Chapter 6
The air in my area of the office smells of pungent boiled eggs and thick floral perfume, courtesy of my elderly colleague and cubicle neighbor, Donna.
Though I’ve strategically placed plants along the ledge that divides our spaces to block unwanted conversation, nothing can be done about the odors.
I rest my elbows on my desk and press at my temples, my headset digging into my ears as the voices on the conference call hum on around me. God help me.
I need a distraction or I’m going to gag. No one is talking to me or about a part of the project I own. Seize the moment, brain. Check out and shift gears. I click over to my personal email and lean forward eagerly when I spot a message from my bank.
Please, please, please.
It’s just impressions of words, but they set my eyes to watering.
Regret to inform…salary is insufficient…would need to meet this minimum threshold…would still require mortgage insurance…
“If I may interject…?” Anthony cuts off a soft-spoken woman from APAC, and I slam at the mute button on my phone before I groan.
There’s a pause, and then, “I’m sorry. Did you say something, Penelope?” Anthony asks. I’m not on video, but to my horror, Zoom has illuminated my name like a Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree. My audio is still on.
I straighten. “Ah, no, sorry. Just stretching. I did want to make sure that we get to the other items—”
“And we will. However, I must object to the definitions as set out in slide five. If someone could…” The Professor lectures some more, a roadblock to all progress.
A little while later, I knock on Rochelle’s door. She waves me in and lifts a brow when I nervously close the door behind me.
“Hey, Rochelle… Something has come up, and… Remember how we talked about a raise?” I force myself to sound confident, authoritative.
“I think I’ve proven myself even before this whole project, and I’ve never said anything about putting in the occasional night or weekend, but now it’s an every night kind of thing.
This stuff is intense, and some of the personalities are… tough.”
She frowns.
“And I’m totally not complaining. We’ll get there. It’s just… I want to buy my apartment, and I need the extra income to qualify—”
“Penny, I’m going to cut you off there. An off-cycle raise is going to be tough, but if you get this framework hammered out—at least the first iteration that we can present to leadership—I’ll have the ammo I need to try and make it happen. Your target timeline for the proposed framework is when?”
I swallow. I’ve got seven-and-a-half weeks to have a shot at buying my place at a price I can just about reach to afford.
“Not the final framework, right? Just the first stab at the framework?” At her nod, I say, “Another month?” Which is actually doable, if Anthony can shut his yap long enough to let anything get worked out.
“Okay, so let’s revisit this then. Sound good?”
My stomach sinks. I want to say no. I want to slam my hands on her desk and say that I more than deserve one based on past performance alone, and the new responsibilities I’ve taken on—which, by the way, are above and beyond my job description—shouldn’t be the thing that tips the scales.
But I don’t. “Thanks, Rochelle. I’ll get back at it then.
Do you want your door open or closed?” I give her a small smile and walk away before my mask falls.
The rest of the day is an uphill slog, and by the time I insert my key into the building’s front door, I feel as if every person I passed on the sidewalk on the way to and from work hitched a ride on my back. Each step jars my aching joints, and I nearly weep when I finally step into my apartment.
The dam to the reservoir I’ve built up fails.
I look around my apartment and remember sitting in the middle of the empty living room floor the day I moved in.
At the time, I couldn’t afford new furniture, but piece by piece, I filled this space with the proof of my hard work and independence.
It might look like a white sofa, bookshelves, and gauzy curtains to someone else, but to me, this apartment—this one—adds up to freedom. It adds up to me.
I toe off one shoe and then the other and step onto my area rug. My apartment pulls me in, hugging me tight.
This is my home. I need that raise. I need this global project to take off, and I need roadblocks to move so I can get that raise.
I suck in a deep breath through my nose and release it slowly through my mouth.
My home is my happy place, and I’m not going to worry about losing it until I have to. I’ll figure out a way.
With that, I announce, for emphasis and not because I’m unhinged, “The day’s stresses are over!”
The insistent knock at my back disabuses me of that notion immediately.
