Bess
We spent two days like this, hidden away in Lane’s house, the only serious conversation being over the money I spent to get to Florida.
“Tell me how much it was for the ticket, Bess,” Lane demanded over coffee.
“Nope.” I shook my head with a smile.
“Bess,” he growled.
We were half-naked, lounging on the couch with big mugs and pretend smiles. The housekeepers had been shooed out, the gardeners sent home, and the pool unattended. Lane was hiding and I was aiding and abetting.
I texted May to make sure my shifts were covered at the hotel. Her no-nonsense attitude was a welcome mental break from all the charades here in Florida.
My supervisor, Maddie, thought I took some personal time to see my dad. I learned from May that Robbie was filling in for me in the mornings. Brooks was fine. And of course, May couldn’t resist asking about the man of the hour.
MAY: How’s Lane?
ME: Fine.
MAY: Toast is fine.
ME: Well, he’s toast.
And that he was—toast. Lane was burned. Third-degree burns covered his entire heart.
When we first met—or the first time I actually remembered meeting Lane—his wounds were wrapped in gauze, but the dressing had unraveled somehow. And now he was trying desperately to find new bandages. Sex, midnight swims, showers, and shouting on the phone for work were all doing little to cover up his singed heart.
For forty-eight hours, we did everything but talk. Every time I tried to have a serious conversation, he shook his head. “Not now,” he would say. I would chatter on about the hotel and he would listen. I even mentioned AJ getting help, and Lane just nodded.
On the second night, standing beneath the seven—yes, seven—showerheads in Lane’s master shower, his hand drifted down my side. I was pushed into the tile wall, Lane leaning into me, his dick seeking entrance. His fingers brushed over my center, tickling and teasing before finally entering me. One, then two.
“Bess,” he whispered in my ear, his voice barely audible over the roar of the water. “You feel so good. You take it all away, make it all worth it.”
“Lane, you need to tell me what it is, what I make go away.”
He was full-on fucking me with his fingers now, flicking that spot, and I was on the precipice.
“Just feel this. Lose yourself in me, Bess.” He moved his hand a little faster, and the most sensational orgasm shot through me.
It had worked again. He tapped yet another vein and shot up with my orgasm, and I was a willing bystander. An enabler. I had to stop the madness.
Dried and satiated, before we collapsed in bed, Lane said, “I have something for you.” He pulled the necklace out of his drawer. The heart, with our different shapes and sizes and personalities masquerading as diamonds filling it.
“How did you get it?” I asked, reaching out to run my index finger over its decadence.
“All by myself. That fucker thought he could take you and my necklace from me.”
“What?” Shocked, I stepped back.
“I paid a visit to AJ and got what was mine. Did him a service, actually, because he called some older chick in a Buick to help him dry out.”
Shirl?
“I don’t know who or what happened after that,” he added. “I didn’t stay for the show.”
Frowning, I said, “Lane, he may have been awful, but I hope you didn’t hurt him.”
A cold chill ran through my body. Why did everyone treat me with kid gloves? Was I that fragile? How did I not know about this?
“Bess, he’s fine. You told me yourself, he’s in rehab. That’s a good thing, right?”
I nodded.
“Now, come here,” he said and pulled me into bed, tucking me in next to him. Shifting our bodies, he molded me to his form, barely giving me room to breathe.
I woke to shouting, kicking, screaming.
“No! Jake! Look what you did . . . Jake!”
Lane grabbed my wrists and shook me, hard. My head was banging against the mattress, my neck feeling like it was going to snap.
“Lane!” I yelled. When that didn’t bring him to his senses, I slammed my knee up into his abdomen. It was my only defense.
“Oh, you’re fighting back, Jake? This is all your fault! Take it.”
“Lane! It’s me! Bess,” I shouted, my voice hoarse from trying to be heard over his.
Another knee to his gut, more yelling of his name, and finally his eyes popped open and focused on me.
“Bess?”
Realization of what happened flooded him, his face growing pale in the faint moonlight streaming through the window. “Oh shit! No!” he said as he slumped back and moved all the way to the edge of the bed.
“It’s okay,” I said.
But I wasn’t. My wrists burned from his fingers, my heart ached from the stress, and I had a headache—either from the banging or the screaming.
Lane threw his arm over his face and said, “You have to go.”
“What?” When I turned to him, he rolled the other way, giving me his back.
“You have to go,” he said. “Now.” Then he felt along his nightstand until the glow of his phone filled the room.
He was on the phone, apparently with an assistant, and the details of the one-sided conversation washed over me.
I was leaving.
Now.
There was a car coming.
A flight was arranged.
So I packed my bags silently, determined not to argue with him. But when we made it down to the driveway, I wasn’t able to keep quiet anymore.
Standing in the muggy, bug-infested Florida night, I turned and faced the man I’d traveled to help. “You know what, Lane? I’ll leave. I’ll run like you want me to, so you can blame me or whoever else you want to blame. But you and I both know you need help.”
Throwing my hands out, I said tersely, “Get it! Not for me, but for your own peace of mind. You’re eating yourself alive, and that’s something I know all about. The end is never pretty, and I would hate to see you go out like that, but it’s happening. You’re going to end up empty and soulless.”
Lane didn’t say a word. He just stood there, expressionless, staring at me with his arms crossed over his chest, removed from any responsibility.
When the car pulled up, he said, “There’s no other way. You’re right. I’m not going down a pretty path, Bess. So just go. You don’t deserve this. Run, and do it fast.”
I saw a lone teardrop slide down his cheek before I got in the back of the car, and I couldn’t take my eyes off the headlights shining on his brooding figure as we pulled away. Alone in the back of the town car, I cried. For him, not for me.
Lane had two choices now. Find a better, stronger drug than me to wipe away the pain. Or face the truth.
I hoped he picked the second.