Chapter 27 – Elijah
Chapter Twenty-Seven
ELIJAH
T he thought of her sitting there alone, disappointed when she realizes I’m not coming running like a pussy-drunk idiot, makes me feel marginally better. I ignore her call with a smile. She probably tried the burner first, but that is well and truly dead. By now, she must be getting increasingly desperate. Maybe she’s figured it out—she’s far from stupid. She’ll probably guess that Nathan put two and two together and came to tell me. She’ll probably have been trying to calculate the odds, though—wondering if Nathan actually saw her in Freddie’s office or if there could be some other explanation. Wondering if she could come up with a decent excuse and continue with her sly game.
By now, she knows the answer to that is a solid no. She won’t be able to manipulate me ever again. She may have signed with Freddie Kemp, but he doesn’t scare me. Tomorrow, I will sit down with Drake, and we will come up with a strategy. This will hurt him too. The bitch doesn’t know what she’s let herself in for. We’ll destroy her in exactly the same way she planned to destroy me. I will fucking ruin her the way she’s ruined me. Well, not exactly the same way, given that she’s torn my fucking heart to shreds. Her lack of heart makes it impossible to do the same, but I can and will ruin the only thing she cares about—her reputation. Freddie Kemp might be a shark, but he’s never come up against Nathan and Drake before, and they will eat him for fucking breakfast.
This is exactly what we hoped to avoid—all-out warfare. At least it’s what I hoped to avoid—she was pretending to my face while plotting with Freddie in private this whole time. Keeping me pussy blind so I wouldn’t see it coming.
I’m back at the townhouse now, filled with anger and welcoming it. Anger is better than what came before. Give me good old-fashioned rage over heartbreak every damn day.
I strip down to workout shorts and a T-shirt and head to the gym in the basement, needing to punch some shit. Once my hands are wrapped, I start with the speed bag. I build up power until it’s a blur in front of me, then move onto the heavyweight punching bag that hangs from the ceiling. I put my gloves on and lay into it. Every blow I land comes with a satisfying thud, and I work up a healthy sweat. Eventually, though, even that isn’t enough.
Fuck it. I tug my gloves off and throw them to the floor. I need to feel some real pain.
Twenty minutes later, I’m done. I sink to the concrete and pour half a bottle of water straight over my head. I’m sweating hard, my face feels like someone took a blowtorch to it, and my lungs are bursting.
I swallow down the rest of the water and look at my hands. My knuckles are scraped and bloody, my fingers swollen and red. That was fucking stupid, but I needed it. I needed the distraction of the physical, because the emotional is threatening to knock me out. I clamber to my feet and notice my back is still sore from that stupid ballet bullshit last night. Jesus fuck. Was it really only last night? It seems impossible that so much changed so quickly. How long was she going to keep up this charade, anyway? The legal process would have shown her true colors before much longer. Maybe she and that fucker Freddie Kemp were planning a big reveal. Who knows—it’s pointless trying to figure it out.
I take the world’s hottest shower, torturing myself with the spray on its most punishing setting and then change it to freezing cold. It’s the only way I know to keep my mind off her. Even now, my bastard memory is messing with me, flooding me with images of her in the shower at the Greenwich Village place. I fucked her in there the last time we met, with her long legs wrapped around my back, her ass in my hands. She came so hard around my cock, screaming my name, her eyes fluttering and rolling. The water flowing off her slender shoulders and cascading over her rigid nipples… Fuck!
My hand is on my dick, and despite the icy water, I’m still hard for her. I still want her. I’m nothing but a goddamn animal.
She used that against me, and I hate that I was such an easy mark. I hate that despite it all, my stupid, soft heart is still in pieces. I dry myself off, throw on sweats, and pour another Scotch. I don’t know what to do with myself. I can’t stop thinking about her, about what she’s done. My thoughts are ricocheting around my head like a pinball on acid. I have too many fucking feelings, and I don’t know where to put them all. I also have too many fucking questions and no way to answer them.
