Hero (12 page)

“Do you know how much I love you?”

“More than the sun?”

“No . . .”

“More than the moon?”

“No . . .”

“More than the stars?”

“No . . .”

I frown. “How much, Mommy?”

“I love my little Cataline more than the sun, the moon, and the stars combined.”

I squeal and jump into my mother’s embrace, throwing my arms around her neck. “I love you that much too, Mommy.” When her skin under mine turns icy, I draw back to find her eyes are closed. “Mommy?”

Her blue-tinted face is slack, her body unnaturally still. My once-white nightgown is soaked red and clinging to my body. I swipe at my mother’s blood as I scream, but when I reach for her again, she’s gone. It’s my own blood sticking to my hands.

A man’s far-off voice says, “Oh, dear.” I cry out to him for help, but he just continues to repeat the words.

Darkness is splintered by harsh, yellow light, and I have to shield my eyes with my elbow. “Turn it off,” I say. I’ve been in shadows for days, even during my meals, and the light’s assault is painful.

I recognize the voice as Norman’s when he yells for Rosa. Peeking from under my arm, I see the stain has spread on the mattress. I can’t help staring at it until Rosa appears, one long string of Spanish words flying out of her mouth. She coaxes me from the mattress and urges me up stairs upon stairs until we’re in my room.

The space is blindingly bright, but not so much that I don’t notice it right away. “Rosa,” I say, pointing. “My window. Why’s it closed?”

She pushes me until we’re in the bathroom, where she helps me strip off my clothing.

The shower steams over quickly. In the foggy, distorted mist of heat, I pretend I’m in my apartment bathroom. I wipe my hand between my legs, scrubbing at dried blood as I think about what I’d normally be doing. I don’t know what day it is, so I pretend it’s Friday. I’d work and then go home either alone or with Frida, depending on her plans. It makes me regretful of all the times I declined her invitations to spend time with her work friends. I don’t fit in with them, though. Or anyone, really. But if it somehow meant I’d be somewhere else in this moment, I wish I’d done it.

After, Rosa thrusts a box of tampons at me, forcing my hands around it as though I might throw it down. I promise myself I’ll never take the little things for granted again. Or the robe she wraps me in, or the way she lovingly combs back my wet hair.

A half hour later, cleaned and fed, I sit in the main dining room awaiting instruction. When nobody comes to get me, I decide to search the mansion for Norman. Eventually I give up and go to the library, where I find him in an overstuffed chair by the window.

“Come in,” he says when he notices me, gesturing to the chair across from him.

I sit hesitantly and pull my robe tighter.

“How are you feeling?” he asks.

“I’m not hurt, Norman. I just got my period.”

“I know,” he says, and we both look at our hands. “I’m sorry. I’ve been taking care of people for a long time, Cal—Master Parish included. I’ve never been so careless in my life.”

“It’s not your fault,” I say. “I didn’t know how to ask . . . I was ashamed.”

He touches the corner of one eye and nods. “I’m in a difficult position, Cataline. I’ve served the Parish family for many years. Calvin was still a boy when his parents passed—well, he was a teenager, but he wasn’t yet a man.”

My fingers run along the hem of my robe. “I didn’t know that.”

“He never discusses it. He feels a . . . responsibility to them and to this city.”

“A responsibility?”

“He’s not a bad person.”

“I disagree.”

“And he would say you’re right. He’s his own worst critic. Imagine a life where you never allow yourself a single mistake. That’s him. This has been difficult for him because you bring a sense of disorder to the mansion. He isn’t used to that. He likes things a certain way, and . . . you don’t always follow the rules.”

“I don’t understand any of that. If he hates having me here so much, why doesn’t he let me go home?”

Norman sighs, and his eyes scan the room quickly. “I’ve said quite enough. Just try not to upset him. I know you find it hard to believe, but he is a good man.”

I want to believe it. At least I did once, but now I know the truth. It seems Calvin has everyone fooled but me.

“I . . .” It’s silent while I determine how to respond. “I think
you’re
a good man, Norman.”

