Chapter 45
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
To Do:
- Sephora gift cards for Bri and Charlie
- Figure out how to put life back together
Raised voices jolted Claire awake the next morning. Her eyes snapped open, and without stopping to think she rolled out of bed and onto the floor. The designated under-the-bed baseball bat was cool to the touch as she withdrew it.
She barely even paused to register that she had not sleepwalked.
“What’s going on?” Brianna’s head popped up from a cot on the floor. She flung her sheets off.
“Voices,” Claire said. She rose and snapped the curtains open. If a member of ESA was out there trying to kill her private security guy, she was going to have to fight him in Luke’s Navy sweatshirt and corgi-print panties.
The bottom dropped out of her stomach. Oh, hell. There she was. Alice Alejo, dressed in a hot pink track suit and arguing loudly with the security officer. Claire dropped the baseball bat and ran down the stairs two at a time. Brianna and the dogs chased after her. She missed one step and fell, spectacularly crashing down the stairs and banging her elbows off every ninety-degree angle in sight. She crumpled in a heap at the bottom and moaned.
“Are you okay?” Brianna rushed to her side.
“I’m fine.” Every part of her body already hurt from being abducted and nearly drowned. What was a few more bumps? She clambered to her feet and thrust the door open.
“Mom, what are you doing?” Claire stood in the morning sun, corgi underwear and all.
“There, see? She called me Mom. Honestly.” Alice slung her purse back over her shoulder and stomped across the grass. Was that the flash of a Taser being tucked into Alice’s bag? The man in the SoCal Security polo raised his eyebrows at Claire, and she nodded. He got back in the car.
“Darling, what are you wearing?” Alice’s carry-on hit the porch with a thump and her arms snaked around Claire in a suffocating hug.
“Pajamas,” Claire said defensively.
“Not that, though I do wish you’d put on pants before you open the door. On your face.”
“Huh?” She ran a hand over her face. Apparently her new anti-sleepwalking medication had been so effective that she had fallen asleep before she could remove the false mustache Brianna had glued onto her the night before. Their efforts to disguise her as a man had been surprisingly successful, and it hadn’t exactly raised her self-confidence.
“Ah, well. That’s?—”
“You don’t have to tell me.” Alice pulled back and took Claire by both arms, shaking her a little. Tears had welled up in her mother’s eyes. “I can’t believe you got abducted again . Where was your Taser? Why didn’t you call the police?”
Claire’s shoulders slumped. Her fifty-five-year-old mother had managed to incapacitate her attacker with nothing but a rolling pin. Claire had been in one of the most populated cities in the world with a litany of weapons at her disposal and self-defense training, and she had still almost died. How embarrassing.
“Come in, Mom.” The door creaked open behind her.
Alice was momentarily distracted by Rosie’s delirious joy at seeing her grandmother. Bri passed Claire a pair of shorts on her way into the kitchen, and Claire scrambled into them.
This was not going to be good. Alice wasn’t exactly adept at de-escalating crises. If anything, she was only going to stir up more trouble—probably in the form of yet another PI. And a well-paid new PI was sure to tattle on Claire if she infiltrated a men’s rights conference.
Brianna appeared from the kitchen, two steaming mugs of coffee in hand.
“Good morning, ladies,” she said, far too chipper for the chaos that had just unfolded.
“Brianna! How are you?” Alice swooped in for another strangle hug. Claire mouthed a thank you over Alice’s shoulder, and Brianna smiled.
Claire glanced at the front door behind her. One hand hesitated on the knob. She could totally run away before Alice noticed. Alice turned around and shook her head. Holy shit. Had she taken up telepathy now? Claire sighed and trudged into the kitchen.
After an hour of chatting about her new project, Bri left to meet with her trainer.
Then the ranting began. Eggs jiggled in a frying pan on the stove as Alice paced in the kitchen.
“I can’t believe the police haven’t been more proactive. They know about your history. Surely your father has spoken to them. And now Luke has had to hire private security just to keep you?—”
She must have noticed the grimace Claire made at the mention of Luke’s name.
“Where is Luke, sweetheart? Working already?”
Claire slid the pan off the burner and took a deep breath. She addressed the spatula. “He left. Pretty much right after I was abducted. He said he couldn’t be with someone who didn’t care if she lived or died.”
There was a small gasp behind her. Claire turned to find Alice’s enormous sky-blue eyes watering cinematically. “He didn’t.”
She offered a flat smile. “It’s okay. I think I was just too much for him. It’s better to know now than in five years, right? Besides, he spent the last month bossing me around. Telling me I can’t leave the house by myself. I’m not a child.” Despite the casual nature of her words, thousands of daggers pierced her insides. She had opened her heart again, and look where it got her. Maybe she really was meant to be alone—a starry-eyed spinster creating happily ever afters for everyone but herself.
Alice collapsed into a chair at the kitchen table. She seemed lost in thought. “It’s not like him to just leave. He must have been really upset.”
Claire wrenched the refrigerator door open. She needed to focus on something else, or she was going to lose it. The fancy kombucha Luke had requested sat on the bottom shelf, mocking her. She yanked the glass bottle out of the fridge and twisted the top off. The scent of vinegar was strong in the air as it swirled down the drain.
Words bubbled up on their own. “I still can’t believe he said that to me. You know? That I don’t care if I live or die. Who is so casual about their existence? Of course I don’t want to die. I just want things to go back to normal. I’m tired of being hunted like an animal. I’m tired of waiting to see what twisted way ESA is going to try to ruin my life next. I’m tired of putting everyone around me in danger all the time.” She slammed the bottle down on the counter and whirled around. “They’re threatening Brianna and Charlie. And they almost took you from me.”
