“Just this one bag,” I tell him as I step out of the limo. “I’ve got it, thanks.”
Since I’m wearing my day’s purchases, the L’opale bag I stowed in the vehicle over lunch contains the underthings I had on when I left the apartment this morning.
All of Nick’s talk about wanting me to feel powerful and confident feels like a joke as Manny opens the door for me and I make my way through the lobby of the soaring tower high-rise that’s just one more of Baine International’s extensive holdings.
I feel like a joke.
How long before Nick tires of me and I find myself in Kathryn’s place?
Am I going to be standing in front of him one day, desperate to reach him but receiving only impenetrable, scathing contempt in return? Am I already heading toward that eventuality?
One hundred nights.
That’s the only thing he’s promised me.
Should I really be surprised if that’s all I have in the end?
That thought haunts me as I push the elevator button and wait for the car to descend. While I stand there, I realize I haven’t checked my voicemail since Tasha’s aunt called. I pull my phone from my purse and play back the waiting message.
She’s made some calls about cheap art studio space, but nothing’s turned up. The only possibility she’s found is a shared sublet situation in a developing section of East Harlem.
“There’s a good chance I can call in a favor and get you an appointment to see it today, but I need to hear from you as soon as possible. Please let me know if you’re interested.”
Shit.
Her message was time-stamped almost two hours ago.
Stepping aside as the elevator arrives and a small group of people exit, I hit the callback and hope I’m not too late.
“Mrs. Vargas,” I say when she picks up on the second ring. “Hi, this is Avery, Tasha’s friend. I’m so sorry I missed your call earlier. Will it still be possible to see that sublet you found?”
She tells me the address and asks if I can meet her there in half an hour. Considering it’s a fifteen minute subway ride to the East Harlem neighborhood, that means I have about ten minutes to change clothes and get to the station.
“The space is small and nothing fancy, dear. But from what I understand, you’re mainly interested in price and a decent location, and this checks off both those boxes.”
The idea of having space of my own in which to paint again invigorates me so much, I wouldn’t care if the sublet is a rat-infested closet. I need to paint simply for my own sanity, but I can’t deny that I’m still hopeful of one day seeing my art for sale in a gallery again. I’m practically vibrating with excitement as I step into the vacant elevator and push the button for the penthouse.
“It sounds great, Mrs. Vargas.”
As eager as I am to look at the space, I’m also relieved to have something productive to do, rather than sit around licking my wounds and waiting for Nick to return.
Tasha was right when she said my art is a part of me. It’s a part I’ve been neglecting for too long. If I learned anything today, it’s that I can’t afford to lose myself because I’m tangled up in someone else. Not even if that someone is Dominic Baine.
Hell, especially him.
“Thank you again, Mrs. Vargas. I’ll see you in thirty minutes.”
~ ~ ~
As it turns out, the sublet isn’t rat-infested. It is, however, only slightly bigger than a closet. It’s also a co-op studio being utilized by two other artists—a painter and a mixed-media sculptor. Only one of them, the sculptor, is there when we arrive at the one-room studio above a shoe repair shop on Lexington Avenue. She’s a curvy girl with a beautiful face and a choppy pixie haircut dyed in the dark rainbow colors of an oil slick. Countless tattoos and piercings decorate her pale ivory skin.
“I’m Lita Frasier,” she says, giving me a perfunctory handshake as Mrs. Vargas and I step inside the tight, cluttered space.
“Avery Ross. Thanks for letting me come by and take a look.”
She shrugs and walks away from us, drifting over to mute the music that’s blaring from a decrepit, paint-speckled boom box on the other side of the room. The CD playing is Mozart, which is a surprise, but something tells me Lita enjoys catching people off guard.
Two easels, one empty, the other with a half-completed painting on it, are set up on one side of the room. Most of the other side is overtaken by a collection of what I’m tempted to call junk. Plastic milk crates overflow with metal objects of all shapes and sizes, random chunks of wood, pieces of broken glass, bins of twisted wire, and assorted other materials.
