Harlot (Hush #2), page 21
“Lydia, I’m sorry.”
Her phone chimes one last time, and mine hasn’t stopped ringing.
Lydia’s lips curve into a slight smile before falling flat. She drops the phone into her lap and says, “He told you his name is Adam, but that’s a lie, Camilla. The person who’s been following you is Vincent Coppola. He’s Luca’s youngest brother.”
“I think you should be baptized,” Elijah said on a sweltering North Carolinian Sunday afternoon.
The air conditioner in the small classroom had burned out. Ministry brought in portable fans that offered no relief, moving hot hair around like a blow-dryer. I’d swept my long, stringy hair off of my neck and bundled it into a bun on the top of my head, securing it with a pencil. Sweat dripped down the back of my neck, pooled between my breasts and behind my knees. Daddy would have killed me had he known, but I folded my jeans to my knees and pushed my shirtsleeves over my shoulders. Compared to the other girls in Sunday school, in pastel dresses and skirts, I was still the most modestly dressed.
“I was baptized as a baby,” I’d said, catching the way his icy blue eyes lingered on my exposed skin.
“You were dedicated, not baptized. And your parents made that decision for you. It’s time you decide for yourself, Cami. God places judgment on children and adults differently, and you’re going to be eighteen in a few months. I want to get married as soon as we’re able, but we can’t just announce our engagement on your birthday.”
“What do you mean?” His wandering eyes and talk about marriage felt intrusive in ways showing him parts of my body hadn’t. I pulled the sleeves of my shirt down and covered my bare shoulders.
“If you turn eighteen, and we come right out and say we want to be married, what will everyone think? They’ll think we’ve been fooling around for a while.”
“They’d be right.” I meant it to be lighthearted, to alleviate the sick feeling I had in my stomach.
Elijah’s expression hardened, and he looked around the room for unwelcome spectators before he’d grabbed my elbow. The tips of his cold fingers dug into my skin, and he bared his teeth when he said, “I’ve put my fucking soul on the line. I’m at God’s mercy because of you. Are you so selfish that you’d have me risk my position with the ministry, too?”
I shook my head.
He’d let me go, and I rubbed my arm. “Didn’t I just tell you God judges adults and children differently? Well, I’m an adult. He isn’t just going to forgive me for being with you, and neither will the church.”
“But you said God wanted us to be together. You said Jesus and Mary Magdalene—”
“It’s different. You don’t understand because you’re still a kid.” He pointed to himself, and the hard lines softened around his eyes. “All I want is to court you like a respectable, God-fearing man. Don’t make it more difficult than it has to be.”
“Sorry,” I’d mumbled as sweat dripped down my temple.
Elijah relaxed and fell back into his normal façade. There were sweat stains on the arms of his shirt, and it disgusted me. I wouldn’t have minded had he left me alone, and that was a first. “Besides, I’m teaching the next baptismal class. We’ll meet here every Thursday evening between now and your birthday. Don’t you want to spend more time with me, Cami?”
Elijah lost a sliver of his allure on that damp, blistering summer day, but he was all I had. Daddy agreed to let me attend the baptismal classes, under the impression that nearly fifteen years inside the closet with God had finally left a lasting impression. I was the only member of the church scheduled to be baptized the day after my eighteenth birthday, and so, each Thursday, teacher and student were alone in the church classroom for an hour and a half.
Mom called it a breakthrough.
The church called me holy.
Elijah Read called me his.
They were all idiots.
It’s nearly two in the morning when Yael drops us off in front of the apartment. If Lydia wasn’t afraid someone was going to jump out of the bushes and kidnap me, she might have stormed off and left me to walk through the dark alone. But she rests her hand on my lower back and waits until we’re through the front door before abandoning her ward.
Lydia slams her bedroom door, only to reopen it immediately. “Where’s Dog?”
“He’s with Dawn.”
She blinks at a loss and asks, “Who the fuck is Dawn?”
