Until I'm Yours (29 page)

I
’m wearing green, my signature color. This is my signature hairstyle, the blond hair flowing past my shoulders, straight as a board to the middle of my back. Makeup—expert. Heels—high and outrageously expensive. The green dress François designed for me molds every curve like my body was a canvas he painted it onto. The skirt stops mid-calf, clinging from hem to throat. Even the sleeves fit my arms like skin. There is no room for fat in such a creation. The woman who wears this dress must be fit and flawless.

And yet when I look at myself I see only mistakes. I wear my sins as surely as a scarlet letter blazing across my chest. I hate the reflection staring back at me. This dress feels tight. This hair feels heavy. This makeup, thick enough to camouflage the angry, red scratch on my cheek, feels like it’s caked all over my face, and I can’t breathe. I can’t do this.

I’m no goddess.

“Ready?” Stil enters the small room where I’m waiting at the Gansevoort Hotel. “I think every reporter in New York, including the
National Geographic
correspondent, squeezed into that ballroom.”

“Not surprising.” I turn to the side in the mirror, needlessly checking the dress for bulges and wrinkles. “The biggest freak show in this town is here.”

“You’re not a freak show, Sof.”

“Tell that to the protesters outside carrying signs that say ‘baby murderer,’” I say quietly.

“Sof, I’m so sorry. Those are Manchester supporters picking at bones to make sure the support swings Kyle’s way. You know that.”

“They’re picking at bones all right.” I press my lips together. “Like buzzards hovering over my carcass.”

“No one’s paying them any attention.”

“Oh, the reporters certainly are. You can best believe they’re getting their B-roll ready for the six o’clock news.”

“Sof, you know when you’re ready to talk about…” Stil hesitates before going on. “About anything. I mean, you know.”

I meet her eyes in the mirror, silently begging her not to ask me about the baby. She’s known me too long and too well not to get the message. She lets a breath go, running her slim hand through the spiky hair.

“I’m good, but thanks.” I turn to face her. “Is François going mad? He can’t have imagined when he chose me as his inspiration that I’d come with all much baggage.”

“Are you kidding me?” Stil snorts, twisting her matte red mouth into a grin. “He’s practically jumping with glee. I think he’s of the all-publicity-is-good-publicity school of thought.”

Publicity? It seems that every news outlet in the world carried the same headline this morning.

“I spit on you,
puta
!”

And thanks to modern technology, camera phones all around captured the whole dreadful scene, giving anyone who’d like one a play-by-play of my awful confrontation with Seville.

“Well, I’m glad this publicity is working out for somebody.” I retouch my lipstick, which doesn’t need it.

“You seemed to be courting some attention yourself last night.” Stil’s eyes harden on my face. “I mean having dinner with Rip at Minnow. It was like gasoline on a kitchen fire. If they weren’t talking about Seville, they were speculating about you and Rip getting back together.”

“Mission accomplished then.” I smooth my hair once more, turning to check for lipstick on my teeth.

“Is there a game plan here, Sof?” Stil stretches her arms out before dropping them to her sides. “We’re supposed to be partners, and I’m in the dark about so many things right now. Like why you’re cutting Trevor out and making the world think you’re back with Rip.”

“I don’t care if the world thinks I’m back with Rip.” I study the shoes pinching my feet. “As long as they don’t think I’m with Trevor. That’s all that matters.”

“You think this is protecting him?” she asks incredulously. “From what? He’s calling every hour, has been to the building several times asking to come up. You don’t just throw a man like that away, Sof.”

Thank God the door opens. If I have to hear any more about how much Trevor wants me, how he’s fighting for me, I won’t be able to hold out. I’ll
walk
all the way to Brooklyn in these damn shoes and bang on his door until he takes me back.

“You are ready,
oui
?” François asks from the door. In his mid-sixties, François is still a handsome man, distinguished and always perfectly attired in a suit of his own design. His salt-and-pepper ponytail, a nod to his flamboyant younger days, is tamed into line down his neck.

