The Debt

by Karina Halle

  It isn’t until we’re out in the hallway though that I’m not sure where we should go. It’s eleven p.m. and I’m still not sure why Jessica sought me out tonight.

  I look up the staircase to my flat and raise my brow at Jessica. “Do you want to come upstairs?”

  “I shouldn’t,” she says quickly, and it seems like she’s turning to leave, but she pauses, chewing on her lip while she watches my reaction.

  “You shouldn’t,” I repeat. “That’s not what I asked. I asked if you wanted to.” I nod my head toward the stairs. “You might want a nightcap after that tea. I have whisky.”

  I don’t want to seem forward. I don’t want to pressure her. But I can tell that she’s on the fence, that what she wants to do and what she thinks she should do are two completely different things. One might end with her in my bed, if not just the couch for a talk. The other will take her away from me, and as I said to myself before I got home, I’m not going to let her go so easily.

  “A whisky would be nice,” she says finally, eyeing me shyly. “Might help me wind down.”

  “Come on,” I tell her, motioning for her to follow me up the stairs. “I know I’m not supposed to ask, but do you need any help?”

  She tells me no and I watch her carefully as she climbs the stairs with ease.

  “I don’t know how you make it look so graceful,” I tell her while I unlock my door. I know I shouldn’t worry too much since the outer door is always locked, but paranoia sometimes gets the best of me.

  “Oh please,” she scoffs. “You should have seen me the other day in therapy.”

  I open the door for her. “I hate to play devil’s advocate again, but I’m sure it’s those sessions that make every day things look like such a breeze.” I gesture to the flat. “Welcome to my humble abode.”

  She comes in and glances around. The previous owner left most of their furniture behind, lots of vintage chairs and tables with the occasional pastoral painting. Even so, it’s pretty bare which is just the way I like it. The main star of the place are the dark hardwood floors and the arches over the doorways.

  When she doesn’t say anything, I tell her, “I know it’s small and a bit sparse but it does the job.”

  “No, Keir, it’s beautiful,” she says, eyes growing larger as she takes it all in. Finally, she smiles winningly at me. “Really. And it suits you. There’s something very…I don’t know, masculine, about it all. It’s completely the opposite from downstairs.”

  “That’s probably because I don’t collect figurines of tortoises or put lace doilies on top of everything,” I tell her, heading to the small kitchen. “Have a seat. Do you want water or ice in your glass?”

  “Splash of water would be great,” she says, and I quickly pull out my best bottle of whisky, a peaty blend from Speyside. I pour us both a glass and bring them back to the living room.

  My couch is small, black leather with wooden legs. I think it looks rather gothic, like it came from an old apothecary, but with Jessica sitting on it, she makes it look stately and refined. She brings light to it, to the whole room.

  “Cheers,” I tell her, handing her the glass. I raise mine. “Cheers to you being here.”

  “Cheers to you not thinking I’m a total psychopath,” she says as she clinks her glass against mine.

  “If all psychopaths were like you, I’d be breaking into the insane asylums,” I tell her. Maybe it’s the wrong choice of words—of course it’s the wrong choice of words—because her face falls.

  Before I can say anything to that though, she clears her throat and looks down at her drink, swirling the amber liquid around. “I, uh, guess I should tell you the real reason why I came here.”

  My pulse quickens. Does she know about me? Does she know that I knew Lewis Smith, the man who did this to her?

  “Why is that?” I ask uneasily, a faint sweat breaking out on my brow. I need to open a window in here.

  “I have a confession to make,” she says, her voice quiet.

  I cock my head, my pulse slowing. “A confession?”

  She nods and glances at me with soft eyes. Whatever she’s about to tell me, I can tell it’s a burden on her soul. “I know we don’t know each other.”

  “You need to stop saying that.”

  “But even so, I’ve told you a lie and I need to come clean.”

  Oh dear god, give me courage to do the same.

  I swallow thickly. “What is it? That’s not your real name? You do have a boyfriend after all?”

