Every muscle in Steve’s body tenses. “Wait a minute, James—”
“How dare you—” Her voice is deep, filled with outrage.
“I’m sorry.” He runs his hand through his hair and stares at the floor. “That was completely out of line. I apologize.”
“Don’t you dare act like you give a shit, you son of a bitch.”
“That’s not fair, Julia. It’s not right.”
“You walk away thirteen months ago, just disappear, and then come back for money. What’s not right, James?”
“I didn’t walk away.”
“What the hell does that mean?” A few more tears escape from her soft brown eyes. “Tell me what is going on and where you’ve been.” She screams at him. “I absolutely need to know. You owe me an explanation!” She’s quite literally begging him, and Steve feels ashamed for her…of her.
James shakes his head then looks away. “You know what happened, Jules.” His voice is low, almost a whisper. “It seems there was a rumor…”
Her mouth falls open, her eyes widened and stay on him. “Oh, my God. No. I was sure it wasn’t true. I didn’t believe it. Michael Flint told me, but I didn’t believe him, not even when you didn’t come back. I thought you were in London on the DreamWorks project, and that we were over.”
Steve knew the rumor, of course. And like Julia, he too thought it unlikely. He’d never known James to be more than a casual user. Carrying drugs overseas was reckless and stupid, and Steve knew James to be neither. James disappearing, getting swallowed up in his music was far more likely. And leaving Julia behind was typical.
James stares at her, then shrugs and spread his hands in surrender. “Julia, I need to deal with this now. And right now I need money. I’m getting money, and I’m going.” He stays fixed on her. “I’m sorry Jules. I don’t know what else to do. Blink and I’m gone—like I was never here, and we all just move on.”
Julia stares at him. “That’s it? ‘Move on.’” She sighs, and her expression softens. “I didn’t know you were in trouble, James. I didn’t. I thought we were through—”
“We are,” James whispers, glances at Steve and looks down again.
Weighted silence. Julia stays fixed on James. Her expression, her countenance is suddenly calm, professional. Steve can feel the wheels in her head turning as she assesses him.
“Please just tell me what is going on?”
“There’s no point. It won’t make any difference. You can’t help me, Julia.”
She glares at him, then shakes her head. “You really are a self-serving prick.”
James sighs and turns away, looks at Steve for salvation.
Damn him to hell. He deserves it. He’s sucked Julia in, but Steve doesn’t want to know the details. There are laws against wealth managers assisting criminal clients. “Clearly, you two have things to work out. I wish to hell you didn’t. I wish we were on the same page, Julia.” He picks up his mug then he swipes the driver’s license and social security card off the butcher block and heads for the kitchen door as he speaks to James. “I’m going down to my office and put what you need in motion. You’re going to have to sign some paperwork. Come down when you’re ready.” He looks at Julia. “You okay with that?”
“Does it really matter? You can see he needs more than money. But you’re going to help him keep running, aren’t you?”
“I’m going to do my job, Julia. I’m not choosing sides.”
“That’s not how it feels.”
“I’m sorry. It’s up to James what he wants to do. Not me. Not you.” Steve stares at her, and for the first time that morning they connect. She’s looking for James to validate her, and that cuts.
How can Steve draw her in? Why isn’t his respect, his desire, his love enough? He doesn’t try to mask his disappointment as he leans into the swinging door and leaves the kitchen. He’s confident that James will leave as soon as he gets what he needs. Steve’s counting on the fact that he loves Julia enough to go alone.
Chapter Seven
The shroud that veils Steve’s dark blue eyes etches in her brain as she feels him withdraw, and the weight of his demeanor remains even after his exit. It’s not lost on her what he must be going through with James here. She’s humbled by his civility, his moral fiber. Stephen really is a good man. And Julia’s suddenly struck by how much it hurts—hurting him. She has the urge to go after him, comfort him, reassure him of her love, but burning curiosity keeps her where she is, and she hates James right then, for bringing her back to her knees.
He stands at the French doors staring out at the bay. Morning sun pours in through the rippled glass and drenches him in light. His dark, long sleeve fleece or flannel shirt practically glows around the edges. It’s haphazardly tucked into his jeans which hang loose on his hips. Gold highlights in his hair are lit up with the sunrise and halos him. He looks like he’s in a Vermeer painting. Stunning. How many times had his culpability been rationalized away because of his beauty? Untouchable, like fine art, that’s what he was, and always had been, except in spectacular moments.
He hadn’t come for her. She has to face that. Chance brought them together this morning. Entropy, James would have said, a lifetime ago. She leans against the counter top to help her bear the weight of her shame. But as she stands there watching him, she experiences that familiar rush of pleasure. Her magnificent work of art is twelve feet from her, blissfully unaware of what he’d done to her, and the mess he’d left when he went away. And she isn’t about to let him get away with that.
“The first few weeks you were gone gave me time to miss you.” She tries to control the quiver in her voice. He turns to face her and she draws a sharp breath before continuing. “The next month I started to feel anxious and angry. By the beginning of the third month, when it started to dawn on me you may not be coming back, I started coming apart. For the next six months after that I came unglued virtually every day, putting friends, my family, my residency at UCLA—my career, in jeopardy.”
