by Trixie More
“No,” he agreed. “I’m not. I was going to get us some water to give you time to deal with this.” He stalked forward, picking her up and over his shoulder and carried her back to the bed. He tossed her onto it. “But now that things are going this way, I’m staying right here.”
She felt his warm hand brush the hair off her face. As she looked at him, she realized he wasn’t angry. He wasn’t even lustful. She stared up at his handsome face. A small smile lurked at the corners of his mouth and it was obvious to her from the fan of wrinkles beside his eyes, the slight lift to his cheeks and the warmth in his eyes, Edward was happy. She had stopped him from leaving. He wasn’t angry, or sad, or pitiful. He wasn’t pitying her either. He was just glad to be there she realized and her heart galloped in her chest. This was supposed to be about him. She was supposed to be loving and kind and understanding but there was no woman like that inside her anymore. Where was the dutiful daughter? Where was the shy, bungling, useless assistant? Where was the woman who believed she was a victim of fate? All of these women had been inside her and all these women were nowhere to be found. She thrust her arms up and grabbed him about the shoulders and neck, pulling him to her again.
A cry of relief spilled from her; she turned her head and bit his neck.
She couldn’t stop the words from spilling out. “Oh my God! I love you so much.”
He lay on top of her, nuzzling at her neck, biting at her earlobe, murmuring her name in her ear. “Dorothy, my Dorothy. Of all the things that I might have thought my life held for me, I could have never imagined being given you.”
“I’m sorry, Ed,” she said. She pulled out from beneath him so she could turn to her side and see him. She petted his face, stroked his arms. “I’m so sorry.”
His mouth quirked down a bit and he kind of shrugged. “It was a long time ago.”
“I wasn’t talking about that, I am sorry for that too, those men … I can’t imagine.” She ran her fingers over his cheeks, feeling the sharpness of the stubble there, the fine dampness on his face from his sweat. “I’m sorry I wasn’t more sympathetic.”
Edward snorted. “Lady, I spent days trying to imagine how to tell you, how you might react and how I might react to you and what you might say or do after that. I imagined dozens of ways this could go down and never once did I think you would heave the laptop away and launch yourself at me in sheer anger.” He grinned at her and she ducked her face. When he put it that way …
His voice became quieter. “I never, in a million years, thought you would refuse to let me go.” He kissed her forehead. He kissed her eyelids softly, kissed the tip of her nose, his warms lips pressed against each of her cheeks, her lips, her chin.
There was nothing to do but let the tears come then. If she wanted to cry, she would let herself cry, not for the violence, or the crime. She cried for them both because the yearning in his voice was the soundtrack of her own aching. He kissed her tears and she fed him more and finally, they wrapped their arms around each other and held themselves together. On the floor by the bed, the laptop went into standby and the blue sky was replaced by sweet emptiness.
Chapter 21
Warm sunshine beamed through the living room window, the sky outside dazzling, the buildings looking clean and beautiful to Dorothy. She was curled on the couch, hot coffee in her hand, watching as her lover walked down the block to the subway. A yellow plastic bag dangled from one hand and she knew it contained his dirty jeans and the clothes he’d arrived in. She smiled. He’d looked cute and adorably awkward dressing in his sweatpants and Derrick’s old flannel shirt. On the street below he stopped and turned, looking up in the direction of her apartment and gave a little salute. Dorothy texted him.
I love you
In her hand the phone buzzed, but it wasn’t Ed. She could see him pulling his phone out of his pocket now. She looked at her screen. Her father was calling her and it sent a tiny curl of dread into her stomach. By now, her mom must have told him that Dorothy had lost her job. She was tempted not to answer. He might be the powerful Carl Johansen, but he was still her dad. She swiped to the right.
“Hi, Dad,” she said. Below her, Ed turned back to the subway and disappeared down the steps. Her phone vibrated in her hand, Ed’s return text no doubt. She smiled. “How are you?”
“Glad to hear you sounding happy,” he said.
