Vanquish Read online

  She attacked the middle joints of her fingers, synchronizing her exhales with each flex and pop. It took twenty-four minutes for the gas to redissolve into the joint fluid. If she continued cracking at this rate, she'd run out of knuckles. She really needed a better distraction.

  His gaze flitted around the room, never settling on one thing for long...until something behind her gave him pause. What was he looking at? She followed his line of sight to the blacked-out window.

  Oh God, no. Stinging heat crawled over her cheeks. If he opened the shade, the absolute terror and despair waiting on the other side would find her. It would liquefy her bones and seal up her throat until she had no control, no power to stop it.

  His sigh penetrated the clamor in her head. “All right.” He flicked the switch and smothered her storm with blackness.

  A gust of relief freed her lungs and loosened her fists. Jesus, she needed to stop spazzing about what-ifs. She didn't want to be this scared little mouse trapped in her cage. What if Dr. Michaels was right? If she let the panic in, would it really show her a way out?

  A shiver lifted the hairs on her arms. Yeah, right. Screw the free world.

  She clung to the sound of Zach's footfalls and rationalized his tracks on the carpet as a form of therapy. She was supposed to challenge the anxiety, vary the landscape. He helped with that, even if he didn't know it.

  The fifth footprint landed an inch away, and her teeth clamped together. Why did he have to take that last step? Four was even. There were four sides to a square. Four seasons to a year. Four fingers on a hand. Four was complete. Exact. Calming.

  His palm touched her bicep, distracting and warm. She gripped his fingers and pulled him onto the bed, reclining on her back. Chest-to-chest, the weight of his body strengthened her in a way solitude couldn't. Her nerve-endings pulsed against every point of contact, her only connection with another human being. The tops of his feet around her ankles. His fingertips on her face. His thighs and groin exquisitely aligned over hers.

  Soft lips brushed a stimulating path over her jaw, her cheek, her mouth. Slowly, her doubts and fixations gave way to anticipation of his kiss and his cock and the comfort they would bring. Fuck her unhealthy mind. Her carnal nature, her flesh hummed with vitality.

  Lifting his body, he slid the dress up her thighs and tugged down the lace panties she wore for his visits. Fingers found her opening, gently circling, spreading her wetness, and coaxing a tremor of excitement. “I bet your pussy looks as beautiful as it feels.” He pushed in two fingers, shooting shock waves down her legs. “Will you let me taste you this time?”

  Don't ask me to put my mouth down there. Smells like a dead cow.

  She cringed at his voice in her head. “Not today.” Never again, no matter how badly she wanted it.

  “Okay.” He reached for the condom on the side table. The wrapper crinkled as he knelt above her. “How do you want me?”

  “Rough, unrestrained, and perfect.” Everything she wasn't.

  Chuckling, he fell over her and thrust his hips, entering her in one liberating stroke. His ass flexed beneath her hands as he glided his length. In and out, he rubbed her inner walls into a blaze of sensations. Through the darkness, he found her mouth, his tongue rolling with hers and his fingers tingling over her ribs. Every caress and attentive lick left a trail of vibrations.

  Until his palm cupped her breast. She jerked back against the mattress. Even through the dress and bra, he would feel the hard, oversized implants. What must he think of her? Maybe she should explain how much she hated them, how the surgery had dulled the sensations there. No, that would be worse. Only a weak woman would get a boob job she didn't want.

  He let her pull his hand away and move it to her throat. His grip tightened as he pounded into her. Ahhh, right there. He didn't squeeze hard enough, but she was in the zone, rocking against him and holding onto the moment with both arms.

  The thrust of her hips didn't come from a place in her mind. Fucking was a primal impulse, an urgent action that dulled the noise in her head. The musk of his sweat wrapped her in a cocoon. The hum of her pulse swished through her veins. Almost perfect.

  Repeatedly, his cock hit the spot, the right tempo but never enough pressure. Did she feel good to him? Was her pussy tight enough? She clenched her inner muscles with each invasion of his length and moaned. Come on, Zach. Let out a groan.

