Paranormal Erotic Romance Box Set (5 page)

Was there a bill due? Did I have a pimple? Is that a lump?
Did Brandt really love me? Ah…

Did Brandt really love me? Could that be it?

Now I know how Brandt really felt about me, but at the
time, I was encased in an impenetrable bubble of indefinable fear. Back then, I
didn’t speak of intuition. Things were simply black or white; shades of gray
were for socks or dingy undershirts. However, these days I see they’re also for
books.

At any rate, as much as I wish I gave my fear the respect
it deserved and honored it for the warning it was, I would not have believed
it. I mean, if closing his hands around my neck in the front seat of his car
while he called me a whore was not a warning, what was? But the only thought I
dared to make my truth was that Brandt was in love with me. He told me all the
time we had the perfect life and it would only get better. Why would he lie?

And on the ninth day, the day before my marriage to
Brandt, I decided the time had come to confront Nellie Daniels about my chronic
avoidance.

The day was humid and Katt and I were busy packing my bag
for the honeymoon. I spoke to Brandt at exactly three o’clock that afternoon
and he instructed me to meet him at the Clerk’s office at nine o’clock the next
morning. After the brief ceremony, we were off to Cape Cod for a blissful week
at the Battleroy Hotel.

“What if he doesn’t show up?” I said to Katt as I folded
the new negligee I purchased for our wedding night. “What if I get there and he
is not?”

“So much the better,” Katt said and folded my emerald silk
blouse and placed it in my suitcase.

“That’s a terrible thing to say. You don’t understand, if
Brandt snubbed me, if he doesn’t show up, I promise, I will just die.”

Katt cocked her head and glared at me.

“Sophia Pearson, if I ever hear you say that again, if you
ever mention again that you will die if that man does or does not do something,
I will kill him myself!” Katt said and walked out of my room.

I ran after Katt and she flopped onto the couch and put
her face in her hands and started to cry. I sat down next to her and put my arm
around her shoulder.

“Katt, I’m sorry. It was a terrible thing for me to say.”

“Too much importance,” Katt said, “you place too much
importance on Brandt Therrault. You are an amazing girl, absolutely beautiful,
smart and funny. I’ve held my tongue, more or less this whole time, but
goddammit, I cannot do it anymore!”

“Exactly what don’t you like about him?” I said and pulled
some strands of damp hair away from her face.

“I don’t know what it is, but there’s something,” Katt
said and grabbed my leg. “Sophia, I know you will go forward with this and I do
not want to scare you, but promise me that if you feel the least bit of danger,
at any fucking time, you will leave him and not look back.”

I can still feel the chill that crept from my scalp down
to my toes after Katt said that. She trembled outwardly while my insides rocked
and rolled, sloshing around like an oil drum loose in the cargo hold of a
tanker. She felt it, whatever it was, too.

“Katt, I promise you that if I feel the least bit of fear,
I will run,” I said.

Katt smiled and hugged me.

“You’re like my sister, Sophia. I don’t want anything to
happen to you.”

“And you’re more my sister than my actual sister. I
promise, I will heed your advice,” I said.

At four o’clock that afternoon, after Katt and I had a
nice cry and we finished packing my suitcase, the phone rang. And after Katt
was on the receiving end of no less than ten calls from Nellie begging to know
where I was, I decided it was time.

Katt and I left the apartment and headed toward the coffee
shop to confront Nellie Daniels.

“Please, Katt,” I said as I grabbed her arm as we neared
the coffee shop, “I know it’s been super annoying for you to take all these
calls from Nellie and I’ve not painted the nicest picture of the girl, but I
beg you not to say anything mean to her. There is something about her that is
very fragile. She has this weird obsession with people. It’s going to crush her
to find out that Brandt and I are marrying.”

“I won’t say a word,” Katt said as we approached the
coffee shop.

The bell attached to the front door of the coffee shop
rang as I opened the door and we walked in. I spotted Nellie behind the counter
rolling silverware into paper napkins.

“There she is,” I said to Katt and gestured in Nellie’s
direction.

“Sit anywhere you like,” Nellie said as she kept her eyes
focused on the silverware.

“Oh my God,” Katt said and grabbed my arm. “That is the
infamous Nellie?”

