Open Skies (3 page)

Deep breaths. Don’t get dizzy, don’t fall down. Breathe in the blue.

Steve and Julie had met three years before, when Julie had been the project manager on the complete renovation and redesign of the bank where Steve worked. Even though she’d been in and out of Head Office for four months while the plans were finalized and approved, and to deliver weekly progress reports, they’d barely spoken.

She had noticed him, of course. With his athletic frame and broad shoulders and strong arms, he was easy on the eyes – and that was all
before
you saw his face. Dark, wavy hair framed chiselled cheekbones, a sensual mouth, and a nose with a bit of a bump on it. It annoyed her that she’d noticed this small detail about his nose, but she had.

His warm brown eyes made her melt every time he looked at her, and it took literally every ounce of her self-control to remain aloof with him as he flirted outrageously in the office hallway. She figured that any man who looked like that would have multiple women hanging around, hoping for a bit of his attention, jumping in to his bed. Julie had no interest in being one of many, nor did she want to get in to a relationship of any kind. Emotional closeness was emotional weakness, she knew, and weak was not a word that she wanted associated with her.

It was at the party to celebrate and show off the redesign that he’d finally made his move. Steve had been tireless in trying to get her to talk to him, and he’d been attentive and polite all evening. Finally, she asked him just what he expected from her, since if he was after a one-night-stand, he’d been wasting his time on the wrong woman.

He had looked down at her in confusion. Here was this gorgeous woman – smart, talented, creative – asking him what he might
want
from her? His eyes had travelled up and down her body: she was the exact opposite of the New York professional woman ideal of tall, thin, leggy blonde beauty. Despite the ‘Stay away from me’ sign that she had practically emblazoned across her forehead, he was powerfully attracted to her. Short and curvy, she looked like a fresh peach – juicy and lush and curved and ripe. He liked it. He had looked down at her and said that he wasn’t interested in a one-night-stand, either, and could they go for dinner the next night?

Julie had refused, and then refused his next invitation two days later. She had turned him down, steadily, for almost three months, before Tammy had told her to get her head out of her ass and just meet the man for coffee, already. Julie had relented, and it had begun. Two years later, they were engaged. That was less than four months ago, and now here she was, catching him in bed with a tall, thin, leggy blonde beauty.

Julie stared at him. “I don’t believe it. Really?”

“What – what are you doing home?” he said.

“What am
I
doing home?”

He looked down as if he was aware of his nudity for the first time and then grabbed the top cover on the bed. The blonde fought him for it, and they briefly struggled. Julie watched this silently for a few seconds, then she stepped forward and grabbed the cover in both hands. She pulled as hard as she could and ripped it off the bed, completely exposing Steve and the woman.

The blonde screamed again, and crossed her legs and covered her breasts with her hands. Julie looked down and found a skirt, blouse, and cardigan on the floor, next to a pair of glossy chestnut high heels. A very nice mocha-colored lace bra and matching thong were under the bed.

She picked everything up. “Are these yours?”

The woman bit her lip. “Yes.”

“Hmmm,” Julie said. She blinked at the woman.

“Julie, just hand them over,” Steve said.

“Don’t you say one word to me,” she told him in the iciest tone she could summon. “Not. One. Word.”

She walked over to the glass balcony door and slid it open.

“Wait!” the woman said in a panic. “Are you going to throw my clothes off the balcony?”

“I am,” Julie said. “Unless you answer every single question that I ask you.”

The woman nodded frantically. “Anything.”

“OK. Who the hell are you?”

“Nadia Bayliss. I work at the bank with Steve.”

“OK, Nadia. How long have you been screwing my fiancé?”

Nadia’s eyes widened.
“Fiancé?”

“Oh, you didn’t know about that? That we were engaged?” Julie raised her left hand and displayed the ring. “That’s news, is it?”

“Yes.”

“What do you mean, ‘we
were
engaged’?” Steve asked.

Julie turned her attention to him for the briefest second. “What do you mean, what do I mean? Are you
for real?
You do know that I caught you practically with your dick inside another woman, right?”

