And now I sit waiting for him to come home, my heart leaping with every imagined sound. I’ll never know if he watched. Maybe he hires someone else to do it. Maybe he doesn’t care what I do. I could touch myself all day long and it wouldn’t matter.
Maybe. But I don’t think so.
This sickness between us has lasted too long. There’s something there. It’s twisted and terrible, but no matter what I do, I can’t kill it. I can only use it to try to survive.
That night, he drops off my dinner of roasted chicken and grilled vegetables and leaves with barely a grunt of greeting. He won’t even look me in the eye. My heart falls as he turns and walks out.
I almost yell out for him. Please don’t leave me in this cold, silent room. I’ll die if you do.
But I’m done begging. No more pounding my fists and crying. I’m finished putting on eyeliner and lipstick and singing stupid 80’s songs.
From now on, I’ll be silent. If he wants a reaction, he won’t get one. I’ll live on what he gives me. Silence and isolation.
Later that night when the house is dark and I’m lying in bed, he comes into my room.
He comes in almost every night. I lie awake and wait for him.
I listen for the turn of the door handle. His quiet footsteps. The rustle of his clothes as he leans down beside the bed to pick up my ballet slippers.
Tomorrow they’ll be facing the opposite direction. The door to the bathroom will be closed just an inch. The red lipstick Coral left will be in a different drawer.
For a second I’ll wonder why, and then I’ll remember. It’s a message.
In here, my perceptions belong to him. He decides what reality is. I don’t have control over anything. Even the things that aren’t supposed to matter.
I can see him in the bathroom, touching my robe and towel. He looks so…tender. Like part of him is capable of caring.
In the months after James died, when I stalked Bram Russell online every night because I couldn’t sleep, I searched for clues to who he was. For something that would make him seem human.
I learned that his parents were dead and he had no living relatives. His job history was listed in vague terms that gave me the creeps, like “government services” and “educational consulting.” In months of searching, I uncovered only one picture of him with a woman. It was blurry and dim, but I had no doubt it was him. She had dark golden skin and long black hair, and his arm was wrapped around her shoulders. He was smiling. He looked happy. She was gazing up at him as if he ruled her world.
Once, he had a shred of a heart. I don’t know if he does anymore.
He sits against the wall under the window and watches me pretend to sleep. He doesn’t know I’m pretending. Or does he? Are we both part of the same charade?
My skin aches to be touched. I don’t just need him for food and someone to talk to. I want to see him. To hear his voice and his praise. Which only makes me hate him more.
I can smell him from here. Without the distraction of books and music, my perceptions are like an animal’s. I breathe in his hot skin and dark, earthy cologne, his breath and his cock. The scent is so delicious my mouth waters. It makes me wet. I bite my lip to keep from moaning.
A leaf swirls by the moonlit window above his head. The tiny red light on the camera – a barely visible pinpoint – floats in space on the ceiling.
His advantage. When it suits him.
I sit up in the dark. I’m naked except for the sheet pulled up to my chest.
He sits straighter against the wall. He’s surprised to see me awake.
“Hi,” he says.
Hi. As if he didn’t creep into my room at midnight to fuck with my head.
“I’m just wondering something,” I say. “Since you seem so good with video cameras.”
He turns his face slowly toward the ceiling. “So you’ve been performing for me.”
“You’ve been watching.”
“Obsessively.”
“Why?”
“Why?” His voice is low and gruff. “You were suicidal a week ago. You’re in my house. I have a responsibility to watch over you.”
“Watch over me, or watch my body?”
“Both.” He rests his forearms on his knees. Even from here, I can see his shadowed gray eyes. “We came together, Grace. Did you know that? While you were touching that drenched little pussy, I was in my office jerking off with you. I timed it perfectly. It was fucking beautiful.”
He’s seen everything. He’s watched me cry and sleep and touch myself. It’s violating, and horribly comforting. I want to reach for him, to quench the aching loneliness.
“I bet it hasn’t failed once,” I say.
His voice is deathly quiet. “Excuse me?”
“The camera you’ve been using to watch me. I’m just wondering why it’s so reliable, while the one at your front door died that night.”
He doesn’t say a word. He sits and watches me until my neck prickles and my mouth is dry.
“You know why, Grace.”
My insides feel hollow. “No, I don’t.”
I shrink back into the sheets as he stands up. His powerful figure steps close to the bed and looms over me. His arms are crossed, his bare feet planted apart.
“You lie so fucking well,” he says.
“I’m not lying.” I hate my small, meek voice.
He lets out a soft laugh. “What a con job. The innocent girl and her poor boyfriend. He made one little mistake by following me and paid for it with his life.” Bram’s features twist in the moonlight. “And I fucking protected you.”
“You protected me,” I repeat in a stunned monotone.
His eyes are two fiery black holes. “Do you know what I saved you from? Do you have any idea?”
My mind spins in sickening circles. Protected me. Saved me. It feels like an upside-down world where nothing make sense.
I shake my head. “Please, Bram –”
He interrupts me by walking out. He comes back a minute later and points something at the ceiling. It’s a remote. The tiny red eye of the camera goes black.
