Seduction and Pursuit Read online

  I sway in my seat, an embarrassing amount of sweat running down the sleeves of my dress, and I realize I must have blacked out a little. I don’t remember leaving the bar. How did we get to this table?

  Christian sits across from me, hands folded on the tabletop, his smile somehow expectant.

  “Sorry,” I murmur. “Were you saying something?”

  “I asked if you liked it. My film.”

  I don’t remember seeing the end of it. There’s a hole in my memory, from when I started watching it to now. I clutch my head and answer Christian somehow, the words seeming to come from someone else. “Yes.”

  “It’s video poetry,” he says cheerfully, drinking down another shot. “For a class in college. Did it make you feel anything?”

  I nod, still catching my breath. “Yes,” I mutter again. My heart is still racing in some unknown, unknowable fear.

  Or is it… excitement?

  “Would you like to come home with me now? I have more movies to show you.”

  For a moment, despite myself, I almost consent without a second thought. Only at the last minute does the memory of Troy return to my mind. Stirring as if from a trance, I clutch my head, which is suddenly pounding. “No,” I say, almost confused. “I don’t want that.”

  “Then what do you want, Meredith?”

  I look over at him. He’s smiling at me from his chair in a charming way. I try to tell him I want to go home to Troy, but for some reason my tongue is paralyzed, a small dead thing in my mouth.

  “You want the moon?” says Christian. “Just say the word and I’ll give it to you. I’ll lasso it and pull it down, and when you eat it, the moonbeams will shoot out from your fingers.”

  A small, dry laugh rises out of me, unbidden. “It’s A Wonderful Life?”

  “You told me it’s your favorite.”

  “I did?” My voice sounds a little slurred.

  “Yeah,” he mutters, looking confused. “You know, you’re good at this.”

  “Good at what?”

  He holds up his hands, exasperated. “We already convinced Anderson you’re not feeling well. I mean, you are acting, aren’t you?”

  Before I can move, he leans closer and presses the back of his hand to my forehead.

  He frowns. “You’re a little warm. Are you feeling okay?”

  “No, I-I feel… light-headed.” I pull away from him. “Wait. We talked to Anderson?”

  Christian nods uncertainly. “Just now. You told him you weren’t feeling well and you had to go.”

  Oh, God. Have I somehow gotten so wasted I’m having conversations I don’t remember? Or is Christian messing with me? I can’t tell. He’s always got that same cocky smile, which returns now as I study him. There’s something mischievous in it, but it’s handsome, too. Unreasonably handsome. How have I not noticed it before?

  “So come on, Meredith. I’m ready when you are.”

  “For what?”

  He shrugs. “You told Anderson I was gonna take you home. Since you’re not feeling well. Remember? Look, don’t try to argue now.” He rises, comes to stand behind my chair. “There’s no way I’m letting you drive in your state. Besides, I already said I’d take care of you.”

  He lays his hand on my shoulder. It feels very warm through the fabric of my dress. I go to push it away, but when I lay my smaller, delicate hand over his, something about it looks so right. I try to put up a fight, try to remember myself and my son, but for some reason I don’t quite understand, I’m utterly unable to resist him.

  “Troy gets lonely, by himself,” I mumble, one last, feeble protest. But even as I speak, I hold out my arms, so Christian can help me into my coat.

  “What about you?” he whispers behind me, as he slides my coat over my arms. “Don’t you get lonely?”

  Then we’re stumbling out of the bar into the street, down the alley to Christian’s car—a little red Celica from the nineties, well-kept and very sporty. He’s telling jokes and quoting movies. I’m laughing, clinging to his arm, clumsy in my heels. My legs feel a little rubbery beneath me.

  Anticipation, I realize.

  “Don’t worry,” he says, as we pull away from Tully’s Bar & Grill. “Troy sounds like a good kid. I’m sure he’ll be fine by himself for one night. Just this once.”

  “Just this once,” I whisper. I have to hide the eagerness in my voice. “Yes. Okay, yeah. I’ll watch some films with you. For a little while. Then you’ll have to drop me off at my car or something. I can’t stay out all night.”

