Chapter 38
Damon
This is bullshit. I don't even know what I'm doing here. Is it just to punish myself for being so fucking stupid? How could I make such a gigantic mistake? How could this ever even fucking happen?
I should have known better. Scott was acting so strangely at so many of our meetings, he postponed deadlines, it took him forever to come up with a halfway cohesive business plan. He was nervous every time I saw him, but I never thought much of it. Why not? Usually, my sixth sense about people isn't that far off.
Was I too distracted because of her?
No. Don't fucking blame Elene. It's not her fault that you're such an idiot.
My thoughts are running a marathon in my head. I don't want to turn into my parents.
It's almost as if I want to repent, as if I am willing to accept their mistake because I've made mistakes of my own. But our mistakes are so different, despite both being seeded by stupidity.
I'm waiting in the visitor's area, not outfitted in my usual business suit but in a casual shirt and dark blue jeans, nothing too fancy, but still dressed nicely enough to not feel like a slob. My hands are fiddling nervously in my lap and I’m staring at the table in front of me. No man should ever be this nervous to see his mother.
Yet, here I am, feeling again like the helpless little boy I thought I'd left behind. Here, seeking my mother's company for the first time in years. She cried when I let her know on the phone that I'd be willing to come visit her. Holy fuck, she didn’t cry, she howled. I don't think I've ever heard her voice breaking like that, or trying to speak through suffocating crying fits.
Is it bad to say that it made me feel powerful? That it made me proud and filled me with a sense of relief?
Hearing my mother react to me like that replaced that feeling of abandonment and the eventual indifference I felt toward her. Hearing from me made her happy. Having me tell her that I was coming to visit her for the very first time since she got locked up made her collapse in exuberant tears.
I can't help but wonder if she would have liked Elene.
But what does it matter?
I let out a burdened sigh, burying my face behind my hand.
Shit. I shouldn't have come here.
Was this really the only thing I could think of to get myself out of the house? I've spent the past few days locked up inside my penthouse like a caged animal, pacing back and forth in the living room with a drink in hand, and only leaving to meet with Dean and my attorneys. They are working hard to get our asses out of this fucking mess, but things aren't moving fast enough.
I need to see Elene – or decide to let her go.
She knows my full name, and I know she could figure out how to contact me, even if the madam refused to give her my contact details. She could look me up and find a way to get to me. Unlike me, who knows absolutely nothing about her, besides her first name — if that even is her real first name — and that she works at The Velvet Rooms.
The ball is in her court, and so far, she hasn’t done anything.
What does that tell me? That she no longer wants to see me? I doubt that Miss Barry disclosed the full story behind what kept me from coming back to The Velvet Rooms, and the mere fact that I wasn't coming back could be enough for her to void our agreement. I was just another customer, a well-paying client who was willing to pay a premium to claim her exclusively. For all I know, it helped to make her life a little easier, because she no longer had to focus on landing other clients while still earning the same amount of money. She might be cursing me now, not because I left, but because my sudden disappearance made her work life more difficult.
A morose thought strikes me. She could be happy that I am gone because she’s grown tired of our repetitive routine.
No. I refuse to believe that.
Does this feel like work? I had asked her, and when she shook her head in response, it felt fucking sincere. But she is a trained liar, maybe even capable of fooling me...
"Damon!"
The voice doesn't sound familiar, but I know it's my mother's. I look up to find her standing at the other end of the room, still about thirty feet away and separated by half a dozen other tables. She's standing there, looking so small next to the officer who accompanied her to the visiting area, her hands clutching her face on both sides as she stares at me with those same gray eyes I inherited from her.
I get up from my seat, acknowledging the guard with a short nod, and then my mother is rushing toward me. She has always been a slim woman, always keen on maintaining her figure, but it seems that prison has slimmed her down even more. She looks tiny and frail. She approaches me in a near sprint, wrapping her thin arms around my waist. I reluctantly lower mine around her. I tower above her by almost a foot.
"You came!" she cries out against my chest. "My boy, you really came!"
She's sobbing with happy tears and shaking so violently in my embrace that I worry her heart may give in, despite her young age.