“Oui.”
I walk over to him, placing a kiss on his cheek. “How do I look?”

“Magnifique, toujours, ma petite.”
He dangles my hand over my head and turns me to get a full look. “Just as I envisioned you. My Goddess. And the scent, so beautiful, yes?”

“Beautiful.” I lean toward him so he can smell it on my neck. “I’m wearing it now.”

“Parfait. Parfait.”
He hooks my elbow through his and starts toward the door. “As we discussed, the curtain will drop to reveal the ad.”

Just what I need today. Fifteen feet of my nearly naked body. It’s all shoulders, knees, and face. No lady bits or tits, but still. Why couldn’t I have posed in say…a habit? Sister Sofie has a nice ring to it. Maybe I should consider a convent once I’m done with modeling. This ridiculous banter running in my head is further evidence that I’m barely holding on, as if I needed proof. I may present a placid surface, may seem to be held together by steel bands and wooden bones, but it’s all as fragile as porcelain. I know,
only I know
, that one more thing could shatter me. And I can’t have that with half of New York waiting to see the Goddess.

As soon as we take the stage, the buzz in the room escalates to a fervent hum of speculation that has nothing to do with the perfume I’m wearing. I can’t summon a smile, hard as I try, so I freeze my face into Ice Princess mode, hoping they’ll take it for arrogance instead of numb terror that I’ll fall apart in front of them all.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” François begins, leaning into the mic to elevate his voice over the others in the room. “Esteemed members of the press, thank you for coming today. When I considered my new fragrance, I knew I wanted it to embody all that is beautiful about womanhood. I met Sofie Baston fifteen years ago when she was fresh out of high school, new to the runway. I was the first to call her the Goddess, you know.”

He chuckles, offering me an affectionate smile I try my best to return.

“She was a goddess then, and she is a goddess now. Even more so.”

The audience dutifully applauds. I look out for the first time. There are actually a lot of friendly, familiar faces. Mostly people from the industry I’ve worked with for years, mixed in with the story-seekers.

“Without further ado, I present to you my new scent, Goddess!”

François gestures to the wall behind us, and I hear the curtain drop. The crowd gasps, varying degrees of horror on their faces. Is it that bad? I’m afraid to look. Maybe something was Photoshopped badly, or is it a shadow of a nipple? What could it be?

I thought I was prepared for anything. Thought I could withstand whatever they threw at me, sure that I could duck before the next blow fell. But there was no ducking this. The word
WHORE
is spray-painted in bright red letters over François’s perfume ad. They may as well have sliced open my veins and bled me out to scrawl it in my blood.

I’ve barely had time to absorb the initial shock, when my publicist, Geena, is right beside me, pulling my elbow to get me off the stage. I’m submitting, letting her drag me away, when Halima’s words whisper to me again, as clearly as if she stands right beside me.

I tell my story every chance I get. Every time I do, I raise a fist against my oppressors.

“Stop.” I jerk my arm from Geena’s grip, digging my costly heels into the carpeted stage. “No, stop.”

“Sof,” Geena whispers urgently. “We need to get you out of here. This is not good.”

I shake her free and walk back to the podium. François’s sorrowful eyes meet mine, and I don’t know if he feels worse for me or for his beautiful defaced ad. I press a quick kiss to his cheek and step to the mic.

“First, I want to apologize to my dear friend François,” I say, my voice barely shaking. “This is such a special day for a very special man.”

I look back at François, who blows me a kiss, eyes sad.

“I hate that all the drama surrounding me lately has intruded on his art, on this lovely scent I’m truly honored to represent.”

I grip the sides of the podium, pressing my elbows against the wood to scaffold myself.

“This is all because I dared to speak out against a man who hurt me, a man I suspect has hurt other women the same way. He’s a powerful man,” I say. “And I’m not the first victim he’s tried to silence and to intimidate. He’s succeeded before.”

I press my lips close enough to the mic to smear my lipstick.