  “No. Those were true. It’s all been true. Except for one minor detail.” She raps her knuckles on her cast. “How I broke my leg. You see, it wasn’t from fun sexual escapades. God, I can’t remember the last time I had fun sexual escapades, or any kind of capades.” She gives me a wry smile. “Sorry. That was from a Friends episode. No, the truth is, there was no kinky bathroom scene and my leg didn’t really break. It’s more like it…exploded.”

  “Exploded?” My voice is barely above a whisper.

  She nods slowly. “Yeah. I’m sure you know about it. There was a shooting in London last month.” She pauses. She expects me to say “that was you?” or something to that effect, but I can’t muster up the strength to act surprised. “A terrorist, not like some radical Muslim that so many think of when you say that word, but a homegrown English boy, went berserk. Started shooting people. A few died. A lot were injured. I was one of the lucky ones who escaped.”

  “Do you feel lucky?” I ask, knowing that she’s expecting a different reaction.

  She shakes her head, her eyes growing wet. “No. I don’t. I feel terrible about it. I know it could have been worse. I try and remind myself of that every day. I could have lost my leg. Lost both of them. I could have had brain damage. I could have died. I know that I’m lucky when it comes down to it. But it’s hard to see any blessing in it.”

  She leans back against the couch, and I can almost feel the relief pouring out of her. She’s had a weight lifted. I’m envious. Completely fucking envious.

  After a swig of her whisky, letting it swirl around her tongue, she shoots me a curious glance. “You don’t seem surprised by all of this. I mean, most people are usually a bit shocked that I was shot by a terrorist, but you’re taking it all in stride. You can react. I don’t mind.”

  “I knew,” I tell her.

  She sits up straight. “What?”

  “I knew who you were. Not the exact moment I met you, but pretty close after that. When your sister came and mentioned the support group, that’s when it all came together.”

  “You knew,” she whispers to herself. She gnaws on her lip while she gives me an imploring look. “Why didn’t you say something? Why did you let me lie?”

  I shrug, trying to play it off. “You needed the lie. And I wanted to let you be who you needed to be around me. Honesty and trust, it doesn’t come easy. It’s not always a given. I figured you would tell me the truth when you were ready. I’m really fucking glad you did.”

  Her chin trembles for a moment and she looks away. I’ll lose it if she cries in front of me.

  She takes a deep breath and anxiously rubs her palms along her thighs, just enough for the dress to ride up, showing a peek of pale thigh. I have to tear my eyes away. There’s something extremely erotic about her right now and my feelings are nothing but inappropriate.

  “Thank you, then,” she says quietly. “For understanding. I don’t really know why I lied. Or I guess I do. I’m just so tired of people looking at me with pity. And if they aren’t looking at me with pity, it’s out of some sort of twisted pride. It’s like the world knows who I am and has some ownership over me. I guess that’s a true sign of how powerful the media is. It’s not like I get people coming up to me or anything, but they definitely recognize me. And I don’t want pity and I don’t want pride or anything that puts me on a pedestal.”

  “But you know it’s okay to let them feel that way. You can’t stop someone’s feelings, especially a stranger’
s. They look at you like that because you’ve shown people how to rise above and persevere. You’re an inspiration to them.”

  “But I don’t want to be!” she snaps. “I never asked for this. I haven’t done anything special at all. All I did was be in the wrong place at the wrong time. I got shot. I survived. I did what anyone else would have done. I’m not a hero. A hero would have stopped Lewis Smith. I did nothing but take his bullet. I saved no one, not even myself.”

  The mention of Lewis’s name has my heart in knots.

  “Sorry,” she says again, scrunching up her forehead and letting out a groan. “Sorry, sorry, sorry. Sorry for everything these days.”

  “Hey,” I say softly, placing my hand over hers to get her to stop fidgeting. “It’s okay. You can apologize or you can never fucking apologize. It’s up to you. I’ll stand by you, no matter what.”

