by Cassia Leo
“I’ll never know what my mother thinks of who I’ve become. And that’s why I can’t let the person who did this get away with it. He took everything from me. Her life. Her love. Even her disappointment with my mistakes.” He opens his eyes and looks up at me. “I can’t let him take you, too. I have to finish this, and I have to keep you safe.”
The tears come again as I’m flooded with a sickening relief. Charlie’s dead and I’m to blame. And I’m relieved.
Knox takes me into his arms as I weep. My tears soak his collar as my body is wracked with sobs of grief and guilt. Finally, I compose myself and pull my face away from the crook of his neck.
“This is very difficult for me to accept,” I whisper through my dying sobs. “And this is even more difficult to say. But… thank you. Thank you for protecting me.”
He smiles and kisses my forehead. “Now I just have to find a way to protect you from yourself. You caused quite a scene out there. Not that I didn’t expect it.”
“You always know what to expect, don’t you?”
He gazes into my eyes for a moment, pondering this question. “I never expected to find you again.”
I wrap my arms around his shoulders and he kisses me slowly. He wraps his arms around my waist and lifts me gently off the floor then carries me to his desk. With one swift swipe of his arm, he clears the entire left side of the desk and sets me down. All the while, his lips never losing contact with mine.
He takes my face in his hands. He infuses a bit more passion and urgency into his kiss, and instinctively I wrap my legs around his hips. His hand finds the button of my black skinny jeans I wore to work this morning. He undoes the button and unzips my pants in two seconds, then I kick off my heels.
Pulling his mouth away from mine, he quickly lifts me off the desk to stand me up on the floor again. He yanks down my jeans and my panties then tosses them aside. Then he sets me back on his gleaming glass desk. The surface is cool against my bare ass, sending a thrill straight to my pulsing core.
He shoves my knees apart as he kneels before me and plants a soft kiss on my clit.
“Oh, God.”
“Lie back, baby.” I lie back as his tongue takes another blissful swipe at my aching nub. “And you don’t have to keep your voice down anymore. I want to hear you come all over me.”
Chapter 6
Charlie’s funeral service is scheduled for next week. The same day Knox plans to take me to visit my father. I don’t know where my father is hiding out. Or, rather, where Knox is hiding my father. But I know the captain will understand why I don’t want to attend the service.
No one has any reason to believe Charlie’s sudden trip to Michigan or his suicide had anything to do with my father’s case. They all believe he committed suicide because of me.
By some merciful twist of fate, Charlie’s suicide email got caught in my spam filter. I don’t know if Knox engineered it that way to spare me the anguish. What I do know is there is probably nothing Knox doesn’t know about me. Which means he was able to log in to my email account and erase the email before I even knew it existed. When he told me about this, I was livid.
“It’s an invasion of my privacy! How can you not see that?” I shouted at him from the kitchen sink where I was busy washing the dishes from the meal I just cooked for us.
Oh, I saw the resemblance. As if I were channeling my mother’s spirit. Standing there bitching at Knox about his shady business practices. As though my childhood wasn’t just haunting me; I was reenacting it.
“Would you rather have stumbled across that email yourself? I did it to protect you. If it weren’t for me, you’d be in a fucking cell or blaming yourself for Charlie’s suicide.”
“I do blame myself!”
It didn’t take long for Knox to win this argument. And I wound up nestled against his warm body. My muscles stretched and warm like pulled taffy. Clinging to him. My heart pounding and hair tousled like a desperate child. The after effects of another earth shattering lesson.
If someone recorded a video of me in these moments of passion, I doubt I’d recognize myself in the footage. I become someone else when I’m with Knox. I surrender myself to him. Not just my body. I surrender my choice. There is no choice but to do everything and anything he wants in those moments.
I find myself fantasizing about him all day. When will I see Knox again? When will I feel his energy lighting up my insides? When will I find my solace in the sweet surrender? Because he knows exactly when to push me harder and when to ease off. When to lay on the punishment and when to soothe my wounds.
