Chapter 6
What do you know about ESP? Extrasensory Perception; the knowledge of an incident before it takes place. We all have a little bit of it—that other ninety percent of our brains we don’t use.
It’s those times in the car when you think of a song you haven’t heard in years, and it’s the next one that comes on the radio. It’s those mornings when you picture an old friend and at dinnertime the phone rings, and it’s the friend you were thinking of.
I was never a big believer in that sort of thing. But as the store clerk handed me my change for the tiny T-shirt, a ball of anxiety settled deep in my gut.
And it wasn’t normal butterflies. It was urgent. Desperate unease, like when you realize you forgot to pay a credit card bill.
I had to get to Drew. I had to talk to him—to tell him—and it had to be now. I walked quickly down the street. Well . . . as quickly as I could in three-inch heels.
As every step carried me closer to our building, the worry increased exponentially.
At the time I chalked it up to the news I was about to break.
But looking back now, I think it was something else.
Precognition.
By the time I stood outside our apartment door, my knees were shaking and my palms were sweaty. Then I reached for the knob. . . .
If you have a weak stomach? You may not want to watch this.
It won’t be pretty.
I step into the apartment. The lights are out. I put my keys on the table and take off my coat. I flick the switch on the wall, flooding the room with light.
And that’s when I see him.
Them.
Drew is standing in the middle of our living room, his dress shirt unbuttoned, exposing the chest that I’ve traced my fingers over a thousand times. The warm, bronze skin I love to touch. he has a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s in one hand. And the other hand is hidden. Buried.
In a mane of wavy auburn hair.
She’s the opposite of me in every way. Thick red tresses, breasts the size of watermelons, perky in their fakeness. She’s tall—as tall as Drew—even without the stilettos. her lips are red and lush, plump enough to make Angelina Jolie envious.
And those plump red lips are moving against Drew’s mouth.
Good kissers, really good kissers, don’t just use their lips. They utilize their entire body—their tongue, their hands, their hips.
Drew is a good kisser.
But I’ve never had the chance to observe him in action. I’ve never seen him kiss anyone. Because I’ve always been on the receiving end. The kissee.
But that’s not the case now.
I stand there—stunned. Watching. And though it’s only for a few seconds, it feels like forever. Like an eternity.
In hell.
Then Drew pulls back. And almost as if he knew I was here all along, his eyes find mine immediately. They’re hard. Merciless.
And his voice is as cold as the steel of an outdoor gate in a snowstorm.
“Look who’s home.”
Lots of women imagine how they would react if they caught their boyfriend or husband cheating. What they would say. how strong they’d be.
Righteous and indignant.
But when it’s for real? When it’s not just pretend predictions?
Those emotions are peculiarly absent.
I’m numb inside.
Dead.
And my voice is nothing more than a whispered stutter.
“What . . . what are you doing?”
Drew shrugs. “Just having a little fun. I figured, why should you be the only one who gets to?”
I hear the words, but I don’t understand them. My eyes squint and my head tilts, like a bewildered dog.
Drew steps away from the redhead and takes a swig from the bottle. he flinches as he swallows.
“You look confused, Kate. I’ll explain. The first rule of lying is always get the alibi straight. See—right now, Matthew and Dolores are on a plane to Vegas. Matthew’s been planning the trip for weeks—a surprise second honeymoon. So I knew you were full of shit this afternoon. I just needed to see if you’d actually go through with it. So I followed you. Gotta love the GPS.”
Last year, a woman named Kasey Dunkin disappeared after a night out with friends in the city. It was all over the news. The police were able to trace her cell to an abandoned warehouse in Brooklyn, and even though she’d been stabbed multiple times, she survived. Drew and I had the same kind of program installed on our phones the next day.
“You followed me?”
he followed me to Bob’s office. he knows where I went. Does that mean . . .
“Yep. I know where you were. I know everything. I f*cking saw you.”
he knows. . . . Drew knows I’m pregnant.
And obviously he’s not pleased.
My voice rises as I speak, gaining momentum. “You know?” I point at the woman who’s watching us like we’re her own personal soap opera. “And this is how you react?”
Drew looks confused. “Do you frigging even know me at all?
how the f*ck did you think I’d react?”