Nellie looked up from her duties and stared right at me.
She threw one of the napkin-wrapped silverware packages into a bus tub and took
her apron off.

“Yep,” I said and sighed as Nellie walked from behind the
counter and came toward us.

“Lord, Sophia,” Katt said, “she’s simply vile.”

Nellie stopped short and lifted her glasses off her face.

“I don’t believe my eyes! You must have a twin, ma’am,”
Nellie said and grabbed my arm. “I used to have a best friend who looked
exactly like you.”

I chuckled and looked down at my feet.

“Yes, I’m sorry, Nellie,” I said.

“Nellie?” she said and looked around the room. “Did you
call me Nellie?”

“Of course I did. It is your name, right?”

“Well, yes it is. I’m just surprised you remember after
all these months!”

Nellie’s voice was loud and shrill and a few of the
customers at the counter swiveled around in their stools and stared at us.

“Nellie, please lower your voice. You’re making a bit of a
scene.”

“Oh, am I? Am I making a scene? Am I embarrassing the
beautiful, famous model Sophia Pearson?”

“Daniels!” one of the cooks said from behind the grill.

Nellie didn’t seem concerned that she was attracting
attention from the customers and now her co-workers.

“You know, I thought you were my friend,” Nellie said as
her already red-rimmed eyes got teary. “I just don’t understand how you can
justify playing with someone’s emotions the way you do.”

“Sophia?” Katt said through clenched teeth.

Katt was angry, Nellie was positively hysterical and I
turned and looked over my shoulder and judged how far I was from the front
door.

“What do you have to say for yourself?” Nellie said.

“Sophia?” Katt said.

“I’m sorry,” Nellie said and turned to Katt, “but who the
fuck are you?”

“Nellie,” I said and grabbed Katt’s arm, “Katt is my
roommate.”

“And her best friend,” Katt said.

“Oh, so you think you’re Sophia’s best friend?” Nellie
said. “That shows you how much you know. I heard about you and I think you are
pathetic!”

Katt ripped her arm from my grip and I threw myself
between the two of them.

“Nellie, this is not about Katt,” I said and pushed my
back into Katt’s body. “This is about us. Look, I’m sorry I’ve not been very
responsive toward you.”

“Not very responsive?” Nellie said and broke out into
high-pitched giggles. “You’ve completely fucking avoided me since we went to
the movies. You sat here for hours the day we met talking to me. You pretended
to like me!”

“I do like you,” I said. “Look, the reason I came here,
the reason I wanted to speak to you was to apologize for not being available.”

Nellie’s opened her mouth as if she was ready to lay into
me and then her eyes softened and she lessened the gap between her lips.

“Well, I appreciate that, Sophia,” Nellie said. “I know I
get very attached to people. But I like you very much and my feelings are
hurt.”

“And for hurting your feelings, I am sorry,” I said and
took Nellie’s scaly hand into mine. “I really am. But there is something else I
need to talk to you about. Perhaps we could sit down?”

“What else is there?” Nellie asked.

Katt nudged me.

“Well, it concerns Brandt,” I said and sighed. “Actually,
it concerns me and Brandt.”

Nellie ripped her hand, as dry as paper and rough as rock
salt, out of mine. Her eyes shifted back and forth, volleying between me and
Katt.

Finally, her thin lips pursed together and disappeared as
if her face caved into her mouth. She looked like she was sucking on a ball of
tin foil.

“Brandt and you?” Nellie said. “What do you mean? There’s
a Brandt and you, now?”

“Y-yes,” I said and cleared my throat. “Yes, there is.”

“And that’s why you’ve avoided me? Because you didn’t want
me to find out?” Nellie said and looked down at her feet.

“Nellie, I am so sorry,” I said and put my hand on her
arm. “I, we, never meant to hurt you.”

“We?” Nellie said and yanked her arm away from my hand and
rubbed it as if I burned her. “We, as you say, did not hurt me. You did. Brandt
hasn’t disappeared from my life, he’s as there for me as he ever was. More so,
actually.”

Nellie’s voice amped up to full-blast again and the
patrons resumed their interest in our scene.

“Nellie, please, let’s sit down.”

