I’m not sure how to react to that. I examine his face, but he seems sincere.
He takes a step closer. “Not to change the subject, but you look incredible.”
I know I should say something. All I come up with is a morose “Thanks.”
“I’m sorry,” he says softly, taking another step closer. “I know it must’ve been a shock, seeing us like that. I honestly didn’t know until late this afternoon that she’d be coming.”
Plenty of time to pick up the phone. I huff out an aggravated breath.
He reaches out and strokes my arm, then takes another step toward me, so now we’re standing close enough that I can smell his cologne. And the bourbon on his breath, which is surprisingly strong.
“You really do look incredible,” he murmurs. “This dress is . . . wow. And your hair. My God, Joellen. You’re stunning.”
I fight a smile because I’m peeved, but his expression is too admiring to stay mad for long. “I’m glad you like it.”
He curls his fingers into my arm and pulls me closer. “I don’t like it. I love it. You’ve made me your slave.” He leans in and runs his nose along my jaw, raising the tiny hairs on the back of my neck. “Now if only you’d get rid of those glasses, you’d be perfect.”
That leaves me breathless. Stunned, like he just hit me across the face. I picture us sitting together at a breakfast table on some morning in the distant future. He’s reading a newspaper, ignoring me until I reach for another croissant, and then he slaps my hand, snapping “You’ve had enough.”
He’ll never think I’m perfect just the way I am. He’ll never tell me I’m a miracle. I’ll always have to fake it with him, trying to live up to some impossible standard, never able to relax and be myself.
A switch inside my head flicks from on to off, and just like that, I can’t wait to get out of here. “We should go. Someone could walk in any minute.”
“That only makes it more exciting, don’t you think?”
He sniffs my neck, making a low noise of pleasure in his throat. When he drags me against him, I’m startled to feel a bulge below his waist that probably isn’t his wallet.
“Whoa! Okay. Let’s cool it—”
“I couldn’t stop thinking about you while I was gone,” he interrupts, his voice deeper. He trails his lips down my neck, nipping every so often like he’s trying to taste me. Eat me. He backs me up until my bottom hits the sink and I can’t go any farther.
“You enjoyed teasing me over email, didn’t you? Sending me that photo of your earlobe.” He chuckles like a comic book villain. “Clever. If it was your plan to make me obsessed, it worked.”
I start to panic, because he’s acting so strange. “No, there was really no plan—”
He digs his hand into my hair, pulls my head back, and clamps his mouth down on my throat like a vampire. It’s so sudden, I jump, startled out of my wits, then yelp when his hand latches onto my breast and squeezes.
“Michael! You’re hurting me!”
He crushes his mouth over mine.
I shove him away, panting, and raise a hand to my stinging lips. “Dude! Get a grip! I’m not making out with you in a bathroom! In case you didn’t hear me, I just said cool it!”
It’s like my refusal makes Michael snap. He’s there one minute, the familiar, well-mannered man, then he’s vanished, replaced by some random psychopath summoned from a séance gone sideways.
He grabs my upper arms, shoves me up onto the sink, and kisses me again, savagely, his teeth sinking into my tender lower lip. He bends me so far back my head slams against the mirror.
I react on pure instinct and bite him.
“Ow!” He pulls away for a second—breathing hard, astonished—and raises his fingers to his mouth. When they come away bloody, he smiles.
He looks up at me with those psycho eyes, and my blood runs cold. I try to jump off the counter, but he holds me in place, his arms strong from all that stupid squash.
“Let me go!”
“She likes to play rough.” He wrestles my arms behind my back. “Me too.”
He laughs into my ear, and I smell the alcohol on his breath again, searing fumes that make me want to gag. How much has he had to drink? “Stop. Michael, stop!”
“Oh, come on, Joellen, don’t be coy. We both know what we’re doing. You wanted a promotion, right? Did you think those were handed out for free?”
He kisses my neck, pressing his crotch into mine, dragging the hem of my dress up so he can grab a handful of bare thigh. My heart is going like gangbusters with equal parts fear and fury, overlaid by complete disbelief.
“Are you kidding me right now? I said stop!”
“I’ll stop when I’m good and goddamn ready.” His voice is a growl. He curls his fingers around the elastic of my panties where they ride over my hip.
Just as I’m about to let loose a full-throated scream, the door opens. The sound of music swells. Michael and I freeze, looking over to see who’s come in.
It’s Portia.
She’s stiff as a statue in the doorway, eyes wide, mouth formed into a horrified O of shock at the picture Michael and I make on the counter.
My hair is mussed. We’re both breathing hard. My lipstick is smeared all over his mouth. My leg is bent at his waist, and my dress is shoved up so my thigh is completely exposed, all the way up to my panties.
I know exactly what it looks like to her, and it makes me want to throw up.
Portia turns without a word and leaves. The door swings closed behind her.
With all my strength, I shove Michael away. Still off-balance from Portia’s interruption, he staggers back, blinking. I slide off the counter, straighten my dress, then stride over to where he’s standing by the toilet I came out of earlier and slap him as hard as I can across his face.
“You can take your promotion and shove it!”
I run out of the ladies’ room, my vision blurry from the water swimming in my eyes. I hurry through the elegant hallways to claim my coat. Out on the sidewalk, I hail a cab, my breath frosting in puffy white clouds in front of my face, my ears too hot to go numb in the cold.
It isn’t until I’m safely inside the cab and have given the driver my home address that I break down and start to cry.
THIRTY-ONE
When Cam opens to my knock, I throw my arms around his shoulders and bury my face in his neck.
“Joellen! What happened? Why’re you back already?”
Unable to speak without bursting into a fresh round of tears, I shake my head. My whole body trembles. I’m so upset it’s like a bomb went off inside my stomach and ripped a huge hole right through me.
Everything I’ve been fantasizing about for the past ten years has been just that: a fantasy. Michael isn’t a knight in shining armor coming to rescue me on his trusty steed. He’s the apple the witch offered to Snow White—perfect, shiny, and filled with poison.
“Easy. Take a breath, lass. Come inside and talk to me.”
Cam’s shushing me with soft words, his arms strong and protective around my back. He kicks the door shut with his bare foot. “What happened to your hair? And why’ve you been cryin’?”
“Michael,” I whisper. “He . . . he . . .”
Cam goes stiff. His voice comes out low and dangerously hard. “He what, lass?”