“But…”

“Shut the fuck up.”

He closed his mouth and put on his boxer shorts and a t-shirt.

Julie regarded Nadia, narrowed her eyes. “How long has this been going on?”

“Four – four months.”

Four months. They had been engaged just four months.

Oh, dear God. This all started right after the engagement? The whole time that I’ve been looking at dresses and we’ve been choosing venues and thinking about where to honeymoon, they’ve been sleeping together? I’ve been so stupid.

Julie was relieved when her voice came out flat and disinterested. “And have you guys been here before? In my bedroom?”

“Y – Yes,” Nadia faltered.

“So the fact that he lives with a woman isn’t news, right?”

“What – what do you mean?”

Julie gestured around her. “The women’s shoes by the door, Nadia. My makeup in the bathroom. My jewelry on the dresser, my books on the bedside table. My clothes in the closet. It’s not news that a woman lives here. Is it?”

Nadia shook her head. “No,” she whispered.

“Thank you, Nadia.” Julie threw the bundle of clothes at her, taking care to aim it directly at her head. She was gratified when the shoes made a satisfyingly loud
clunk
against Nadia’s skull. “You can go get dressed now. I’m sure Steve will be calling you later.”

Nadia clutched her clothing in front of her and dashed in to the living room. Julie heard scrambling noises, a zipper, shoes clattering on the floor. The whole time she stood facing Steve, frozen. Nadia’s news that the cheating had gone on for four months had hurt Julie, but now she wasn’t hurting anymore. Now she was numb.

Steve looked at her and knew what had just happened inside Julie. More than once in the time that they’d been dating, he’d seen that closed look on her face, usually when he asked about her childhood, or mother, or father. Julie Everett didn’t disclose much and her secrets went deep. They were buried under layers of stone and ice; Steve was sure that he’d never really known the real Julie. Even though she’d thawed and softened and agreed to marriage, Steve knew that she’d never really opened her heart to him. It made him feel isolated and alone, an outsider in his own relationship.

The truth was that the engagement was a huge mistake. He’d known that as soon as she’d accepted and they’d started telling people. He should have called it off. But Steven Bryce wasn’t good at openly being the bad guy. The only child of a wealthy society couple, popular in high school, captain of the football team, a sorority boy, handed a banking job straight out of college by his father’s buddy from the tennis club, he had been indulged his whole life.

Everyone had always,
always
done the dirty work for him when things got tough. His mother handled the teachers when they threatened to fail him for poor grades, his father called in his lawyers when that girl had started squealing about getting her drunk and forcing her to have sex at that party. His adoring female colleagues always covered for him when he dropped the ball at work, and quite a few even did his work when he complained about exhaustion after a night of partying. They were all happy enough to share his bed, as a thank you for their help.

In short, Steve was not at all good at standing on his own two feet, or taking responsibility. But now here he was, caught by his fiancée, naked in bed with another woman. No way to hand this one off, or charm his way out of it, or deny or deflect. He’d have to figure out a way to muddle through somehow.

“Julie,” he started, “I’m sorry.”

“Are you?” she asked. “Are you really?”

She looked at him and he shivered. He’d expected her eyes to be cold and emotionless – he’d seen that before – but what he saw was actually worse. Those mint green eyes were just empty and soulless and dead. He suddenly understood that he’d just hurt her in some way that he didn’t know he was capable of; in a way that he didn’t know that she was even capable of being hurt. He knew in that moment that even though her best in the relationship hadn’t been good enough, she’d done her best. She’d tried, for him, and now she was shut down. He’d just delivered her a body blow, and he wasn’t sure that she’d recover.

A strange emotion began to creep in to his chest, and he suddenly realised that it was shame. For one of the first times in his charmed, spoiled, self-absorbed life, he was actually ashamed of himself. And that made him furious.

The words that spewed out of his mouth were the worst, most hurtful ones that he could have used. He attacked, accused her; berated and blamed her. It was over, he knew, so all that was left to do was make sure this anger went somewhere. She was there, so it all went on her. She’d have to do.

