She finished up the massage at his big shoulders, now supple. His eyes were heavy. His breathing was steady. And if she checked his pulse, she knew she’d find it at a slow, relaxed rate.
It almost seemed mean when she had to pat the back of his neck gently and tell him that time was up.
His eyes widened. “Okay,” he said a little sleepily. “Thanks.”
“Here,” she said, placing a towel on the edge of the table. “You don’t want to get massage oil on your clothes.”
She turned her back and washed her hands at the little sink in the corner, giving him a moment alone to peel himself up off the table and gather his things. “See you Saturday in Chicago,” she said over her shoulder. “I’ll text you a location. I think we’ll be at the hotel.”
“Right. I’ll be on time,” he mumbled. “Thanks.”
“Be well!” As he opened the door to leave, she stole a look at his face. The expression she found there tugged at her heart. It was a little dazed, as if he couldn’t quite make sense of how he’d spent the last hour. She gave him a smile, and the corners of his rugged mouth turned up, too.
Then he was gone, probably to the showers. The hot water would do him some more good, and keep him loose. But it would also give him a few minutes to pull himself together. Somehow it hadn’t been easy for O’Doul to let someone touch his body. But he’d done it. He’d let down his guard. Now he’d have to pull it back up again for game night. In a few hours he was expected to mow down the visiting team from Quebec, and maybe take a few punches to amuse the fans.
While Ari found some aspects of hockey barbaric, she had tremendous respect for the competitive demands these men placed on both their bodies and their psyches. While she was donning her coat and wondering what to eat for dinner before the game, two dozen men would think of nothing but victory for the next seven hours. Cameras would follow their every move on the ice, then reporters would argue afterwards about their odds of making the playoffs for the first time since Nate Kattenberger bought the team.
Ari walked home, heading north toward the tiny Brooklyn neighborhood of Vinegar Hill, where the streets were brick and the buildings were barely three stories high. The houses here were smaller and older than in almost any other part of Brooklyn. The townhouse where Ari lived dated back to the Civil War. Someone had put a rather pedestrian brick facade on it during the sixties, which dimmed some of its charm. But as Ari approached from a block away, its blue-painted wooden door beckoned her home.
She was lucky as hell to live here. The building was worth a couple of million dollars at least, in spite of the fact that a Con Edison substation blocked the entire neighborhood from having any decent views of the river. The townhouse belonged to Ari’s great-uncle. He and the rest of her Italian family had decamped for Florida a decade ago. She looked after the building in exchange for paying only a very modest monthly rent.
As she approached, though, she saw something that made her slow down. The back end of her ex’s dark red van was visible just around the corner. The sight of it made her stomach ache instinctively, but its presence wasn’t necessarily bad news.
Three days ago she’d sent him an ultimatum—an e-mail notifying him that he had two days to finally clear the rest of his belongings out of her storage room. He hadn’t replied at all. Just this morning she’d been wondering what to do about that.
But if Vince was finally clearing out his junk from her basement, that was progress.
Ari dug out her keys—still shiny from their newness—and covered the rest of the block quickly. She jogged up the four steps to her front door and unlocked the brand-new deadbolt. Then she closed and locked the door. And listened.
The only voices she could make out were muffled, and coming from the rear of the building. She set her bag down on the bottom of her staircase and tiptoed through the dining room and on into the kitchen, stopping only to kick off her boots to silence the sound of footsteps on her hardwood floors. She hung back near the old refrigerator, taking a cautious, oblique glimpse out the back window.
Nothing.
Her heart was racing for no good reason. Vince was outside and she was inside, behind the safety of new locks. His presence unsettled her nonetheless. Vince Giardi was the embodiment of her worst, most embarrassing mistake. The grandmother who’d helped raise her—God rest her soul—had been right about Vince. Thank you, Nonna. Sorry it took me eight years to notice.
Ari leaned against the fridge, its hum at her back, and took a six-count breath, expanding her diaphragm. She wouldn’t let Vince get her riled up today. There was no need, anyway.
She heard the distinctive slam of the exterior basement door, and stood on tiptoe to take another peek out the window. A beanie hat appeared. But when the man came into view, it most certainly wasn’t Vince. That was obvious even with the guy’s back to her. He was thin and wearing dirty jeans. Vince would never dress like that. And, damn it, the man wasn’t carrying anything. If there were strangers coming in and out of her basement storage room, they’d better have moving boxes containing Vince’s clothing and video games.
Damn. It. All.
More than a month had passed since the awful weekend their relationship finally ended. They’d had an epic fight. Her flight was late in from Ottawa, and she’d gotten home to find Vince waiting up for her, drunk and angry. He wanted to know where she’d been. Why she hadn’t called.
This was nothing new, sadly. Ever since she’d taken the job for the Brooklyn Bruisers, things had been heading downhill. But on that awful night he didn’t bother to couch his jealous little jabs behind a tense chuckle. He flat out accused her of sleeping with a hockey player.
Even as she’d taken out her phone with shaky hands to show him the official arrival time of their charter flight on her Katt Phone, she’d understood that he’d finally gone too far. That she couldn’t live under a cloud of pointless suspicion anymore. It ended right then, even if Vince didn’t know it yet. But instead of playing it cool like a smart girl, she’d raised her voice. Blame it on her Italian heritage, but her top blew right off. “I shouldn’t have to prove it, Vince,” she’d said angrily. “If you think I’m a cheat, then leave me already! Go on! Just fucking stop this!”
He did stop it—by grabbing both her wrists and shoving her toward the stairs. In her wool socks, she’d slipped. Heart-stopping fear rose up in her chest as the staircase sliced into view. Her head bounced off the wall as she grabbed for the carved antique bannister.
Her foot stopped her fall, though—caught between two balusters. At first it was such a relief to stop falling that she didn’t feel the pain shooting up her instep. And then, shaking with fury and freaked out, she’d tried to conceal it. But that’s hard when you can’t put weight on one leg.
At the sight of her injury, Vince had sobered up fast and used Uber to get them a ride to the ER. “I’m sorry, baby,” he babbled. “Terrible accident.” “Never happen again.”