Beneath This Man (60 page)

His head flies up and I whimper at the sight of him, his green eyes clouded, pain spilling out of them, his chin trembling. He gazes straight into my eyes. They are pleading silently to me. ‘Please, don’t.’

Any ounce of strength that was keeping me marginally together is shredded at the sight and sound of him. I fall apart completely as I clasp his face in my hands and put my lips on him, but I’m not close enough. I gingerly shift so that I’m astride his lap, and then pull him as close as I can get him, without hurting him. ‘Tell me what you were blocking out.’

‘Hurting you.’

‘I don’t understand.’ I’m beyond confused. Doesn’t he think that this is hurting me? ‘I would rather you had a drink.’

‘You wouldn’t.’ He says it on a slight laugh that sends a nervous twinge through me.

I pull back and search his eyes out. ‘I would rather face you with half a vodka distillery inside you than see what I just saw.’

He drops his head in shame. ‘Trust me Ava, you wouldn’t.’

‘Yes, I would.’ I affirm. There is no contest. ‘And trust you? Jesse, I feel sick with betrayal.’ I’ve not even thought about what I’m going to do to Sarah when I get my hands on her. A trample won’t cover it. She has marked my neurotic God and the more all of this sinks in, the angrier I’m getting.

I lift myself from his lap and bat him away when he tries to grasp me. ‘I’m not leaving.’ I say a bit too harshly. His panicked expression has me even madder.

I start pacing around his office, tapping my nail on my front tooth under the tense, anxious eyes of my challenging man, who just keeps delivering on fucking challenges. I’m struggling here. That was some serious sadistic shit. God, I thrashed a belt at him on the launch night of
Lusso
.

I lower myself to the sofa opposite him and rest my aching head in my palms.  I can hear him repeatedly drawing breath, as if he wants to say something. I exhale wearily and massage my temples. ‘Is there anything else I need to know?’

‘Like what?’ he asks guardedly. I don’t appreciate it and how the hell would I know what? He’s knocked me for six with this place, his drinking, and now willingly being whipped. What else could there possibly be that could shock or anger me more than this?

‘I don’t know, you tell me. You said no more secrets, Jesse.’ I throw my arms up in annoyance. I want to comfort him desperately. Keeping myself away from him is hurting almost as much as bearing witness to his beating. ‘Why would I prefer this to drunken Jesse?’

He leans forward delicately on a clenched jaw, resting his elbows on his knees, rubbing his temples thoughtfully. ‘Drink and sex go hand in hand for me.’

‘What does that mean?’ My voice is high and edgy.

‘Ava, I inherited The Manor when I was twenty one. Can you imagine a young lad with this place and a whole lot of women ready and willing?’ He looks ashamed.

My mind starts racing. Oh, I can imagine all right and it’s no wonder the women were ready and willing. They still are. Look at him! ‘You mean the dabbling?’ I whisper. Do I want to know this?

He exhales. ‘Yes, the dabbling, but it’s all behind me.’ He sits forward on a wince. ‘Now, it’s all about you.’

‘You drank and dabbled?’

‘Yes, like I said, drink and sex go hand in hand. Please, come here.’ He reaches across the big table that’s positioned between the two sofas, but I pull back. His hand drops and he looks down at the floor. I still don’t understand, and it still doesn’t explain why he has just accepted a thrashing from Sarah.

‘So, you didn’t have a drink because you would have wanted to have sex?’ My forehead must look like a road map because I am thoroughly confused.

‘I don’t trust myself with alcohol, Ava.’

‘Because you think you will jump the nearest woman?’

He laughs nervously and runs his hands through his hair. ‘I don’t think so. I couldn’t do that to you.’

‘You don’t think so?’ I’m shocked.

‘It’s not a risk I’m willing to take. Ava. I drink too much, lose reason and women throw themselves at me willingly. You’ve seen it.’ He gives me an embarrassed smile.

I scoff. ‘You didn’t look very capable of anything last Friday!’ He was unconscious and yes, I have seen women throw themselves at him. It’s degrading!

‘Yeah, that’s not my normal level of intemperance, Ava. I was on a mind numbing mission.’ he says awkwardly. I suddenly feel awful.

‘So, you usually maintain a steady level of drinking and then have lots of sex with lots of willing women?’ I think I’m getting my head around this. ‘You’ve never had a drink when you’ve slept with me?’