“I should have known that you would do this to me. You
knew how I felt about Brandt when we went to the movies! You were jealous of us
and you tried to do everything you could so I would not be happy. You are a
petty, jealous bitch who deserves to be alone for the rest of your life!”

“Nellie, I understand you’re angry, but you knew, you
know, Brandt was never interested in you,” I said.

“Really? And how do I know that?”

“Well, he said as much,” I said.

“Did he? What did he say?”

“He said you’re just friends.”

“And you believe him?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Why?”

“Because Brandt wouldn’t lie.”

“He’s a man, isn’t he? Grow up Sophia, all men lie.”

“Well, I believe him.”

“Well, you’re an idiot and as much of a liar as he is. The
only reason you believe that Brandt and I are just friends is because you think
he’d never choose me over you, that I’m too ugly for him. Isn’t that right?”

“Enough!” Katt said.

“Answer me,” Nellie said.

“You do not have to answer her,” Katt said.

“Answer me!”

“That is e-fucking-nough, you vile little troglodyte!”
Katt said. “Sophia didn’t want to tell you because Sophia is a nice person, but
I am not. Brandt was never interested in you and he was always interested in
Sophia. He would never choose you over Sophia. Brandt loves Sophia and they are
getting married!”

I gasped and turned my back to Nellie and stared at Katt.

“It’s okay,” Katt said and grabbed my arm. “She knows now.
Let’s go.”

I turned around and looked at Nellie. She peeled dead skin
from her hands. I watched a sheet of her skin drift down to the ground like a
snowflake and when I looked up, Nellie’s eyes burned into mine.

Katt dragged me toward the front door and hitched her arm
into mine so we could blend into the traffic on Newbury Street.

“Fucking hell, Sophia!” Katt said. “Let’s get the fuck out
of here.”

“She was really angry,” I said and shook my head. “Really
angry.”

“Whatever,” Katt said. “You know, I’m really--”

“Hey, Sophia!” Nellie said from behind us.

“Don’t turn around,” Katt said and gripped my arm.

“I have to,” I said and tore my arm from Katt’s grasp.

I turned and Nellie stood in front of the door to the
coffee shop.

“Yes?” I said.

“You think you know him? You think he loves you? Well, let
me tell you something: you don’t know Brandt Therrault and he certainly does
not love you. You know why? Because he loves me. That’s right, Brandt Therrault
loves me!”

Nellie erupted in high-pitched, hysterical laughter.

“You are fucking insane,” Katt said. “We do not have to
stand here listening to this fat, disgusting nutter’s ranting.”

Katt grabbed my arm and dragged me up the street
backwards. I never took my eyes away from Nellie, not even after my myopia long
blurred her face. And she never took her eyes away from me and never stopped
laughing.

I got little sleep that evening. I couldn’t get Nellie’s
voice out of my head and it completely ruined any excitement I had for the day
to come. I woke several times and stared in the mirror and fret about my puffy,
red-rimmed eyes.

“They look like hers,” I said to myself as I looked at my
eyes and thought of Nellie.

I finally fell asleep, but my dreams that evening brought
me no rest or peace. I dreamt of horror; of splintering bones and buckets of
blood. I dreamt that Brandt did not show up to the Clerk’s office and Nellie
arrived in his place. I dreamt of an interstitial that was certainly not heaven
and quite possibly hell.

I dreamt of the rafters.

“A bride received into the home is like a horse that
you have just bought; you break her in by constantly mounting her and
continually beating her.”

Chinese Proverb

I awoke with swollen eyes and a battered brain. I jumped
out of bed and ran to wake Katt so we could get ready. But she was already
awake. She sat on the couch holding a mug of coffee and stared out our large
window at the rising dawn over the rooftops of the city.

“Good morning,” I said.

Katt looked at me and frowned.

“I remember when you and I met,” Katt said and took a sip
of her coffee. “Do you remember?”

“Yes, of course I do. In the bathroom at Ford. It was my
first time ever in Manhattan and I just signed my first big contract.”

Katt smiled at me and turned her head back toward the
window.

“I came straight from London and I was so damn
frightened,” she said and lit a cigarette. “I just had an argument with my
agent and an absolutely horrorshow fight with that boy. God, what was his name?”

Katt blew smoke rings as she tried to remember the boy she
travelled with from London to New York. The plane ride lasted longer than their
relationship.