Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
Iescape early the next morning, and I literally didn’t sleep to achieve it.
Although I got out of the apartment quietly, managed to get a wad of cash quietly, he would have heard me fire up the car.
I know without even looking that he’s a shadow behind grimy glass looking out over the gravel yard as I drive off.
This right here is my moment. My only moment thus far to get away, and after this, there will be no more oversights like car keys lying around. The thing is this isn’t my escape. Not really. It’s just a day.
I need a day.
As I spent the night behaving like a fucking animal and having my insides rearranged countless times, I realized he’d won.
There is no escape, no matter how much I want there to be.
I can’t escape anything while I’m a fugitive.
The only rational thing to do is stay with him until his own plans play out and then see where I land.
Maybe I can get away then.
Seven years with the Agency up in smoke, and the man who caused it won’t explain it. I know if he didn’t decide I was worth something that I’d be dead, but going into hiding, trapped like a mouse, is only marginally better.
It takes fifteen minutes to reach an area with amenities and another thirty to find a salon that can fit me in. It’s three hours after that that I emerge a dirty blonde with shorter hair that just skims my shoulders.
This is as close to my natural color as I’ve been in years, so it’s a big change but a necessary one at this point.
It’s not like fresh hair and some colored contacts are going to change my appearance enough, but it will help.
I settle on warm brown contacts and buy more makeup.
After lunch, I scour the area for clothes and pick up a burner phone that I hide under the passenger seat.
It’s around dinner by the time I’m satisfied, so I grab some takeout and hit the road.
When I pull back into the warehouse, he isn’t standing there like I anticipated. I gather up my bags on one arm, toss the garment bag over my shoulder, and grab the takeout with my free hand.
The door opens just as I reach for the handle, and his eyes dart to my hair as mine dart to his suit. The light gray, perfectly pressed outfit is all business except for the open collar of the crisp white shirt. A flare of stress shoots up at the sight; it reminds me of the first time I met him.
Stepping aside, he lets me pass. I set the shopping bags against the wall and flop the garment bag over them. I’m still holding the takeout when he crowds me into the wall and twirls a strand of hair around his finger.
“You stole my car.”
“Borrowed.”
“Stole,” he repeats, tilting my chin up. “But you came back.”
“I can’t escape you,” I whisper.
“No . . . you can’t.”
His words sober me more than my own. There was something almost romantic in my words, but his words were . . . a threat. He plucks the bag from my hand and takes it to the kitchen, opening it up and dishing it onto plates quietly.
Tentatively, I sit on a stool at the counter and watch him. I figured he’d be annoyed, and he is, but there is a lot more going on than that, and I don’t recognize it, so I can’t decipher it.
“I just needed clothes and some other things,” I stammer, “I got a dress for the gala . . .”
“I already got you a dress,” he says with irritation, and then sets a plate in front of me. “The blonde is . . . nice. Pretty short, though.”
Absently, my fingers graze the ends of my hair, and the thought that he’s disappointed in my appearance stresses me out. I tuck some hair behind my ear. “I just didn’t want to bother—”
He holds a hand up, stopping my explanation, as he leans into the counter across from me and picks at the food. I eat most of the meal, but we don’t talk during it, and the longer the silence goes on, the worse I manage to feel.
“Try on both dresses, and I’ll pick the most appropriate one.” He clears the plates and leans against the counter with his arms crossed. “Now, Theresa.”
The skin on the back of my neck tightens with his tone, and I’m getting tired of the sensation becoming so commonplace. I slide from the stool and cross the room, grabbing the garment bag from the floor on my way to the washroom.
“No, right here.”
“Jesus Christ,” I say under my breath. He’s never going to let me out of his sight again.
Turning on my heel, I walk back, and he holds up his hand again, stopping me before I get to the kitchen.
He takes the garment bag from me and lays it on the bed before pulling another one from the closet and laying it out too.
The sound of the zipper opening is loud, echoing through the room in our silence.
“Undress.”
Irritated, I do my best not to let my frustration play out in my face and movements. I peel my jeans off and drop my shirt on the floor, and finally my bra. He lays a black dress in my arms and then kneels and slides my panties off.
God, he’s being so fucking stoic. I mean, he’s always stoic, but this feels severe even for him.
I swallow thickly as he rises and then step into the dress while he watches me.
Once I get it up to my chest, he walks around me and zips it closed.
The classic strapless gown fits like a glove and has a sophisticated mermaid silhouette with a slight fishtail off the back. The perfect black-tie dress.
He walks around me. “It’s perfect.”
“Fine.” I nod.
I get an unimpressed look, and then he unzips me and waits while I slip out of it. I’m left in the middle of the floor naked as he carries the dress back to the bed. The second zipper is just as loud as the first, and his face is unreadable when he hands me the dress I bought.