  She frowns, a hint of an incredulous smile tugging at her lips. “Why are you so good to me, Keir McGregor?”

  “I don’t know that I am,” I tell her carefully. “I just know what it’s like to not feel right.”

  “Not feel right?”

  I don’t want to get too personal. I’m not supposed to reveal too much. I’m not as brave as she is. “Sometimes…we have a war in our hearts. We’re torn in two directions. The way we feel and the way we should feel. They rarely align. The battle goes on. I know what it’s like to stand in the middle of that battlefield and not know which side to fight on.”

  Her lips part ever so slightly, the shock of cherry red against the white of her teeth. I wonder what it would be like to kiss her. I wonder if I should, if I could, if this is yet another war I’m not sure how to win.

  I abruptly get up, taking my hand off of hers. “Excuse me,” I mutter hastily, heading for the bathroom. Once inside I close the door and rest my forehead against the mirror, taking in a deep, ragged breath.

  It wouldn’t be easy, but I know what I should do. I know that this is something that can’t continue. That I need to come clean, just as she did. Tell her everything. Do it now before things go too far, before anything happens between us. She might even understand.

  But I don’t want to tell her the truth. And this is one side I’m picking and standing behind one hundred percent. I can’t spend all my time with her living this war inside, debating when and where I’ll tell her.

  There is only harm in the truth. It would unburden my guilt, but it would make her feel compromised. It would break her trust in me and I have a feeling I’m one of the rare people who get that from her.

  And so I add another grave inside me, burying it all. I can only hope it stays there.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Jessica

  The minute that Keir disappears into his washroom, I release a rush of air from my lungs, like I’ve been holding my breath again. Only it’s not my body that’s been strained, but something else, something deeper.

  He knew. The damn man knew that I was lying this whole time. Of course, looking back, it was kind of obvious. The way he so easily slid over my slip-ups. How he didn’t push for too much information. He knew and he was letting me figure out who I needed to be.

  I could have kissed him for that. I probably should have. Then he made that eloquent speech about his heart being a battlefield (way more poignant than Pat Benatar) and got up to go to the bathroom in a hurry.

  Now I’m sitting here, wondering. The last thing I wanted to do was scare him off. He’s taking it all pretty well considering I’m some girl who literally went to his favorite bar looking for him, then when I didn’t find him, hunted down his address based on a few landmarks, walked around the neighborhood for an hour while I worked up the nerve to take it that far, then ended up having tea with his landlady. Not to mention the fact that I then owned up to a lie, a pretty major one at that.

  It makes me wonder if he would have said anything if I hadn’t confessed. How long would he have let it go on for? I’m only sitting here in his stark apartment because I sought him out. If I hadn’t, would I have seen him again? I guess the ball has always been in my court ever since I turned down his invitation for dinner.

  He can’t possibly be getting the wrong idea now. To be honest, I’m not really sure what I expected from tonight. Originally I thought I would have seen him at the bar, I would have told him the truth, and then, if I was lucky, see if that dinner invitation still stood. I didn’t expect to end up at his place drinking Scotch.

  And now that I’m here, I’m not sure what to do next. Everything I told him still stands. I don’t want a relationship. I’m too fucked up to get involved with anyone. My demons will get the best of me and destroy us both.

  He has demons too though. You saw them in his eyes, just now. He understands you too well to have gone through life without them.

  It’s true. Keir has something dark and damaged buried deep inside him. He’s harboring pain in the shadows of his soul. I can see this now. But who pays the price when our demons come out and play with each other? If I’ve learned anything, it’s that two wrongs don’t make a right, and therefore two fucked-up people can never equal anything good.

  But sex. Sex is something different. Terrifying in its own way for many reasons but a step removed from anything that could hurt me further.

  The truth is, when I’m around him, I feel my body coming to life in ways I haven’t felt for a long time. I can’t remember the last time I felt pleasure in any form. My body has turned against me. Everything always hurts. Nothing ever feels good.