He stares back at her. She waits for his response but none comes.
“Stephen’s constant support and Saint-like patience saved me from caving in on myself completely.” And she isn’t going to let him see her cry. She turns away and fills her cup, then leans back against the counter top and looks at him again.
Part of her is glad he found her with Steve, and she hopes it’s hurt him. She’d played his return countless times, rehearsed speeches in place, but suddenly feels afraid to speak. She absolutely refuses to come apart. But as the tension grows with the silence between them, she finally can’t take it anymore. “If the rumor is true, why on earth would you carry drugs overseas?”
“I didn’t.”
“Then why were you arrested?”
He laughs, cynically, angry, and looks away. “My father set me up.”
She only knew his father through his descriptions, which were few. Julia had an impression of a tall, imposing general type, with German origins. In all the time she’d known him, James had not seen, nor spoken to his father. “Why would your father do something like that, James?”
“I don’t know. I used to think it was because he was insanely controlling, but I’m not so sure anymore. I’m not so sure of anything anymore.” He stares at her through the brass pots and pans that hang above the butcher block. His hair hangs in his eyes and looks dark against the whiteness of his skin. His shirt is loose on his shoulders. He looks gaunt. Strung out.
“Have you been using since you left?”
“No. I haven’t touched anything—that wasn’t forced on me for the last thirteen months.”
“What does that mean?”
“Forget it.”
“No.”
“Why?” He glares at her. “What difference does it make now? You’re with Stephen. Be with Stephen. Go have a life.” He turns away and looks out the French doors again. “As soon as I get set up here I’m gone. I’m dangerous to be around and I don’t want anyone else getting
hurt, especially you.”
“You’ve reserved that right for yourself.” She regrets saying it as the words leave her mouth.
He shakes his head but doesn’t say anything.
“James, I can see you’re in trouble and I want to help you. Whatever it is, we can deal with it. But I can’t help you unless you tell me exactly what is going on.” Don’t get mad. You’ll lose him. Stay even. Be very specific. Take him step by step. “What happened after I left you in the studio that morning at your house the last time I saw you?”
He turns around and faces her, fixes his eyes on hers with an intensity that connects them. “You can’t leave it?”
“No.”
He sighs. “Okay, Julia. You want a recap of our conversation before you left, or just the highlights that followed?”
“You actually remember one of our arguments?”
“I’ve replayed it a thousand times in the last thirteen months.”
“Why don’t you just tell me your version?”
“Okay...” He cocks an eyebrow. “I’m assuming you remember our… discussion in the studio that last time we were together?” He pauses. She nods. “Then you’ll recall you came down that night and we got into it, and you walked out, to the kitchen, I think, to draw me out of the studio thinking I’d follow you.”
She blushes, exposed by his insight at her transparent attempt at manipulating him.
“Well, I was gonna come after you, but my father’s solicitor called right then, before I even got up from the board. My half-brother, Ian, had died of an overdose, and my father requested I attend the funeral. He’d chartered a jet to collect me, but I didn’t want to be beholden to his terms, so I agreed to get there on my own, which meant leaving in the morning to make it to the UK for the service.” He moves to the butcher block and spread his huge hands on the oak top. “And then you came back into the studio, remember? All bent out of shape I was back to working. But I wasn’t. I was booking a flight. I was going to talk to you about it, but you stormed out of the house.”
For a minute it’s hard to breathe as memories of that night flood her head. She flashes on him sitting in front of the multiple monitors in his studio, totally absorbed in the waveforms streaming by on the screens, never noticing she had come in the room. Julia forces herself back to the present. James straightens under her scrutiny, tucks his hands in his jeans pockets. “Why didn’t you call me, or text me to tell me what was going on? Why did I have to find out about Ian a month after the fact from Martin Risner? How could you just leave like that?”
“I booked a two day turn around, Jules. I figured when I got back I’d tell you all about it. I knew if I told you before I left you’d want to come, but it was pointless to get you involved with my family. My father and I were estranged. Ian and I were never close. I hadn’t seen either in ten years. Then Miles, my father’s lawyer, is beseeching me to attend Ian’s funeral, guilts me out that I’m expected, tells me my father is under media scrutiny and would be publicly shamed if I didn’t attend. And I considered telling him to forget it, but at the time anyway, I had no ambitions of hurting my father. And, well, you were coming down my throat, and I couldn’t exactly deny your reality, so I figured the funeral would give me some distance from working, and using, and give us a break for a few days.”
“What us? We were done. It was over. You released me and left.”
“Released you?” He shakes his head. “Julia, we’re having this conversation because it’s what you think you need. But the truth isn’t going to set you free, my dear. You’re going to have to do that.”
She glares at him. He’s doing it again—pulling the focus from him by putting it on her. She isn’t going to let him. “So you’re father set you up and you’ve been in jail in England for the past year plus for using speed?” It sounds ludicrous. First arrests in the States for possession got a slap on the wrist and maybe court ordered outpatient rehab.
“I wasn’t in prison for most of that time. And I was arrested for trafficking, not just using.”
