Forty
Amelia
Three days later, I’m back at his house and sitting in the sunroom. The house is quiet. With the Volkov threat gone, Tony and Jorge have left us. They might’ve been my jailers, but I kind of miss them.
Everything feels subdued, or maybe it’s me. Linda tiptoes around me like she’s scared I’ll snap at any moment, and it’s wearing. She started to apologize for giving me the Ambien, but thankfully stopped before awkward became unbearable.
As for me, I no longer want to feel numb, so that’s something. What I really want is to get my life back, but I don’t know how. I have no gallery, no income, just the money from the insurance in my bank account.
I’ve let my apartment go. Paying rent made no sense when I’ll never live there again.
Van Wyk happily arranged for my things to be shipped here, but I’ve not unpacked the boxes, not even for my mementos and pictures of my parents.
I can’t bring myself to get them out. How can I even look at them knowing how disappointed they’d be in me?
The house feels different. It’s still my prison, but the ghosts of Juliette seem to have settled.
Or maybe it’s knowing the truth. Van Wyk has promised he won’t leave again, and promised me freedom—so long as it’s not a divorce.
But I don’t know what freedom looks like, so I don’t know what to ask for.
What do I do, get a job? We’re ninety minutes from NYC, and my husband is worth a fortune.
I miss my gallery. I miss my sister and my friends, but I don’t feel strong enough to see them yet.
I am stronger, though. I no longer want to swallow a bottle of pills. Instead, I want to yell and scream at Van Wyk, my anger never far away. Yet it’s tempered with memories of him with red-rimmed eyes and wrinkled clothing, promising me change.
I’ve barely seen him since we got back. He spends all his time in the office, often on the phone. So I’m not abandoned, I’m just… alone.
And I’m waiting for him to do whatever it is he’s going to do, waiting for my life to begin again, waiting until I can decide what I’m going to do.
Buy some books and get them shipped, for a start. Someone must know the address of this place.
The next day, he walks in wearing a morose expression, and flops into one of the other chairs.
He doesn’t usually disturb me when I’m in here. I raise an eyebrow in curiosity, but he merely stares at the floor a few feet in front of his chair.
I try to focus on my book, but his brooding presence is distracting.
“Are you all right?”
“A man I know was killed.”
Jesus, that’s out of the blue. “I’m so sorry, Van Wyk—”
“Lukas,” he says automatically.
“Did you know him well? Was he a friend?”
“Someone I’ve worked with for years, yes.” He pauses, then shrugs one shoulder. “And he was an asshole.”
“Oh. Okay…” I frown, trying to reconcile Van Wyk’s verbal indifference with the emotions he’s displaying. If Van Wyk thinks this guy was an asshole, how bad could he have been?
Takes one to know one, I suppose.
“You met him,” he adds. “Edward Haynes.”
It takes me a moment to place the name. “The man from the gala.” He drove me home. “And at my apartment after the attack.” He arranged… cleanup.
Is it a surprise a man that lives a life of violence dies the same way? Where does that leave Van Wyk? Or me, for that matter?
My hands clench in my lap, nails sharp against my palms. “I thought you said the Volkov situation was resolved.”
“It is. This was something different.”
More violence, more threats. More excuses to keep me locked up. I can hear my own heartbeat and I’m struggling to breathe. “Van Wyk… I don’t want to live like this. I can’t live like this. In fear, for the rest of my life?”
“I know,” he says quietly. “I came to the same conclusion last night. That’s why I’m here. We… need to talk.”
“Uh-huh,” I say slowly, grasping for the frayed edges of my composure. I’m not strong enough for this.
Usually, those four words are followed up with some actual talking, but he only stares at a point in space halfway between us and close to the floor.
I sit there, my nerves on edge, biting my lip as I wait for him to get on with it.
“I’ve been doing some thinking,” he says at last.
Oh, great. He’s been doing some thinking, but my blood pressure has just spiked. And now he’s gone quiet again, like that was all he came to tell me.
“Yes?” I prompt, my irritation growing. Can’t he think any faster?
“I… came to apologize.”
“Pardon?” Of all the things I was expecting, that wasn’t even on the list. I mean, he’s not wrong.
“Several apologies, in fact,” he adds with a grimace.
Still not wrong. The silence settles. Still not saying anything else. Is he deliberately drawing it out? Saying sorry must be new to him. Maybe he doesn’t know how?
“Did you break something?” I ask sarcastically. “That’s more Linda’s domain than mine.”
He winces. “This… isn’t easy for me.”
It’s not a walk in the park for me, either. What does he want, my support? If so, we’ll be sitting in silence a long time.
“I’m… sorry about the night of the gala,” he says with a distinct air of formality.
