I love it. I hope you do.
I miss you,
Beryl
I keep watch over Gavin’s gray bubble like a vigil. If I had my phone, I could send a text to Anthony, sure he’d go caveman on Peter in a heartbeat. Anthony’s sharp and strong and possessive. But what I need is Gavin.
He’s broken, and I think he gets what’s broken in me.
I’m drifting to sleep under a blanket on the couch when I hear my laptop’s familiar ping.
Gavin: Beryl, I’m here for you.
I scramble for my computer, pulling it on my lap.
Me: Gavin.
Gavin: Are you safe? Are you OK now?
Me: I’m safe at your place. I dozed off on the couch. But I’m still not OK.
Gavin: Tell me.
And so I type him the whole awful story, from charming Peter to rich Peter to dangerous Peter. Gavin rarely interrupts, just a few comments to let me know he’s listening.
Gavin: I’m sorry I went dark. I wish I had been there for you. I would have helped you.
Me: I know you would.
Gavin: I never would have let you go with him. I know his type. Spoiled. Rich. Thinks he can get away with anything.
Me: Look who’s talking.
Gavin: Ouch.
Me: Sorry. You know I didn’t mean it that way.
Gavin: No. It’s fair, considering what you’ve seen of me. I came apart and did pretty much anything I wanted.
Me: You hurt someone to get what you wanted.
I freeze. There it is. Another accusation, and I’m sure Gavin’s going to run away from me again.
Me: Oh, shit, Gavin. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.
Gavin: Bull. You did mean that. And I can handle it. I’ve done a lot of thinking this week, about how I have to face the truth, and admit it. If I don’t, I’ll never get past it.
Me: And?
Gavin: I have to admit that I used Lulu. She helped me write, helped me refine my songs. And even when she was spiraling—and I knew she needed help—I kept using her. I didn’t want her to go into treatment, not right away, because I needed her.
Me: Did she need you?
Gavin: She needed a lot of things. She needed someone who would protect her. Who could save her from herself. But I didn’t do that for her. That guilt keeps chasing me no matter how far I go.
Me: I feel like I need a protector. Two bad dates has me thinking my brain or my heart doesn’t work right.
Gavin: Wait—two?
Me: Yeah. I went out with a guy last week. That didn’t go well either.
Gavin: What did he do to you?
Me: Nothing. I mean, I stopped things before they went that far.
Gavin: Why?
Me: If I tell you, you’ll think I’m ridiculous.
Gavin: Tell me anyway. And I don’t think you’re ridiculous. Not at all.
Me: I heard you. On the radio.
Gavin: When?
Me: When we were … you know. This is embarrassing.
Gavin: Are you saying my voice killed the mood?
Me: Something like that.
Gavin: Double ouch.
Me: I didn’t mean it like that.
Gavin: Then what?
Me: I heard your song and it was like you were there in the room with us. And I wanted to be with you. More than with him. That’s why I stopped.
Gavin: Oh.
Me: I sound like an idiot. I can’t believe I told you that. Now you’re going to think I’ve gone all fangirl on you.
Gavin: Have you?
Me: No. I mean, I like your music, but it’s not that. It’s this—our conversations.
Gavin: Not my killer bod?
Me: Hello, ego. I’m Beryl.
Gavin: I was joking.
Me: Yeah. But you do have a killer bod. I Googled you.
Gavin: I told you not to! The last thing I want is for you to start believing some of the garbage online.
Me: Sorry. You’ve probably figured out I don’t always do what I’m told.
Gavin: Me, neither. But will you do something for me, if I ask you?
Me: Yes.
Gavin: Anything?
Me: That’s a big request.
Gavin: Trust me.
Me: I do.
Gavin: Go upstairs to my room. Take your computer.
Me: OK. I’m here.
Gavin: Open the bottom drawer of my dresser.
Me: K.
Gavin: There’s a shirt in there. Light blue, lots of holes. It says Camp Crestwood.
Me: Found it.