“But I’m still here, Mr. Manchester, and my story remains the same. You may find people to call me a whore. You may find people who will call me a homewrecker. You may even send some to march out front and call me a murderer, but you will never,
ever
find anyone who can call me a coward, and I’m not backing down.”

There’re cameras everywhere. I find one to look directly into, narrowing my eyes with all the indignation and fury building in me with atomic force.

“Me, you won’t silence,” I tell Kyle. “Me, you can’t make go away.”

And with that, I allow Geena to pull me off the stage, to bundle me into a waiting car at the rear of the hotel. To smuggle me into my building, managing to avoid all the press out front. She herds me along, and I let her, but as soon as we reach my apartment, I stop her at the door. I stare her down, and just shake my head, closing the door in her face and locking it.

For a moment, I just stand there, unable to process any of it. Then the fortress I’ve built around my emotions starts crumbling. That thick skin that crusted over and is now as tough as an old scab covering an ancient wound cracks open. I wondered how it would feel when they found something sharp enough to cut through all the layers. I didn’t know they’d come with an ice-tipped stiletto. I didn’t know they would plunge it through my heart.

All the pain comes at once, like an avalanche I can’t ward off. The old pain of what Kyle did to me, what he took from me. My parents’ betrayal, a lifetime of their indifference. Losing my work with the foundation, the closest I’ve ever come to doing good. The violent ignominy of Seville’s confrontation. All the insults and innuendos piled on my head and shoulders for the last few weeks. I feel it all and at once, and it is so much heavier, so much harder to bear than I thought it would be.

I stare at myself in the bathroom mirror. The Goddess looks back at me—perfect, composed, beautiful. She’s such a lie. Such a shell, good for nothing but covering up pain. I hate her. I want this fucking signature color—
this green
—off my back. I claw at the neckline until it gives a satisfying rip, exposing my bra beneath. I peel the dress away, tossing it across the bathroom to land in my sunken tub. I kick off my shoes and strip away my underwear until I face myself naked.

And it’s still not enough.

My hair swings down my back, the hair that so fascinated Esteban Ruiz. I’d wake up to him running his fingers through it every morning in Milan. I rummage through my bathroom drawer, searching for my shears. I’ve seen women do this in movies and wondered what’s the point of cutting your hair at your breaking point? Where is the
relief
in that? I can’t speak for the many women who’ve gone before me into the cutting cliché, but for me it’s the weight. The weight of other people’s opinions, their judgments. It’s the lie of my identity entwined with something that hangs around my shoulders, but is already dead.

At the first snip, I wait for the weight to lift. If I can just shed these trappings, this artifice, that lie about my pain, I’ll feel lighter. I’ll feel better. I snip again, lopping off a slivery chunk of hair and watching it waft to the marble floor.

Nothing. Still no lighter.

Tears boil in my throat, running over my cheeks like hot water as I snip and chop and clip until I’m standing in a silvery pool of my own making, the pile of hair silky against my bare feet and ankles. I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror, and finally the Goddess is gone. In her place is a naked girl with butchered hair. Tears have washed her makeup away, and mascara streaks her face in sooty trails. A bright red scratch across her cheek stands out like an exclamation mark.

I sink to the cold floor, falling onto my side and pulling my knees to my chest, rolling myself up until I’m as small as an atom. With nothing left to cover me, I finally feel the pain, and it is awful, but it is real. It is true. I can’t hide from it anymore.

I’m tired of trying.

I
’ve missed something.

Something vital, and it’s bugging the hell out of me. I am, by nature and by necessity, a meticulous man. I don’t mean that my socks all have their own cubby and all my shit is color sorted and alphabetized. I’m meticulous about the things that really
matter
. I’m meticulous about people. I observe them. I discern. I intuit. I’m rarely wrong. And if I’m not mistaken, Sofie Baston loves me. I saw it in her eyes our last morning together. It charged every touch, every kiss. I know it the same way I knew she hungered for significance.

Because I recognized it in myself first.

