Chapter 22
Sapphire
Madeleine blew up my phone. Leaving her not saying anything was only the first reason I was a terrible girlfriend. I should have responded, anything, just texted her and let her know I couldn’t talk right now, but I couldn’t… I just couldn’t. Couldn’t pick up the phone, couldn’t get up off the couch, where I lay on my side staring out the window.
I didn’t know what time it was or how long I’d been there—I knew somewhere in the back of my mind that I was forgetting something important, something I was supposed to be doing or somewhere I was supposed to be, but I couldn’t find the thoughts in the murky haze that was my head right now, couldn’t put things logically together. All I knew was that the sunlight outside the window had faded and turned to wispy twilight that peered in through the cracks between buildings when I heard knocking at the door, and I got a sick feeling in my throat, my heart jumping with all the energy it had, which wasn’t much right now.
“I’m sorry,” I said, finally, my voice thin. “I… I just need… a minute. I’m really sorry.”
It felt like cold water thrown over my face when it was Andrew’s voice from the door, not Madeleine’s. “I don’t know how many minutes we have, honestly,” he said, his voice that thing he did where he sounded calm and it was just the slight squeeze in his voice that gave the urgency away. “Your mother requested somebody else come find you here soon enough.”
I sat bolt upright, a cold sensation pooling in my head, and I stood up, shakily, turning back to the door. “Come… find me? Here? For what?”
“I’ve told you about asking questions you already know the answer to, Sapphire.”
My throat tightened, and I stood there in the hazy, surreal nightmare of the moment. “So, what?” I said, finally. “You’re finally deciding to just go with the kidnapping approach?”
He sighed, heavily. “Sapphire—I’m not trying to bring you back to your parents.”
“What?” I balled my fists. “What are you lying for? As if I don’t know what they pay you for?”
“Are we going to have this conversation through a door again?”
“At this point I wouldn’t be surprised if any of my parents’ lackeys are ready to grab me and… and throw me in a bag. So, yes, we are having this conversation through a door.”
He sighed, and I heard him leaning back against the door. I stood there facing the door with my heart pounding, until, slowly, I found myself leaning back against it too.
“I passed along your message to your parents,” he said. “From what you told me last time.”
“I’m not sensing it led to a change of heart, judging from what she told me earlier.”
“I’m hazarding a guess it did not. They did not… express a lot of remorse for their behavior.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, hating the way my pulse pounded, the way my stomach churned. I wished Madeleine were here… I longed for the way everything had made sense this morning. Longed for the way things fit safely into place when she was here. “Why are you telling me? I already know how they reacted.”
“What I’m telling you is…” He sighed, hard, and I could see his expression—the familiar lines of his face, knowing the way he was probably raking his fingers back through his hair, clawing into his scalp. I’d seen that look so many times. “It’s not acceptable for them to treat you the way they have. So I told them I can’t, in good conscience, help them chase you down like this.”
My throat tightened further, a fuzzy dry feeling in my mouth, and I pursed my lips, breathing in slowly, out slowly. It… probably should have healed something in me, right? To hear something like that from the person who’d raised me? It felt like a band-aid on a bullet wound—a band-aid on a heart attack, something plastered on the outside when the hurt was on the inside. “And yet here you are,” I said, finally, my throat like sandpaper.
“Sapphire, I’m telling you I’m trying to help you. I spent a while trying to talk them over, telling them—they need to accept you as you actually are if they want any chance at a relationship with you—”
“I don’t want that. Did you ask what I wanted?”
“No, no I didn’t. Because I’m a terrible, craven fiend, whatever you’d like to hear, Sapphire. The point is, I tried to talk sense into them, and they wouldn’t have it. Your mother finally gave up and decided to take matters into her own hands, and she got somebody else to track down where you work.”
I snorted, gripping my fists tighter. “Where I work? They’ve known where I live for a month now. Was taking the elevator too much trouble? Didn’t want to bother unless she had a private elevator?”
“I didn’t pass it along to them that you were staying here. Or even that I’d given you the key.”
I stopped. “What?”
“Everyone needs privacy. Besides, I could tell something extreme must have been happening. I think it was the right choice.”
I felt like something broke then—something crumbling inside me, and the tears burned hot on my face, a thick feeling welling in my throat. I flicked my fingers under my eyes, throwing the tears off in frustration, but they welled up again just as quickly, and I hugged myself with a short, frustrated sigh, before I turned, and I unlocked the door, opening it just a crack.
Andrew stumbled on the other side—I’d kind of forgotten he was leaning on the door—but he caught himself, turning back to face me. He looked like he’d aged ten years… started to look more like my father. Despite every single angry thought I’d ever had about him, Andrew deserved better than that comparison.
“What are they going to do?” I said, quietly, peering through the opening in the door. “They can’t drag me away.”
He pursed his lips, looking down, not meeting my eyes. Almost… ashamed? Of what? Not fulfilling his duties? Or just to look me in the eye after everything that had happened? “No,” he said. “But they can make your life hell. For you and your girlfriend.”
I gripped tighter on the doorhandle, anger spiking up hot in my throat again, just like it had earlier. Was it something that came more easily, more naturally, with practice? I really hoped not. “So you’ve been stalking everything in my life?”
“More or less. Partly because I was paid to and partly because I was worried. They don’t know about her yet, but I promise you they’ll find out.”
