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I looked down again at the fork I’d barely used during our meal because I’d felt sick to my stomach. Ward got in these moods sometimes and over the years, I’d learned that there was nothing I could say to bring him out of them. Only time worked, time and sleep and sobriety. He finished another beer now and I knew he was glaring at me.
“Well?” he prompted.
“I just want you to feel better,” I told him, and he stood up, took out his wallet, and threw some money on the table. I quickly tried to calculate if it would be enough to cover the check but he was already pulling back my chair and taking my arm to escort me out of the restaurant. We moved fast into the dark parking lot.
“What the fuck is your problem, Sissy?” He swung me around and he bent slightly so that our faces nearly touched. “Why are you acting like a bitch again?”
“I’m sorry, I’m not—no—”
He’d shoved me and my back bumped hard against his car. “Shut up. Stop pacifying me. Do you think I don’t see it? Do you think I’m stupid?”
“No, of course I don’t think that. I’m sorry,” I said again.
“Look at me!” His fingers on my jaw forced me to. “How sorry are you?”
“I’m really sorry.” It was hard to talk with how he was squeezing. “I won’t do it again.”
“You’re not going to give me more excuses about your behavior, are you?”
I tried to shake my head but his grip didn’t allow it. “No,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”
Ward kissed me, pressing his mouth hard enough to mine that it hurt my lips and gums. He shoved his tongue in deep so that I almost gagged, too, but I stayed still and let him.
“I miss how you were,” he told me when he pulled back. “You used to be such a nice girl. It was this cheerleading bullshit that ruined you. That was when you started thinking you could treat me like shit. That was when you started cheating on me.”
Oh, no. “I don’t. I never would,” I swore. “I would never, ever—”
He kissed me again. His fingers moved from my jaw to grip my throat and I froze, but he didn’t tighten his hold. When he broke away, he was panting, and I tried to take in more air. “I put that ring on your finger as a promise,” he said. “It’s a promise that you’re mine, forever.”
I was afraid to speak or nod, and I didn’t even want to swallow and move my throat against his hand. I met his eyes and willed him to know that I was always faithful, that I wasn’t a bitch, that I was still the nice girl he’d met six years before. After what felt like hours, the pressure on my larynx eased slightly and then after another long stretch of time, he let go completely. He still stood close, though, and he kissed me again. It was a lot more gentle this time.
“I don’t want to fight with you, Sissy,” he murmured.
I shook my head. I didn’t want that, either.
“You’re still my girl, right?”
I nodded now, bobbing my chin up and down very fast so he’d know that I meant it.
“Good.” Ward put his arms around my waist and hugged me, not too hard and not too tight. I held myself stiffly at first but when he jiggled me slightly and told me to relax, I made myself lean against him and tried to will my heart to stop pounding, too. I breathed his cologne, the familiar odor that made my stomach twist.
“My girl forever.”
I closed my eyes and waited for him to let go, but he was right: it was going to last forever.
Chapter 5
Ilooked anxiously at the clock on the wall and then compared it to the time on my phone. They both agreed that I was late.
“Are you sure that you’re ok here? Are you sure you don’t need me to help you anymore?” I asked my manager, one of the bakery owners, but she shooed me toward the door.
“I’m fine! You can go, Lissa,” Chara told me. She wasn’t much older than I was, so we got along more like friends than boss and employee, and I didn’t want to run out and leave her swamped. “You’re always in such a rush!”
I was today, for sure. Just as I had been gathering up my stuff and getting ready go, a huge group of tourists had come in wanting to taste the Spanish and Cuban pastries we sold. They had totally cleaned us out ofbollos preñaosand a lot of the other shelves in the glass case were more than half-empty. We always did a good business, but the number of people crammed into the little shop had been almost overwhelming.
I couldn’t have left Chara to deal with all of them so I’d stuck around, but now I was in a rush to get to my second job at the grocery store and I drove fast. Oddly, almost all the parking spaces in town seemed to be full, like it was the Fourth of July parade day or something, so I had to park in the lot at Roy’s Tavern and run over to the NGS. And even more oddly, the store was more crowded than the bakery had been with all the tourists. I could barely make my way in through the door.
Then I saw why.