Henri can say we’re not right for each other. Sofie can say it’s too fast or she’s not good enough. Everyone can tell me it will never work. Sinner, saint, whatever. I know my own heart. I always have. It told me I couldn’t spend the rest of my life with Fleur, and it tells me with Sofie, I must. And she feels it, too. I’d bet my life on it.

So why am I reading a caption under a picture of my woman having dinner with that damn quarterback? At Minnow last night? Why did she take me off her list? Why won’t she return my calls? Or texts? Why is she boxing me out when all I want to do is protect her? Why didn’t she tell me about the baby? About the abortion? It grates that she still doesn’t trust me to accept her, flaws and all. I can’t blame her. She’s been rejected, exposed, and disdained in the past. For someone like that, unconditional love and acceptance is a foreign currency she doesn’t know how to exchange. I experienced it from my family and closest friends all my life. I have to remember for Sofie, it’s still a novelty.

But she could have told me.

I drop my head into my hands, elbows on my desk. I shove aside the documents ratifying the transparency measures I proposed for the Collective. I can’t care about anything else right now. I’m no good.

“Long day?” Harold asks from the office door.

“Something like that.” I lean back, composing my face and propping one elbow behind me on the chair.

“Still no word from Sofie?” Harold’s eyes and voice hold caution. He rightfully ascertained that I’m a powder keg set to blow at the least provocation.

“No, and I don’t get it.” I shake my head, meeting my best friend’s eyes. “I know she needs me, but she won’t let me in. Believe me, I nearly got arrested trying.”

“Did you see the latest development?” Harold takes the seat across from me.

“You mean dinner with Rip?” I grit my teeth but manage to speak. “Yeah, I saw. It’s bullshit. There’s an explanation for it.”

“No, not that.” Harold frowns. “You didn’t hear?”

Dread creeps over me like a morning chill.

“What happened?”

“She had a press conference or something earlier today.”

“Yeah, for her new scent, Goddess,” I say quickly. “What about it?”

“Apparently some of Kyle’s supporters, or maybe some protesters, defaced the ad. You can pull up the footage. It’s everywhere.”

I immediately search for the press conference on my laptop. The footage is awful, and Sofie is magnificent. Not just beautiful. It’s what she says and how she stands. I don’t see a woman’s curves and the perfect hair and makeup. I see conviction. I see courage. I see a fighter, and she’s my match. Let anyone try to tell me differently, even Sofie herself.

“She’s pretty badass.” Harold’s eyes and words hold respect.

I glance up, pride in her making me smile, even though she won’t even see me right now.

“Yeah, she is.” I shake my head, but my thoughts don’t settle. It still doesn’t make sense. “I’ve been retracing my steps to see what went wrong. We were fine. We were fantastic, actually.”

We made love that morning. It was perfect. I made omelets. We showered together. We laughed over things that only we would find funny.

“We left her place and came here,” I say aloud, not seeing Harold, but seeing that morning. Seeing Sofie stretched out on my bed upstairs, smiling and tempting me to make love to her again. “She seemed quiet when we rode back to her place, but we were fine. And then when all hell broke loose at her apartment building, it’s like a switch flipped. I don’t know what she’s doing or why she’s doing this to us.”

I lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees, hands hanging between them.

“To me,” I add. “I don’t know why she’s doing this to me.”

“Maybe I do,” Henri says from the door.

I glance up to find her in the spot Harold occupied before he sat down.

“What do you mean?” I demand, tensing. “How would you know why Sofie’s shutting me out?”

Henri walks fully into the office, sitting beside Harold, her expression tight. She takes off her glasses and cleans them on her shirt. It’s her tell. She always does that before she apologizes. What does she have to be sorry for, and what does it have to do with Sofie?

“I’m waiting, Hen.” I keep my voice even, but it’s a struggle. “What do you know about it?”

“I, well, I…” She leaves it there for a few seconds, slipping her glasses back on and then peering back at me from behind the protection of the lenses. “She and I had a, um, conversation the other day.”

Harold closes his eyes and shakes his head from side to side.

“Hen,” he says. “We talked about this.”