He gets up and shifts the table so he can kneel in front of me and rest his hands on my thighs. He looks straight into my eyes. ‘No, Ava.  I have never been under the influence of alcohol when I’ve had you. I don’t need it. Alcohol blocked things out for me, made me forget how hollow my life was. I didn’t give a fuck about any of the women I slept with, not one. And then you fell into my life and things changed completely. You brought me back to life, Ava. I never want to touch the drink because if I start, I might not stop and I never want to miss a moment with you.’

Tears start to prick at my eyes at his confession. He was a playboy who fucked about all over the place. I knew that. ‘Have you had sleepy sex with anyone else?’ I hold my breath. Of all the things to ask, I ask this?

He sighs heavily. ‘No.’

I narrow my eyes on him. ‘What about a sense fuck?’

‘Ava, no! I’ve never cared about anyone else enough to need or want to fuck any sense into them.’ He squeezes my thighs. ‘Only you.’

Okay, that bizarrely helps, but he still insists he’s not an alcoholic, which is utter madness. If you don’t drink because you can’t trust yourself, then there’s a problem and anyway, he could have been under the influence all this time. They say a good alcoholic hides it well. How the hell would I know? I think back to Thursday evening when I found him in his office with a bottle of vodka and another woman. Oh, this is bad news. Not only have I got the concern of him having a drink, I’ve also got to worry about what he does once he’s had one. This is rich! I can’t even have a business meeting with a male client without him dissolving on the spot, although Jesse’s meltdown with regards to Mikael seems to be warranted. But I’m not delusional enough to think that he wouldn’t trample my other male clients.

I push his hands away from my thighs and get up, leaving him crouched by the sofa looking lost. ‘So on Thursday in your office, are you telling me that if you had drank the vodka, I would’ve found you nailing Sarah on your desk, not just looking cosy with her on your desk?’ This is horrible.

He gets up and stalks over to me, grabbing my hips to immobilise me before bending down to get into my line of sight. ‘No! Don’t be so stupid.’

‘I don’t think I’m being stupid.’ I scathe. ‘It’s bad enough worrying about you drinking. I don’t know if I can cope with the additional complications of you being drunk and wanting to fuck other women!’ I’m screeching, but I can’t help it.

He recoils. ‘Will you watch your fucking mouth? It doesn’t make me want to fuck other women. It just makes me want to fuck!’

‘So I had better ensure that I’m with you when you have a drink then, hadn’t I?’

‘I won’t be having a drink! When will you listen to me, woman?’ he shouts. ‘I don’t need drink.’ He releases me harshly and stomps off towards the window and then back again. He points at me. ‘I need you!’

And we’re back to that. How the hell does he know? I slap his finger out of my face. ‘You need me to replace drink and screwing.’ I want to cry. All he needs me for is to remove himself from a lifestyle that would kill him if he kept it up for much longer. I’m his escape from a certain premature death by alcohol poisoning. I think I might throw up again. He really is scared of me leaving, but it has nothing to do with how much he loves me. It is because he is scared of returning to a hollow life. ‘You manipulate me.’

‘I don’t manipulate you!’ He actually looks offended.

‘Yes, you do! With sex! Sense fucking, reminder fucking. It’s all manipulation. I need you and you use it against me!’

‘No!’ he roars, and then swipes his arms straight across the top of the drinks cabinet, sending dozens of liquor bottles and glasses crashing to the floor, the sound of broken glass thundering around us.

I jump, stepping back, but he stalks forward and grabs the tops of my arms. ‘I need you to need me, Ava. It doesn’t get any simpler than that. How many times have I got to tell you? As long as you need me, I look after myself…simple.’

‘How is having yourself whipped looking after yourself?’ I scream in his face.

He drops me and grabs at his hair, virtually pulling it out. ‘I don’t fucking know!’

I look to the heavens above. This is hopeless. ‘I do need you, but not like this.’

He takes my hands. ‘Look at me.’ he demands harshly. I drop my head back down so we’re at eye level again. ‘Tell me, how do I make you feel?  I know how you make me feel. Yes, I’ve had a lot of women, but it was all just sex. Mindless sex. No feelings. Ava, I need you.’

I look at my handsome, troubled, neurotic rogue, looking me straight in the eyes and I want to scream at him, bang his head against a wall and knock some sense into him the conventional way. We make each other crazy. That’s the truth of it. We’re no good for each other, and he does manipulate me. The problem is, I enjoy it. The sex kitten in me comes racing to the surface every time. I need him, just as much as he needs me, but for different reasons. He’s made himself a part of me. He’s embedded himself into my mind and soul. Without him, I feel like nothing. I am nothing.

