I'm Watching You by K. E. Ward - HTML preview

CHAPTER SEVEN

As it happened, Duncan took control of her life.  He dominated her time, ordered her around and played with her emotions.

He was testy at times, sweet at others.  He could be tremendously encouraging and helpful, but he could also be a big pain.  Leah and Duncan got into huge, walloping fights, but always, their rabid lust and need for each other overpowered their annoyances.

They made love in parked cars, like teenagers.  They had sex on the stairs after gloomy dinner parties.  They ripped each others’ clothes off at work, in public, at the apartment, at his house, and everywhere and anywhere they could get a hold of each other and feel the desperate need that the other inspired.

Leah arrived at his house one evening when the sky was streaked with deep blue and pink clouds that were moving swiftly across the chilly air.  She slipped into his front door noiselessly, took off her black pumps and tip-toed into the kitchen.

He was sitting on one of the stools, bent over a glass of brandy.  Without raising his head, he said, “You know, I’m going to leave you as soon as my wife comes back.”

The black of her hair looked vampirish against her pale skin as she approached him.  Making gentle swaying movements, she stopped about a foot away from him and extended her hand to touch the glass.  “Give me that liquor,” she said softly.

Her lips were swollen as though she had just been kissed.  He looked up, perplexed, and gazed searchingly into her face.  She touched him lightly on the cheek and he grasped her hand.  She was shaking.  No man had had this effect on her since Brendan…since Cameron…

“I can’t,” he said.  But then she took the glass in her free hand and downed it in one swallow.  Gracefully, she picked up the bottle and poured another one.  Without taking a breath, she finished it.

He stared at her with incredulity.  “You really were a boozer,” he said.

Her eyes were full of pain when she said, “You don’t want your wife, who left you.  You want me.”

He shook his head.  “She’s coming back, Leah.”

With a violent sweep of her hand, she threw the glass into the fireplace, where it shattered.  She ran to pick up the pieces and cut her hand.  Duncan rushed to her.

“Leah, you’re bleeding.”

She started to cry.  She felt like a baby having a temper tantrum, shaking, beating her arms against his chest, swallowing her tears.  But there was no use.  Duncan was leaving her, and there was nothing she could do about it.  Years before, she had told herself that she was never going to love again, but apparently, she had not learned her lesson.

Yes, she loved him.  There was no use denying it now.  Perhaps part of her thought that he was going to be the knight in shining armor that would save her from all her past indiscretions.  She didn’t know.  She didn’t care.  She ran from the house in a fit of tears, covering her face.  Duncan called after her, but she didn’t look back.  “Go to Hell, asshole!” she yelled.

She put the key in the ignition and turned.  She didn’t know where she was going.  She sped out of the city and headed for the back roads.  Doing well over ninety, she was racing past pickup trucks and semis.  The liquor, amazingly enough, wasn’t making her dizzy, but it was giving her strength.  Strength to do what she was about to do.

She pressed on the gas.  Trees and houses sped by at blinding speeds.  She felt like she was on fire, ready to do what she had intended to do, but was stopped from, years ago.

But then Hunter’s face appeared before her like an apparition.  Still speeding, tears dripping down her face, she let her eyes drift from the road and instead gave her full attention to the hallucination.  “Hunter, oh Hunter!” she cried.

She slammed on the brake.  She didn’t even really know how she came to a complete stop safely on the shoulder.

Cars were going by serenely.  She sucked in a breath as though she had just been submerged in water.  She checked herself and saw that she was fine.

Using her cell phone, she called the nanny and asked her if she could stay the night.  After she hung up, she went in search of the nearest motel and booked a room.

Before Duncan and Leah broke up, he suggested that she become more ambitious with her talents at work.  She never thought that she would be taking a piece of his advice, certainly not after their split.

But as Hunter grew into a young man, Leah searched for her escape through work.  She buried herself in her research, poured her heart and soul into the pursuit of recognition, and once again, became quite successful.

Work kept her mind off the cycle of rejection that she was beginning to realize might last forever.  While she wrote diligently in front of her computer screen, she thought only of Hunter, with his sandy hair and glowing green eyes, lanky build, and charming demeanor.  Work made her feel powerful even as she was powerless to change her past.

One day, her editor approached her with an assignment.  Leah was almost forty-five at the time.  “I want you to do a very special article,” he said.

Leah looked up at the man.  “Oh?  What about?”

He handed her a stack of papers.  “Aging in Hollywood.  I have several people lined up for interviews.”

She looked down at the top of the pile in her hands.  Brendan Caldwell’s name was near the top of the list.  She returned to her office feeling nervous.

It was too late, she thought.  Brendan Caldwell hated her, and would always hate her.  As soon as he found out that she was the one doing the interview, he would certainly cancel it.

But she had a dream that night.  All her life, all her dreams with Brendan Caldwell in them involved Brendan running away from her.  But that night, he was sitting down with her, hugging her.  She had never felt so much love in her life.

