My eyes shot to his face and I yanked my hand away from his. I rubbed my palm against my thigh, still feeling his touch there. “Go to hell.”
“Temperamental.” He gave me his half smile. “See? I’ll remember you.”
And then he was gone.
I stared after his retreating back, his figure dark against the mostly white landscape, broken up by only concrete and vehicles.
I exhaled, unaware that I had been holding my breath. I told myself I was glad that he was leaving. Glad that I wouldn’t have to see him again.
Turning, I headed back inside the house, wrapping my arms tightly around myself as if that might somehow make me feel less cold. And less empty.
Chapter 5
I WAS GRATEFUL WHEN Monday rolled around just so I could distract myself with the routine of the week. There was no expectation of me going out. I didn’t have to work so hard to be the me that I had created ever since I started here at Dartford. Friday loomed ahead like a visit to the gyno. Something you didn’t want to do, but you knew you had to. If I didn’t party it up on the weekends, if I stayed in, then everyone would think something was wrong with me. That I was sick or depressed. And nothing was wrong with me. I worked hard to convince everyone—myself included—that nothing was wrong with me. I was happy. Really.
My week ran its normal course. I still barely made it on time to classes, slipping in and finding my desk at the last second possible. I dodged my mother’s phone calls. The afternoons I spent in the studio, losing myself in my work so much that I sometimes lost track of time.
On Friday afternoon I was working at my station, wishing it were still Wednesday so I didn’t have to go out. I sighed, blowing at the strand of hair that dangled in my face. I had agreed to go with Pepper and Reece to hear a new band. Suzanne was joining us, too. Georgia had some lame event with Harris. Some future “Douches of America” banquet.
“That’s really good,” Gretchen said, stopping by my station to comment. “Not your usual . . .”
I blew at a magenta-dyed streak that dangled in my face. I had pulled the short strands back with a kerchief, but it always kept escaping.
“Good is not my usual?” I joked. “You wound me.”
“No.” Gretchen shook her head, staring intently at the canvas. “It’s personal somehow.”
Her words forced me to stand back and consider my work in a way I never did while I was laboring over it. When I’d returned to the studio on Sunday, I had a stern talk with myself, deciding that just because I was painting a scene from Shaw’s house didn’t mean anything. I was an artist. I seized inspiration when it arrived. I didn’t need to examine the source.
The door had taken on a richness. There was a lushness in the browns that made it leap to life. The glass was like crystal, winking with light. I marveled that I had somehow achieved that effect. It took me hours playing with a lot of blues and yellows. The snow visible through the glass bled out beyond the door like this amorphous cloud of pristine white. And there, in that fog of snow, was a face. Almost ghostly. The features vague and indistinct. Except for the deeply set eyes. They seemed to stare back at you, intense and probing.
When had I done that?
“No,” the single word escaped me on a breathy exhale. My shoulders slumped.
“What? Something wrong?”
Oh. Hell. No. I was not painting him. I wasn’t doing that. I wasn’t some lovesick stupid girl pining after a hot boy. I didn’t pine. Pushing up off my stool, I grabbed the offending piece by the edges, determined to add it to the stack of canvases that we recycle.
I was almost to the dozen or so canvases leaning on the far side of the room, Gretchen trailing after me, when Professor Martinelli’s voice stopped me in my tracks. “Emerson, what do you think you’re doing?”
Still clutching the canvas that was almost as tall as me, I peeped around the side. “Excuse me?”
Professor Martinelli swept into the studio, her many bracelets jangling. I never understood that. Those things would distract me while I painted, but she was never without at least a dozen bracelets on each arm.
“I was going to recycle this and start on something new . . . I have a fresh idea,” I babbled, “something that has really been nagging at me—”
She pointed an imperious finger at me. “You will put that canvas back at your station and finish it.”
I opened my mouth to protest, but she cut me off. “This is the first piece that you’ve done that has shown any true inspiration. I’ll not have you toss it aside.”
