46 Kimmy
I woke to throbbing in my jaw and the smell of clean sheets against my skin.
For a second, as I lay there with my eyes shut, I didn't know when or where I was. Then it all came back—the club, the dark room, Caius's nasty face leering inches from mine, the flash of a whip, the way my pulse went flat at some point of the evening.
But I wasn't there anymore. I was somewhere else.
I opened my eyes and stared at the high ceiling, recognizing the loft's bedroom. A shade was yanked halfway across the window. Pale daylight streamed through and scattered the overcast across the floor.
Right… It'd been raining on and off this entire week.
I licked my lips and tasted salt. My mouth was a mess and it hurt when I moved my jaw.
My phone was on the nightstand, plugged into a charger next to the clock. I hadn't taken it with me last night. Seven had said it would pose a security risk. Even bringing the burner along was dangerous. The only means of communication with the outside world was the microphone in the pendant.
I reached over and touched my neck. Still there.
My relief was instant.
After a few minutes of breathing, I grabbed the phone and checked the time.
1:24 PM.
Two missed calls from Brynn. One from Geneva. One from Margaret. A voicemail from Katrina. There were a few more texts from work, but nothing urgent.
I sat up. The world dipped and took a second to steady itself.
My neck felt like someone had been at it with a cheese grater.
I carefully worked my jaw. It was sore and there were scabs in my mouth but nothing seemed to be broken.
The left side of my head hurt above my eye.
I reached up, felt the swelling and a small bandage in the center of it.
I was still in the same skimpy underwear from yesterday, but now I had a white dress shirt over it, with all the buttons fastened except the top one. It was too big. Probably, Seven's.
I brought the sleeve to my nose and inhaled it.
It was his. It had his scent. That weird combination of cedar-y laundry detergent and leather.
I shimmied to the edge of the bed and put my feet down, wincing at the new set of aches that came alive. I remembered, hazily, being carried—through the corridor, across a parking lot, a jacket pressed around my shoulders, Seven's voice. His face.
My head spun a little from the fact he'd bared his face.
Had I dreamed it?
There were glimpses of another man in my head. Or maybe it had been part of the same dream, someone kneeling at my side and shining a penlight into my pupils.
I was confused, wondering if all those broken fragments were figments of my imagination.
I limped to the bathroom to look at myself in the mirror, bracing for the horror show.
It wasn't as bad as I'd feared, but it wasn't pretty either.
The makeup was smeared in stripes down my cheeks, a droplet of dried blood at the corner of my mouth, and my hair was a tangle that might never come loose.
There were handprints on my neck, faint but unmistakable.
The bandage above my eye was tiny contrary to what I thought it'd be.
I let out a sound that was half a laugh, half a groan. Then I proceeded to carefully clean my face until I felt like a human again. I used a washcloth to wipe away what I could, but every touch was agony.
I peeled the underwear off. The sight of my own legs, crisscrossed with marks, made me shudder, but not from fear.
I felt a strange kind of pride.
I'd gone in there, I'd faced him, and I'd gotten what I needed.
And in the end, I'd survived.
I was still here, still alive.
The pendant at my throat—the fake crystal hiding the camera—remained in place despite my assumption that Seven would take it off.
Reaching for it slowly, reverently, like it was a religious artifact, I set it on the bathroom counter, careful not to let it roll into the sink.
A long minute passed in staring at it before moving on to the task of wiping the rest of my body clean.
A clean T-shirt came from the closet, followed by cotton panties.
Then I shuffled out to the main room.
The loft was empty. The light from the windows fell across the couch, the table, the floor, but there was no sign of Seven.
The kitchen area was the same except for a bottle of painkillers on the counter and a single sticky note on the fridge. I walked over and read it. The handwriting was weirdly careful.
Food in the fridge.
Back soon.
7
My hand shook a little as I peeled the note off the door. There was a plastic container of chicken soup, veggies with rice, and a pack of ChocoNut.
I glared at the pack for a longest time, wondering how he knew I liked these mini bars.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I shook my head and tried not to overthink this. I was exhausted, in pain, and hungry. My headache was getting worse too. I needed to eat.
I was waiting for the food to heat up, standing in front of the microwave and looking at the gray city landscape outside the barred windows when yesterday's memories swarmed in again.
