You Own Me (Owned Book 1)

by Mary Catherine Gebhard

  Vic nodded.

  “What about you?” I felt like the weight of the conversation was largely on me. It was always like that with us. Vic rarely talked about himself, but he didn't seem to mind that I talked about myself more than an autobiography would. He encouraged it. Sometimes I got the impression he was pushing the conversation away from himself on purpose.

  “What about me?” Vic parroted back.

  There he was, again, pushing the conversation away from himself. If that wasn't evasive maneuvering than I don't know what is.

  “Well, what do you do? What did you do? What are you going to do?” I pressed. It had been a week of this and I still barely knew anything about him; but I felt like he knew everything about me.

  Vic eyed me curiously, a smirk twitching on his lips. “Calm down. You sound desperate, Lenny.”

  I threw a Post-it pad at his face.

  He caught it so fast I barely saw him move.

  I sighed in a huff. “Fine, but if you don't tell me anything about yourself, I'm done telling you about me.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Vic asked, leaning forward.

  I met his challenge head on and walked on my knees to him. We were face to face now.

  “Yes,” I replied.

  Vic leaned back, shrugging as he did.

  “Okay,” he said.

  I wanted to scream. Here I was practically dying for information, and he didn't give two shits. Fine. I moved back to my spot on the floor, and recommenced planning my party. We didn't say two words to each other the rest of the night.

  I turned my threat to Vic into a promise to myself. I didn't give Vic any more information about myself until he coughed up something about himself. I was sick of opening up to him while he was always holding something back. I learned snippets about his life, but it was just that, snippets. Talking to him was like watching a movie through a hole in a piece of paper. I got to see some of the movie, but the rest of it was blacked out.

  I learned his last name: Wall. I learned he had a sister, a mother, and a father. I learned he worked in security (well, I guess I already knew that). I learned his favorite movie was Aliens, the one with Sigourney Weaver. I thought that was funny. I mean, you can like Aliens, but as your favorite movie? I just couldn't let him get away with that.

  “So, if you could only watch one movie for the rest of your life, you would pick Aliens?”

  He didn’t hesitate: “Yes.”

  I shook my head. “That is so sad.”

  Vic and I sat in my apartment while music streamed faintly in the background from Pandora. I couldn't really understand the lyrics and didn’t know who the artist was. The music was folksy and sad, yet beautiful. The singer had a strong voice; whenever she sang, it felt like my heart was being pulled from my body.

  “Why don't we ever go to your apartment?” I asked Vic, pulling myself away from the siren song. “I hear it's snazzy!” He did live in the penthouse, after all.

  “Because—”

  “Oh God!”

  Spider! I hate that I'm one of those girls, but I am. Spiders freak me the hell out. I don't know what it is. Rationally, I know they aren't scary. Rationally, I know they are good for the environment: they keep the bug population under control. Most spiders aren't poisonous. Tarantulas actually make pretty good pets. Rationally, I know all of this. However, when I see a spider, all of the ratiocinations fly right out the window. All I see are its spindly legs and creepy crawly body, and I can feel it crawling on me and laying eggs in my shoes and me stepping on those eggs and releasing a billion spiders that crawl up my legs and into my body and then lay eggs in my brain...

  “What?” Vic asked, interrupting my brilliant logic.

  “Spider!” I screamed, pointing like a two-year-old. It was crawling toward us like it had a plan.

  Vic raised an eyebrow. He shrugged, half-smiling, and walked toward the spider. He lifted his foot, raising it as if to squish it.

  “No, don't kill it!” Yeah, I'm complicated. I may hate spiders, but that doesn't mean they deserve to die.

  “Seriously?” Vic carefully put his foot back down and turned to stare at me. He had this way of staring that made me question my very being. It wasn't condescending or cruel, it was just opening. Like I was an onion whose layers he could peel away. Vic stared at me and peeled away the layers.

