Exiled Page 12

  I wrinkle my brow as I sip my wine, the one half glass I'm allowing myself. "I thought you flipped other businesses? I'm confused again. What is it you actually do, Logan?"

  This gets me a laugh. "After I got out of prison, I had a decent chunk of start-up capital stashed down in the Bahamas, one of those private, offshore, numbered accounts. I'd been siphoning my income there via a complicated network of transfers while I was working for Caleb. Security, you know? I needed to know, if something went wrong, that I'd have some cash to start over. Well, good thing I did that, because obviously, something went wrong and I had to start over. And I started over by starting small. This was a floundering restaurant when I bought it. It was a sushi place, I think, and not a great one. So I gutted it, remodeled the interior, gave it a new identity. Upscale, a simple but elegant menu, efficiently run, good service. I sank maybe a quarter of my capital into this place between the purchase and the remodel, but it started turning me a decent profit within three years. It was stable and climbing toward the black by the end of the first year, though, so I knew I was good to start looking for my next endeavor, which was the car dealership here in Manhattan: BMW, Lexus, and Range Rover. High initial cost, but quick returns." He searches my face. "Am I boring you?"

  "Sort of, yes," I admit. "I'm not a businesswoman."

  "Okay, short version, then." He takes a swallow of wine, pauses so we can order our dinner, and then starts over. "I started out buying businesses, anything I could find that I could afford and that I thought would turn a quick profit. Once I'd gotten my investment back from each business I bought, I would invest in another. And meanwhile, each business would be turning me a profit, increasing the cushion between my investment and my income. I would invest, restructure if necessary, get involved to make sure it was running, and then I'd move on to the next venture after I was sure the company could run without me. I did a lot of traveling in those early years. I was an independent business owner, essentially, and that was it. But after a few years, my income was enough and my diversity of businesses broad enough that I figured it'd be safe to let that spread of companies be my stability, so I set up Ryder Enterprises, the management company, to run them without my input. And then I started doing what I do now, which is what you saw, what I've told you about--flipping corporations. Mostly stocks, tech, investment, securities analytics, high-dollar, white-collar sorts of stuff. See, there are millions of businesses out there, thousands just here in New York. And at any given time, there are always some that are barely making it. I buy them up at a bottom-dollar price, since they're about to go under, and then I either jigger things internally so they'll start turning a profit, or I disassemble them and transfer their accounts to a different company, usually one I own, which I then sell at a profit. You ever see Pretty Woman? I'm kind of like Richard Gere's character in that movie, just . . . hopefully less of a dick than he was."

  "What about the people who work for the businesses when you tear them apart?"

  "Well, that's what sets me apart. I always make sure there's somewhere for everyone to land. I've got a whole team dedicated to referrals, connecting employees to headhunters, things like that."

  "So this restaurant, the gas stations, and the movie theaters, you just own them?"

  "Right. They're income stability. So even if I make a colossal blunder, make a bad investment and lose a shitload of money, the Ryder Enterprises spread of companies can sustain me in comfort." He bobs his head side to side. "Can sustain us in comfort, I mean."

  I expect Logan to have our bill comped, since he owns the restaurant, but instead he pays it and leaves a rather significant tip for the waitress, who I don't think had any idea she was serving the owner.

  And then a long walk block after block back to the theater district. We take our seats just as the house lights are lowered.

  The show is . . . unlike anything I've ever experienced. Bursting with energy, music that soars and sweeps and hints at the Middle Eastern origins of the story. The dancing! The singing! It's all too much, and I want to sing and dance with them. The Genie, especially, is a delight, such wild, joyous, frenetic energy, presence that dominates the stage, the whole theater.

  I am raving as we leave the theater, chattering more than I think I have since I woke up from the coma. Logan is listening, attentive, but seems content to let me talk, to merely enjoy this admittedly rare bout of effusiveness from me.

  It is past ten o'clock now, but the city is still manic, bustling. Lights flash and blink, voices rise in a pleasing din. A policeman on a huge black horse trots past, watchful, alert. The crowd of people leaving the theaters takes over the streets, so the cars trying to ply their way from one avenue to another must inch slowly between the gaggles of theatergoers. I chatter about my favorite songs, about the Genie, about how fun the show was, how Logan has to take me to see as many shows as he can spare the time for.

