Meant For Me (19 page)

Mind fuzzy from sleep, body still tired from the long drive, I tried to figure out why she looked so urgent. Angry.

Chloe dangled something in my face. My eyes crossed for a second before I realized she was holding the Anya bracelet over me. Shit. She’d found it before I’d had a chance to explain.

If I had been awake, I would have handled it better. But I said the first thing that came into my head. “What were you doing digging in my pockets?” Chloe didn’t seem like she would go through my stuff. It wasn’t meant to be an accusation but just a curious question because it seemed out of character. But it sounded wrong, totally wrong, and I knew it as I watched outrage cross her face.

She pointed to the floor.

I wasn’t sure what that meant. Using my elbows, I tried to prop myself up so I wasn’t talking up at her. I needed coffee and to clear my head. It took effort to interpret what she was trying to communicate. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Her lips pursed. She was already dressed in shorts and a T-shirt and she pulled her phone out of her pocket and typed.

I found it on the floor next to your clothes. I stepped on it.

“Oh. Sorry. I was going to tell you. Last night I saw you got texts from Anya and so after you were asleep I went to see her. She gave me the bracelet.”

Her eyebrows shot up.

You what???? You should have taken me with you!!!

Uh-oh. I sat up even further, pushing the comforter off me. “I didn’t want to wake you up. And I didn’t want you to be hurt. Anya wasn’t exactly friendly and I didn’t want you to see that. I wanted to explain to her that you…” I stopped talking. None of that sounded right. It sounded like I thought she was a little kid who couldn’t handle herself. I had been on the verge of saying that I was going to explain to Anya that Chloe didn’t talk.

She figured that out, obviously. A sound of pure exasperation came out of her mouth and she made two fists. Then she picked up a pillow and hit me with it.

“Baby, calm down.”

Because that is literally the two stupidest words you can ever say to a woman. Again, I blamed the grogginess.

Chloe hit me again, this time right in the face. Then she dropped the pillow, threw her hands up in the air, and turned away from me. She tucked the bracelet in her pocket, followed by her phone, then grabbed her backpack. Wait a minute. She was leaving.

No way.

I jumped out of bed naked and reached for her. “Chloe. What are you doing?”

Whirling, she held her hand out like she wanted something from me.

“What? What do you need, baby?” I took her hand.

She yanked it back out of my touch. For a brief second, she glanced down at my naked body and got flustered, her cheeks turning pink. Then she made a gesture in the air. A letter… a number. Something. Then she fanned herself. Did the ‘sounds like’ gesture then laughed.

What the fuck. What could possibly be funny right now?

After a second, it came to me. “Oh, money? You want your money? You can’t be serious about leaving. Where are you going?”

She pointed up.

“Home? I’ll drive you home if you want to go now. Whatever you want.”

But she shook her head, pointed to me and made an X.

Nice. She wanted to go home but not with me. “Let me take you home and we can talk about it.”

With a sound of annoyance, she bent over and yanked my jeans off the floor. In another second she had my wallet out and removed her money from it. She was serious. She was going to leave. Somehow she thought she was going to be able to get herself back to Maine from New York City with five hundred bucks and no ability to communicate.

“Stop. Just stop. Let me get dressed and we can hit the road.” I reached for her and she dodged my touch and ran for the door.

Holy shit. I bolted after her but had to stop when I got to the open doorway. I was naked. She was tearing down the hallway and I doubled back to yank my clothes on and grab the room key so I didn’t get locked out. By the time I got to the elevator she was already gone. I took it down, barefoot, and rushed through the lobby, looking left and right. There were two entrances to the hotel- one on Lexington and one on 42
^nd
- so I had to guess which one she would have exited through. When I got to the street, there was no sign of her. I ran around the corner and still nothing. I even came back in through a Starbucks that was connected to the lobby and scoured the place for her. No Chloe.

Oh, my God.

I was terrified what would happen to her.

For five minutes I kept searching, then I went back for my phone and texted her.

She did at least answer.

I’m fine. Just leave me alone. I’m mad at you.

Why can’t we talk about this? I’m worried about you being by yourself.

And I’m sick of you thinking I’m a little kid. I don’t need you to do things for me that I can do myself. It wasn’t fair of you to go see Anya.

