That’s one way to break the spell. Cripple the woman. Ella tenderly places her foot down on the ground and forces a smile to her lips.
“Don’t worry about me. I’m all right.” Her eyebrows reach skyward as she searches my face.
The crowd we never noticed gathering around begins to scatter, some laughing and shaking their heads as I grab onto Ella and pull her into my arms. “I swear I was born with a couple left feet,” I murmur.
“Well, I don’t know about that.” She laughs. “I think you just need a good teacher. I can show you a few things.” She leans into me and my thoughts swirl to an entirely different kind of dance I’d like her to show me. One where she’s naked and horizontal.
“Besides, I’m completely fine,” she reassures me. “See?” Her fingers clutch my hand and she twirls out across the grass before twirling back into me. Without thinking I dip her back in my arms, leaning over her. I softly cover her plump lips with a tender kiss.
12
Ella
I surrender in his arms, parting my lips for him as his tongue slides into my mouth, exploring mine. An electric shiver runs through my body, down my spine, and tingles through my limbs as he holds me safe against him. His kiss is everything I could ever dream of. It’s actually better, because it’s real.
In the distance, I can hear a tune. My body reacts to it before my mind does, knowing it’s something I can’t ignore. I stand up and Jackson holds me against his firm body. Stepping back slightly, he kisses me once, twice on the lips and then on the forehead. My heart is racing with wild thoughts as my body aches for more of his touch.
I know this isn’t the place for that, but I can’t help but wish we were somewhere a little more private. Somewhere he could strip me down and cover my entire body in those kisses, sending jolts and vibrations through every cell until he sent an entirely different type of jolt through me. When he makes me his.
I sigh and open my eyes, finally hearing the distant tune come into focus just as my eyes start to see his rugged face clearly again. It’s my special ringtone for Sylvia! I jam my hand in my bag and yank out my phone.
“Hijueputa,” I curse in Spanish as my thoughts spin so fast they make me dizzy as I would be if I went on one of these rides. How did I miss seven text messages and a phone call? My voicemail is blowing up with what I’m sure are angry threats. I pull back from Jackson and see the last few texts across my screen.
Sylvia: home early, come get us.
Sylvia: where ru?
Sylvia: taking a fucking uber!!!!
I check the timestamp on that last message. Sylvia sent it almost twenty minutes ago! “Oh God, I have to go.” A cold sweat breaks over my hairline as I look up into Jackson’s confused eyes.
“You have to go? Now? What’s going on?” He looks down at my screen, but I pull it out of his sight.
I don’t have time to explain any of this. I can’t tell him the first thing about my life with Sylvia, let alone the fact that I’m basically wearing her stolen wardrobe and sneaking out behind her back. I can’t explain how she pretty much owns me, or how I disobeyed her. And I definitely can’t explain how much worse my life is about to get if she finds out any of this.
“I’m sorry. I just, I can’t.” I leave Jackson in shock as I race through the fairgrounds toward the gate.
“Ella, come back!” he calls out, but he doesn’t try to chase me down.
Good thing. I don’t have time to stop and explain this to him. I’ve got to get back to the house before Sylvia and Raymond return. There’s no telling what she’ll do if she gets there first and sees me strolling in wearing her expensive dress and shoes. I have a pretty good idea of how it would go, though. I’m not prepared to live my life as the sexual property of the highest bidder.
It’s only ten blocks to the house. I can get there before them if I run. I stop just outside the gate and rip my shoes off my feet. Clutching them tight in my hand, I scurry down the sidewalk, desperate to beat Sylvia to the house. Desperate to keep my life the same. Desperate to keep living under Sylvia’s rule.
13
Jackson
Before I can even blink, Ella has disappeared into the crowd, running away from me frantically. I rub my hand over the back of my neck and pace back and forth. I shouldn’t have kissed her like that. It was probably too much, too soon. Ella doesn’t seem like the kind of girl who jumps into bed on the first date and she probably thought that’s where I was trying to take this.
