The Muse (34 page)

She almost lost it when Erato shook her head and smirked. “No way. You managed to get out through this window. I refuse to miss the opportunity to watch you climb back in.”

Kate had never wanted to slap someone across the face so badly. She gave Chad a helpless look, which he answered with a boyishly enthusiastic nod. “No problem.” With a gentlemanly tip of an imaginary hat, he scrambled up the side of the building like the parkour artist he apparently was. Erato giggled in pure delight, which naturally inflated him even more. She moved aside coyly, allowing him entry into the office. Taking his place at the window next to her, he literally
flicked his nose with his finger
and said, “Beg pardon, ma’am.”

Kate covered her face with her hand. She just couldn’t. Could not
possibly
stand to witness the two of them in close proximity. Without looking, she called out, “Ready?”

After a slight hesitation, Chad announced, “Ready.”

She removed her fingers from over her eyes and assessed the situation. Chad had ninja-warriored himself halfway out the window, anchoring himself to who knew what, one long, muscled arm extended far enough that she didn’t even have to tiptoe to reach him. Unfortunately, she still didn’t know how to avoid the carnivorous bush. Approaching it with exaggerated caution, she leaned against the sharp, wickedly uncomfortable branches and reached out for Chad’s strong hand. He caught her around the wrist just as she lost her balance, once again crashing into the foliage with an ungraceful grunt. For a moment she considered just surrendering and staying where she lay, because really, how would she ever come back from today?

But Chad didn’t give her a choice. In a feat of what seemed like impossible strength, he lifted her dead weight out of the clutches of the shrubbery and hauled her upright. His other hand beckoned for hers. “Grab on, Kate. We’re almost there.”

He really was a sweetheart. Without a trace of laughter in his eyes, he pulled her inside, handling her in a remarkably gentle manner considering the difficulty of the task. Not so for Erato. Although she allowed only a bare smile to show, her eyes danced with barely suppressed mirth. “Oh, you poor thing,” she cooed when Chad finally set her down on blessedly solid ground. Erato stepped forward quickly, plucking a leaf from her hair while tugging up the side of her pajama bottoms that had ridden too low during her bushwhacking adventure. “Here, let me help you.”

It was official. She wanted to die.

Stepping away from Erato, Kate resisted the urge to simply flee the room. A glance at the door confirmed that it was closed, so it might be locked and she couldn’t, anyway. Even if she could, the only way to preserve any remaining dignity was to bid Chad a polite thank you and farewell. After all, it wasn’t his fault that her grand plan had gone to shit. Or that a supernatural sociopath had hijacked her life. Or that she’d face-planted into the same bush twice in one day. Mustering up the very best smile she could manage—not as good as one of Erato’s fake smiles, but it would do—she turned to address her savior cum co-conspirator in humiliation. “Thank you for everything.” She intentionally kept her gratitude vague, because even if Erato would eventually drag the truth of what they’d been doing out of her, she refused to initiate that talk in front of their guest. “Sorry for derailing your day.”

“Not at all. This was fun.” Indeed, Chad was glowing. The guy nearly vibrated with happiness. And why not? He’d gotten to play hero more than once without having to risk life or arguably limb, had earned the gratitude and attention of two women whom he’d apparently enjoyed hearing fuck each other, and had borne witness to some of the greatest physical comedy performed since Lucille Ball was in her prime. Not bad for a Saturday afternoon. “Should I let myself out the window, or…”

Erato laughed and looped her arm in his. “How about I walk you out?” She led him to the office door and opened it, glancing back over her shoulder at Kate. “You should go shower. Lunch will be ready soon.”

The savory aroma of baking lasagna filled the air. Why had she ever imagined that something as mundane as entirely homemade, from-scratch roasted vegetable lasagna would ever challenge Erato? She nodded, not wanting to say anything too revealing in front of Chad. “Fine.”

She went into her bedroom while Erato showed Chad to the front door. She might never have a better opportunity to look for her cell phone than right now, even if she only had a minute or two before Erato returned, but her appetite for subterfuge had disappeared. She had nobody to call. Although things with Olive hadn’t ended as acrimoniously as they could have, even a text message wouldn’t exactly be welcome at this point. A fresh wave of pain rolled over her at the memory of how excited she’d been to receive that first text from Olive after they’d reconnected at the farmers’ market. Back when everything had seemed so full of possibility…She stopped near the foot of her bed, awash in so much sadness she literally couldn’t take another step forward. She just wanted to crawl under her covers and go to sleep and not wake up until Erato had vanished from her life forever and she’d forgotten how safe the world had felt in Olive’s embrace.