I’ve seen Drew annoyed before.
Thoughtless.
Frustrated.
But this is different.
This is . . . cruel.
he asks me, “You’re not even gonna try and deny it? Make me think I’m delusional?” For a moment his face crumples. And he looks . . . anguished—like a torture victim about to break his silence. “Aren’t you going to tell me I’m wrong, Kate?”
he blinks and the anguished look is gone. And I’m pretty sure I just imagined it.
Wishful thinking.
I fold my arms across my chest. “I won’t discuss this with you in front of an audience.”
Drew’s jaw locks stubbornly. “Are you going to end it?”
My feet move back away from him, all on their own.
And my hand drops protectively to my abdomen.
“What?”
he repeats himself, impatient with my shock. “I said—are you going to f*cking end it?”
Politically, Drew is pro-choice. Despite his Catholic upbringing, he respects and loves the women in his family far too much to let some old man on Capitol hill dictate what they can or can’t do with their bodies.
But emotionally—morally—I’ve always thought he was prolife. So the fact that he’s standing here telling me to abort a child, our child, is just . . . incomprehensible.
“I haven’t . . . I haven’t had time to think about it.”
he laughs bitterly. “Well, you better start thinking, because until your little indiscretion is out of the picture? I don’t even want to f*cking look at you—let alone discuss anything.”
his words hit me like a gust of wind on a cold day. The kind that leaves you breathless.
Drew isn’t Joey Martino.
he’s worse.
Because he wants me to choose. An ultimatum. Like he did with Billy.
And what the hell is he talking about— my indiscretion? Like I made it happen all by myself?
And then it sinks in—his anger. his vindictiveness. It starts to make sense.
“Do you think I planned this? That I did it on purpose?”
he smirks, and even a deaf person would be able to hear the sarcasm. “No—of course not. These things just happen sometimes, right? Even when you don’t mean them to.”
I open my mouth to argue, to explain, but the stripper’s giggle cuts me off. I glare at her. “Get out of my house before I put you out with the rest of the trash.”
In situations like this? Women can cut each other down faster than a tree dealer on Christmas Eve. But it’s not because we’re petty. Or catty.
It’s because it’s easier to go after a nameless woman than to admit that the true fault lies with the man who was supposed to love you. Who was supposed to be committed. Faithful.
And wasn’t.
She says, “Sorry, honey, you’re not paying for this show. I go where the money man tells me.”
Drew loops an arm around her waist and smiles proudly. “She’s not going anywhere. We’re just getting started.”
I find the strength to raise a brow. And try to land a shot of my own.
“Paying for it now, Drew? Isn’t that pathetic.”
he smirks. “Don’t kid yourself, sweetheart—I’ve been paying for it for the last two years too. You’ve just been slightly more expensive than the average whore.”
I should have known better. Arguing with Drew is like dealing with a terrorist. he has no boundaries; nothing’s off limits. There are no depths he won’t sink to to win.
Then he looks thoughtful.
“Although I must say, despite how everything’s turned out, you were money well spent. Especially that night, against the kitchen sink”—he winks—“worth every penny.”
I’m dying. Each horrible word cuts into me like a blade slicing skin. Can you see the blood? Oozing slowly with every atrocious syllable. Drawing it out, making it more painful than it ever needed to be.
You look surprised. You shouldn’t be.
Drew Evans doesn’t burn bridges. he sets dynamite to them.
Decimating the bridge, the mountains it connects, and any other living thing unlucky enough to be within a fifty-mile radius.
Drew never does anything halfway. Why should destroying me be any different?
I turn to walk down the hall before I crumble in front of him like an Egyptian pyramid.
But he grabs my arm. “Where are you going, Kate? Stick around—maybe you can learn a new trick.”
You know how someone’s personality can make him more attractive? Like that kid in high school who, despite the lack of muscle tone and the case of mild acne, was able to run with the popular crowd? Because he told the funniest jokes and had the best stories.
I wish I could tell you it worked in reverse. I wish I could say that Drew’s words magically transformed his face into the monstrosity he sounds like.
But I can’t.
Look at him.
I imagine this is what Lucifer looked like when God tossed him out of heaven. Bitter and broken.
But still so achingly beautiful.
