He searches for a word for a moment, before blinking slowly, as if coming to an unexpected—and not entirely welcome—understanding.
Then he shakes his head and looks away, swallowing.
He stands there like that, tense and silent, while I watch him struggle with everything he won’t allow himself to say.
It’s incredibly appealing, damn him.
“Hey. Gangster.”
Without turning his head, he glances back at me. His eyes are guarded.
I find myself unexpectedly smiling up at him. “I like you like this. It gives me hope that somewhere deep down underneath all that hard black armor, you might actually have a heart.”
“I’d say thank you, but I’m not sure that was a compliment.”
We gaze at each other for a moment, neither of us moving, until I exhale a breath. “Is it safe for me and my friends to go back to our apartment?”
He doesn’t hesitate when he answers. “Aye.”
I examine his face, intuitively understanding what it is he left unsaid. “Because you’ll be watching out for us.”
“Aye.”
“And you won’t let anything bad happen.”
“Aye.”
“Because you…inexplicably…like me.”
He reaches out and gently brushes his knuckles over my cheek. His gaze follows the path of his touch. He says softly, “It’s not inexplicable. I like you the way Newton liked gravity.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Once he found it, everything else in the universe made sense.”
I sit with that for a moment, allowing myself to feel all the things that sentence made me feel. Allowing myself space to take it in and sit with it.
Killian gives me time to work it over and simply waits.
He doesn’t insist I respond. He doesn’t push for any kind of reaction. He just stands quietly and watches me with no expectation.
I could laugh at him. I could rage at him. I could shower him with scorn. His gift to me is that he’d accept any of those things, and he’d still be glad he said it because it’s his truth.
It dawns on me like the sunrise over mountains: he doesn’t want to lie to me. He doesn’t want to play games with me. He only wants to tell me his truths.
If my life were a movie, it would be co-directed by Alfred Hitchcock and Woody Allen.
I say gently, “Do you think it’s possible you’re having a midlife crisis?”
He throws his head back and laughs.
“I mean, we haven’t even kissed.”
Still chuckling, he says drily, “Not for lack of trying on my part.”
“You have to admit, though, this pursuit of yours is over-the-top. It’s practically fictional. Romeo himself would be impressed by your single-mindedness.”
“If you think I’m over-the-top, you should meet my brother. He sat in the same section of a shitty diner for an entire year staring at his future wife and obsessing before ever speaking a word to her.”
The moment he says it, he looks like mentioning his brother was a mistake.
I smile at him, strangely glad he did. “Don’t worry, gangster. I won’t tell anyone you’re human. We’ll just keep letting everyone think you got here when Pandora let you out of that box.”
He sweeps his thumb thoughtfully over my cheekbone, then cups my chin in his hand. He gazes at me steadily for a moment, then says, “I’ll give you a week to think about it.”
“It?”
“The kiss. If you decide when a week’s up that you really don’t want to kiss me, I’ll let it go. You’ll never hear from me again.” He pauses. “To clarify: I’ll still be making sure you’re safe. This isn’t blackmail.”
Incredibly, I believe him. But I can’t admit that, so I go with sarcasm instead. “How gallant.”
“Just because I’m the leader of an international criminal organization doesn’t mean I can’t be honorable, too.”
“Funny, I was under the impression that’s exactly what it means.”
That sly, I’ve-got-a-secret twinkle returns to his eyes. “Where I’m concerned, lass, you should get used to being wrong.”
He ducks his head, brushes his lips against my cheek, then takes me by the shoulders and moves me a few feet to one side. Then he leaves, letting the door slam shut behind him.
I stand unmoving where he left me for a long time, my hand to my face, feeling the ghost of his lips burn my skin, trying to convince myself that when Max said my collision with the elemental force that is Killian Black was fate, she was dead wrong.
Trying but not quite believing it.
13
Jules
I call Max back and tell her everything. Then I ask her what she thinks we should do.
“Aside from driving straight to the nearest adult store to stock up on lube and fishnet stockings? Book an appointment for a Brazilian wax. Then set up a video camera in the closet. I’m gonna want to watch the highlight reel over and over again.”
“I’m not having sex with him. Also, you are a very disturbed person. I said what should we do? Stay in our safe spots for the time being, right?”
“He knows where your safe spot is, genius.”
“I’ll move to another one, obviously.”
“Uh-huh. And what makes you think he couldn’t find you there?”
She makes a good point. I touch my hair, wondering if he implanted another tracking device when he had his hand buried in it.
I decide the odds are good. I should take another shower.
“We can’t go back to the apartment like nothing happened. That’s reckless.”
Max laughs. “Right. Because the three of us would never do anything reckless.”
I sit on the edge of the bed and stare out at the view of the Charles River, where I accused him of planning to throw me while I sported a pair of cement shoes. I think of his face when he said he liked me the way Newton liked gravity.
I think of his eyes.
I say quietly, “Help me, Max. I’m lost.”
She’s silent for a long time. Then she says, “You’re lost because you like him. And you hate yourself for liking him. Because he’s everything he is. Because your worst nightmare is ending up like your mother: drunk in love, then dead as a result.”
It’s both a gift and a curse having another person know me this well. My chest constricts until it’s painful.
I whisper, “I remember how she worshipped my father. How she hung on his every word. Even when I was little, I couldn’t understand her devotion. I knew he was bad…why didn’t she?”
Max says firmly, “You’re not your mother. Or your father. You’re you, not the sum of their parts. Let that shit go.”
Letting go is what I’ve been trying to do my whole life. But a person’s life history isn’t a butterfly’s cocoon or a snake’s dead, outgrown skin. We can’t walk away from it. We carry our history around in our hearts and our memories and deep within our bones. It’s alive and well, circulating in our bloodstreams.
Our pasts know exactly who we are, even when we don’t.
Or don’t want to admit we do.