Entangled Love (11 page)

“I don’t mean to interrupt, but Evelyn, I’ve been looking everywhere for you. You’re needed back at the office immediately.”

Evelyn heard his voice, and her eyes told her that Michael was looming over their table, but her brain couldn’t quite comprehend what he was doing on her date with Henry.  Henry had been about to kiss her, and she had been of a mind to let him. When she had heard Michael’s voice, it was like being thrown into a river of ice. Any attraction she had felt for Henry had shriveled up and disappeared.

“Michael, whatever it is can wait until tomorrow morning. As you can see, Henry and I were just finishing dinner. If you don’t mind, we can talk in the morning.”

“Actually, I do. Mind that is.” Michael reached out and grabbed her clutch and wrap from the empty chair, and then grabbed her hand, pulling her to her feet and away from the table. “This emergency can’t wait and Victor can’t handle it.
” Glancing back over his shoulder at her speechless date, Michael hid his smile and offered, “Harry, was it? Nice to meet you. Maybe next time we can chat and get to know each other. I’ll make sure Evelyn gets home after we take care of business at the office.”

Evelyn was trying to disengage her arm from Michael’s hold when she caught sight of Victor standing near the front of the restaurant. What was he doing here? “Michael…”

Glancing down at her, Michael cautioned her in a tight voice, “Evelyn, don’t. Just come with me.”

Still struggling, Evelyn tried once again to get her arm free, “Let me g…”

Bending down so that it appeared as if he was whispering in her ear, Michael told her, “Evelyn, you are leaving this restaurant with me now. If I have to throw you over my shoulder and carry you out of here like a sack of potatoes, you are still leaving with me. How you exit this fine establishment is entirely up to you.” Meeting her gaze, he held her eyes until she finally sagged in defeat and relaxed the tension in her arm. “Thank you. Now, I believe Victor has already called valet service for my car. You and I are going to get in said car, and then you can say anything you want to.”

Steering her to the front of the restaurant once again, she turned once, to see Henry staring at them with a befuddled look on his face. It was obvious that he had no idea of what had just transpired. When they reached Victor, Evelyn gave him a beseeching look, silently asking him to rescue her, but he studiously avoided meeting her eyes and she finally gave up. Victor was definitely on Michael’s side at the moment. She would take that up with him tomorrow.

By the time the car arrived and Michael had Evelyn seated and belted into the vehicle, he was surprised there wasn’t steam coming from her ears. She was one mad woman.

The minute he pulled away from the curb she started talking, in a not-so-pleasant voice, “Michael Cavanaugh Jennings, I don’t know who you think you are, but that was incredibly rude, even for you. Poor Henry is still wondering what just occurred. And as for this supposed emergency, you know we don’t have nighttime emergencies so cut the crap!”

“Watch your language! And I could really care less about what Harry thinks…”

“Henry! His name is Henry!” Evelyn took a calming breath, angry that she had raised her voice at Michael.

Michael glanced at her before turning his attention back to the road, “You and I have unfinished business and you have no right to go out with another man until we get things settled.”

“No right? Things are settled, or did you forget? I broke the rules and fell asleep. You don’t want to admit you might have some feelings or emotions inside that heart and mind you keep so carefully locked away, and I won’t live like that. I’m not anyone’s dirty little secret.”

“For the record, I have never referred to you a ‘my dirty little secret’ so get rid of the drama.”

Evelyn stared at him and shook her head, “You just don’t get it do you? I won’t be the woman you use for sex so you don’t have to pay a street whore. I want a flesh and blood man, who likes spending time with me, who can communicate with me about more than what part of my body he likes most and what he plans to do to said body.  I want someone I can dream with, and who doesn’t mind dreaming with me right beside him, while we ‘sleep’ together.”

“You don’t know what you want. Your body does though and I aim to remind you of that fact just as soon as I get home.”

Evelyn looked around her and realized that he was indeed taking her to his home, a place she had sworn she would never go again unless he was begging. He wasn’t begging!

She quickly tried to figure out a way to get away from him, and decided that when he stopped to key in his code for the security gate, she would simply get out of the car and walk away. He wouldn’t be able to back up without risking punching holes in all of his tires, and by the time he traveled around and came back to the exit side, she would be in a taxi and headed home.

Sitting back in her seat, she decided to just remain silent for the rest of the trip and ready herself to make her getaway.

Michael looked over to see Evelyn sitting back in seat, calmly waiting while he drove them home. Finally, it seemed that she was going to be reasonable about their interaction.   Relaxing slightly, he completed the drive in silence, thinking of all the things he wanted to do to her once he got her inside his home.