Gavin: Put it on.
Me: ???
Gavin: Just do it, Beryl. You said you trust me.
I strip down to my underwear and pull his shirt over my head. It’s soft and paper-thin from hundreds of washings.
Me: OK.
Gavin: This is me giving you a hug, Beryl. It’s the closest thing I can think of. I want to hold you and tell you things will get better.
I inhale the shirt’s smell and suddenly Gavin’s there, wrapped around me. I bring the shirt to my nose and catch the musky scent of his soap and his sweat.
Me: I feel you. I can smell you.
Gavin: Good. Now get in my bed.
I pull back the stark white duvet cover that’s crisp and new, another change I made to Gavin’s home.
Gavin: Which side are you on?
Me: The left side. Closer to the bathroom.
Gavin: That’s my side! Can you scoot over?
Me: No. I like this spot better.
Gavin: Beryl, you’re killing me over here.
Me: Fine. Have it your way.
I scoot over to the other side, even though he can’t see me.
Gavin: I Googled you, too, you know.
Me: Seriously? I doubt there’s much to show for it.
Gavin: You’d be surprised. I found tons of articles you wrote for the Oregon Daily Emerald and the Cottage Grove Sentinel.
Me: They sucked.
Gavin: No. You’ve got talent. I like how you start your stories.
Me: It’s called a lead.
Gavin: Yeah. The one about the hot air balloon that did a forced landing in a cul-de-sac. About the wind?
Me: The lead was, “The wind wasn’t cooperative, but the neighbors were.”
Gavin: That was cool. Do you write other stuff?
Me: Stories and poems and stuff. In a journal, just because I can.
Gavin: That’s why I started doing music. I want you to send me something you’ve written. Something nobody else has seen. Can you do that?
Me: Yes.
Gavin: Promise?
Me: Pinky swear.
Gavin: I saw pictures of you. You’re beautiful.
Me: LOL
Gavin: Don’t insult me by telling me my eyes don’t work right. I love your smile.
Me: I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.
Gavin: They’re not in my bed right now.
Me: But they were.
Gavin: You know how to kick a guy when he’s down. I admit I had my share of adventure.
Me: I know. Google tells all.
Gavin: Don’t believe everything it tells you. The life of a rock star is seriously exaggerated. When we started, none of us in the band could get a date. But when we started getting famous, girls just came from everywhere, throwing themselves at us.
Me: Poor you.
Gavin: Don’t snark. There was a tipping point when it got out of control and I had to start shutting it down, isolating myself from fans. That’s when it got lonely.
Me: Were you lonely? When you left?
Gavin: Lonely doesn’t even begin to cover it. More than anything, I was angry. I hated myself. I hated my band mates for not setting things straight, for letting me keep pulling at Lulu instead of pushing her into treatment. And I hated my assistant for helping me hurt her. He didn’t kill Lulu, but he bought her the stuff that did.
Me: No wonder you fired him.
Gavin: I’m s
urprised I didn’t kill him. I’m surprised I didn’t kill myself.
Me: You wouldn’t.
Gavin: No. You’re right. Life is too exciting and messy and unpredictable to give up. I’m telling you all this crap about what I hated in my life, but it was an adventure.
Me: That’s what I wanted when I came to New York—an adventure. I wanted exciting and messy and unpredictable.
Gavin: And?
Me: Well, tonight sucked, but most of my time in the city has been incredible.
Gavin: I hope all of tonight didn’t suck.
Me: No. Not now. I like being here with you. I feel like you’re closer, being in your shirt and your bed.
Gavin: I wish I could feel you. I’d rub your back. I’d spoon you.
Me: And pet my hair?
Gavin: For as long as you want me to. Until you fall asleep.
Me: Would you stay with me? Or would you get up in the middle of the night and go somewhere else if I snore?
Gavin: Of course I’d stay. And in the morning I’d kiss you awake. Like Sleeping Beauty.
