And that was when he hit the wall.
"No," he gasped, and immediately felt something snap inside him. It was like dropping a lug nut onto a buzz saw blade; there was a ping and a chug and suddenly the balance was off, the whole mechanism spinning dangerously out of control.
"No!" Nora cried, her body suddenly out of sync with his. Syd tried to hang on, to keep from being pummeled to death by the wave he'd moments ago ridden the crest of. "Don't stop . . ."
But the moment was gone; there was no longer any pleasure in the pain. The crescendo faltered, fizzled; her motion turned savage, radically overcompensating. The more she advanced, the more he withdrew. He didn't want to, hated that he couldn't control it.
And Nora . . .
Nora was all over him, crazy with need; Syd withered in response. She kissed and bit and slammed with the desperation of the damned. "Don't stop," she whispered, "don't . . ."
Vainly he rallied, brought his teeth to her neck, torn between lust and revulsion. He bit her as hard as he could, but it was feeble now, a toothless imitation. And that just made her crazier, like tossing a rabid dog a rubber bone. He tried again and she twisted away from his mouth, glaring at him. A naked fire burned in her gaze.
"Goddammitl!" she hissed. "Not like that!
"Like this!"
She fell upon him: her hands grabbing his arms and pinning them as her hips hammered his loins and her mouth found his neck and locked on.
Syd heard a snarl and felt a hot slash of pain. He writhed and tried to get out from under her, discovered that he could not, that he was trapped, she was much stronger than she looked, and all the strength he could muster was not enough to pry her off.
The lovemaking turned ugly, as she raced to a climax that he had no part of except as meat. He wondered if this was what it was like to be raped and realized no, this was even more fundamental. This was what it was like to be taken, like a predator takes its prey: helpless, in pain, to be used and consumed. . . .
The thought shriveled him instantly. He deflated, slipped out of her.
And Nora lost her mind.
"GOD DAMN!!" she bellowed. She rolled off of him and stood, panting, crackling like a downed power line. Syd grabbed his throat instinctively, half-expecting to feel the gush of his own blood cascading through some great ragged fissure.
"SHIT!" Nora turned, punched the wall. "Why did you stop?" she demanded. "Goddammit, Syd, we were so fucking close! Couldn't you feel it?"
Syd stared at her, aghast. There was no J>lood. His throat was still intact. "What are you talking about?" he croaked.
"Why did you stop?"
"I don't know," he blurted. "I . . .
"You what?"
"I thought I was going to hurt you!"
"HA!" she scoffed. "You couldn't hurt me if your life depended on it!" She began pacing back and forth. "I can't believe what a fucking pussy you are sometimes," she muttered.
"Hey, fuck you—"
"Oh, great, now you're tough," she ripped into him. "Now you can get it up. So where were all those balls five minutes ago, when they could've done some good?"
Syd's mouth opened, closed again. That one scored a direct hit, kicked his legs right out from under him. "I'm sorry," he said, looking away. His head wanged, a knot of tension blossoming behind his eye sockets. "Everything just got weird all of a sudden. . . ."
"Says who?" she countered. "Did you see me complaining? I wanted you to bite me, Syd. I needed you to."
"You don't understand. . . ." he began.
"What's to understand?" she spat.
"I wanted to kill you!" he exploded. "I swear to God, Nora, for a second there I was gonna seriously hurt you."
"Good!" she said. "That's what I wanted you to feel."
"What the hell for?" Syd was stymied. "I don't want to hurt you, Nora. I don't want to hurt anybody."
"Oh, yeah?. What about Karen?"
The remark came from out of nowhere, took him totally off-guard. "What the fuck are you talking about?!" Syd said defensively. "I don't want to hurt Karen. . . ."
"Yeah, right," Nora gave him a deadly look. "Tell me you don't dream about ripping her smug, lying little face off." She watched his reaction, knew she'd hit a nerve. "And what about whatshisname—" Nora smiled viciously, drew the name out for maximum sarcasm, "—Vauuuughn."
"Shut up."