  “All right,” Christian says, in a light way. “I’ll take you back to my place, but only if you promise you’re not just gonna worry about Troy the whole time.” His smile is perpetual.

  I smile back. “I promise. You’re right. He’ll be fine. I’ll just let him know I’m with a friend so he doesn’t worry.”

  “Good girl,” says Christian.

  Blushing a little, despite myself, I get out my phone and call home. The phone rings for a few minutes before Troy picks up again. “Hello?” he says.

  “Hi, honey. It’s me.”

  “Mom…” His voice is reluctant, abashed. “Lana left a few minutes ago.”

  “I figured she would. That’s okay, honey. Uh, listen. I’m out with… some friends, and I’m gonna be out a little later than I expected. I want you to go ahead and go to bed. I’ll be there by the time you wake up. All right?”

  “Um, Mom? Are you sure everything’s okay?”

  “Of course, honey. Everything’s fine.”

  “You don’t sound like yourself.”

  I swallow. An uneasy feeling comes over me. What am I doing? He’s right—I should be on my way home to him right now. Home to my little two-bed, two-bath townhouse in Birmingham, with its patch of unkempt grass that I’m too lazy to mow, strewn with Troy’s hot wheels, the windows bright with his video games, warmed with his laughter.

  But instead I look over at Christian in the dark, drinking in his smooth, angled face. “I’m fine,” I tell my son. “I just didn’t want you to worry, that’s all. You be good tonight, okay? I love you, honey. Good night.”

  “Good night.”

  I hang up, put my phone away, and keep my promise to Christian: I don’t think of Troy again.

  He drives casually, in the slow lane, hugging the speed limit and leaving plenty of room. As someone passes us, his smile tightens into a smirk and he mutters, “Asshole.”

  “I’d have done it too,” I tease him. “I’ve seen student drivers go faster than you. Drive much?”

  He grins again. “Not really. I’m from the wild, wild west. Where I’m from, we don’t need roads.” His voice changes subtly as he speaks each line. I think he’s quoting movies.

  “Where are you from?” I ask.

  “Colorado, mostly?” He shrugs. “That’s where I learned to drive, anyway. I came from the desert. Hell, I been all over the southwest.”

  The sound of his voice, smooth and musical as a woodwind instrument, is so distracting I have to struggle to hear his actual words. “What desert?”

  “Enough about me. Where are you from, Meredith?”

  “Illinois. My parents had a townhouse there for years, before my father died.”

  “Cool,” says Christian. “What’d he die from?”

  I shift uncomfortably at his flippant tone. “Heart attack. It took him young. Not as young as my husband Max, but young.” I adjust the wedding ring on my finger, soldered to Max’s engagement ring with its tiny speck of diamond.

  Christian glances at me from the corner of his eye. “I noticed you still wear his ring. He must have been very important to you.”

  Even through my drunken stupor, I’m a little taken aback. I lower my hand, suddenly self-conscious. “He was a good man.”

  “How’d he die?”

  A flash of irritation comes over me. It’s like he’s picking at scabs just to see if I’ll bleed. I sit up a little straighter, frowning at him. “Cancer,” I say. “Early onset.
Rare, they told us. Lucky us.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay.” I relax. “He’s been gone two years now, and he told me to move on, but… I guess I’m not that strong.”

  “You seem pretty strong to me.”

  I look down, my face flushing.

  The city streets narrow into dark alleyways. The street lights grow further apart, some of them not even lit. He’s going off the beaten trail, into parts of downtown where I wouldn’t venture in daylight, much less after dark. I swallow. “Your apartment’s out here?”

  “Uh-huh. Us students gotta live cheap, babe.”

  His casual pet name arouses no protest in me. It arouses other things.

  He pulls the car up to the curb, lifts the brake and nods out the window. “Here we go.”

  Across the dim street, a brownstone apartment building rises next to an overgrown, vacant lot strewn with trash. Again I feel a pang of uneasiness. “You live in that?”