“Dog Mom. I told her we’d pick him up in the morning.”
Lydia slams her bedroom door again, shaking the art on the walls.
I light the spread of candles across the top of my dresser and nightstands, but I can’t escape the dread chained around my wrists and ankles like weights. It’s coming from all angles, the ricochet of my father’s voice, Elijah’s manipulation, Lydia’s disappointment, and the phone I’m too afraid to answer.
For a single evening—a matter of hours—I had everything I wanted.
A glimpse of a life that will never be mine.
But God doesn’t forgive the whore in this story.
I kick off my shoes and crawl into bed, drowning out the echoes of my past and the disaster that’s sure to be my future with an infomercial for a food dehydrator. I wrap my arms around myself, clutching Wilder’s shirt, determined never to give it back no matter what happens in the morning. The last thought I have before sleep takes me under is that my cell phone has finally stopped ringing.
Because Wilder is here.
The front door crashes open, yanking me back from any kind of slumber. I jolt upright with my heartbeat in my throat, confused and not entirely coherent after my brief brush with sleep. My body calls to the strength steamrollering through the apartment, his brother bellowing after him to calm down. I hold my pillow to my chest, hoping it’ll soften the blow.
It doesn’t.
Wilder rushes into my room, swinging the door open with enough force to blow out half of my candles. He’s a shadow of the man I last saw a few hours ago. Having lost the jacket and tie, he’s rolled his sleeves up to his elbows. Veins protrude from the top of his hands, through his forearms, all the way up to his neck. Gray irises turned black, deepened by the circles under his eyes.
I push myself onto my knees, and the pillow slips from my hand onto the floor. Wilder’s chest heaves frantically like a wild, untamed animal. I taste rage in the air and smell his scent on my skin, and I whine, trapped prey too willing to be eaten alive.
“I’m sorry,” I say for the second time tonight. I’ll say it a million times if he needs it.
Lydia emerges from her bedroom with a toothbrush in her mouth and an expression of utter astonishment on her face. Talent holds his arm out, keeping her back from Wilder. He’s not to be trusted in this state, and I did this to him.
“Wilder,” I repeat, holding my open palms out. “Please.”
Narrowing his eyes, Wilder’s brows come together in confusion before they lift in realization. “You’re afraid of me?” He points to himself and smirks sadistically. “Camilla, the only person in this apartment anyone should be afraid of is you.”
I set my jaw in defiance and lower my hands to my sides in fists. “I said I was sorry.”
“You could have been killed. Or worse.”
“What can be worse than dying?”
He closes the distance between us, and Talent steps in from the hallway and lingers under the doorframe. Lydia returns from using my bathroom to rinse her mouth out, wiping water from her chin on the back of her hand. They look ready to pounce, like Wilder would ever truly hurt me. It breaks my heart that his behavior has given them a reason to imagine such things. But they don’t see what I see, black eyes fading to gray, glistening with unshed tears. He bites down to keep his chin from quivering, but there’s no hiding the way our hearts ache. It stays between us, like a secret.
“To be at Luca Coppola’s mercy.” Wilder clutches his shirt over his heartbeat. “That would be worse for you than death. He would make sure of it, if only to hurt me after tonight.”
Wilder falls to his knees beside the bed, and I cradle his head in my lap. He doesn’t say anything, and I don’t apologize again. We’re content in each other’s arms, calm in this space like the stretch of highway between Grand Haven and San Francisco. Where the trees loom over the road, standing guard like giants. Anger flows through Wilder’s veins, and I’m defensive, but we’re untouchable, sedated by a dream-like ease.
Talent closes the door. He whispers, “Just give them a minute.”
“Did something happen?” Lydia asks, her voice fading into her bedroom.
