Otherworldly Bad Boys: Three Complete Novels (87 page)

I got home late the next day because I had to rework my latest Vigil article to Henry’s liking. He felt that the stories were getting stale. It was the same-old, same-old, or so he claimed. Vigil saved someone. I asked him about it. There were pictures.

“This isn’t going to be news for much longer,” he told me. “People want change. They want excitement. You have to come up with something else.”

But I didn’t have anything else. The hell of it was that new things were happening. Vigil and I were investigating where The Phantom kept his trophies, but I didn’t think I could write about that, because it would give away too much. I couldn’t let the world know that The Phantom was Hayden Barclay. Also, I couldn’t let people know about our clues. After all, Barclay could read the paper and know how close we were to finding him. That might make him panic.

Henry had some ideas, but they meant substantial rewrites, and they kept me at the office until late.

When I got home, I was dragging a bag of Chinese takeout with me, because I didn’t have it in me to prepare any kind of food for myself. I couldn’t even stomach the idea of assembling a sandwich.

Airenne was in the living room, the TV blaring.

I brought my takeout in there. We didn’t have a kitchen table, so we usually ate in the living room. I could have taken my food to my bedroom, but that seemed rude. I still felt kind of guilty about “stealing” Callum Rutherford from Airenne, and I thought that I needed to play nice.

She sat straight up when she saw me. “Oh my god, Cecily, you’re back. You will not believe what I saw on the news. I recorded it. I’ll play it back for you.” She began hitting buttons on the remote control, and the screen changed.

“The news?” I said. “Is it about Vigil?” Had the stupid TV stations scooped us again?

“No, it’s not about Vigil,” she said, as if I’d had the stupidest idea ever. “It’s about Callum.”

If only she knew that the two of them were one and the same. I sat forward in my chair. “What about Callum?”

“You told me you two were officially together, right? That you’re his girlfriend?”

“Yeah,” I said. “So?”

“So,” she said, “then why was he out tonight at a society function with his usual group of bimbos?” She pressed a button on the remote, and the TV displayed an image of Callum walking into a building with a girl on each arm, and an additional girl on one of the girl’s arms. I guessed two girls weren’t enough for him.

“You sure that’s tonight?” I said. “Maybe it’s old footage that they shot a long time ago.”

“It’s tonight,” said Cecily. “Watch, they talk to him.”

I watched.

A reporter shoved a microphone in Callum’s face. He asked him questions about the charity benefit that they were attending.

“Well,” Callum said, grinning widely, “as you know, I love to share.” He kissed one of the blondes. Then the other. Then the third.

The girls all giggled.

I felt sick.

I wasn’t entirely sure why. I still had this strange feeling that Callum Rutherford was a different person than Vigil. But the fact was that they shared a body. And if that body was making love to me, then I didn’t think I wanted it kissing other girls.

Girls he hired.

It was disgusting. It was sordid.

And none of it made a bit of sense. Why did he have to hire his dates? Why did he insist on hiring so many of them? Did he really have to have three girlfriends?

I got up out of my chair, backing out of the living room.

“Sorry,” said Airenne. “But I thought you’d want to know.”

I nodded. “Yeah. Thanks.” I headed for my room.

Her voice floated after me. “Maybe he’s not as serious about you as you thought.”

I clenched my teeth. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“No. I don’t want you hurt, Cecily.” She sounded shocked.

Whatever. I slammed myself into my room.

It was quiet.

I’d planned on spending the evening doing some research on Davy Jones. I was going to google every possible combination of the words and Barclay’s name until I figured out what the connection was. I thought that Vigil and I needed to make some progress on that front.

But I couldn’t think about it now.

I felt betrayed.

And, on top of that, it made our cover story to Airenne suspect. Now it looked like we weren’t dating. How could he have done that to me? Didn’t he know that his being out with other girls would be embarrassing to me? Publicly embarrassing? Was he an insensitive jerk or simply an idiot?

I didn’t have a way to get in touch with Callum, per se.

I had a phone number that Vigil had given me, but it was for newspaper business.

Still, since that was the only way I knew to get in contact with him, it would have to do.

I pulled out my phone and dialed.

It rang. Of course, he wouldn’t answer. He never answered this phone. I left messages on it, and Vigil got back with me later.

I waited until the bland voicemail voice picked up.

After the beep, I said, “I need to talk to you.”

And then I hung up.

Airenne knocked on my door. “Cecily?”

“What?” I snapped.

“You never touched your Chinese food.”

I sighed.

Hours passed, and he didn’t get in touch with me. He didn’t crawl through my window. He didn’t call me back. He didn’t send me a text.

I ate my Chinese food in the living room with Airenne, grilling her about this charity event he was attending. How long would it last? When would he leave?

She was surprised he hadn’t told me about it. “What do you guys talk about?”

“We don’t talk a lot,” I muttered.

I managed to eat all of the Chinese food, which is quite a feat, because the portion sizes are huge. Usually, I had half of it leftover for lunch the next day. But I was too upset to stop eating, so I ate it all.

And then I felt pretty gross.

The time came for the charity event to be over.

I waited.

Still no word.

Hadn’t he gotten my message? Or was he spending time with his hired girls? Jewel had told me that he sometimes slept with them. What if he was doing that right now? What if he was having an orgy with all of those blondes?

I thought about him kissing all of them again.

It made me want to throw up.

