Kitabı oku: «Push»
I feel like I am wrapped in a cyclone. Everything is whirling around me, drawing the air out of my lungs and filling me with the best kind of turmoil. Every time his tongue slides against mine, a prickle in my gut tells me how right we are together. How much I need David. How much I need us.
I hope the cyclone never stops.
Emma Searfoss has spent a lifetime trying to escape her abusive stepfather. It’s why she moved far away from home. It’s why she’s kept no ties with her remaining family. And it’s why she’s got a major rage problem. When her neighbor shows up to fix the kitchen in her new apartment, his enigmatic charm calms the fire in her. David is cool and collected, and he makes Emma feel safe for the first time ever. But David has his own chilling past—his six previous girlfriends have all disappeared without a trace. Emma’s walking a dangerous line, but David’s pull is intoxicating. And impossible to resist...
This is a new adult romance with mature content for readers 17 and up.
Push
Claire Wallis
Dedication
For Melissa
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Claire Wallis has penned hundreds of magazine and newspaper articles over the past ten years, with science playing the lead role in almost all of them. Though nonfiction writing will forever be her first love, fiction has unexpectedly swooped in, hooked her by the soul and become her true love. As a result of this coup d’état, Claire’s writing career has made a complete U-turn, and instead of rocks, plants, insects and microbes, she is now putting human characters in the lead.
Claire’s previous jobs include working at a limestone quarry, hawking vegetables at a farmer’s market, clerking at the dollar store and convincing new mothers that they need to renew their subscription to that parenting magazine in order for their child to survive. She lives in Pennsylvania with her amazingly awesome husband and son.
Connect with Claire by visiting her website, www.clairewallis.com; following her on Twitter, @ClaireWallisNA; and checking out her author page on Facebook.
Contents
Emma's Prologue
David's Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Emma's Epilogue
David's Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Emma’s Prologue
I am standing on the bridge, and in a rush of brutal and beautiful clarity, I know. I know that I am not the only one. I know that he has done this before. With other women. In other cities. On other bridges. But it doesn’t matter. They weren’t me.
How could he have been so careless?
The green fabric of my dress is clinging to my skin, and the air is calm and humid. My hands are tied behind me, but I’m not crying. I’m not fighting. My skin is not burning with anger or fear. My brain is in charge of my body, and it is telling my instincts to go fuck themselves. As I look out over the dark river, it is all falling into place. The picture is whole.
His breath is steady, deep. He’s always been the calm that feeds off my turmoil, is thrilled by it even. But not today. Today there is only peace. I know what he needs from me, and even as I stand here on the edge of everything, I love him. If he asked me to jump, I would. There would be no hesitation. I know that now, and he knows it, too. I suspect he always has.
I can feel the remarkable beauty in his anticipation. Doing this one thing is going to make him very, very happy, far happier than anything else we have ever done together. It is going to make everything better. I know it.
I will not fail.
I suddenly feel his hand on my face. I quietly sigh and push my head into his palm, feeling the softness of his skin. Inhaling his scent. His smile is small, sheltered. But if I do this, if this happens, his face will open with joy, and his teeth will show and his eyes will brighten. He will be unstuck.
His hand falls from my face, and he drops to his knees. The sacks of sand at my feet—on my feet—feel dense. I stand still as he knots them slowly to my ankles. I am quiet because I am not afraid. I am not sad.
Right after we met, he brought me to this bridge. He showed me the colorful graffiti painted across the trusses and told me that this illicit art had turned a simple bridge into a masterpiece. It was someone’s opus, he said. The fact that some kid, probably unaware of his own talent, could create something so moving obviously touched him deeply. At the time, I wondered why he was so captivated by it. But now...now it is clear. He knew, even then, that all this would come to be. Because it had happened before. With the others.
Still, none of it matters.
Because I am here now, and I am the one.
David’s Prologue
I love her. Truly, I do. And that’s something I cannot say about any of the others. I am, however, a goddamned son of a bitch, and despite my adoration of her, I need this. I need to do this.
I thought that, perhaps, I was past all this fucked-up bullshit. I thought that I could go on being with her forever. For the first time in my life, I was enjoying a taste of contentment. Happiness. But then, as it always does, the unrelenting ache swirled back into me, striking through me, biting into my brain like a gnawing hunger. A craving for a single, perfect moment in which I have absolute control. I can’t ignore it. Even with her. Even though I really do love her back.