Unless… It’s only ten o’clock. Too early for me to try to sleep, and I don’t want to be around my family. Nathan agreed to keep this whole situation quiet for now. The last thing I need is pity or more questions. Worse, the subtle sense of I-told-you-so that I will imagine is there even if it’s not.
I genuinely believed Amber and I were finding our way back to each other, and I wanted it so much. Each time I saw her during our “affair,” my feelings for her deepened. I witnessed her opening up and softening, and I watched myself open up right alongside her. Tonight, I planned to lay it all on the line for her—ask her to come back, promise her the world, give her my whole heart.
I still don’t understand why she felt the need to pretend and deceive. Except I suppose I do. She made her feelings about my family very clear. Apart from Drake, she cannot stand them, and vice versa. Over the years, that attitude has hardened inside her, made her bitter. It’s like scar tissue, hidden beneath the surface. She saw a chance to strike back, to screw them over the way she thinks they screwed her over, and she seized it. Fuck, maybe I’ve got it all wrong. It could have been good old-fashioned greed. I clearly don’t know my wife as well as I thought I did, so why would I think I could figure out her motivations on my own? There is only one person who can provide the answers I seek.
I’m self-aware enough to know I’m looking for an excuse to see her one last time before things get nasty, but I need this. I need to look her in the eyes and call her out. Only then will I be able to fully turn my back on her.
I bang on Amber’s door with my fist, ignoring the doorbell with its dreamcatcher hanging over the buzzer, twirling in the wind. There’s no answer, and I bang again. I realize as I stand here that I haven’t really thought this through—she might not be home. For all I know, she’s found herself a new man already. My breath freezes in my lungs, and I slam both fists on the wooden door.
Finally, lights come on inside the house, and I hear footsteps on the stairs. If she has found another man and he’s here with her, I won’t be fucking responsible for my actions.
“Hey, asshole!” someone shouts from behind me. It’s the voice of a two-pack-a-day smoker, full of gravel. “Shut the fuck up. Some of us are trying to sleep.”
I turn around to see a vicious-looking old crone glaring out at me. Fuck, this must be the famous Mrs. Katzberg, the woman Drake thinks is former Special Forces. At only five feet tall, she still manages to be terrifying. Before I can respond, Amber opens the door, and I turn back, coming face-to-face with my wife. She doesn’t look like a monster, but clichés are clichés for a reason—looks really can be deceiving.
“Amber, hon, you okay?” Mrs. Katzberg shouts. “You want me to call the cops or shoot him in the ass?” I have no doubt she’s the kind who keeps a handgun next to her dentures, and I prepare to hit the ground.
“That’s all right, Mrs. K,” Amber calls back. “I appreciate it though. You go on and get back to sleep. I’ll come by tomorrow so you can give me that recipe we talked about.”
“All right, dear. You know how to reach me.” This last part seems pointed, a threat, and as I turn to watch her close the door, the look that old woman sends my way has my balls crawling up inside my body. Jesus. If I still gave a fuck about Amber’s safety, I would be sufficiently reassured by the presence of the vigilant battleax across the street.
Shivering in only a T-shirt that ends at mid-thigh, Amber glares up at me. That’s my fucking Ramones T-shirt from a million years ago. “I thought you said you threw that in the trash.”
“Yeah. Well. I lied. You’d better come in or Mrs. K will have a fit. She wasn’t joking. She has a Mossberg shotgun in there.”
She walks away without another word, and I follow her into the small house. Someone has been painting, and the smell of cocoa is in the air. The space is chintzy and cute, definitely the domain of women. I try to imagine a heartless, scheming bitch living here and struggle to make the two halves fit.
She leans against the kitchen counter, and I work hard at not noticing the legs. Or the hard nipples. Or the deliciously mussed-up hair.
“What do you want, Elijah?” There’s no aggression in her tone. None of her signature frost either. She simply sounds sad and tired.