I open the door to a towering, angry, fresh-from-work Jack. “What the hell did you do?” he growls.
“What?” I back up a step.
His face—handsome, if you’re concussed—changes from enraged to a slightly constipated consternation. “Why are you crying?”
“It’s none of your business.” I raise my chin and, to my horror, my eyes well once more. Don’t cry in front of the enemy.
“Hey! What…” Jack runs a hand through his dark hair and takes a step toward me. He reaches out.
I rear back. “What are you doing?”
He lets his arm drop, and he snaps, “Clearly, I’m comforting you.”
I laugh out loud. The thought of Jack comforting anyone, me especially, is so outlandishly stupid, I can’t help myself.
“And you’re really good at it, I see. But I don’t need you to comfort me.
Also, don’t vampires have to be invited in?
” I look pointedly down at his feet, standing just inside my door.
Jack’s nostrils flare like a bull seeing red. “There she is, all piss and vinegar. Fine. No comfort. How about you tell me why you scared the shit out of my appraiser instead?”
I gape at him dumbly. I have no idea how to wrap my head around those words.
He leans forward so that his face is directly in front of mine. His warm breath smells of mint. For a second, my only thoughts revolve around the blue flecks in his silver eyes. Around letting him hold me. Resting my head against his chest. And maybe sinking my teeth into his shoulder.
The radiating heat of his body invites me close, pulls me in, not unlike the feeling I get from my apartment. My pulse beats a rapid staccato against my throat, a reaction wholly related to his closeness. This is…unexpected. And invigorating? Hot? Why are none of these adjectives negative?
“If you think the way you’re going to get rid of me is by scaring away the bank people, think again.”
“Appraiser?” I repeat, latching onto the last word I registered. I step back again. He follows and shuts the door behind him.
“Yes. My appraiser. Who disappeared from my apartment yesterday. Who wouldn’t answer my calls until about an hour ago, when she told me some loon appeared in the hole in the wall, threatened her life, lunged into the hole toward her, and when she ran out, the ‘dangerous hole lady’—her words and mine—chased her down the stairs. ”
His words snap me out of my daze. “Excuse me? You’re talking about that woman you were putting the moves on—?”
He takes a step closer to me, and I force myself not to step back. I can feel his body heat, hot as a building radiator in winter. “I wasn’t putting the moves on her. She was here to appraise my apartment. For my mortgage. And you scared her half to death before she could do her job.”
He must observe the dawning horror on my face because he crosses his arms and purses his lips, the picture of irritated manhood.
I hold up a hand. “Okay, so… Yes, yeah… That’s not what happened at all? I mean. Some of it did, but not like how she said. I leaned through The Hole to warn her, not threaten her. And I ran to the hall to finish my thought because she bolted before I could—”
“Warn her about what?”
“You!”
“What about me?” he roars, any semblance of patience gone. “Is this what I have to worry about if I bring people over?”
“Only until The Hole is patched. But yes, I will chase away every woman you think you’ve scored.” I raise my chin a fraction, breathing heavily now.
He stares at me, incredulous. And then he surprises me by tipping his head back and laughing. A full-throated laugh.
I frown, watching the smile transform his features as the rumbling in his chest continues. My shoulders melt away from my ears. The tension, the fight in me, is draining away, replaced by confusion. “What is so funny?”
“I knew it,” he mutters.
Before I can ask what he’s talking about, he reaches up and brushes his thumb across my cheek, wiping away a lingering tear. His expression is inscrutable.
“Tell me to stop, and I will,” he says.
My mouth opens, the rest of me paralyzed by shock. And then he moves, curling an arm around me, his other hand sliding under my hair to the back of my neck.
Every nerve ending in my body stands at attention.
Synapses, long dormant, fire. Misfire. I can’t breathe.
Every inch of me is pressed against his hard body.
My chest is heaving. I’m ready for battle.
His lips are close, so close. His eyes are intense, darker than I’ve ever seen them. He’s closing them. He’s going to…
“What are you doing?” I choke out.