As he negotiated the security spikes protecting the front entrance to his parking garage, he pulled to a stop and rolled down the window to enter the security code. When Evelyn opened her door and exited the vehicle all he could do was yell at her to come back and wait for the gate to finish opening. The code box prevented him from opening his door to chase after her, and he quickly pulled his car around the lot and returned to the exit side, only to find no sign of Evelyn anywhere along the street.

Evelyn hailed the first cab that approached her and sat calmly as it delivered her home. Once there, she left the lights off and took herself to bed, crying herself to sleep at how screwed up the night had become. Michael wanted her in his bed, but not in his heart. She wanted to share her life with someone who would share it back, but the only one her heart seemed to want was Michael.

Michael drove as fast to Evelyn’s house as he could safely do. He passed a taxi exiting her subdivision and hoped that it was the same one that Evelyn had caught outside his house. As he pulled into her driveway, he saw that there were no lights on in the house and paused, wondering if she had decided to spend the night somewhere else; someplace where he couldn’t find her.

Glancing at the windows in Victor’s house, he saw those lights were off as well.  Maybe she was hiding in the house hoping he would just go away. Not happening!

Approaching the door, he rang the doorbell and then knocked on the door. When she didn’t answer, he continued to knock on the door, and finally started talking to her, demanding she open the door and let him in so they could talk.
So intent, was he on the front door, he didn’t hear Victor appear behind him.

“What in the name of all that’s sane, are you doing banging on Evelyn’s door like a lunatic? Do you have any idea of what time it is?” Victor demanded.

“Go away, Victor. This is between Evelyn and me.”

“In case you didn’t get the memo, she doesn’t want to talk to you right now or she would have opened the door. Michael, I let you get away with the shenanigans at the restaurant tonight, hoping that seeing Evelyn with another man might make you come to your senses. The evidence would lead me to conclude the opposite. Whatever you should have said, didn’t get said, or Evelyn wouldn’t be hiding in her bedroom right now, hoping you will just go away.”

“I’m not leaving until she talks to me. She got out of my car and ran away,”  Michael whined.

Victor wisely contained his smirk, knowing that Michael needed a chance to calm down and think clearly. “Why don’t you come over, I’ll make some coffee and we’ll talk for a bit?”

“I don’t want to talk to you. I want to talk to Evelyn.”

“Do you have anything new to say to her?” Victor queried. He knew that Evelyn would be able to hear their conversation from her bedroom, which was directly above the front door. Maybe if Michael had come to his senses, she would relent and open the door.

“Why would I say anything new to her? Nothing’s changed. She’s with me until I say otherwise, and I haven’t said that yet.”

Victor shook his head at how ridiculous Michael sounded.  He had to be one of the most stubborn men Victor had ever met. “Come next door and let’s talk.”

Michael shrugged his shoulders and followed Victor next door.

*****

“Michael, what are you doing?” Victor asked, handing the man sitting on his couch a bottle of water. Michael and Victor had been friends for what seemed like forever, but the man sitting on his couch wasn’t acting anything like the friend Victor remembered.

“What do you mean?” Michael drank deeply from the bottle of water before looking at Victor. He could feel the censure coming off Victor in waves. Victor had always been fairly easy to read. When he was mad, he didn’t try to cover it up, or pretend everything was okay. He let you know he was mad and why. He also wasn’t known for getting mad without a reason.  Michael sighed as he thought of the lecture that was most likely on its way.

Victor held onto his temper, when everything in him was urging him to knock some sense into Michael. Punching Michael would solve nothing, but it might make Victor feel better. He had watched Michael and Evelyn dance around each other for several months now. It was obvious to everyone that there was still chemistry between them, but Michael had gone out of his way these last several weeks to be hateful and downright mean to Evelyn every chance he got.  More than once, Victor had wanted to pop Michael in the mouth for the way he had spoken to Evelyn, but he had stopped himself, hoping against hope that Evelyn would finally reach the breaking point and do it herself. It looked like that point had arrived.

“You know what I’m talking about. I watch you all week, treat Evelyn worse than a stranger on the street. You try to humiliate her and cut her down every chance you get. Then, I see you leaving her house at all hours of the night, or basically kidnapping her from a restaurant because she was there with somebody else. Man, you’ve got to get it together.”

“I did not kidnap her from the restaurant. You saw her, she willingly left with me,” Michael smirked.

Victor shook his head, “You my friend, are an idiot. Evelyn only left with you to avoid making a bigger scene and embarrassing not only herself, but Henry.”

“She had no business being out with Harry…”

Victor snorted in disgust, “Get his name right. It’s Henry. It’s the least you can do after tonight.”

Michael said nothing. He would not give the man the satisfaction of actually using his correct name. He didn’t owe him anything.

“So what happened after you left the restaurant?”

Michael huffed out a breath, defeat marring his features, “She waited until I was keying in the security code for the parking garage, and then just walked away from the car and got in a cab. I couldn’t even get out of the car. I had to pull through the parking lot and return to the exit side. By then she was gone. I drove out here, hoping that she had come home.”

