Toronto Collection Volume 3 (Toronto Series #10-13)

by Heather Wardell

  "Honey," Jillian said, "I can't think of anything worse than a perfect man. How the hell do you live up to that?"

  We all laughed, and Jeanine nudged Megan. "Andrew's perfect, right?"

  She burst out laughing again. "I spent half an hour picking up his socks this morning so I could put in a load of laundry. He takes them off wherever he is then forgets about them so there's a pair under his desk, one behind the couch... But he does all the grocery shopping because I hate it, so I can put up with his socks. No, he's not perfect. But he's more than good enough."

  I wanted to tell them about Jake and the accusation and have them help me understand how I could trust him, but I couldn't betray his confidence like that. Instead, I said, "Well, so is Jake, I think. He knows about my history and he goes out of his way to be trustworthy, and I've never seen him do anything to make me distrust him, but I'm still having trouble."

  "I think it's not about what you see him do," Jillian said.

  Jeanine nodded. "It's what he does when you can't see him."

  I blinked. "But if I can't see him, how do I know what he's doing?"

  Jillian rocked her head back and forth. "That's the point. And the problem. If you can't let yourself believe he's good all the time, then he's not good for you any of the time."

  By that logic, I'd come to the right decision about Howard. But could I trust Jake all the time?

  *****

  I walked to work after breakfast with my knees weak from laughing, since we'd gone on to talk about the marathons both Megan and Jeanine had run and they'd had such funny stories Jillian had choked on her coffee. We'd agreed to go out again the next week, when I'd get to meet Megan's friend Tosca who sounded great too, and I loved how my circle of friends was growing.

  Nearing work, I saw Jake walking toward me from the other direction holding two coffee cups. We smiled at each other, and kept smiling as we grew closer, and I wondered how I'd ever not noticed how adorable he was.

  "Greetings, my Persian carpet princess," he said when we were standing before each other, and gave me an awkward bow with his coffee cups held out at his sides.

  I responded with my best curtsey, no better than his bow. "Coffee King, I presume?"

  He chuckled. "I'm a prince at best. But yeah, I took the liberty of getting you a cappuccino. If you don't want it I'll just throw it on Howard."

  We laughed and I said, "Talk about a dilemma! But I think it's too good to waste. So thank you."

  He handed me the cup. "You're welcome. I must admit, I have an ulterior motive."

  I furrowed my brow at him so hard I could barely see. "So there are strings attached to this cup?"

  "I'm afraid so." He ran his hand through his hair. "Feel free to say no, though, okay? Seriously."

  His obvious tension made me stop my ridiculous fake frown. "What's up?"

  He glanced around. "Can we sit for a second?"

  "Of course," I said, and followed him to the curb of a not-yet-open restaurant where we would be off the busy sidewalk.

  When we'd settled down on our concrete seat, he said, "I was talking to Hannah last night. Kate is coming this weekend to--" He blinked. "You probably don't remember who Kate is."

  "The one who had amnesia, right?"

  He smiled, and I was glad I'd remembered because I loved the way happiness lit up his eyes. "You got it. Anyhow, she's coming to see Hannah, and I want to see her."

  "Okay," I said slowly, not sure where I fit in.

  He shrugged. "I can't talk to Jennifer, but I can talk to Kate. It's not the same, but I feel like finding out if Kate hates me for what I might have done will make me feel better."

  I considered this. If she did hate him, I couldn't imagine it would make him feel better, but then again at least he would no longer be in doubt. If Christophe had seen me in New York, even if he'd told me his whole motive in attacking me had been to hurt me I would have had some closure. I hated that I didn't have any now.

  "It might not," he admitted, "but I just have to do something. I'm stuck right now and I hate it."

  "I get it."

  "Do you think I'm crazy?"

  "No more than usual."

  We laughed and he said, "I'll take it."

  After a few seconds of silence I said, "What do you want me to do, though? I can't help you with Kate, I've never met her."