I didn’t know whether to be flattered or annoyed. I’d been a student here for two years and she had never reacted to anything I’d created like this before. Grumbling under my breath, I carted the canvas back to my station and pretended to work for another half hour, feeling Professor Martinelli’s gaze on me. I didn’t want to storm out right out after she told me to put the canvas back. She might very correctly think I was annoyed. When enough time had passed, I washed my brushes and cleaned up at my station.
Dusk had fallen. Night came on fast in the winter. I walked along the sidewalk, mindful of the ice patches. Once inside my building, I chose the staircase over the elevator. My steps rang out over the concrete. I kept hearing Professor Martinelli’s voice in my ears. And then I saw those eyes. Shaw’s eyes. It’s like I was possessed . . . and someone else, the “possessed” me, had painted those eyes.
At my door, I fumbled with my keys, but it was suddenly yanked open. I looked up, expecting Georgia, but it wasn’t her. It wasn’t Pepper.
It was my mom.
THERE WASN’T MUCH DIFFERENCE in her appearance now at age forty-eight versus how she looked when I was nine. Except her face looked kind of waxy. She’d had some work since I last saw her. And her hair was longer. She wore it in a sleek braid down her back with several shorter layers escaping to frame her face. I squinted. I’d never seen her hair this long and I suspected it was due to extensions.
She never seemed to change outwardly. Or, for that matter, inwardly. When I was little she used to do the whole PTA-room-mom-thing. But once she and Dad divorced, she stopped pretending. She stopped trying to be the best mom on the block. She moved to Boston and began her quest for husband number two.
And she found him in my stepfather.
She looked me up and down, her nose wrinkling. “What’s all over you? You’re a mess.”
“Paint,” I replied. No greeting. No hug. This was normal.
“You always did have a unique sense of . . . style.” Typical passive aggression. When she wasn’t being outright aggressive.
I stepped past her into my suite. “How’d you get in here?”
“Your RA. I told her I was your mother and she let me in.”
I’d have to talk to Heather about that.
“What are you doing here?” I dropped my bag on the floor and sank down on my bed.
“You’re not returning my calls.”
Wow. She must be desperate to come here. “I already told you. I’m not going.”
“Emerson, would you stop being so selfish for one moment? You’re family. How’s it going to look if my own daughter doesn’t attend her stepbrother’s wedding? You already missed the showers. I want you at the rehearsal dinner and wedding.”
“No.”
Her lips compressed and she crossed her arms. The action pulled her shirt dress tightly across her upper body and I marveled at how thin she was. Thinner than the last time I’d seen her. She must be down to four saltines a day.
“You know the embarrassment this will cause me. You just want to hurt me.”
Shaking my head, I stared at her. She really thought this was about her. About me wanting to hurt her and not what might or might not be comfortable for me. “It hasn’t once crossed your mind that this isn’t about you?”
She stared at me, blinking in something akin to bewilderment. “What do you mean?”
“Justin,” I spit his name out like it was venom in my mouth. ??
?I wouldn’t go to his wedding if you held a gun to my head.”
“Oh!” She tossed her hands up in the air. “This is still because of that misunderstanding.”
I surged to my feet. “There was no misunderstanding.”
She held up a hand as if to ward me off. “You were always guilty of an overactive imagination. You flighty artist types—”
“Mother!” I snapped. “I imagined nothing.”
“Fine!” Mom grabbed her bag from where it sat on my desk and marched toward my door. “Cling to your bitterness and this ridiculous agenda you have against Justin. You haven’t even seen him in five years. When are you going to grow up and move on, Emerson?”
“Oh, I’ve been quite grown-up for some time.” The hard realities of my youth had guaranteed that.
“Don’t call me. Don’t text.” She stabbed a red-nailed finger at her chest. I almost laughed and reminded her that she was the one who called and texted me. “Not until you learn to accept me. You never have. Not since I married Don.”