Julie stood in silence as he raged. His words seemed to be coming from far away, from the bottom of a deep well, and she barely heard them. When he finally stopped talking, she focused on him again.

“OK,” she said. “Now that you’ve got all that off your chest, you can get dressed and go now. Give me the key.”

“With pleasure,” he snapped. He yanked the key of the keychain and threw it on the floor. “I’ll stay with Nadia.”

“Well, aren’t you a classy bastard,” Julie said.

He gave her a sulky look.

“You’ll need to get your stuff out of here in the next week,” she said.

“Fine.”

He finished dressing, grabbed his phone and watch off the bedside table. He put on his jacket and stomped out through the living room.

Julie stood in the bedroom, listening. The door slammed. She was alone.

She took a deep breath and looked around the room, as if seeking an answer somewhere. Her eyes fell on the clock above the sink in the master bathroom: 12:13. She felt an overwhelming urge to laugh, to shriek, to throw things. In less than three hours, she’d discovered that she had a father, become the dubious owner of a ranch, effectively been fired, caught her fiancé cheating on her, and broken off her engagement. Her life was a disaster area.

She called Tammy.

**
Tamara Jenkins was known for her temper. She’d lost jobs because of it, and had lost relationships because of it. One time, when a customer kept patting her ass as she poured his coffee, she dumped the whole pot all over his breakfast. When her slime ball boss fired her, she told him that the creep was lucky the coffee hadn’t gone over his scab-infested head. Not the
big
head, either.

Another time, she found out that her boyfriend was seeing another woman on the side. She waited outside his house, and when she saw her boyfriend take the girl inside and saw the bedroom light go on and then off, she threw a rock through the front window. When the two of them had stumbled out on to the street, she soaked them both through with the garden hose.

She had marched in to her boss’ office within thirty seconds of Julie’s call and taken the rest of the afternoon off, no excuses or explanations offered. When Reggie Carter meekly protested and Creepy Paul started spouting something about filling in a formal request for leave, she planted her high-heeled feet and told them that she was leaving now and she’d be back tomorrow morning. Maybe. She’d let them know. She turned and marched her leopard-print-short-skirted butt out to the parking garage, barely stopping to put her faux-leather jacket on over her too-tight red blouse.

She showed up at Julie’s apartment at just past two o’clock on that horrible Monday in her friend’s life. She lugged bottles of wine and mix for Margaritas, and frozen pizzas and cartons of ice cream, and three bags of sour cream and onion chips and a gigantic KitKat bar. She used her own key to let herself in.

Julie was sitting on the sofa staring at her hands.

Tammy threw everything on the kitchen table and hurried over to Julie. She sat down but didn’t hug her; she wasn’t sure if Julie was ready to be touched yet.

She studied her friend, looking for damage. Julie was often taken as cold and emotionless, and she worked hard to come across that way. She’d built her entire professional reputation on creating perfect spaces – she took wrecked buildings and bare rooms, and made them warm, comfortable, welcoming. She set each piece of furniture just so, in just the right place; she chose the perfect painting to balance the room; she selected colors that complemented each other. Julie had total control over every single professional space or home that she walked in to at work, and she made them all new and shiny and safe. She was a perfectionist, fussy about detail, and demanding as hell. Her colleagues respected her, but didn’t like her. They called her the Ice Queen, and joked that Steve probably had to shove her in to the deep freeze to thaw her out at the end of the day.

But Tammy knew the truth. Julie had been through so much in her early life, and a lot of it had hurt her deeply; it had also made her as tough as hell in many ways. Her coldness was her defence, her armor. Without it, Julie would be a bubbling mess of emotions, all the time. She had learned early on to put the best, shiniest face on everything in her life, and after a while, Julie got smart and turned that in to a well-paid career. Masking flaws and presenting a perfect environment was what Julie was best at.

Julie looked up at her. “My hand looks so weird without it.”

Tammy looked down and saw that the massive diamond engagement ring was gone. “What’d you do with it?”

Julie nodded at the bedroom. “Threw it off the balcony right after he left.”