My hands fly to my temples as I struggle to suppress the madness behind what is happening. “You’re out of your mind.”
“Please explain why you keep running away from me. Is it a habit of yours?”
My brain feels as if mini seizures have taken over the space in my head. “I wasn’t running away.” I glance around nervously, trying to get a grip on myself. “I was stepping out of a minefield as quick as I could. It’s called survival.”
“And I’m the minefield?”
“You and your girlfriend.”
“I don’t have a girlfriend, Sophie.”
“Really? It looks to me like you do have one.”
“Yes, and you have not once failed to make up your own assumptions about me. But I’ll have you know, things are not always as they appear. You of all people should know that.”
I sigh. I can’t deny some truth in his words. “It’s possible you have a point there.”
He laughs. “Of course I do.”
“However, that doesn’t change anything. This is New York. I know your man-sequel ways like the back of my hand.”
With that perverse smile lingering on his lips, my insides explode in an acidic turmoil.
“You do? Please, enlighten me on my man-sequel ways.”
“Oh, no. I’m not painting the picture of an Adonis who can potentially be any girl’s dream. And not only that, but he embraces it like a world Guinness achievement—flaunts it, even.” I can go on and on.
His face lights up. “You think I’m good looking?”
“Is that what you took from what I said?”
“Really explains the depth of my analysis, don’t you think?”
I cross my arms and roll my eyes at him in disdain. I start shaking, whether from the cold, my intoxicated state, or the nervousness I don’t know. Oliver removes his suit jacket and wraps it around my shoulders. My breathing weakens as if he’s punctured my lungs with his allure. He rubs my arms up and down to keep me warm. I look away to avoid his eyes, those pools of blue wonders.
I choose to skip the pleasantries. “You are extremely touchy-feely, Oliver. Stop.”
“Hmm.” He looks thoughtful. “The last time a girl asked me to stop it was 2004. Jamie Covington. She tore my heart apart.”
“Perhaps she knew what she was up against.”
“Hey.” He gently takes hold of my chin. Looking at him is everything I want to do. His breath rushes against my face and I blink furiously. I chant a wordless prayer as his rigid physique presses against my stomach.
“Well, you have me caged. What do you want now?” I say, hard as a rock.
“I want to take you home. That’s all I’m going to do.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“Why not? Is it on your technique list of how to dodge my man-sequel ways?” he says, grinning, then the smile fades. “You shouldn’t be drunk. You shouldn’t be parading around like that.”
“Because it’ll make me look bad to the press?”
“Screw the press,” he retorts. “You can barely stand up straight. I want to make sure you get home safely.”
I unflinchingly say, “No, no, no. Absolutely not.”
He looks like he’s had enough. “There you go again with that negativity.”
“No happens to work for me.”
“And yes happens to work for me.”
“Oh yeah? In that case, will you leave me alone?”
He stiffens. “I’ll leave you alone if that’s what you want. But first, I take you home.”
I’m in no mood to argue; I’m falling asleep. Oliver makes a quick call. He has his driver pull his car to the sidewalk, then opens the back door for me and motions me in with a persistent please. With my stomach in a knot, I go inside, Oliver following behind. At this proximity, all I want to do is re-evaluate our touching settlement. Maybe even throw my rulebook out the window. Midway down the road, my head takes on a mind of its own and comes to rest on the shirt underneath his suit. At this point, he must think I shift between episodes of sanity and madness. In an act of drunkenness fueled by the pounding of his heartbeat in my ear and the scent of his body, I trail a finger over his lightly haired chest. I didn’t mean to touch him, I just did.
“Sophie.” I hear his voice above my head.
“Hmm?” My head swims as I inhale him with each breath.
“Is this you being touchy-feely?” he teases, burrowing me farther into his embrace.
Damn it, what am I doing? “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“Shut up, Sophie. I’m not going to ask you to stop.”
I swallow, my mouth suddenly dry.