My wood-wicked candles crackle, some with low wax levels burn a blue flame, and the others throw shadows across the walls and ceiling. I’m not as concerned with them as I am about the way Wilder’s eyes close as I brush my fingers through his hair. The rhythm of his breathing slows down, and he grows heavy in my lap. Graying eyes blink and open, the moments in-between lasting longer and longer, until he blinks one last time, and they stay closed. The small circles he’s rubbing on my back stop, and his hands relax but don’t fall away.
“Get into bed with me,” I whisper, pressing my lips to his temple.
“No, we’re not staying here tonight.” He shakes his head, inhaling a large breath through his nose as he pushes himself away from the mattress. Wilder stands tall, bloodshot and bruised, offering me a hand. “Come on, we’re going to my house.”
“I need to pack a few things first.”
He extends his hand farther. “You don’t need anything.”
“I need shoes.”
“You don’t.” Wilder turns around, and I climb onto his back, squeezing his sides between my thighs. He hooks his hands under my bottom, and my bare feet swing in front of us. “I have everything you need, baby.”
We leave the apartment. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t live the rest of our days like this. He’s strong enough to carry me, and I’m happy enough to let him. Wilder makes the sweetest, sleepiest sounds as I kiss from his shoulder to his neck, unconcerned with the stillness of the night outside when his pulse flutters against my lips this way.
Normally, he’s hard to pin down, uncontainable and stubborn, but I have him trapped now. It’s amazing to feel his strength against my body, like holstering a loaded gun with the safety off. Fearless and lethal, this man who’d take on the mafia to keep me safe.
“Isn’t this better?” I ask, whispering into his ear.
“Isn’t what better?” he asks.
“Loving me.” I cross my ankles around him, and I might never let go. “Instead of fighting me.”
His lips twitch into a small smile, illumined by a dimly lit streetlight. Cool winter air makes his eyes sparkle, different than when they glistened with sadness in my room. The tip of his nose turns red as the tips of my toes freeze. My nipples harden against his back, and my breath turns to vapor against his skin. I hold Wilder impossibly closer, until there’s no space between us and I’m the warmest girl in the city.
“I’m not done fighting with you, Camilla,” he says, turning his head to look at me over his shoulder. “And I think I can do both.”
This ungodly hour, when only the forsaken and terrible roam, is alive with noises of the night. Crickets conduct their songs, coming to a stop as we approach, only to pick right back up when we pass. Bare branches rustle in the light ocean breeze, a piece of litter tumbles down the street, end over end until it settles in the gutter, and Wilder’s shoes tap on the concrete sidewalk under the sound of buzzing electric lines and streetlamps.
God dipped His fingers in stars and smeared them across a black canvas and called it tonight’s sky. He painted a crescent moon in the corner, greedy with the light. But Wilder presses a button on his car key and headlights fill in the gaps. The roar of the engine silences the branches and cuts off the crickets.
Cool leather seats warm, and Wilder drives with his hand between my thighs. Streetlights cast sharp shadows across his face, and stoplights turn green, yellow, and red. His expression hardens again, and he’s constantly checking his mirrors for other cars on the road. We pass by the Grand Opal where Talent lives, along a stretch of highway that runs parallel with the ocean, until we run into a gated community. A night guard waves us in. Wilder lifts his pointer and middle finger from the steering wheel in greeting.
The houses grow in grandeur the farther into the community we go. I pull my feet close to the seat and smooth my hair down, but last night’s makeup is smeared under my eyes and my skin smells like sex.
“What’s wrong?” Wilder asks, turning onto a road that goes straight up.
“You can take the girl out of the dusty old town, but you can’t take the white trash out of the girl,” I say.
“This shit impresses you?” He doesn’t give the massive homes a second look. Wilder only has eyes for me… and the road so we don’t crash and die. “None of this means anything. I know most of the people who live around here, and they’re all deadbeat motherfuckers.”
“Well, had I grown up in a house like one of these, being locked inside the closet probably wouldn’t have been so bad.”
He swallows hard, tightening his grip on the steering wheel. “You’re not trash, Camilla. Don’t talk about yourself like that.”