  He remained unnervingly quiet as he rotated his pelvis. The scent of sex filled the air, sweet and tangy. What if he didn't like the way she smelled? Was he holding his breath?

  His exhales brushed warmly across her mouth, his exertion heating and slicking their bodies. Was it difficult for him to get off with her? Was he imagining fucking a different woman?

  She shook off her hateful thoughts and savored the moment, biting at his lips and angling her pelvis. If only he would thrust harder. That brief stretch of solace was in reach. It tingled the flesh that spread around his cock and tiptoed up her spine. She trembled, anticipating the moment when everything inside her would still.

  Then it came, the gallop of climax beating along her scalp and booming behind her ears. She moaned as the ripples washed over her, numbing her legs and carrying her to a place where voices and shame didn't dwell.

  He followed with an erratic buck of his hips and a breathy groan. She buried her face in his neck, twitching with the aftershocks of tranquility.

  Too soon, disappointment invaded her peace. First, came the dissipation of orgasm. Always too weak, too fleeting, it never sustained. Then, the absence of his body as he disposed of the condom. And finally, his tracks across the carpet and the click of the light switch. Her stomach sank.

  She shoved the dress over her thighs, despising the chill of loneliness creeping into her skin.

  “Your mail and supplies are in the kitchen.” He pulled on his clothes, shooting sidelong glances in her direction.

  She swiped her thumbs beneath her eyes to clear away mascara and combed fingers through her hair. “A bag of trash and my shipments are ready by the door.” She hated her dependency on him as much as she dreaded the post-sex awkwardness. Nevertheless, her merchandise had to be mailed or her bills wouldn't be paid.

  She’d tried the door-to-door mail service once, but when her packages were stolen right off her porch, she’d lost a month’s income. She couldn’t risk that again. Zach was the dependable solution.

  A knot tightened beneath her breastbone. How the hell did she become so lonely and helpless? Perhaps those traits had always existed, hidden beneath beauty pageant crowns and fake smiles.

  Separation from people hadn't cured her need to please. She longed to lift the hem of isolation, look into eyes full of acceptance, and see in them the reflection of a woman who didn't give a rat's ass.

  Neither of them spoke as he laced his boots, each second straining longer than the last. Should she say something? Maybe compliment his performance?

  He straightened and lingered in the doorway, deep lines etching his forehead. Stay trembled on her lips, but he didn't owe her anything. They didn't have dinner dates or interact beyond their routine. He always arrived at the scheduled time. She always left the front door unlocked and waited in the bedroom. No conversation. No deviation. No questions.

  What did she have to offer him besides a scheduled orgasm? If he stayed, he might suggest they go out and do normal things. If he found out she hadn't ventured beyond her front door in two years, he'd never come back.

  She cracked her knuckles. She needed to stop the unproductive waffling. Either she continued with him as a detached fuck buddy or she pursued the relationship with a deeper connection. She couldn't have both. The former worked. The latter would end swiftly and painfully.

  Squaring her shoulders, she met his eyes. “See you Friday.”

  A subtle inhale flared his nostrils. He studied her for a long moment, nodded his head, and left.

  She curled her fists in the bedding, her muscles straining to run after him.
r />   The slam of the front door knocked the wind from her lungs. Way to go, Amber. Might as well add a few dozen cats to the paranoid, anti-social routine and call it what it was.

  She hung the dress in the closet, where it would stay until Friday, and put on yoga pants and a t-shirt. She vacuumed, ran four miles on the treadmill, and showered. A few hours later, she finished the filigree carving on a leathercraft order, ate a pancake, and showered again.

  As the nightly news ended, she stood before the bathroom mirror and pinched the flab hugging her hips.

  If you exercised more, maybe I wouldn't be thinking about your sister all the time.

  She shouldn't have eaten that pancake. If she weren't ten years older than Tawny, maybe she would've held his attention. Her stomach clenched painfully, and she bent at the waist, gripping her knees.

  Was he in bed with Tawny now? Kissing her sister the way he'd once kissed her? Of course, he was. They were married now.

  She turned away from the mirror, squatted before the toilet, and gagged with the reflex of a practiced vomiter. Her eyes watered, and her throat contracted and burned. The partially-digested pancake splattered the bowl.