I lie frozen in bed, my heart pounding. Bram sets the remote on the nightstand.
“I was wrong to monitor you without telling you,” he says. “I’m sorry.”
He doesn’t sound sorry. He voice makes me shiver.
“Okay,” I say. “Thank you.”
“Promise me you won’t hurt yourself.”
“I won’t. I promise.”
He presses the pad on the wall and the door opens. His silhouette towers in the moonlight. My whole body yearns for him, for just one touch.
“You know, I told myself I was watching over you while you were alone,” he says. “But the fact is – you’re beautiful. I just loved looking at you, Grace.”
He turns, and the door closes quietly behind him.
Bram
When I brought Grace into my life, I should have known everything would change. Even the past wouldn’t stay the same.
I’m at work, in the umpteenth meeting about the merger. Sitting around the table are the heads of every department – finance, logistics and training, IT. Fritz sits at the head. I’m the only one not sitting. I lean against the wall with my arms crossed, wishing I were in my office watching Grace.
Not that I can trust what I see. She knows now, and nothing she does will be innocent. It hasn’t been for days.
I was shocked when she confronted me. Shocked at her strength after days of isolation. Most women would have begged for comfort. She wanted the truth, just like I want from her. Neither one of us would budge.
I lost control. She pushed and I pushed back. In two minutes, I ruined a week of gains. The camera splintered her trust, and I smashed what was left.
This morning I brought her breakfast. Eggs and toast. She always cleans her plate, but today she left most of it behind.
“Not hungry?” I asked.
Her eyes were huge and scared. “No.”
I wanted to tell her that I understood. That I know why she lied. But I can’t if she won’t admit that she did.
I left her room without saying a word. I finished the rest of her eggs standing at the counter in the kitchen, and for some reason, she seemed so human to me at that moment. A lost girl who’d been hurt and made mistakes. Just like I had.
I think of my laptop on my desk, and crave a glimpse of Grace. Even if it’s all a show, I’ll take it. Even when she tries to fake it, she can’t help but be herself. That’s what’s so fucking alluring about her.
It takes all of my will to bring my focus back to the meeting. Cole, my head of IT, is just starting to speak.
“Signet called about the 2015 data breach, so I’ll be putting the documentation together,” he says. “That’s my life for the next week.”
Everyone in the room laughs but me and Fritz. Suddenly I’m on high alert.
The data breach. I thought that fiasco was long over. I haven’t thought about it in two years.
“How do they know about it?” I ask. I try to keep the stress out of my voice, but I sound like I’m ready to strike.
Cole looks down the table at me. “It was part of the disclosure between our departments.”
“Martin Yates decided it wasn’t a breach. He was before your time. He thought it was a software glitch.”
The room is tense and silent. Cole shifts nervously in his chair. “To prep for the merger, two forensics guys went over the incident and decided it was hacking. They’re writing up a report. They think we can figure out who did it.”
I exchange a glance with Fritz. “Is that so?”
“The good news is, the system’s been rock solid for two years. So Signet’s not worried. They just want an accounting of what happened for their lawyers.”
In other words, they want to see the data Martin and I labeled a software fuck-up and then buried. Not because we cared about publicity, but because there were operatives’ lives at stake. If the evidence got out, it could get one of my employees in another country killed. It might even now.
That was the point of the hacking in the first place. Fuck with me by putting people who worked for me in danger. Make their names public. Expose operations. Cripple Phantom and bring us down.
Unfortunately for Cole, the thought still enrages me. “‘Just an accounting?’” I say, everyone’s eyes riveted to me. “Is that what you call the identities of people in the field?”
“No, Sir,” Cole says. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize –”
“I want everything related to that incident classified,” I say. “Nobody sees it unless I sign off, and I don’t sign off on sending it to Signet’s lawyers.”
He nods. “Absolutely. Done.”
“Good,” I say. “Then it shouldn’t be a problem.”
Cole looks like he might puke. Fritz gives me a faint smile. I wish I could see the humor in the situation.
Shouldn’t be a problem.
Wouldn’t be, if I’d never answered that message.
I’ve reamed myself countless times for it. Wondered why I didn’t delete it. I don’t know how my contact information got out, but it’s hard to keep that stuff private. The email was so weirdly formal, I still remember some of the words. As an young engineer with deeply-held views, I admire your company’s mission, to establish a strong American standard...
It was a little too idealistic. Too starry-eyed. But he was obviously bright and his education was stellar. He knew a lot about me. He knew everything about the history of Phantom – how we’d expanded, the competition we’d crushed. He was thinking about my company’s role in the world, and that was more than most kids his age would do.
So I wrote back. This may disappoint you, but Phantom isn’t about a certain vision of America. It’s about providing an important service people need and doing it well. If you’re still interested in an interview, let me know.
He was, and I set it up for him. I’d been in his shoes. Striving. Trying to use my brain for good. I’d come from nothing and done plenty of shit work I was too smart for. I related to his ambition. I was happy to help.
Until the next week, when I met him. Two years ago last month.