  And I want that. I want to feel good. No pain, just desire. I want to succumb to a man who will take charge and protect me, who will do the thinking for me and leave me to just feel. I’ve felt his hands on my skin, I know there’s a roughness to him, I know he’s a man who could give me exactly what I want.

  But I’m afraid. I’m new at this, newer than I’ve ever been. The last time I had sex with Mark was…well, I don’t want to think about that. But it was months ago. And before that it was months in between again. Before him, I didn’t date all that much. Too much baggage to haul around, too many quirks and fears that prevented me from getting close with a man. I can count my sexual partners on one hand.

  There’s just something about Keir that endears me to him, that makes me feel safe. The fact that he’s gorgeous, so ruggedly handsome, and undeniably masculine that he makes me feel wet just thinking about fucking him (and when the hell was the last time my body felt that?) is just part of this equation. If I didn’t trust him, I wouldn’t be doing this right now.

  And what are you doing exactly? I ask myself. I glance over at the bathroom, wondering if he’s okay or if I did something wrong. I should probably get going.

  I down the rest of the Scotch, my throat burning as it goes, then ease myself up off the couch.

  Just then the bathroom door swings open and he comes striding out, a strange fire in his gaze.

  “I was thinking I should go,” I tell him, but my words grow quiet as he gets closer. His expression, his green eyes flashing like stones, the firm set of his jaw, makes me shut up.

  “You’re not going anywhere,” he says. “Sit. I’ll get you another drink.”

  “It’s getting late,” I say feebly, but I sit down anyway, my leg giving a protest of pain.

  “You need something for that?” he says, noticing my wince.

  “The Scotch will do fine,” I tell him quickly, not wanting him to make a fuss. “But really, I should go.”

  “Why?” he asks from the kitchen. I hear the top pop off the bottle, the slosh of liquid in the glass. “Where do you have to be?”

  I have to think about that for a moment. He comes over and holds out the glass. “I won’t keep you here if you don’t want to be here. But if you do want to be here, you don’t need to make any excuses.”

  I take the glass from him, holding it delicately in my hand. He stands over me, a massive wall, waiting for some kind of response.

  “I just…” I begin. “I…�
� I take a sip for bravery. Swallow. “I’m not very good at this.”

  “Good at what?”

  “At…this. Being with a man.”

  When he doesn’t say anything to that, I look up at him. He’s got a peculiar smile on his face, his brows raised. “You call this being with a man?”

  I clear my throat, feeling my cheeks grow hot. “I mean. I’ve told you before—”

  “Yes, how you don’t do relationships, how you don’t do sex.”

  “I never said I don’t do sex,” I remind him quickly.

  His eyes never stop searching my face. “Then what is it? What are you afraid to say?”

  I have the sudden urge to flee and I know it must show because he suddenly points at me and says, “Don’t you dare say you have to go again. I want you to go back to what you said, that you’re not good at this. What is this? Us? You and me? There’s nothing mystifying about you and me, Jessica. You know quite well how I feel.”

  I stare at him in shock. I do? “How?”

  He looks off with an air of impatience. “I invited you to dinner and you turned me down.”

  “But then you said just as friends.”

  “And I meant it. But there are different types of friends. It’s up to you to decide what kind we are.”

  I put my drink down with a clunk. “Holy pressure.” And now it’s not just my face going hot, but my entire body, flushed from head to toe.

  “You’re on fire, little red,” he says, his gaze skirting over my limbs in such a hungry way I can almost feel them on my skin. “I have to say, I like this look on you. Hot and bothered.”

  “Back with the innuendos again,” I comment, but my voice is weak.

  “No, no innuendos this time. You came looking for me tonight not because you wanted to confess but because you want something from me. What is it? What do you want from me? What do you think I can give you?”

  Jesus. This is so utterly unnerving. His words slice right through me, his eyes peeling away the layers, trying to get at something I’m not even sure of myself.

  If I lie, he’ll know. I can only be honest with him.