I pull my arm free. And my voice is high-pitched, almost hysterical. “Don’t touch me! Don’t you ever f*cking touch me again!”
he smiles slowly, the very picture of serenity. he wipes his hand on his pants, like he just handled something dirty.
“That really won’t be a problem for me.”
I’m going to be sick. I’m going to throw up all over his black Bruno Magli shoes.
And it’s got nothing to do with the pregnancy.
I go down the hall, forcing myself to walk. Because I refuse to let Drew see me run from him.
I barely make it to the bathroom in time.
I drop to my knees and hold on to the toilet for dear life. A nail breaks and my knuckles turn white. My stomach contracts and I heave violently. Blood pounds in my ears and acid burns my throat.
I cough and I sob, but my eyes are dry. There are no tears.
Not yet. That part comes later.
how can he do this? he told me he wouldn’t . . . and I trusted him. When he said he loved me. When he promised he’d never hurt me.
I believed him.
We never talked about having kids. We never talked about not having them either. But if I had known he’d be this way, I would have been more careful. I would have . . .
God.
Listen to me. My boyfriend is in the living room with another woman on his lap, and I’m sitting here thinking of all the things I could have done to keep it from happening?
And I called Drew pathetic.
When there’s nothing left in my stomach, I pull myself up to the sink and look in the mirror. Splotchy cheeks and dull redrimmed eyes stare back at me from a face I don’t recognize.
I douse my face with cold water, over and over. Drew may have ripped me apart—turned me into a quivering mass of shame and self-recrimination—but it’ll be a cold day in hell before I let him see that.
I stumble to the bedroom, grab a duffel bag out of the closet, and blindly fill it with the first things my hands touch. I have to get away. From him. From everything that reminds me of him.
I know what you’re thinking. “Your career, everything you’ve worked for—you’re throwing it all away.”
And you’re right—I am. But none of that matters anymore.
It’s like . . . like those poor people who jumped from the towers on September eleventh. They knew it wouldn’t save them, but the fire was too hot and they had to do something, anything, to get away from the pain.
I zip the bag shut and put it on my shoulder. Then I brace my hand against the door and I breathe. Once. Twice. Three times.
I can do this. I just have to make it to the door. It’s only a dozen steps away.
I walk down the hall.
Drew is sitting on the couch, legs spread, eyes on the dancing woman swaying in front of him, the bottle of Jack beside him. I focus on his face. And for just a moment, I let myself remember.
Grieve.
I see his smile—that first night in the bar—so boyishly charming. I feel his lips, his touch, the first night we made love, here, in this apartment. All heat and need. I relive every tender word, every loving moment since then.
And I lock it all away.
In a box of steel, banished to the farthest corner of my mind.
To be opened later. When I’m able to fall apart.
I step into the room and stop just a few feet from the couch.
Redhead dances on, but I don’t look at her. My eyes never leave Drew’s face.
My voice is raw. Scratchy. But surprisingly resolute.
“I’m done. With you, with all of this. Don’t track me down a week from now and tell me you’re sorry. Do not call me and say you’ve changed your mind. We. Are. Over. And I never want to see you again.”
how many parents have told their teenagers that they’re grounded forever? how many teenagers have responded that they’ll never speak to them again?
Over. Forever. Never.
Such big words. So final.
So hollow.
We don’t really mean them. They’re just things you say when you’re looking for a reaction. Begging for a response. The truth is, if Drew came to me tomorrow or next month, or six months from now, and told me he’d made a mistake? That he wanted me back?
I’d take him back in a heartbeat.
So do you see now what I was saying before? I’m not a strong woman.
I’m just really good at acting like one.
Drew’s voice is blunt. “Sounds good.” he toasts me with the bottle. “have a rotten f*cking life, Kate. And lock the door on your way out—I don’t want any more interruptions.”
I want to tell you he hesitated. That there was a hint of regret on his face or a shadow of sadness in his eyes. I would stay if there was.
But his face is blank. Lifeless—like a dark-haired Ken doll.
And I want to scream. I want to shake him and slap him and smash things. I want to, but I don’t. Because if you try and hit a brick wall? All you’ll get is a broken hand.
So I pick up my bag and lift my chin. And then I walk out the door.