The Goodbye Girl (Red Market Series Book 2) (27 page)

The sun set hours ago, and after dinner I returned to my office. There is a Turkish clinic that is in negotiations with us for a new organ procurement plant. Bigger than the one in Mexico, and in Turkey the law is blurry at best, making it a viable option for us. When I eventually close my computer and end the last call, I am so tired my mind is playing tricks on me. I sit in the almost dark room, lit only by the desk lamp and stare out the window at nothing. I remove the hearing aids and slip them into my drawer, not having the world amplified in my ears makes me sigh with relief. Quiet. My sanctuary is silence and I revel in it as I swill a glass of brandy and just stop everything for a while. 

In that quiet, sitting alone in the office that was once my father's sanctuary - I haven’t even opened my mother’s office, I have no desire to either. There I am confronted with the truth burning me on the inside, worse than the burns that have eaten my skin. I love her and I need her. My rejecting her advances is hurting her, making her feel like I don’t love her, when I do. Would loving her like
that
really be so bad? No one knows she is my child besides me and Hugo, no one would judge because they would never know. I love her and I want her more than I dare to admit even to myself. For the first time in my life my desire to be with a woman isn’t a consequence, it’s a choice and it feels like that makes my want for her more powerful. With my glass in hand, I wander down the silent halls of the house, no sounds or movement anywhere. The staff are gone for the night and I know Lettie, the name is finally easier to say, will be fast asleep in her room. I am drawn to her side of the house like a moth to flame, the choice taken away from me by what I know is there. The magnetic pull that has always kept us close drags me towards her faster, my steps gaining momentum despite the pain of my skin stretching too far. When I push her door open a hair to see inside, I find the queen sized bed empty the covers not even wrinkled. I hold my breath, dropping my glass on the soft carpet and scan the room looking for her with panic creeping up my throat. I hold in my need to scream for her. Crumpled in a small heap on the cold floor she lies, naked and huddled up near the fireplace. Broken pieces of my heart split apart even more as I see her there. I can’t deny that I am attracted to her naked body, that the thought of her lips on mine doesn’t make me want to kiss her for all eternity. I open the door and walk into her room, it smells of her. I love her, her place isn’t on the floor anymore it’s beside me, with me in every way. I sit in the wingback chair that's covered in hideous floral upholstery and I watch her sleep until I can’t stop myself any longer. Standing beside her, I bend down to pick her up. She still weighs almost nothing and I lift her. My burns make it harder than it should be, just to remind me how close I came to death. Rubbing her face into the crook of my neck as I carry her to the big bed, my cock goes hard, only now I am unashamed by my reaction. I am owning who I am and my love for her shouldn’t be held back by ideals of people who no longer exist in my life. Love becomes my religion in that bedroom and as long as it is love I feel, then it cannot be wrong. I remove my clothing, leaving them in a messy pile on the floor beside the bed and I lay down beside her. My hands explore the feel of her skin, waking her slowly. Her brown eyes seek affirmation in mine, she doesn’t believe this is real. I hold her head in my two hands as she leans up on her elbows. The one hand is marked with the fires of hell and the other is holding my love in it as I pull her face closer to mine and kiss her. My kiss is not the kiss of death like many others before it, I don’t want her to give up her life, I want her to claim it. I need her to find her life in my kiss, the way our tongues move with one another. The perfect dance of a love so deep that it’s in our blood. 

We lose ourselves to one another and find ourselves too, each time I nip her lip and her back arches I want to take more. I grab her hair in fists and hold her against my mouth so she cannot escape, she takes away my demons and loves me. Her hands touch my skin and and soothe away the burn that never left after the fire. She is the ice to the fire in my soul as we slowly come together in love. Yes, love. This is love right here in this moment. I want more of it, all of it, all of her. 

“Lie back Lettie. And shhhh, please, please stay quiet so I can love you.” She rolls over on her back and shifts up so her head rests on the pillow. Tears are falling down her cheeks but she doesn’t make a noise. Her body is openly displayed to me and while others would be disgusted, our scars unite us in the pain we have suffered to find each other. I love every single mark on her precious skin, they tell me how she fought to live. She comes alive with my touch, my mouth makes the goosebumps ripple over her skin. She is biting her bottom lip to stay silent while she comes on my tongue as it makes love to her. I watch her and she watches me. She takes me away from the mad man I have always been and allows me to love her like she has always deserved. As I hover over her body, ready to kiss her, she pushes against me with her little hands. Showing me rather than speaking that she wants me to roll over onto my back.
Maybe we can do this.

I lay on my back, the soft sheets enveloping my body as she straddles me, her legs tucking in against my sides. Her sweaty palms take my hard cock between them as she slowly rubs up and down, making my eyes roll and my lids flutter closed at the pure pleasure in her touch. When she stops and I open my eyes she slams herself down on me, forcing me inside her hard. Throwing her head back and clawing my chest with her fingernails she begins to move against me, slowly now. Rocking and swaying her body to grant me a feeling that can’t compare to any that went before it. I can feel her pulsing around me as my hands hold onto her hips, gripping her a little too tight. Forcing her to move faster against me. She is biting down on her knuckle, fighting the need for her voice in the throws of our combines climax. Shuddering against me as we find release together.

