Chapter Five – The Ex

Sarah

He steps onto the elevator with me before I can utter a protest, and the doors close behind him.

“I came to see you, Sarah,” he says.

I shake my head and look away.

“I can't believe you're doing this,” I say. “Coming to my work now, Blake?”

“What, I can't stop by for a visit?” he says defensively, but with a smile on his face.

“A visit my ass,” I say. “You no more stopped by to just 'visit' me than the Pope stops by McDonald's for a cheeseburger.”

“You must be a frequent visitor of McDonald's yourself by now,” he says. “I heard what happened. How Daddy cut you out of the family.”

I glance over, hearing his emphasis on the t when he says 'cut', and see him smirk. He takes his hand out of his pocket and holds it up to me, using two fingers to mimic a pair of scissors.

“Snip...snip...” he whispers.

I smile.

“Blake, you're just jealous,” I say. “'Cause you're not allowed to touch these Chicken McNuggets anymore.”

I use a semi-free hand to grab the bottom of my breast, giving it a squeeze and lift. I can see his eyes immediately go to my chest, and I can barely help the urge to roll my eyes. Men.

As if God himself sends me a saving grace, the elevator dings and the doors open to my floor, and I give him a slight wave and immediately step off. I know he's going to follow me.

And just as I suspect, he does...but what I don't expect is that he's so stunned by my “brazen” sexual innuendo that he stands and stares for a moment, and barely starts to step off the elevator as it starts to close, and like an idiot, bumps right into the door.

“Sarah,” he says as he recovers, the stumbling, bumbling fool that he is.

“Blake, go back to your own office,” I say as I set the box Mr. Beckett will need on my desk. “Carrington-Kennedy currently has no open cases with this firm. I'm sure Mr. Bass would be pleased to help you with anything you need if you just go there.”

“I'm not here for business,” he says. “I'm here for pleasure.”

“There's a sperm bank about twenty minutes from here,” I say. “They deal mostly with the pleasure sense, I'm sure they'll be able to help you.”

“That's cute, Sarah,” he says. “Really cute.”

“Yeah,” I say drolly. “People tell me that I'm just fuckin' adorable.”

“It's funny that you should bring up Bass,” he says. “Is he one of the ones that tells you you're just adorable?”

“What business is it of yours if he does?”

“I thought Daddy might be interested to hear.”

I stop.

“Well, congrats,” I say. “So you're the new man he promoted to being his gossip bitch. I'm sure you'll do well in the position.”

“Oh Sarah,” he says, his head shaking. “Why are you so bitter?”

“Why am I so bitter?” I can feel my blood pressure rising. “Oh honey, we could be here all night. Why don't you go back to your yard? I'm sure once Daddy Kennedy realizes you snapped your leash, he'll be rightly upset at losing the family pet.”

He stands there, watching me, as I put away folders and papers, readying myself to leave. Frankly, I'm no longer worried about dragging out my time away from the house – with Blake showing up, going back to the house to deal with Lance will be a picnic. I leave the box of files on my desk knowing I'll just come in a few minutes earlier on Monday to take care of them, grab my purse and coat, and start walking back towards the elevator.

“We're going to talk, Sarah,” he says.

“No, we're not,” I say.

As I walk past him, I'm startled when his hand reaches out and grabs my arm, his grip on me tight. I can't help it; I snap. I twist my body and my right hand flies up, striking his nose with the bony heel of my palm. He cries out in pain and shortly after, I have his arm locked behind his back, and he's leaned over in front of me, blood dripping out of his nose onto the carpet.

“Don't you ever touch me like that!” I say.

“Alright!”

His body loosens submissively, and after a few moments I let go of his arm, allowing him freedom from the locked position. He takes a few seconds to recover as he turns around towards me, stretching out his arm and wiping his bloody nose with his fingers.

“You're a crazy bitch,” he says as he looks at the red liquid on his fingertips.

“That's right, I am,” I say. “And if you know what's good for you, you'll remember that the next time you wanna stop by for a 'visit'.”

