Vigil (24 page)

I shook him off. “That was how I knew. That Barclay was The Phantom. Because they found her body. Part of her body, anyway. And I knew that she was afraid of him. I knew he had to be the one.”

“Cecily, what happened to your friend is not your fault.”

I turned on him. “That’s why it’s personal, you understand that? That’s why I have to get Barclay. That’s why he has to pay. Because he took Darlene from me. And she was the best friend I ever had. Maybe the only friend. You say you don’t want to kill him, but—” And I was overtaken with sobs. The wrenched through my body, from the pit of my stomach to my chest.

He caught me in his arms, holding me close.

I was crying too hard to struggle.

“Shh,” he said. “Shh, Cecily. It’s okay, We’re going to stop him. I promise you, we are.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

I sobbed, clutching at him, for a long time. And all the while, he rubbed my back, assuring me that there was no way that Barclay would get away with any of it.

Even though I was upset, it felt good to be in his arms. I hadn’t been sure how he would react to the news that I’d been a stripper. If he was holding me, that was a good sign, wasn’t it?

Finally, I stopped crying.

He let go of me.

I looked up at him.

He looked away.

Why wasn’t he meeting my eyes? Was that a bad thing?

We went back to the picnic blanket, and we both sat down. Neither of us said anything.

Callum offered me a sandwich.

After all that crying, after getting out that long story, I was starving. I took it. I bit into it. It was turkey and curried mayonnaise with lettuce and cucumbers. It was delicious.

Callum started to unwrap a sandwich for himself.

I chewed, watching him, waiting for him to say something.

He wasn’t looking at me.

I swallowed my bite of sandwich. I felt anxious, but I tried to sound nonchalant. “Um, whatcha thinking over there?”

He peeled the plastic away from the sandwich. “This is a lot to take in.”

A lot to take in? Crap. That was bad. He
was
freaked. I ate more of my sandwich, trying to think of what I could say.

I decided to test the waters a little bit. “You’re not going to want to date me publicly anymore, I guess. It wouldn’t be good for your image.”

He took a bite of his sandwich and chewed.

I waited.

He swallowed. He still didn’t say anything.

He certainly wasn’t jumping in to disagree with me. I kind of wished he would. I kind of wished he’d tell me that he didn’t care what anyone thought, that he still wanted to be with me.

But I didn’t know what he wanted. It was possible that he was
really
freaked. That he was looking for a way out.

“Maybe you don’t want to date me at all,” I said.

“Cecily…” He didn’t finish.

I waited. Again.

I waited, begging him to say something else. But he didn’t. He still wasn’t looking at me.

Damn it.

“It’s okay.” I set my sandwich down. My voice was flat. I was resigned to it. Why had I expected anything different? “I understand. You can’t talk to me? I’ll talk for you.”

“Cecily, just—”

“No,” I said. “How’s this? You feel bad me for me. You sympathize that I was in a tough situation and all of that. But you just don’t feel the same way about me anymore. When you look at me, all you can see is that I’m tainted, and that I’m used up. You imagine all of those men staring at me, and you don’t like the idea of having shared me with them, even if they never touched me. It’s deep inside you. You don’t mean it to be that way, but it is. And so, you want to end it.”

He stared down at his sandwich. “I’m not saying that.”

“What are you saying then?”

He was quiet.

“It seems to be like you’re not saying anything at all,” I said.

He took a deep breath. “Okay. Well, I think you’re right about the public dating. I don’t want to have to talk about all of it in public. And anyway, I never liked us trying to do that. It made my identity too obvious. And besides, you’ve always belonged more to Vigil than you have to me.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Well, I can’t have sex with you, can I?” he said. “When I’m Vigil, I can. You belong to him, and maybe it would be easier if we made things simple.”

“So, you want me to go back to only interacting with you when you’re in the mask.”

“I…” He rubbed the bridge of his nose.

I felt cold all over. “It’s more than that,” I said. “You
do
want to break up. Completely.”

“I.. I don’t,” he said. “I don’t want to lose you, and I don’t have any right to judge you.”