Tonight has been full of surprises. Confessions with Wilder, the views in San Francisco, and driving outside the five-mile radius where I exist within Grand Haven have brought me to the realization that I still live a small life.
This isn’t North Carolina, and I’m not confined to my father’s house. But have I not limited myself to my clients’ offices and the apartment I share with Lydia? Is this what she’s been trying to tell me all along? And is this why Wilder has been so resistant to me? I’m a twenty-one-year-old girl marveling at lush green lawns and cobblestone driveways because I only see suburbia on television. It’s an alternate reality to me, manufactured in Hollywood. But we’re only twenty minutes away from the apartment. These lawns and driveways have been here all along.
I travel the same roads every day, service the same kind of man, and outmaneuver the same type of people. Then I go home and put a dent in the couch. It’s no wonder why I was so easy to follow. My routine doesn’t change. Only this time, I’ve put myself in the closet.
The difference is I’m not alone with the dusty jackets and tea lights.
I have company.
Wilder slides his hand around the back of my neck, rubbing his thumb against the soft spot below my ear. I lean into his embrace and think about the box he’s trapped himself into. His confinement spreads much wider than mine, but he adheres to a corporate world and a criminal enterprise. Both vile, and neither of which he asked for. Not really.
“Do you want kids?” I pull my bottom lip between my teeth, wishing I could scoop the words out of the air once spoken. For once in my life, I’m thankful it’s too dark for him to see the burning heat in my cheeks.
“Yes,” he says easily. His fingers still massage my neck as we continue to drive up, up, up.
“Lydia doesn’t,” I say casually. And then shyly add, “But I do.”
“Okay,” he answers precisely and right away. It doesn’t come off like, that’s nice you’ll have kids one day. But it sounds exactly like, okay, should we have three or ten?
What happens in the dark comes to light. He should be warned.
“What if I’m a bad mom? What if I’m like my parents?”
His lips curve into a smirk. “My brother and I were terrible kids. We drove my mother crazy. I have no doubt she wanted to lock us in a closet more than a few times. I think it’s normal to feel that way sometimes, but you’re not supposed to actually do it. That’s where your parents fucked up. You won’t lock our kids up, Camilla. If they turn out to be little bastards like Talent and me, we’ll just send them to boarding school.”
He winks.
I melt.
If there is one thing that doesn’t surprise me on this never-ending night, it’s that Wilder Ridge lives in a castle on top of a mountain. Don’t worry, Grand Haven, I think to myself. The princess has come to turn the beast into a man.
Maybe.
I kind of like him beastly.
And it’s not so much a mountain as it is a large hill that’s high enough to overlook the entire community and beyond. He doesn’t have a cobblestone driveway, but one made of normal concrete.
“The cobble was bumpy as fuck,” he mumbles, turning the car off in front of the garage.
His home has a timeless mid-century modern design. The two-story house is painted white with black trim, the windows rival those at Ridge & Sons, and the tall front door truly looks as if it was taken from a castle. The roof is covered with solar panels, and hedges and large trees frame the sides of the property for privacy, but they do nothing to hinder the view. I can see the entire state from here.
We exit the car, and my bare feet sting against the concrete driveway. Wilder approaches from the back, hugging me from behind. He rests his head against mine and points over my shoulder. I follow the tip of his finger to a skyrise that sits alongside the ocean. “That’s where Talent lives,” he says, moving farther down the coast. “That’s the office building.” To the right, away from the lights of the city and into a dense neighborhood, he says, “And that’s you.”
“You can see me from here?” I ask, surprised just making out the lights around our apartment complex.
“I always see you.” He presses his lips to the top of my shoulder before leading me toward the front of the house.
Automatic lights outlining the pathway sense our steps and illuminate the ground as we walk by, going back out after we pass. Wilder is an energy-conserving criminal, because the world we live in might be kind of messed up, but he’s doing his part to leave a better one behind.
For our kids. Who we’ll send to boarding school in case I have an itch to lock them up.
