“Hi, Ms. Charles, this is Cypress Winters. I need a favor. Could you recommend one of the best employment law attorneys in Los Angeles to me?”
So, okay, this gift is both for myself and for all the women who’ve worked with my former boss and Universal Health Group. For the ones who would suffer the same degradation and pain in the future without my stepping up.
This is for all of us.
Chapter Seventeen
Jude
I cover my mouth, smothering a yawn as the security line in O’Hare Airport crawls forward at not even a snail’s pace. If a snail and a thousand-year-old tortoise on Ambien fucked, whatever animal that unnatural union created would be how slow this line is moving.
It’s seven a.m., and God knows I’m not a morning person. But damn, most of these peoplereallyhate mornings if the attitudes, grumblings, and complaints are anything to go by. Though hell, if the TSA guy repeatedly instructs us to remove our laptops and phones from their cases and place them in separate bins, what’s to be surprised and bitch about when you have to do it? God bless the TSA workers. They need haloes…and anti-depressants.
Finally, after rolling through the metal detector twice and being frisked by an electric wand, because yes, I hid a weapon of mass destruction in the dick area, I make it through and gun it to Terminal 3 and the gate where my nonstop flight for London is leaving. The plane doesn’t leave for another two hours, but I need an I’m-about-to-throat-punch-the-next-person-who-bumps-into-me size cup of coffee. It’s early, and I’m tired as hell. That’s what not sleeping for the past week will do to a person.
The bright beacon of hope that is a Dunkin’ Donuts beckons me, and I gladly—desperately—stand in another line. Five minutes later, large black coffee in hand, I trek across the terminal to my gate and drop into one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs that seems to be the norm for airports in general, setting my duffel bag between my feet.
I glance at the electronic sign behind the gate desk, and so far, my flight is on schedule to leave at 9:30. Which means I have an hour and a half to kill. Hopefully, the chairs on either side of me will remain empty, because I’m not in the mood for talking either. That has less to do with it being early in the morning and more to do with where my thoughts plod off to as soon as my mind isn’t preoccupied with travel shit. Or more accurately, who.
Cypress.
Jesus. I scrub my palm down my face, hard. Once. Then twice. If only it was that easy to brush her from my head. Believe me, I’ve tried these past twelve days. When I’m tattooing, it’s easier. Which explains why lately I’ve been the first one at the shop and the last to leave. Sunday night, I returned there after dinner at Mom’s—a dinner weallattended—and Knox ordered me to go home and not come back. True, I needed to pack and get everything squared away before leaving, but my apartment is too loud—the memories of Cypress’s screams echoing in the rooms, and I can’t escape them. Can’t escape her.
The less time spent there the better.
Popping the tab on the coffee lid, I sip the strong, hot brew, and even the punch of it isn’t enough to turn the tide of my mood or thoughts. I’m…empty. Since I walked out the door of my apartment, her bags in hand, and stored them in her car, a hole has taken up residence in my chest. Later, entering my home and finding her gone for good was worse. The loneliness, the deafening quiet, the room that seems to have captured her roses-and-apples scent in the freaking walls—I haven’t been able to handle it, and for more than a few nights, Knox’s couch and I have gotten up close and personal.
Anger rolls through me—I told her I loved her, and she still ran—but almost immediately, the image of her face as she stood in my living room that last day wavers in front of me, and that vision extinguishes my fury.
Cypress loves me; I don’t doubt that. She hadn’t been able to hide her pain and sadness from me. What I’d told her was true—I know her. And part of me also knew that I went into that battle with my fists tied behind my back. There was no way I could win against her fear, her past, her broken heart. But I’d tried—and come out bruised myself.
I’d do it again in the beat of that broken heart.
For her, I’d go to the wall, over it, and through it. But a wise person knew when to retreat and regroup. I didn’t need her quotes to figure that out. Space. She needs that to figure out what she wants, who she wants to be, and where her future is headed. I can give her that, because when I go after her again, I need her to believe that I’m not trying to trap her or steal her independence. And for her to accept that, she has to deal with her own demons. That I can’t do for her. Though if I could… Well, the Winchester brothers wouldn’t have shit on me.
But the waiting? It’s going to be a motherfucker.
Setting the cup of coffee by my feet, I unzip my bag and remove a couple of travel guide books about London that I picked up from the bookstore a few weeks ago.
Just as I lean back in my chair, somebody plops down right next to me. I clench my jaw, imprisoning my growl of annoyance. Because there aren’t at least twenty-five other empty seats in the area. Preferably one that doesn’t inhibit my damn elbow room.
“I just bought that book. The London Eye is definitely going to be one of my first stops.”
My muscles seize, locking up. Even my mind shuts down tight, nothing able to move or function. Except my heart. That runs like a souped-up Charger in an illegal street race.
That voice.
Thatfucking voice.
My mind is finally caving to the need, to the hunger to see her one more time, and now I’m hallucinating so random people sound like her.
I lift my head.
Cypress smiles at me.
Oh shit.
I stare at her, visually feasting on her, still not prepared to believe she’s sitting next to me. Still unable to grasp that those denim-and-moonlight eyes gazing back at me are real. Or the beautiful face, with its elegant, stunning angles and curves, is within touching distance. Mirage or not, I reach for that sensual dip in her delicate but stubborn chin and trace the shallow indentation. A shudder works its way through me, and I close my eyes. And breathe in the scent that’s haunted me for days.