“But you are judging me,” I said. I could hear it in his voice.

He sighed. “What you said about all of those men staring at you? Well… I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about that. And I can’t help it. It kind of bothers me.”

I shoved the rest of my sandwich in my mouth, chewing fiercely. Maybe if I ate enough food, I could hide how much he was hurting me. Because I hadn’t realized it, but I’d wanted him to be my knight in shining armor. I wanted him to tell me that none of it mattered, that he loved me no matter what, and that there was nothing that could tear us apart. I wanted a big, grand romantic gesture.

And there wasn’t anything grand or romantic about him.

What was I thinking?

This was the guy who’d fucked me over the back of a chair, who’d blindfolded me and forced me to suck his cock in a bathroom. He was hot. Dangerous. Exciting. But romantic?

I was an idiot for thinking he could be a knight in shining armor. I was too stupid for words.

I swallowed my sandwich. “Well, you know what? That’s fine. I’ll get out of your hair, and you’ll never have to see me again. Okay? Is that okay?”

God damn it, I felt like I was going to start crying again. How could I have any tears left?

“No,” he said. “That’s not what I want. Look, I promise, no matter what, we’re going to work together to take down Barclay. And if you could just give me a little bit of time to try to process all of this—”

“Fuck you.” I got up and started through the garden. The tears were blinding me.

He came after me. He grabbed me by the shoulder and turned me to face him. “That’s not fair, Cecily. You hid this from me—”

“Because I knew you’d react like this.”

“Bullshit. Maybe if you’d told me that story the other night when I asked you, it would be different. Maybe if I hadn’t read it an a newspaper—”

“Your stupid ex-fiancé did that,” I said. “She said it was because you guys are a dynasty, and she’s going to marry you. She couldn’t let me get in the way of that. Well, I guess she got what she wanted.”

“I’m not going to marry that bitch,” he said. “I hate her. I hate her for doing this to you.”

“Whatever.”

“It’s only that when I look at you now—”

“You see me differently,” I finished.

He looked down at his shoes.

“I have to go.” I walked away. Part of me hoped that he would catch up with again and stop me.

But he let me go. He let me walk all the way out of the garden by myself.

* * *

“Can I buy you a drink?” said the guy who’d just sidled up next to me at the bar. He wasn’t unattractive. He was young. He had blond curls and a broad smile.

I shrugged. “It’s a free country.”

His smile widened. “You look sad.”

I shrugged again.

“What are you drinking?”

I looked down into my mostly empty glass. “I think this was a whiskey sour.”

Curly gestured for the bartender. “Hey, two whiskey sours, please.”

The bartender mixed our drinks and brought them over. Curly paid the man.

I finished my other drink in one gulp and started on the one that had just appeared in front of me. I didn’t say thank you to Curly. I didn’t care about him. I hadn’t asked for the drink. He’d decided to buy it for me.

“So, what’s wrong?” he said. “You’re way too pretty to be so sad.”

I tipped the drink into my mouth. “You make that up yourself?”

He set down his drink, laughing. “Hey, I’m trying to be nice to you. You don’t have to be so hostile. I don’t know who did you wrong, but it wasn’t me.”

“Maybe nothing’s wrong,” I said. “Maybe this is just my face.” I took another big drink. I wasn’t sure how many drinks I’d had. I’d been here for a few hours. I hadn’t been counting my drinks. But I did know that I felt fairly inebriated. And that being drunk wasn’t making me feel better the way I’d hoped it would.

“You got a mouth on you, don’t you?” said Curly. He offered me his hand. “I’m Troy.”

I looked at his hand. “Hi Troy.”

He laughed again. “You’re determined not to loosen up, aren’t you? Come on, I just bought you a drink. The least you can do is tell me your name.”

I glared at him. “I didn’t ask you to buy me a drink.”

“You didn’t tell me to get lost either,” he said. “From my limited understanding of Girl, that generally means I’ve got a shot.”

“I don’t actually speak the typical Girl language,” I said. “Sorry about your luck.” I swept off the bar stool. I’d find someplace else to sit if he couldn’t take a hint.