I am standing on the bridge, and something in her face suddenly tells me she’s figured it out. She knows that she is not the only one. She knows that I have done this before. She looks at my eyes, and despite the darkness, I know she can see through me. She sees straight to the others—all six of them. She can see the three cities and the four other bridges. She knows now, yet she is so calm. Unchanging. But it doesn’t matter. Because they weren’t her.
I put my hand on her face. She sighs and pushes her cheek into my palm, her breath skimming across my skin. Shit. She is cold. There’s no heat. No anger. No panic. I smile softly at her, knowing that fear will sink in soon enough. It always does, because in this perfect moment, there is always fear.
I stoop down next to her and nearly brush her bare leg with my fingers. I don’t dare touch her again though, because I suddenly feel that if I do, I might change my mind. And where would that leave us? We are here now, and I am pulsing with my own eagerness. As I begin to lash the bags of sand to her bare ankles, I glance up at her face. She’s staring straight ahead, lost in her own thoughts. Her brow is rigid. Her lips are narrow. I think I see a slight smile. There isn’t so much as a drop of fear in her body.
Why?
A bitter realization strikes me like a whip. She isn’t afraid because she wants to do this. She wants me to love her so fucking badly that she will jump off this bridge, voluntarily, right now, if I ask her to. Just because she knows it will make me happy. Because she thinks it will fix me.
Now I am livid. I am awash with contempt for this woman. No, for myself. I fucking love her already. Did she not see it? Did she not feel it?
I am a twisted, fucking son of a bitch, and the woman I love is standing on a bridge prepared to let me push her off just to make me fucking happy. Jesus H. Christ.
I look back down at the sandbags, and I continue to fasten the knots far more slowly than I should because I am waiting for a whimper, a snivel, something. Some sign of her comprehension that I am going to do this. A sign that she is afraid. A sign that maybe she’s changed her mind, that she knows I am not worth fixing. A sign that she does not, in fact, want my love. But I get only composure and control.
It is infuriating.
As I get up I can feel my anger swell. I am standing behind her now, looking at how her dress clings to her body. She is frozen. I am a fucking fool for her, and the realization that she wants to do this makes me want to push myself off this goddamned bridge. I could stop. I could untie her hands. I could tell her that it is all an angry, sick joke. But what about the others? She knows about them now; I’m sure of it. I can’t ask her to carry that knowledge around for the rest of her life.
Because I really do love her back.
I put my hands on her waist and breathe.
Chapter One
Emma—Age 8
I am a small girl, much smaller than the other girls my age. I am standing on the white plastic bench in our bathroom, and I’m up on my tiptoes stretching as high as I can. I want to see her better. Watch her move. Smell her lady smell. She’s leaning into the mirror, her breath creating a small circle of haze with each exhale. Her softly curled red hair nearly reaches down to the back clasp of her bra. I want to touch the curls, find out just how soft they are. But I know she’ll scold me if I do because her hair is already fixed just the way she likes it.
As she shifts even closer to the mirror, her lips stay parted in concentration. Her left hand tugs at the corner of her eye and stretches it outward, smoothing its surface. Her right hand spreads the eyeliner across her top eyelid. When she reaches the end of her eye, she stands back slightly, and blinks at herself in the mirror. As she repeats the process on her other eye, I am transfixed. I want to put on eyeliner, too, but she says I am far too young to wear makeup. She says that I am beautiful enough without it. But I think that she just says that to keep me from pestering her about it, so this time, I keep my mouth shut.
When she’s finished with the eyeliner, she opens her eyes really wide and puts on her mascara using small, soft sweeps. The brush accidentally touches her eyelid, leaving behind tiny, sharp, black lines. She frowns slightly, licks her thumb, and absently swipes the lines away. Her eyes meet mine in the mirror, and a sweet grin touches her lips. She reaches toward the mirror and begins to playfully tickle my face’s reflection. Her eyes and nose scrunch up in delight. My face echoes hers.
“You are a silly girl, Emma,” she says as she turns to look at me, taking her hand away from my reflection and putting it on top of my ginger-colored head. She is looking down at me now, and we are smiling. After quickly mussing my hair, she trails her index finger down the center of my forehead, between my eyes and down to the tip of my nose. She sprinkles her fingertips across my nose and cheeks in a game of connect-the-dots.
“Someday you’ll love these freckles as much as I do,” she says as she plants a rapid kiss on the top of my head and then returns to her reflection in the mirror. She quickly puts on her lipstick, plumps up her breasts, and flips her long bangs out of her eyes.