  She didn't look in the mirror as she brushed her teeth. Didn't glance at her midsection as she dressed and sat on the couch. She had zero resistance to self-deprecating thoughts, and the white envelope on the coffee table didn’t help.

  The notice of default was proof of her worthlessness. She had ninety days to reinstate the mortgage or she'd lose the house, her safe place.

  Her head hurt, and her chest felt hollow.

  She would have to increase the sales on her leather goods, but it wouldn't be enough. She'd already cut all her expenses. All but one.

  She popped her knuckles and dialed Dr. Michaels.

  “Good evening, Amber.” Dr. Emery Michaels' warm greeting was always unassuming, despite the fact that her calls were sporadic and often panic-stricken. “How are you doing?”

  Which problem should she tackle first? She blew out a breath. “He wanted the lights on.”

  A pause. “The young man who delivers your supplies?”

  Zach wasn't that young. Probably older than her thirty-four years. “Yeah.”

  “Is this the man you want the lights on with?”

  His tone wasn't judgmental, but her hackles flared. “He's the man I want to fuck, Dr. Michaels. Lights or no lights, you said my libido was a good thing.”

  “Yes, as long as sex doesn't become an addiction.”

  “I can live without it.” The thump in her chest disagreed.

  “Has your relationship expanded beyond sex? Have you talked with him about your healing path?”

  Secrecy and shame were interwoven with her condition, and she excelled at being a psychiatric textbook. “No and no.”

  “Have you given more thought to attending a self-help group?”

  Sweat trickled down her spine, and the muscles in her neck went taut. “I can't—”

  “Agoraphobics Outbound meets bi-monthly at Austin State Hospital. It's a ten minute cab ride from your house.”

  She chewed the inside of her cheek and imagined all those people staring at her, examining, criticizing. How would she escape? What if she got lost, stuck in a crowded place, or fainted?

  Not only that, her mother was a patient in that hospital. Her breathing quickened. She couldn’t bear to be in the same building with a woman who wanted nothing to do with her.

  “Amber, you need the solidarity of a support group.”

  Something she would never receive from her family. She gripped her knuckles. Crack. Crack. Crack. Crack. Strangers would be worse. They wouldn't know her, yet they'd weigh her worth as she lost her shit.

  “Amber.” His soothing timbre steadied her pulse. “Tell me what you're thinking.”

  “They'll see how undesirable I am.”

  A sigh whispered over the line. “You are a lovely woman, but you will never hear that until you believe it yourself.”

  “He didn't think so.” She winced, hating herself for mentioning him.

  “Yet he didn’t want to give you up.”

  She'd once viewed marriage as a sacred covenant, arrogant in her belief that only three A's justified divorce. Adultery. Addiction. Abuse. He had committed none of them—never acted on his desire for her sister while they were married, never hit her, never so much as got drunk—yet she'd divorced him. She'd given up, taken the easy way out. “I failed him.”

  “Eliminating the toxicity in your life is not a failure. It's curative and courageous and never, ever easy.”

  She blinked against the achy burn in her eyes. Brent hadn't always been toxic. Sixteen years ago, he looked at her like she was so much more than a sparkling accessory on his arm. She deeply missed the man she'd fallen in love with. “Leaving him was the hardest thing I've ever done.”

  “That's right. So the Outbound meeting would be a piece of cake in comparison.”

  She straightened the envelope on the table, leaving a four-inch, right-angle gap from the table's corner. “I won't be calling you anymore.”

  “These sessions are necessary in your recovery.”

  “I know what I need to do to get better.” Face her fears. Remember to belly breathe. Ask for help.

  “What have you eaten today?”

  The purged pancake floating in the toilet. Had she remembered to flush it? Gripping the phone, she ran to the bathroom and relaxed when she saw the clean bowl. “I can't afford to pay you.”

  “I see.” Wariness breathed through his voice, but he didn't offer to counsel her for free.

  She wasn't worth his charity. Not that she would've accepted it anyway.