FIVE
THE SPLENDOR OF the sun wakes me from my slumber. A miracle has occurred right before my eyes. I slept like a baby. I have not slept like a baby in as long as I can remember. I’m both outraged and stumped as if somehow sleeping is an abnormal phenomenon that should not have occurred without my authorization. I curse my body, feeling betrayed by it—on the verge of tumbling into misery, indignation, or some other fruitless void.
Speaking of things that should not have happened—
What am I doing in a strange house? I despise strange things, but here I am, lying in a strange bed with a strange scent clung to the soft, fluffy fibers of the sheets.
The space beside me is empty, and I’m grateful. But then, I notice a slight crinkling in the sheets, an indication that I didn’t sleep in this ginormous bed alone. I look away, then look back to see if it’s still there. It is.
I sit up. My body aches, my mind is in frenzy, and my thoughts are running loose after my morning reflections. I look around the room and see my clutch bag on the upholstered bench at the end of the bed. I grab it and tiptoe toward the bathroom.
I split into parent and daughter personalities—the parent reprimanding the daughter as she stares at her reckless face in the mirror, hair disheveled, and eyes black like a raccoon. I need Tina, my team of highly effective beauticians, and maybe a redeemer. I lift the sink faucet’s lever and wash makeup residuals off my face.
Back in the bedroom, as I study the room I slept in, the door springs open, revealing Oliver as if he’s the grand prize behind a game-show curtain.
“Ever heard of knocking?” I ask very blandly, not having the energy to create a scene.
A soft smile appears on his face. “Not in my own house. Besides, I can guarantee you,” his gaze pins to my thin nightgown, “I’ve seen you wearing a lot less.”
“That doesn’t mean you should. Where’s my dress?”
“The dress that looked like a bird died on you?”
My hands fly to my hips as I stare at him reprovingly.
“Take it easy. It’s being dry-cleaned. You put the nightgown on yourself. Don’t worry. I shut my eyes during the graphic parts.”
My eyebrow shoots up. “Oh, really?”
“Of course not. How are you feeling?” he asks, polite, caring...like I’m a patient and he’s treating me. “You slept through most of the morning. I thought I was going to have to give you mouth-to-mouth.”
His words are tilted at an amusing angle. I can almost feel them tickling me in the ribs. “Ha! I feel fine. Thanks.”
“Why do you always have to say fine?”
“I don’t know,” I reply aloof. “It’s a fast answer. I thought you said you were going to take me home.” I face away, scrambling for my phone in my clutch bag. I have missed calls from Jess.
“I did take you home.”
I turn to look at him. “Yours. Not mine.”
“You fell asleep in the car,” he explains, his hands in his pockets. “My house was closer than yours, so I just brought you here.”
“And we slept in the same bed because—?”
I see a flicker of enjoyment in his eyes. “You asked me to.”
My heart beats unsteadily, and I hold my trembling hand against it as if it will jump right out. “You’re kidding.”
“I am most certainly n
ot kidding.”
Fear rushes through me. I try not to think about what other outrageous things I may have said in my drunken state. Oliver dismisses the subject easily and walks around to where the closet is. He slides the door open and points to the wardrobe hanging inside. Just as easily, he says, “There are clean clothes for you here. Anything you need is in the bathroom, towels and toiletries. If you like, you can take a shower.”
He’s either trying to be an extremely good host to me, or he has girls stay over all the time. My gaze scans the room. It looks staged, everything in its place, spic and span. Attempting to sound all Zen-like, I voice one of the million questions forming themselves in my mind.
“You really know what you’re doing, don’t you?”
“Why do you say that?”
I wave a hand around. “The towels. The clothes. The minty air freshener. Looks to me like you have it all figured out. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was a guest room.”
“It is a guest room. One of three in the house. But to answer your question: no, I don’t have it all figured out. Not even close. It’d be foolish of me to believe so.”
“After last night, you must think I’m the fool.”