Victor was laughing so hard he had to hold his sides. Evelyn had certainly won this round. What he wouldn’t have given to see the look on Michael’s face when Evelyn calmly walked away from the car; leaving him helpless to do anything about it.

Michael scowled at Victor, not liking being laughed at one bit. “Yeah, it was real funny. I felt like a fool.”

Victor sobered and pounced, “You are a fool. That woman next door has carried a torch for you for so many years and what do you do with it? Nothing but abuse it. She was so confused the day you left town. All of her life she was the one who bailed her dad out. You remember how it was when we were in school. Instead of using her trust money to buy clothes, or jewelry, or things, she paid the staff salaries, she paid the repair men, she paid the household bills…Taking care of her father’s responsibilities had become a habit with her.

“When her father told her she needed to marry Henry, it was more about her habit of taking care of her father’s problems, than marrying some man she hadn’t even met. Up to that point, she had never walked away from her familial responsibilities.  You and I,” Victor gestured back and forth between he and Michael with his hand, “we don’t understand that. We had loving families that took care of us. How many times, growing up, did you have to worry about paying the electric bill, or the grocer?”

Michael was listening, and the longer Victor talked, the more memories assailed him.  Memories of buying Evelyn’s lunch or just happening to have an extra ticket to the school dance. Or sliding an extra hundred dollars in her wallet when she wasn’t looking. He and Victor had never talked about it, and would never have discussed it with Evelyn. Not because of pride, but because they had known how tightly she was trying to hold things together, and neither of them wanted to pull the string and have to watch her world unravel. So they kept silent, and worked behind the scenes whenever possible. They protected her from their families figuring out her circumstances, and were the best friends they could be.

As thoughts of the teen years came back, more recent memories also came to mind. Memories of him belittling her, or talking coldly to her in the office. He was so ashamed at how he had been treating her. 
Why was everything so hard with her? Love was supposed to be easy, and fun, and the best thing that happened to you? Not filled with struggle, anger, and despair.

Michael seemed so lost in his thoughts; Victor finally just sat back and watched his friend put it all together. After fifteen minutes, Michael finally looked up to find Victor staring at him. “Figure anything out?” Victor asked him.

Michael shrugged his shoulders, “It wouldn’t matter if I did. After tonight, I don’t think Evelyn will ever speak to me again. To say I was an ass is putting it mildly.”

Victor nodded his head, “She’s forgiven you before. She’ll forgive you again.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“I can’t. But I can tell you this, you need to get your head out of your ass and start letting your heart direct you. Your head isn’t doing such a good job.”

“What if she leaves me again?” Michael asked.

Victor shrugged, “Then at least you can say you tried. You won’t have the regret of not knowing. She didn’t really leave you three years ago – you left her. And by the way, it’s usually a requirement to actually have someone before you can consider them to have left you. Right now, from where I’m sitting, you don’t have Evelyn.”

“This is supposed to be easy. Why is it so hard?”

“What’s supposed to be easy?” Victor wasn’t sure what Michael was talking about.

“This thing between Evelyn and I. It’s supposed to be easy.”

“Exactly what is the thing between you and Evelyn?” Victor wanted Michael to finally put a name to it. He had been avoiding that for years. If he had any hope of getting Evelyn back, he needed to learn to voice his feelings and admit to them.

“You know…this thing going on between Evelyn and I.” Michael was getting a little annoyed that Victor was pushing him to put an actual name to he and Evelyn’s relationship.

“Oh, you mean the arrangement you have with her where she services you like a common street whore, but you never pay her. Is that what you were talking about?”

Michael surged to his feet in anger, “I have never treated Evelyn like a common whore. And the arrangement was by mutual consent.  Just because we don’t sleep at each other’s house, doesn’t make it cheap.”

Victor was spitting mad as Michael tried to defend his treatment of Evelyn, “In my book it does. You don’t spend any time with her, even as a friend, outside of the bedroom. You’re destroying what little confidence that girl has. She actually asked me if I thought she was ‘girlfriend’ material the other day. She’s beginning to think that the reason you can’t admit to your feelings is somehow her fault, you asshole.”

Michael was taken aback. Evelyn was blaming herself because he wanted to protect his heart from further injury. “But I’ve never said anything to make her think that….”

Victor shook his head in disgust, “That’s right man, you’ve never said anything. Do you ever compliment her? Do you ever ask her how her day went, or do you just get right down to it?”

Michael couldn’t answer.
What had he done? If another man had treated Evelyn the way he had, he would want to kill him.

Dropping his head into his hands, Michael felt the tears well up in his eyes. He didn’t even try to stop them. He had screwed up badly. Looking up at Victor he asked, “Do you think she’ll ever forgive me?”