My whole life changed, all because I got an email and decided to answer it. Sometimes things really do happen for no apparent reason, randomly.
But when I think of Grace waiting in her room in my house, my willing captive, the whole thing doesn’t seem random at all.
Grace
It must be Thursday, or maybe Friday.
I’m losing touch with everything but the shape of the room and the pattern of the stone walls. This morning when I woke up, I had to think for a second to remember my name.
Bram went to work after leaving with my half-eaten breakfast. I wanted to say something as he walked out, and I could tell he did, too. But neither of us did. I sat under the eye of the camera all day hoping he was watching me. It wasn’t much of a connection, but it was something.
It’s just getting dark when I hear the garage door go up. I jump to my feet. My heart is racing.
He’ll be here in half an hour. He thinks he’s unpredictable but he has patterns. I know them by now. He always brings my breakfast after his shower in the morning, when he smells like sandalwood and his hair is still wet. He brings my dinner once he’s changed clothes and the outside lights flip on.
I pace while I wait. I go to the bathroom and check my makeup for the fifth time, though I don’t know why I care. I should be making myself ugly and pathetic. Maybe then he’d pay me just to go away.
The sun goes down. The outside lights come on. My stomach starts to ache from hunger. But still he doesn’t come.
Is he all right? Is he still angry?
I brush my hair and stare in the mirror. I want to know why he thinks I’m a liar. What did I lie about? Who does he think I am?
I wasn’t part of James’s group, if that’s what he thinks. It always seemed kind of silly to me, anyway. When Bram’s lawyers brought it up during the trial, they treated me like I was part of it. As if I’m some subversive tech expert when I’m not busy planning weddings. He never even talked to me about it.
It was James who taught me about justice. It wasn’t just an abstract term to him. You really could make things right, he said, if you tried hard enough. Sometimes it took unusual tactics. Principles are everything, he used to say.
I used to believe him. After this week, I’m not sure anymore.
I’m on the edge of tears when I hear footsteps in the hall. I have to fight to keep from running to greet him. I’m afraid I’ll babble anything to be on his good side again.
I’m sorry for what I said about the camera. You only wanted to keep me safe. Please say everything’s okay.
Pitiful. Who am I? What’s happening to me?
The door opens and my heart soars before sinking. It isn’t Bram. It’s Coral.
“Hi, Grace.”
She gives me a quick smile and bustles into the room with a glossy shopping bag.
I’m so disappointed I can’t even say hello. “Where’s Bram?”
Her kitten heels click the floor as she walks toward me. She’s wearing a body-con dress that skims her curves and makes her pregnancy look sexy and elegant.
“You’re gaining weight,” she says, eyeing me from top to bottom. “These should fit perfectly then.” She reaches into the bag and pulls out a tissue-wrapped package.
“What’s happening, Coral?” I ask. “Why haven’t I seen Bram tonight?”
She gives me a reassuring smile. “You will.”
“When?”
Putting her hand on my shoulder, she looks directly into my eyes. “When he decides to come. He’s had a busy day.”
“But he’s always so consistent. He has a schedule. He –”
Putting an arm around my waist, she leads me to the bed. “Sit,” she says.
Smiling, she pulls items out of the bag and shows them to me. She starts with a tiny pair o
f pale pink and black satin panties, followed by a matching bra and garter belt. There are black silk stockings with a seam up the back, and strappy suede sandals with dark red bottoms.
They’re all so pretty. They’re the kinds of things I used to fantasize about wearing on my wedding night. When I’d be so sexy, James would have to have me.
“You bought these things?” I ask.
“Bram did.”
“You mean, he paid for them.”
“I mean, he went to the boutique this afternoon, picked everything out himself, and then paid for it. I’m just delivering it.”
My heart contracts as I imagine Bram in a lingerie store, listening to the salesgirl and looking through the racks. “How did he know my shoe size?”
“He measured your feet before you came to. He wanted to make sure you had everything you needed.”
“All I need is my life back.”
“That’s what you think you need.” She smiles. “I think you’ll love what he chose. Take off your robe.”
When I hesitate, she raises a brow at me. “Take it off, Grace.”
Unknotting the tie, I let the robe drop and stand flushing in front of her.
“Did you shower today?” she asks.
“This morning.”
“Good.” She leans forward and sniffs my neck. “I asked Bram if he wanted you to wear perfume, but he said no. He likes the way your skin smells.”
“Does he?” I glance down so she won’t see the pleasure in my eyes, but she knows.
“It’s a nice compliment, isn’t it?”
I nod. “What’s all this for? What’s going to happen tonight?”
“He didn’t tell me.”
“Do you get paid for your services?”
She lets out a gutsy laugh. “Bram doesn’t need to pay for my friendship.”
“Have you and he ever…?”
Her eyebrows lift. “Fucked? No. We like each other, but we’ve never had chemistry.”
“Why doesn’t he have a girlfriend?”
“He used to. It’s been a long time.”
Panties in hand, she bends down. I step into one leg hole and then the other. She pulls the panties smoothly up my legs and over my hips.
Breaking Grace Page 12