Holding my purse close to my body, I leave him to bleed on the carpet as I head toward the elevator. Going home doesn't seem nearly so daunting anymore.

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When I walk in the door, my senses are assaulted with the smell of something wonderful cooking on the stove.

“Mmm.”

I breathe in deeply. I know that scent. He's making his famous chicken fried steak, and it makes my stomach rumble at just the smell.

“Lance?”

I yell, but I quickly realize he's not going to hear me, because he's got the radio on, singing to the tune of “The Way You Make Me Feel” by Michael Jackson.

I lay my purse and my peacoat over the back of the couch, and I'm just about to slip my heels off my aching feet and walk into the kitchen when he bursts into the living room, sliding on the hardwood floor in his socks in his own version of a “Footloose” move. I can barely take a step before he grabs my hand and pulls me into a twirl.

“You're home,” he says when he pulls me into his arms.

“You're dancing like a moron,” I say.

“Cutting right into the heart as usual,” he says, and releases me.

He walks back into the kitchen. I silently giggle; number two out of the two days we've been here and again, we have an encounter over old 80's music. It's almost like the old days, except we're adults now. At least this time he got a handle on his coordination. It's almost charming.

No, damn it. I can't get sucked into that.

I kick my foot to throw my first heel off, leaning down to remove the other with my hand. I throw it over with the other, hearing it land on the floor with a dull thud. The hardwood floors feel good against my slightly aching feet, only covered with thin pantyhose; if I were less of a lady, and if I weren't in the presence of another man, I'd rip those off right now.

He turns the stereo down as I walk into the kitchen, coming to stand next to him near the stove.

“So what did you do today at work?” he asks.

“I kicked a guy's ass,” I say. I'm pulling out two wine glasses and another bottle of Carrington's fancy wines; after today, I need it.

“Whoa.” He turns to look at me, his eyebrows raised. “In the court room?”

“In the nose.”

His eyebrows lower, but he still has a distinct, astonished look on his face.

“You mean you legit kicked a guy's ass?”

“I legit kicked a guy's ass,” I say with a nod.

“Who?”

“Blake Peters,” I say as I start pouring the wine.

The room falls silent, and he drops the metal tongs he's using to turn the steaks in the oil. They clang against the metal pan, and I look over at him.

“Your, uh...your ex?” he says uncomfortably.

“Don't remind me,” I say. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, yeah,” he says, picking up the tongs again. “Drop of oil. Snapped at me. Ow.”

I narrow my eyebrows at him.

“So, Blake stopped by to see you then?” he asks. “What'd he want?”

“Not sure.” I lift my glass to urge the sweet wine into my mouth. “You're a lawyer. Is it technically still harassment if he's the one who left with a bloody nose?”

“There's a fine line between self-defense and assault,” he says. “If your right-hook is still as good as it used to be, you might have to add 'with a deadly weapon' to it.”

“Great, so now I have to worry about a lawsuit and how to explain to Mr. Beckett why his eggshell Berber is stained with red droplets,” I say.

“You drew blood?” he asks. “I'm impressed. I thought you stuck to stabbing enemies with clever insults only.”

“I pulled out a few of those too,” I say with a sigh.

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Lance

I'm sitting out on my deck, listening to the waves slap up against the shore. The sun set hours ago. The wind has picked up, and I can tell that a hell of a storm is on the way.

If not on the beach, in my heart.

Her ex showed up. In her office. I shouldn't be surprised; barring a sudden move or homicide – which at this point, I'm not sure Sarah isn't considering – of course he's going to still be around. I guess I just thought...

Well, I guess I thought she was done with him.

From the sounds of it, she thought she was done with him, too. A strong palm to the nose generally isn't a statement of unconditional love. If it was, I wouldn't be questioning whether Sarah really hates me or only wants to hate me.

But now, I'm worried.