“You just told me you weren’t using. Were you or weren’t you?”
“I wasn’t, Jules. I swear it. I trashed the pharms I’d collected before I left home, heeding your words. But they found an eighth-ounce of methamphetamine in my jacket on x-ray at Heathrow. And when I tested positive for amphetamine from the Didrex, well, it made their case. My father couldn’t have timed a drug set-up better had he premeditated it.”
“Do you know how bizarre this sounds?” She studies him, trying to assess his cognitive level. He looks exhausted, totally spent, but he doesn’t seem delusional. “If you weren’t in prison all this time, where have you been?”
He folds his arms across his chest, tucks his elegant hands against his sides and looks away. “I was in enforced rehab for three days, and the second night turned into a living nightmare. There were five guys, all privileged class, busted together at an Ecstasy Rave. I went maniacal when they were molesting me, ended up killing one of the sonsabitches.” He takes a deep breath and shudders as he releases it. “Just so happened he turned out to be some judge’s son. That judge had me locked me up in Langside Priory Hospital for the criminally insane, outside Glasgow, for killing his kid. That’s where I’ve been until about a month ago.”
She has no idea what to say. She tries to associate what he’s just told her with related experiences in her college studies, or recall a PTSD patient having gone through something similar for some context, but she handles mostly accidents, violence, and drug issues in Emergency. James may be delusional, of course. Developing paranoid schizophrenia was a real and increasing possibility in white males from their mid to late twenties.
Perhaps he had some conflict with his father after the funeral. Assuming he isn’t crazy, it’s possible with Edward’s money and resources he could have set up his son. But why? And what James said about killing a man didn’t resonate. He felt bad when he killed a spider. Even with sports, like soccer or racquetball, the competition was always secondary to mastering the game. “Let me get this straight. You’ve been in a mental institution in Scotland for the last year for killing a judge’s son?”
He laughs, this deep angry chortle. “Up until a month ago.” He gives another quick laugh. “Right out there, isn’t it? If it didn’t just happen to me, I wouldn’t fucking believe it.”
Julia isn’t quite sure she does believe it. At least all of it yet. “Where have you been for the past month?” Why didn’t you come to me?
“I was in London for about a week. I made it to the States after that, went up to Boston and stayed there about two weeks, at the Devlin’s place in Cambridge.”
“Harry and Michelle Devlin?”
He nods.
“Aren’t they divorced?”
“Yeah, they are.”
“So you stayed with Harry, or Michelle for two weeks?”
“Michelle.”
“How did you end up with her?” And why didn’t you come to me? Michelle was Harry’s trophy wife, a Victoria Secret's model. “I didn’t know you really knew her.”
“She knew me. She used to hang out when I was producing Harry’s album. About a month ago I ran right into her in Harvard Square. I was pretty messed up, even more than I am now, if you can believe that.” He grins. “She really helped me out, helped me come up with a plan and put it in motion. She got me together with her lawyer who put me in contact with a guy who set me up with a new identity. She gave me Harry’s old Porsche to drive here to Stephen’s, to cash out, go someplace safe, hide for a while, get my head together.”
“Why didn’t you come to me?” Stupid Julia.
“I couldn’t, Julia.”
“Don’t give me that, James. You managed to get here. You could have come to me.”
“No. You’re wrong. Any contact puts you at risk. Stephen too, but…” He pauses, and shrugs. “I need money. I need to be able to move around, and that takes money.”
“Clearly, money isn’t
all you need.”
“You’re right, I’m sure, but at this minute it is.” He takes his mug from the butcher block, comes around it and pours himself another cup of coffee. “So as soon as Stephen gives me some numbers, I’m gone. It’ll be best for everyone that way.”
They stand two feet apart. Julia fights the urge to slap him. “Is that right? Is that your professional opinion, or just what works best for you?”
No response. He takes a sip of his coffee.
She glares at him. “Why do we always come back to what works for you?”
“It’s different this time.” He speaks without looking up.
“Not for me, James.”
“Tell me what you want to hear, Julia.” He looks at her, sets the mug on the butcher block and wrapped his fingers round the edge of the island behind him. “You want to know that every fucking moment in hell, the thought of you was my lifeline; that day after day I searched for something to save my sanity. And it was never music. It always turned out to be you.” He glares at her. “Does that help you, Jules?”
In a way it does, then shame consumes her. Despite his suffering, she needs to know he had feelings for her. She wants to hold him, have him hold her. Surrender into him. Protect him. Forgive him. And she isn’t going to let him see her cry.
“Julia, you need to listen to me now. Look at me.”
She does. He leans against the butcher block slouched on one hip. He stares at her, but it feels like into her. “Stop crying.” He leans forward and brushes the tears from her cheek with the side of his thumb.
With his touch comes that sudden rush of pleasure, and she grabs his hand before he pulls away. She holds her breath. He grips her hand and pulls her to him and hugs her against him, their bodies pressed into each other. She can feel him breathe, his heart beating. “You are intoxicating,” he whispers. “Every time I got wrapped up in you—with you—it was all consuming. So I pulled back. I never let myself really be with you. Not all the way. Not like I should have. And I am profoundly sorry.”