Sin for Me

by Jackie Ashenden

  The apartment door closed, and he made himself count to one hundred, very, very slowly.

  It was only when silence had blanketed the apartment, the deep, empty silence of absence, that he let himself move. Going over to the sideboard where he kept his liquor. There was a half-empty bottle of bourbon standing on it, the glass cool against his palm as he picked it up by the neck.

  Then he flung it against the wall with all his strength.

  It smashed into a million pieces.

  Just like his heart.

  * * *

  Zoe couldn’t see as she walked down the sidewalk, but that had more to do with the fact that her glasses had fogged up and her eyes were full of tears, rather than her shitty eyesight. Her chest hurt too, like someone had punched her hard right over her heart. No, scratch the had punched her part. They were still punching her, over and over, like they wanted to break her ribs.

  Every part of her wanted to turn around and go back, race up the stairs, fling herself into Gideon’s arms, and tell him she wasn’t leaving after all. That all she wanted was to stay here in Royal, with him.

  Yet she didn’t. She kept on walking.

  He hadn’t said the words that deep down she’d wanted to hear, the words she’d told herself didn’t matter, the words that the lost, lonely part of her had wanted to hear her whole life.

  But no one had ever said them to her. Not her mother. Not her father.

  Not Gideon.

  If he’d said them, she would have stayed and nothing would have made her leave him. But he hadn’t and so now, here she was, walking down the sidewalk away from him. Away from Royal. Away from the only place that had ever felt like home.

  She blinked fiercely, wiping away the tears with shaking fingers, swallowing them back.

  She really had no idea where she was going to go, but it wasn’t to Princeton, that was for sure. She’d go somewhere else. Somewhere where no one knew her—which wasn’t difficult since everyone who knew her was right here in Royal.

  The streets were full of lunchtime traffic, the sun beginning to get hot, the air sticky and humid. A crowd of teenagers passed her, laughing and shouting to one another.

  She gripped her bag tighter, a great, gaping emptiness opening up inside her. It was familiar, that emptiness. She’d felt it a lot when she’d been young, shipped around to different foster homes, another unwanted, unloved kid. The emptiness had stayed even when her mother had come back and Zoe had gone back to live with her, eating a big hole in the middle of heart.

  The only time she didn’t feel it was when she was with Gideon.

  Her jaw tightened.

  Okay, so it hurt. And okay, she felt like she was dying inside. But she was doing what she had to do to protect the people she loved. She had to take some comfort in that. Anyway, she’d survived this long without hearing those words, she could keep on surviving. Even if it meant an empty life without Gideon in it.

  Zoe lifted her chin, blinked away the tears, and stuck out her hand as a cab began to approach. It slowed, then pulled over to the curb. She tugged open the door and climbed inside, shutting it behind her.

  The others were going to be pissed she hadn’t said good-bye, but that was too bad. Saying good-bye to Gideon had used up her meager store of courage. She had nothing left.

  “Where to, sweet thing?” The taxi driver, an old guy who looked eighty if he was a day, gave her an inquiring look in the rearview mirror.

  “The airport,” Zoe said.

  As they drove out of Royal, she didn’t look back.

  Chapter 17

  A week later, in a crummy bar off the Strip in LA, Zoe looked up at the TV screen above the bar to see her father’s face plastered all over the national news.

  The guy who was trying to chat her up faded into the background as she stared in shock at the TV. Oliver Novak, prominent businessman and senatorial candidate, had been arrested on suspicion of various crimes from extortion to tax evasion to attempted murder, or so the talking head on the screen said. Then there was a clip of her father being escorted out of his Grosse Pointe mansion by two officers, his hands in cuffs behind his back, his expression stony.

  Zoe went cold, knowing exactly what must have happened. Gideon had ignored her and gone to the police anyway.

  The stupid, stupid asshole.