  “Could you maybe . . .” I struggled with a way to phrase it. I wanted him to get a cup and put the spider in the cup. Then I wanted him to take the cup to a secure location a million miles away from me and dispose of the spider. Then I wanted him to smash the cup into a billion pieces. But, we weren't that close of friends. In fact, I don’t think anyone was that close. “Could you maybe take it away somewhere?”

  As I got to know Vic, I realized that somehow, a lot of statements I made turned into questions. I'm normally not the kind of person who asks a lot of questions or turns to someone for help making a decision. Vic is just the kind of man who demands the final say. A lot of my attraction to him diminished upon that realization. Don't get me wrong: he's still incredibly hot, but I don't think I could handle that in a romantic relationship with him—or even just a friends-with-benefits relationship. Even if I decided something, Vic would still get the final say.

  Case in point: Vic's shoe fell upon the helpless spider. I didn’t get mad, because when I asked my question, I realized the odds of him agreeing were zero. That's how it is with Vic; he rarely approaches a conversation willing to negotiate. He's already made up his mind.

  “What are those marks on your arm?” Vic asked.

  The spider was dead and, up until now, so was our conversation. It was getting late, past ten at night. If it were any other night, I would be in bed trying to sleep. This wasn't any other night though, Vic was here. And some desperate, lonely part of me never wanted him to leave.

  “Do you really not know, or do you just want to hear the story?”

  “I want to hear the story, Lennox.”

  “Well then, Vic Wall, you'll have to wait.”

  “Why is that?”

  “There is a growing knowledge disparity between us that you need to remedy.”

  “I don't follow.”

  “Tell me something more about yourself. And not something I could Google.”

  “I own this building.”

  “I said something I couldn't Google.”

  In typical Vic fashion, he casually said, “I was abused.”

  I wasn't expecting him to say that. I was expecting him to start out with something light, like, I used to have a dog. I didn't know what to say. I'm sorry sounded so… Useless.

  I reached out and touched his arm, and he looked at me. His eyes were so full and inscrutable. I needed him to speak, goddammit! I just wanted to reach into his brain and rip out whatever thoughts he had like I was Dumbledore with a pensieve.

  “I tried to kill myself,” I offered.

  Vic wasn't the kind of person who needed pity or comfort. He needed security. (Ironic, since he worked in security.) Perhaps trusting him with my secrets would give him security. “I tried to kill myself,” I said, a little more loudly.

  Vic looked up at me, his eyes no longer betraying his emotions, but instead fixed on mine, so I pressed on: “These are the scars.” I showed Vic my left wrist.

  “What happened?”

  I shook my head. “Nuh-uh, mister, I show you mine—you show me yours, remember?”

  Vic shrugged. “I don't talk to my mom or dad anymore, because my dad abused me and my mom let it happen. Pretty standard stuff.”

  I nodded, unconvinced of his nonchalance. “Uh-huh. Standard.” I swallowed, looking for courage to continue. “I didn't plan it. One day I just snapped. I broke open my shaving razor to get the razors. I started scraping away at my skin. It looks so easy in the movies, you know? It's not. I was at it for hours, biting at a washcloth so no one heard me scream.”

  Vic nodded. “I was adopted. My adoptive parents had my sister ten years later.
Then, my father became a religious fundamentalist, and he viewed me as a demon.”

  “What the fuck.” I said, more as a statement than a question. I really wasn't expecting that.

  “He believed I tricked them into the adoption, that I was the harbinger of the revelations, and that if he beat me hard enough he could kill the demon inside of me.”

  “He was insane.”

  “Yes, he was.” Vic inhaled deeply. “He was a great father but then he started to get sick and delusional. The delusions were aimed at me. My mother was weak-willed and my sister was only a child then.”

  I hugged my knees. “My mother died when I was eleven. I have my dad though. He doesn't beat me.”

  Vic laughed. “So there's that.”

  I nodded. “So there's that.”

  Silence settled over us, our own thoughts keeping us company until Vic offered: “I have a cabin.”

  “That's cool,” I said, not really sure what to say to this non sequitur.

  “I was going to go this weekend.”

  Still not really sure what to say, I just nodded.