On the long worktable sits an abstract sculpture made from many of those items. Its form is both disturbing for its many jagged edges and sharp protrusions, yet sublimely elegant in the way all of its pieces somehow combine to create a thing of beauty.
“I try to keep everything pretty chill around here,” Lita informs me, catching me looking at her work. “This is my studio, but I lease out space on a short-term basis to other artists to help cover my rent, which is ridiculous, even for this section of town. Normally I only let people I know do this, but since my mom and Rosa are friends, I told her I’m willing to make an exception with you. I guess.”
I glance at Mrs. Vargas in question. “When you said you were calling in a favor to get me an appointment today—”
She lifts her shoulder. “My niece adores you and she said you needed help finding someplace to work. That’s what favors are for.”
“I charge two-eighty a month cash, plus a month’s deposit for a copy of my key,” Lita says. “If that sounds good, we’ll settle things up, then you can come in whenever you want, set up your shit, and work here as often as you like.”
It does sound good. It sounds pretty great to me.
“I’ll take it.”
I can’t tell if the quirk of her pierced eyebrow means she’s happy or disappointed. I hand over most of the cash I tucked into my cross-body bag before I left the penthouse, and she hands me a tarnished key for the door.
As I slip it into my pocket and Mrs. Vargas steps away to respond to an incoming text, Lita points a tattooed finger under my face, then delivers some terse instructions for how she expects me to conduct myself when I’m using her studio.
“No squatting in here. No screwing in here either. And absolutely no fucking stealing. Clear?”
I nod. “Yeah, of course. Has that been a problem for you before?”
She narrows her eyes at me, and I clear my throat before she decides to change her mind about this whole thing.
“Right. You don’t have to worry about any of that with me. I promise.”
Without responding, she pulls her phone out of the back pocket of her shredded black jeans and starts tapping the screen. “Cell?”
As I rattle off my phone number, her colorful head tilts up at me.
“Pennsylvania area code? I grew up in Philly.”
“Ah.” I force a smile at the mention of my home state. “Small world.”
For what isn’t the first time, I wish I’d have had the forethought to get a New York number as soon as I moved here. I wanted to make it easy on my mom, so I kept the old number she knew by heart. The one I also registered with the prison on the day she was processed and locked away.
“Okay, all set.” Lita gives me a faint nod, then taps something on her phone. Mine immediately buzzes with an incoming text. “That’s the code for the building access. Half the time, my asshole neighbors leave it open, but just in case you ever come here and it’s locked, punch 9-3-2-7 to get in.”
“All right. Thanks.”
Mrs. Vargas and I head out a few minutes later, pausing to say our goodbyes down at the street.
“Can I give you a ride somewhere, Avery? I’ve got a client meeting across town in a few minutes, but I’ll be happy to drop you at the subway station.”
I glance up at the clear afternoon sky and shake my head. “No, thanks. It’s right up t
he street and it’s such a nice day, I prefer to walk. Besides, it’ll give me a chance to see what’s around.”
After she waves and heads off for the parking garage a couple of blocks away, I set out on a leisurely stroll for the subway station. This Spanish Harlem neighborhood seems a world away from the upscale blocks of the Upper East Side, but the change of scenery is refreshing. These sidewalks are lined with modest mom-and-pop retail shops and local eateries that tempt with everything from tacos to teriyaki.
Up ahead on the next block, a small grocery with fresh fruit and produce on display outside catches my eye. I walk that way, and pause under the red awnings to peruse the containers of ripe strawberries and aromatic oranges. It all looks so good, I can’t resist picking up a few things to take home with me.
I’m not in the store more than ten minutes when my phone rings. Juggling my hand basket of groceries in one arm, I glance down at the display. Private number. I rarely ever answer them. Everything in me urges me to ignore this one too.