  The guy next to her was still talking, but she’d long since ceased to listen, hauling her phone out of her pocket and looking down at the screen. There were no texts. Shit.

  Opening a new text message to Rachel, she typed in a quick question, hesitating only a moment before hitting send.

  She’d only made contact with the others once since she’d taken the first plane out of Detroit. It had gone to Atlanta, but she hadn’t stayed there, taking yet another flight bound for LA. She’d stepped out of the terminal at LAX and into the baking heat of a Californian summer, so bright she had to blink back tears. Yeah, it had definitely been the sun, not the homesickness.

  Waiting for a bus, she’d switched her phone off flight mode, and predictably it started vibrating like crazy from all the missed calls and voice mails and texts.

  She’d ignored them all, unable to deal with them, in the end settling on sending one text to Rachel. I’m sorry I didn’t say good-bye. Tell the others I’m okay. I’ll let you know if anything changes.

  Rachel had sent her a reply, a demand to be told what was going on and where Zoe was, but she’d ignored that, too.

  She couldn’t face them. Just couldn’t. If she was going to live her life without the others in it, then she had to put them behind her. It was the only way she could cope.

  For a whole week she’d done exactly that, spending her time exploring the city, filling up the emptiness inside her with sightseeing, spending at least one whole day at Disneyland, the next on the beach at Santa Monica, looking at the sea for the first time in her life.

  It hurt, sitting on the sand alone, staring at the blue ocean in front of her. Because there should have been someone next to her, holding her hand. There should have been someone to slide his arm around her and hold her close. There should have been a warm chest to lay her head against so she could listen to the beat of his heart and surround herself with the familiar scent of engine oil and leather and smoke.

  But there wasn’t.

  Her decision. Her choice. And it fucking sucked.

  The guy chatting her up now was supposed to be her Gideon cure, but she suddenly didn’t give a shit about him, her whole awareness centered on the phone sitting on the bar next to her.

  Eventually it vibrated back, and she snatched it up, looking down to read Rachel’s reply.

  Gideon went to the police. He worked out some kind of deal, which means he doesn’t have to do time. Where the hell are you and when the fuck are you coming home?

  For a second she stared down at the text glowing on the screen, her heart racing, her hands shaking with relief. Then, hard on the heels of the relief came the anger.

  Jesus Christ, what was his deal? She’d told him he didn’t have to do that. Her leaving had been supposed to save him and he’d gone ahead and handed himself in anyway.

  Which kind of means you left for nothing.

  Yeah, it really did, didn’t it? Her agonized choice. The ripping feeling in her chest as she’d walked away from him. The empty hollowness inside her that had been there ever since she’d left Detroit.

  All for nothing.

  He’d been going to do it all along, and yet he’d only put up a token protest when she’d told him she was leaving. Hadn’t argued when she’d said she was doing it to save him. He’d let her believe that what she was doing was the right thing for all of them.

  That had been the thing she’d clung to over the past week, the only thing that had made it bearable. Knowing that by leaving, she’d helped the others. She’d saved Gideon. But now . . .

  Now what? Don’t make this all about you and your choices. What about him? He was prepared to go to prison for
you, while all you had to do was sit on the beach for a week....

  She swallowed, staring at the screen in front of her, at Rachel’s text blurring in front of her eyes.

  Shit. He’d done so many things for her. He’d come back to her over and over again when she’d been a child, his visits the one bright thing in the world she had to look forward to, and he’d never not come when he’d said he would. He’d never not turned up. Even when she’d gone back to live with her mother, even when he was so much older than her, those visits had continued. He’d remained her friend, the one person she could count on, the one person she knew would listen to her. He’d given her hugs when she’d been small and afraid. His had been the ear she’d poured her troubles into when she’d had problems at school. He’d given her wordless comfort when things with her mother had gotten bad.

  He’d been there for her.

  Then he’d finally taken her away, to Detroit. Spending thirteen years of his life keeping her hidden and safe . . .