She walked into the interview room like a bride in a procession.  He was sitting there, hands clasped in his lap, his posture friendly, open.

She stumbled to sit down.  “Hello, Mr. Caldwell,” she croaked.

He didn’t speak at first.  When he did, his voice was low.  “It’s been a long time, hasn’t it, Leah?”

She wiped the hair from her face nervously.  “And I’m sure you’ll have a lot to share for the interview.”

He placed a hand on her notes.  “That can wait.  First, let’s talk you and me, okay?”

She looked at him suspiciously.

“Do you hate me?” he said.

“No,” she said.

“Then, do you love me?”

“Brendan, I was your stalker.”

He paused.  “I know.”

“You see, that’s what makes me so angry.”

“What?  Unrequited love?”

“No, of course not.”

“You lie.”

“I know.”

“Then you do love me.”

She paused.  “If I admit it, will you leave me alone?”

He smiled.  “Yes.”

The people standing around didn’t know what was going on.

“Did you hate me back then, Leah?”

She looked him straight in the eyes.  “Yes, I did.”

“Why?  Because of Jeremy?”

“That and other reasons, yes.”

“I was just a kid, Leah.  I’m sorry for what I did.  I was sorry then.  I suffered a lot growing up.  I was even suicidal for a long time.”

“What’s the point, Brendan?  I was your stalker.  For years, you wanted me as far away from you as possible.  Hell, you even had me arrested.  Why are you interested in me now, after all these years?”

He was quiet.  “Because I love you. And I hate you.”

She wasn’t sure if she’d heard him right.  “After all this time, you’ve finally realized that you love me? And you hate me?”

He was quick to respond.  “That’s right.”

“What a pickup line.” Then she fell into stunned silence. Remembering that she had work to do, she said, “Let’s just do this interview, okay?”

He agreed.  The interview went smoothly, even though it was, by far, the strangest one that Leah had ever conducted.

Afterwards, she slapped her notes down and said, “Brendan, I don’t want to hear this.  I’m sorry, but too much has happened.  If you had said this twenty years ago, maybe I would have listened.  But now, I just don’t think it’s possible.”

Brendan smiled at her mysteriously.  When he left the room, Leah could see that he was disappointed. She then followed him, and his eyes burned into hers.

She went home to her son that night, and thought of Cameron.  Of all of her boyfriends, he was the one whom she thought she would most likely end up with.  She was not obsessed with him, like she was with Brendan, but she had loved him fully and completely, and would have been faithful to him for a lifetime.  The separation from him caused, within her, a tumult of painful emotions, feelings that she had thought at one time in her life that she would never get over.

While with him, she had been so certain that he would be her husband—that he was the one to take away all of the conflicting feelings that she had had for Brendan.  But that’s not how it turned out.

In the end, she found out that Brendan had feelings for her.

She talked with her fourteen-year-old son in the kitchen, chatting about his day at school, teasing him about his crush on one of the girls in his math class.  Hunter was the real joy and meaning in her life, and there was nothing in this world that would make her take back the years that she had spent with him.

After he had gone to bed, she turned on her computer and began to write.  While it was booting up, she filled the kettle and boiled some water for some tea.

She brought her steaming mug of tea back with her into the study and saw the screen saver flickering on the monitor.

The night was quiet and peaceful.  Over the years, Leah learned to love living in the city.

She thought about writing a book.  Perhaps about her life experiences.  Who knows?  Maybe somebody would read it.

She began to type, and smiled as she did.

She sent a final letter to Cameron.  In it, she told him about her family, the developments with her career, and news concerning some of the college friends he had lost touch with.

She didn’t write anything personal.  She figured there was a time and place for that, and now was the time to let bygones be bygones and leave it all behind.

Seven years later, she got a call from him.  He was never married and his parents had passed away years ago.

“I’m sorry, Leah,” he said.

She paused.  “Don’t worry about it, Cameron.  It was a long time ago.”

“It’s important to me.  Now that I’m older, I think I finally understand that I shouldn’t have done what I did to you.”

“You did what you had to do, and under the circumstances, I’m not entirely sure I wouldn’t have done the same thing, myself.”

“You’re so kind, Leah,” he breathed.

She thanked him, but knew that it wasn’t true.

After the conversation was over, Leah hung up the phone and cried.

She had spent a lifetime trying to avenge what once went wrong, only to find that the fault lay within herself.  Brendan wasn’t at fault for Jeremy’s death; and Cameron wasn’t at fault for ruining her life.  Leah herself was to blame for all the tumult of her past: simply by not forgiving them.

Leah pulled out the locket from her jewelry box.  She opened it, and inside was a picture of Brendan—the same one she had cut out from the yearbook when she was fourteen.

Beside it, she placed a picture of Hunter, and tears came from her eyes.  They were, indeed, two handsome men.