He pauses and opens his eyes. Then he whispers, “The jealousy is a little nutty, but—”
I plant my hands against his very firm chest—which I do not think about at all, thank you very much—and push as hard as I can. “What the hell are you talking about?”
He stumbles back, his lips tipped into an irritatingly self-assured smirk.
Meanwhile, I am a quaking mess. “I suspected, sure, but confirmation is good. I’m not a huge fan of over-the-top jealousy—it screams trust issues.
The warning-other-women-away thing and the crying are a little…
” He trails off, correctly reading the gathering storm clouds in my eyes.
“I. Am. Not. Jealous,” I grit out.
He straightens and slants me a look. “You literally scared away a woman you thought I was hooking up with.”
“Away from you. Because you’re a cheating asshole. Not because I was jealous, you creep!”
His facial expression is almost comical. It’s like his dick’s sudden realization that he isn’t getting any is warring with the story he just told himself. He wipes a hand down his face.
“Cheating? I’ve never cheated in my life.”
“I met the girl in the picture. Your ex.”
“The girl in the picture—”
“The picture on the wall of your bedroom!”
His face contorts in confusion. “The only pictures of women on my wall are of my family. Are you talking about my sister? And how the hell do you know what picture I have there?”
“Sister.” He said “sister”! The word ricochets around my brain as I gawk at Jack.
“Well?” he asks, crossing his arms.
My mind shuffles cards like an Atlantic City casino dealer, struggling to reconcile everything I’ve ever thought about Jack with this new revelation.
My eyes keep flitting to his and then skittering off, images, impressions, preconceived notions falling away, like a time traveler’s photo album after they’ve set the past to rights.
“I—” I’ve got nothing. “Why would you try to kiss me? You don’t even like me!” I sputter out, not sure whether I’m saying it for him to deny, or to remind him of that fact, or just to change the subject.
He doesn’t deny it. Instead, he presses his thumb and index finger into his closed eyes. “Listen, you’re a pretty girl. Abrasive, argumentative for no reason, but okay to look at. I figured I could close my eyes and think of England. But you’re right. This was a lapse in judgment.”
The comments sting, and there’s extra venom in my retort as a result. “I would never get with you. I don’t hate myself enough for that to ever happen.”
“You don’t hate yourself enough?” he jeers, and plants his hands on his hips. “Because you’re not at all damaged, right? How long do your relationships typically last? Blink and you miss them? Milk keeps longer than guys last around you, right?”
My breath seizes in my lungs, my mind reeling. Mom’s words coming out of Jack’s mouth. He heard that, and possibly—definitely—more.
“You’re a dick,” I whisper.
He laughs. “How do you know? You told your friend a couple months back that you haven’t seen one in two years.”
I suck in a shuddering breath. It’s one thing to be semi-aware of a seam deep within yourself, a self-sabotaging wound you’ve slapped a Band-Aid on despite suspecting it requires stitches.
But it’s another for someone who already doesn’t like you to discover that seam and hold a mirror up to it.
To have the ability to poke a finger in it whenever they want to win an argument.
I am bad with guys. I know this. It’s been a running joke between me and Margie forever because she’s the same, but in a different way.
But it’s not a joke, really. I actively look for little deal-breakers that conveniently move the goalposts of what I’m looking for beyond the reach of whoever I’m seeing.
I preemptively break up with guys because of my dad.
His betrayal of Mom and me has trickled down through the cracks in my defenses and polluted the well of who I am.
So I’ve avoided getting involved with anyone for the last two years, because it’s better than suffering breakup after breakup.
“Get out of my apartment. Now.” I’m shaking.
He stalks up to me, his quicksilver eyes churning with anger and a whole host of other emotions I can’t read.
I stand my ground, bracing myself for his next verbal lash, or God forbid, a kiss.
But Jack stalks past me, steps onto my sofa, flips the sheet up, and disappears through The Hole.
Like a goddamn gremlin.