But Nora wouldn't shut up, and Nora wouldn't back off. 'Tell me you don't lay awake nights thinking about him," she continued. 'Tell me you don't think about your wife lying there with her legs spread, about the look on her face when he slid his dick inside her. . . ."
Syd closed his eyes, trying to contain his mounting rage as Nora methodically twisted the knife. "The one she put in her mouth . . . " She leaned in close, practically whispering in his ear. ". . . the mouth she kissed you with—"
"WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?" he shouted in her face. "WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME??"
"I want to know if you've got what it takes," she said flatly. "And I want to know," she said, "can you let it out?"
"Let what out?" he asked, incredulous.
"Don't be stupid," she answered. "What do you think is going on here, Syd? What do you think happened last night? Do you think this is all an accident?"
"I don't know what you're talking about. . . ." Syd muttered. His head was throbbing now, as if his brain had just grown too big for his skull. He brought a hand to his temples, massaged them gingerly.
"It's not chance that we met, Syd," she said. "It's fate. I chose you. You've got it in you.
"But you've got to let it out."
"LET WHAT OUT?!"
"Your strength," she said. "Your power. The thing you've kept strapped down your whole goddam life.
"I want it, Syd. I need it. And if you can't give it to me, then you're no fucking good to me at all."
The last line hit him like a roundhouse punch; Syd glared at her through the pain. "So what," he muttered sarcastically, "you want me to bite chunks out of you and beat the shit out of people on your behalf? Anything else? Do you want me to kill for you, too?"
"If need be," Nora replied. She was dead serious. "I at least want to know that you can." A rueful light shone in her eyes. "I need somebody who can take care of me, Syd, somebody who'll be there when I need him with more than just the best of intentions, not just another well-meaning wimp who can't get it up in the clinches."
The insult was targeted, absolutely intentional. Syd sulked and smoked as she threw on her jeans, then her shirt, then her sweater. Every article of clothing she donned put another layer between them, until finally Syd was alone in his nakedness.
"Well," he said at last, "I guess maybe you need someone else."
"I guess I do," she replied. Her tone was both caustically brutal and threaded with regret. "I guess I do."
Nora's boots were at the foot of the bed; she stepped into them in silence, then turned and scooped her jacket off the chair by the door.
She paused on her way out, and they regarded each other defiantly. Syd stubbornly met her gaze, refusing to give an inch. The look on her face as she turned her back on him was at once haughty and contemptuous and incredibly sad. He listened to the clack of her boot heels and the jingle of keys as she moved across the living room.
There was a moment of silence after she rounded the corner, and his heart leapt, thinking she's coming hack! Then he heard the sound of the front door opening and closing behind her.
And she was gone.
"FUCK!!!" he roared, vaulting off the bed. The ashtray tumbled off, spilling its smoldering contents onto the floor as he grabbed his jeans, fumbled into them.
"NORA!!"
Syd ran out into the living room, saw in a glance that her bags were gone. A car engine cranked outside; Syd raced to the window, saw her headlights come on.
He banged on the ancient frame, trying to pry it free. The moldings seized up and held and he punched it, fist smashing the wood so hard that the pane cracked, sending
a tinkling shower of glass raining down to the street.
Nora's car started to back out of the space.
"NORA, DON'T GO!"
Syd spun, dashed for the door: throwing it open, taking the stairs two at a time. Halfway down he stumbled and pitched forward, slamming into the banister and whacking his knee on the heavy wood. "SHIT!" he screamed, kept running as he hit the first-floor landing, threw the outer door open.
He made it to the street just in time to see her taillights wink and disappear around the corner.
"NORA!" he screamed. "NORA, I'M SORRY!! COME BACK!!"
Lights came on in the houses across the street, as lumpy profiles peered out at his distress. "WHAT'RE YOU LOOKING AT?!!!" he shrieked. The lights blinked out again. Syd looked back, saw the last of her exhaust dissipate into the night.
He stood there, shirtless and shivering. Nora was gone. He was in shock. The throbbing in his knee came to him, registered as pain. Nora was gone. He wiped his hand across his face, felt something sticky, looked at his hand. A gash glistened where he'd torn it open.
