One Year With Him Page 14

  “Can you just take me home?” I smelled his leather jacket, his cologne, the Jameson on his breath. He stood inches from me. If I just leaned forward, I could kiss him.

  “Where’s your car?” he asked.

  “Kevin’s.”

  “What happened?” His voice was tight as a bowstring, and his posture matched.

  I felt the pressure of a big fat cry push out my lower lip, squeeze tears from my eyes, and steal breath from my lungs. “I hate it that I break up with you twice, and both times you show up in a crisis and I get upset.”

  “What happened?”

  “I fell.” My voice cracked mid-sob.

  “You look like you fell on someone’s fist.”

  “It was actually more of a really hard slap, but you should see him. He looks really bad.”

  Jonathan blinked. Slowly. “What happened?”

  I didn’t answer. He put his hands on my shoulders and, as if by force of will, removed all anger and judgment from his expression. It only made me cry harder.

  “Fuck you.”

  “What happened?”

  “He wanted...” I broke down. How could I tell Jonathan that I missed being touched by a man, by him, so I let something happen I should have stopped? Or why I was blaming myself when I hadn’t done anything? “He kissed me, and I bit him. Then he hit me. I hit him with a bottle and ran, and my car and keys are at his place. And you’re not supposed to be here witnessing this, so I do not feel guilty at all.”

  I tried to read his expression, but it was hard to see through my tears. He slipped one of those freaking hankies out of his pocket, and I snapped it away before he could tell me to blow.

  “It’s my fault,” I said.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. You said not to be alone with him, and I should have listened. You said he wanted to hurt me, and here I am. Now I don’t know how I’m supposed to go to Vancouver with him.”

  “Where was Darren while you were getting beat up?”

  “Parties. It’s the biggest night of the year.”

  He put his arms around me, and I fell into him, putting my cheek to his shoulder, my face to his neck. He felt right. So right. So warm and gentle. That was the touch I’d wanted when I let Kevin near me. I’d gotten it so wrong. I felt a tightening on my ass, then a tickle. He’d slipped my phone from my pocket.

  “What are you doing?” I grabbed for the phone, but he held it high, tapping and dragging until a map appeared. He’d found Kevin’s address.

  He handed me the phone. “Stay here with your friends for a minute. I’m going to get your car.”

  “Jonathan, just take me home. Don’t get in a fight.”

  “A fight?” His voice was tense with control. “You think I’m going to take him behind the gym and punch him? Do I look like an adolescent?”

  “No, but—”

  “Stop.” He put his hands on my face and got close enough to kiss. “You’re mine, and I will defend you. But this isn’t a movie. You don’t destroy someone with a fight. And Monica, I know you walked away from me, but I am going to destroy him nonetheless.”

  He kissed my forehead and walked toward the studio.

  Chapter 29

  JONATHAN

  I couldn’t say exactly how much of the situation could have been avoided if Margie hadn’t pulled Will’s team, but at the very least, I would have gotten a call when Monica ran out. If I hadn’t been at the Stock, she’d probably be begging the bus driver for a free ride back to her hill or crossing Elysian Park to get home. Somalia was safer.

  She had to come back to me. Soon. He’d had his lips on her, and I burned from the inside out. I didn’t want to get upset about it in front of her. Her lips were mine. Her face was mine. I’d let her go, secure in the knowledge that she’d come back to me. But in the interim, anything could happen with either of us. Though I knew the difference between what was fake and what was real, I couldn’t guarantee she made the distinction.

  And also, her body was mine, regardless. Mine to kiss. Mine to fuck.

  Mine to hit?

  The contrast wasn’t lost on me. I’d spanked her ass pink with the intention of a harder, rawer fuck. And she wanted it, begged for it. He hit her in anger, on her face, and hard. But what was the difference? When and how did she become a punching bag for the men she was involved with?

  Wainwright was two blocks away. I saw her car in the front lot before I saw the building. The poor street lighting left dozens of dark corners and blind turns, but it made it very easy to see that the front door was ajar. Music came from it. A stringed instrument over a hip-hop percussion line that seemed a little bit off. It was disconcerting, all raw nerves and tension.

