Strict (Part Six) Read online

  “Yes.” My voice turns serious. “I need you to know I had nothing to do with that.”

  Her mouth drops. “Of course you had something to do with it!”

  “I mean that I didn’t confirm or deny anything to your adviser. I told her it was none of her business, and to get out of my office before I cancelled the whole program.”

  Chloe drops her head into her hands and groans. “You didn’t.”

  “I certainly did. She was being –”

  Chloe slams her hands down on the table, and coffee sloshes over the rim of her cup. “Do you realize what you’ve done? Do you?”

  “You can get another internship, Chloe.”

  “Really?” She laughs. “Because three hours of emails and phone calls have proved otherwise.”

  I frown. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that no one wants to hire me, Gage. No one needs an intern, especially not one who’s not affiliated with a school program so that they can make connections with the administration there.” Chloe shakes her head, and I see her eyes are shiny with tears.

  I reach across the table and take her hand. “Let’s go back – ”

  “Go back to your apartment?” She blinks fast and the tears are gone, replaced with nothing but anger. “And then what? You’ll almost have sex with me and then leave me again?”

  “Chloe.” I struggle to keep my voice even, my hands tightening around the laptop that I’m still holding. A war wages in side of me, one side wanting to punish her for talking back, the other wanting to let her in.

  “What, Gage? Don’t ask questions, right? Just let you do whatever you want, while I take whatever it is you’re willing to give me?”

  I scrub my hand over my jaw. “No. That’s not what I mean.”

  “Then what do you mean?”

  “I mean come back to my apartment with me, and we can figure this out. I’ll make some calls, get you an internship somewhere.”

  She shakes her head. “And then what?”

  “And then you’ll have an internship.”

  “You know that’s not what I’m talking about.” She levels me with her gaze, and it’s like she’s seeing me, really seeing me, and I shift on my chair uncomfortably.

  “What is this, Gage?” she prompts. “What’s going on here?”

  “Chloe.”

  “Stop saying my name like that like it’s a real response! Why, Gage? Why did you do what you did last night? Leave me like that?” Her voice is small but strong, her hands clasped in front of her on the table. I want to reach across and take them in my own, but I’m holding her laptop, and I’m afraid if I give it back to her, she’ll leave.

  I want to tell her. I want to tell her everything about my past, about why I can’t let her in.

  But how can I? It’s impossible.

  And so after a moment, when I don’t say anything, Chloe stands up, gathers her things, and walks out.

  Chapter 3

  CHLOE

  CALL ME IMMEDIATELY. I’m leaving the city. Also, I’m starting to get worried about you.

  I hit send on the text to Grace, and then make my way into Grand Central Station, the whoosh of the automatic doors helping to push me through into the domed building.

  I’m going home. Back to Syracuse.

  I can’t stay here any longer.

  I don’t have an internship.

  I don’t have a place to stay.

  And besides, I can’t stay in the city, not with Gage so close.

  I buy a ticket for the train to Stamford, because of course there are no straight trains from New York City to Syracuse, which means I have to take the bus from Stamford to Syracuse.

  So by the time I get to the bus station in Syracuse, I’m tired and pissed off. My arms ache from having to clutch my bag on my lap, and my head aches from resting it against the window.

  My clothes smell like train exhaust, and my hair is frizzy with sweat, which makes no sense, since it’s not that warm out.

  Once I’m out of the bus station, I take an Uber to my parents’ house.

  As soon as my mom opens the door of our split-level, totally normal, totally ordinary house with its white siding and its light blue shutters that my dad never gets around to painting, I start to cry.

  “Chloe!” my mom says, enveloping me in a hug. “Chloe, honey, what is it? What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” She pulls back and looks me up and down, checking me over.

  “No, no, I’m not hurt.” I swipe at the back of my eyes with my hand. “I’m sorry I didn’t call. I meant to, I just…” I trail off, not able to tell my mom that I was embarrassed, that having to come home was horrible enough without having to tell her why.