Breathless and bleeding, Syd hobbled back to his apartment. As he limped up the stairs a part of his mind vaguely wondered where his cigarette had landed, if it was even now smoldering, turning to a fire that would burn the whole goddamned building down, and him along with it.
He should be so lucky.
20
IT WAS TWENTY till two when Vaughn Restal finally decided to call it a night.
Up until that point, he had to admit, the evening had frankly sucked. Trish Reinhardt had informed him, not two hours before, that it was over between them. Ray had found out about them, and they'd gotten all weepy on each other, and damned if they hadn't decide3 to try and work things out. He was gonna help her start her own business, fer chrissakes. Go figure.
Vaughn was vexed. Trish had broken the news to him in mid-nightcap; ensconced in a cozy little corner at Fifty-Five South, his hands tracing the inside of her thighs under the table, contemplating the way her ass would look bent over his breakfast nook once they got back to his place.
Vaughn liked variety. He also liked Trish's ass, which was nice and creamy and tight. The two went hand in hand, so to speak; and Vaughn had handled Trish Reinhardt's sweet backside at every available opportunity over the last three months. In his apartment. In her apartment, while Ray was doing the swing shift at Caterpillar.
On his balcony. In the park. In the car on the way to the bar.
He had big plans for that ass, not to mention every other part of her. Which was one reason why he'd been so upset when she fessed up as to her intentions. Marriage counseling; yeah, right. Go for it, baby. Ray was a jerk, and he didn't understand her: Trish had made that real clear the first night they'd hooked up. He certainly didn't know the first thing about making her happy, and Vaughn doubted that he ever would. "But he really loves me." Uh-huh. If he did, why did she hook up with ol' Vaughn in the first place?
Because Vaughn had made her happy, that's why— probably for the first time in her whole miserable life. He genuinely cared about her, goddammit, and she cared about him—or so she said. So now she was gonna go back to some numbnuts workaholic who ignored her? He needs me, she said. Yeah, well, what about me? he thought bitterly. What about my feelings?
It wasn't fair. Vaughn drained his beer, lit a cigarette and poured himself another from the pitcher of Killian's on the table before him. He was hurt. The least she could have done was give him one last pop for the road, maybe blow him in the parking lot. At the very least, she could have given him some advance notice; save him shelling out for one more romantic dinner, maybe give him a chance to line up some other plans for the evening.
Plus, they'd come in her car, on account of someone having spiked Vaughn's gas tank with a pound and a half of Domino's last weekend. Fortunately he only lived a few blocks away, but that was hardly the point. It was cold outside. It was all just damned inconsiderate, was what it was.
Vaughn sipped his beer and stewed. He felt victimized. He didn't really like messing around with married women; deep down he really considered himself to be a pretty okay guy. He just had a thing about women-in-need; he was attracted to them, to the point of being driven. They came into the bar, looking all lost and lonely in that way Vaughn could never resist. Could he help it if so many of them happened to be trapped in archaic, decaying relationships?
If he could find any personal fault at all, it was that he was just too damned sensitive. He felt too much, cared too much, wanted too much for them. It was like a chemical thing. So they opened themselves up to him, and he liked to make them feel good. Past that, he just couldn't help himself. He was only human.
Besides, was he to blame if these guys couldn't hold on to their women? If they'd been doing their jobs right, it never would have happened.
Vaughn sighed. When he stopped to think about it, it had really been kind of a lousy year. Tonight's letdown with Trish was nothing new; in fact, it was practically becoming a déjà vu experience. Before her, there'd been a string of similarly short-lived relationships: with Darlene, and Melissa, and Laurie, and Marcia . . .
And Karen, a voice in his head piped in. Let's not forget Karen.
Vaughn winced. Come to think of it, that's where this whole downhill slide had started. Her and her fucking psycho of a husband. Correction: ex-husband. Like that was really his fault. His hand came up instinctively to touch the crooked hump on his nose, the one that blew his profile and made him feel insecure, and he wished he'd never even seen the bitch. It seemed as though his luck had soured in the aftermath of that experience, like their bad karma had rubbed off on him somehow. He was sorry and all, but really. Like they wouldn't have flamed out anyway? It was ridiculous.