Now, as I sit in Central Park watching the world pass me by, the guilt over Charlie’s death sits at my side, casting a dark shadow over me. All I can think is that I need to be punished. And there’s no one who can do it better than Knox.
The walk back to my building is invigorating. I bound up the steps to my apartment buoyed by my excitement. I’ll text Knox the usual message: The birdie got out of her cage again. I won’t even have to cook or order in tonight. We’ll dine on each other.
I love having a day off in the middle of the week!
Turning the key, I immediately notice the lock is loose. It’s unlocked.
I take a step back. I’ve lived with my father long enough and watched enough movies to know that you don’t enter your home in cases like these. I glance around the short corridor at the other two doors on this floor.
My heart is jackhammering against my chest. But through the thrumming of my pulse, I can hear movement inside my apartment. The door swings inward suddenly, and I nearly jump out of my skin.
Chapter 7
August is wearing a puzzled expression. As if he wasn’t expecting me.
“You asshole. You nearly gave me a heart attack.” He chuckles as I shove my way past him. “What the hell are you doing in my apartment? I thought you gave me all the copies you had of my house key.”
“Your landlady let me in.” He shuts the door and follows me into the kitchen. “I brought you something.”
“August, you have to leave. You shouldn’t be here.”
I grab a glass from the cupboard and fill it up with water from the tap. He watches silently as I guzzle half the glass. I slam the cup down on the counter and glare at him. He’s not leaving.
“What did you bring me?”
He smiles and I feel a slight pang of longing in my chest. Apparently, the last four months of my relationship were a sham. August was only cooperating with Knox so Knox could get closer to me, learn my patterns before the arraignment. They knew an indictment would be handed down the moment that construction crew tore down the old strip mall. My dad contacted Knox as soon as he learned about the project. Then the plan was set in motion and August was blackmailed into cooperating.
I was furious about it initially, that August could be so easily manipulated into becoming Knox’s lapdog. Of course, I was even more furious that Knox was the one who caught August cheating on me. But I still find myself missing the lazy Sundays in my apartment. The way August would complain about his blog partners while I indulged in hours of bad reality TV.
He grabs a cream-colored box tied with a black ribbon off the breakfast bar. Then he sets the box down on the counter next to me. He looks so pleased with himself.
“Open it,” he says as he picks up the new cat figurine Lita gave me and smirks.
“What is it? A severed head?”
“Just open the box.”
I untie the ribbon and lift the lid. It’s the red scarf I saw in Vogue magazine last month. On one of those lazy Sundays. I didn’t even mention it to August. He must have seen me admiring it while I was reading. Typical August to notice me coveting a scarf.
“It’s vintage Hermes,” he says, pulling the scarf out of the box and laying the cat figurine on top of the cushiony tissue paper. “It will look stunning with that vintage sheath dress you bought a couple of months ago. Very Jackie O.”
I shake my head as he drapes the scar
f over my neck. “You shouldn’t have bought me this. I can’t accept gifts from you anymore, August.”
“Why? There’s nothing wrong with a simple gift between friends.”
He’s still holding each end of the scarf. The way his eyes keep shifting to my lips is making me nervous.
I remove the scarf from around my neck and push it into his chest. “Take it back.”
“Becky, it’s just a scarf. It’s not a ring.”
I march around him and make my way to the dresser near the foot of the bed. “Just leave.”
“Fine. I’ll take it back.”
He follows after me and I turn on my heel before I reach the dresser. “What do you want? Are you trying to get me back or something? What is this?”
“I want to fucking apologize, okay!”
August has never raised his voice at me. He’s always so agreeable. Even when we did disagree, we never really fought. He believes in talking things out calmly. So this outburst is both shocking and exciting.
“You already apologized.”
“Not properly.” He wiggles his fingers as if he’s itching to hit something. “I messed up. I know. But it was only once.”
“August, I don’t want to know how many times you’ve cheated on me.”