  "No, but you can help me before and after. I haven't seen her since we had our last fight and..." He shrugged. "It'll be her and her husband, and I just feel like it'd be easier if you were there."

  The vulnerability in his voice, the way it cracked on 'easier', touched my heart. "Then I'm there. Where and when?"

  "Thank you," he said softly. "I'll let you know. We're still arranging it over email."

  "Got it." A thought occurred to me. "But I have a condition."

  He chuckled. "You already agreed, you can't add a condition now."

  "Watch me," I said, smiling at him. The smile faded, though, as I put my condition into words. "If I ever try to see Christophe again, or have to talk to him, I would like you to be there. Or at least around," I added quickly, since he would almost certainly not want to go to Rikers Island with me.

  He held out the hand not holding his coffee. "Deal."

  We shook hands, and smiled at each other.

  Then we sat in silence, still holding hands, for a long moment.

  "I'm glad you came to Toronto," he said eventually.

  "Yeah." I stared down at our entwined hands, loving how they felt together and wishing more intensely than I ever had before that I was ready to move on. "Me too."

  He gave my hand a squeeze and let me go. "We'd better get to work, though, or Rhonda won't be glad."

  I smiled at him, trying to recover from the longing I felt. I'd been right in what I told my new friends at breakfast: Jake was a good man. I felt sure of it. But I just couldn't let myself take the final step and trust him completely. "I'm waiting for Mike. I don't have to do nothing until he gets here."

  Jake laughed. "Does he know his editor mangles the language like that?"

  "He and me have talked about it," I said breezily, and Jake laughed harder then said, "There he is. Or is it 'there he are'?"

  We got to our feet, and I said, "Beats me," and had just enough time to smile at Jake before Mike called, "Hey, there, queen of the editors. Ready to get to work?"

  "She's having grammar issues today," Jake said as he neared us. "Watch yourself."

  "I ain't having no issues," I said, then laughed at Mike's shudder, and we walked into the building together speaking in the most error-filled ways we could manage.

  Mike and I went straight to the conference room, still chuckling over our disastrous sentences, but soon our amusement was gone.

  "I really do think you need to do something with that part," I said, for the fourth time. "You have that woman skipping off into another relationship right after her physical wounds heal from the attack, and that just doesn't work."

  "But it should work," he insisted. "She deserves to be happy and that relationship makes her happy."

  "It does, but it's way too soon. She's got to figure out how to trust people again and you don't even touch on that. Even if you showed her trying to trust him and having trouble, that would make it better. But you act like the assault shouldn't have changed her and of course it did."

  "But it shouldn't have!"

  He almost shouted the words at me, and we stared at each other as they rang through the room.

  I took a deep breath, trying to decide if I really wanted to do what I thought I wanted to do. Could I, should I, tell him about my past? I'd felt good with him right from the start so I wanted to let him use my experience to make his book more realistic. But did I want to share my story with the kind of person who could invent such horrors? What if he used it against me?

  "Alexa, I'm sorry."

  The misery in his voice made me decide. Somehow, I felt sure I could trust him and I was going to. "Here's t
he thing, Mike. I was..." I cleared my throat, and he looked at me, startled. I tried again. "Mike, two years ago I was the victim of an attack like this one. Your character was taken by a coworker, and my attacker was my boyfriend, but it's the same kind of thing. The same kind of shocking unexpected violation. And..."

  Mike rubbed his forehead. "And so you know my character can't be ready to trust yet, because..."

  I nodded. "Because I'm not. Not completely. Not like how you showed her."

  We sat in silence for a moment. I didn't regret telling him, but I also didn't know how he'd react.

  "Damn," he said softly. "I was hoping writing that would make it true."

  I looked up, confused, and my eyes widened at the tears in his. "Mike?"

  "You can't trust completely, but I..." He swallowed hard. "I can't trust at all."

  His meaning hit me like a thunderbolt. "Are you saying..." I touched the printed manuscript page before us with a fingertip. "This happened? To you?"