“Hey, wait a second,” he said. “You’re leaving?” He looked terribly upset.

I rolled my eyes. “I’m not having a good day.”

“Yeah, and I was trying to cheer you up,” he said. “I saw you over here at the bar. You looked a little familiar, but I couldn’t quite place you. And I swear I’m being nothing but nice and polite to you. So I don’t see why you’re treating me like this.”

I hated when men used that subtle form of manipulation. The essence of what he was saying was that he was doing everything right, and I was doing everything wrong. He was trying to make me behave the way he wanted me to behave. I hated him. “Leave me alone, Troy. I mean it.”

He cocked his head. “Wait a second. I know how I know you.”

“You don’t know me.”

“You’re that chick that was dating Callum Rutherford. The one who used to be a stripper.”

A sick, cold feeling went through me, like being doused with cold water. He recognized me? How could that be possible?

“You know it seems like you could be real friendly if you wanted. What was your name? Oh, that’s right. Cecily.” He grinned at me.

I turned away from him.

He grabbed me by the arm. “When you were a stripper, were you this much of a killjoy?”

“Let go of me.” My voice was quiet. My teeth were clenched.

“Because, you know, you’ve got a killer body, but that attitude of yours… Well, it could really use an adjustment.”

I dumped my whiskey sour over his head.

He sputtered. “What the hell?”

But he’d let go of me, and that was the important thing.

I squared my shoulders. “Thanks for the drink, Troy.” I walked out of the bar.

* * *

I wandered through the streets of Aurora. Now that I was on my feet, navigating my way through the city, I realized how drunk I was. It was like looking at the world through blinders. I could only see what was right in front of me. Everything else was blurry. It was more difficult than usual to put one foot in front of the other.

I ended up near the apartment that I used to share with Darlene, back when we worked out near the docks, when she first started taking up with Hayden Barclay. I went to the building, and I leaned against a street lamp, and I gazed up, trying to find our window.

One window in sea of windows.

Darlene wasn’t there that much. She hooked up with a lot of guys. Sometimes she brought them back to our apartment, but that was a pretty rare occurrence. Letting a guy know where you lived wasn’t always smart. If things went south, he could come find you.

I spent a lot of time alone there.

But sometimes, we spent time together. I remembered late night conversations, full of laughter. I remembered ordering pizza together and pigging out. I remembered watching movies together on our couch.

It was only maybe six months we lived together.

She was with Barclay after that, and he liked her. He got her some other apartment. Some swank place where she lived by herself. I visited her there a few times, but it wasn’t the same as when we lived together.

It wasn’t the same at all.

I couldn’t handle thinking about Darlene.

I supposed I’d come here to run from what I was feeling about Callum.

Or Vigil.

Or whoever the fuck he was.

I’d known right from the beginning that I was in deep shit. I’d known that I was going to fall for him, and he wasn’t going to fall back.

But it had seemed like I was wrong.

Memories came back to me. Moments of us together.

His lips on the top of my head. His whisper.
You’re lovely.

On the balcony, eating breakfast.
You and that fucking mask are the best things that ever happened to me.

And his voice rumbling in his chest.
I love you.

Did those things mean nothing? Could it really all have changed so quickly?

On second thought, I couldn’t handle thinking about this either.

I needed more liquor. Stronger liquor. There was a store right around the corner from my apartment. I’d get some on the way home.

* * *

The computer screen was too bright. I adjusted the brightness. Again. It was the third time I’d done it. I was sitting at a desk at the office. It was morning.

I was hungover.

It was my own fault. I shouldn’t have spent last evening getting so drunk. I knew that now. At the time, life had seemed too difficult to handle on my own. But now, the effects of drinking so much seemed too difficult to handle.

I grimaced.

I could hardly concentrate on the emails I was trying to read. My head was pounding, and I felt out of it.

I needed caffeine. I needed food. I’d eaten a banana on my way to work here, but it didn’t seem to have been enough. My stomach was making noises at me.

I got up from the computer and went over to a few of my fellow interns. “Hey, I’m going next door, you guys want anything?”