  “Chloe, please!” my mom admonishes. “This is your home.”

  And in that moment, as she hugs me again, the words have never felt so true.

  She calls to my dad to make me some scrambled eggs and toast, the meal that’s been her answer to everything since Cassidy and I were little, and I scarf them down at the kitchen table while I tell my parents the whole sordid story. Well, besides the BDSM part.

  I expect them to flip out, but to my surprise, they’re actually quite nice about the whole thing. I guess maybe when one of your children is murdered, the other one getting involved with her boss isn’t the worst thing in the world.

  My parents listen, and ask questions, and even though I can tell they don’t approve, and that maybe tomorrow there will be more questions, for now they’re content to just let me vent and be upset.

  “And I still can’t find Grace,” I say, frowning as I look down at my phone. “I’m actually starting to get worried.”

  “What do you mean?” my mom asks from the sink as she rinses out the frying pan.

  “She’s not responding to my texts or calls.” I frown. “She came to stay with me in the city, and then she went to visit a friend of ours, but I haven’t heard from her since.”

  “For how long?” my mom demands, and the frying pan falls into the sink with a clatter.

  “Since yesterday.”

  “George.” She glances at my father and immediately he’s grabbing his cell phone.

  “Yes, I’d like to talk to Officer Percey, please. This is George Cavanaugh.”

  “What?” I say. “No, Dad, you can’t call the police.”

  “Of course we’re going to call the police, Chloe, and it was very irresponsible of you not to mention this to us before. Brandon McCarthur is out there, God knows where, and there’s no way to know who he’s coming after,” my mom says.

  I take in a deep breath and resist the urge to tell my mother that Brandon McCarthur is not responsible for everything in the world, but I stay quiet.

  I listen as my father talks to the officer, and I give answers to the questions he asks about Grace, her height, her weight, her last known address.

  “I’m sure she’s fine,” I say, but there’s a weird feeling in my stomach, and my heart is beating fast.

  I think my mom can tell, because she brushes my hair out of my face, her hand nice and cool on my forehead.

  “Why don’t you head up to bed?” she asks.

  “It’s only seven o’clock,” I protest.

  “You’ve had a long day.”

  And she must be right, because as soon as I climb into my old bed, I fall asleep.

  I’m awoken two hours later by voices trailing down the hall from the living room.

  One is my mother and the other is a female voice that sounds familiar, but I can’t quite place.

  “Well, he’s extremely handsome, I saw him on a cover of a magazine!” the female voice crows. “He’s also very wealthy. He owns lots of properties, including a mansion in the Hamptons! Which is where all the elites go to summer. That’s what they call it, you know, summering in the Hamptons.”

  I peer out my bedroom door and down the hallway, to where my mother is standing in the living room with Mrs. Britsky, our next door neighbor. I sigh and try to move back into the bed
room – Mrs. Britsky loves to talk, and if she sees me, she’s going to ask me a million questions, and I really don’t feel like talking about the disaster that is my life right now.

  But then I stop.

  “Well, she’s sleeping right now,” my mom is saying. “But I suppose I could wake her up.”

  “It’s so strange that she never mentioned they were dating,” Mrs. Britsky says. “But when I went to talk to him, he told me all about it. Nice man, really. I wanted to invite him in for a tea, but you know how William gets about guests. Now, I told him that he could use my shower and he said –”

  “What’s going on?” I ask, walking down the hall, my eyes on my mom.

  “It seems as if Gage Stratford is here,” she says.

  “Where?” My heart pounds as I look around the room, half expecting him to appear.

  “Outside,” my mom says.

  I go to the window and peer through a slit in the blinds. Sure enough, one of Gage’s fancy cars sits parked next to the curb, engine idling.

  “Jesus,” I mumble.

  “Chloe!” Mrs. Britsky says, as if she’s shocked. “Such language! That may be how they talk in New York, young lady, but – “

  “I’m twenty-two,” I grumble as I head back down the hallway.

