We Were Never Here(39)
A moral code. My earliest associations with goodness and justice hadn’t come from a sacred text but from careful observation of what garnered approval…or at least didn’t draw my parents’ ire. Sex, too, lacked a pall of morality—starting with Ben, what to do, when, and with whom had all come down to what made sense to me, what felt right.
Screw Sebastian for trying to take that away from me; what I did with my body was my decision, all mine. I sat up and reached for Aaron’s jaw, then pulled him gently toward me.
“Well, hello.” His tone bordered on giddy, and I smiled against his lips.
I ruffled his hair, flicked my head toward the bedroom. “Just be gentle, okay?”
And he was, his lips and tongue and fingers soft, and he paused to stamp my neck with kisses and ask, again and again, “Is this okay?” Every time I felt the faraway panic begin to flare, I watched his face, the uncomplicated kindness there, and breathed until it subsided. Breathed louder, harder, both of our breaths rhythmic and sultry, until all that existed was the feeling, deep and tender and raw.
After a freeze-frame of stillness, he slid his hand across the sweat on my back.
“That was amazing,” he murmured, and gave my ass a cheerful slap. He padded into the hallway, and I listened to the minor melody trickling out of the living room.
I slipped into a kimono and sat on the edge of the bed. I felt sexy and wild, and I congratulated my body on finally cooperating post-Cambodia. I smoothed my tangled hair and turned on a lamp, then headed for the bathroom as soon as I heard him come out. As I neared, the music abruptly dropped out, replaced by the handbell-like chime that signaled a new text.
I’d dropped my phone on the coffee table earlier, and now I flipped it over. I scanned the screen twice, my stomach scrunching and crumpling like a sheet of tinfoil.
Two missed calls from Kristen, ten and fourteen minutes ago, when Aaron and I were in bed.
And just now, a text: “I need you.”
CHAPTER 17
“Everything okay?” Aaron paused in the kitchen’s doorway, brow wrinkled.
I looked up. My brain skittered ahead: I should call her. Wait, no. She’d purposely said nothing. That meant it was about Cambodia or Chile—definitely not something I could discuss in front of Aaron.
Or, hell, on the phone at all.
“What is it?” He crossed to me and I dropped the phone to my side.
“It’s Kristen,” I said. “She’s— I’m so sorry to do this, but I have to go see her.”
“Now?” He shook his head. “Is she okay?”
I ached to tell him, to open my mouth and let the truth spew like poison. You were right about something happening in Chile. And in Cambodia, before that.
My arms crossed over my belly. “Yeah, she’s…going through something right now.”
“Oh right, she just got laid off.” I must’ve looked startled because he added, “Or something else? Sorry, I know it’s none of my business.”
“No, I’m sorry. To be all vague and to suddenly run out on you.” I looked around. “You can stay, if you want? Dunno how long I’ll be there.”
“That’s all right, I’ll head home.” Aaron lifted my chin and kissed me sweetly, his lips soft. “See you soon?”
A folding feeling in my chest, a desperate desire to blow Kristen off and sink back into his embrace. I pressed my eyes closed, steeled myself. “Of course.”
* * *
—
I called Kristen from a button on my steering wheel as soon as I got on the freeway, which I had all to myself at midnight on a school night. I need you. I flicked through the possibilities like a channel surfer: Something had happened with our Cambodian secret—maybe the body had been recovered, bloated and waterlogged, or someone had uncovered something in the hotel, some evidence we’d missed. Or—more likely—it had to do with Chile, the fresher cover-up, one that hadn’t yet stood the test of time.
Or maybe it was so much simpler than that. Maybe she was finally freaking out the way I had after Cambodia, without upheaval at work and her last-minute trip to Wisconsin to distract her. Maybe it was all sinking in—the attack, the dawning horror of what she’d done to defend herself, and all those nightmarish hours afterward. Aw, Kristen. My love for her oozed from my heart like an egg’s soft yolk.
“Hi!” She picked up right before it went to voicemail. She sounded…chipper.
“Kristen, hey. I’m on my way.”
“You’re what?”
“I’m coming over. I figured you…that isn’t what you meant?” I switched to the right lane and slowed.
“Oh, I had a stupid fight with Bill at dinner and then I couldn’t sleep and felt like talking. On the phone.”
The baseball stadium sparkled on the left; I was still closer to home than to Brookfield. “Got it! I totally overreacted. I thought you meant…like, you needed me.”
She laughed. “Girl, you know I always do!” A crunching sound. “Are you close? You can still come over! Sorry, I’m working my way through a bag of chips.”
I slid onto the off-ramp, deflated and—though I knew it wasn’t fair—irritated. “It’s so late, I better not. But what happened with Bill?”