“What kind of conversation?” My teeth clamp off all the other questions I want to hurl at her. “What did you say to her?”

“Well, I just… I mentioned some of the concerns we had about—”

“We?” I slice in. “Who’s we and what concerns?”

“I told her some members of the Collective expressed concerns about your relationship with her.” Her head drops forward and she bites her lip briefly before going on. “And I told her that being with her could jeopardize everything you’ve worked for. Everything you want.”

I shoot to my feet, leaning over the desk and jabbing my finger into the papers spread in front of me.

“How the hell do you presume to know what I want, Hen?”

“I d-don’t.” She stammers when people yell at her. “I…I j-just know how h-hard you’ve worked. She—”

“What else did you say?”

She presses her hand to her temple, like I’m giving her a headache.

“I, well, just that I…” She pulls a breath in from her chest and exhales slowly before looking back to me. “That if she cared about you she’d think about what will happen when she’s done with you. I think, since things went so badly the other day, that maybe she’s trying to protect you.”

“Henrietta,” Harold says sharply before I get the chance to respond. “Can’t you see he loves her?”

I glance at Harold, surprised by his astuteness. Attracted to? Really into? Lusting after? He could have said any of those things, and been correct, but he said love. And I do love Sofie. I’m just surprised he knew.

“I thought she was a phase he was going through,” Henrietta whispers, blinking back tears under Harold’s rebuke. “I’m sorry.”

I walk around the desk and perch on the edge.

“Hell, Hen.” I reach down to grab her hand just as a tear splashes on it. “We’ve been through a lot. You know I love you like a sister, but Harold’s right. I love Sofie. I know you don’t get it. I know you don’t approve—”

“No, now I get it.” She looks up, blinking owlishly behind her glasses. “I saw that press conference earlier today. I get what you see in her.”

The tight muscles across my shoulders relax just a little. A smile eases its way onto my face.

“Good, because you’re going to see a lot more of her.” I grimace. “If I can get her to see me at all.”

My phone buzzes in my pocket, and when I see Stil’s name flash across the screen, I take it as a sign that things might go my way.

“Stil, where is she?” I walk out of the office, already headed for the foyer and grabbing my coat from the hall closet.

“I…we’re at her apartment.” Her voice strains tears through the words. “I’m worried about her, Trevor. She’s locked in the bathroom and—”

“Locked in the bathroom?” I stop on the sidewalk, raising my hand to hail a cab. “For how long?”

“Like the last couple of hours.” Panic highlights her words. “Maybe I should have called maintenance or something to break the door down, or I could jimmy the lock. She…she just won’t open up.”

“I’m on my way.” I slide into the backseat of the cab. “Do me a favor. Call downstairs and get the key. They’ll do that for you. Make sure I can actually get in and up this time.”

I can’t free my voice from irritation that Sofie blocked me that way. At least now I think I understand why, but I won’t feel much better until I’m sure. Until I can hear it from her for myself.

Once I’m inside the apartment and in Sofie’s bedroom, right outside her bathroom door, I hesitate. What is on the other side? I know Sofie wouldn’t let this lead her to hurt herself. She’s too much of a fighter for that, but these last few days have cut deeply, have bruised and beaten her in ways she couldn’t have been prepared for.

Stil stands right at my back, so close I can practically feel her breath. I turn to face her, placing my hands on her shoulders and bending down until our eyes are level.

“Hey, why don’t you go get a drink or something?” I give her thin shoulders a reassuring squeeze. “Just give me a few minutes with her.”

“I’m not leaving.” Stil’s eyes are hard as pebbles in her little heart-shaped face. “I’ve been with Sofie a long time, and I’ve never seen her like this.”

She looks down at the floor, clearing her throat before looking back up at me, determination on her face.

“I’m not leaving.”

Thank God Sofie has this woman. Her parents certainly offer no support. I pull Stil in for a quick hug and drop a kiss on her cheek.

“I’m not leaving either,” I say. “So she’s got both of us. Just trust me with her for a little while, okay?”