I open the short zipper on the hip and then step into the swathe of champagne satin that I picked out.
It slides up my body effortlessly, and I watch him as I slide it up my arms, one at a time.
The narrow shoulders drop down to a beautifully draped cowl at my chest, showing an acceptable amount of cleavage.
Closing the zipper on my hip, the fabric pulls taut over my stomach and hips, clinging to my curves. I turn slowly, showing him the back that cowls all the way down to my ass, leaving my back bare. It pools slightly at my feet with just a small train and has a gentle trumpet silhouette.
“Shoes?”
I nod toward the bags at the wall, and he picks through them, drawing out the shoebox and returning with the sky-high, strappy gold heels in his hands.
Without a word, he kneels in front of me again and slides the shoes onto my feet before fastening the strap around my ankles.
Now I’m staring straight into his eyes when he stands again.
“No one deserves to look at you in this.”
“Okay,” I whisper in defeat, and my throat tightens. “May I shower now?”
I’d agreed not to last night, fulfilling some possessive need of his, but now I don’t want him to have that satisfaction. I don’t want to cooperate anymore.
There is another unreadable flash in his eyes, but he doesn’t say anything, just nods. I turn and walk to the other end of the space and close myself in the bright white room just as my eyes well with tears.
Fuck, he’s good.
Turning on the shower masks the sob I let out. His anger shouldn’t affect me like this, but I think I’m just surprised by it. I thought when I came back it would be okay, that when he saw I came back he wouldn’t be angry anymore. I just needed some time . . . It shouldn’t bother me so much.
This is temporary. Our time together is limited.
Hanging the dress on one of the hooks and placing the shoes against the wall, I step into the shower and let the scalding water blast me for a moment before sinking down to the floor and staring numbly at the tile wall.
Normally I would tell myself it’s a manipulation, because it is, and then I’d get over it and level my own manipulation to retaliate, but my brain isn’t working right anymore.
I’ve never wanted someone’s approval like this .
. . My heart is starting to get involved, and I can’t stop it, and I know it’s going to get hurt.
He got in—I let him in, and now he’s doing what he does, and I feel so fucking helpless to resist it.
How can I be like this when I know it’s an angle?
Find your own angle. This is what you do. You are so good at this. Stop letting him beat you.
A shadow passes over the wall, and when I look, he’s sitting on the floor beside the opening to the shower.
“I thought you really left . . . I always expected you to at some point.” He pulls at his ear and then meets my gaze. “It felt different than I thought it would.”
“Why didn’t you come after me?” My voice wobbles despite myself.
Coming after me would have blown my day, but I expected it to some degree.
It was a toss-up between him hunting me down and him waiting to see what I’d do, but I bargained on being hunted.
In my head, he’d have found me quickly, nearby, and realized he was overreacting.
Some semblance of trust would form . . .
or I’d come back, and he’d be surprised but happy, and again, that seed of trust would be in place.
Instead, there is only anger and disappointment and the crushing weight of the guilt he’s making me feel, even though I haven’t done anything wrong.
And if it feels differently than he thought it would for him too .
. . that can’t be right, or real. It has to be another facet of the web he’s weaving to test me, make me lower my guard enough to trust him and come clean.
“I didn’t want to find you.” He bumps his head back on the wall. “Not today.”
“You’re that mad at me?” So mad he didn’t want to find me because he would have done something bad if he did?
I push my eyes into my knees and rock slightly. A hand grabs me, and I panic, sliding back and throwing him off again and again until he crawls all the way in and drags me across the tile to him.
“Stop it!” I slap him. “Let me go!”
Sitting, he pins my arms across my own body as he hugs my back to his chest. The water has soaked him, ruining his fine wool suit, and I start crying.
His grip on me relaxes. “You can’t stroll out into the world like that. Not anymore.” He presses his mouth to my temple and murmurs, “Someone could see you. A camera could have picked up your face.”
I shake my head and turn into him, sliding down as I bury my face in his chest and understanding dawns on me.
He’s mad because he was worried. I crack a little at the realization, hoping it’s true, and then I break a little more when I realize he’s right.
I’m not trapped here because he won’t let me leave .
. . I’m trapped because nowhere else is safe anymore.
After a while, he pulls me to my feet and washes me before wrapping me in a towel and stripping out of his drenched suit to don his own towel.
***
In bed, he strokes my hair, and I feel numb. The rain sounds louder. The warm light from the lamp in the corner casts a halo. My head starts to ache, and I squeeze my eyes shut against it.
“My head hurts,” I whisper.
A moment later, the lights are out. He pushes some pills between my lips, and tears leak down my face again.