She shakes her head. “No. If you stay in this hallway, I will call the police. I’m not fucking around.”
“I own this building, Grace.”
“You do not own me, Asher.” She says it with such venom I recoil.
“I know that, sweets. I do.”
“Then leave. Respect me. For once. Respect me.”
That hurts, I have to admit. I do respect her, but I’ve got no good excuse for why I didn’t tell her what we did that night besides fear that she’d react badly. And why did I fear that?
Because I knew it was wrong when we did it. I knew.
And she knows I knew.
I give in and retreat. I walk to the door, open it, step through, and close it behind me. The chain lock engages and I force myself to walk towards the stairs. I take them slowly, telling myself the whole way down to the lobby that once she cools off, we will talk about this and figure it out.
But until then, I walk over to the chair in front of the fireplace I had refurbished for the building lobby and take a seat. Until then, I will sit right here and wait.
Chapter Seventeen
#NotMyInvisibleMan
THE BUZZING of my phone wakes me. My eyes are so swollen from crying, I have a hard time opening them to see the screen.
Unknown number.
Vaughn.
Meet me on the roof.
Jesus, can’t that guy take a hint? Why doesn’t he ever give up?
Do I want him to give up? I ask myself honestly. Or is this whole freakout a test to see how committed he is? Isn’t it a good thing that he’s still hanging around? I know he was down in the lobby because there’s reporters outside now. I was watching TV for hours as they set up camp in front of my building. If Vaughn hadn’t put in the new security features, they’d probably be camped out in my hallway.
But the marriage…
Bebe called and I told her I can’t talk about it yet. Not to her. I need to figure it out and I don’t need all that old psycho-babble they used to feed me when I… came back.
I need to think about it in new terms. Vaughn was right. I was traumatized when I was let go. I’m not sure if any of my therapy sessions mentioned that or not. I refused to talk to any counselors. Just refused. I went for more than a year. Three times a week. And never once did I say a word.
So once I was adopted by the Chambers family, they let me decide if I wanted to continue wasting my days that way. And of course, I said no thank you.
Things got better after that. I got to recreate myself. I got to choose a new name.
In the hospital I was wild. And vulgar. And undignified. I lost myself in those eight months. So I chose Grace.
I wanted to remind myself to be graceful. To act with grace. To never, ever let that freak win. He made me into a primitive and weak mess. He made me uncivilized and rude. Withdrawn and silent.
I wanted to be Grace and so I became that girl. The yes girl. The girl who pleased people and fit in. I became… social. And perky and sweet and cute.
I chose Kinsella because Sophie Kinsella is my favorite author. I read every book of hers while I was locked up that year. She kept me going. She kept me alive. She made me laugh again. I wanted to be the girls in her books. I wanted to live those lives. I wanted to be anyone but me.
And so I am. I am a cliché of chick-lit females.
Are you coming? a second text asks me.
Am I coming?
What would those girls in the books do? That’s how I’ve made my choices since I became Grace Kinsella. WWKGD? What would Kinsella girls do? Blow off the millionaire movie star one last time? Or admit they need him, and humbly ask for another chance?
I throw my covers off and pull on a pair of jeans and grab a hoodie. Kinsella girls don’t wear hoodies to meet millionaires on the roof, but it’s dark. So who cares?
I grab the keychain with my new house key off the foyer table and stick it in my jeans pocket, and then step out into the quiet hallway. I pull the door closed with a soft whoosh and listen for noise downstairs.
Nothing.
I take the stairs up to the roof and push through with the start of a smile on my face. I haven’t been up here since that dinner we had all those weeks ago. The roof is dark, but the lights from the building across Wazee Street backlight the palm trees. I bet they are gonna die soon if they stay here. It will be cold and snowy before long. I look for Vaughn as the door closes behind me but there’s no one.
“Vaughn?”
A foul-smelling cloth covers my mouth and I inhale before I realize what’s happening.
My eyes look up and find his face.
No, not his face.
His mask.
This time not the boy from camp. This time he’s the Invisible Man.
“You’re mine,” he says, the voice taking me back ten years. “I told you, Daisy. You’re mine.”
That’s the last thing I hear as my world goes black.