“Sweetheart, put the knife down.” Alice’s hand closed over her wrist.
She had picked up the chef’s knife without even noticing.
Claire dropped the knife and sank into another mom hug. Patchouli and vanilla infiltrated her nose as Alice squeezed her tight. She had come perilously close to losing the strongest woman she knew. Alice had spent Claire’s formative years lecturing her endlessly on personal safety. Without her mother, she wouldn’t have been able to slip her bonds that night in the parking garage. The emergency tool wouldn’t have been in her purse. Her mother had prepared her for the worst, and she had survived because of it.
“You’ll never lose me, darling.” Alice whispered. “And I don’t think you’ve lost Luke either, for what it’s worth.”
Claire withdrew and went back to the pan. She couldn’t think about Luke right now.
Alice hovered behind her. “Sweetheart, you’re tough. Like me. I know you didn’t have the best childhood, and I’m sorry about that,” she said.
Oh boy, an impromptu therapy session. Had she not suffered enough? If she didn’t head it off now, they’d both spend the entire day weeping and eating ice cream out of the container.
“Mom, that’s?—”
Alice put a hand on her cheek. She smiled, but there were tears in her eyes. “I fell to pieces when your dad left. You and Charlie held things together. I relied on you both too much, I know I did. You were such a sweet girl, even then. Making sure the bills were paid and making grocery lists. You’re used to having to be tough. And I think in some ways that’s served you well. You have grown into a miraculous woman. You are kind, fierce, loyal, independent, silly, beautiful, all the best things a person could be.”
Claire bit her lip. Crying was not on the agenda for the day, but the tears were welling up of their own accord. Damn it, Mom.
Alice’s hands cradled hers, cool and soft. “You’ve been through so much, Clairebear. You’ve been hurt, in more ways and by more people than most of us will ever experience.”
Now her lip was quivering. Deep breaths.
Alice squeezed her hands and continued. “I know you hate that he was trying to tell you what to do. But imagine you were him. Wouldn’t you want him to do everything he could to be safe when you weren’t physically with him? He told you to stay home because he can’t protect you while he’s gone.”
Claire opened her mouth, ready to protest that she didn’t need anyone to protect her. Alice silenced her with a stern look.
“But you left anyway,” she continued, “knowing full well that there’s a group of crazed idiots out there hell-bent on killing you, and look what happened. You keep putting yourself in danger for no reason. He loves you, sweetheart. It’s no wonder he’s upset.”
Claire frowned and pulled her hands away to cross her arms. Even if her mom was right, it was no reason to just leave.
Alice tucked a curl behind Claire’s ear. “He just wants you to take this seriously. To be safe. To value your own life. To think about him, and all the other people who love you. You mean so much to so many. Especially your mama.”
She booped Claire on the nose. “Relationships take work, sweetie. You have to be willing to make concessions for each other. And I know part of you is afraid to give up your independence. To feel like you’re accountable to someone. To fully open your heart again after what Jason did to you. But Luke is not Jason. I don’t want to see you throw away the great love of your life because you’re too proud to look at things from his perspective. You need to know when it’s time to apologize if you want to make this work. So why don’t you do what you can to make it right?”
Claire sniffed and rubbed at her fake mustache. Her mother had an annoying ability to put a complicated situation simply. “Do you guys have a group chat going or something? You’re not supposed to take his side.”
“I’m not, darling. You’re right—he shouldn’t have left. But I understand why he did, and I think you do too.”
“Well,” Claire said, sitting up and wiping a finger underneath her eyes. “There’s nothing I can do about it now. He’s gone.”
Alice nudged her. “You know that’s not true. You, my sweet girl, have an unparalleled talent for creating beautiful moments. Why don’t you do what you were born to do and create one for him?”
Claire dragged the sleeve of Luke’s sweatshirt over her face. The fake mustache caught the fabric and ripped itself off. The tears were out in full force now. She pressed a hand to the raw spot and looked at her mother.
“But what if he doesn’t come back?”
Alice squared her shoulders and took Claire by both arms. “Then he’s an idiot, and you’re finally going to move to Florida with me.”
Claire laughed in spite of herself. “That is not happening.”
“Oh, come on, just think of the proposals. Beautiful sunshine, sandy beaches.”
“I’m sorry, didn’t I read that a Miami wedding was interrupted last week when a gator attended the ceremony and death rolled with the aisle runner?”
“Stop deflecting, sweetie. Go get one of your binders.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Claire said as she left the kitchen.
Anxiety rippled through her. Luke had been almost unrecognizable when he left. Stoic, cold, the spitting image of his notoriously icicle-like mother, Rachel. He had left, mere hours after she had been abducted. Did she really owe him a big romantic gesture?
A picture in the hallway caught her eye. She stopped and ran a finger over a pooka shell glued to the frame. She and Luke were pressed together, his fingers caught in her windswept hair. A cotton candy sunset colored the sky behind them. A pang of regret gripped her stomach. Could she spend the next sixty years of her life without him? Watch as he fell in love again, married someone who wasn’t constantly being abducted? Had beautiful, grumpy, suspiciously in-shape children with an Olivia clone?
Ideas were creeping in, but her stomach was still in a vise. Alice was right. She had been foolish, dangerous. If Luke was in her position and he had run off alone, she would be furious. And even before that, she had allowed herself to be so engulfed in Brad’s circus that she had forgotten to prioritize her relationship. All Luke had asked was to spend some time together in his second home. He wanted to show her what he loved about Los Angeles, and she barely made a spare minute to give him that. It had all been for nothing.
Even if he didn’t want to get back together, she owed him an apology. Her hands shook as she pulled a fresh binder out of the closet in the hallway. Would he understand, or was she about to put herself out there just to have her heart stomped on?