  All the while, Logan has my hand and is taking us somewhere specific.

  To a place in the heart of the theater district called Junior's. It is crammed with people, every table occupied, and the hostesses are telling people it's a twenty-to thirty-minute wait minimum. Logan puts his name in and then finds me a seat, stands in front of me. I've run out of words by this time, though, and now we're quiet.

  But I like this, too, that we can sit together in silence, content to merely be.

  It seems Junior's is famous for its cheesecake, and Logan doesn't have to ask me twice to convince me to order a piece of chocolate cheesecake. Which, when it arrives with Logan's coffee and my tea, is mammoth. More cheesecake than I think any one person should be able to eat all at once; that is my thought when it arrives, at least. But yet by the time I've set down my fork, I've eaten very nearly the whole thing.

  Cheesecake eaten, Logan pays the bill and yet again leaves a fabulously generous tip, and then leads me back to Times Square, which at night is a simply magical place. The lights, the way the TVs shine and flicker and shift, the advertisements for all the shows, the contagious air of vivacity that infuses the crowd . . . it is truly magical. We sit on the steps and watch people, and I take the time to process everything I've experienced today. The ferry, the memories I regained, the key necklace, which is now nestled between my breasts, exactly the way Mama wore hers.

  I am sitting a step below Logan, between his knees. I lift up, twist, and kiss him until someone hoots at us, and someone else tells us to get a room. I smooth my palm over the stubble on his cheek. "Logan, I know I already said this, but thank you so much for today. It was . . . I think this was the best day of my life."

  Logan's eyes go down to my cleavage, but the speculative gleam in his eyes tells me he's looking more at the key, and I wonder what he's thinking.

  Marriage?

  I'm having a baby, possibly his.

  And possibly . . . not his.

  So what do I want?

  To belong to Logan forever, of course. To be utterly, irrevocably his. To know that no matter what else life throws at us, we will belong together, side by side, hand in hand, lives tangled and braided and inextricably woven together.

  Yes, I want to marry Logan.

  And I cannot wait to discover how he will ask me. Because he will.

  I know he will.

  It's just a matter of when, and how.

  I am not impatient, I realize. He will ask me in his way, in his time. And it will not disappoint, because Logan is incapable of disappointing me.

  Love is patient, I remember reading somewhere.

  EIGHT

  Less than forty-eight hours later, early in the morning. Four thirteen A.M., so says the digital clock on Logan's bedside table. There's a pounding on the door. A fist, hammering wildly. Cocoa goes nuts in her room, clawing at the door, barking like a demon. Snarling. Logan is out of bed, tugging on jeans, jogging to the door.

  "Shit," I hear him mutter under his breath.

  I'm in one of his button-downs, the hem coming to midthigh. Behind him, peering
past him, as if I could see through the door. But the sinking lead ball in my stomach tells me who's on the other side.

  Logan's curse tells me.

  He jerks open the door, puts his body into the crack. "The fuck you want, Caleb?"

  "What is mine." Your voice is mad, animal snarl.

  "Dude. We've been over this. You let her go, remember? She's with me now. It's what she wants. Just . . . let her go. Please. For her."

  A moment of silence, and an explosion of violence. Logan is knocked backward, and you are lunging through the doorway. I shrink back against Cocoa's door. She's wild, barking, snarling, scrabbling. Tearing the door down like she did when Logan was gone.

  Not this. Not again.

  Logan is up on his feet, bleeding from his lip. "Back off, motherfucker. Just leave before this gets messy, huh?"

  But you are lightning, you are a striking serpent. Pistol whipping out, a black blur, the point jammed up into Logan's chin. "I will not miss a second time, Ryder."

  You twist the barrel into Logan's flesh. Turn, see me. Your eyes flash, your lip curls. "X. Get over here. Now."

  I rise to my feet. Straighten my spine. "No, Caleb. It's over. I don't want to see you anymore. Never again."