“Fuck!” I slam my fist into my palm and look up at the angry mother giving me the stink eye for swearing in front of her son. He must be about ten years old, so I doubt I’m saying anything he hasn’t heard, but I still know better. “Sorry.” I grimace at my outburst.
She doesn’t say a word, giving me the side-eye as she shuffles her kid off to another part of the fair. I jam my balled up hands in my pockets and kick the compacted dirt as I walk aimlessly through the crowd.
Maybe I can get a hold of her on Tinder, talk to her and make her understand that I just got swept up in the moment. I didn’t mean to frighten her off like a timid deer racing away from the edge of the busy freeway at night. I hate that I ruined such a fun first date. Especially one where I had a genuine connection.
I grit my teeth, setting my jaw as I swerve around hordes of people enjoying their nights. Some eating cotton candy. Some laughing and joking around. Some holding big stuffed animals they won at the games booth. I smirk as I remember my own embarrassing attempt to win Ella one of those. Even that humiliating defeat was a highlight of the night for me. Just being next to her, just watching her smile, watching her enjoy life, it made this entire night better than I could have ever imagined it would be.
I look up at the darkened Ferris wheel and come to a stop outside the barricade surrounding it. I’m not sure why I walked back here. I guess I wasn’t really paying attention to where my feet were taking me. Part of me was hoping that if I stuck around for a bit maybe Ella would come back and explain what I did that made her run away from me like that.
Leaning against the metal gate, I look inside in a daze, hating how stupid I was for ruining the one date I’ve had since I was in the SEALs. My gaze travels across the ground when a shimmering glint catches my eye. It’s hard to see from where I’m standing, but is it? It almost looks like a ring lying on the ground underneath the wheel.
My mind flashes to the ring Ella was fidgeting with as her nerves got the better of her. Is it possible that she dropped it? I check over my shoulders in each direction but don’t see any kind of cops or security guard who’s going to give me a hard time. Placing both palms flat on the barricade, I easily leap over the side and quickly walk over to where I saw the shiny jewelry on the ground.
As I approach, it’s plain to see that it’s the exact same ring. I pick it up, dusting it off on my shirt before putting it in my pocket. What are the odds? There’s something about her, about us, that makes me feel it was all meant to be somehow. I don’t mean I’m about to go call up a wedding planner or save my money for an engagement ring. Nothing like that. But, in a smaller way, this night was supposed to happen.
Until I fucked it up, that is.
“Hey, buddy, get out of there. The ride is closed, ya dipshit!”
I turn toward the angry carny yelling at me and take that as my cue to get the hell out of here. I jog across to the other side of the fencing and hop back out, heading straight out of the fair to the main gate.
Maybe when I give it back to her she’ll hear me out and give me another chance to show her I’m not some kind of hormonal teenager posing as a man. First things first, though, I need to get a hold of her and let her know I found her ring.
14
Ella
My bare feet slap against the hard pavement as I race toward the house. Little rocks dig into my soles as I sprint like a woman in a horror movie trying to outrun the monster. In a way, I am that girl. The monster I’m trying to outrun is the terrifying existence I
will have if I don’t beat Sylvia and Raymond home.
“Hey, watch it!” a random woman shouts at me as I brush past her, but I don’t have time to apologize. I don’t have time to do anything but run as fast as my thick legs and my beating heart will allow me to go. I know that the airport is only a half-hour drive from the house, so it will basically take a miracle for me to get there before them.
I pull the night air deep into my lungs and hold my shoes in one hand, my bag in the other, and pump my arms hard as I thump my feet against the sidewalk. Tender spots I’m sure will turn to blisters by morning are already forming. However, if a few blisters are my biggest problem tomorrow, I will be the luckiest girl in the world.
My thoughts grow unfocused as the memory of the night I escaped my country flashes behind my eyes. I ran with this same despair nipping at my heels, except that night it was literally a matter of life and death.