  She felt like someone had kicked her hard in the stomach, all the breath suddenly going out of her.

  He didn’t have to take her with him when he’d left Chicago. He had money, he had prospects, no matter what he thought. The world had been his oyster, and yet he’d given all of that up to protect a lonely young girl.

  Now he’d done it again. Risking jail time to make sure the man who’d threatened her was taken out of the picture for good.

  Her eyes burned, Rachel’s text blurring completely. Who was worth that kind of sacrifice? Certainly she wasn’t.

  “Hey, are you okay?” The guy next to her sounded concerned. “You had some bad news or something?”

  Unable to look at him, she shook her head. “No, I just . . . I just have to go. I’m sorry.” She slipped off the barstool, heading straight for the exit without turning around.

  Outside the night was thick with heat and neon, the gritty streets reminding her of Royal for some reason, even though they were completely different. The sidewalk was packed with people all out for a night on the Strip, the street full of cars.

  Zoe joined the stream of human traffic, not knowing where she was going, only knowing that she had to move, had to fill her lungs with air or else she was going to suffocate.

  She’d walked away from him, so full of the importance of her sacrifice for him and for the others, all the while secretly hoping he’d tell her to stay. That he’d say the words she’d wanted to hear from him for so long. But he hadn’t said anything; he’d just let her go. Then he’d turned around and made his own sacrifice. Without a word. As if the possibility of at least fifteen years in jail didn’t matter to him in the slightest.

  She wrapped her arms around her middle, a large boulder sitting dead center on her chest.

  He’d let her walk away from him and she had. She hadn’t bothered to ask him why, when he’d been so possessive earlier. She’d been too sore, too hurt, concentrating on the fact that he hadn’t given her what she wanted.

  She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, oblivious to the curses from other people as they dodged to avoid her.

  Shit. So for all her realizations about how she needed to grow up, how she needed to treat him as a partner, a man, and not demand stuff from him like a child, in the end, that’s exactly what she’d done.

  Why? What the hell was wrong with her?

  Zoe gripped herself tighter, forcing herself to move on, to keep walking.

  She had to do something, had to give him something back for everything he’d done for her. Something real this time, without wanting anything for herself. Except she didn’t know what that could be. The only thing she had to give him was her love, and that could never be enough, not to make up for what he’d given her. What he’d sacrificed for her.

  She was, after all, only a girl who nobody wanted. A girl who had nothing to offer anyone except herself, and that certainly had never been enough.

  Oh, come on. He came back to you, time and time again. He gave up years of his life for you. Do you think he’d do that for anyone?

  Her heart began to speed up, thumping loudly in her head.

  She had no answer to that, yet she couldn’t deny the facts. He had come back to her. Over and over. And she’d never stopped to think about why that was. Why a teenager years older than she was would want to spend time with a child. Why a man would want to spend time with a teenage girl.

  Oh sure, there were creepy reasons, but Gideon wasn’t that sort of guy and he never had been. He was her friend, that was all. And yet . . .

  Maybe she did do something for him. Maybe she helped him in some way. Maybe . . . whatever she had to offer would be enough.

  Does it matter if it is?

  Slowly this time, Zoe came to a stop, staring sightlessly at the crowds of people flowing around her like the water of a stream flows around a rock.

  No. It didn’t matter.

  She didn’t matter.

  The only thing that did was Gideon.

  He had come back to her, always.

  Maybe it was time she came back to him.

  * * *

  “Hey, seven o’clock tonight. Gino’s. Remember?” The sound of Rachel’s footsteps rang as she came down the metal stairs from the office.

  Gideon didn’t look up from the engine sitting on the workbench. “Yeah, yeah. I remember.”

  Rachel had been filling in for him since Zoe had gone, and although he was thankful for her help, he hadn’t so much enjoyed the worried glances she kept shooting in his direction whenever she thought he wasn’t looking.