  I pushed open the door and slipped into a narrow hall with doors on either side. Music came from the big room at the end. A voice, layered over and over, with that single stringed instrument and hard percussion. Something was off about it, but it was definitely Monica. I saw her bag half falling off a table in the big room. I grabbed it, and when I turned, I saw the piece.

  It stood complete. The sections had been labeled for transport, and the wood packing boxes stood next to it. Like the coalmine, it was a freestanding room with an inside and outside.

  It was cut in two by a foot-wide horizontal wound around the circumference. Shingles covered the walls, and the windows, framed in the Craftsman style and broken where the wound intersected them, were painted in gold and silver. Curious, I went inside.

  From the inside, the open jaw of wood and plaster in the horizontal cut looked more evil, more hazardous. Detritus spilled everywhere. Broken cinderblocks. Gum-stuck urbanite. Grassrooted clods of parkway. All of it was anonymous, generic, unwanted, ripped out, found but not rescued. On the walls was a huge screen print of an open wound. It could have been any body part, from some ravaging knife fight or a ten-hour surgery; that didn’t matter. It was three hundred sixty degrees around, and grotesque. On the other corner was an insect with a mandible and antennae that went around the walls.

  Then the music made sense. Monica’s voice, her words layered so many times that their syllables and meanings were lost. The strings sounded a little off key and the bass riff was half a millisecond off time, then gradually more, until the core was a disconcerting cacophony that fell back into the correct beat, looping into a false sense of a more permanent rightness. Each corner of the piece accentuated a different vocal layer, and each speaker had a different tone.

  “It’s good,” I said. I knew he was within earshot. “Music’s the same inside and out. But you hear it differently.”

  “Reality’s the same inside and outside the relationship.” He stood in the doorway, which was too tall for the room. Two people could leave at the same time, but only if one was on top of the other. “Before and after, life sucks. What are you doing here?” The left side of his face was cut and bloody. He held a red-soaked bag of ice to it.

  “She did a good job on you,” I said. “You deserve worse.”

  “Come on, man. She’s a cocktease.”

  “Not with me.”

  “Fine, dude, whatever. What do you want?”

  I walked past him and stopped. “Came to get the car. You let her walk out into a dark street alone. I don’t know what comes over men like you.”

  “You know what? Fuck you. You’re just another rich guy with ownership issues. Pussy like that’s never owned.”

  I pushed him against the doorframe. The bag of ice dropped, breaking and spreading cubes and shards all over the floor. “You don’t—”

  He pushed me back. We were evenly matched, physically, so when I pushed him back, we ended up in a lock in a doorway designed for one person, straining against each other, unmoving for our red faces and effort.

  I slipped my foot behind his ankle and yanked his leg from under him. We fell, with me on top. I got my knee in his sternum while he was still disoriented. I got lucky. I kept my head. In that millisecond, I looked at that piece of shit and thought, On
e hard hit to the face, and I have him. Then the voice of reason chimed in. I wouldn’t have him. Knocking him senseless would do nothing but give him a headache in the morning. Worse, I’d lose Monica’s respect. She expected better of me, and we were too precarious for me to do something temperamental and stupid.

  I had to remove him from her life peacefully and permanently.

  “Listen to me,” I said, out of breath and knowing my upper hand wouldn’t last. “I’m going with her to Vancouver. We will both act like gentlemen. You will not speak about her like that to me or anyone else. Do you understand?”

  “You don’t know her,” he choked out.

  I dug my knee in his chest. He swiped at me, catching my cheek. “Do you understand or not?” I asked.

  “Fuck you.”

  I stood up. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

  Chapter 30

  MONICA

  I made sure I was facing the block Jonathan had walked down. He was taking too long. I knew Ute’s crowd by sight, name, or both, and under normal circumstances, I would have had a fine time listening to their Hollywood war stories. Broken commitments. Rich executives demanding endless hours of free work. All of the tales laced with hope hope hope.