“You’re not being fair. Just hear me out.”
“I’m not being fair? I’m not being fair? Was it fair for you to fuck someone behind my back?”
“I never fucked her!” His green eyes are desperate with a need for me to hear him out. “Yes, I took her to my apartment, but I never had sex with her. As soon as she left, Knox showed up and threatened me.”
“And I’m supposed to believe that you never fucked her because…?”
“Because it’s true!” He grabs both my arms and the look in his eyes frightens me. “He threatened to have my uncle killed. He helped my uncle escape the country last year, a few months after we started dating. My Uncle Stewart was about to go to prison for fifteen years for securities fraud. Knox is the only one who knows where my uncle is. We get occasional encrypted video messages from him, but they’re all routed through Knox Security, so they’re untraceable.”
He lets go of my arms and grabs my face so I can look him in the eye as he continues. “This is the guy you’re sleeping with. He’s fucking diabolical, Becky. You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into.”
My stomach twists at the thought of how August and I must look right now; his hands cradling my face at the foot of my bed. If Knox walked in at this moment, he’d probably kill us both.
“You have to leave. Now!”
I push him away and march toward the kitchen. He follows closely behind me. I grab the scarf and the box off the kitchen counter. Then I shove them into his gut.
Opening the front door wide, I sweep my hand toward the exit. “Thank you for the gift, August, but I can’t accept it. Please don’t come back unless you’re invited.”
He narrows his eyes at me as he passes over the threshold. “You’ve changed. The Becky I knew would never get involved in something like this.”
“That’s because I’m not the Becky you knew. I never was. I was pretending. I’m Rebecca. Rebecca Veneto. Goodbye, August.”
He reaches into the box and hands me the cat figurine. “Tell Lita I said hi.”
Chapter 8
Lita is such a lightweight. She drinks maybe four times a year. At weddings or on New Year’s Eve, she’ll have one glass of champagne and declare herself “warm.”
But guilt is a powerful emotion. I’m going to guilt Lita into having drink number two tonight. I need to know just how much she knows about Knox and August.
Knox’s vendetta looks very much like an impressionist painting viewed up close. I need Lita to fill in some of the missing details. Or help me take a step back so I can make some sense of it. If that’s possible.
I pick up Lita at her apartment in Chelsea, then we head to The Park, a restaurant-slash-dance club featuring indoor trees and shrubs. After yesterday’s excursion to Central Park ended in a bad run-in with August, I figured I’d better cancel out that experience with a trip to a classic hangout.
Lita and I used to go to The Park almost every weekend before I met August. It will be nice to spend some time with my best friend in our old stomping ground. And Knox is busy tonight. Probably off planning something “diabolical.” I know his goons are watching me, but we’re just here for a drink. I’m not worried.
I pull Lita past the indoor trees, which glow with twinkling lights. She protests as I drag her up the stairs, past a display of a dozen or so glowing lanterns. I’m taking her to the second floor bar and dance floor.
“I don’t want to dance tonight,” she pouts. “I’m hungry! I want some chicken wings.”
“We’ll get some chicken wings tomorrow. I’ll take you out to brunch for a hangover cure.”
“Oh, nuh-uh!” She shakes her head adamantly as I pull her through the dense Saturday-night crowd toward the bar. “You have lost your mind if you think you’re getting me drunk.”
“Please just have one drink with me?” I plead while trying to find a place to squeeze in at the bar.
“I’m going to the restroom. Stay right here. I’ll be right back.”
Lita wouldn’t ditch me, would she?
I turn back to the bar and try to squeeze into a tiny space between a young guy who’s wearing some yummy cologne and a blonde who’s using her assets to try to get the bartender’s attention. The guy scoots back a little so I can squeeze in next to him, and I smile at him to acknowledge his kindness. He’s actually kind of hot. Or maybe it’s just really hot in here.
“I’ve been waiting here for thirty minutes,” he shouts a few inches away from my ear. “He’s finally getting our drinks. What are you drinking?”