She was right. I knew she was right. I did tend to act like she couldn’t handle anything on her own. But it was different than it would be with another girl her age. She did have limitations. She couldn’t deny that. And what was so wrong about worrying about her? It was a sign I cared. I’d always had her back. I had done nothing but offer to help her. I hadn’t pushed her, in fact, I’d put the brakes on having sex on the beach. So how could she just walk out so easily and leave me to worry about her?

As I paced the hotel room back and forth, wondering what to do, I was both worried and annoyed. I wasn’t known for having good responses to being hurt. I tended to lash out and hurt back. Demanding the engagement ring back from Caitlyn was a classic example of that. So before stopping to think about how totally fucking stupid it was, I responded to Chloe.

So what, taking off without talking to me isn’t childish?

Yep. Brilliant. When she didn’t answer, I fought the urge to throw the phone across the room. Instead I took the used condoms I had abandoned on the nightstand and took them to the bathroom and tossed them. Then I turned the shower on with no hot water. I stepped into the cold water and let it pelt against me with icy lashes both to focus my thoughts and to cool my anger.

It didn’t work.

When my lips started to turn blue, I got back out and made a half-hearted effort to dry off before tossing my belongings in my bag and leaving. First stop, Grand Central Station to look for Chloe. Then Penn Station. Then LaGuardia. The odds of finding her were about nonexistent but I had to try. I also debated calling her father but I knew that would just worry him and there wasn’t a whole lot he could do about it from Maine.

I was stepping on the subway when it occurred to me that maybe Chloe would go to Anya’s. Cursing myself for not copying Anya’s number, I decided showing up at her apartment was worth a shot.

As I held onto the pole and tried not to fall into the guy sitting in the seat behind me, I felt my phone vibrate.

Childish? I can give you childish. I never want to see you again.

I pursed my lips. Yep. That was childish.

Even knowing she’d done it on purpose, it still hurt. A violent lacerating, blood gushing wound of pure pain.

I’d fallen in love and our relationship was gone as quickly, and silently, ironically, as it had arrived.

You’re right. That is childish. We need to talk about this.

Ethan. Stop trying to fix me when you can’t even fix YOU
.

If she had tried to find the deepest way to hurt, she couldn’t have found a better way than that. It was painfully true. She was right. I was a mess. A fuck up. Tenuous plans that I wasn’t even sure I wanted to follow.

I’m not trying to fix you.

I honestly didn’t think I was. Sure, I wanted her to talk, but that was fair.

I care about you. I want you safe. You’re making me sound like some kind of pervert who thinks of you as a little kid.

The train jerked and I fell forward two feet. I hit send before I meant to.

So I typed again.

I know you’re an adult. But there is nothing wrong with me wanting to protect you and make things easier for you. If you’re defensive about that, it’s your problem, not mine.

Yeah, that was the way to fix things between us. But it pissed me off. She was acting like she needed to put some kind of pedo alert on me. Yet at the same time she had been totally willing to have sex. So who was fucked up in the head here?

Truthfully, probably both of us.

Chloe didn’t answer.

At Anya’s, I rang the buzzer. Hard.

“What?”

“Is Chloe here?” I demanded.

“What the fuck is with you people? No. Go away.” Her voice sounded trembling, like I’d woken her up or she was hungover or something.

I believed Anya. I didn’t have any reason to believe she would protect Chloe if she were there. Standing on the sidewalk, backpack on my shoulder, I debated what to do.

The door to the building slammed open and Anya spilled out onto the sidewalk, a crying baby on her hip. An older guy had shoved her. He threw a diaper bag and a duffle bag after her.

“Hey!” I yelled. “What the hell are you doing? She has a baby for chrissake.” Who shoved a woman with a baby?

Anya was wearing a ratty tank top, tiny denim shorts, and flip flops. Her makeup was running down her face, either from sleep or tears or both. The baby on her hip was sobbing, obviously terrified, his blond hair sticking up and his face beet red. He was in a onesie, his plump fingers clinging to Anya’s thin arm.

“Mind your own business,” the guy told me with a thick New York accent. “I’m evicting this bitch.” He shook Anya, making her rattle back and forth on the sidewalk.

“Get your
fucking
hands off of me!” Anya screamed at the man.