"I'm not a liar, mother," I say, unintentionally sounding colder than intended.
I gently push her away from me, which proves to be harder than anticipated because she refuses to let go of me. I can't remember the last time my mother hugged me like this.
"Please," I say in a lower voice. "We don't have a lot of time."
"Right, right," she stutters, finally retreating and hurriedly wiping her tears away with the back of her hand. She's wearing make-up and has styled her brown hair in a simple up-do, maybe in an attempt to impress me, maybe to feel better about herself.
"Let's sit," she says, pointing to the chairs arranged at the tables as if she was inviting me into her living room. "Let's talk."
I smile inwardly at her attempts to be nonchalant, when I know how stirring this is for her. She has been begging me to come see her for so long, and I've been rejecting her every time, until she finally gave up trying.
And now I'm here, just because I didn't know where else to go when I was feeling lost and alone.
I feel pathetic.
"You look horrible," my mother observes, cocking her head to the side as she studies me intently. "Have you been drinking?"
I throw her a sinister look. This is the first time she’s ever posed that type of question to me. She never worried about me using any kind of drug. On the contrary, she and Dad used to try to convince me that cocaine would make my life easier, more productive, more successful.
"If I had, would you ground me?" I ask with a note of cynicism.
Her expression hardens because she knows that there is an accusation, blame hidden in that question. Parenting has never been her strong suit, and never once was I ever grounded growing up. My parents barely knew or cared whether or not I was doing something bad, let alone punish me for it.
"Did you talk to your father, too?" she asks next.
I shake my head. "No, just you."
She nods silently, prohibiting herself from asking any further questions. To say that my relationship with my father was bad would be a massive understatement. We never really had a relationship. Unlike my mother, he never even pretended to be a parent to me. The only advice he ever gave me was to rely on coke when I wanted to be successful. 'It's the rich man's aspirin', he used to say.
"So, what's wrong?" my mother asks, her voice as hard as mine.
"Why do you think something is wrong?"
She scoffs. "Well, son, you didn't even call on my birthday, and Mr. Cook told me you weren't exactly excited about the idea of your father and I getting released on parole early — which, by the way, there is a very good chance that may happen. But..."
She lowers her gaze, a shadow of sadness passing over her aging face. "Am I wrong to worry that you might be in trouble or came here to tell me some bad news?"
I shake my head. "It's none of that."
Her face brightens for a split second, and then she furrows her eyebrows. "But why then? Why today? Why now, Damon? After you've rejected me for so long?"
"Does there have to be a reason?"
"There is one," she insists. "I may not have been the greatest mother to you, but I still am your mother. I can tell when something is not well with you."
I'm almost impressed at her shrewd observation. Almost. I guess after two days of not shaving and surviving mostly on liquor, any person would look a little rough, even to a stranger.
Before I can say anything, she responds to her own question.
"Is it because of a woman?"
The subtle flinch of my body doesn't go unnoticed by her. A knowing smile spreads across her face as she leans forward.
"It is, isn't it?" she pries. "Only a woman can make a man look like this."
I shake my head, smiling weakly.
"You know what?" I say. "I don't know why I am here. I don't know why now all of a sudden, I thought it would be a good time to come and see you, but for some reason I did. And yes, that reason may be a woman."
The smile on my mother's face widens.
"Would it be heartless to say that I am happy to hear that?" she asks.
I frown at her. "Yes."
A suppressed giggle escapes her.
"Oh, but I am," she says. "She must be quite a girl if she managed to send you here, to me."
"She didn't send me!" I protest. "She doesn't even know that I'm here."
I cough slightly, averting my eyes. "And she probably wouldn't care."
I recoil when I feel my mother's hand on mine, a caress so familiar, yet so foreign. My first impulse is to pull away from her, but I don't. Instead I place my other hand on hers, squeezing, holding on to her, so fucking desperate for comfort.
"Why don't you tell me about her?" my mother says, her voice soft and patient. "I want to know about this girl who has the power to put a stop to my restless boy's stubbornness."
I respond to her request with an exasperated sigh, but a moment later, the words start pouring out of me like a flowing river. It's the first time I have ever given voice to my contemplations about Elene.
And it feels fucking good.