Dorothy groaned. “Mom told you.”
“Of course. She’s my wife, you’re my daughter. Guess she thought I should know.”
Dorothy could hear the smile in his voice and everything was all right. “I didn’t want you to know I lost my job.”
“Had to happen sometime,” her dad said.
“Me getting fired?”
“No, me finding out,” he replied. “So what happened?”
“I goofed up, I guess.” She turned from the window and put her feet up on the coffee table, leaning back. She really did love talking to her dad. He was always so matter of fact, predictable. “I didn’t show up on time, started running late and put off my projects.” Admitting it felt better than she expected. “But, Dad, the projects were sooo dumb.” On the other end of the phone, her father grunted. “They had me doing a pitch for Tiffany Stone shoes.”
“Shoes? Imagine that.” He was laughing now. “Giving you a campaign for shoes.”
She rolled her eyes. “Tiffany Stone, Dad. I hated those shoes.”
“So you didn’t pull your weight.” He just stated it in a matter-of-fact tone. “So now what?”
“Well, here’s the thing. I really did like the campaign I did for Walker and Birkeland.”
“How so?”
“It felt important, Dad. I felt important. I felt like by helping him, I was helping do something vital.” She smiled to herself. “I really liked that.”
“Did you finish it?”
“Yeah, and presented it and they were wowed. I know it.” She heard the certainty in her voice, the strength, and it felt good. “They freaking loved it.”
“And?”
Dorothy went on to explain about the conference, the divisions in the global warming movement, her disappointing job search and her fraternizing. “I shouldn’t have dated him, Dad, but I couldn’t help myself.”
Her father grunted again. “I doubt that. Where’s this prince now?”
That was a lot of drama for her dad, she thought. She grinned. “He just left.”
“Lovely.” He cleared his throat. “So what do you want to do, little girl?”
It was the same question he’d asked her a hundred times. Sitting on the pavement, skinned knee and torn jeans, next to her first two-wheeler, it was “What do you want to do, little girl?” All dressed up for the prom when her date stood her up, “What do you want to do, little girl?”
I want to get back on, Daddy. I want to go with you, Daddy. And each time he’d picked her up, stood up for her and with her. Why had she ever thought she couldn’t tell him she’d failed?
“I want to save the world, Daddy. And I want to marry Ed.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really,” she said.
“Then do it. You aren’t that eighteen-month-old baby and you aren’t a victim. You have just as much right as anyone to go out and make the life you want, little girl.”
“I do, don’t I?”
“Yes, you do. Yes, you do.”
An idea was starting to form in her mind. Triggered, she was sure, by the sight of that damn tattoo in the video.
“Dad? You have some philanthropists on your board of directors, don’t you?”
“I do. What of it?” Her dad was smiling again, she could tell.
“If I send you some information packets, will you pass them out to your board for me?”
“You know I will. What’s the point of being powerful if I can’t help my daughter?” he asked. “Bring them over and have dinner with us. I love you, little girl. I’m being badgered by this wife of mine to get ready for some dumb thing, and I go
t to go, but I love you.”
“I love you so much, Daddy,” she said. In her hand, her phone buzzed again, reminding her she had a text waiting. She hung up; her father never did long goodbyes. The text from Ed was waiting.
Love you too
Burst out of his skin. That’s pretty much what Edward wanted to do. He jogged down the subway steps, swinging the plastic grocery bag full of his clothes. He winced a little thinking of the odor on them. He’d been pretty rank when he’d arrived at Dorothy’s door yesterday.
I love you
The weight of his phone in the pocket of his sweat pants felt like a talisman, protection against the life he had lived just ten days ago. It bounced against his thigh.
He moved through the subway, the shiny white tiles glowing. They should have been dull. After all, they were put in eons ago, but they always looked clean to him. Down in the tunnel, heading toward the platform, he could see his train coming. He should have walked home, he had so much energy in him, so much to tell Gunnar. So much to do. He shifted his weight to the balls of his feet, stuffing his hands in his pockets, letting the bag dangle from his wrist.