  “I want you to come with me, Lennox.”

  My eyebrows popped up in surprised. Vic and I were friends. Yes, there was sexual tension between us, but I think we both understood that we couldn't go down that road. An isolated cabin with just the two of us? That was decidedly romantic. And with the sexual tension between us? It all just seemed so precarious and fragile, and, dammit, exciting.

  “Lenny.” Vic's voice cut through my speculation. “Stop overthinking it.”

  Ugh, I hated when he did that. He just knew me so well didn't he? I glared at him.

  “Fine,” I replied.

  He smirked. I pouted.

  I hated how sexy he looked when he smirked, it made our friendship really hard. Like his abs, and his arms, and other things. God, he looked really good today. He was wearing his hair down which he never did. It was brown-black, long, and sleek; I wanted to run my fingers through it. It showed off his hard (practically chiseled) jaw tremendously. I bit my lip.

  We'd been having these little chats for just short of two weeks. Mostly they were nothing serious, but occasionally they got heavy. Like today.

  If I have to run away like before, like I did from Seattle, I don't know if I could stomach it. I felt inexplicably tethered to Vic.

  “Lenny?”

  Uh-oh. I'm pretty sure I was staring. He was sporting that smirk again. I crossed my legs and looked away.

  “Lenny, did you hear anything that I just said?”

  “Yes! Of course! Why wouldn't I have?” Me thinks I doth protest too much.

  Vic's smirk was now a broad grin. “So, you know we're leaving Friday morning? It's only an hour drive. Up in the mountains. It's a little cold, so bring some sweaters.”

  “I already knew all of that because you said it before, and I was paying perfect attention,” I snapped.

  “Of course you were,” Vic smiled. He stood up, clapping his hands together. “I have to go now, but it was so great talking to you. I do enjoy these little chats.” He was being pretentious on purpose.

  I threw my shoe at his head. Regretfully, the shoe narrowly missed its target.

  Eyes narrowing to black slits, Vic glared at me.

  My gut turned to ice.

  “Lennox,” Vic whispered, “do you know what happens to girls who disobey?”

  I shook my head, feeling small.

  Vic smiled, and the darkness dissipated from his eyes. “Well then, maybe you should decide if you want to find out.”

  It was actually perfect timing that Vic asked me when he did. Isn't it great how that works? The first time I'd had off since I started working was the time Vic was going to the cabin. Serendipity and all that jazz. It was a belated Labor Day, or at least that's what Bethany told me. Bethany had been making me work federal holidays and overtime without pay, which I'm 99 percent sure is illegal, so this was her way of getting me off the lawsuit line. She gave me a weekend off. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.

  I tried to pack light, and failed miserably. I'm a horrible over-packer. It's the anxiety. I can't help but want to pack every single thing. What if there's a hurricane? What if there's a tornado? What if there is light rain? I need to pack for every contingency; if I don't, then I just stress about it for the entire trip. So, for my three-day weekend with Vic, I packed a large suitcase. I could already hear what he was going to say.

  “Are you planning on moving in?”

  I shook my head, that really sounded like Vic!

  “Shit, Lennox, if we were taking a plane we'd have to buy an extra ticket for that bag.”

  Wait, that really sounded like Vic.

  I turned around, hands on hips. Vic was actually in my apartment, mocking me.

  “Hey! I thought we agreed you had to knock before you barged in. You know, in case...” I trailed off weakly.

  “In case you're naked?” Vic asked, wiggling his eyebrows.

  I folded my arms, frowning. “You're early.”

  “And you're not naked,” Vic replied, pretending to pout. Or, at least, I think he was pretending to pout.

  “I'm so sorry to disappoint you,” I replied, sarcasm dripping.

  Vic winked. “There are ways you can make it up to me.”

  I rolled my eyes and finished zipping up my suitcase.

  “I'm not carrying that for you.”

  I stuck my tongue out at him. “This isn't my first rodeo.”

  “Could've fooled me.”

