Jack and Djinn (The Houri Legends, #1)(13)

“You’re shutting me out because you’re scared. I get it. I really do.” She was walking away, and he was raising his voice, not yelling, not desperate, only insistent. “You can’t scare me off, Miriam, and you can’t push me away. Just give me a chance.”

Miriam wanted to, more than anything. She wanted to rush back down to him, but she refused to let herself. She unlocked her door and closed it behind her, leaned against it and tried not to sob. This is stupid, she told herself. She’d just met him. He didn’t know what he was talking about.

All men are *s, she reminded herself. No matter how perfect they might seem at first.

The trouble was, Miriam didn’t believe herself.





Chapter 4





Miriam

Three weeks earlier





It was Ben and Miriam’s one-year anniversary. Ben had reservations at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse in Troy, which was where he always took her for special occasions. But she hated it. She hated steak, she hated expensive wine, and she hated the stuffy, buttoned-up servers and the fancy atmosphere. She liked things simple, for the most part. She didn’t mind expensive dinners every once in a while, but something about the place just set her on edge. She’d told Ben this, of course, but he’d brushed it off. Special occasions always equaled Ruth’s Chris, no matter what. So here she was, sitting in the passenger seat of his truck, wearing a dress and wishing she was at home in her yoga pants.

She knew how the evening would go: He’d order the most expensive wine he could afford and drink at least one bottle, if not two. He’d splurge like crazy on himself, but he would never ask her what she liked. He wouldn’t consult her on the wine, and he’d behave like a total dick to the wait staff. She was just supposed to go along and keep her mouth shut. And sleep with him when they got home, of course. Normally, she’d keep herself in her shell, sip on one glass of wine, and nod in all the right places.

Tonight, for reasons she couldn’t have explained, Miriam decided to go a different route. When Ben poured the wine—$120 a bottle—she drank it as fast as he did. He didn’t seem to notice right away. She’d finished her third glass before the entrees had arrived, and she was feeling loose and unafraid for once.

“Good to see you finally relaxing a little,” Ben remarked, refilling her glass.

“Hey, a year is a long time. Something to celebrate.” The words were tumbling out of her mouth without any forethought, and she was grateful for it.

Maybe if she got drunk enough, she wouldn’t remember anything the next day. Ben would want to have sex, but she just couldn’t make herself do it anymore. It had been okay when they first started dating. Better than Nick, at least; that, more than anything, had made Ben seem like a decent guy at first: He was better than Nick. She could even pretend that he loved her, that he cared about her…sometimes. But the longer she dated him, the more she came to realize that his drunken rages were going from an occasional explosion to a regular part of their relationship, becoming ever more frequent and ever more violent.

He used to slap her every now and then, yell at her, curse her out. Eventually he’d pass out, and that would be it. Then, one night, he got really drunk with his buddies from the Corps and showed up at her door with anger in his eyes. She’d tried her best to keep him calm, but he had memories of the war in his thoughts, and when that happened, there was no avoiding the hurt. He’d cracked her with a fist that night and nearly broken her jaw. The next time he hadn’t been as drunk, but he still slugged her in the stomach for no good reason. It was always the little things that would set him off. A misunderstood question, a reply too long in coming. Eventually he didn’t need a reason. Of course, he’d feel bad the next day, take her out for dinner, buy her flowers or jewelry, charm her into bed. Sober, he was the man she’d known when they first started dating.

But he wasn’t sober much anymore.

She chewed her steak slowly, each bite tasting like sawdust. If she refused to eat it, or complained about it, or ordered something different, he’d fly into a rage and blame her for making him mad and making a scene. So she ate the steak. She washed it down with more red wine, becoming dizzier by the moment.

But there was another reason she was getting drunk.

Jack.

She kept seeing his face every time she closed her eyes. She felt his hands on the skin of her back, his lips on hers. Ben was across the table from her, chattering about some basketball game, but she didn’t hear a word he said. Instead, she was hearing Jack tell her she deserved better. She also wondered if Jack was all he seemed to be. She found herself hoping he was, and tried to think of innocent reasons to see him again.

“Miriam!” Ben’s voice cut through her reverie.

“What, Ben?” She tried to focus on him, but his face was wavering and splitting into two.

“I said, I’m sorry about the other night.”

“You did?”

“I said it, like, three times. You were staring off into la-la land or something.”

“Oh, sorry.” She didn’t want to talk about that night. “It’s…just…don’t let it happen again, okay?”

“I won’t, I promise,” Ben said. “So. How do you like your steak?” He always asked that, and she always told him she didn’t like it. Tonight, she was more interested in getting home.