  I grab my phone off the nightstand by my bed. Sure enough, four missed calls, two voicemails, and three text messages, all from Gage.

  The first text just says, Chloe. Pick up.

  The rest of the texts and all the voicemails are variations on the same message, which is basically just ‘I’m coming to see you, answer your phone.’

  As I’m in the middle of listening to the third voicemail, another call beeps in.

  Gage.

  I answer it.

  “Was that you peering out the windows?” he asks, his voice low and smooth. “Do you need me to help you get rid of your neighbor? She seemed pretty excited to invite me over for tea. Do I look like the tea drinking type to you, Chloe? Because if so, I’m going to have to fire my personal shopper.”

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing here?” I demand.

  “Looking for you,” he says easily, like it’s the most normal thing in the world for him to be sitting outside of my house in his car like some kind of deranged stalker.

  “Why?”

  “Because you left me sitting in a coffee shop, which was very rude of you, Chloe. And I still have your laptop.”

  I squeeze my eyes shut. Dammit.

  “Why didn’t you ring the doorbell like a normal person?” But even as I’m asking, the scene that unfolds in my mind definitely isn’t pleasing. Gage showing up at my door, asking my parents if he can come in and see me.

  “Because I wasn’t sure if you wanted your parents to know about me,” Gage says.

  “Thanks for considering my feelings,” I say sarcastically.

  But he either doesn’t get the sarcasm, or chooses to ignore it, because he says, “You’re welcome,” very matter-of-factly.

  “You need to leave.”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No, I’m not leaving.”

  “Well, I’m not coming outside.”

  “Then I guess we’ve reached a stalemate, haven’t we, Ms. Cavanaugh?”

  “I guess so.”

  “I suppose I will be forced to sit out here and partake of the hospitality of your neighbors.”

  “What?”

  “Your neighbor, Mrs. Britsky? She was quite pleased to see me here, once she realized that I wasn’t a vagrant or petty criminal. I’m sure she’ll be happy to provide me with refreshments.”

  “That’s illegal.”

  “What is?”

  “Sitting outside someone’s house.”

  “Is it?”

  I bite my lip, not sure. I mean, technically the road is a public area. But surely you can’t just sit in front of someone’s house, just like, staring at it. That’s stalking. I cross my bedroom and peer through a slit in the blinds, making sure that there’s no way he can see me.

  I can see him, though, or at least the outline of him, sitting in his fancy car, wearing a baseball hat like he was on the first night I met him. His posture is relaxed, easy, like he’s sure that I’m going to fold and come out and see him.

  “Chloe.” His voice is low and growly, and I step away from the blinds, not sure I trust myself to not go out there if I stand at the window, able to see him sitting out there, how easy it would be to just slip out the door and into his arms.“I need to see you.”

  “Are you going to talk to me?” I counter.

  “What?” He seems startled by this.

  “Are you going to talk to me?” I ask. “Let me in? Tell me about River, about…I don’t know, just…” I take a deep breath. “I need to be an equal in this relationship, Gage.”

  “I thought I explained this to you, Chloe. The things I need are non-negotiable.”

  “I’m not talking about the sexual things. I don’t mean the domination. I’m talking about the other part of it, the emotional part. Without that, I just… I can’t.” I squeeze my eyes shut, willing myself not to cry.

  “Chloe.”

  And I can tell by the tone of his voice that he’s not going to let me in, that he’s not able to, or just doesn’t want to.

  So I swipe at my tears with the back of my hand and force myself to sound strong. “I’m sorry,” I say. “But the things I need are non-negotiable, too. So you should leave now.”

  And then I hang up the phone.

  But he doesn’t leave.

  Instead, he stays in his car, parked outside of my house for the rest of the night. Anytime I dare to peek through the blinds, I catch sight of him through the tinted windows of his car, just the shadow of him, either on the phone or typing away on his laptop.

  Other times he’s just sitting there, staring out the window.

