“That’s the thing, though, isn’t it? It wasn’t real.”
The door bounced hard against her spine as he thumped it with something, his foot, his fist. “Don’t say that.” An order, one he didn’t expect to be ignored.
Ava tilted her head back and felt the tears pool at the outer corners of her eyes. “I thought I knew you,” she said, voice choked. “And it never mattered who you were or what you’d done, because I knew you, and I understood you. I was wrong, and maybe that’s what hurts the worst. I never knew you; not at all.”
“Ava.” This time it was definitely a kick, down low, right at the small of her back. “Open the goddamn door.”
“Or what?”
“Or I’ll kick it to fucking pieces.” She heard him take a deep breath. “And then you’ll have to go with me to Home Depot and get another, ‘cause I can’t let you sleep in an apartment with no door.”
The tears started down her cheeks, thin cool trickles against her burning skin. “I’m trying to be all Jo Dee Messina and stand my ground here, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“Yeah, and that’s stupid.”
She closed her eyes; she felt sick and miserable, desperate inside. “Please just go away. I hate fighting with you.”
Silence on the other side of the door. He wasn’t moving.
“Mercy, go!”
A beat passed, and he said, “Is that what you really want?”
“Yes,” she lied. But when she heard his footsteps begin to retreat across the landing, she stumbled to her feet, threw the locks, and yanked the door open. “Wait, Merc–”
He caught her around the waist as he charged into the room, lifting her up and kicking the door shut behind him. He kissed her while she was still gasping in surprise, and his hands clutched at her with an unchecked strength she could feel leave instant bruises.
Ava didn’t care. Her mouth opened under his and her hands dove inside his cut and the smell of wind in his hair crowded all thought from her mind.
They ended up on the floor, on the rug in front of her sofa, in a tangle of frenzied hands and half-torn-off clothes. It was over too soon, so Mercy pinned her hands up over her head, stretched over her like a big cat, and took her again, more slowly, no less fervently.
After, he slumped down onto the rug and pulled her against his side. He was still in his t-shirt and jeans, the fly just undone, and she was in nothing but her bra, with the straps tugged down.
Ava rested her head against his shoulder and tried to catch her breath, still stirred by the echoes of spasms, too limp to move.
The shadows grew long across the floor. The air cooled her skin until she was covered in gooseflesh, shivering and sliding her hands up beneath his shirt, seeking warmth.
It wasn’t the way it had been before. That automatic sense of safety, of shelter and peace; it was gone, decimated by the months apart, shattered by that moment she’d awakened in his apartment and found him gone. It wasn’t just the two of them anymore; the baby, and his leaving – they were in the room too, whispering and rustling in the corners, like the settling of bird wings. The unfailing man who’d helped to raise her had taken the most simple and precious thing she could offer him – her love – and he’d shoved it away.
The longer they lay on the floor, the more the moment began to hurt. The more Ava saw of the cruelty in his coming here today, the way he’d come for her body, like it was his to hold or reject. Like she didn’t even have a say in anything.
She was crying by the time she sat up and turned away from him, pressing her hands over her face, drawing her knees up to her chest.
Mercy’s large, rough hand settled in the middle of her back, a warm brand against her skin, some silent communication she didn’t know how to read.
“I don’t know you anymore,” she said again, voice broken and shivery, “and that’s the worst part.”
She listened to him get to his feet, straighten his clothes. He kissed her, one lingering stroke of his lips against the top of her head, and he left. Again.
The next morning, as she pressed a cool washcloth to the dark circles under her eyes, she cut him out of her heart for good.
At least, she thought she did.
Twenty-Eight
Present Day