  Christian smirks. “We’ll have the place to ourselves. Come on.” He opens his door and comes around to my side, helping me out as I stare, still dumbfounded. In his expensive suit and slacks, Christian looks completely mismatched against the grungy scenery. I feel less dizzy now, but I let him lead me across the street anyway, up the wide steps of the building and through the rusted door.

  Inside, the lights in the stairwell are dazzlingly bright, stamping strange patterns of light across my vision. It reminds me, in a vague way, of the film Christian showed me in the bar, but I still can’t quite remember it. The whole memory is blanked out.

  Christian leads me down a long hallway, the wallpaper faded with age, scrawled with graffiti in places. He stops at a door at the back, fishes a set of keys from his jacket pocket, and opens the door into darkness. Leaning inside, he flips a light switch.

  “Anyone home?” When no one answers, he turns to me with a conspiratorial grin. “See? Just you and me.”

  He puts his hand on the small of my back and guides me, gently, inside.

  The first room is a combination kitchenette and living room, separated by a small square table. Behind it is a beaten-down love seat and sofa, angled toward an LCD TV in an entertainment center in the corner. The apartment smells faintly of cigarettes. I hate the smell. It reminds me of my mother.

  “Do you smoke?” I ask, frowning.

  “Nah. My roommates do. Sorry about that. You want anything to drink?” he asks. When I shake my head with a queasy smile, he offers, “How about something for your head?”

  “All right.”

  My head is throbbing. Those drinks I had at the sports bar were much stronger than I realized or requested. That bartender must have been new to the job or something.

  Christian opens a bottle from one of the faded cupboards and returns to my side, handing me a pill and a glass of water. I take the pill without a second thought, start to drink.

  “I’ve been waiting to get to know you.” Christian strokes my hair. “You’re older than the girls I usually go for. I like that.”

  My cheeks flush. The liquor—or whatever caused my disorientation before—is starting to wear off a little, and his comment irritates me on multiple levels. I smirk as I lower my glass of water. “You’re a player or something?”

  He waves a hand. “Nah, nothing like that. I’m just… on a journey, is all.”

  I have to consider this. “I guess everyone is.”

  He nods. His eyes are locked on me in a way that makes me vaguely uncomfortable. “I’m looking for a soul mate, you know? The perfect mother to bear my child. A mother like you.”

  My legs feel wobbly again. He says the strangest things, yet I like it.

  “Come on,” he waves. “Let’s go to my room. I’ll put a movie on.”

  Heart pounding, I let him lead me by the hand down the narrow hallway, toward a closed door at the back of the apartment. Walking at his side feels so right, like tonight is a prelude to something big, some new destiny.

  He meets my eyes as he pushes open the bedroom door. His smile starts a wildfire somewhere deep inside me. I can barely catch my breath.

  In contrast to the living room, Christian’s little bedroom is Spartan, immaculate. His bed is queen size, filling most of the room. The dark bed sheets are neatly made, unslept in. In the corner across from the bed is a small particleboard dresser, the surface entirely empty save one neat metal desk lamp and a small, flat screen TV. A cheap black shelving unit holds a few sparse trinkets—a solved Rubik’s cube, a few business textbooks, a row of unlabeled CDs. It all feels anonymous somehow, like props on a movie set.

  “Wow,” I whisper. “You’re so… neat.”

  He gestures at the bed. “Have a seat, Meredith.” He opens the mirrored doors of a closet that looks empty save for a handful of hanging clothes, and slides out of his suit jacket, tucks it inside on a hanger. I can see the lean muscles of his chest flex against his well-fitted business shirt, and my heart flutters faster. I slide down on the edge of the bed, watching him.

  “How long did you say you’ve been living here?” I ask.

  Christian doesn’t answer as he loosens his tie and slides it over his neck, adding it to the hanger with his jacket. I look around the walls, empty of decoration. The absence of any personal touch lies ominously over the room.

  It’s almost like no one lives here at all.

  Some distant, uneasy voice whispers at me nervously—what do you really know about this guy?

  He moves, and my eyes are drawn back to him irresistibly. He’s unbuttoned his business shirt, and the white t-shirt underneath contours to his body like a second skin. My fears and reluctance drift back beneath the surface as I watch him cross the small room with sinuous, animal grace.