As she lets her body flop down against me, her hair falling over my face and her cheek against mine she whispers,

“You really love me?” setting my demon free. I rip her off of me by her hair. Throwing her onto the floor beside us, she tries to get her grip to escape in the pile of clothing. My boot makes her fall on her face as I tower over her. She heaves in panicked breaths as she shakes her head, knowing full well this is her fault, she made a terrible mistake. I grab the nape of her neck and pin her head down to the floor while my other hand fists my now raging hard cock. Kicking her legs apart she goes limp and stops fighting me, tears fall down her cheeks as I fuck her there on the floor in between my dirty clothes. Her body silences the monster as she comes over and over, accepting my assault as a blessing. 

When the silence returned, I looked down at the bruises I caused and the glazed look in her eyes. I stood and walked out, closing the door behind me, leaving her there.
Why didn’t she stay quiet? Why would she make me do that? Why did she let me? What have I done to my child? I just wanted to love her.

Guilty of loving my child

I have avoided
her for weeks, my guilt eating me alive each day. I lock myself away behind work and my closed office door, we don’t even share meals any longer. I am ashamed that I lost my control with her, that I hurt her like that. I want her life to be perfect, I don’t want her to hurt anymore. Maybe I need to move away from here, because walking on eggshells and hiding away is tiring me out. I am afraid to face her after what happened after she whispered so sweetly in my ear. For any other man that would have been a moment of love. A sweet declaration made in a moment so pure, but for me it was the pin pulled from a grenade. I wish I could find a better way to be normal, to be everything that she needs, but I am failing already. I am not meant to be anything other than alone. The old lady that has prepared food in this house since I was boy puts a tray down on my desk. I don’t want to eat. I read through the list of the upcoming transplants scheduled for our Mexico City clinics. Things are growing at a rapid rate, there are many more sick desperate people in the world than I thought. It’s funny how being faced with death makes the question of ethics fall away. Then one person's life is always worth more than another. Hugo communicates mainly by email, he knows how taxing having to talk to and listen to people is for me. He tries his best not to add to the mounting stresses in my life. Voices are my enemy again and I wrestle my disease daily, every little thing sets me off and keeping control has become almost impossible. I live in an almost constant state of aroused rage again. 

In my gut I know I miss her, that she misses me and I need to find a way to fix this, but how do I fix an incurable condition? I wish I could chop off my ears and be free of the curse. My head in my hands I close my eyes and wish for the silence to return to me.

A loud knock on the door startles me.

“I need to speak with you, so please let me come in,” Lettie yells from the threshold of my safe place.

“Wait,” I say fumbling to replace the hearing aids before she can undo me any more than I already am. When I look up at her in the doorway she is scowling and her little brown eyes are vicious with anger. “Okay, come in Lettie.” 

Her steps are determined as she stalks towards me where I hide behind my desk. She doesn’t stop, but walks right up to me until her belly pushes against the hardwood edge opposite me.

“Why are you hiding from me?” she yells and with the hearing aids in it's worse than a rock concert in my ears. “I made a mistake.” She sighs and looks down, shaking her head. “I am only human, Caesar. I am trying so hard.”

“I hurt you, Lettie. I saw what my hands did to you.” I answer her with the dirty truth.

“And I fucking liked it, because it was real. The first real thing since I landed in this fairy tale place where nothing is real.” She slams her hands down on my desk, leaning closer to me. “Nothing is this perfect, I can’t live with the perfect. I need real Caesar. I fucking need you. If you don’t love me, if you don’t want me, then take me back to the streets. This shiny castle in the damn country is making me crazy.” Tears flow from her cheeks onto the leather top of my desk. “I don’t want to be here without you, all of you, even your sickness. You don’t think I’m sick? We are all sick. The world is sick, Caesar. Love me or let me fucking go.” 

Her eyes are like lasers trained on mine burning into me. Lust, love, hate and brutal honesty flow from her broken soul to mine as she catches her breath from yelling at me. 

“I don’t want to sit out there alone. I want to be with you, learning from you. I want all of you, the man who sells people, the man who goes crazy from a whisper and the owner of those bodies in the yard. I want you, I love you, and leaving me alone hurts more than anything you could do with your hands.” She finishes quietly, thank God I put these things in my ears. 

I don’t have the words to answer her. I wish I had an answer for everything she has just unloaded on me. Guilt strangles me more now, knowing that my abandonment was more painful than what my hands did to her. Physical pain is nothing for her, but her heart is so fragile that it could break in a second. 

“I am sorry.” My voice cracks with emotions I don’t know how to show to her. 

“I know you are.” She tucks her chin to her chest and wipes her eyes on her shirtsleeve. “So am I.” When she looks up I know what love is. The physical barrier of the desk is too much and I get up to go to her. Grabbing her and holding her against me, I let my own tears tumble down into her dark hair. I cling onto her as long it takes me to find silence. When my mind goes quiet and my body aches for her sweet soft touch, I take her to my room and I make her truly mine. I love Lettie like she should be loved with every part me.