A Stranger on the Beach. Michele Campbell

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СКАЧАТЬ The yolk was vivid orange, and Aidan thought, Take me out in a box, I’m never fucking leaving this place.

      He brought plates to the table. She smiled up at him, grabbed his hand, kissed it, and he thought about having sex with her again. But this thing between them was more than sex. He didn’t want her to think of him as just some stud. He wanted to get to know her, and for her to know him. Well, not everything about him, not yet. He’d be nervous telling her about his past. He would start with the good things, and there were good things. He’d make her see.

      He turned on the burner, and the blue flame was beautiful to him. Scrambled eggs and toast—simple, you’d think, but he had a special technique involving butter and a long, slow cook over low heat that made them extra creamy. He took his time, humming as he worked, enjoying the feel of her eyes on him. When the eggs were perfect, he carried the pan over to the table and turned them out onto her plate.

      She took a bite and closed her eyes, savoring.

      “Mmm. These are the best eggs I’ve ever had,” she said.

      He served himself, sat down and tasted. He couldn’t disagree.

      “I’m all right at a couple of things,” he said, ducking his head modestly.

      “All right? More like amazing.” She raised an eyebrow suggestively.

      Now it was his turn to blush. But he couldn’t stand it if this was only about sex for her. People refusing to take him seriously was the story of his life. He wanted more from Caroline, and she kind of owed him, didn’t she? After the way he took care of her last night. Maybe she didn’t owe him love, or even gratitude, but she owed him respect. He hoped she wouldn’t turn into some stuck-up bitch, or he’d be really sad. He ate his eggs in silence, staring down at the plate, until she teased him with her bare foot on his leg.

      “Cat got your tongue? I didn’t take you for the silent type,” she said, nudging him playfully. Her toes were painted the color of blood.

      Her legs where they emerged from the bathrobe were perfect and shapely. An hour ago, those legs had been wrapped around his neck. He could take her back to bed and make her beg for it. He had power here. He needed to be more confident, and not be cowed by her beauty or her money.

      “I’m feeling cooped up,” he said. “It would be nice to get outside. What if we went for a walk on the beach?”

      “Oh.” She put her fork down. “That’s not such a good idea.”

      Figures, uh-huh. Should he be surprised if she was like everyone else?

      “You’re embarrassed to be seen with me,” he said.

      “No. If I was, would I have been hanging all over you in the bar last night?”

      “Maybe. You were pretty drunk.”

      She leaned toward him, taking his hands and looking into his eyes. “Stop it, okay? I want to be with you. I want us to go places together. Just not right in front of my house where my neighbors can see. I’m married, you know.”

      He had this funny buzzing feeling in his head. He got it sometimes, like a warning bell, a bullshit detector. Was she playing him somehow? But she was saying all the right things. Things he wanted to hear.

      “All right. Where, then?” he asked.

      “What about your place? I’d love to see where you live.”

      He turned away, so she wouldn’t see how her request unnerved him. The two of them lived in different worlds, and he’d been ignoring it, hoping she would, too, or better yet, that she hadn’t noticed. He was working on changing his situation. Taking her to that shithole would blow the illusion, would make her see him for someone he wasn’t—or someone he was, but only temporarily, because of a string of rotten luck that she was going to help him reverse.

      “Ah, it’s messy. You know, guy living alone, and all,” he said.

      That was a lie. Aidan was a neat freak who cared for his few possessions meticulously. He did his laundry at the Wash N’ Go every Monday like clockwork, and never left a dirty dish in the sink. But his run-down studio apartment near the edge of town wasn’t much better than an SRO, with a hot plate and a mini-fridge standing in for a real kitchen, and a cramped bathroom with a cheap plastic shower. The furniture consisted of a sofa he got for free off Craigslist, a plastic table and chairs from Walmart, and a twin bed from his mother’s attic that smelled like piss and mothballs. Aidan’s paycheck went to his clothes and his car, the restitution payments from his conviction, and the rent. When he got done with all that, he was so broke that he scrounged his meals at work.

      Caroline would hate him if she knew how he really lived, and he’d hate her right back for knowing. He was already walking that thin line with her, the one between love and hate. He loved Caroline, but he hated city people. They were the reason guys like him couldn’t live in this town anymore. Coming in with their millions, buying up every shotgun shack to build their mega-mansions. Gramps saw how it was going and sold, but that was years ago, and the land changed hands two or three times since then. It made the speculators rich, and Aidan and his brother never saw a penny. Then Caroline came in like a queen, riding in her golden carriage. Aidan was the guy running along behind, cleaning up the horse shit. If she didn’t know that, he wasn’t about to enlighten her by letting her see his crappy apartment.

      “I know somewhere better,” he said. “A place you would never find on your own, that’s really special. Come on, get dressed, I’m taking you out.”

14

      “Where are we going?” I asked.

      “You’ll see,” Aidan said, his mouth set in a hard line.

      We were in my car, speeding along the main road. Aidan was driving. The sky had clouded over. The wind had picked up, and the trees swayed. In the gaps between the houses, the surf pounded the beach like it was angry. A storm was coming.

      “I thought you needed to go back to the Red Anchor to pick up your car. But we’re headed in the opposite direction,” I said.

      He stared out the window, stone-faced, and didn’t reply. A cold knot of fear gathered in my stomach. The first time I saw Aidan, I knew he was trouble. But I was so desperate for distraction, and he was so tempting, that I ignored the warning signs. When we were in the shower together, and he said he’d take care of Jason for me, I knew I should have kicked him out. But I wanted the sex. When he offered to make me scrambled eggs for breakfast this morning, I should have asked him to leave instead. But the sight of him, standing shirtless and barefoot in my kitchen, the morning sun illuminating his perfect body, silenced my doubts. After breakfast, when he leaned over to kiss me, I should have pulled away. Instead, my lips parted, and I kissed him back. He drew me to my feet and pulled me tight against him. We were on the verge of going to bed again when he said something that made my blood run cold.

      “Once your husband’s out of the picture, we can do this all day.”

      I pulled back.

      “Out of the picture? What’s that supposed to mean?” I’d said, looking him in the eye.

      “Nothing,” he replied.

      His arms tightened around my waist. It took an effort to break СКАЧАТЬ