  I didn’t mention my meeting with Eddie, or his insinuation that if I’d just release a single song about being a submissive under the beautiful Mr. Drazen, I’d have a deal. A real deal, with a real record label. I just smiled and accepted condolences about Gabby. I talked briefly about the B.C. Mod show as if it was some little project that may or may not actually lead to something. I kept it vague and kept Kevin out of it.

  A pressure on my shoulder made me jump. I was still edgy from wrestling with Kevin, but when I turned, it was Jonathan. He had a scratch on his right cheek.

  “He’s left-handed,” I said, pointing at the scratch on his cheek. “You said you wouldn’t get physical.”

  “What are you…?” He touched his face and came back with blood. “Thorn bush. It’s dark over there.” He held out my bag. “I parked your car around the corner. I’ll have Lil drop it to you tomorrow.”

  “Why can’t I just take it?”

  “Because I’m driving you home.”

  “No, Jonathan—”

  “I want to talk to you.”

  He looked as though he had to tell me something, and since he’d just gotten back from Kevin’s, I was pretty sure I needed to hear it. I said goodbye to everyone with Los Angeles hugs, promising calls and get togethers that I wanted from the bottom of my heart, but I would never make happen.

  He walked me down the block, saying nothing until we got to the Jag. He opened the passenger door for me. I leaned on the car, not ready to commit to letting him drive me home.

  “Get in.”

  I crossed my arms. “What happened at the studio?”

  “I saw the piece.”

  “And?”

  “You know it’s phenomenal. You don’t need me to tell you that. Now get in.”

  “I don’t need to be pushed around twice in one night.”

  He leaned on the car, one hand on each side of me. “I need to get off this street with its four hundred drunk kids going back and forth from a party.” He wasn’t touching me. Not even our clothes were touching, but I felt him in a push of desire. I wanted him. My lips, my cunt, even my throbbing face wanted him. When he spoke again, his voice went from his mouth to my heart, lighting it on fire. “I need to speak to you privately.”

  “I don’t want to speak. I want to go home and look in a mirror.”

  “You bruise easily. Okay? Now get in the car.”

  My hand went to my face. The skin was numb, with pain underneath it. “It must be awful.”

  He took my hand and kissed my cheek. It hurt and gave me incredible pleasure at the same time. When he moved his lips from my cheek to my neck, the hurt disappeared and the pleasure increased. “It’s not,” he whispered.

  “Is this a ploy to get me in the car?”

  He looked in my eyes, then he kissed my lips, parting them with his tongue. He paused only to say, “Yes.”

  I gave in to him, his arms resting on either side of my head and closing out the rest of the world. Only in that kiss did I realize how bad the last weeks had been, how much I’d missed him. Not just his physical attention, but his words and gestures, his protection and devotion.

  He dragged his lips along my jawline and said, “What do you want, Monica?”

  “I want you.”

  “You want me what?”

  “To take me to bed.”

  “I’m not a toy.” He said it while kissing my ear and touching my throat, his erection firm on my belly. He used his most tender voice. “You can’t throw me away, then reel me back whenever you feel like fucking.”

  “Then stop touching me whenever I throw in a line.”

  He pulled away slowly. “You’re right.” His eyes scanned mine, and his expression changed, as if he’d realized something. I didn’t know if I liked it.

  A part of me wanted to reel him back in. It was the part of me that loved him in the first place, naturally. That part wanted to rub against him. That part had watched him walk across the street like a stranger, with all the heated possibilities that implied.

  But my brain said “no.” My mind was the repository of memory, and in that repository sat Eddie Milpas’s suggestion that I become Bondage Girl for the masses, the symbol of their unspoken, unwanted desires. I could sing like a frog, and it wouldn’t matter as long as I wore a rich man’s collar.

  “Let’s talk in the car,” I said, “but I’m taking myself home.”

  He paused, and I wanted to fall into his eyes, so close, so piercing. I slipped from under him and into the car.

