On Every Street (The Artists Trilogy #0)

On Every Street (The Artists Trilogy #0) Page 23

My fucking man. How could he? After everything we’d gone through. After everything he’d said. The pain was so excruciating I’d rather have my legs burned by acid a million times over before experiencing this. This made me envy Miguel, his throat slit, dead and peaceful. This crippled my soul, the one thing I had left. He broke my heart until I couldn’t be sure I had one to begin with.

And then the laughter started. The girl, that fucking whore’s voice, was soaring out of the room, whispering sweet nothings to him. He whispered them back. I heard “baby” and “beautiful” and the only relief in the sting was that he didn’t call her “angel.”

My sorrow quickly whipped itself into anger. Anger was an old friend. Anger was a weapon I knew how to play with. I went down the hall, prepared to barge in on them. I was prepared to catch them in the act, to show that I knew, to rub Javier’s face in his deceit, in his destruction of our love, something he so carelessly tossed aside for someone else.

I found that the door was open a crack, and if my lungs were capable of breath, I would have held it. I pushed the door open, very slightly, very quietly.

And saw something I didn’t expect. They were facing away from me, lying on their stomachs on the bed, side by side, their feet hooked around each other’s. They were staring into each other’s eyes, and while Javier looked like his cool and disgustingly charming self, the woman was very obviously in love. She was long with tawny curves and a thick head of red hair, and she smiled at everything he said. They were still making sweet talk to each other but I couldn’t hear it anymore. The heartbeat in my ears was too loud, drowning out everything.

My mouth dropped open, my lips ready to scream, my tongue ready to fight. And I realized I couldn’t do it. Not this way. If I confronted him, I’d give him the satisfaction of knowing that I knew. He’d blame my leaving him on that. He’d follow me around the world and beg for forgiveness that I would never grant him. The only thing I had going for me, in accepting the lie, in forgetting the past, was that he loved me.

I thought he loved me and he didn’t. I gave up my ghost for him—my plan, my revenge, everything that I was. Right or wrong, I had given up a large part of me to be with Javier, to overlook the things he did and continued to do. I did all of that because I thought he loved me. I believed in it, in him, in my bones, in my core, in my very soul. But here was the truth, her shapely ass staring me right in the face.

He lied. I lied. Any love that starts out under a lie is bound to kill you. I just didn’t want to die on my feet.

I backed away from the door, careful to not get caught, and quietly made my way downstairs, picking up the beer as I went. I started my car and only made it halfway down the street before my vision got blurry, the tears spilling over. I pulled over and quickly wiped them away, trying to stay calm, trying to stay focused. I adjusted the rear view mirror so I could watch the house, cracked open my beer and waited. I waited until she walked past the truck to her own car, not even glancing my way. I guess Javier had made her park up the street to hide the evidence. I guess Javier didn’t want to get caught with someone like her.

She was gorgeous and sensual and walked with a confidence I severely lacked. She was everything that I wasn’t, providing Javier with the things that I couldn’t. I didn’t even know what I lacked, except that it wasn’t enough to keep him faithful. This woman was unblemished, unscarred. She looked real. She looked like she used her real name.

I watched her drive off, the chrome of her Mercedes glinting under the streetlights. And that’s when it all hit me like I’d been punched in the face, in the stomach, in the chest. The anger, the pain, it erupted from somewhere deep inside, rushing forward and taking over my body and my mind. Things were going black, my ears throbbing with pressure, my limbs shaking with the rage that spread over me.

I thought about him fucking her. I thought about him fucking me. I thought about every look he ever gave me, everything he ever said. I thought about how beautiful he made me feel, how good he’d been to me, how happy I was when I was with him. I thought about being in love, making love, living in this love we shared, this life we created. Even if it was a false life, it was still my life, and now suddenly, in an instant, it was gone.

It was all gone.

There was a cavern in my chest where our love used to be.

I screamed like a dying animal, thrashing in my seat. I stuck the seatbelt in my mouth and clamped down, biting as hard as I could, letting the screams roll through me, shaking the car, shaking me to my very being. This was my soul crying, my heart fighting, and they all were losing. I screamed and hit the dash with my fists until all I felt was pain, the real pain that felt so much better than the claws that were raking at my heart, making me bleed inside, making me feel like I lost myself for good. I screamed and bawled and convulsed and kept at it for hours, buried by the pain, unable to keep from feeling it. It would go away for one second, enough for me to get air, and then it would come crashing back down, that merciless wave that wanted to drown me. And every time I thought about giving up, about letting my lungs fill, about being too weak to take on any more, the reality wouldn’t let me. I was stuck on this endless loop. That was the truth then, this is the truth now. That was the truth then, this is the truth now.

So many lies leading to so much loss.

I stayed in the car until I didn’t have anything left in me to give. I was numb, and even when I tried to think about it, it didn’t sting. It just ached, dull, like a tooth that needed pulling.