But it could be Lita. It could be someone from the prison infirmary calling about my mom. It could be anyone. Yet down to my marrow, I know it isn’t just anyone, even as I swipe the lock screen and bring the phone to my ear.
“Hello?”
For a long moment he doesn’t say anything. In the silence, I feel a spark of hope that maybe my paranoia is just that. The feeling doesn’t last.
“Hello, Avery.” My breath seizes in my lungs as the voice I dread—the one person I fear more than any other in my life right now—releases a thin chuckle. “Long time, no hear.”
I glance nervously around the store, feeling cold panic begin to bubble up inside me. “Stop calling me, you hear me? Stop texting me.” My voice is tight, clipped. I pray he’ll take it as fury and not the terror I taste on my tongue as I hiss into the receiver. “I don’t have anything to say to you.”
“Ohh, now, see? That’s where you’re wrong. You and me, we got plenty to talk about.” I hear him take a drag off a cigarette, then exhale slowly. “We can start by talkin’ about August twenty-first.”
A clamminess settles at my nape. Nine years ago on that date, my mother shot and killed her husband, Martin Coyle. He’s the reason she’s been living at Muncy State Prison all this time. I am the reason too. Because if my stepfather hadn’t been abusing me—if he hadn’t finally succeeded in doing more than that on August twenty-first—my mother wouldn’t be serving a life sentence for murder.
My temples start to pound. I’m breathing hard and fast, but I can’t seem to get air. The small store feels suddenly too hot, too crowded with other people.
“You still there, Avery?” He sounds amused. “Maybe you’d rather talk about your mom. Sounds like that fall really took a toll.”
At his emotionless tone, a chill sweeps over me. The suspicion that’s been eating at me regarding her accident at the prison two weeks ago now floods into my veins like ice water. “Did you have something to do with that?”
“Me?” He chuckles as if I just told a joke. “Now, what on earth would make you say something hurtful like that, Avery? I’m concerned about her, is all.”
“Leave her alone.” I lower my voice, trying not to be overheard inside the busy little market. “I want you to leave us both alone, damn you. Haven’t we all suffered enough?”
“Not even close, baby girl.”
The endearment grates over my senses even more than his threatening response, as I’m sure he intends. Bile surges up the back of my throat in reflex of hearing it again after so many years. “Stay away from my mother. Stay away from both of us, or I’m calling the police.”
“We both know you won’t. And we both know why.”
I ignore this last threat. Not because it’s untrue, but because of the sheer terror it ignites in me to hear him say those words. I need to protect my mom. I need to protect myself, and this new life I’m trying to create out of the ashes of my horrid past.
“I’m done with this conversation,” I snap at him. “I don’t know what you think you have to gain by harassing me or my mother, but you’re mistaken.”
“Yeah? I’m sure that rich prick you’re fucking might have something more to say about that.”
I scoff, appalled. “This is about money?”
“This is about debts, baby girl.”
A violent shudder racks me. Instead of his voice, in my head now I hear another one crooning the nauseating endearment. A voice so similar to my current harasser, because it belonged to his father, Martin Coyle.
My temples start to pound. “Don’t call me that. Don’t ever fucking call me that, or I’ll—”
“Or you’ll what, Avery? Shoot me?”
If I’d heard anger in his words—or any other emotion—it might have lessened some of my dread. But all I register is coldness. And unflinching determination.
“Leave me alone, Rodney. Please. Just . . . go away. Leave me and my mom alone.”
It takes him a second to reply. When he does, the sharpness of his voice cuts through me like a blade. Like a bullet. “We’ll talk again, Avery. You can bet your life on that.”
He ends the call and I’m left standing there, stunned and shaking.
I know Rodney means what he says.
He’s not going to leave me alone.
He’s not going to stop calling.
Now that he’s found me after all these years, he won’t stop coming after me. Not until he gets whatever it is he thinks he’s owed. Maybe not even then.
