want to disappear again and hope for a few calm years before someone else from my horrific past surfaces again. In my dreams, yes, I might want Liam to disappear with me. But I learned a long time ago that storybooks lie, and dreams don’t really come true.

  He turns to me. “Xena?”

  “School. Right, yes.” I clear my throat, trying to remember what I was saying. “So, yeah. I had to take the GED, but it wasn’t a big deal. I started taking business classes at a community college during the day and turning tricks at night. And I kept going to my AA and NA meetings, and I kept seeing my counselor every week.” I meet his eyes dead on. “You might say I had a few issues.”

  “I’m shocked,” he says, making me laugh.

  “Yeah, well, I was determined to get it behind me and make something of myself. Make my dad proud, you know?”

  “I guess you did. You ended up with a great job working wi
th Ella.”

  “Oh, man. That was a freaky day. It was my twenty-fourth birthday, and I’d been beat up by a John the night before, so I had this nasty bruise on my cheek.”

  I point, as if it’s still red and swollen. Sometimes I think it should be, the fucker hit me so hard.

  “I was in a pissy mood because I’d gotten a shit score on a paper I’d turned in about services for the homeless, and the professor had the audacity to say that I hadn’t put in enough research and—” I make a slashing motion with my hand and rein myself in.

  “Anyway,” I continue, “the point is that I was a mess. But I went to the interview anyway. I figured it was good practice, but I was certain I wouldn’t get the job. I’d had no idea who she was when I applied, but after I got the interview, I learned she was this rising pop singer. Nowhere close to where she is now, but she was getting radio play and, well, I figured there was no way in hell she’d hire me.”

  “But you went anyway.”

  “Like I said, practice. And, I don’t know. I just felt like going.”

  He grins as he comes to sit on the bed again, only closer this time. “The universe was starting to shift in your favor.”

  “Maybe so. Anyway, I go in, and she immediately asks about my cheek. I wasn’t sure what to say, so I just sort of evaded. Then she asked about school, and since I was steamed about the paper, I told her. She asked me about my research and I went off on her completely.”

  “She was a stand-in for your professor.”

  “Big time. I told her I worked on the street and knew what I was talking about, and that I interacted with the homeless daily, and that I’d been homeless for two months when I first moved there, and that if she really wanted to know, my cheek got busted when a John decided to demonstrate his right hook.”

  “So what happened?”

  “She asked me when I could start.” I laugh. “At first I thought she wanted to sleep with me—I knew from my research that she’d had girlfriends.”

  “But nothing there?”

  I shake my head, glance at him, then look down at my knees. “Nothing. I like men, even though I haven’t slept with that many who, you know, I actually wanted to be with. You’re kind of a notable exception.”

  He reaches out, his hand resting on my covered foot. “I’m flattered.”

  I look up, then get a little lost in his eyes. In the strength I see there, and the compassion. I’m spilling all this shit onto him, and I don’t see anything reflected back at me that makes me want to curl into myself. I’m the same person to him I was yesterday and the day before. And right then, I really want to kiss him.

  “Thank you,” I whisper.

  “For what?”

  I try to wrap my thoughts into words. “For everything I guess. For protecting me. For the way you’ve touched me.” I glance down, no longer meeting his eyes. “For not asking me if I’ve been tested now that you know my history. I have, you know. Lots.” I draw a breath, and look up to see his eyes on me, soft with compassion … and something more, too. “Anyway, thanks for being a really great guy.”

  “My pleasure.” He smiles as he says it, but his words are underscored with just a tiny bit of heat. Or maybe I’m just hopeful. Or stupid. Because I like this man more than I should. And I want him more than is safe.

  He’s had it rough, too, I think. More than suffering through a friend’s kidnapping and surviving combat. But I don’t want to ask. I’m melancholy enough simply from going over my own dark past.

  “You and Ella went from employer/employee to genuine friends,” he says, and I’m both grateful and frustrated that he hasn’t been reading my mind. Because I’m suddenly very aware of the pressure of his hand on my foot. And the fact that he’s so close to me on the bed.

  I shouldn’t feel this way—I know that. And yet I want. I just want.

  I bite my lower lip, then barrel forward. “You’re kind of like Ella.”

  “It’s the hair, isn’t it?”

  I narrow my eyes, but otherwise ignore the quip. “I just mean that you’re the kind of guy that usually scares me.”

  “Usually?”

  I silently curse as he takes his hand off my foot, then smile with relief as he slides a bit closer before reaching over to take my hand, making my pulse kick up its tempo. I like this feeling. This will-we or won’t-we. I haven’t done this much—the real thing between men and women. I’m not an expert in reading clues or flirting. When a man is forcing or paying, there’s really no need for subtlety.

  Most of the time I’m terrified of my own emotions. But right now, I want this. Whatever the hell this is.

  He holds my hand lightly, his fingertips moving over my skin. “Usually,” he repeats thoughtfully. “So are you saying I don’t scare you?”