I crumpled, sinking against the doorframe. “She said… she’s not afraid of what they might do…”
He smiled at me, softly, and it was the saddest thing I could ever have seen—that halfhearted little smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “She does seem like a wonderful young woman. I’m sad these things didn’t play out like they should have… I would have liked another world where you bring her around to show your family and I could embarrass you in front of her.”
I couldn’t do this right now… not with this feeling like everything was shattering at the seams. I gripped tighter onto the doorhandle, feeling like everything was drifting apart and nothing I did could hold the pieces together. My voice came out thin, wispy. “You did meet her… actually.”
He smiled wider. “In the park, yes—I recognized her face when I looked her up. She’s a good actor. And I’m glad you had someone there when you left.”
I pushed out a long, slow, shaky breath, trying to pull the drifting, hazy shapes in my head back together to form thoughts. “What… are they going to do to her?”
“Bring up bullshit challenges to tarnish her student record, for one. She’d be able to fight them, but it would take so much time and energy from her and she’d be up against people for whom that kind of money is enough to throw away without noticing…”
“ Why? She didn’t do anything. She just…” I squeezed the doorhandle tighter, clutching on when it felt like I’d fall over if I didn’t. “She just wants to design a hotel… one like the Peninsula. Maybe they’d stay there one day. Why couldn’t it just be like that?”
“Because… of some things I won’t use to describe my employers while they are still, technically, my employers.”
I narrowed my eyes. “What? Planning on quitting?”
“I imagine I’m not long for that job whether I quit or not. I’ve made enemies by now.”
I looked down, wavering. “Why… would you do that? You’ve been working for them for almost my whole life, it’s…”
He sighed, putting his hands up. “Because I’ve worked for them almost your whole life. And it’s hard to see someone grow up and not be concerned at least a little bit for her wellbeing.” When the elevator chimed down the hall, he jerked back with eyes wide, looking down the hall, but when the footsteps pushed into a different apartment, he relaxed—slowly, still watching, letting his guard down one bit at a time until he turned back to me with a haggard expression. “They’re going to bring those same kinds of bullshit issues against you, too, Sapphire. Wherever you go to work, they’re likely to harass you, and this apartment—they’re trying to track down where you’re living as we speak, and I don’t think it’ll be long before they find this. They’re probably going to challenge you to a legal battle that, again, even if they don’t have a case, is going to be a battle of time and money that you can’t win.”
“So what are you saying? That I have to go back to them? That I’m a prisoner, that they can legally kidnap me anywhere I go, hunt down and ruin the lives of anyone I love just to force me back, and there’s nothing I can do but obey, submit, meekly follow them?”
He pursed his lips, standing up taller. “Not necessarily… they’re powerful, but only in the Midwest.”
I felt a cold pang hit like a slap in the face, and I shivered, staring at him for the longest time before I said, “So… you’re telling me to move.”
“I am. As far as I can see, the options are either to move or to go back. If you have another suggestion, genuinely, I want to know.”
I sank, slowly, against the doorframe, staring down at the floor. “But I don’t… know. I don’t know how. Just getting to a point I was surviving here was so hard, and I only did it through sheer dumb luck, and—”
He put a hand up. “I know. That’s why I would help.”
“Help? Help what? Do you have another condo somewhere to hand out to me? Just a stack of them tucked away?”
“Would if I could. Do you remember Chelsea Branning, the stylist?”
“Um…” I shifted. “Yeah. What about her?”
“She lives in Baltimore now, doing events. I passed along your portfolio to her and explained a… little, about the situation, and she’d be interested in taking you on.”
I blinked, fast, my head spinning. “Chelsea? Taking me on? As a stylist? Are you serious?”
“Completely serious, yes. It would be a full-time job with good benefits, which you might need. Baltimore’s gotten expensive lately, from what she tells me. It’s not luxurious pay at entry-level, but Chelsea knows you and trusts you and likes your work, so she’s happy to train you on.”
“When did you—”
“I’ve been preparing for the worst. Old habit of mine.”
“But…” I stumbled back, slumping onto the couch, and Andrew stepped inside with me, shutting the door behind him—I didn’t notice, didn’t look, didn’t pay attention, just crumpled into myself as he sat down next to me. “But everyone here… all these people who did everything for me and I’m supposed to just up and run away? Just like that?”
“It wouldn’t have to be forever…” he said, his voice thin. “If you give it long enough that your parents get it into their heads they can’t chase you down like that, then you could come back, try again…”
“I’ve given them years to get this into their heads. They just get worse… every… single… time. How long am I supposed to give them? Five years? Ten years? Fifty years? Do I leave Chicago until they’re dead? I… I don’t know what I’m supposed to say… to Britt, to Haley, to Ellen, to… to Madeleine.” I buried my face in my hands, clutching my fingers tight against my hair. “I don’t want to go… I don’t want to go.”
He was quiet for the longest time, this horrible horrible silence as I broke down, fighting back one tear but losing against the next, until I was sobbing into my hands, and he put a hand on my back.
“I’m sorry,” he said, finally, his voice small. “I wish… there were more I could do.”
“I need to… I need to talk to Madeleine,” I said, my voice wavering. “She’s still at work and I’ve been ignoring her messages… she’s going to be worried sick. God, Andrew, what am I supposed to tell her?”
“I could pass the message along to her, but I don’t think you, she, or I would feel that right.”
I shook my head. “No… no. I have to tell her myself. I have to… do… at least one thing like a responsible… adult.” I sniffed, trying to pull myself together, sitting upright, but I cracked and broke again, collapsing into myself crying. “I have to… I have to grow up now.”