“You have a car here?” My eyebrows pinch in. We all came in Kaplan’s car.
“No. I’m going to borrow one of my parents’.”
“Oh. Right.”
He chuckles as he finishes off his coffee, rinsing out the mug and setting it in one of the dishwashers. “Want a to-go cup?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
“You get used to it. Or not. A lot of people either have trouble with it or chase.”
“Maybe that’s why you all stayed single.”
Oliver rolls his eyes, but ruefully shrugs as he finishes pouring two metal to-go thermoses with coffee, handing one to me. “Yeah. That. But the truth is, we’re just cautious and have learned the hard way on more than one occasion. It’s difficult to know who you can trust when you’re a Fritz.”
“Why does this sound like a warning and a threat all mixed into one?”
He grins at me like I catch on quickly.
I follow him through the back of the house toward a garage I didn’t see last night when we arrived in the front. He opens a door and there are eight bays, each with a different type of car from SUVs, to a large Bentley that looks like it’s meant to be chauffeured to a couple of smaller sportier cars.
We climb into an Escalade and pull out into the chilled early morning. There is still ice clinging to the grass and trees, but it’s supposed to warm back up to seasonal temperatures later today so much of this will melt away.
“I assume Rina told you about what happened with Harrison. Why we don’t fuck around when it comes to her.”
I pause mid-sip of coffee and meet his profile. “Yes. He stalked her for six months before taking his life.”
Oliver mutters out a curse under his breath. “Is that all she said about it?”
“She mentioned the inheritance that she’s donating and the letter she got. She threw it in the fire without reading it.”
He nods slowly, thoughtfully, his expression sobering. “She told me she did that and I’m glad for it. But Harrison didn’t just stalk her and kill himself, Brecken. He terrorized her for six months and then kidnapped her.”
“What?” Comes out in a strangled gasp. I think I stopped breathing. And blinking.
“He was everywhere. All around her. Impacting her classes, her friendships, her fucking life. After he graduated that spring, we all thought things would improve. That he’d move on or that his father would rein him in since he had started being groomed to take over Bishop Energies.
“None of that happened. I stayed in New York that summer because she was there, and I wanted to keep an eye on her. I don’t know why she stayed. Back then we all used to go to our place on Martha’s Vineyard for the summer. She was determined to make a show of not being afraid. She had spoken with the police and finally got a restraining order, but it did nothing. He kept at it. And he was fucking good at it too.”
“What do you mean?”
“No one ever saw him, so it’s not like we could do much with that bullshit restraining order. I was on her constantly. We all were when we could be. But around the end of the summer, beginning of the new fall term, he disappeared from her life. Seemed to be on the straight and narrow with Bishop Energies. Everything stopped. For more than a month, things were back to normal. I was already in medical school at Columbia, having finished a year early from college. Rina was going into her sophomore year and was desperate to be normal again. To live a normal life.”
“But that’s not what happened,” I surmise, my voice hoarse as chills run up and down my body. My hands are shaking, and I set my coffee down into the cup holder, so I don’t spill.
“No. That’s not what happened.”
Oliver merges onto the highway into light rush hour traffic, the sun barely starting to rise in the east, a welcome sign after two days of icy rain and wind. I squint into it, my heart racing with equal parts curiosity and dread.
“Rina went to some party at a frat house. That night I get a call from her roommate, saying she never came home, and she couldn’t get in touch with her. Rina doesn’t do that. She didn’t ever do that. Especially with Harrison stalking her for months. She and her roommate had a check-in system. I went to the house where the party was and after talking with the guys there, someone said that they had remembered seeing Harrison. He had drugged and taken her. Tied her to a dingy bed in an even dingier building in the middle of Harlem. The building was set to be demolished, made into new apartments or something, so no one was living there. No one heard anything.”
“Jesus.” My lungs empty, my hands clutching the seat so tight all the blood is draining from them. “I didn’t know.” Why didn’t she tell me that? She told me about him. About the stalking. But not the attack. God, she’s so strong. And so much more about her makes sense, but… “Did he…” I can’t even say the word.
“Yes. He did.”
“Fuck. Fuck!” I bellow, my hands coming up to my face, scrubbing up and down. All I see is a haze of red. All I taste is bloodlust. If I thought I wanted to go back in time and kill him before, that has nothing on the murderous son of a bitch I am now. “How long did he have her for?”
“About twenty-four hours or so. The idiot had taken a cab with her drugged out to that building and I guess the driver’s conscience finally got to him because he called the police and from our report and his, they pieced it together quickly and found her. But before they could get to her and arrest him, he shot himself, making sure she witnessed it.” He turns quickly, catching my eye. “Two nights ago was officially six years.”
“The night I showed up at her place.” My hands fall to my lap as I stare at the Boston skyline, my thoughts disorganized and messy. Bloodthirsty and desperate. I want to kill him all over again and I want to hold on to her, protect her. “She never told me any of that.”
“She doesn’t talk about that night, Brecken. She’s told her friends about Harrison and the stalking. But not about that night. Never about that night. She’s been battling it for six years, never letting anyone in. Never fully trusting another man with herself. But she seems to be different with you and we’re hoping you could be different for her.”
“But?” I press, knowing there is more.
“You seem like a good guy. Like a guy who cares about her. But as I said, we don’t fuck around when it comes to Rina or her safety or her heart. She’s been through enough.”
“I’d never hurt her. Ever.”
“She told me you’re only here for a year.”
I think back on Rina sleeping this morning. Those creases by her eyes were gone. I’d love to say I did that, but I know it’s all her. She threw that letter in the fire and with it, she set herself free. And in watching it, in hearing this, I think I fell in love with her.
I think I’ve been in love with the idea of her all along, but now it’s different. Now it’s the real deal.
It’s her courage. Her courage is fucking stunning. It’s breathtaking. And if she can have the courage to do that, after all she’s been through, I can have the courage to do what I need to do. I want to be a man who deserves a woman like her. I want to be the man she wakes up next to every morning and falls asleep next to every night. I want to cook her dinners and make love to her on every surface. I want to hear her laughter at my stupid jokes and watch her roll her eyes when I try to charm her.