  His movements rustled through the phone. “The self-help group is free. That's your next goal. I'll forward links to online support groups and see if I can find a therapist who might be more affordable.”

  She'd already looked, but maybe he'd have better luck. “Thank you.” Jesus, she was going to miss him. “I'll look for your bill in the mail.” And hopefully, she'd have the funds to cover it.

  “Be patient with yourself, Amber. Sometimes you have to step back to open the door.”

  Three days later, she glared at the front door, her legs paralyzed with fear. Clutching the cell phone to her ear, she said into the receiver, “I call bullshit.”

  “Amber, ring my boss if you don't believe me.” Zach sniffled through the speaker, his voice leaden with congestion. “He sent me home. I feel like I'm going to die.”

  “You can't die from a cold.” But a heart attack was fatal. She could feel one coiling around her chest, squeezing the life from her body. “What about my mail?” She covered the phone to muffle her panicked gasps.

  “Why can't you get it?” He sneezed, followed by a nasty, wet inhale. “Are you on house arrest or something?”

  Unbelievable. They’d had this arrangement for six months. He was just now asking why? She released a thready breath. “I just can’t. Will you ask someone else at the store to bring my mail to the door? Or maybe you know someone who wouldn’t mind swinging by?”

  “No. No one lives near you, and I can’t just ask people to do that.” He coughed. “Listen, I need to go.”

  The palpitations in her heart wobbled her legs. “I need my mail today.” She needed it two days ago. The leather dye she'd ordered sat twenty-six steps from the door. She couldn't finish the knife sheaths without it. If she didn't mail out the completed sales by tomorrow, the water would be shut off.

  He hacked through the phone. “I'm sorry, Amber.”

  Guilt formed a hard, jagged lump in her stomach. “Please don't apologize. This isn't your fault.” She rubbed her forehead with cold, shaking fingers. Her stomach gurgled with dread. “Get some rest. Hope you feel better.”

  “Yeah, okay. See you Tuesday.”

  The phone disconnected, and she slumped to the floor, sucking harshly for air. She hugged her stomach against an onslaught of queasiness and glared at the front
door. It stood between her and her paycheck. The damned thing wasn't a terminal disease. It wasn't swinging a chainsaw. It was just a door. A bolted, four-sided shield against certain suffering.

  Sometimes you have to step back to open the door.

  One step back and twenty-six steps to the mailbox. She could do it in twenty-four, a semi-perfect number. Twenty-four hours in a day. Twenty-four carats in pure gold. Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie.

  Good God, she was drowning in her own crazy. Just get it over with. She swiped a palm over her face, smearing her makeup with sweat. Shit. She darted to the bedroom and changed into a white halter dress and matching heeled sandals. A check in the bathroom confirmed her hair held its curl. Her makeup was still flawless. She returned to the door.

  Deep breath in. Out. Twenty-four paces there and back. She used to make that trek before Zach and Kevin and Chet and...oh, fuck it. She could take her phone. If she panicked, she could call Dr. Michaels.

  No, she couldn't. She swayed and gripped the doorframe. Okay, not a deal breaker. She wouldn't need him. She had this.

  Her heart rate doubled. What if she broke down so spectacularly she couldn't walk? What if she couldn't get back to the house?

  She flattened a hand over her sternum, hating this, hating herself. What happened to the brave girl who stood on stage time after time, shaping her mouth into a practiced O of surprise as tiaras were placed on her head? Oh yeah. That girl tried too hard to please people, and look where it got her.

  She smoothed down the dress and stared at the knob. Reach out and turn it. Twenty-four steps. She could walk them to the tune of kick the fear habit, embrace the new, don't beat yourself up and all the other psychosmart mantras that sounded invigorating until they were put into action.

  How about the shit that kept her up at night? Overdue utilities, no showers, no flushing, no clean dishes?

  She flipped the deadbolt four times and yanked open the door.

  The sun hit her face in blinding white. She raised an arm to shade her eyes, the blanket of humidity seeping into her pores. A winged insect buzzed past her ear. The smell of fresh-cut grass tickled her nose. The hum of air conditioning units had her spinning in every direction. Were the neighbors home, watching from the shadows of their windows?