CHAPTER THIRTEEN
EVAN
REBECCA’S SHIFT IN MOOD IS like a snake uncoiling to strike. One moment we’re inches apart, hands together, feeling the something between us. The next she’s this furious thing, looking ready to claw my face off.
With warning in her eyes, Rebecca says without inflection, “What?”
“I want to take care of you,” I repeat.
She acts like I’ve thrown acid at her. I reach for one of her hands, but this time she doesn’t just back away. It’s more of a whipping motion.
“I don’t want anyone taking care of me.”
“Becca, what did I—?”
“DON’T CALL ME BECKY!”
I blink. I didn’t call her Becky, but I can read her well enough to know that’s the last thing I should say. I’m not sure what’s happened, but I need to tread carefully. She’s a bomb on a countdown — a vial of nitroglycerine that’s been shaken like a can of Coke.
I move toward her, but every step is small and light. I’m on eggshells. Someone has snatched the sweet, beautiful, vulnerable woman I was talking to, and swapped her with this maniac.
I don’t mean to raise my hands, because it plays into what’s going on, making it clear that she’s the aggressor. But they do so all on their own because that’s what you do when people need calming.
“Please. Just tell me what I did wrong.”
“What is this, Evan?” She’s not fury-crying, but I can see it’s close. There was a thin twig inside her, and somehow, I’ve managed to step on it.
Was it my big question? That I asked Rebecca hers? Is it the whole of this strange experience — the way I’ve brought her here with no clear agenda?
I wasn’t making any of that up; it is how I work. That is how I name my pets. Things don’t have a meaning until they have a name, and you can’t name something until its truth reveals itself.
I was already feeling something brew when I did … well, whatever I did to trigger this change. Now it feels like we’ve never been farther, and that this might be over before it can start.
I watch her eyes. I see that I’m the problem, the enemy. But I can’t look away. This is a mortal challenge, and looking away displays weakness. But I can’t help noticing that in anger, those deep blue eyes are more beautiful than they are in peace. There’s a sharp, instinctual being at her core, like a native brandishing a sharpened spear. More than vulnerable. It’s real.
“It’s a job,” I say. Hands up, trying to hold my ground. Losing a little.
“Is it pity?”
“Pity?” At first, it’s like I’ve never heard the word. “No, of course it’s not—”
“How did you find out about me?”
“I saw your ad set on LiveLyfe.”
“Is that the truth?”
“Of course it is!”
“Tell me the truth.”
“I’m telling you the truth!”
“Did you talk to anyone about me first? Get the inside scoop? Figure out what I like and what I don’t? I knew the head of LiveLyfe wasn’t just going to stumble across …” Becca doesn’t finish the thought. She turns away, going for her bag, shoving it closed.
“Wait. You’re leaving?”
“Yes I’m leaving!”
“We haven’t done anything yet!” Then, when she’s straightened up and marching for the door, I say something desperate: “We have a contract!”
It’s the wrong thing to say. She spins.
“What did you hire me for, Evan?”
“That’s what we need to figure out.” I need to talk her down, try to find the place where we left off. But Callie was right; I’ve thrown our money away. I should let that be all we lose. We can’t get in bed with a wildcard. I’ve misjudged Rebecca Presley. I can never work with her now.
Lies.
Even as she stares daggers at me, I feel my heart and gut betraying my logic. The truth is, I still want to be here with her. Like it or not, I want to protect her from a world that could devour her delicate soul. I still want to build what we’re destined to build. There’s fire inside her; I just need to learn how to direct it where it needs to go and learn how not to get burned.
But there’s more than that, too.
Even as Rebecca hates me, I’m drawn to her. I don’t want to flinch. I want to move closer. I don’t want to flee the fire. I want to step into it and be consumed.
She shakes her head. “This was a mistake.”
She heads for the door.
I reach out to grab her by the arm. Something’s snapping inside me, too.
“Come back here and talk to me.” It comes out hard, like steel.
“I’m through talking to you.”
She pulls away again, but I hold fast. This time when I drag her to me, I shake her a little. I can’t parse my emotions. Some of me is mad at her for being pissed, for being so rude that she won’t even explain what I’ve done. Some of me is angry for the sake of anger: I’m not used to being spoken to this way.