“Care to explain?”

Startled, Kate turned to the half-open door of her bedroom to find Erato staring at her with a mixture of curiosity and amusement. She seemed almost playful, entirely devoid of anger or disapproval over Kate’s afternoon excursion. For some reason, the apparent lack of concern over her whereabouts offended her more than any lecture or spanking. Fed up and full of self-loathing for letting this
asshole
ruin her life—this asshole who happened to look no less beautiful than ever, and into whose comforting arms she still longed to collapse—Kate couldn’t stop the day’s emotions from spilling over. “Just leave me alone. Please.”

Erato took a tentative step into the room, her good humor fading away. “What happened?”

Kate huffed in disgust. “Like you don’t already know.” She steeled her gaze and took her own step forward, narrowing the distance between them. “Even if you can’t actually read my mind, I’m sure you’ve got some other way to figure it all out.”

“Is this about Olive?”

Kate closed her eyes and silently counted to ten. Her stark depression seemed to crave a more emotionally satisfying outlet in the form of abject rage, but whatever pleasure she took from lashing out would be short-lived. Nothing good could come of a knock-down, drag-out argument right now. “Let’s just say you don’t have to worry about me being distracted anymore.” She counted again to five, slowly, then said, “I don’t have anything left to be distracted about. I’m too complicated and untrustworthy, and your mere presence in my life is a deal-breaker. So…” Taking deep breaths, she opened her eyes only when she knew the sight of Erato’s stupid, pretty face wouldn’t undo all her careful self-soothing. “You win.”

Erato stared at her with sad, baby-doe eyes. “I didn’t intend to upset you—or Olive, for that matter. My only objective—as I told you on the first day we met—has been to help you meet this deadline. Now I don’t want to say I told you so, but this is precisely why I warned you against pursuing a new relationship while we were working together. You swore that your fascination with Olive was only sexual, but clearly that’s never been the case. Things were escalating quickly, and I had to choose to end the self-sabotage you were about to engage in.”

When Kate opened her mouth to object, Erato held up a hand and kept talking. “I know, you only asked to go out for one little dinner date, but believe me, it wouldn’t have ended there.” She finally took a breath, challenging Kate with fearless eye contact. “You know where it would have ended? Eventually, with you crawling back to that full-time job you can’t stand. It may not feel like it right now, but I’ve only ever acted in your best interest.”

The beast inside her stirred, but she kept a tight rein and offered only a terse “Bullshit.”

“I would never have chosen for you to have your heart broken. Certainly not while writing a romance novel.” Erato reached out to touch her hand but drew back at the look of warning Kate offered when she got near. “I tried to be extremely clear that you wouldn’t have room for anyone new in your life until you finished the book. You swore you understood. What you’re feeling now, you chose to feel.”

How could Erato inspire such passionate and introspective writing about love when she obviously knew nothing about its genesis? “My brain understood. Unfortunately, my heart doesn’t work that way.”

Offering a tentative smile, Erato said, “Well, if you and Olive are meant to be together, my interference can’t possibly be enough to keep you apart.”

Kate scoffed. “Don’t be stupid. We’re not living in some silly, unrealistic romance novel. In the real world, sane, stable women like Olive Davis run away from toxic dating situations like the one you helped create, and I, for one, tend to
applaud them when they do
. So I can’t even tell you how offensive it is to hear you imply that if only we were ‘soul mates,’ we might have earned some sort of special protection against the cold-hearted, evil shit you’ve pulled to keep us apart.”

Erato flinched, the color draining from her face. For the first time, she looked truly wounded. “I’m not evil.”

“No? Well, it sure feels that way. I mean,
come on
. You’ve turned me into a prisoner in my own apartment. How do you justify that? It’s not like I was planning to shack up with Olive and bang her for a month straight without stopping to write.” Kate curled her fingers into tight fists, trying to control her rapidly building anger. “It’s not like I don’t take breaks throughout the course of the day, anyway.
Mandated
ones. What would’ve been the difference if I’d had a meal or three with her instead of you?” She shot Erato an icy glare, eager to cause pain wherever and however she could. “Except, of course, that you would have had to share me in some way other than sexually. Maybe that was the problem? Not enough control for you?”