He swallows audibly as his eyes take their time meeting mine. When they do, I attempt a smile.

“Even after all this?” he asks.

“Yes. I’m sorry for being difficult. It’s just that I’m scared. That’s the only reason.”

“I know you are,” he says, turning his gaze back out the window. I’m not sure if I imagine it when he whispers, “I am too.”

“Will Calvin be mad you let me out?”

“Let me deal with him.”

My fingers in my lap are speckled with red, and I wonder how long I’ve been wringing my hands. The words I say to him, someone who hurts me even without laying a hand on me, are sweet, soft, and feathered. Someone else speaks them from my mouth. “Put me back in,” I tell him.

It takes a moment before he turns to me. “Pardon?”

“Up here, I don’t know what I am. The basement is the truth. My reality is dirty captive, not this.” I gesture around my shining, gilded library. “This is nothing but a lie.”

Even without windows or clocks, there’s no mistaking the dead of night, the perfect stillness. My breath seems to catch with every noise as I wait for sleep. I listen for Calvin’s footsteps on the basement stairs. I’m staring into such blackness that neon pricks the space in front of me as though I’m squeezing my lids shut. Maybe I am.

Eventually my chest deflates, and my fingers unfurl from my palms. I peer toward the stairs. Whenever the door opens, light slices through the darkness. The cell has been unlocked since Calvin broke the gate almost a week ago, but Norman has been sneaking me upstairs for meals and showers. I don’t ask how he gets away with it.

I frown. Will Calvin still be angry with me? Or has he forgiven the way I shunned his help? Norman’s statement continues to ring in my ears, though I don’t know why. There’s no truth to it.

“. . . he is a good man.”

A good man. What would that look like?

If I peeled away the ugly Calvin, would I uncover goodness? I let the fantasy play out. It doesn’t make me cringe. He’s not angry with me but regretful. He tells me what’s broken in him, and why he lives within walls. He explains why he’s doing this to me. I relish the feeling of his hair between my fingers as I comfort and kiss him. We slowly learn the insides of each other through our mouths, our eyes, our fingertips, our words.

“You’re awake.”

I gasp inelegantly and vault upright. My heartbeat reverberates through my entire body as I shift my back against the wall. Calvin’s silhouette sharpens, and I hear the squawk of the gate. “How long have you been there?”

“No more than a minute. I thought you’d be asleep.”

I’m trying to decipher the tone of his voice as I sniff for displeasure. “I don’t . . .”

“What?” he prompts.

“I haven’t been sleeping well.”

“No? Come on. Back to your bed. You’re free.”

My laugh is unnatural and base, something I’ve never heard from my mouth. “Free?” I ask. “I don’t think you know the meaning of the word.”

“I’m trying, Cataline.”

The sincerity in his voice that halts another snippy response. “I know,” I say. “It’s just that down here or up there, it’s all the same.”

“Why am I not surprised,” he mumbles to himself, “that after all this, you’re still fighting me?” His voice rises, an indication he’s now speaking to me. “I’m beginning to wonder if you even want me to be nice. Tell me, do you prefer me cross?”

“Nice,” I say. “I want you to be nice.”

“So then come to bed.”

My face flushes hotly; it sounds like an invitation, and I immediately picture the one time I’ve seen his bed. A woman on her hands and knees for him. There’s a pang low in my belly, something sharp and electric.

“Christ, it’s not like I’m inviting you into the pits of hell. You’ve been down here a sufficient amount of time to reflect on your behavior. Now it’s time to go back to your room.”

The heat recedes just as quickly as it flooded. For a moment I was there, at his mercy, just like her, scared but excited, pushing and pulling against him.

Hands under my knees bring me back to the moment. He pulls me from the wall and lifts me against his solid chest. His nose touches my temple as he inhales. “You smell awfully nice for being locked up over a week.” My shiver is a result of his breath near my ear and the insinuation that he knows of Norman’s and my indiscretions.

