“Yeah. But you’ve never said if you were one of them or not.”
“What if I am?” he asked. I had the feeling that he was completely serious. “Would it matter?”
Would it matter?
I wasn’t sure. “I’ll have to think about that one.”
Jake grabbed another beer from the fridge. “Now we can eat! What’ll it be—steak or pasta?”
“Steak,” I said. “The answer to that question is always steak.”
“Good answer. I love a girl with an appetite.” He went about prepping for dinner, but his words hung heavy in my mind. I love a girl with an appetite. Who did he see me as? A girl he was caring for, or a friend he was helping out?
Could I be something more to him?
Of course, I couldn’t be someone more. I was barely able to think about that kind of relationship, let alone be in one. Besides, Jake was the kind of guy that girls threw themselves at for a chance to be touched by him.
Why would he ever want one who was only capable of running from that?
While Jake cooked and plated the most beautiful steak and roasted asparagus I’d ever seen, I thought about the game of secrets we were playing.
As much as it was meant for us to learn about each other, it seemed as if the only thing it really did was expose which secrets we fully intended to keep.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A LOUD CRASH WOKE ME. The little blue digital clock on the nightstand read two-fourteen a.m. I sat up straight, my heart racing.
What was that?
My eyes strained as I tried to see through the dark. The door knob slowly screeched as someone turned it from the kitchen side of the door. I pulled the covers up to my chin. I wanted to ask who was there, but when I opened my mouth the words caught in my throat. There was something too familiar about the entire situation. It stopped me in my tracks. The knob began to jiggle violently when whoever it was out there realized it was locked. They weren’t too happy about it.
Please be Jake. Please be Jake.
I froze. I felt like I was watching a movie when the bedroom door sprang open, and pieces of wood flew from the hinges. The dark outline of a man appeared in the shadows.
“There you are, you little shit!” The deep voice was slurred and filled with bitterness. “You think you can come back here and hide from me, do you? You think I wouldn’t know where you were?”
The smell of whiskey hit my nose right before the man lunged forward and wrapped his massive hand around my arm, squeezing tight enough to cut off circulation to my fingers. My entire arm burned at the sensation of his touch, like he had doused me with gasoline and set fire to it. I tried to pull away, but he was too strong. His powerful grip held me still. I tried to scream, but I couldn’t catch my breath. It was so dark I didn’t even see his fist flying toward my face. A shattering pain rippled across my right cheek, my jaw bone vibrated from the blow.
Just as quickly as the beating had started, it ended. The man flew off me like he was attached to a rope that had been yanked backward. He crashed into the closet, knocking both doors from their hinges. They snapped in half as he landed inside, a tangle in the clothes and hangers.
Moonlight shone through the window, highlighting the pure rage on Jake’s face as he stood over the man in the closet. His usually-blue eyes were as dark as the surrounding night. He wore only a pair of black draw-string sweat pants. His chest and feet were bare.
He knelt next to the man crumpled in the closet, placing his hand behind his neck and forcing him to look in my direction. “Look at her, old man!” Jake commanded. I held the sheets up around my chest, one hand clutching my cheek. It throbbed in time with my racing pulse. “Does that look like me, Frank? Does she look like someone you can get drunk and beat up on, you stupid old man?”
A look of horror crossed the old man’s face. His shoulders slumped as he closed his eyes and shook his head. “I thought…” he whispered. “I’m so sorry.” He dropped his face in his hands and started to cry.
“Are you sorry for beating on her, or are you just sorry it wasn’t me? Cause either way, your apology don’t make shit better. What a piece of shit you are, coming here in the middle of the night, tanked off your ass. What part of this seemed like a good idea to you, you stupid fuck? You could have killed her!” Jake pulled his pistol from the back of his sweats and held the barrel to the old man’s temple. He leaned down close and looked the old man in the eyes. “I'm here because you have fucked up everything Mom worked for her entire life.”
Mom?
“I’m here so the house she loved, the home you spend your time rotting in, doesn’t end up with the tax collector, and Reggie and Bo don’t end up on the fucking unemployment line. Because you sure as shit don’t seem to give a fuck about anything but drinking whiskey and wallowing in your own shit.” He cocked the gun.
My breath hitched.
This man was Jake’s dad...
The old man kept his eyes closed while Jake continued through gritted teeth. “While I’m in town, you are never to come here again, and if you so much as lay a fucking finger on Abby, I will blow your motherfucking head off.” As he spoke the last words, he nudged the gun against the old man’s temple, pushing his head against the wall of the closet. “You’re lucky I don’t just end you now, you sorry bastard.”
“Just kill me, then!” The old man cried. “Just fucking kill me, boy!” His face reddened, strings of saliva connected his top and bottom teeth.
Jake yanked the old man up by the back of his shirt. “Not today, old man,“ he said. Then he shoved him stumbling toward the hall and out of the room. The front door squealed open, then slammed shut.
Once again, there was only silence.