“Are you all right, miss?” One of the grocers calls to me from where he is restocking a basket of baked goods.
“Yes. I’m . . . “ I shake my head, feeling dazed. Trapped.
Desperate to escape the trouble I knew would find me one day.
God, what am I going to do?
Abandoning my filled basket right where I stand, I hurry for the exit. I hear the store clerk calling after me in concern, but I don’t stop. I don’t slow my pace for an instant, not even once I’m outside in the bright afternoon sunlight.
As I hurry for the subway station a few blocks away, the traffic light stops me at the corner as cars rush by. At my feet is a large sewer grate, with vents wide enough to lose a heel.
Or a phone.
I glance down at my hand. My fingers are wrapped so tightly around my cell it’s a wonder the device hasn’t shattered.
I can’t outrun my past. I know that.
But I’ll be damned if I’m going to make it any easier than I already have for my demons to catch me.
The traffic light changes to green.
I relax my grasp on my phone, then watch the grate swallow it before I step off the curb.
Chapter 7
I’m too keyed up to return to the big, empty penthouse right away. My stepbrother’s voice is on an endless loop in my head, his not-so-thinly-veiled threat looming over me like a dark ghost that I cannot shake.
Instead of taking the subway to the station closest to Nick’s building, I get off a couple of stops earlier and detour on a short walk to Central Park. Seated beneath the trees, surrounded by nearly 850 acres of nature and the sounds of children’s laughter drifting over to me from the nearby carousel, I can finally breathe again.
I hardly notice the time until the shadows start to lengthen and the packs of nannies and their young charges begin to thin out.
By the time I reach the Park Place building, it’s nearly sundown.
I hear Nick’s terse voice as soon as I step off the elevator into the penthouse. He appears in the vestibule, his phone at his ear. He looks haggard, still in his suit pants and black oxfords, his white shirt untucked and loosened at the top, the sleeves rolled up on his forearms. His gaze sears me, stark with anger . . . and relief.
“Never mind, Tasha.” When he speaks now, his voice is low. Unnervingly level. “No. She just walked in.”
He ends the call, then, without saying a word to me, strides back into the sprawling apartment and sets his phone down
on the kitchen island countertop. I notice an open bottle of whisky there. Beside it is a glass with nearly two fingers of amber liquid in it. Nick downs it in one swallow.
“Where’ve you been?”
The calmness of his voice belies the displeasure I sense in every hard line of his body. Although we’re separated only by the open space of the large living room, I feel as if I’m still standing on the other side of the emotional wall he constructed between us this afternoon. I stare at the back of his dark head as I approach him.
“I had an appointment to look at an art studio sublet this afternoon.”
“So I hear. Tasha told me her aunt left you in East Harlem three hours ago.”
Had it been that long? “I decided to stop by the park for a while afterward.”
I tell myself I have no reason to feel guilty for going, yet as Nick pivots to face me now, it’s all I can do not to flinch. He is furious. I’ve only been at the receiving end of his anger once before—the night we nearly broke up because of my secrets. He had a similar look in his eyes then.
A look of suspicion.
Distrust.
“You just take off without saying anything? Jesus Christ, Avery. I didn’t even know you were interested in looking for a studio.”
My own temper flares now. “I didn’t realize I was required to tell you my every move. Or is that also part of your terms for our relationship? Do we even have a relationship, Nick?”
I know that’s unfair, even as I say it. But I’m still pissed at him too. I’m still hurt from the fact that he shut me out today. I don’t wait for his answer. Turning, I head into the bedroom to drop my purse on the dresser and take off my shoes.
Nick follows me in. “What’s going on? You’re upset with me, obviously. This is how you deal—by ignoring my calls and texts? I’ve been trying to reach you for hours, Avery. Then I come home and you’re not here. For fuck’s sake, I thought something happened to you.” He blows out a sharp breath. “I thought you left.”