At least now I had a place to redirect the anger that was boiling up inside me. “Seriously, man, stop touching her,” I said, in a cold voice. “Whatever issue you have with her, you have no right to put your hands on her.”

“Hold Asher for a second,” Anya said to me, lifting the baby toward me.

I took him instinctively, cuddling him close and murmuring reassuring shushes in his ear.

The minute her son was safe, Anya turned and whaled on the guy. She went at him like an alley cat, swatting and kicking and hissing. “Don’t ever touch me again!” she screamed. “Fucking pervert.”

The guy tried to block her blows, and he stumbled backwards. “Stop it, you crazy bitch. You should have just paid your goddamn rent.”

“I
did
.”

“Hey, uh, Anya, just let it go,” I said, glancing around nervously. The baby had calmed down and was clinging to me, his eyelashes damp with tears, clear liquid running out of his nose onto his lip. “You don’t want the cops showing up.”

Somehow I didn’t think it would go in her favor if they did. She looked fierce and down on her luck and in my experience the older white guy usually won in situations like this, baby or not. Bending over, firm grip on the baby, I hauled her bag off the ground and put the strap over my shoulder. “Let’s go.”

She gave the guy one last clobber than grabbed her other bag and turned to me, breathing hard. “Fine.”

I watched the landlord over my shoulder until we were a few feet away. I didn’t want him following though I didn’t see why he would. “I hope you feel good about throwing a mother into the street,” I said, because I couldn’t resist.

“Junkie whores shouldn’t have children,” he said, before retreating into his building.

“Dick,” she said vehemently, tucking her hair behind her ears. “I’m not a junkie or a whore, just for the record. And I did pay my rent. I just can’t prove it. And when I refused to suck him, he threw me out.”

That was appalling. “Seriously? Wow. That’s disgusting.”

Her jaw worked. “Just another day, just another asshole. He’s about nine hundred on the list of men who have tried to blackmail me with sex.”

That was really damn disturbing. “I’m sorry. So do you have somewhere to go?” We were walking, but I wasn’t sure where. I looked down at the baby. He needed a hat or something. The sun was beating on his round cheeks and he was squinting as he tried to look up at me.

“I have a friend who lives in Queens. I guess I’ll go there.”

“Do you have money for the subway?”

She shot me a dirty look. “I’m not that broke.” Then she wiped under her eyes and begrudgingly said, “Okay, maybe I am.”

Her sigh was heartfelt and I felt bad for her. It must be exhausting to try and be so badass all the time.

“So what is up with you and Chloe?” she asked. “Did you lose her?”

My chest tightened. “We had a fight. She got pissed about me coming to see you last night.”

“You didn’t tell her?”

Anya shook her head. “Dude. Bad move.”

“Tell me about it. But I didn’t want you hurting her. She’s really sweet and sensitive.”

She snorted. “Unlike me, you mean. I’m the bitch who would hurt your fragile girlfriend.”

“Something like that,” I agreed, because what was the point in lying?

“I’ll take my son back now, thanks.” She held her hands out with a wry expression.

“Sure.” I handed him over and watched her hug him close, kissing his forehead. “How much money do you have, seriously? I can’t just leave you.”

“It’s not your problem.”

“You’re Chloe’s sister and Asher is a baby. I would be a total asshole if I just got into my car and drove off.”

She eyed me. “Holy crap, I almost believe you mean that.”

“I do.” I pulled Anya into a doorway to a shop that was closed, boarded up and graffitied. “Here.” Digging into my backpack I glanced around to make sure no one was watching us, and I pressed the ring box I had forgotten to take out of my backpack into her hand. “Pawn this. Don’t take less than fifteen hundred for it. It’s worth five grand retail.”

Her mouth dropped open as she flicked the box open. “You want me to take my sister’s engagement ring?”

“No. It’s not Chloe’s. It’s from my ex.”

She hesitated. “What do you want in return for this?”

“Nothing.” I could see why she would think that, but I really didn’t. I just couldn’t stand the thought of Chloe’s twin wandering around the city homeless with a baby. In a way, it was helping Chloe too. She would want me to do the right thing. I knew her heart was huge and she would help Anya in any way she could if her sister would accept the help. “Just don’t end up in a situation you can’t get out of it.”