“I don’t know you, Sophie,” he says with zest. “I’m a man of mathematical faith. Assumptions are a phenomenon much akin to your own liking, not mine. It is logical that you make assumptions, as a way to support a hypothesis. It is not when you claim them as true without clear evidence to back them up.”
Before I can think of something crafty to say back, from the supersensitive part of my ear, I detect the irritant buzz of a mosquito, its wings flapping around the room as loudly as a helicopter. This is a hazardous issue. I don’t want to be feasted upon by some small carnivore and all the heavy droning is making me whine mentally. I try to annihilate the noise and at the same time listen to what Oliver is saying.
I hear the words, “breakfast” and “terrace,” and all I say while trying to act perfectly levelheaded—pretend the room is bloodsucker-free—is “Yeah, sure. That sounds great!”
Panic strikes as it comes to my attention that I could have just agreed to anything without even knowing it.
I want to grab the mosquito out of the air, hunt it down, eradicate it, but then Oliver will think I’m out of my mind, and that is his line of work. He’s standing before me like an artist’s model, almost like a muse waiting to serve as a source of creativity.
“Sophie, are you all right?”
I stand perturbed, wondering where the mosquito has come from. I’m smacked with the thought that maybe the place is brimming with flying parasites. I silently pray this creature doesn’t have any accomplices of the dangerous female type; the possibility of getting bitten by a crawly pest isn’t on my to-do list for the day. I nod, mentally raising the white flag in the mosquito’s direction.
“Yes. Now how about a little privacy?”
“Of course.”
I go off to what is going to be a steamy encounter involving the shower and me. But when I first open the bathroom door, I just stand appreciating the sight before me like a kid at Disneyland for the first time. The shower stall has three glass sides against a back wall of white marble. Multiple jets mounted on the wall with a showerhead above beckon me toward a deluxe retreat.
I feel klutzy until I step into the shower stall, but in half a second, there I am—blissfully swooshing around inside the shower, lathering, massaging myself with a perfume bar of soap that smells like jasmine. The water on my skin feels warm, too warm. In my apartment, the plumbing is a nightmare. Hot whatever everywhere in the apartment is okay, but not in the shower. It starts out warm but then runs one degree cooler than glacial. The pressure is too low and one time I woke up to find water covering the kitchen floor. The pipe under the kitchen had come loose. Jess went ballistic. She wouldn’t come near the kitchen area in weeks. She ate out regularly, claimed she gained five pounds in just a few days.
But this shower—this is glorious. The feeling is exquisite for the shortest of moments.
I slip into a mid-length white shirt, beige skinny pants, and leopard-print loafers from the uncanny selection of clothing in the closet.
Outside the room, I contemplate a plethora of wonders, a dazzling panorama of high-quality museum décor. I see elevators to my left, and in front of me two doors resembling the door to the room I slept in. A myriad of spotlights shine down on the glass display cases full of antiques.
Clean scents drench the air. No mosquitoes. The silence is rare. I move cautiously, frightened of having an accident in this unflawed place. I stand out like a legume in a bag of rice. I focus on the stairway at the center of the room, approach it, lean on its glass railing, and look up its ascending steps.
I have no idea where I should go. I bring myself to sit down on the bottom step of the stairway and wait. A smoke would do good right now. My hands clinch together underneath my chin, with elbows on my knees, and feet flat on the floor.
“Hey. What are you doing?”
I turn around and Oliver is coming down the stairs.
“I don’t know my way around.”
He grins as if he’s pleased with himself. “That would be my fault. I apologize. Did you find everything okay?” He sits down beside me and faces me directly.
“Yes, everything was great. Thank you.”
He leans a little bit closer. My arms tighten around my knees.
“Good. Now we can eat.” He takes my hand and steers me up the stairs.
Two steps higher up the staircase, he looks down, and holds out his hand for me. I pause to catch my breath as I join him. Whichever floor this is and however high we have gone on the stairway, all I know is that my heart is so far up in my throat I’m all but choking on it.