But there are other feelings in me. Somewhere in there is magnetism: a raw, pulsing sense that feels like instinct. Masculine drive that starts low, in the pit of my stomach. There’s a part of attraction that’s inseparable from aggression. A part of lust that holds hands with fury.
My jaw is rigid. Adrenaline courses through my veins. My cock is rock hard, throbbing with every hard beat of my heart.
Knowing it’s wrong, knowing these are things that lawsuits are made of, I grip Rebecca’s upper arms with both of my hands, bringing her front and center before me. I almost shout, like a lion’s roar.
“Sit down and listen to me!”
The change is instant. Her eyelids flutter as if her mind is resetting.
And then she cries. There’s no space between her anger and hurt.
She sits. I let go. Tentatively, I sit across from her. I wait for her to speak first, if there are words coming.
And she says between the tears, “I’m so fucked up.”
There’s a box of Kleenex on the table. I reach for it, drag it forward. I’m about to pluck a few tissues and give them to her, but she snatches three in quick succession before I can. The PFFT as they leave the box is like a series of silenced gunshots.
She swipes at the tears as if they’ve offended her. She doesn’t really blow her nose, just tries her best at facial triage. It takes ten seconds, and then she looks up at me, her eyes like pools.
“I’m sorry,” she says.
“Don’t be sorry.”
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“I don’t know what I said. I don’t know what I did wrong.”
She wipes at her nose, her motions furious. I can see she hates herself right now. It bothers me. Nobody should hate Becca, not even Becca.
“That’s okay,” she says. “I don’t know, either.”
“I obviously pissed you off, but I don’t know what I did. I’m not trying to be dense.”
She sighs. Then I see her eyes again, and at that moment, I see the depth of hurt within her. It wasn’t just Steve who wounded her. It was a string of men, all of whom treated her like shit. I’ve read enough of Becca’s personalized work to know some of her history, and now it’s all falling into place. Grew up without a father, with a mother who was her own breed of wacko. No wonder Becca is so funny, and no wonder people love her so much. The humor is a wall, meant to turn troubles into something less threatening, at least until the sun goes down. And the love people have for her? That’s the brokenness inside them recognizing the splintered pieces inside Becca.
“It was what you said about taking care of me,” she tells me. “It’s something my ex used to say. But he said it condescendingly. Like I was a hopeless idiot in need of a keeper, to protect me from myself.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
Sniff. “I know you didn’t. It’s just that I have triggers. You’d think I’d know them by now, but that surprised me.”
“I just want to find you a project. A position within LiveLyfe so that you can have the time it takes for us to figure out how—”
She waves me off. “I know. Believe me, I know. You just caught me off guard.”
She meets my eyes. I see her pain, and my heart calls out to aid it. I see how hurt she is, and God help me, I do want to take care of her. I meant it in business, but sitting with her I feel it in life.
Softer, Becca says, “You make me feel …”
The thought goes nowhere.
She shakes her head. Wipes her eyes again. Stands up, resumes her spot at the window. With her back to me, Becca says, “You got yourself into some deep shit with this one, Evan Cohen.”
“Which one?”
“This crazy bitch at your window.”
I stand. I walk closer.
Becca turns. There’s a new look on her face. Another change, and this one makes me want to touch her differently than before. Her eyes have become cat’s eyes. I can’t pinpoint the way her body has changed, but now it’s talking to me. Asking for things I know better than to do.
Her nipples are hard, pushing against her blouse. Her cheeks and neck are blushed. Her lips are wet, slightly parted. Her gaze is knowing. Vulnerable, but not helpless.
I take another step.
“I still don’t know why I’m here.”
“We’ll figure it out.”
“I know better than this. I have my own thing. I can’t be bought because I’m too crazy to care about what normal people care about.”
“You’re not crazy.”
Her hand rises as if to touch me, but I’m still too far away. Her eyes flick down, toward the fork of my crotch. Evidence of inappropriate lust is all over me.
The hand lowers. I close the distance. Now she runs her hand along my arm, slowly, almost without meaning.
Face to face.
“You hired me for a project.”
I swallow. “I believe in you. I don’t know why, or for what.”
“Was there any other reason?”
Her fingers rest on my arm. She’s half-turned, her hip leaning into me.
I reach up. With my heartbeat in my head like a tympani, I open the top button of her blouse. A finger trails into the soft, sloping skin beneath. I look up again to see Rebecca watching me, her lip delicately bitten.
“Maybe,” I say.