  "Isabel." This, from you, is a plea. Low, vicious, desperate. "You must."

  "No." I gesture at Logan. "I love him. If you kill him, you will have to kill me as well."

  "Isabel--" Logan grunts.

  "No. You shut the fuck up, Ryder." Your voice is a rabid, grating snarl. Rough, unstable. To me, then: "Isabel."

  You wander away from Logan, but the gun stays trained on him. To me. Stumbling, nearly. Uncharacteristically uncoordinated. Not drunk; your eyes are lucid. Mad. Crazed. I don't even know. I glance at Logan. Plead with him silently to stay put. I will not allow you to shoot him again.

  "You don't need the gun, Caleb." I make sure my voice is cool, calm.

  "You'll come with me?"

  "No."

  "Then I need the gun. You are mine. You will come with me." Your voice is . . . not yours. Not Caleb's. Almost as if you are regressing. Becoming Jakob, somehow. Someone less refined, less in control. The Czech is showing through in your rhythms and diction.

  "I can't, Caleb. I do not belong to you. Not anymore. I'm with Logan now."

  A snarl. The gun levels at Logan. "Then he is dead. He should have already been dead. He does not get to have you. Only I."

  "Caleb, please." I touch his wrist. Urge him to lower the gun. "Please don't do this. Don't."

  Your hand latches onto my wrist. You jerk me hard, so I fly through the air, land against you. "Mine--only mine. Not his."

  "Caleb, let go. You're hurting me."

  "Let her go, asshole!" Logan shouts.

  Cocoa's claws are gouging through the door.

  Logan lunges again, and you fire. Miss. A hole appears in the wall to Logan's left.

  "A warning, only. For her. Back." You grab me by the throat.

  Twist me so my back is to your front. The gun jabs at Logan. Your fingers pinch against my throat. I cannot breathe. I don't think you realize what you're doing.

  "Let her go, Caleb," Logan murmurs, careful now. Voice low, slow, soft. "Let her go. You're hurting her. You're choking her."

  You glance down, let me go with a start. But then you grab me once more, this time one of my wrists, the other, pinioning them in one of your hands behind my back. Propelling me to the door.

  "Caleb--" I start.

  "Silence." You push me to the door. Let me go. Twist in place to cover Logan with the gun. "You. On your knees."

  "Not gonna happen, man. You can shoot me if that's your game. You did once, already. I survived that."

  "You will not survive a bullet in your brain," you say, and jerk open the front door.

  The alarm has been blaring this whole time. I didn't even notice until now. I don't think anyone has.

  Logan watches with agony on his face, watching Caleb take me away yet again.

  "Caleb, wait!" Logan pleads.

  "No waiting. She is mine." This is not you. This is Jakob, someone I do not know. Someone I can predict even less than I could Caleb.

  "You don't understand, Caleb. It's Isabel . . ." He steps around front, accepts the barrel of Caleb's gun to his forehead. "She's pregnant."

  You go stone-still. Your eyes search Logan. I, between you, see this. See the hunt for the truth in your eyes on Logan's.

  "No." You shake your head. A denial. A refusal to accept it.

  "Yes, Caleb." I whisper it.

  "His?" You turn your gaze to me.

  "I--I don't know." I despise myself for having to admit this. "It could be either of yours. There is no way to know, yet."

  A moment of frozen, fraught silence.

  "Kurva." This, in a language I do not know, from you; Czech, most likely. It has the tone of an epithet. "A baby?"

  "Yes." I turn in place, look up at you.

  "Kurva--a baby." You look down at me, as if I am a creature you have never seen before.

  There is a depth in your eyes, a wrecked, mortal agony in those dark brown pools that is awful to see in a man ordinarily so closed off and stoic. You search my face. Hands at your sides, gun held casually, easily, forgotten.

  "Isabel . . ." This, from you, is a whisper. A plea. A moment of weakness. A caress, with a word. Softness from a stone. Love, even, from a razor blade.

  And then, without a word, you're gone. Just . . . gone. You turn, and flee. Run swiftly, desperately. Round a corner, and gone.

  Logan and I both stare after you.