  Even the endless questioning in the tiny room at the police station hadn’t been as bad. Or the shouting he’d had to put up with from the others when they’d realized what he’d done the day after Zoe had left.

  Yeah, they’d been pissed, as they’d had every right to be. Though luckily the DA had offered him a deal—all the info he had on Novak, plus anything on a few other guys the police had been after. Being an informant didn’t exactly lead to a long life expectancy, but it was better than life in prison. And he’d been given anonymity by the police, plus organizing a few things on his own with various contacts of his. If anyone came after him, they’d be in for a nasty surprise.

  No, it was his friends who were more likely to kill him, and when he’d told them what he’d done, he’d almost been sorry he hadn’t taken a jail term. Especially when Levi had almost thrown a swing at him.

  Of course it wasn’t only about what he’d done in terms of Novak.

  It was also about Zoe.

  They all missed her acutely, and he knew that Levi and Zee at least blamed him for the way she’d taken off. That was okay with him. They could hate him for that. But he didn’t regret it.

  She was off seeing the world, and that was as it should be.

  “You okay?” Rachel had stopped near the bench, and he could feel the back of his neck prickling under her anxious gaze.

  “I’m fine,” he said shortly, even though he wasn’t fine. Not at all.

  There was a hole inside him, the hole that had always been there, ever since he’d been a little boy coming in from school one day to find his mother dead. A hole that afterward he’d kept filled with hate and with anger. Until Zoe. Who’d smiled at him the first time he’d met her and all the other times since. Who’d flung out her arms to him without hesitation whenever he’d visited.

  Who’d made him feel good.

  Who’d filled the hole inside him with laughter.

  Who was now gone.

  So no. He wasn’t fucking fine.

  “Sure?” Rachel persisted.

  The wrench he was using slipped, his fingers banging painfully against the hard metal of the engine’s casing. He cursed. Fucking thing.

  “Hey,” Rachel said, “look, I’ve been meaning to tell you, but Zoe—”

  “Don’t.” The word was flat and cold, but he couldn’t make it sound any different. “Just don’t, Rach. I don’t wanna know.” And he didn’t.
The mere sound of her name opened that hole inside him wider, and he couldn’t let it get any bigger than it was already. Because if it did . . . Jesus, he didn’t know what he’d do.

  She gave a soft sigh. “Okay. I hear you. Just . . . We’re here for you, Gideon. You know that.”

  Finally, he lifted his head and met her worried gaze. He couldn’t give her the smile he knew she wanted, but at least he could show her he appreciated the sentiment. “I do know. And I’ll be okay. I promise.”

  She looked like she was going to say something else, but then, thank Christ, she only lifted a shoulder and stepped away. “Great. Well, I’ll see you tonight. The final plans look amazing and Levi’s really excited to show everyone.”

  He wished he could feel more excited about them himself, but he didn’t. He couldn’t even pretend. So he only nodded before looking back down at the shitty little engine he was trying to fix and waiting until her footsteps died away and the door clanged shut. And he was finally alone.

  Then he picked up the wrench and threw it violently against the wall.

  But of course that didn’t make any difference.

  Fuck’s sake. Get a handle on your shit. Throwing things at walls doesn’t help.

  No, it didn’t. When he felt like this, the only thing that helped was Zoe. That was why he’d always been circling back to her for nearly half his life, coming back to her again and again, because she filled the hole, eased the pain. Showing him a better way. She was always there, always waiting for him.

  Except this time she was the one who’d gone and he was the one waiting, and he didn’t know how to deal with it. He didn’t know how to wait. Didn’t know what he should do with the void in the center of his life.

  A Zoe-shaped void.

  She’d been his constant for so long that now that she was gone, he didn’t know how to be. Christ, he was a fool.

  He pushed himself away from the workbench, deciding to give up for the day. Cleanup took him half an hour, and then he was locking the garage behind him and heading upstairs to the apartment.