There was a moment—right before I blacked out—when I was sure I'd kissed him. I didn't know if it'd happened for real, or if I'd imagined it just like I imagined his face, but the feel of his mouth was still somehow on my lips. Soft and familiar.
My face got hot just thinking about it.
The microwave beeped, scattering my thoughts.
I took the soup out, burned my hand a little, and brought the container to the table. Then I took the painkillers. I ate standing up, sipping it very carefully because my mouth was hurting. It tasted like broth and garlic and some mystery spice that tickled the back of my throat.
I found myself glancing at the door, waiting for Seven to come back. With every passing minute, the silence pressed in harder. The loft felt less like a safe house and more like a cell.
When I finished eating, I washed the bowl, set it in the sink, and paced the room.
I went back to the bedroom and looked at my phone.
No messages from Seven. Not that I expected any. At least not on this number.
I moved to stand in front of the windows. The view was dizzying—too many floors up, the city spread out in every direction, steel and glass and motion and a little bit of drizzle. On the distant freeway, the cars glittered.
I lay down on the couch, arms wrapped around my ribs, and stared at the ceiling again. The pain in my body was a steady background hum, like the aftershock of an earthquake.
Eventually, I gathered my courage and called Margaret.
She answered on the third ring. "Hi, dear!" Her voice was a hurricane of warmth and worry. "Is everything alright?"
"Hey, Mom. Sorry I missed your call. It's been a busy morning."
"Oh, that's alright, honey. I just wanted to hear your voice."
I smiled, or tried to, even though she didn't see me.
"Work's been nuts." The lie came out easily.
"Quarterly audits are around the corner, and we're short-handed.
It's a whole thing." My voice sounded almost normal, even to me.
I'd learned a long time ago how to put the right coat of paint on a bad story.
I didn't dare let her hear the cracks underneath.
Especially not after what she'd been through after the accident.
"You should tell your boss to give you a break. You know, life is short. You can't just work and work and expect to enjoy it later. Because one day, poof—" There was an unmistakable sound of snapped fingers "—the years are gone. Like that."
"Mom, trust me I know." I could hear the beach behind her—the thwack of a volleyball, the yelping of kids, the distant calls of seagulls, the soft waves. "You sound happy. Is it beautiful there?"
"It's paradise. I met two sisters from Des Moines yesterday at breakfast and they want to teach me how to play gin rummy." She giggled. "And I finally put my feet in the Atlantic Ocean. It's so much warmer than the Pacific."
I pictured her in a sunhat, pants rolled to the knee, toes digging into wet sand. I wanted her to have that happiness.
My thigh screamed in protest as I shifted my weight on a couch. I made a little noise, tried to cover it with a cough. "That's amazing, Mom. You deserve it."
"You sound very tired, Kimmy," she said. "Are you sure you're alright? You're not…you know…overworking yourself, are you?"
"No. I'm good. I promise."
Then, it came. "What is it I'm hearing from about someone breaking into Katrina's place?" Margaret supplied carefully.
Shit. "Just some kids," I said. Damn Katrina. I warned her to keep it under wraps but if the news reached June, it was bad. Our older foster sister was a horrible rumormonger.
"Is everything really okay, dear?" Margaret's voice sounded worried all of a sudden. "I feel like you girls are not telling me what's going on."
"Mom, it's all really okay." I pinched the bridge of my nose, counted to three, decided it was time to wrap up the conversation before she caught on. "I have to go now. Just have fun and don't worry about us. We are all grown up and we've got it."
She sighed, but there was nothing she could do from her island. "Alright. But if you need help, you call me. Or your sister. Or that young man you're seeing."
"Of course. I love you. Let me know when you are on your way back so I can arrange a ride for you."
After ending the call, I was silent for a few minutes, then curled up on the pillows and drifted off.
I woke up after 6 PM to a weak sunset in the washed-out sky. I checked the burner.
Still nothing from Seven.
Not even a text.
Somehow, this made me feel disappointed. Even though I had no right to be.
I dialed his number—the only one programmed on the device.
No answer.
I dialed again but to no avail.
I tried to read the news on my phone, but the headlines all blurred together. There was a shooting somewhere, a political scandal, a viral video of a dog playing piano.
Nothing about Caius Valmont.
I put the phone down and lay back. I watched the door, waiting for a beep of the keypad, or a footstep, or any sign that I wasn't alone in the world.
The day finally came to a close.
Seven never showed up.