“Hey, mister.”
He turned to see who had spoken. The train washed away all other sounds as it pulled to the platform and stopped. Edward turned his attention back to the train and got on, moved through the cars, and found a section with plenty of space. He dropped onto a hard, orange seat. Next to him a man about his own age plopped down. Not one seat down, leaving a polite space, but right the fuck next to him, despite there being about fifteen million empty seats.
Edward raised his ass up and moved over one seat. To his ever-loving dumbfoundedness, the idiot did too.
“What the hell?” he asked.
The guy just grinned slyly at him. “I think I recognize you.” The man was thin and his cheeks pulled back like curtains from his smarmy smile. Large ears sprouted from the sides of his face, the light glowing red through them, making them seem thin, like tracing paper. The voice that came from the guy was thin too, a high whine.
“You wouldn’t recognize shit if it hit you in the face,” Ed spat. His hands fisted as he resisted the impulse to shove the guy away.
The smarmy smile slid away. Cloudy blue eyes fixed on Ed’s face. “I sure as fuck recognize you,” he said. The smile slid back, cheeks folding away from it. “You’re the pool boy.”
Ed tensed. This guy sure had some balls.
“I must have watched that video a hundert times,” he hissed.
Edward stared, feeling his blood pressure rising. The guy lifted his cell phone. “Think I’ll take your pic-sure, boy,” he said.
Edward couldn’t believe it. All these years, this had been his greatest fear. Some illiterate hick, who couldn’t pronounce the word picture, forming a judgment about him, thinking he knew something about him. He shook his head. Here it was, his worst nightmare and it was … nothing.
Edward’s laugh boomed forth, driven by the sheer largeness of it. He was still laughing as he plucked the cell phone from the guy’s hand. He turned it around and thumbed the camera to selfie.
“Gimme that,” the slime ball next to him spluttered.
“Now wait, little buddy.” Ed slammed himself closer to the man, whipped an arm around the guy’s spindly shoulders and yanked him up close. In the camera, the thin man looked terrified, his shriveled cheek smooshed tightly into the blue buffalo plaid of Derrick’s shirt. Good. The guy should be scared. Ed gave his most frightening grin, lifting his chin high so the man looked even smaller. He touched the screen and a virtual shutter whizzed closed and disappeared. The picture was frozen on the screen. The pool boy giving a sniveling, terrified man a glad-hand style hug. He pressed save. Then he held his hand over the power button until the phone started shutting down. His stop was near.
“I sure as fuck am the pool boy,” he whispered in the man’s ear before he shoved him away. He stood up and tossed the phone on the seat. The man snatched it up. “Glad you mentioned it.” He laughed again at the man and left the train.
An hour later, Edward was in his own clothes, a giant ham, cheese and salami sub with coleslaw, pickle and chips on the desk next to him. Beside it sat a glass of filtered water from his ecofriendly pitcher. He munched cheerfully while he waited for Gunnar to join his video call.
“Stikk og heng deg.” Which was basically Gunnar telling him to hang himself. His friend’s face appeared with sheet marks across his left cheek and his pale hair sweat-damp and stuck to his forehead.
“Holy shit, man, how does your wife sleep with you?” Ed asked happily.
“I’m goin’ back to bed. Runknisse.”
“Yeah, but I’m your favorite wanking gnome, aren’t I?” He took a giant bite of his sandwich. “What time is it there?”
“As if you didn’t know. And you’re not my favorite anything. You’re my ex-business partner,” Gunnar groused.
Edward smiled like fool. “I’m so glad you forgive me.” Effor-fucking-vescent. That was how he felt.
“I’m sorry about the other day, man,” Edward said around a mouthful of food.
“Yeah? So what?”
Edward was perversely glad that Gunnar wasn’t making it easy. So darn great. “Look, I was an ass, a …” He thought furiously for a good curse to use. Shit bag was all that came up. He shrugged. “A drittsekk. I won’t do it again.”