  We made it down to the car. Vic wasn't kidding when he said he wasn't going to carry my suitcase. I wasn't kidding either. When you’re a chronic-over-packer, you learn to carry your own shit. My suitcase was cumbersome and very heavy, but I managed it. I did trip over it a few times, but I got it to the car. Vic laughed at me the whole way.

  “Shut up!” I snapped, as I shoved the suitcase into his car. Vic drove a black, sporty Subaru SUV. You don't see many Subarus in California. The climate and terrain generally doesn't call for the type. I love them though. They're so much fun to drive in the snow and across rough terrain. It made me wonder where Vic drives that he needed one.

  “Hey, watch it, it's not my baby's fault you're crazy,” Vic said. I raised my eyebrow at him. His baby? “My car,” He explained, touching the exterior of his car tenderly.

  Of course. His “baby” is his car. For emphasis, I shoved my suitcase even harder into the trunk. Vic gave an exaggerated gasp.

  I shut the trunk, and climbed into the passenger seat. “Your cabin is an hour away?”

  “Sick of me already?” Vic replied, turning on the car.

  I nodded. “It's a possibility.”

  “I'll just have to change that,” Vic murmured.

  For the first half hour, Vic and I listened to the new Arctic Monkey's album. It's one of my favorites, so I zoned out, watching the scenery change at a rapid pace against the window. When I got bored looking out of the window, I tried to convince Vic to play a game with me.

  “What kind of game?” Vic asked suspiciously.

  “A spelling game,” I replied. Nothing too serious like the Never Have I Ever game with Lissie. This was an easy game. One person starts by saying a letter, and each person takes turns adding another letter to spell a word. It keeps going until one person gets stumped. I love it.

  “Okay,” Vic said.

  “Great! Umm...” I searched for a letter. “Q!”

  Vic furrowed his brow, thinking. “I,” he finally said.

  “I?” I repeated. Qi? What can I do with that? More importantly, what can he do with that? “I give up. What are you spelling?”

  Vic shrugged. “I don't know. It's an old scrabble trump word. Q-I.”

  “You can't do that,” I said indignantly.

  “You said spell words,” Vic said, shrugging.

  “You have to know what the words mean!” I wrestled ungracefully with my seatbelt trying to face him. I watched his expression change
. The more amused he got, the more annoyed I got. And of course, that made me more irritated, which in turn, made him more amused. I couldn't win.

  “Oh, I see. When Lenny starts losing, all the obscure rules come out,” Vic said, chuckling.

  I faced forward again and folded my arms. “Fine. Pick a letter.” I really was a poor sport. Much too competitive to play games. No one picked me for sports at school because I always took it too seriously.

  “No time. We're here,” Vic said, as he pulled into a gravel driveway. I looked up, my irritation dissolving. We were entering a garage attached to a huge cabin. It wasn't your run-of-the-mill cabin. I had been expecting rustic, what I was getting was opulent and mansion-like in its size. I made sure to keep my mouth shut, because I had a feeling it was about to fall open.

  Just how much money did Vic make? And how?

  “It would be very hard for you to walk off my property. Not only do I own this house but also the surrounding grounds.”

  Vic's voice pulled me out of my spell. He owned the woods too? Well, I was definitely going to explore them later. Maybe I'd find his skeletons.

  “I have to do some work later tonight, but after that I'll be available. We can do whatever you want.” Vic took the key out of the ignition and dangled it from his forefinger.

  Ah, the elusive work. Part of me wanted to spy on that more than explore, but I knew I wouldn't be welcome.

  “I have video games, board games, TV, a hot tub...” Vic trailed off, looking at me.

  “That all sounds fun,” I replied, still dumbfounded.

  “Good!” Vic clapped his hands together, gaining my attention. “I'll show you to your room and then you can do whatever you want until I'm done working.”

  We both got out of the car and I followed him into the cabin and up the stairs. The cabin had an open floor plan. The great room had a cathedral ceiling, and the hallway on the second floor was a big balcony overlooking the first. It was really a breathtaking design. Vic led me into my room off of the balcony/hallway. The room was just as stunning as the rest of the cabin.