I lift up the glass of scotch and take a drink. I'm generally not a hard drinker. I enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine with Sarah over dinner, and we talked for a while before she finally excused herself, saying how tired she was. I pretended I was tired too; walked her part of the way to her room, saying good night and watching as she walked in and closed the door behind her. But now, I'm here.

It has to be at least one in the morning. I have to be up early, at least by eight, early for Sunday standards; I absolutely have to do some work on the Carlisle account, or I may end up disowned by my father too. But try as hard as I might, I can not sleep.

Not with the thought of Blake on my mind.

Blake Peters was one-hundred percent, unscathed gold to Sheldon Kennedy; perfect son, perfect student, perfect lawyer material. For God's sake, if Sheldon had his way, he would have adopted Blake into the family and cast Jude aside, especially after Jude came out as gay five years ago. Marriage just gave Sheldon an excuse to welcome Blake into the family, and Sarah almost made that happen.

And then, she didn't.

Hmm, maybe I'm onto something.

My mind is working and the wheels are turning, but then they're interrupted. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a shadow on the beach, heading out to the water. First, the shadow is nothing but black, and I can't see details. Then, the shadow steps out into the light of the bright white moon, and I see her nightgown.

Standing up from my chair, I rush over to the railing and lean over it slightly.

“Sarah?”

She turns towards me and looks up at me, her hair whipping around her face in the wind.

“Lance?”

She says it surprised; she didn't expect me to be up.

“Hang on, I'm coming down,” I tell her.

I'm sure it looks stupid – the way I'm running out of the room and down the stairs at a fast pace, at one in the morning, to go down to the beach in my sweatpants and t-shirt. I try not to race down the stairs and through the patio door in the dining room like an idiot, setting a decent pace as I walk through the sand toward her.

“Sarah, what the hell are you doing out here?” I ask. “It's past midnight, and there's a storm coming.”

She's staring out at the water, watching the waves roll in. She opens her mouth to speak, and softly shakes her head, but before the words can come out, she breaks down.

“Sarah, what's wrong?”

I'm shocked when she falls towards me, starting to sob into my shoulder wordlessly. I hesitantly put my hand on her shoulder; I don't know why she's broken down, much less how she'll react to my touch.

“Let's get you inside.”

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“I'm sorry.”

It's about the millionth time she's said it. She's still in tears, but at least she's inside. The rain started pouring a couple minutes after I brought her inside. The chill in the air dropped a few degrees and I started a fire.

“Sarah, you don't have to be sorry,” I say. I poke the fire one more time to shift the logs and get a good flame going, and once I'm satisfied with it, I toss the poker back in with the other tools.

“I don't know what's wrong with me,” she says.

“Just start by telling me why you're crying.”

I come to sit next to her on the couch in front of the fire, drawing my legs up underneath me. The wind has whipped her hair into a mess, and I bring up my finger to coax a few unruly strands back into place behind her ear so I can see her face.

“I didn't want to see him, you know?” she says. “Every time he comes around, my life turns to shit.”

“What do you mean your life turns to shit, Sar?” I ask. “I mean, you clocked the guy in the nose.”

“It's not about that, Lance,” she says. “I mean, God, look at me! He shows up for five minutes and here I am bawling over it all night.”

“So, you miss him?” I ask, trying to hide the disappointment in my voice.

“No,” she says softly, wiping away a few tears. “No, it's not that I miss him. Not really – I mean, not him. Definitely not him.”

“Then what is it?”

She sighs. “I don't know.” She pauses hesitantly, but the tears have stopped. “I miss having the void filled. Now it's just...empty.”

“So you do miss him?”

“No!” she half-yells. “Not him!”

“Then what is it?” I've raised my voice too, but I can't wipe the smile off my face. She's confusing the hell out of me. “You say you don't miss him but you're empty. If there's a void there, he must have filled it. Ergo, you miss him, or am I wrong?”

“I miss someone, but it's not him.”

“Then who do you miss?” I ask softly.

She turns to look up at me shyly, her eyes peeking out from under long, wet eyelashes.

“It's you,” she whispers.