“There’s not a chance you’re keeping that promise.” Gunnar lay his head on his desk.
Edward joyfully told Gunnar about the guy on the subway and was immensely gratified to see the shock on his friend’s sideways face. “And I told Dorothy.”
“You told her?” Gunnar sat up again, looking skeptical. “About being the pool boy?”
“Better than that. I was so bent after you hung up, I took the thumb drive over to her place and played the video for her.” He practically bounced in his chair watching Gunnar’s expression.
“No! What did she say?”
“Same thing you might expect, tackled me on the spot and begged me to shag her.”
“No!”
“Well sort of. She called them bastards, tossed the laptop around a bit, stuff you might expect.”
“Same thing I did,” Gunnar said.
Edward thought back. “Did you?”
“You are a drittsekk. In fact, that’s too good for you.”
“Well, that lasted about a minute and a half and after that, it was all about her.” He grinned widely.
Gunnar sat back in his chair. “What now?” His mouth opened in an enormous yawn.
“Now I’m going to find ten agencies in Los Angeles, where, I’m told, they adore environmentalists. Then I’m going to make ten appointments to discuss marketing our products. I’ve decided letting you pick the ad agency was a dumb idea.”
Gunnar snorted at that, his eyes barely open.
“Hey, what’s wrong with you? It’s not that early.”
“Tied one on after our fight, if you must know, you dumb faen,” he replied mildly. He shut his eyes and let his head flop back.
A woman’s hand appeared on camera, dropped a couple of white pills on the desk and set down a mug.
“Hiya, Eddie” said Gunnar’s wife, Eva. He heard her walk away. He was going to have to take Dorothy to Norway soon to meet his best friends. The thought made him smile.
He cleared his throat. “Then, I’m going to call our vulture capital guys and see if they will give us an extension, based on all my badass plans.”
Gunnar just nodded, eyes shut.
“And finally, I’m dumping all the cash from the video, and every cent I have left, into the business account; we’re going to pay the guys.” That made the man’s eyes open.
“We need that for the ad campaign,” he said.
“Nope. We don’t. Dorothy proved that. We need some of it, but we can get pretty far with social media ads and revamping our website. Maybe come into the twenty-first century and set up some funnels.”
> “How is that going to help us go public?”
“Maybe it will, maybe it won’t. We’ve got one point five million to burn through before we have to close our doors. Perhaps we should be working on driving in sales instead of investors.”
Gunnar’s mouth hung open. “You think that will work?”
“Nope,” Edward said brightly. “I think trying will show us what to do next.”
Gunnar narrowed his eyes.
“Think about it. If you liquidate, you’ll have half of what? A building in Orange County that we still owe money on and whatever product stock we have. We still have to pay the rent on the space in Norway until the lease runs out and we still owe employment taxes on the Orange County team’s payroll.”
Gunnar grunted. “What do you think had me drinking last night? Surely not worrying about you.”
“Yeah, well this way, you have half of my million five.”
Gunnar looked down. “I can’t take that from you.”
“Who says you can’t? I’m putting it in. I think you should get to work.” Edward grinned as Gunnar groaned.
“All right.” He swallowed the white pills, followed by a sip from the mug. “Man, that woman makes bad coffee.”
Edward laughed and signed off. He had a lot of work to do.
Chapter 22
As soon as she hung up with her father, Dorothy got to work. Over breakfast, Ed had told her about drinking and watching the video, and the fight with Gunnar, including the man’s threat to liquidate the business. An idea had been percolating in her mind this morning, but before she acted on it, she needed a way to contact Gunnar. She didn’t want to tell Ed what she was doing until she talked Gunnar into staying with the business.
The hardwood floors were cool on her bare feet as she padded into the bedroom to look for her laptop. She had sent it spinning, that much she knew. She moved around to the far side of the bed and found it, upended, slightly open and most likely with no battery power left. The silver thumb drive winked at her from the USB port and a chill chased over her, leaving her feeling cold and serious.