I should decline. I don’t want to give this guy the wrong idea. There is no doubt in my mind that I belong to Knox. But how? As a fuck buddy? As a co-conspirator? Or is it something more? Is what we have… love?
We certainly haven’t made any verbal commitments to each other. There’s no harm in letting someone buy me a drink. Actually, there’s no harm in letting this guy buy Lita a drink. Once he sees Lita, he’ll be much more interested in her.
“Two Long Island Iced Teas,” I reply and he responds with a tiny nod. He’s got this.
The bartender returns with three beers—I’m assuming the other two are for his friends—and he spouts off my drink order.
“I’m Alex. What’s your name?” he asks, turning around.
He raises his hand to get his buddies’ attention. Across a writhing sea of dancers about ten bodies deep, two guys acknowledge his gesture and make their way toward us.
“My name is Lita!”
Alex and I turn toward the sound of Lita’s voice. Her lips are pursed and her head is cocked. She does not look pleased.
I hand her the drink. “Look what Alex bought you. Isn’t that so nice of him?” I turn to Alex and he’s mesmerized with Lita’s supermodel looks. “Alex, this is my friend Lita. She’s celebrating a promotion today, and she needs a little encouragement. She doesn’t drink often.”
Alex smiles, revealing a mouthful of straight, white teeth. Perfect. Lita insists that guys with gnarly teeth always have bad breath and don’t know how to kiss. I nudge Alex’s shoulder to break his trance.
“Oh, yeah. Hi, Lita. Very nice to meet you.”
He offers Lita his hand to shake and she rolls her eyes. She squeezes in next to me at the bar so that I’m between her and Alex.
“I’m hungry.”
“I can get you something to eat,” Alex offers, shouting over me as if I don’t exist.
His two friends arrive and Lita and I are introduced to Hugo and Barry. Neither of these two are Lita’s type, but I would expect her to at least be friendly to Alex. After a few awkward moments of silence and ignored questions, Alex gives up on Lita and asks if I want to dance.
Lita hasn’t taken a sip o
f her drink yet. I don’t blame her really. This has got to be the strongest Long Island Iced Tea I’ve ever had. And I’ve had many. I only took two sips of mine before I abandoned it on the sticky bar.
“Sure,” I reply, then I turn to Lita. “Just one dance then we can go downstairs and eat, okay? Come on.”
“I’ll just wait here.” She winks at me as Alex and I set off. She knows she’s being a pain in the ass, but she’s happy she’ll be getting her way soon.
The thumping beat of the song rattles my chest. Soon, the music and the smell of sweat and Alex’s dance skills have me swaying and writhing along to the beat. I miss dancing. I’m not much of a club person, but dancing brings out a whole other side of me. That primal instinct embedded in my DNA; a part of me that once enjoyed dancing around a fire outside a cave.
Alex puts his hands on my hips and I press my back into his chest. Our bodies move together in time with the rhythm of the music. I slide down, shaking my butt as I go, then I slide back up. The guy dancing next to us smiles at me as he watches us grinding against each other.
Then suddenly I feel something prodding my backside. He has an erection. I spin away from him, and that’s when I see Knox standing at the bar with Lita. Watching me.
Time stops as the club disintegrates. All I can hear is the frantic thrum of my heartbeat. All I can see are those blue eyes glaring at me from across the room.
Alex grabs my arm as I try to leave. “Sorry. You just got me a little hot.”
I shake his hand off me and head for the bar. Knox whispers something in Lita’s ear then heads for the stairs. I shove my way through the crowd, my body shaking with adrenaline. Lita looks worried as I approach her.
“What the fuck was that?” I shout at her. “Why did he leave? What did he tell you?”
“He just said to tell you he’d be outside.”
I race toward the stairs and through the various rooms until I finally land outside on the sidewalk on 10th Avenue. I glance up and down the street, then I see the black SUV. It’s parked in front of the pizzeria on the corner.