Some people threaten others in the heat of the moment, or as a reaction to an argument. I’ve heard boys fist-fighting in school threaten to kill each other while they traded blows in the parking lot after class. I know what that sounds like. But there was something different about Jake’s threats to his father, and it was more than just the obvious gun pointed at his head. This hadn’t sounded like the random anger of someone caught up in the heat of a moment, or the idle ravings of someone who had no intentions of following through on them. Jake’s words were solid descriptions of what was to come if the old man didn’t stay away. They weren’t threats at all.
They were promises.
***
Sleep was impossible after that. Not only was my mind racing, but my cheek exploded in pain every time I turned on my side. The pillow might as well have been stuffed with concrete.
The silence was interrupted when Jake came back into the apartment. The front door squeaked. Keys fell onto the coffee table. I could tell he was trying to be quiet, but even the cricket outside the window sounded like he was playing his song on a trombone.
Jake came into the room. As soon as he looked at me he cursed. “Shit.” He turned back around, disappearing down the hall, and I heard him fiddling around in the kitchen. Drawers slammed shut, the contents rolling and rattling as he searched for what he needed. Then, he appeared again holding a plastic sandwich bag filled with ice. He sat next to me and reached out to place the ice pack on my cheek. I grabbed it from him before he could make contact.
“I got it,” I assured him. “Thanks.” I placed the ice pack against my face, cringing at the sting of the cold.
“Bee, I’m so sorry. I didn’t think he would ever come here, let alone in the middle of the fucking night. Nobody’s seen him in almost a year. I don’t even know how he knew I was here.” He leaned in closer. “Are you okay?” There was hurt and concern in his voice.
“I’m fine,” I said. And I was. I was perfectly fine, because I was numb. Numb people can’t be anything other than fine.
“It’s all my fault,” he told me. “I couldn’t sleep, so I went out on the patio for a smoke. I didn’t even hear him come in.”
“Where is he now?” I asked.
“I threw him in the bed of his truck and drove him home. He was passed out when we got there so I unloaded him in the front yard. He was lucky I didn't toss him in the canal. I walked back.”
“Is that why you and your dad don’t get along? He drinks and beats up on you?”
“Among other things.”
“Like what?”
He took a deep breath. “The night I decided to leave town he tried to kill me. Told me that it was me who was supposed to die instead of my brother and he was just righting a wrong. He was so drunk, but he meant what he said. He took a swing at me with an ax, and when he missed I came pretty close to killing him with it myself. Then, I took off, and I haven’t seen him since. Until tonight, that is.” He reached out to touch my cheek. It had started to swell. I flinched, turning away from him. He frowned and withdrew his hand. “Bee, how come I can’t touch you?”
“Because you can’t.” It was the truth. My truth.
He couldn’t, because I wouldn’t let him.
“Are you okay?” he asked, concern in his eyes.
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t have to be like this! There is no way you can be fine right now!” Jake smoothed his hand over his goatee. “Someone bursts in here in the middle of the night and attacks you, and you’re just fine? Cause I’ll tell ya, I’m not fine!”
“Calm the hell down! I’m okay, really. I promise.”
“Okay is worse than fine. For fuck’s sake, I would rather you scream, and yell, and cry, and blame me!” Suddenly, he was quiet. “I just...I just want to hold, and comfort you.” He made a move toward me, but this time I refrained from flinching.
As long as he didn’t touch me, he couldn’t break me.
“Why do you want those things from me? It doesn’t change anything. I’m okay because I choose to be okay.”
I'd been saying it my whole life. It was all I knew.
“No!” Jake shouted. He jumped off the bed and started pacing the room. “No, you’re not okay because you choose to be—you just think you're okay because you choose to avoid the situation. You’re not honest about your feelings, and that’s not okay at all!”
He reached for me, and I scurried to the other side of the bed as if he were wielding a knife instead of offering comfort.
“No,” I screamed. My heart was racing. I didn’t want to feel the burn. I didn’t want to be pulled down into a place I didn’t know if I could ever climb out of.
I didn’t want to feel.
“Just let me hold you, Bee.”
“No. Fuck you. Leave me alone!”
“Why don’t you want me to touch you?” he asked again, this time louder, his voice laced with anger.
“Why do you want to touch me? I’m nothing. I’m no one.” My voice was shaky. I was on the verge of my first real tears since I was a child, and I was hell bent on not letting them come.
“Why do I want to touch you? Are you fucking kidding me right now? I want to help you. I want to hold you. I want to make it all okay for you. I want to fucking touch you because you are the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen, and I can’t imagine never being able to hold your hand or kiss you.” I thought that was everything, but then he added, “And yes—I want to fuck you, too, like I’ve never wanted anything in my whole life.”
Why would he want me?
Sincerity played behind his eyes, the same eyes that had held so much hatred for his father no more than an hour earlier. “You’re not nothing. Don’t ever fucking say that again, because you’re everything.” He said it again, quietly this time, “You’re fucking everything, Bee.”