  Logan wraps his arms around me, hauls me inside. Carries me. Sets me down on the couch. Lets out Cocoa, who sniffs me and then Logan, tail wagging, murmuring softly, whining.

  "What the hell was that?" Logan asks, taking a seat beside me and curling his arms around me, pulling me against his chest.

  I shake my head. "I . . . I don't know. He's coming apart."

  "He certainly seemed . . . unstable."

  "It was frightening. That was not Caleb. That was nothing like the man I've known these last six years. He is always so . . . in control. Strong. Stoic. Emotionless." I gesture vaguely. "That? That was . . . I am worried. For him. For me, for us. I never quite knew what he might do, but now? After seeing him that way . . . I am afraid."

  "Understandable. That was one of the weirdest things I've ever experienced." The next is more to himself than to me. "It's almost as if he has multiple personalities or something. To be so completely unlike himself . . ."

  "What is that?"

  He glances at me. "What? Oh. MPD, multiple personality disorder. It's where a person goes through something so extremely traumatic that the mind sort of . . . compartmentalizes, in a way. Cuts out the part of the mind that contains those memories. But instead of just suppressing or repressing them or whatever, the mind will create a different personality, an entirely new psychological entity that is tougher, that can deal with the trauma or whatever it was. If . . . Jakob--the guy born in Prague--went through something really truly awful, he might have created Caleb as a way to deal with it. If Jakob felt overwhelmed and weak and victimized and out of control, he would have created a personality like Caleb, you know? Someone strong, dominant, in control. And now, losing you, somehow it has fractured Caleb's hold on Jakob, if you know what I mean. Like Caleb has been in control this whole time, and now Jakob is breaking through."

  "You think that is the case?"

  He shrugs. "I mean, it's all speculation. Only a trained psychologist could really diagnose something like that. It's just a totally wild guess. Caleb could just be losing his shit in the more normal sense. Just . . . cracking up."

  "It worries me, either way. I never caught even a hint of any of this from him until recently."

  "No way to really know, unfortunately. And he's not your problem, anymore. Your concern now is being healthy. Taking care of this baby."

  I breathe out slowly, a shuddery breath. "The baby."
I put my hand on my belly. "It doesn't feel real. And I don't . . . I don't even know what to do next."

  "Well, we get you a doctor, number one. Make sure you're healthy, all that. And then, number two, I think you should talk to someone. A therapist. Try to make some kind of sense of . . . everything. And eventually, you need to make some decisions regarding your future, and our future."

  "What decisions?"

  "Well, you've been staying here sort of out of default, because there was nowhere else. But is that what you want? How do you want to structure your life? Do you want to keep living with me here? Do you want to keep working on getting Comportment off the ground, or does being pregnant change that?"

  "God, Logan. That's too much. Too many questions. I don't know. I don't know any of that!" I feel stifled, my lungs compressed, my mind crammed so full of such a wild whirling maelstrom of thoughts and emotions that I can't think, can't sit still, can't take anymore.

  I shoot to my feet, pace away. "I need to get out of here. I feel crazy. It's all too much." I clutch my head in both hands, feeling as if the crushing weight of everything that is my life is about to explode out of my skull. "I can't be here anymore. I have to--I don't know. I don't know."

  I could scream from the burden of it all. Caleb, Logan, the baby, my past--and the lack thereof. The brief snippets of memory that hint at a wonderful childhood, and the not-so-pleasant glimpses at something far more nefarious between Caleb and me. Lies. Truths. Illusory tapestries woven with skeins of both lies and truth. Six years, nine years. A mugger, a car accident. Did I know him before? Did he cause the accident somehow? Has all this been a plot of his devising? How can I care for a child when I am not even a person, but a ghost, a shred of a soul lost in limbo? I am no one, I am nothing. I am the Starry Night, and Madame X. I am a shaven-headed girl in a hospital bed. I am a blank slate, a tabula rasa on which a mysterious man named Caleb Indigo has inscribed his imprint. I am Rapunzel, locked in the tower, raven-haired instead of blond. I am Belle, prisoner of a Beast, a thing of shadows and magic and primal carnality. The least of the threads that comprise me is Isabel.