  He doesn’t seem sleep.

  By the second day, when his car is still parked outside and he still hasn’t moved, my mother starts to think she has a right to give her opinion on the situation.

  “He must be really uncomfortable out there,” she says thoughtfully as she slips a pod into the Kuerig machine.

  “Good,” I say.

  “I wonder if he’s eaten.”

  “I hope not.”

  “Probably doesn’t have coffee.” She sets a steaming mug down in front of me, as if I should feel bad that Gage is out there with none. I take a huge sip as if to prove that I don’t care, but the joke’s on me, because I end up burning my tongue.

  “You do realize he’s the reason I got fired, right?” I ask her.

  She sighs. “You said he wasn’t the reason.”

  “He wasn’t. I mean, he was… I mean, I wanted to be with him, Mom, I just…” I take in a sniffling breath. “I’m so confused. And I’m worried about Grace.”

  The police in New York City and Syracuse have both put out missing person bulletins, and Grace’s picture has been plastered all over social media, but so far, no one has heard from her. I can’t help but think that it’s my fault she’s missing, that I’m started to worry that maybe it does have something to do with Brandon McCarthur and my sister after all.

  Before I know what’s happening, I’m crying, huge sobs that rack my body and leave me feeling spent.

  “Oh, sweetie,” my mom soothes, pushing my hair back from my head and pulling me close to her. “Everything is going to be fine.”

  “It’s not,” I say. “Nothing is fine. Cassidy is gone, Grace is missing, Gage is…” I trail off, not sure what Gage is.

  “Shhh,” my mom says. “Shhh, it’s all going to be okay.”

  But she doesn’t know the truth. She doesn’t know the things that Gage has been doing to me, doesn’t know the way my body craves it. If she did, I doubt she would be as tolerant of the fact that he was sitting outside as she is.

  “Why don’t you go back upstairs?” my mom says. “Try to get some sleep.”r />
  “I just woke up,” I protest.

  “Did you sleep?” she presses.

  “Not really,” I admit.

  “Go on,” she says. “I’ll make corn chowder for lunch.”

  She knows it’s my favorite.

  Up in my room, I toss and turn, just like I did last night, unable to fall asleep. Finally, in the afternoon, I give up trying to sleep and spend the day submitting resumes for internships, this time doing it to local companies in Syracuse, hoping they’ll be more responsive than the ones in New York.

  I do add some New York City ones in for good measure, even though I have no money and nowhere to stay. It’s at least worth a shot.

  I spend a lot of time worrying about Grace.

  Texting her, even though I know there won’t be a reply.

  Looking at the facebook page that’s been set up for her, but there are no updates, except for random people commenting about how sad it is.

  By the time it gets dark, I’m restless. I haven’t left the house since I’ve been here. Maybe tomorrow will be the day I finally leave. I take a shower, then crawl into bed and watch movies until I fall asleep.

  When I wake up, it’s midnight, and the house is quiet, my mom and dad in bed.

  I’ve resisted looking out the window, but I can’t anymore.

  I walk over to the blinds and peer out.

  Gage is still sitting there in his car.

  Doesn’t he ever sleep? Like, is he even human? I think of his body, the strength of it, the curve of his muscles, the lines of his body.

  I watch as a car pulls up behind Gage’s, and my breath catches. Brandon? Has he somehow tracked me down here? Or maybe that man, Gavin, the one who wants to buy River’s company.

  I wait for a shadowy figure to slurk out of the driver’s seat, but instead, it’s a young guy I don’t recognize. As he walks toward Gage’s car, the glow of the streetlight illuminates him– he’s wearing skinny black jeans and a gray hoodie, and he’s holding a brown paper bag.

  I watch he knocks on Gage’ window until Gage rolls it down.

  Gage accepts the bag, and hands the guy some cash.

  The guy looks pleased, then turns away. Is this… is this some kind of drug deal? I never pegged Gage as the type to do drugs, but …