I can’t let my mind do this to me. I can’t think about that now. I didn’t risk everything to make it to the United States only to lose it like this. I kick up my speed, somehow finding a burst of energy I didn’t know I had, and dash across the last block to the house like an Olympian. I almost fall over onto the grass as I skid around the corner and up the driveway.
There’s no car here, but the Uber could’ve already dropped them off and left by now. I stand back up on my burning feet and climb the stairs to the side door, two at a time, and peer inside. There are no lights on in the house. I turn the knob on the door I left unlocked and tiptoe in over the threshold.
My soles are searing as I quickly make my way around the familiar furniture and stop dead in my tracks as headlights flood through the front window and eerily light up the room. They’re home. My muscles are frozen tight, like my fear has turned my legs to stone.
“Move, Ella,” I hiss and take the final painful steps to my room. I chuck Sylvia’s Jimmy Choo shoes under my bed along with the bag and dive in under my covers, tugging them up over the dress I borrowed from her closet for the night, and try to get my breathing under control. Sweat is dripping off my forehead as I hear Sylvia and Raymond walk into the house.
“Ella! Ella, you answer me right now! I called you a million times to come and get us.” Two sets of footsteps clomp down the hall, coming closer with every step to my room.
I quickly wipe my head on my sheet, pulling it tight up around my neck. I close my eyes and pray she doesn’t come in here. That she doesn’t find me wearing her clothes, sweating like a race horse. Please don’t come in here, please.
“Ella, what on earth are you doing?” My door opens and I gulp, playing dead, or at least pretending to sleep as light slides in across my room.
“Is she sleeping?” Raymond’s dim voice bounces off my eardrums.
“Ella!” Sylvia yells at me, but I don’t move. I just keep my eyes shut and my body perfectly still. Inside I’m pleading with God to send her on her way, but I’m pretty sure I’m completely screwed.
“Look, she’s all red and sweaty. I think she’s sick or something,” Raymond talks from my doorway as they both watch me.
“Well, I’ll be talking to her about this tomorrow. Sick or not, she should answer her phone. Anyway, let’s get out of here. I don’t want her swine flu or whatever.” I can almost hear her eyes roll as she turns in a huff and the door clicks closed behind them.
Tears streak down my face as I look up at my ceiling. “Thank you,” I quietly sob. “Thank you!”
I lie in my bed, perfectly still until I hear Sylvia plop down in the living room and turn on the television. “Ray-ray, come here. My show is on and I need a foot rub,” she beckons him like a dog. Of course, he complies. He knows the score. His comfortable lifestyle comes with a price and, if I were a betting girl, I’d say he’s going to pay it tonight.
I ease back out of my bed and free myself from the sticky sweater and silky dress now coated with my sweat. I’ll deal with that tomorrow. For now, I just stuff it in the back corner under my bed and slip into my normal pajamas. Looking down at my wrist, I lightly trail my finger over the wristband Jackson bought for me to get into the fair.
My thoughts flicker through the images of this evening, like an old, nostalgic woman thumbing through a family album. I touch my lips as I remember his kiss, the way he tasted. My heart gallops again, but this time it has nothing to do with running.
“And I’ll never see him again.” The words physically hurt to utter. They catch in my throat and tear out my heart. I wrap my fingers around the band and tear it free from my wrist, shoving it under my mattress before I climb back into bed.
My phone!
Hopping up, I drop down on my belly, stretching underneath my bed for the purse I tossed under there earlier. Fishing it out with my outstretched fingertips, I yank my phone out of the main pocket and open it up. It takes a second, but I remember the way Julianna showed me to delete the apps and I wipe them from existence.
Sighing with relief, I go back to bed and let my tense body slowly unwind as I relax against the mattress. My mind swirls with a cyclone of memories from the night, all of them so surreal, I already feel like I’m dreaming before I even close my eyes to rest.