“When will you be back?” I ask her, not really wanting to know the answer.
Her eyes meet mine in the mirror again, and I think they look a little sad. A little as if maybe she doesn’t really want to go this time.
“Michael says we’ll be back in three or four days,” she tells me. She is walking to her bedroom now, and I am following her like a puppy instead of an eight-year-old girl. “Emma, you know Carol really enjoys staying here with you and the boys. It’s just for a few days. She’ll take good care of you. Besides, you’ll have her mostly to yourself. Ricky and Evan will be at practice every night after school.”
“I know,” I say. It’s just that Carol doesn’t wear eyeliner. She doesn’t curl her hair. She doesn’t smell like a lady—she smells like a fireplace. She is not my mommy. She is not you.
As she dresses herself, I sit cross-legged on the bed and watch her move. After her skirt is zipped and her blouse is buttoned, she grabs my hand and pulls me off the bed. She leads me over to the dresser and switches on the lamp. The dresser is flooded with a soft light, and I am instantly delighted because I know that she is going to let me pick out her perfume. It makes me happy because I know that every time she takes a breath and smells the perfume, my perfume, she will think of me. And know how much I love her.
I study the little glass containers. It’s difficult to decide which of the beautiful bottles is most deserving of my mother’s neck. My mind is floundering with indecision when Michael walks in. He’s dressed in a pair of khakis, a blue dress shirt and a tie. His neck and back are stiff, and his dark hair is combed straight back in a series of perfect, rigid lines. When I see him I freeze, and my eyes drop toward the floor. Mommy lets go of my hand and steps over to him, kissing him on the cheek and touching his arm.
“We need to leave now,” he says, looking at her with his mouth straight. “Where is your bag?”
“Over on the chair,” she says, nodding toward the red wooden chair in the corner of the bedroom. Michael strides over to it, picks up the bag, and walks briskly toward the door. As he walks past me, I glance up at him, and our eyes meet. He smirks his knowing smirk, and I feel hot and angry inside. So angry. I feel my skin starting to burn.
Mommy doesn’t look at me again. She hastily picks up the nearest bottle of perfume and squirts two puffs of it on to her neck. I watch the little droplets of moisture spin around her as she rushes out of the room after Michael. She didn’t even pick one of the prettiest bottles—and it makes me want to explode.
Chapter Two
Emma—Present Day
I can’t find the picture anywhere, and it is starting to piss me off. What did he do with it? The fucker probably threw it away just to spite me. I’m disgusted with myself for asking Michael to send me my things, but frankly, it was better than the alternative. The thought of him wrapping and packing all the mementos from my bedroom makes me want to wretch. Yet I know it was far better than going back to that house to get them myself. Far better than having to look at him and his greasy-ass hair.
On top of the last unopened box is a yellow sticky note. It is my tally of the postage amounts from all the boxes. I peel it off the box and put it on my desk. I am sending him a check tomorrow simply because the idea of owing him anything makes me crazy. I open the last box and frantically rummage through it. I am really starting to get annoyed, and I can feel myself losing it. So help me God, if he kept that picture...
In my mind I can see myself buying a bus ticket and breaking down his door to pry the picture from his hairy, disgusting hands. But there’s no need for such aggression after all, because suddenly I can feel a corner of the wooden frame deep down in the box. Even without seeing it, I know exactly what it is. I have touched that frame a million times. I pull it out of the box and wipe the dust from the glass with my palm. There we are. Two freckled redheads. Our arms are wrapped around each other’s neck, and we are smiling. We are gleaming. I know I am happy in the picture because it was before Michael. Before the mess. Before my dad was gone, and before Michael turned my brothers into assholes. It is just my mother and me, and for the millionth time, I can’t take my eyes off of us.
* * *
I sit down on the edge of my bed holding the frame with both hands. When my mind eventually settles, I begin to scan the room for somewhere to put it. This place is still so new to me. I have barely settled in, so fully unpacking the boxes from Michael doesn’t make any sense. Frankly, I could throw the whole lot of them into the incinerator. The picture is the only thing in them that matters. I haven’t lived in that house since I was eighteen—nothing else of any real consequence was even there anymore. Still, I am curious about examining the contents just to be sure. Next week maybe. For now I’m going to concentrate on getting the rest of my clothes unpacked. I prop the picture up on my already crowded nightstand. I tap a light kiss on to my fingertips and then transfer it to my mother’s image.