I drove away to a coffee shop, ducking from people’s curious glances, then made up my face in the bathroom. My makeup was ruined, my eyes red and puffy—dead giveaways. I washed my face, dabbed cold water under my eyes, and ignored the knocks on the door from impatient customers. I made myself look presentable, then leaned forward on the sink, having a staring contest with myself.

“You are Ellie Watt,” I told myself. “And that’s something he’ll never take from you. Eden White is dead.”

Then I left, brushing past the people, and went back to the house. I’d already stopped calling it home. I parked in the garage and took my four beers upstairs.

Javier was in the living room watching television. He smiled when he saw me and I was sure he saw through everything. But he didn’t question the extra time it took me to return the smile. He didn’t mention the extra makeup I had on my eyes to cover up the puffiness. He didn’t notice the darkness in my eyes while I had to look at him. His beautiful face. I couldn’t have hated him more.

I gave him the beers, sat by him on the couch, and we made small talk about work and I pretended I was playing a role. He never knew me, the real me, he never loved me and therefore he never hurt me. Ellie Watt was unscathed. Ellie Watt would survive the night. Ellie Watt would leave.

We kissed goodnight and I refused to enjoy it. I refused to miss those lips or remember that last kiss or remember anything about us. I kissed him like I’d kiss a snake.

In the morning, he got up and went for his jog. I declined, pretending I had a bit of a headache. And then, in thirty minutes, I packed up everything I could. I took a gun of his from the study. I took a load of cash from his safe. I took the car keys to Jose. Like hell I was going to let him track me this time.

I went into the garage, moved all my shit, moved my con artist emergency kit from the truck and into my new car. Then I took my cell phone and placed it on the ground just behind the tires. I started Jose with a victorious roar and backed out, smashing the cell to delicious smithereens.

I roared away down that street, away from Javier, away from my first love, away from the lies. I gave the middle finger to Ocean Springs, to Biloxi, to Gulfport, to the whole damn state. I kept driving because that’s what Ellie Watt wanted me to do.

To keep going, keep moving, and never look back.

A few weeks later after conning my out of Louisiana, I was back in Texas with only one place to go. Gus wouldn’t know I was coming and maybe he wouldn’t even want to see me, but I figured it was time to tell him he was right. It was time for me to apologize.

Texas, of course, was always bigger than I expected. I pulled over at a Holiday Inn outside of Huntsville to crash for the night. Sleep, however, didn’t come easy to a road weary mind. In fact, I’d turned into somewhat of an insomniac ever since…well, ever since Mississippi. When my mind wouldn’t shut off at ten o’clock, I rolled out of bed and made my way across the parking lot to a saloon, hoping for a stiff drink and maybe some steak brisket.

The bar was fairly packed so I took a seat up at the counter, away from the loudmouthed fishermen at the end, but beside a grizzled old woman.

Actually, up close she was less old and just grizzled. She was probably in her late sixties, with blond and grey hair gathered back into an anorexic ponytail. She had skin like cowhide and makeup that belonged on Malibu Barbie. I could tell she’d been just like me at some point, lost and angry and racking up the miles.

She smiled at me, hot pink lipstick on smoker’s teeth, and said, “Thank you for joining me.”

I nodded back. “They have strong drinks here?”

She shook her head. “They don’t. Stick to the beer, I’ll buy you one.”

“Thank you…” I trailed off expectantly.

“Thank you, Marda,” she said. “And who is the beer for?”

I stuck out my hand. “I’m Elaine.”

My new name never sounded so sweet.

She pursed her lips as if she figured I wasn’t telling the truth. But it didn’t matter, between strangers in a bar, on the side of a Texas highway.

Marda told me she was just waiting for her husband to pick her up. He was working late and they were jetting off to Houston right afterward. Someone’s birthday party was the next day. I told her nothing about myself, learning to lay low and keep my mouth shut. She bought me drinks and brisket, and after my fourth beer, that’s when everything changed.

The bar had emptied out. There were some rowdy men in the corner booth and a few lonely souls scattered about. The service had dried up and the bartender was spending her time in the back room, watching infomercials on a tiny TV screen. When we needed her we rang the bell, otherwise we were on our own.

I guess the bartender reminded me of Hogan’s Heroes, because suddenly I was thinking about Julie, then Javier, and a single tear leaked down my face.

“Honey, what’s the matter?” Marda asked, handing me a greasy napkin. I took it and put it beside me, wiping my tear away with my hand.

“It’s nothing,” I told her, breathing in long and deep. I had a prescription in my purse for panic attacks just in case, but I’d learned to tell the difference between panic and sorrow, even though they sometimes felt like one and the same.

“It’s everything,” she said after she slugged her beer. “I saw it when you came in. It’s a man, isn’t it? Oh, what a stupid question. What did he do?”

I hadn’t told anyone yet about what happened. It had been locked in my head, buried in a box. I was afraid to speak, to make it real. But the beer was hitting me hard and I was just so fucking tired of trying to hide from the pain.