The whole thing just undermined his confidence, he realized. And he got really tired of watching his back. Like the gas tank thing, for instance; it almost ruined his fucking engine, and was gonna set him back almost four hundred bucks, to boot. And what about the time he got his tires slashed outside Mr. Bill's Crab Shack, and he wasn't even with anybody. Did anyone ever think about that? No, it was just Dump-on-Vaughn Day. It wasn't fair.
Oh, well, he thought, what are you gonna do? There's all kinds of assholes in the world. He finished his beer and turned his attention to salvaging the rest of the evening.
It didn't look too promising. He scanned the room; there were maybe thirty people scattered across the bar. Fifty-Five South was large and dark and spacious, with high ceilings and a long brass-railed bar perpendicular to the row of big picture windows that looked out onto Front Street. The walls were covered with funky photos and counterculture gewgaws in a homegrown Hard Rock Cafe kind of effect. It was a cross-cultural hangout, and it tended to attract a mix of college kids, working people, and young professionals.
Although not, he amended, at the moment. At this late hour the pickings were pretty slim: everyone was either already hooked up for the night, or not worth the bother. A trio of sloppy-drunk coeds were getting scoped by a quartet of equally sloppy jocks. He half-wondered which of them would end up being odd man out.
A cluster of lonely-looking middle-aged guys lined the bar, nursing beers and bleak futures. A half-dozen couples conversed, oblivious to everyone and everything else. Vaughn sighed; at least someone was having a good time. There was a blonde down on the far end who looked like she could use some company, but she was a little shopworn and twenty pounds too heavy to register on Vaughn's empathy scale.
Oh, well. Vaughn checked his funds. The dinner tonight had tapped him; he had exactly ten bucks left with which to get lucky or cab it home. He was just about to abandon all hope when the door swung wide, accompanied by a blast of head-clearingly-cold air. Vaughn looked up, and suddenly he was trying to scrape his jaw up off his knees.
Oh my god, he thought, astonished. Who is THAT?
She was gorgeous, and she was wasted: two qualities he deeply admired in a woman. Her hair was long and tousled, her jacket unbutto
ned in spite of the cold; and when she slid out of it, Vaughn just about slid right out of his boxer shorts. Even in a sweater and jeans she bypassed babe, went clear to goddess.
Better yet, she looked like a kindred spirit, which was to say she looked like she'd just been through some shit. Her eyes were red-rimmed and positively aglow with turbocharged emotion. His senses were keenly tuned through years of practice, and he recognized the look instantly: she was in breakup mode.
Vaughn smiled. She hit the bar and kicked back a Cuervo shooter like it was a Dixie cup of Kool-Aid, did another one in the time it took for him to bring his own glass to his lips.
He couldn't take his eyes off her; she was clearly a woman after his own heart. Vaughn liked the way she moved, simultaneously deliberate and over-the-top. She flipped her hair back and away from her face; Vaughn found himself staring at the muscles in her neck. They looked chewable in the extreme. And as for the rest of her . . .
Trish Reinhardt's ass was a sack of wet cottage cheese by comparison. Correction: there was no comparison. This woman was in a class all by herself. Vaughn watched, waiting. No date showed up, no pissed-off hubby or beefy beau. By all outward appearances, she was alone.
Maybe the night wasn't a complete whack, after all.
He thought about it for a moment, weighing his previously sagging spirits against the lateness of the hour. Not a lot of time to get to know each other. Still, he thought, nothing to lose by trying. Besides, she really looked like she could use a friend right now.
He signaled the waitress on her way back to the bar, slipped her the sawbuck, and asked her to do him a big big favor. She nodded and hustled off; Vaughn put his feet up and struck a decidedly casual pose, the better to watch as the line played out. If she didn't take the bait, no biggie. He was just a nice guy, buying a cute girl a drink.
But if, on the other hand, she did . . .
Please, he thought. Oh please . . .
The bartender appeared in front of her, placed a fresh shot on the bar. She fingered the glass, as if searching it for clues. The bartender gestured toward Vaughn. She turned and scanned the room, stopped when she came to his shady little corner. Her eyes flared.
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