Me: Then you’d be sorely disappointed. I sleep ugly. If you were here tonight, you’d wake up next to a girl with raccoon-eye makeup and hair sticking up in twenty directions. You’d be horrified.
Gavin: I’d be horny. I’d have you out of my shirt and flat on your back. And trust me, I wouldn’t be looking at your hair.
I squirm and my hand trails down my stomach, fingering the edge of my underwear. This is getting really personal. But I’m dying for him to tell me more.
Me: Don’t stop there.
Gavin: You want me to tell you everything? Tell you how it will be when I kiss you and steal your breath? When I kiss your breast and hear your gasp for the first time?
Me: Yes.
Gavin: I’ll tell you how we’ll feel, skin to skin. I’ll tell you how I’ll take time to explore you, and how I’ll find the spot inside you with that catch, that switch that makes you more alive than anything.
I find the catch he describes and my breathing shallows. I type the next word urgently.
Me: More.
Gavin: We’ll lock together and find a rhythm that will make you forget where you are. You’ll forget what’s happened before—the bad dates and the bad guys and the way they hurt you. But I’ll make you remember how it feels to fly.
Me: Yes.
Gavin: Are you flying now? Are you touching where I will be when I finally get to be part of you?
Me: Yessssssssssss
I lean on the S key because I’m incoherent, soaring as I hit a peak, then gliding on a high that really is like flying. I feel Gavin’s softness in his shirt, I smell the musk and cedar of his scent and soap, I hear his words in my head. As I’m touching my body, he’s touching my soul.
Gavin: Beryl. I’m here. I’m holding you—my shirt and my pillows and my bed are everywhere I’ll be when I’m back.
Me: When?
That’s the word that matters to me.
Gavin: I have to do something before I come home. I’m in Bali and I’m going to Sydney next.
Me: Civilization?!
Gavin: Yeah. It will be a shocker.
Me: And then you’ll come back?
Gavin: I will. Beryl, you need to sleep. It’s the middle of the night, and I don’t want you wrecked tomorrow because of me.
Me: I don’t want to let you go.
Gavin: Don’t worry. I’m not leaving you. I’ll be here tomorrow, same time.
Me: Gavin.
Gavin: Yes?
Me: Thank you. For being my anchor. And for letting me fly.
Gavin: Just be there when I get home.
Me: Hurry.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
I arrive at the office early on Monday morning and push through a pile of new paperwork to regain my grasp on reality.
Responsible me. Careful me. Dotting-I’s-and-crossing-T’s me.
That kind of Beryl wouldn’t be stupid enough to jump into a stranger’s car. I berate myself for the millionth time for letting the night with Peter unfold the way it did.
Then again, that Beryl also wouldn’t have dared to have cybersex with a rock star. Did that seriously happen? I must have replayed our sexting a million times over in my head yesterday.
I follow up on an email from new clients Phillip and Rebecca James. They’re both trial attorneys and away in different cities to try cases for a few weeks at least. Their address is a Trump property I’ve walked by several times with Jasper and I’m looking forward to scoping out what’s behind its smoked-glass doors.
Dan hasn’t arrived at the office yet but I decide to head out, leaving him a note about the new client.
I notice a peculiar thing about the sidewalk as I approach the Trump apartment tower’s doors—while most New York sidewalks are pockmarked with gum and debris, this sidewalk glows pale gray, as if it is pressure-washed every evening.
It probably is.
I do the ritual identification process with the doorman, which is complicated by the fact that Peter has my driver’s license. Instead, I show the guard my old student ID and the emergency credit card that wasn’t in my clutch Saturday night.
After inspecting these carefully, the guard finally nods and tucks my business card into a binder.
“I’ll keep this in case another resident needs a referral,” he says, and I thank him, making a mental note to get more cards in the hands of doormen. Referral genius! I hope Dan will be proud.
The lobby is ridiculously overdone with vast slabs of pink marble on floors and walls. The elevators are obsessively polished, not a fingerprint to be found on any brass or mirrored surface.