He carries me as though I weigh nothing at all. When we’re out of the basement and crossing the foyer to the staircase, my gaze shifts imperceptibly. Light hurts my dark-soaked eyes, but I can’t resist following the line of his strong jaw. I inspect the stubble shadowing his olive skin and the dimple in his chin before drifting to the hollow of his cheek. He’s always been incredibly handsome, but this close I can see the art in his beauty. We stop on the third floor landing.

He looks down, and cautiously, uncertainly, I reach up to pinch his glasses by their frame. They slide off into my hands in slow motion. Brightness still floods my vision, but now my world is an unearthly shade of green. His eyes are looking at my mouth, his own mouth slightly parted. I’m not only curious about how he tastes, but I
want
to know, and that thought catapults me back to reality.

“Put me down,” I demand in a hoarse whisper.

“We’re almost there.”

I’m upset, with whom I’m not sure. I push against his wall of a body. “I can walk.”

“Relax.”

My momentarily forgotten anger crashes over me all at once like a set of mad ocean waves. “Go to hell, Calvin. I mean it. I don’t want your hands on me.”

“Struggle all you like. It just turns me on.”

“You’re sick,” I say, stabbing my elbow into his chest.

“Sick?” he echoes, and his body vibrates against mine. “You’re the one who wants to sleep locked up in the basement by yourself.”

“Because in the basement I’m a prisoner,” I say. “Up here, I don’t know what I am. Am I your whore, your hostage, your toy?” My body pulsates from the tears I’m trying to keep inside. “I can’t live like this,” I continue, “not knowing my fate.”

“Do you want to be my whore?” he asks as he shoulders my bedroom door open.

“I just want to know what I am, whatever it is.” My voice breaks as heat pools at the edges of my eyes. “I don’t understand why I’m here.”

He stops mid-step when I break into tears, clutching his t-shirt to my face. His arms squeeze me even closer. “Cataline . . .” he says softly into my hair. “Don’t cry. I—”

“Stop,” I scream so loudly that he jerks back. I push against him with the entirety of my strength, and his immobility only infuriates me more. “I can’t take this back and forth. I don’t know who you are. Put me down. Now!”

“You want down?” His snarl stills my body. “I’ll put you down,” he says, “and that’s where you’ll stay until I’m finished with you.”

“Finished?”

With a stride forward, he tosses me so I bounce on the mattress. My pearl nightie bunches around my waist, and he’s staring between my legs, eyes riveted as his hands rip impatiently at his belt.

I gasp and slide off the bed, darting to his right. His arm shoots out to catch me, yanking me so my back is pressed against his front. He walks us to the bed until my thighs are flush against it.

“Get off me,” I screech. His hand pushes my upper back so my breasts mash against the mattress. His calm, controlled movements serve to remind me how easy it is for him to manipulate my body. He lifts my nightgown, exposing me as the sound of ripping fabric ricochets through me.

“What are you doing?” I reach up and claw at the sheets, trying to escape by pulling myself out, but he grabs my arms and forces them behind me. He secures my wrists at the base of my spine, and coarse lace digs into my skin as he winds my thong around them. He gives the fabric a hard tug and lets go, leaving me fighting against it, wiggling underneath him like a fish on land.

His hands slide between the mattress and my body, where they grasp my breasts roughly through the satin. He pulls me upright until I’m flattened against his body. “Relax,” he commands.

“No,” I say through gritted teeth.

He grips my hair in a ponytail and guides my head to the side. “Turn around.” When I don’t respond, he tugs so I have to swivel and face him. “Lie down,” he says.

“Calvin, please,” I say.

“Down,” he barks, and I flinch. I sit tentatively, pressing my thighs together so hard that they begin to perspire. I ease back onto the bed, my hair spreading everywhere, my eyes searching the ceiling. His hands push up the fabric of my nightie until it circles my waist. Firm fingers trail down my belly before parting my legs with little effort. The slide of his skin against mine pulls so deeply inside me that when it leaves, there’s a void, some dull, endless ache.