I badly want to say ‘What?’ but I bite my tongue, waiting to see if he’ll expand.
“I was wrong to treat you like that.”
Six months. That’s how long I’ve been waiting for that apology. And now that it’s come, I can’t think of anything to say. ‘You think?’ feels inadequate, ‘fuck you, Van Wyk’ feels too late, and ‘at least you weren’t impotent’ doesn’t strike the right note.
“I shouldn’t have taken Serranto’s hairs out of your purse, either,” he adds, then sucks in a breath through his teeth. “Or cut off your clothes.”
This is awkward. It’s all so stilted. He is shit at apologizing.
Watching him reach for it is somehow worse than if he’d said nothing at all.
He stares for a long time at the floor, then speaks again. “I should never have put cameras in your apartment.”
I can’t keep quiet on that one. “Damn right you shouldn’t.”
He opens his mouth as though he’s going to defend himself, hesitates, then closes it again. He still hasn’t looked at me.
“I won’t apologize for bringing you here.”
“Oh, was that it?” I ask. As apologies go, it ranks right up there with a ‘we attempted delivery’ card. “If you’re done, explain how that’s the one you’re not sorry for?”
“I’d do it again,” he says immediately. “It was the only way I could keep you safe.”
I press my lips together, glaring at him. It’s difficult to disagree when I can’t think of another option, but that doesn’t mean I’m happy about it.
“But I am sorry about abandoning you,” he adds.
“Over Christmas,” I point out. “And for weeks at a time.”
He doesn’t argue. “You’re right. That was my worst mistake.”
He has a lot to choose from, but I almost agree with him. That was the hardest time.
“I thought you were safe,” he murmurs, almost to himself. “If I’d known the damage it would do to you…”
“What did you think would happen?” I throw at him. “You left me in a house full of strangers, unable to leave, unable to even contact the outside world. Not even a goddamn phone!” And in a house where his wife committed suicide. But I can’t bring myself to add that.
“You’re right,” he says quietly. “I didn’t realize until it was…” He lets out a ragged breath. “…almost too late.”
I have no comeback to that.
For the first time since he started talking, he meets my gaze, his eyes dark and full of sorrow. “Walking in on you, lying there… it will haunt me forever.”
Now it’s on me to apologize. That reversed quickly.
“I’m sorry,” I say with feeling, if only to show him how it’s done. “It won’t happen again.” Of that, I’m reasonably sure. I tried it, didn’t like it, and it didn’t stick. More to the point, I was glad to wake up, even if this is the life I woke up to.
He raises a hand to stop me. “No, please don’t. It’s not on you, it’s on me. I am the one that’s sorry, Amelia. More sorry than you will ever know.”
Unlike the others, that actually sounded like he meant it. The guilt I was feeling ebbs slightly, and in its place comes some gratitude, directed at him. That’s fine, he can have it; he hasn’t earned anything more.
He clears his throat. “I’m sorry I put you in danger.”
Oh, he hasn’t finished his list. I settle back into my chair.
He gestures with one hand. “You’d already caught Serranto’s eye, but I may have made it worse, killing those men in your apartment.”
I’m not sure he did. If he hadn’t been there, where would I be now? Where would Lucy be? Playthings for the Volkovs, for Serranto? My stomach flips, and I swallow bile.
“You may have made them better,” I mutter.
He glances at me in surprise, expression grateful. “I hope so. I hope some of what I did was… for the right reasons.” His eyes return to that spot a foot above the carpet. “I’m… also sorry that I forced you to marry me.”
Well yes, there is that. Gosh, it’s a long list.
“I knew there was a chance you’d say no,” he explains, “but I shouldn’t have blackmailed the judge to ignore your response.”
“I thought you bribed him?”
“I did. I shouldn’t have bribed him either.” His brow furrows. “I wanted to be sure you’d marry me. I thought…”
The silence lingers after he’s trailed off.
“Yes?” I prompt, eventually.
“…I thought you wanted to,” he adds. “Hoped you wanted to. I’m… sorry that you didn’t.” He winces. “Don’t.”
I press my lips thin. I can’t bring myself to admit that part of me did want to marry him, ridiculously early as it was. Hell, if he’d only courted me the traditional way—more flowers, less break-ins—I’d have been head-over-heels and grabbed him before he changed his mind.
But that’s not what happened.
“It was difficult agreeing to marry a man who has only ever coerced and forced me.”
He swallows. “I… wasn’t always like that.”
“So what, I just bring the worst out of you?” I shake my head in dismay. “Great.”
“No.” He leans forward in his chair. “No. You bring the best out of me.”
“Terraces, concealed cameras, and being cuffed to my bed are your best? Then you have a funny way of showing it.”