Airenne went to bed eventually, because it was late.

I knew that I needed to do the same.

But I couldn’t go to sleep. I lay awake in bed, waiting for my window to open, for my phone to ring.

Around one in the morning, my phone beeped, letting me know I had a text message.

Frantically, I grabbed it.

The message was from Vigil. It said, “Sorry, I won’t be able to make it tonight. I’ll be in touch tomorrow.”

Wouldn’t be able to make it? What? Was that because he was busy with those girls?

Well, I wasn’t going to let this slide. If he wanted to fuck me, there were rules. I wasn’t some pushover girl who fell over onto her back when some hot guy in a costume tried to stick his dick in her.

Well, okay, it could really appear that way. I hadn’t exactly demanded anything from him before letting him screw me. We hadn’t had a talk about boundaries. I hadn’t ever heard him promise to me that we were exclusive. But he had said that we were together.

Very together.

That was how he had put it, I thought.

So, maybe I was crazy to think that meant that we weren’t going to see other people. I guessed I should have made sure to communicate to him that I wanted him not to kiss anyone except me anymore.

So, I would. I’d tell him.

Unless…

Unless he didn’t want to be together anymore. Maybe he’d decided that I wasn’t nearly as exciting as three big-breasted bimbos at once. How could I compete with that, anyway?

Of course, he was paying those girls.
Paying
them. Why?

I barely slept. I kept turning it all over in my mind, wondering what he was thinking, practicing what I was going to say to him when I saw him. Eventually, late at night, I managed to fall into something like sleep. It was shallow and easily disturbed.

When I woke up the next morning, I felt gross because I’d eaten too much Chinese food the night before, and exhausted and cranky because of my lack of sleep.

Somehow, I was going to have to wait until Vigil got in touch with me to resolve this. I didn’t know when that would be, and the thought of waiting interminably tied my stomach in knots.

I needed to talk to him. Now.

I didn’t have anything pressing going on first thing in the morning at
The Sun-Times
. And as long as I got my stories done on time, it would be okay if I didn’t show up at 9:00 AM sharp.

The Rutherford Enterprises building was only a few blocks from the newspaper offices anyway.

I knew that Callum at least put in an appearance there. After all, he was technically the CEO of the company. We hadn’t talked about it, but I’d always assumed that a playboy like Callum was in charge in name only and that someone else actually ran things. But now that I knew him, I wondered.

I bet he was there.

I bet I could go see him at work.

He couldn’t brush me off if I showed up in his face. He’d have to listen to me.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Rutherford Enterprises was housed in an enormous skyscraper that had the company’s name and logo emblazoned on the side of the building. It gleamed in the early morning sunlight, silver against the sky.

I climbed up the concrete stairs to the front door.

The entire front of the building was encased in glass—sleek and modern.

When I entered the front lobby, I could see that the rest of the building had that same look. Everything was contemporary, rounded, metal. It was such a difference from
The Sun-Times
, which looked like it hadn’t been updated since the 1940s.

It wasn’t hard to figure out where Callum’s offices were. The very top of the building. The floor that towered over everything.

I marched onto the elevator, hit the button for the top floor, and waited. More people piled into the elevator with me, pushing me further and further back. Eventually, the door closed.

The elevator moved.

It seemed we were stopping on nearly every floor.

When we did, some people exited the elevator, but others got on. It stayed at the same relative level of crowdedness.

I was beginning to feel nervous. Even though I’d stayed up all of last night thinking about what I was going to say to Callum, now I could hardly remember any of it. I knew that I’d had a lot of righteous anger working for me. But now, I felt cowed by the size and splendor of his office building.

This was Callum Rutherford I was talking about. He had more money than God. He owned half of Aurora—the half that wasn’t owned by organized crime. Here I was, walking into his domain, trying to tell him that he had to clean up his act? Was I crazy?

My stomach turned over, and I began to fidget with the edge of my shirt—a plain blue shirt that buttoned up the front. I wore it over a pair of black slacks and some black Mary Janes. My hair was in its typical braid. (Oddly, stealing Callum from Airenne had not made her relinquish the shower in the morning.) I looked professional, but I didn’t look stunning.

Hell, compared to the girls that Callum had been making out with last night, I looked positively boring.

But that’s mostly in presentation,
I reminded myself.
I could look like that too if I dyed my hair and wore the right clothes and makeup.

Hell, I
had
looked like that. Was that what he wanted from me? Was I not enough for him because I was too plain? Too no-nonsense?

The elevator dinged up another floor. The doors opened.

People exited. People entered.

My heart thudded in my rib cage. What was I going to say to him? Why couldn’t I remember?

I closed my eyes. I’d tell him he had to choose. I’d tell him he had to be with me and only me or I wouldn’t be with him at all.

And I’d mean it.

Wouldn’t I? Oh hell, I wasn’t sure. What if he refused? Would I really be able to resist him when he came to me at night, clad in all that black spandex, his deep voice sexy in my ear, his adept hands working on the most sensitive parts of my body?

I took a deep breath.

Sure, I’d resist him.

Sure.

Oh, who was I kidding? I was screwed.

The elevator was stopped again. People were nudging their way inside, pressing buttons for their floors.

I had to tell him anyway, even if I couldn’t resist him. If I rolled over and let him treat me like dirt, then I’d lose respect for myself. I’d lose respect for him. Eventually, it would all blow up in my face. So I had to tell him.