“That’s not true. I don’t have a problem with Don.” Honestly, I didn’t. I met with her and Don several times a year for dinner. Even joined them for Christmas one year in Paris—true, I felt safe doing so because Justin was spending the holiday with his new girlfriend, his current fiancée, a girl I’ve obviously never met but who had my boundless pity.
“When you’re finished behaving like a spoiled child, call me.” She slammed out of my suite.
I stared at the door, my chest heaving as though I had just run a marathon. A soft knocking at the adjoining door had my head turning. Pepper peeked in the room, her eyes brimming with concern. Great. She’d heard that.
“You okay?”
I nodded.
She stepped inside the room, rubbing her palms over her thighs. “That your mom?”
I nodded again. “Sorry, I didn’t introduce you two.” My voice cracked a little. I swallowed. “As you heard, we’re not on the best of terms these days.” Years, really.
She sank down beside me. “Want to talk about it?”
I shook my head. “No.” Rising from the bed, I started searching through my closet, stuffing my emotions way down deep where they couldn’t get out. “What time does this band start? I could use some fun. And a drink.”
Make that a few.
Chapter 6
THE BAND PLAYED LOUD and fast, the drummer going wild with the sticks. Sweat trickled down my neck as Suzanne and I danced hard. Bodies hopped all around us. The place was hot and jam-packed. People bumped around me. Guys I didn’t know grabbed at my hips. I didn’t care. I just danced, stopping only occasionally to make my way to the booth where Pepper and Reece sat and take another drink from my whiskey sour.
Pepper watched me with her face all scrunched up with worry. She’d looked at me that way all night. Which only made me want to drink more. Until that look on her face didn’t register. Every once in a while she would glance at me and whisper something to Reece. Slamming my glass down, I made my way back out onto the dance floor to Suzanne.
My goal was drunken oblivion.
I didn’t know at what point in the night Shaw showed up, but when I flipped my head and spotted him in the booth with Reece and Pepper, I stopped dancing. My dancing partner at the moment didn’t stop, however. He continued to bump against me, his hands roving over my belly, sliding under my shirt to palm my stomach.
Shaw stared across the crowd at me. I stared back until the guy with his hands all over me spoke into my ear. “You’re so fucking hot. How about we get out of here?”
Snapping my gaze off Shaw, I turned until I was facing the guy pawing me. Typical frat boy. He wore his hat backward. Greek letters emblazoned across his chest. “I want to dance!” I shouted over the crazy loud noise.
“We could dance back at my place.”
“No.” I shook my head, and resumed dancing, indifferent to him.
He stuck close, dancing with me and Suzanne, trying to infiltrate.
“Who’s that?” Suzanne called, nodding toward our table.
I followed her gaze. Shaw was talking to Reece now. “Friend of Reece.”
“Holy hotness,” Suzanne murmured. “I’m going in.” Smoothing her hair back from her sweaty cheeks, she made a beeline for the table. I pretended not to watch, not to care, and kept dancing.
A new guy moved in, taking her place. I had frat boy behind me and the new guy in front. New Guy gripped my hips and thrust his pelvis in time to the music. I watched the table from beneath my lashes. Suzanne shook hands with Shaw. He was talking to her and I felt a stab of panic. Did he like her? She was pretty. And likable. Obviously. She was my friend. Suddenly annoyed, I pushed out from between my boy sandwich and headed for the bar.
At the bar, I looked left and right. I didn’t have long to wait.
A guy squeezed into the space beside me. “Hey!”
“Hey,” I returned.
“Chad.”
“Emerson.” We shook hands, his hand holding on to mine longer than necessary.
“You alone?”
I waved back in the direction of my table. “Came with some friends.”
“Yeah. Cool. Me, too. Great band.” He nodded at the stage. I forced myself not to yawn at the small talk. I just wanted a drink.
“Saw you on the dance floor.”
I leaned in a little. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. You’re the hottest girl out there.”