I look like an out of shape slob the way I’m panting for air as I reach the top of the long staircase. Wheezing, I motion for him to halt. “Give me a minute.”
“Sure, all the time you need.”
I’m overcome by the breathtaking view of the city, from a fairy-tale rooftop terrace. “How many stories is this?”
“Six above ground, two below.”
“Six? You’re so dramatic. Couldn’t we have taken the elevator?”
“Actually, we came up only two floors.”
“Oh.”
“Are you all right?” he says, casting a worried look on me.
“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine. It’s hereditary. My mother had a high blood pressure thing.”
“You should sit.”
I turn to the festive, mouth-watering lunch set out on the wood-topped table, presumably just for the two of us. There is more where that came from on the matching food trolley near the table.
I breathe in awe, or nervousness, and look up at the clear blue sky. Something steals over me as my ears take in the sound of peace, stillness—soundlessness.
“What’s wrong?” Oliver strides away to a nearby chair, then turns and notices me standing in the middle of the terrace.
“Nothing. I’m just listening. It’s quiet.” I rub my hands over my limp biceps and turn to sit in a rope-style lounge chair like the one Oliver is sitting in. “You know how hard it is to find quiet in New York?”
“I take it you prefer silence?”
I give some thought to what I will say, scratching my hand incessantly. “I don’t believe in silence. There is always something to hear. I think there’s a fine line between sound and noise, and I don’t like either extreme—that fine line in between, that’s what I prefer. Noise usually chases me, and you might have figured this out already, when something chases me...I run.”
He smiles throughout most of what I say. “By the looks of it, something did chase you.”
I follow his gaze all the way to the messy-looking red splotches on my hand where large hives are erupting and apparently, I’m not demonstrating self-control. There must be at least three bites the size of nickels just begging to be scratched.
I just knew that would
happen. I try to rid myself of the intolerable itch, meanwhile, Oliver orders me to stop, says I will spread the irritation. When I don’t obey his command, he groans softly, fastens his hand over my mine, and keeps it there firmly.
I watch his hand holding mine, while with the other hand he grabs a massive plate of fruit salad from the trolley and nudges it in my direction. I completely forget about the mosquito bite. I wonder about when was the last time I had real food, at a real house, at a real table, actually having time to sit and cherish every bite of a healthy meal. But all I seem to recall on my nostalgic journey into the past is myself on a couch, myself on the road, myself at the kitchen counter, and myself at a restaurant.
I reclaim the hand Oliver imprisoned and rake it through my hair like what we’re doing is no big deal for me. I grab a fork and go at my salad. He serves us coffee in matching miniature cups, and after, he hands me an aspirin. I stare at him in wonder and wash the tablet down with coffee. I lean back into my armchair, brush my hands caressingly over its wooden frame, and relax into it.
“Do you like it?” He grins, watching me pet the chair.
“I do. It’s nice.”
“That is sustainably-harvested wood, and this,” he gestures toward the table, “was carved from a tree that fell naturally.”
“You don’t see many men into the environment and permaculture.”
There is a flash of playfulness in his eyes as he tells me, “You’d be surprised by what I’m into.” He says it in a friendly but sinister tone.
He sits there looking at me for a couple of seconds and I effortlessly stare back. When my cheeks begin flaming, I shake my head out of its stupor and speak up.
“So why do you have women’s clothes hanging in the closet?”
He smiles brightly. Seeing him in daylight, up close, in dark jeans and a gray shirt—I’m struck by how young he looks. “They were brought here especially for you. I want you to be comfortable.”
“Tell me more.”
He settles back into his chair. “Your dress size is a two. You are five foot nine, thirty-four inch bust, twenty-four inch waist, and thirty-four inch hips. You wear a shoe size eight and a half. Anybody with a computer or a phone can look that up.”
A Diamond in the Rough Page 7
