Chapter 18
eighteen
“Fuck.”
My nightmare hurtles me into consciousness just before my lungs collapse. They heave as I throw myself out of bed, automatically reaching for the loaded gun on my nightstand and drawing it.
It takes me several breaths to realize I’m pointing the damn thing at an empty room. My bedroom.
Blood, panic, and pain whirl through my head in a kaleidoscope of misery. Shots ring in my ears, deafening me to any sound apart from the rough breaths scraping out of my chest.
I know I’m alone, but I click off the Glock’s safety and clear the apartment anyway. When I am certain it was all part of my bad dream, I drop into my father’s seat—at the kitchen table I took from my parents’ house—and stare at the dark window across the living room.
After setting the gun aside, I curl forward to drop my head to my hands. Eventually, the noise inside of me quiets, replaced by the dull roar pressing down around me.
Silence.
Because I’m alone.
The thought hits differently in this moment. It isn’t just a fact. Or a placation. This time, it’s the worst kind of realization. The truth.
I am alone.
Still. Always.
I stay there for a long time, staring at the dark void outside my window, waiting for the first strains of dawn to touch it. For the first time in a long time, I don’t want to go to the gym and pound myself into submission. I just want to sit with the truth. With my choices.
I don’t know how long I stay there before the sky lightens from pitch black to silvery slate. Long enough to work my way through all of my thoughts and back again.
Gradually, reality steals me out of my introspection. It’s Friday. And that means—
A spark settles into my center. Alice.
“Fuck.”
Grayson spits the curse along with a mouthful of saliva, lunging up from the ropes surrounding his boxing ring.
I swallow a smirk. I’ve knocked him back four times, even though I’m going easy on him. I don’t want to give him a black eye to match his tux for his engagement party, but he’s making it easy.
In my professional opinion, his legs are too loose. Every boxer knows what causes that.
“Watch your left,” I remind, raising my gloves to demonstrate. Again. “Keep your shoulders lax and step with your right foot.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he grumbles, putting his fists up. “We both know I’m horseshit this morning.”
I jab left to throw him off and swing a right hook. He barely dodges it, pivoting to face me again.
“Long night?” I drawl, hoping to provoke him. I only get a chance to goad my boss when we’re in the ring. Sometimes, if I rile him up enough, he really comes at me. I need the challenge since I skipped my usual gym session this morning.
“Longer than yours,” he shoots back, striking quick enough to get a piece of my torso.
While his arm is extended, I uppercut and hit him in the diaphragm. He grunts, losing a step. I take another swing and land a blow to the side of his head. “How would you know?”
Shaking me off, he raises a sardonic eyebrow. “You obviously have a bit of frustration to work out.”
He has a point. I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep or satisfying sex in months. Maybe years. And the recent image of Alice in her damned towel doesn’t exactly help. Nor does my brain’s new habit of projecting the picture into the forefront of my mind the second I lie down.
Grayson’s fist slams into the side of my jaw. “Watch your left,” he taunts.
I have to laugh. “Yeah, yeah.”
We both round, snarling as we go for each other again. After another four rounds, he finally falls back, panting. “Okay, I give.”
The thrill of victory pours through me. I do my best not to grin. “Ella should take the night off every once in a while. Give you a fair shake in the ring.”
Grayson glowers, tugging his gloves off. “I’ll be sure to pass that along.”
I toss my own gloves aside and reach for my water bottle, chugging half in one go. “Is she ready for tomorrow night? I know she likes big parties about as much as I do.”
His scowl morphs into a grimace. “Which is still more than I like them.” He sighs.
“She’s been a good sport about this one.
I think she feels bad for choosing so many wedding details that my mom disapproves of.
She’s trying to be upbeat about the engagement party because she thinks it’s Mom’s one chance to have things her way. ”
That sounds like Ella. I nod, my mind spinning through the dozens of details I have to review before the following night, not to mention their actual wedding day.
That will be its own logistical nightmare.
“To be honest, I’ll be happy when this is all over,” I grouse, mopping sweat off my forehead with the hem of my tank top.
Grayson agrees, nodding. “Hopefully, people will stop being so insane once we’re married.” He sighs again. “It can’t come soon enough. I’m supposed to pay the rest of Alice’s planning fee by tomorrow, and then there are only three months to go.”
Strange relief bleeds into my chest. Good, I think.
Alice needs that money. Maybe she’ll be able to pay her bills soon.
And get some more tea for herself. It was generous of her to give me any in the first place.
I never should have taken them. I suppose I could go to the shop and get her some more—
“Marco?”
Carajo. I keep doing that.
“Sorry,” I apologize, tuning back into the conversation. “What?”
Grayson squints slightly. “I asked if you thought Miss Moore was a little… off? I’ve been thinking about it ever since those paps got hold of her. She barely said a word about it afterward.”
I don’t like the flash of fear that seizes my lungs at the memory of that man. And the knowledge he still has her address. I also don’t like Grayson’s implication that her silence was anything but pure terror. I’ve seen the way she clams up when she feels stressed or scared.
A pang hits my heart. I know I was with her when she woke up, but I should have been there when it happened. She must have been terrified.
Poor sweet girl.
“She’s just so quiet,” Grayson continues.
I think of all her mumbling and humming. Our long, lively debate. For a moment, I almost contradict him.
But those small pieces of her feel like secrets. My secrets.
“She seems… soft.”
When I reflect on why I find it so impossible to maintain a proper level of suspicion around her, that’s the word I keep coming back to. Soft and sweet—and seemingly neglected by most people she knows.
Grayson’s expression turns sympathetic. “Poor girl.”
Too late, I realize how my reply sounded to him. He doesn’t know I’ve spent any extra time with Alice. As far as he knows, she’s just Miss Moore to me. The awkward wedding planner I suffer for Ella’s sake.
He thinks I was making some sort of veiled insult. Using the word “soft” as a placeholder for “pitiful.”
Why does that make me want to roundhouse kick him?
I don’t have time to think it over too much. The elevator on the far side of the basement gym dings. As the doors part, Ella’s petite form appears.
Grayson grins, immediately distracted. “You missed Marco kicking my ass,” he tells her, dropping his drenched shirt in the hamper beneath the laundry chute. “It was pathetic.”
Ella glows as she smiles up at him. “You could never be pathetic,” she soothes.
I laugh. “Oh, I wouldn’t be too sure about that. His head was in the clouds.”
Grayson tucks a piece of his fiancée’s hair behind her ear. “Your fault,” he mouths at her. A brooding pout pulls at his features. “At this rate, I may as well not bother getting back in the ring after our honeymoon.”
Ella giggles, turning her deep blue eyes on me. “Want a victory scone? I baked some to go with your tea.”
I think of Alice again, wondering if she’ll make me tea when I see her later. “Actually,” I find myself saying. “Could I take two to go?”