Ah, the brilliance of flattery. I flattened my hand against his chest. “Well, how about you buy the hottest girl on the dance floor a drink?”
His eyes flared with excitement and I knew in that moment he thought he was getting laid tonight. Boys could be so dumb.
“Sure. What’d you have?”
“Whiskey sour.”
He waved the bartender over and ordered our drinks.
“So are you like a professional dancer? You’ve got some moves.”
And the flattery kept getting better. Or rather, cheesier. Our drinks arrived and I took a long sip from my glass. “Nope.”
“You a student? At Dartford?”
I nodded.
“Me, too. I’m an econ major. Figure it will help for law school—”
“Chad?”
“Yeah.”
“Let’s drop the small talk. You don’t care about my major and I don’t care about yours.”
His eyes widened. “Wow. You’re to the point.”
I nodded and lifted my glass in a sloppy little salute. “Yes. I am.”
“I can get to the point, too.” He leaned forward so that his mouth brushed my cheek. “I’d like to fuck you.”
I stifled a wince and pulled back to look at him. “That’s supposed to shock me, I guess?”
His eyes glittered. “How about it?”
Suddenly everything felt bleak inside me . . . as if this was the most I could expect out of life. That there would never be anything more than this. A father who loved me as long as I led my own life, independent from him, never demanding anything other than money. Not his time. Not his affection. A mother who could never love me more than herself. And guys eager to use me and toss me aside afterward.
I downed the rest of my drink and signaled the bartender for another. The bartender returned and lined up two shot glasses in front of me and Chad. I gripped the cold glass, ready to shoot the liquid, let it burn out every other feeling until I was comfortably numb inside.
“You’ve had enough.” The deep voice cut through my fog of bitterness.
Turning, I narrowed my gaze on Shaw, standing there. Up close and personal. I’d been thinking about him all week—hell, I’d been painting those eyes that were staring at me right now. Still, the reality of him was so much more than what I’d re-created on canvas. Those melting dark eyes blazed down at me, and I read the judgment there so clearly. The tiny hairs on my arms prickled, ready for a fight.
“You’re not the boss of me.” God. I sounded like I was ten years old.
I could do better than that.
He actually had the gall to pluck the shot glass from my hand and plunk it down on the bar. Not only that. He slid it away. I’d have to stretch across the counter to even reach it. “About this I am.”
I glared from the glass back to him. “Give it back.”
“Why? Just so you can get shit-faced and let some guy you don’t give a crap about paw all over you?” He held my gaze as he growled this, not even glancing at Chad.
“Hey,” Chad objected, but I didn’t even glance at him. I was too busy glaring at Shaw and letting the hot emotions swirling through me gain momentum. I hugged those feelings close and stirred them to a boil. It was better than how I was feeling before. His sudden presence had erased those cold, bitter feelings. Now there was just fury at him for daring to tell me what to do. He wasn’t even my friend. He didn’t even like me.
“Jealous?” I sneered. “Why? You seemed to be having a good time with Suzanne.”
God, now I sounded jealous. Of my own friend, no less. It must be the alcohol. I wasn’t thinking about what I was saying.
His nostrils flared. “You’re not getting drunk.”
“Newsbreak. I’m already there.” Well. Close anyway. Although he was definitely killing my buzz. “Look. I get that you’re Reece’s friend and you probably think I need looking after, but really. I’m fine. I don’t need babysitting.”
As if I hadn’t said a word, his deep voice rumbled across the air. “You definitely don’t need another drink.”
I inhaled sharply. Who the hell was this guy? It was none of his business how much I drank. Or who I let paw me. “Go to hell,” I flung out.
A muscle popped in his jaw and I knew he didn’t like that. Gratification swept through me.
He jerked his head in the direction of the doors. “C’mon. I’m taking you home.”
I scanned the crowd, searching for my friends. Suzanne, Pepper, and Reece were watching us with great interest from the table. “Thanks, but I already have a designated driver.”