She looks like she’s still not sure, glancing at the closed door for a few moments. She finally exhales a heavy breath and leaves the bedroom without a word.

I don’t bother knocking. I use the key Stil got from maintenance, turning it until the bathroom door swings open. My heart plummets at my first sight of her. I know she’s not dead, but she’s so completely still in a small lifeless knot on the bathroom floor, wearing nothing at all. She doesn’t even respond when the door opens. The beautiful hair she’s known so well for surrounds her, severed and cast down into silvery heaps on the marble floor.

I take a few steps until I can see her face, and her eyes stare vacantly ahead, tears rolling silently down her cheeks, into her mouth, onto her neck. I want to squeeze the life out of something, to rage at everyone who hurt her and left her for dead. To choke Kyle Manchester and everyone from his team. But I can’t do any of that right now. I can only do this.

“Sofie,” I say softly. “Sit up.”

She doesn’t speak, just shakes her head, eyes fixed on nothing and unblinking. I reach for her, startled by how cold her arm is.

“You’re freezing, darlin’.” Still no response.

I scoop her up and carry her into the bedroom. She doesn’t protest when I pull the covers back and carefully place her under the sheet and comforter. Without thought, I kick off my shoes and crawl in behind her, pressing my body to her back, reaching for her hands and chafing them between mine.

I don’t know how long we lie that way, the silence broken only by our breathing. Slowly, her back begins to relax into my chest, and I scoot as close as I can, tucking my chin into the cove between her neck and shoulder. I cross my arms over her waist, pulling her into me as tightly and gently as I can.

“I didn’t abort my baby,” she whispers.

I freeze. As much as the questions line up in my head, wait on my tongue, I hold them back. She has to do this, to tell her story in her own way. I squeeze her fingers between mine, silently encouraging her to say more.

“I…I was so young.” Tears crack her voice, and she sniffs before going on. “I knew I was pregnant at the Paris show. I was scared. I didn’t know what I was doing. I’d always thought I’d sow my wild oats and then settle down with Walsh, but he didn’t seem much interested in a life with me. I had this amazing guy I thought loved me, and I started thinking maybe
he’s
the one. Maybe
we’ll
have a family.”

Her laugh sounds harsh in the quiet darkness of the room.

“I was such a fool,” she says. “I’m having this man’s baby, and his wife shows up, confronting me, calling me names, making a fool of me in front of the whole world.”

She shakes her head, the jagged pieces of hair brushing my chin.

“There was some foolish part of me that wanted that baby,” she says. “Who did I have? Not my parents. I had no real friends, except Walsh, and he never wanted to be more than that. I thought, This is mine. I’m not giving this up. I wanted to believe Esteban when he told me their marriage was over. I was all set to tell him about the baby, but I needed reassurances, so I pressed about when he was getting the divorce.”

She draws in a trembling breath.

“He finally laughed in my face and said, ‘You actually think I would leave my wife for
you
, Sofie? This is all there is.’”

My jaw hurts from how tightly I’m clenching it to tamp down my anger. That little shit. I could crush his skull for doing that to her.

“So I didn’t tell him,” she continues. “I didn’t tell anyone. I pretended it was just not there for a few weeks; like it would go away. I had shoots and shows. I was sick all the time, but not eating. I was so busy, and I…I guess I didn’t take care of myself.”

For a few moments, I know she’s not with me. I know she’s lost in a place she needs for herself at least a little longer. And then she invites me in with her words.

“I had a shoot in LA.” Her voice is as soft and wistful as a sigh, barely there. “I had an early flight to catch. I woke up and I was…there was blood in my sheets. So much…”

I feel her muscles tightening as her story unfolds, and I rub her arms, hoping to soothe her.

“I had no one to call.” I can hear in her voice that she’s been transported back to that morning, to the fear and panic. It’s there, woven into her words. “I…I hadn’t seen a doctor. Only took a test. I called the closest thing I could think of. My therapist. She was a rape counselor, but she lived not too far away. She came and got me and took me to a hospital, but it was too late.”