  He gave one gasping sob then nodded hard before dropping his head into his folded arms on the table.

  Shocked and horrified, I hugged him tight then realized maybe I shouldn't have and whispered, "Is this okay?"

  In answer, he grabbed hold of my arm and held me in place.

  He clung to me and cried almost silently for several minutes before he cleared his throat and muttered, "Sorry."

  "No need to apologize."

  He raised his head, and his wet eyes softened when he looked at me. "See, that's why I don't wear mascara."

  I gave a choked laugh and wiped the tears and smudged makeup from my face, my heart still hurting for him in the way that had made me cry with him. I understood even more now why Jake had wanted to hug me in Union Square. "That's the only reason?"

  He batted his eyelashes at me. "That and I don't need it. Not with these beauties."

  We smiled at each other, then sobered at once.

  "Mike, I don't want to push but--"

  He shook his head, cutting me off. "I think I need to tell. If you'll let me."

  I remembered how telling Jake some of the details had made me feel freer, so I nodded though I was afraid to hear it.

  "It was my dad," Mike began softly. "From when I was very little. The details of the assaults are all true. The story around it I made up, but everything in there is something he did to me."

  My stomach twisted but I made myself relax. I wouldn't be any use to Mike if I started throwing up. "What happened? Did he end up in jail?"

  Mike sighed. "He died eighteen months ago. Car accident. I was planning to go confront him. I'd been working up the nerve for ages, since my sister had her baby boy and I started wondering if he would start in on the kid next. But before I could..." He shrugged.

  "Nobody else knew what he was doing?"

  He shook his head. "He was a planner." Just like Mike's protagonist. "He was careful and smart."

  And horrible. "For how long? How old were you?"

  Mike stared at the table. "Being raped by him is my earliest memory. How long? I left home when I was fifteen, after he--" He rubbed his hand over his forehead then his mouth.

  I took his other hand and squeezed it. "I'm so sorry. You don't have to say any more."

  "I do." He wrapped his free hand over mine. "When I was fifteen, he..." Mike turned his head to stare at the wall, so I didn't see his face when he said, "He caught me having sex with the boy next door," but I did hear the pain and fear in his voice.

  "He... you're..."

  "I'm gay. Yeah. And if Daddy hated me before, he sure hated me after that." He turned back to me and gave me a twisted smile. "It's unnatural, you know. Evil."

  "Well, he would know unnatural and evil," I said, shaking my head. No wonder Mike had been so adamant about not having a gay character.

  He managed a more relaxed smile. "True. Anyhow, I was left with no way to get closure. I couldn't confront him because he'd died, and nobody else knew and I couldn't tell. I tried therapy but I couldn't bring myself to say anything even to the therapist. She told me to try writing it, and I went home and started with that and never went back to her. The writing helped, and once it was done I decided to try to publish it because I thought it might help more people than just me."

  "You wrote it from his point of view, though. Why?"

  He looked at me like it was obvious. "Because I wanted to understand why he'd do that. What it felt like to hurt me like that. What he got out of it."

  The same questions I'd wanted to ask Christophe. "Did it help?" My voice came out in a whisper. "Do you understand now?" Maybe I should let Lance write my story from Christophe's point of view and--

  Even the thought sickened me, so I was relieved when Mike shook his head slowly. "I hated every second I spent in his head, and before long I didn't even want to understand. I didn't want to imagine I could be like that." He slumped against his chair's back. "God, Alexa, I can't believe I told you. I've never trusted anyone with it before."

  I sighed. "I trusted you, right at the beginning, and I hated that I did. How could I stand being near someone who could invent stuff like that? But I guess maybe on some level I knew..."

  I didn't want to say the rest, but he did. "Knew I'd lived it."

  I nodded. "Something like that."

  "And you did too."

  I nodded again.

  "And you're... you're starting to trust people?"

  I thought of Jake. And Howard and Carly. And Jillian and Megan and Jeanine. "I am. I pick wrong sometimes, but I'm learning how to recover from that too."