I look at her face, really look at it, and see how pale she is. Her eyes are red rimmed, and there are dark circles forming underneath. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her look so broken, and I fight the urge to comfort her. “I want to know when you were going to tell me.”
“Tell you what?”
“Fuck it, Amber, you know what.”
She rubs at her eyes again and sighs. “Elijah, it’s late, and I’m too tired for this. I can’t play these games with you anymore. It’s sick and it’s cruel. So just ask what you want to ask and leave me in peace.”
Huh. This is not the reaction I expected at all. I thought she’d be spitting like a cornered tiger, ready to scratch my eyes out.
“I agree. No more games. So how long has Freddie Kemp been representing you?”
She looks up at me sharply, her eyes huge. “What?” She’s trembling, and her legs look like they’re about to give out. Her skin goes even whiter, and as she tries to straighten up, her knees buckle and she starts to fall. I catch her under her armpits and heft her toward me. She sags against my body, then immediately starts flapping her hands like she’s trying to fight me off. What the fuck is this? Some kind of act? She’s pretending to be sick now?
“Let me go, I’m fine.” She pushes away from me with weak shoves, but as soon as I loosen my hold, she staggers again. Shit. This isn’t an act. She’s a mess. I scoop her into my arms and carry her like a child into the living room, where I lay her on the couch and cover her with the pink crocheted blanket draped over the back of it. Brushing her hair back from her face, I note her unfocused eyes and wobbling lips.
“When’s the last time you had something to eat?” I ask briskly. I’m still angry, and I still have questions, but she won’t be answering them if she’s unconscious.
“I don’t know, breakfast maybe… It doesn’t matter. Just leave, Elijah, leave me alone like you did earlier. I don’t need you.” The words come out in an uneven flurry, and as she speaks, tears spill from her eyes. She bats me away, but I don’t budge.
“I’m going to get you something to eat and some tea. I’ll be right back.”
As soon as I stand up, she curls into a ball under the blanket and buries her head in her arms, sobbing uncontrollably. I have no clue what’s happening here, so I concentrate on the basics.
It doesn’t take long to find what I need, and I whip up some buttered toast and a cup of the chamomile tea she likes, then add a couple chocolate chip cookies on the side. The cocoa I smelled earlier is still sitting in its mug, completely cold now. She must have made it and left it there when she went to bed.
I take in the signs of her life here: the colorful jars of tea and cocoa, a bowl of kiwi, a pile of paperwork. It’s an invasion of her privacy, but I rifle through the pages. The top page reads “Leslie Odom Jr. Community Center Volunteer Application and Questionnaire,” and her elegant handwriting fills every page. I study her answer to the question of why she wants to volunteer there, and her apparent naked honesty, her desire to have a lasting impact on the world around her, fills me with doubt. Why bother taking the time to complete a twelve-page questionnaire if this whole moving to Brooklyn and finding herself thing was a ruse?
Determined to get answers, I carry the food and tea back to the living room where she is still curled in a ball but has stopped sobbing.
“Amber, come on. You need to eat.” I gently pry her hands from her head and encourage her to sit upright. She lets me maneuver her but pulls her knees up and refuses to meet my eyes. I tuck the blanket around her and pass her the plate. Her hands are shaking so damn much she struggles to get the food to her lips, and I don’t think having me here is helping. “I’m going to use the bathroom, but eat and drink your tea. You need to get your strength up.”
She doesn’t respond, but she does nibble at the corner of a piece of toast, so I leave her and go find the bathroom, giving her a bit of space. After closing the door behind me, I let out a harshly whispered “Fuck!”
I came here full of self-righteous fury, and now she’s gone and blown that all away. Nathan would say she’s faking it, but I know my wife, and she is in real distress. Whether that’s because she’s been caught or for some other reason, I don’t know yet.