  He shut my door and walked around the front. I was so disappointed in myself. I had left him for good reason. I left him for the same reasons I left Kevin: my life, my career, my work. So how did I end up in the front seat of his car, about to talk about things I didn’t want to talk about? How would I handle being in close quarters with him when all he had to do was touch me and I’d fall to pieces? I was weak, and I knew it. That was why I’d left Kevin so sharply. That was why I was celibate for so long. If being in control of my pussy wasn’t an option, at least I could control who I saw and under what circumstances.

  As weak as Kevin had made me, and as much as that weakness had made me run from him, it was nothing compared to what Jonathan did to me.

  He got in the driver’s side, and I closed my eyes. I didn’t want to see him or the way the light hit his cheekbones or the taut skin of his jaw. If I could just close off my nose and ears, I’d get out of the car intact.

  “Monica,” he said, “are you all right?”

  “It’s been a long night.”

  “You can’t go with him.”

  “Fuck you, it’s my career.”

  “The masochism’s not supposed to leave the bedroom.”

  “Go to hell.” I went for the door handle. He reached across me and grabbed my wrist.

  “You’re not hearing me. You don’t belong near him. It burns a hole in me.”

  I was entitled to see whomever I wanted for whatever reason I wanted. Jonathan and I were broken up. But I felt guilty for leaving him, and my guilt spoke. “Who was she? In DC? You going to tell me you don’t have someone to fuck in every port of call? Tell me about her, and we’ll call it even.”

  He leaned back, letting my wrist go. “Are you serious?”

  I shouldn’t have asked, because his look wasn’t one of denial, but “How dare you ask?” The way he said it, I was sure he’d done some fucking in the past two weeks and it immobilized my heart. When I was a kid, a hole the size of a fist opened up in the middle of our street. Three inches of asphalt dropped into a deep nothingness. It got bigger and bigger, falling into itself until Teddy Ramirez’s Toyota got stuck.

  My chest had that sinkhole in it. It just fell in on itself, creating a bigger opening into nothingness and suc
king the breath out of me. No. That was not good. That was the very definition of awful. I shifted and went for the door. He reached across me again and blocked the handle. “You can’t run away every time something gets difficult.”

  “Jonathan, please, I can’t bear the thought of you with someone else.” His body was so close to mine, so real. That son of a bitch. Built so right for me and how many others?

  “Wait. You think there was someone else?” he asked.

  I bit my lip. I didn’t know what I thought any more.

  “Monica. There’s. No. One. Else.” He let the handle go and stared at me for a second. “There’s only you. You think I’m stupid? You think I can create what we have with another woman? I know the world. I know the people in it. Us? What we have isn’t something we made. It’s something that existed before we even met.”

  The sinkhole in my chest reversed itself, like film run backward, from broken to whole.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have asked. It wasn’t my business.”

  “Why did you walk away from me if you still care?” he asked.

  “I’m human. It’s a terminal condition.” I wanted him to kiss me. I wanted his lips, his hands, his tongue, but I couldn’t, not when there were so many sensible reasons not to. “I took a meeting with Eddie Milpas. He wants to make me a star, which I’d laugh at coming from anyone else. But it’s not funny because he has the power to do it. He wants to put Carnival’s muscle behind me. If he does, I’ll have everything I ever wanted.”

  “Monica, that’s—”

  “He wants the song,” I said. Jonathan leaned back, against the door, a rueful smile at his lips. “He’s not getting it. I keep my promises, and to be honest, I wish I never wrote that thing. But that’s not the rub. He has plenty of songs with kinky lyrics that’ll sound great from a girl all dolled up in leather and chains. BDSM is hot right now, apparently, and I’m ‘in the know,’ so I can pull it off.”

  I paused, because the image exploded in my mind. “Fuck! I spend a few weeks with you and I’m Bondage Girl. What the fuck am I supposed to do now? Do you know how hard I’ve worked? Do you know what I’ve put into this, and to sit across from this guy, and he tells me…wait for it….he tells me that I’m perfect because I’ll know what I’m talking about? Who am I? What the fuck?” I slammed the dashboard. “And Kevin, do you know why he forced himself on me? Because he thought I liked it that way. God damn it. Jonathan, what if those cameras were in my house because someone wanted to blackmail you? And I’m getting caught in that net now. This is not what I want.