  He crouches and slides a small cardboard box out from under the bed. For a moment, I watch in wide-eyed apprehension, unsure what to expect—part of me expects a collection of toys, perhaps some strange and secret fetish.

  Another part of me fears something worse. Like a butcher knife or a gun.

  But when Christian unfolds the box, the contents are completely unexpected: it’s stacked to the top with black VHS cassettes. Small labels are taped to the sides, though I can’t make out the illegible writing.

  “This’ll do.” He chooses a tape, then slides the box back under the bed and clamors to the dresser, where he inserts the tape into the ancient VCR underneath the little flat-screen television. Then he pushes play.

  The video starts with a countdown from ten over a scratchy, flickering background, like an old silent film.

  Christian comes and joins me, sprawling back on the bed with a sigh. He kicks off his boots, then slides deeper into the bed, propping his back against the pillows. He pats the dark bedspread beside him, his smile beckoning. “Come on. You’re gonna like this, Meredith.”

  Swallowing, I lean down to unbuckle my heels and slide my feet free, clad in dark pantyhose. Then I scoot back on the bed, feeling oddly light-headed, my cheeks slightly tingling. Christian holds out his arm and I slide under it, almost without thinking.

  “What’s it about?” I ask.

  He strokes my shoulder. “I don’t want to spoil it.”

  The light from the TV looks strange, almost surreal. I start to feel a little disoriented again, a little light-headed. Am I still drunk?

  “Where’d you study film? Was that at Wayne State, too?”

  “Shh,” he whispers, squeezing my arm. “Pay attention. It’s about to begin.”

  I look back at the screen, at the final seconds of the countdown. The situation is starting to make me nervous. It occurs to me that he’s been dodging every question I ask all night, especially about himself or his past. Instead, he speaks in poetry, or changes the subject, or quotes some line from a movie, almost defensively. I thought he was just being coy, cocky.

  But what do I really know about this intern, except that he’s so damn beautiful?

  How did he talk me into coming here in the first place?
I haven’t done anything this rash since college, certainly not since Troy was born. What on Earth convinced me to go home with this perfect stranger?

  The countdown ends and the movie begins.

  A red portal into hell opens on the screen.

  Images flash across my eyes, too fast for my mind to follow—scenes of bodies strewn on an empty highway, carrion birds circling overhead. Waves breaking on rocky shores, the water tinted red by photo effects. Old refrigerators and meat hooks and abandoned buildings, caked with rust and decay.

  Glimpses of human forms, naked and coupled, writhing in red darkness, their faces tight with pleasure or pain.

  A looming figure at the end of a corridor, faceless under a domed white gas mask, a man in one frame, a child in the next.

  A soothing voice speaks over the scenes: “Listen to the sound of my voice. Feel the warmth of submission filling you up. It feels good to submit.”

  “Christian…”

  “Don’t talk,” he whispers. “Just listen. It feels good to listen, doesn’t it?”

  When I look over, Christian is peeling out of his undershirt, revealing the sharp angles of his hard, lean body. From his broad shoulders, his torso narrows to a thin waist in a pleasing V-shape. His musculature is in perfect proportion, not bulky, but sleek and chiseled, like a swimmer or a gymnast. Still, I can see the subtle flexing of his abs with every movement, hinting at unseen power.

  His skin, to my surprise, is laced with scars of varying shapes and sizes, from the delicate licks of a razor to deep, thick indentations in his muscles, as if the skin were scooped away. There’s even a brown, circular divot in his shoulder that—if I didn’t know better—I’d think was an old bullet wound.

  My eyes widen as I look down at him. He smiles knowingly.

  “I’m not perfect,” he whispers. “Sometimes I have to vent the pain.”

  “You did this?” I’m not sure I believe it.

  He only looks back at me, his blue eyes untouched by his smile, dark and unknowable as the sea.

  Despite myself, I reach out and touch him, tracing the long line of a scar above his nipple. The droning sound and flashing lights of the movie fade to the background, become subliminal. There’s only me, and Christian, and I can’t help but touch him.