This small, unmistakably feminine room oddly seems to fit her in a way none of the rooms in our house ever did. I absentmindedly pick up a bottle of shampoo from the side of the tub and sniff the coconut fragrance she uses these days. The budget-store brand toiletries are another glaring disparity, more evidence that there are way more pieces missing from the puzzle I came here looking to solve tonight.
Dead set on learning the truth once and for all, I splash my face with cold water and head back downstairs.
Giving her a moment paid off. She’s eaten most of a slice of toast and nibbled at a cookie, and she is now sitting with the tea in her hands, steam forming a cloud in front of her face.
“You feeling better?” I ask, sitting down next to her.
She scoots her feet away as though she’s scared of touching me. “Better, yes. Thank you. Now will you leave?”
“No. I won’t. Not yet. I know you’re not at your best, but I’m not leaving until I have answers. How long have you been cooking up this thing with Freddie?”
Again, the mention of his name makes the blood drain from her face, and she swallows hard before speaking. “I haven’t been cooking up anything with Freddie, and I don’t know what you’re talking about. If that’s all you’re going to keep asking me, it’s going to be a long night for both of us.”
I suck in a breath and try to calm myself. Yelling at her when she’s in this state won’t help.
“Nathan saw you there, Amber. You must have known that he’d tell me.”
She frowns up at me, looking confused. “What did he tell you?”
“That he saw you. That you had an appointment with Freddie Kemp, in his office, alone—that he’s your attorney.”
She looks at me like I’ve grown an extra head and sips more tea. Probably buying herself time. “I should have known he’d interpret it like that and that he’d come running straight to tell you what your big, bad bitch of a wife was getting up to.” She shakes her head and huffs a humorless laugh. “I would have thought of it if I’d been thinking straight. It didn’t even occur to me… I’m so stupid.” Her big brown eyes are glassy, but no tears fall. “Did you just… just believe him?”
She sounds so fucking disappointed in me. I would rather her throw the damn tea in my face than hear that defeated tone in her voice.
“Of course I believed him. Nathan is many things, but he’s not a liar. If he says he saw you, he saw you. But I did also call Freddie.”
“I see.” She nods. “And? How did that go?”
“Well, he basically backed up what Nathan said. Said you’d been to see him, and he couldn’t confirm you were his client because of confidentiality but that I could figure it out myself.”
She laughs bitterly and puts the tea down. Her arms disappear under the blanket when she tugs it up over her shoulders. “Okay. I get it now. You think I’ve been pretending to go along with the civilized divorce plan, and all the while, I was secretly sneaking around behind your back. Plotting what exactly? To steal all your money? Your precious Jamestech?”
Her tone is calm and even, and I don’t know what to think, so I simply shrug. “Something like that, yeah.”
“And you think I’ve been sleeping with you for, what, spite? To pump you for information? To make you underestimate me?”
Those are all things I considered. She still isn’t angry, and it’s confusing the hell out of me. Maybe she simply lacks the energy, and as soon as the sugar hits, she’ll be across this couch with her claws bared.
“Oh, Elijah. What have we become?” She drops her head back and closes her eyes. “How far have we fallen for you to believe that about me?” When she looks at me, the grief in her eyes guts me, but it doesn’t match her resigned tone. “The irony is that I thought… I thought we might actually make it, you know? I thought we might get back together. But here we are. Again. Me on one side, and you and your family on the other. You never even asked me. You didn’t give me the benefit of the doubt. Instead, you automatically believed your brother, who hates me, and then you believed Freddie Kemp, who…” Her voice falters, and she pulls the blanket up to cover her mouth. Tears fill her eyes again, and she stares down at where they fall in beads on the brightly colored yarn.
“Who what, Amber?” I say gently. I want to reach out and touch her, but her closed-off body language stops me. She needs her space right now. Eventually, she looks back up, and the pain in her expression sucks all the air from the room. She bites her lip and then nods—almost to herself, as though she’s found some inner strength and is acknowledging it.
“Freddie Kemp, who assaulted me today.”