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We head to the “freight elevator” which doesn’t look like any elevator I ever rode or ever would want to ride.
Henry punches a button that’s attached to a metal coil thing. There’s a screech and a rumble and our cage arrives. “Come on.”
We step in and it hoists us up through a seemingly endless concrete column that would be utterly dark if not for a sputtering makeshift utility light clamped to the side.
Fear spikes through me during the long flickers when I think the light might go out—I wasn’t prepared for how much like the well this would be—not the cage part, but how dark it is and the way we’re closed in by dark gray walls and you can see light way up high.
I move a little closer to Henry. I was so scared in that well for so long. Scared of dying. Scared to call for help. Scared it was Denny and his friends out there, looking for me, scared that they’d get to me first, but wanting so bad to get out. Scared of the sounds. But mostly I was scared of the dark. I would sit in a little ball. I would tell myself if I got really small, even the darkness couldn’t find me.
The elevator is taking forever, and I inch closer still, enjoying Henry’s nearness, his strength. I tell myself he’s just the vacuum cleaner salesman, not here to make me feel safe.
His fake currency still spends.
“Vicky,” he says.
I brace myself. Does he notice I’m being a freak? “What?”
“Are you going to smell me again?”
I smile. “It’s just a little rickety.”
“I forget you’re not used to this. Totally safe.” He puts his arm around me. “Okay?”
I don’t know whether the okay is about his arm around me or the safety statement. “Okay,” I say.
“I wouldn’t put you in here if I didn’t know it was safe. I wouldn’t do that.”
I nod. It’s not the elevator now, it’s him, doing strange things to my body. Him being protective. Like I’m one of his people.
“But if you want to smell me, you can.”
I don’t want to smell him. I don’t want the warm weight of his arm to feel so good. I want him to stop making me feel alive and happy. I want to not perk up in some soul-deep way when our gazes find each other from across a crowded room. I want him to not seem to admire the Vonda in me.
I want that not to feel amazing.
I lean in closer, stealing what doesn’t belong to me. My head isn’t exactly on his shoulder—it’s difficult to do that when you’re wearing a hard hat. But it’s close.
He brushes a lock of hair over my shoulder. His knuckles graze my jawline. His touch is featherlight. Barely there.
But the energy of it hums over my skin, spreading outward in a burn, like fingers of heat warming cold, remote parts of me.
I fight the urge to turn my face to his hand.
“You look hot in the hat,” he says.
“You’re just saying that.”
But when I do turn my head, his eyes are dark. Serious.
His voice lowers to a rumble. “I’m not just saying that, Vicky.”
Oh, I want to kiss him. And, if anything, an elevator shaft that looks like a well should be reminding me why I have an allergy to rich, powerful men. It’s not.
His eyes drop to my lips. My heart pounds.
The elevator grinds to a stop.
I’m shaking when we step out into wide open space, twelve stories over Brooklyn. And it’s not about fear.