It was all I ever wanted and didn’t want to hear at the same time. We hardly even knew each other. We couldn’t have a real relationship. I could never give him what he needed or wanted, and there was no way in hell he was ever going to be able to make things okay for me. He didn’t even know what he’d be trying to make okay.
Who the fuck did he think he was?
“How?” I snapped at him. “How the fuck are you going to make it all okay for me? Huh? Are you going to travel back in time and make my parents treat me like I'm worth more than the neighborhood dog? Are you going to tell them to take me to school instead of keeping me home to torture me? Are you going to read to me and teach me how to cook? Are you going to close my bedroom door when they're having a fuck-party in the middle of the goddamned living room? Is that what you’re going to do, Jake?”
He stayed silent.
“You think a hug is going to heal me? You can’t help me. Nobody can help me! I help myself. I’m okay, because I fucking want to be okay! I don’t want to be touched, because I don’t want all the shit that comes with it.” The next part spilled out of me before I could reconsider. “It burns, okay? Is that what you want to hear? It burns down into my bones, and it physically fucking hurts me to be touched!”
I sank from the bed onto the floor so I didn’t have to see his reaction to my confession.
“Are you going to make them love me, Jake?” I pulled my knees up to my chest. “You say you want to help me, but how can you when you keep so much from me? You won’t even tell me why this ‘business’ of yours is such a secret.”
“You want to know what I do? Do you really want to know? Because once I tell you, I can’t just take it back.” Jake rounded the bed and crouched on the floor in front of me. “I’m fucking afraid that I’m going to look at your perfect face and you’ll see me for the first time as the monster I am. I haven’t told you because I can’t stand to think of you looking at me like that. I don’t want you to judge me for what I’ve done…for what I do.”
He did reach out then, trying to brush a strand of hair out of my eyes.
I jerked my head away. “Don’t fucking touch me!”
I leapt up and bolted for the door, but Jake’s massive frame cut me off. He grabbed me by the shoulders and pulled me into him, wrapping his arms around my back, locking his fingers together. My arms were pinned to my sides. My swollen cheek was pressed against his hard chest. I tried to knee him. I kicked and struggled. I even bit at his chest in hopes of forcing him to release me. The heat of his touch felt like I was lying against the surface of the sun.
“Let me go,” I cried out, “it burns. It fucking burns!” The tears prickled at the edges of my eyes. I couldn’t let them come because once they did, I didn’t know if I’d be able to make them stop.
“No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t burn. It’s just me and you here. It doesn’t really hurt, I promise. It’s all in your head, baby.” He kissed the top of my head, but he might as well have lit a fucking match and held it to my scalp.
“Let me fucking go!” I wailed.
The intense fiery pain spread down into my feet until I could no longer stand from the torture. My legs gave out from under me, but Jake held me firm against him, keeping me from falling to the floor. I continued to fight and buck in his grip with everything I had left. The sobs I’d kept in for so long burst out from deep within me. Hot tears raced down my face and pooled in the line separating my top and bottom lip. I tasted the salt with each ragged intake of breath. Jake ignored my cries and tightened his grip on me.
“I kill people, Bee,” he whispered. For a moment, I wondered if he'd really said it, or if it was in my imagination.
I continued to fight him until the fighting was only in my head, and my body gave out and went limp against him. Jake backed us up until his legs were against the dresser drawers. He slid down to the floor, pulling me into his lap as my head fell against his chest.
“I kill people for money, mostly bad people. But, I work for bad people, too—Mafia types, big corporations.” He was quiet and matter-of-fact. “To be honest, I don’t check which direction my targets’ moral compasses point before taking them out. They could be anyone.”
There were too many emotions I didn’t want to feel, all of them assaulting me at the same time. I didn’t know which feeling was which. The burning in my body had started to die down to a simmer, but my sobbing was so fierce I couldn't find the power to rein it in. I wanted to know so much more. I wanted to ask him a million questions, but I couldn’t find a place within me calm enough to form the words.
“I enjoy it,” he continued. “I know that sounds sick, but you know what’s worse than being a sick son of a bitch?” I didn't even try to answer. My skin and bones had melted into his body, and I was a mute lump of flesh piled on his lap. “Knowing you’re a sick son of a bitch.” He laughed softly into my hair, relaxed his grip on me and started mindlessly tracing circles on my back with his fingertips. “I know that how I feel inside isn’t always right. But, right or wrong, I can’t change it. I’m not going to make apologies for it either. I refuse to pretend to be someone I’m not. I allow myself to feel all of the things that I am, the things that make me me, even if they’re not what ordinary people would deem right or good. I’ve learned to feed off of those emotions instead of letting them hold me down by condemning myself for the way I am.”
Something inside me started to change during Jake’s confession. He had embraced me by force like Nan had, wrangling me into emotional and physical submission. I knew he hadn’t done it to hurt me. He’d done it to wake me up, to make me feel, even though it had