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Chapter Twenty-Three
Daphne
There’s spending two weeks with a man who’s kidnapped you.
And then there’s spending the rest of your life with the man you love.
Even if they’re the same man, it’s different.
Emerson and I had a shape to our days. A routine we were beginning to find again when I moved in with him. For the first ten days I’m home from the hospital, in his house, that rhythm is nowhere to be found.
My obsessive Collector is even more obsessive about making sure I get an appropriate amount of rest, which basically means he won’t let me do anything. He brings all my food to me in the studio. Carries me to bed at night. He refuses to take me to the downstairs gallery. I can’t beg hard enough to sway him.
Do you think I need a frame to fuck you until you’re delirious, little painter?
He does not.
It takes me way too long to realize Emerson’s stopped surfing.
He doesn’t say a word about it. It’s like he’s erased it from his life entirely. Which makes a certain amount of sense in the beginning. He doesn’t want to leave me alone for long. But when I’m healed enough to feel restless, when I get up and start circling the canvas again, he doesn’t surf.
Before, he went in the mornings, as soon as he woke up.
The next morning I turn over in bed and find him already awake. “Surf?”
Emerson’s eyes blank out. Gone. Back again. His mind is protecting him. Making art out of the moment. My skin prickles, but before I can press, he’s climbing out of bed and going into the bathroom.
This is what we did. Brush teeth. Base layers. It’s bitter out on the water. We walk downstairs together, and I steal as many glances at him as I can without falling. It’s a quick trip through the house to the mudroom.
Emerson’s wetsuit hangs on a hook near my winter things. Every piece is new. His wetsuit was torn when he ran through the woods after me, and my snow pants and coat were all beat up when I rolled onto the asphalt.
He reaches for the wetsuit.
His hand freezes a few inches from the fabric. Emerson’s expression goes cold.
It stays that way.
New tension hits his body like a wave. Like a freight train. His base layers don’t hide any of his muscles, or the too-fast rise and fall of his chest. His hand drops, but I can tell, I can see, that his body doesn’t know what to do. He makes a move for the door, like he’s going to run, but stops. All the color drains from his face. His eyes land on me, blank, wide, wild, and my mouth goes dry.
I should have known. I should have predicted. He saw me taken from the beach while he was out on the water. It had to have an effect.
“Wherever—” Keep it together, Daphne. “Go wherever you need to go. Okay?”
Agonized frustration crosses his face, darkening the heart-stopping blue-green of his eyes, and then Emerson pushes past me. Fast footsteps, up the stairs.
I follow him, fumbling for my phone.
Sin answers on the second ring, sounding groggy. “What.”
“It’s me. It’s Daphne. Emerson’s having a panic attack. What do I do?”
“Are you away from home?” He’s awake now. Alert.
“No. He tried to go surfing. We didn’t make it out of the mudroom. He went upstairs, but I don’t know where—”
“Bedroom closet,” says Sin.
I stop dead, halfway to the landing. “What?”