Which is practically everything.
I watch the buttons light in turn on my way to an upper floor—not the penthouse, but better than halfway to the top. The Jameses will have to climb another twenty stories to truly keep up with the Joneses.
I’d thought I was getting inured to flagrant displays of wealth, but the Jameses prove me wrong—their apartment is a treasure trove of gaudy ostentation.
Everything’s big—a larger-than-life dining room table that seats twelve, its surface polished to a mirror shine. A massive sectional in the living room could host a dozen of my friends for movie night. A folding oriental screen partially hides a television so big it probably required a special freight elevator to move it in.
The walls are covered with art and artifacts, modern and traditional. It seems like Phillip and Rebecca whip out their credit cards whenever the mood strikes.
I look at my list—collect mail, feed and water plants, swap out their DVR for a new one with the cable company, put away deliveries, and organize the baby’s room.
I wonder which of them is traveling with the baby and whether they have a nanny.
The plants are tucked throughout the house on virtually every flat surface, including rock gardens, succulent wreaths, African violets and trailing plants that hang down from the tops of high bookcases.
I get a footstool from the kitchen to reach the plants on the bookcase and glance at the James’s reading material.
Bestsellers. Crime thrillers. Legal reference books. And scads and scads of parenting manuals.
From What to Expect When You’re Expecting to Jenny McCarthy’s Belly Laughs, from hefty manuals on breastfeeding to The No-Cry Sleep Solution, it looks like they’ve got enough reading material to navigate every second of Junior’s first few years.
I’m no stranger to over-analyzing how to parent—my mom put me through the wringer with each counseling class she took. But at some point, I think you’ve just got to put down the instruction manual and try it.
At that thought, I snort. I’m the pot calling the kettle black.
Most of my life has been spent reading the instructions and the safety warnings and the fine print—all of it before I dared to do something.
Before I came to New York, I was stuck perpetually on ready, aim. Then I tried to pull the trigger, to be spo
ntaneous with Peter, and look where I got with fire: burned.
I find the DVR in a cabinet and before I disconnect it for a trip to the cable company, I flip on the television and scroll through their shows.
Extra mile, as Dan says. I’ll figure out what they like to record and reprogram everything on their new DVR. I pull a notepad out of my purse and start jotting down titles.
Jersey Shore. Real Housewives. The Bachelor. Storage Wars.
What the heck?
It gets worse: Reruns from The Girls Next Door and Fear Factor. I’m appalled by their awful taste. Could reality TV get any more mindless? Suddenly, I feel a little bit superior to two highly educated attorneys.
I scroll through recorded shows and find some hilariously crappy porn. It was recorded free off Skinimax and features a silicone-enhanced Barbie and a dude in need of serious manscaping. Yuck.
I glance at the art on their walls, expecting it to morph into dogs playing poker. Maybe their fridge is stocked with Coors.
I check.
Close. Budweiser. And their pantry has pork rinds and every kind of processed food your Home Ec teacher warned you about. Even Easy Cheese.
Really.
OK, so these people aren’t the pillars of good taste and refinement. To each their own. I’ve still got to sort out the baby’s room, but I decide to leave that for another day and I head back to the office.
When I finally see Dan, his expression is stern.
“You’re in a heap of trouble, young lady.” Dan chides me. “I thought you were going to text me to say you made it home safely on Saturday?”
“I lost my phone.” The memory of Saturday night hits me again and my face crumples. Dan’s posture changes instantly, concern replacing rebuke.
“Beryl, it’s not the end of the world,” Dan says. “I’ll bet you wanted an excuse to upgrade, right?”
His cheerfulness buoys my mood, but I can’t bring myself to tell him how I lost my phone.
“Thanks for taking me to the charity gala,” I say, working out how to ask Dan for details about Peter. “I gave out a ton of cards, but I didn’t collect that many. How do I follow up with people?”
Tattoo Thief (BOOK 1) Page 15