The mocking attitude that had been on display earlier was gone. Erato stared at her with cautious regret. “You know that’s not really the issue. At least I hope you do.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter now, does it?” Kate glanced into her bathroom, suddenly craving the sanctuary and privacy of a hot shower. “Could you please leave? I want to be alone.”

“I’ll leave the room, but I’m not leaving you. Not yet.” Erato paused, making Kate wonder momentarily if she actually expected a thank-you for that. Luckily, she kept talking. “Soon, but not yet.”

“Not soon enough,” Kate muttered as she trudged into her bathroom, loud enough to make sure Erato could hear. She slammed the door behind her without looking back to check on the damage she’d caused. It pissed her off that Erato dared to act hurt about anything at all, considering all the crap she’d subjected her to over the past month and a half. Granted, the woman had also been responsible for some incredible highs—literal and figurative—and had also magically resurrected Kate’s writing career, but still. She had a lot of nerve to get her feelings hurt about taking some blame for Kate’s broken heart, basically, even if she
had
tried to warn her away from falling in love.

Maybe Erato was right and an entanglement with Olive
would’ve
sunk her already flagging writing career. She would’ve much preferred to find that out the hard way. Especially because right now, from where she was standing—sobbing beneath the hot spray of her shower while cursing the entire concept of sex and romance—she couldn’t imagine how losing Olive wouldn’t do exactly the same thing.

Kate was able to write during the next three days only because her characters were still mired in their own pits of misery and despair. Their moods matched hers. That helped keep her moving, along with the dim hope that Erato would actually leave as soon as Kate typed
The End
on a manuscript fit for submission. Erato did her part by delivering a constant stream of snacks and delicious meals—including the best lasagna Kate had ever eaten, the insufferable bitch—while also seemingly imbuing her with the improbable ability to push through her depression just enough to allow for the translation of her parallel feelings into the voices of her characters.

She was producing the most emotional work of her entire life. Even as she wrote, she wondered how she would stomach revisiting this part of the story, considering that she was attempting to grapple with her own sense of loss and regret perhaps even more than Rose and Molly’s. Now more than at any other time in her life, writing served as pure catharsis, a way for her to take everything painful and torturous and messy inside her and project it onto her characters’ lives. She had no trouble articulating how desperate they felt to go back in time and do things differently. Their misery was her misery.

Editing was going to be a nightmare.

Luckily for Rose and Molly, their change of fortune was fast approaching. Although Rose’s mother had assumed her daughter had taken advantage of Molly—never imagining her beloved nurse might be a lesbian—Molly decides she needs to have a frank conversation with her charge and correct her assumptions. Kate had been looking forward to writing this scene: a heart-to-heart talk between Molly and Rose’s ailing mother, where Molly finally takes off the kid gloves she’s used to wearing and confronts Rose’s mother with three simple truths. First, that she is a lesbian and has been since she was ten years old, having had an early and at the time inexplicable crush on Lilith from the television show
Cheers
. Second, that her daughter doesn’t limit her romantic choices based on gender, which was a quality Molly happened to admire—after all, it left Rose open to every possibility for happiness. And finally, that she has fallen in love with Rose and, while she’d love to have her mother’s blessing, she’s no longer willing to deny herself and Rose a chance at happiness to appease old prejudices or out of blind loyalty.

Because romance novels demanded a happy ending, Kate intended to write one. Rose’s mother wouldn’t experience a miraculous change of heart as far as her comfort with homosexuality (as her character repeatedly referred to it), but she would acknowledge that she has always adored Molly as a person, and her daughter could do—and had in fact done—a lot worse. After a little discussion, during which Rose’s mother tries to convince Molly that both she and Rose are more than pretty enough to win over a couple of handsome, single men, Molly convinces her that the time she has left with her daughter is too precious to spend arguing about Rose’s very nature, which hasn’t changed despite years of her mother’s overt disapproval. Molly is surprised but relieved when Rose’s mother finally agrees and gives her blessing.