15
Jackson
“Yeah, man, it’s the weirdest thing.” I watch as Ryan packs up the saddlebags on his Harley. “I have no idea how to get a hold of her besides Tinder, and her profile has just disappeared. I had the best night with an amazing woman and now I lost her somehow.” I tug her ring out of my pocket and admire it in my palm. “Just like she lost this.”
“I’ve never heard of anything like that before.” Ryan cinches down the straps on his bag and double-checks to make sure they’re adjusted properly before he swings his leg over and settles in on the seat. “I don’t know what to tell ya. That’s strange,” he agrees.
“Don’t go yet,” Chloe yells frantically from the front step, waving a sheet of paper in her hand.
Mom walks down the steps with her and leads her over to where Ryan is all set to go on his bike in the driveway.
My daughter skips over to my side, flapping her sheet in her hand like a flag, then thrusts it out toward Ryan. “Take it,” she demands.
“What’s this?” He plucks the paper free from her grasp and smiles down at it. “Oh, you painted me a picture?”
“Uh-huh.” She beams proudly. “I painted it all by myself and even used my sparkly paint,” she announces. “What do you think it is?” She looks at him expectantly and his eyebrows shoot up comically as his lips twist to the side and he studies the black blobs with tiny streaks of orange on the tops.
“Ummm.” Ryan looks over at me for help, but I don’t have the first clue.
“It’s the blackbirds!” She jumps up and claps her hands together gleefully. “One named Peter and one named Paul,” she explains.
“Oh, of course they are. You did a great job painting them. Wow!” Ryan nods solemnly, looking over the crinkly page like he’s studying a fine art exhibit.
“I know.” Chloe randomly twirls in a circle and then stares straight at Ryan. “I got some paint on my hands, though.” She drops her voice, like she’s confiding a secret. “But that’s okay. Nana said artists get messy and I am an artist,” she proclaims proudly, puffing out her chest as her big blue eyes sparkle.
“Yes, you are,” Ryan agrees. “I’ll keep this with me right here.” He folds the sheet and places it inside his leather jacket. “Because it’s just so special, okay?”
“Uh, okay.” Chloe looks up at the sky, already much less interested in this conversation than she was a minute ago. Something else has already caught her attention.
“All right, I’m heading out. It was great meeting you, Marie.” Ryan smiles at my mother and she stands up a bit taller. Wait, is she wearing makeup? Mom never wears makeup.
“The pleasure was all mine.” She titters like some kind of shy school girl, not like my silver-haired mother. Red flushes her cheeks and I glare over at my friend with s
uspicion.
Ryan shrugs and revs up his motorcycle as I push ideas of my mother having some kind of inappropriate crush on my old SEAL buddy out of my mind. I won’t even let myself think of anything more inappropriate than that going on here. I’d have to bleach my brain.
Mom gives a little wave and then walks over to where Chloe has begun picking the last of the wildflowers and dandelions from the side of the driveway.
“I’m gonna pick you some flowers, Nana! Aren’t they soooo pretty?”
“They are,” Mom agrees, smiling at her with the pure joy that comes with being a grandparent.
“Hey, man, thanks for this. I had a great time,” Ryan talks loudly over the roar of his Harley engine. “About the girl, the only thing I can think of is that when you lose something, they always say to retrace your steps. Maybe she lives around the fairgrounds and she’ll be searching around there too? I dunno. It’s worth a shot maybe.” He shrugs and flips the visor on his helmet down before backing out of the driveway.
“Buh-bye!” Chloe yells and waves both of her hands wildly over her head, hopping around the front yard at the same time.
As I watch Ryan drive away his words echo in my mind. Retrace your steps. That is the advice they always give when you lose something. And... Ella lost her ring! I jam my hand into my pocket and pull out the band. I wonder if she’ll retrace her steps to try to find it. The idea floats up inside me like a red helium balloon into a sunny autumn sky. The sheer joy it brings me is enough to let me know what my plans are for tonight.
Retrace my steps. That’s exactly what I’ll do.
16
Hot, Quick & Dirty: 12 Steamy Short Stories Page 45