‘How can you need me if I make you do this to yourself?’ I ask tiredly. ‘You’re more self-destructible now than you were before me. I’ve made you
need
alcohol, not want it. I’ve made you into an unreasonable, crazy man, and
I’m
certainly not stable anymore. Don’t you see what we’re doing to each other?’

‘Ava,’ His tone is warning. He knows where I’m heading.

‘And for the record, I hate the fact that you’ve put it about?’ I need him to know this, but then the most horrific thought slams into my head.

I gasp.

‘When you disappeared for four days…’ I can’t even finish. My heart has just jumped into my throat and exploded.

His eyes widen at my obvious conclusion, his mouth tightening, the muscles in his jaw ticking. ‘They.meant.nothing. I love you. I need you.’

‘Oh God!’ I fall to my knees. He hasn’t denied it. ‘You were fucking other women.’ My palms find my face as the tears start again, a massive hole punched straight through my stomach.

He joins me on the floor, clenching my arms, shaking me. ‘Ava, listen to me. They meant nothing. I was falling in love with you. I knew I would hurt you. I didn’t want to hurt you.’

‘You said you couldn’t do it to me. You forgot to add
again
. You should have said you couldn’t do it to me
again
.’

‘I didn’t want to hurt you.’ he whispers.

My defeated face comes up. ‘So to remedy that, you fucked other women?’ My stomach is turning. I can’t breathe. ‘How many?’

‘Ava, please don’t. I hate myself.’

‘I hate you too!’ I cry, my shoulders jerking as I sob relentlessly. ‘How could you?’

‘Ava, why are you not listening to me?’

‘I am, and I don’t like what I’m hearing!’ I scramble to my feet, but he grabs my waist to prevent me from walking away.

He rests his forehead on my stomach, and I watch through my hazy vision as his own shoulders start jerking. ‘I’m sorry. I love you. Please, I beg you, don’t leave me. Marry me.’

‘What?’ I cry. We’ve not even spoken about the subject at hand yet, and I’m already balancing on the edge of complete breakdown. This is information overload. This is the death blow. ‘I can’t marry someone who I don’t understand.’ I utter the words quietly through my heaves and feel him sag before me on a sharp intake on breath. I can see the angry welts and beads of blood across his back. ‘I thought I was working you out.’ My voice is trembling. ‘You’ve destroyed me again, Jesse.’

‘Ava, please. I was a mess. I lost control. I thought I could fight you out of my head.’

‘By getting pissed and fucking other women?’

‘I didn’t know what to do.’ he says quietly.

‘You could have talked to me.’

‘Ava, you would have run away from me again.’

‘All of the apologies you’ve been giving me were because your conscience was eating away at you. It wasn’t because you were drunk, or because of The Manor. It’s because you screwed around on me. You said you hadn’t dabbled since way before me. You’ve lied to me. Every time I think we’ve made progress, more bombshells. I can’t cope with this anymore. I don’t know who you are, Jesse.’

‘Ava, you do know me.’ He looks up at me with pleading eyes. ‘I’ve fucked up. I’ve really fucked up, but no one knows me better than you, no one.’

‘Sarah might do. She seems to know you very well.’ I say with zero emotion. ‘Why?’

He collapses onto his heels and drops his head. ‘I’ve let you down. I wanted a drink, but I promised you I wouldn’t, and I know what’s likely to happen if I do.’

I wince at his admission. ‘So you had yourself whipped?’

‘Yes.’

My stomach joins my heart in my throat. ‘I don’t understand.’

His head remains dropped. ‘Ava, you know I’ve led a colourful life.’ His voice is quiet. He’s ashamed.  ‘I’ve broken marriages, treated women like objects and taken what’s not mine. I’ve damaged people, and I feel like all of this is my penance. I’ve found my little piece of heaven and I feel like everyone is going out of their way to take it away from me.’

The lump in my throat grows further. ‘YOU are the only one who’s going to fuck this up. Just you. You drinking, you being a control freak, you fucking other women. YOU!’

‘I could have stopped it all. I can’t believe I’ve got you. I’m terrified you’re going to be taken away from me.’

‘So you ask a woman I despise, a woman who wants to take
you
away from
me
, to whip you?’

He frowns as he looks up to me. ‘Sarah doesn’t want to take me away from you.’