I unzip one of the suitcases and start moving a pile of T-shirts into a drawer. I catch sight of myself in the mirror. My eyeliner is smeared, my hair is gathered into a sloppy bun behind my head, and my constellation of freckles is now backed with a pink flush, no doubt the result of my internal rant over the whereabouts of the picture. I sigh and then remember that it really doesn’t matter how I look because now I live alone. No more brothers, no more Michael, no more college roommates, no more need for someone to share the rent and utility bills. It seems I am a grown-up now. At long, long last. It is both refreshing and humbling.
As I shift another pile of T-shirts to the dresser drawer, I hear the door buzzer. Who the hell is that? Who even knows that I live here? Oh, God. I feel a slight and sudden panic. Michael is the only one who has my address. I had to give it to him so he could mail the boxes to me. But he wouldn’t dare come here, drive all this way, would he? I decide there is no way it is Michael because he is a smart enough man—he knows I will knock him in the balls if he shows up here. Fucker.
I walk down the hall, past the wreck of a kitchen, and into the living room where the door buzzer startles me again by sounding a second time.
“Hold your damn hat on,” I mutter as I press the intercom button. “Yes?” I ask into the small, gray box.
“Hi. Um, is this Emma Searfoss? Apartment seven?” asks a male voice.
“Yes, it is. What can I do for you?” I ask. A rush of thick, syrupy relief courses through my veins. I am beyond grateful that whoever it is, it’s decidedly not Michael.
“This is David. I’m here to fix your kitchen cupboards. The landlord was supposed to call you yesterday to let you know I was coming,” he says. Oh. I haven’t checked my cell phone since yesterday afternoon, so I have no idea if Carl called me or not. For a moment I hesitate, but then I figure the guy must be legit because part of the rental agreement included refurbishing the kitchen cupboards. Right now they are a complete wreck; the doors are either falling off or missing altogether, the paint is peeling, and most of the shelves are cracked and warped. I haven’t even attempted to unpack the kitchen boxes, expecting Carl to come and fix the cupboards as he promised. I’m pleased that he’s decided to do it sooner rather than later. Whoever David is, he’s got his work cut out for him.
“Oh, okay,” I say into the gray box. “Up the stairs. Second door on the left.”
“I know,” he says casually as I press the door release switch. I quickly grab my purse and toss it into the back bedroom, just in case David is some kind of criminal. I almost snatch the pepper spray out of it first, but then I decide that that would be one step too close to crazy.
There is a knock at the front door, and a second later, I open it. I immediately wonder why I didn’t grab the pepper spray when I had the chance.
David does not look like a cupboard fixer. Frankly, he looks a little psycho, and I wonder how stupid I am to let him waltz into my apartment without checking for a message from Carl first. But if I close the door on him now, I’m going to look like the psycho. A stupid cliché pops unwelcome into my head: “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” I stuff the words back into my brain, back into the mouth of every Sunday-school teacher I ever had.
The only visual indication that David is actually here for the reason he claims is the belt of tools slung low around his waist. There is a hammer swaying off his left hip and some screwdrivers tucked into little loops on the right. A tape measure sits next to the hammer, and what appears to be a pair of lineman’s pliers is sticking out of a small pocket to the side. There are some other tools there, too, but I don’t recognize them.
He catches my glance at the tool belt, and I realize that I must have some foolish look of relief on my face, because a second later he is wearing a small, lopsided grin. He looks quite pleased with himself, as a matter of fact, and I immediately think he must be a cocky bastard.
Aside from the tool belt, he is wearing a gray T-shirt, a pair of black skinny jeans and a pair of heavy black work boots. His dark, mussed-up hair is cut short, and it looks as if he forgot to shave—for the past several days. On each ear are two small silver hoops, and his arms are covered in tattoos. I can see the swirls of ink beneath his skin, but I can’t tell what the images are—I don’t want to look at them any longer than I already have. I don’t want him to think I am checking him out. Cocky bastards love being checked out, and I refuse to give him the pleasure.
I step aside and let him into the apartment. He looks around quickly and makes a beeline towards the kitchen. I think immediately that he must be familiar with the apartment’s layout because he doesn’t ask where to go, nor does he hesitate.
“Come on in,” I say sarcastically as he breezes past me.
“Thanks,” he says without turning around. I watch him walk around the corner to the kitchen and wonder whether I am supposed to follow him in there.
“Holy hell,” he says quietly. “What a mess.”