  His eyes filled with tears again. "I hope I do someday."

  I took his hand again. "You trusted me. That's a start."

  "Good point." He tightened his grip on my hand. "You're ahead of me in this recovery game. Mind if I follow along?"

  "I ain't got no problem with that," I said, and we laughed together through our tears.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Saturday afternoon, Jake and I walked along the wide path at the shore of Lake Ontario to use up the ten minutes before his appointment with Kate. We'd had lunch together, and at first he'd been friendly and funny like always but when we neared the end of the meal he'd gone quiet and I'd known he was getting nervous.

  He seemed even more nervous now, and I reached over and gave his shoulder a squeeze. "It'll be okay, Jake. It'll work out."

  He put his hand over mine. "I hope so. I just wish I knew it would help."

  "I know. But either way, it'll work out."

  He still looked so sad, and I hated seeing it, so I said, "Would a hug help?"

  He didn't answer, but he turned to me and pulled me close.

  I shut my eyes and rested my head against his chest and wished with all my heart that he'd get what he wanted and needed from seeing Kate.

  His hand slid lightly over my hair, sending unexpected shivers through me though I knew this wasn't that kind of hug. "Thank you," he said softly. "Thanks for being here."

  I tightened my arms around him. "Same to you."

  He stroked my hair again then released me, and I stepped back and said, "Well, should we head to where we're meeting Kate?"

  "Nope."

  I looked up at him, confused, and saw he was looking past me.

  I turned, and saw a heavily pregnant woman with blonde hair walking toward us. A blond man beside her carried an equally blond little boy.

  The woman smiled and called, "Fancy meeting you here. I guess we had the same idea for a little walk beforehand."

  We smiled back, but I noticed the man's cool expression didn't change.

  They reached us, and Jake said softly, "Hi, Kate."

  I heard the tension in his voice even on those two short words, and I shifted slightly so I was standing a little closer to him. I didn't want to be obvious, but I felt sure he needed the support.

  He moved even closer to me as she said, "I'm so glad you emailed, Jake. It's been ages. You remember my husband Ryan, I assume?"
/>   Jake nodded and held out his hand. After a second that seemed to last an eternity, Ryan shifted the child in his arms so he could shake Jake's hand.

  "And this," Kate said, ruffling the boy's hair and smiling as he giggled, "is our Henry." She looked back at Jake and said, "Henry Jake Merrill, to be precise."

  I glanced at Jake, but he looked too stunned to speak, so I said, "You gave him Jake's name?"

  She nodded. "Jake saved me. I don't know how much you know about my background but without him I don't know where I'd have ended up. Certainly not back with Ryan." She smiled at her husband, who managed a stiff smile in return. "I figured Henry could use a little of Jake."

  I nodded. I figured most guys could.

  She extended her hand to me. "I'm Kate, obviously."

  Jake startled beside me. "Sorry, I should have... this is my friend Alexa."

  We shook hands and she said, "Gorgeous day, isn't it? So, Jake, are we going to head off to talk?"

  He nodded, then turned to me. "You're okay on your own?"

  I'd told him several times during lunch that I would be just fine, but I smiled and said, "Absolutely. I'll meet you here in an hour, and if you need more time you'll text me. Right?"

  I looked into his eyes, trying to give him all the confidence and support I could before he left with her, and I saw him register it. He smiled and laid his hand on my shoulder. "Sounds like a plan. See you then."

  "Definitely."

  His hand tightened on my shoulder for an instant, then he let me go. He and Ryan nodded at each other and Jake left with Kate, walking off in the direction from which Kate and her family had come.

  An awkward silence landed on me and Ryan, but I didn't let it linger. "So, what are you and Henry going to do?"

  He turned to me, away from watching his wife leave. "There's a great playground nearby, so I think we're going to go there. You're welcome to come with us if you want."

  I felt sure he didn't mean it, and I didn't want to go anyhow. What on earth would we talk about for an hour? "Thanks, but I'll stay here and watch the water. Have fun, though."