  I swallow. “If you were paying attention last night, you should know that you don’t.”

  “I’m glad.”

  I look down at our joined hands. “I’ll admit to a bit of nervousness.”

  His eyes meet mine. “What do you have to be nervous about?”

  Everything.

  “The fact that you don’t scare me.” I hear the breathiness in my voice. “That’s kind of terrifying.”

  He tilts his head, but doesn’t say anything.

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I want more than to not be scared. I want to trust you, too.”

  “And you don’t?” I can’t read anything in his face or his tone. I don’t know if I’ve amused him or offended him, but I rush to reassure and explain anyway.

  “On some level, I do. I mean, I’m here with you and my life is in your hands. But that’s not really trust.”

  “Isn’t it?”

  Once again, I try to read his face, but fail. “No,” I confirm. “It’s just pragmatism. I don’t think I’ll ever really trust anyone again. I’ve gone too long looking over my shoulder.”

  “And yet there’s Ella.”

  I look at him, and wonder if it’s hope that I’m hearing in his voice. Or if that emotion belongs entirely to me.

  “Yes,” I say. “There’s Ella.”

  “But she’s a woman. I’m not a woman, Xena.”

  “No, you definitely aren’t.”

  “And I would never, ever hurt you.”

  “I believe you.”

  He reaches out, then strokes my cheek before sliding his fingers into my hair. “So soft,” he murmurs, then brushes my lower lip with his fingertip. “So beautiful.”

  “Liam,” I whisper.

  “You don’t trust me, but you want me.”

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Why?”

  “Because you make me feel safe, and I don’t mean from whoever is chasing me. I mean in here,” I explain, pressing a hand to my heart. “Safe to be me and not what they wanted me to be.”

  His brow furrows, his expression growing dark.

  “I’m sorry,” I say quickly. “I don’t want to burden you or make you think you’re part of a therapy session. Last night was a frenzy, but right now is desire.” My words are tumbling out, and I’m not even sure if I’m making sense. “I just want you, Liam. Right now, I think I need you.” I lick my lips. “Don’t you want me, too?”

  He makes a soft scoffing noise. “How can you even ask that? Of course I want you. But I can’t have you,” he adds as he runs his fingers through my hair. “Not the way I want.”

  “Sure, you can,” I say. “Of course you can.”

  But he just shakes his head, and it’s like a fist squeezing my heart because I’m certain he’s saying no. Then he whispers, “You break down all my defenses.”

  “That’s good,” I say.

  He shakes his head. “No. It isn’t.”

  I sag with disappointment, but before I can argue or ask him to explain, he cups my head, tugs me toward him, and kisses me.

  I melt into it, the bed covers dropping as I shift onto my knees and scoot closer toward him.

  “No,” he says, then eases me bac
k so that I’m flat on the mattress, my body dwarfed beneath his. “Like this.”

  I melt into the kiss, his lips on mine, his hands roaming over my tank, then easing under the hem as he gently pulls it off me. He tosses it on the chair by the window then closes his mouth on my breast, his tongue doing incredible things to my nipple.

  I arch up, wanting more. Expecting the same wicked wildness from last night. A raw, primal passion that I can lose myself in.

  But this touch isn’t wild. It’s contained—as if he’s holding back. His touch feels so damn good, but I crave more, and I want to pound on him to let go. To ravage me. To take me. To let me feel whatever passion he feels. To be real, because I’ve never actually had real before.

  I want all that, and yet those thoughts and demands fade against the sweetness of his touch. As his teeth lightly graze my nipple. As his hands trace down my belly, then gently tug my yoga pants off and send them flying toward my top.

  “Your turn,” I murmur, and he nods as I start to tug at his clothes until he’s as naked as I am. “Better,” I say, sliding my hand down to find his cock, only to be stymied when he gently pulls it away.

  “Put your hands on my back,” he says, and I do, relishing the sensations of his muscles moving beneath my touch as he kisses his way down my body, using his own hands to spread my legs even wider as the tip of his tongue finds my clit.

  I moan and arch up, trying to wiggle my hips, but he has me held firmly in place, and all I can do is surrender to the glorious sensation. I move one hand from his shoulder to his head, then press him harder against me. I’m rewarded when he shifts from the tiny, teasing movements of his tongue, to laving me completely as his fingers slide inside me, and my hips rock of their own accord in a primal effort to bring this man further and further inside me.

  “Yes, yes.” The word seems to fill the room, and it takes a second before I realize it’s me.

  He slides up me again, capturing my mouth as he enters me. It’s sweet and gentle and so unexpected. So different from everything I’ve known. And as he moves inside me, I feel the growing pressure of a coming climax. The tingling on my inner thighs. The tightening of my belly. He murmurs gentle sounds, and I cling to them like a ladder, climbing higher and higher until I’m at the top and have no choice but to fall off and shatter into a million pieces as I break through the blanket of stars below me.