“Sorry,” I answer sheepishly from the living room. And, before I know it, I add, “My grandma got stoned here the other night and was desperate for some munchies. She gets a little out of hand sometimes.” The utter idiocy of my own words makes me want to evaporate. I don’t even have a grandma anymore.
In a split second he is out of the kitchen and standing in the hallway, his hand on the door frame. He looks right at me, completely stone-faced. Without a trace of mockery, he says, “I think I might like to meet your grandma someday.” He quickly turns away and slides back into the kitchen. I am silent. What the hell am I supposed to say to that?
* * *
Since I can’t come up with a sharp retort, I decide to say nothing. I am not going to encourage this asshole. I am going to shut him down. In fact, I do not say another word to him for the rest of the morning. Instead I go back to the bedroom and continue unpacking my suitcases. I can hear him banging around in the kitchen, and I briefly consider closing my bedroom door just in case he really is some sort of psycho.
But then I wonder what he will think if he sees that I closed the door. I don’t want to seem paranoid or judgmental...or weak. The fact that I am putting so much thought into whether or not I should close the freaking door bothers the hell out of me. I want to not be bothered by the fact that I am alone with a strange man in my apartment. And for some stupid reason, I want him to see that I am not bothered by the fact that I am alone with a strange man in my apartment. I want to beat myself silly over all my foolish waffling about the goddamned door. I finally decide to shut my brain down before it melts—the door stays open, and I keep unpacking.
As I empty out the last suitcase, I decide that I am hungry. It’s got to be close to lunchtime by now. I turn to my alarm clock to check the time, and as I do, I see his reflection in the dresser mirror. He is walking down the hallway, toward my bedroom. Good. Now he’ll see that I didn’t close my door. I am standing next to my bed, and I try to come up with something to do with my hands so that he doesn’t think I’m just standing in my bedroom doing nothing. My nightstand is right next to me, and I reach down to grab something in advance of him hitting the doorway. Before I know it, I am flipping open my little plastic compact of birth control pills and looking at their circular pattern. Oh, fuck me. What the hell, Emma?
“Hey,” he says when he gets to the end of the hallway. “Sorry to bother you, but I need to use your head.” I turn to look at him just as he comes into the door frame. He has lost the tool belt, and his thumbs are casually hooked into the back of his waistband. He looks quickly around the bedroom before his eyes settle on my hands. I snap the pack shut quickly, hoping he might not recognize what I am holding—but I’m pretty sure he is the kind of guy who knows precisely what a packet of birth control pills looks like. I am deciding if I would prefer to curl up in a ball and die or evaporate yet again, when my mind registers what he has said.
“Um, for what?” I ask sharply. Should I offer him a calculator or something instead?
“Um, to take a piss,” he says with far too much lilt in his voice.
I stand staring blankly at him, and I have the distinct feeling that I am missing something. What is going on here?
After another moment passes, he says “Well?” And then it hits me. Oh, sweet Jesus, Emma! He is asking to use your head, not your brain.
“Of course. It’s right there,” I say meekly as I point to the bathroom door. I can feel the embarrassment creeping up my neck, across my face and through my scalp. I am sure now that I am blushing, and I look away so that he can’t see my face.
“Thanks,” he says. He turns to go, and once his back is to me, he adds, “Oh, by the way, your grandma’s handiwork is going to take me several days to fix, so you may wanna relax a little.” He keeps walking down the hallway, and I no longer feel like evaporating. Instead I feel like bitch-slapping the conceited jackass.
“Fuck you.”
The words come out of my mouth with a great amount of attitude and far more self-assurance than I am actually feeling. “And your little dog, too,” I add just loud enough for him to hear.
He turns on his heels and faces me again. His eyes look energized. There is a trace of a smile on his lips, and I suspect he wants to laugh at me...but he doesn’t. Instead he just stands there and looks at me as if there is some sort of crazy current running through him. I begin to think he’s trying to rile me up on purpose. Testing me somehow. I see his game now, and I am perfectly prepared to play.
When the moment passes, he turns around again and steps into the bathroom. The door closes, and I walk out to the kitchen to see what he has been doing out there all morning, vowing to myself that I will not lose my composure again. I will play it cool.
When I turn the corner, my view confirms that he is indeed trying to fire me up. He has torn all the cabinets off the wall, ripped up the linoleum flooring, and removed all the countertops. He has destroyed far more than my imaginary baked grandma ever could. Now I’m on the fence regarding the man’s sanity, and I know why he said he was going to be here for several more days. Game on, David. Game on.
