Beyond Compare (The Beyond Series Book 4) Read online

  Taking a step back, I shake my head before I lose my nerve. “I should finish,” I say firmly, sniffing and looking to the ceiling as I get myself under control.

  Every time I think I’m ready to start again, I look at Lennox and want to start blubbering again.

  “I can’t look at you when I talk,” I croak, turning my gaze out the store window as I choke back another sob.

  “Okay,” I say, after several more deep breaths. “I’m okay.” It takes me another minute to believe it enough to continue, and not once do I dare look at Lennox, for fear of losing it all over again.

  “So, times were hard. For a long time. And then Mom finally died, which was a blessing, given the state of her. And us. It freed me up to work during the day - which helped, but I was under assessment for the first period, to prove I was capable of being the kids’ guardian. There was a risk that we’d lose at least the twins if I couldn’t keep us afloat, and there was always something draining the funds. There were funeral costs, and then the furnace broke, along with the washing machine, which also flooded the utility room and screwed with the wiring, and-”

  Unable to believe my eyes, it takes me a full three seconds to duck behind the fruit stand, sending several oranges rolling across the floor. Not giving them a second thought, I clutch the wooden edge of the stand, peering out the window as Andy Coulson crosses the road coming straight for the store.

  “Oh shit. Shit, shit, shit!” He saw me!

  I stop breathing altogether as he hits the sidewalk, but instead of coming in the door, Andy keeps walking down the street. I watch from my hiding spot until he walks out of view, then exhaling in a rush, I sink fully to the floor, where an orange lands in my lap, followed by several more. “Shit.”

  Rushing to scoop up as many as I can, I fill my sweater like a pouch and stand up to face Lennox.

  Doing little to hide his amusement, he takes oranges from my pouch two at a time, re-stacking them. “Friend of yours from the club?”

  “Huh? Oh. I’m sorry you had to see that. And that I wrecked your display. Again. Geez. Okay. Um, no,” I stammer, forcing myself to say the words. “Not a guy from the club. That was... Andy.”

  “Andy?”

  Clearing my throat I try to choke out what I have to say. I nod. “Mmhm.”

  Another breath. Come on Kat; actual words.

  “Andy Coulson. The boy from next door. He said he was going to be in Buffalo on business. He gave me his card and asked me to be in touch, but I haven’t called him. Wasn’t going to. I don’t want to see him.”

  “Clearly, or you wouldn’t have dived for cover when you saw him just now,” Lennox agrees. “I thought you said he was close to you and your family.”

  “He is. Was. Is.” Groaning, I straighten and smooth my sweater when Lennox removes the last of the oranges.

  Turning to reach for another from the ground, I trip myself up.

  “Whoopsie-daisies!” Lennox says, catching me and setting me to rights again.

  Unable to keep from laughing, I cover my mouth. “Did you just say whoopsie-daisies?”

  Blushing a little, he drops to pick up a few oranges. “It’s a dad thing. Stop changing the subject. The guy is or was close to your family?”

  “Both. But he wants to be closer to me.”

  “But you don’t want that anymore. Right?” he asks, not sounding entirely certain.

  “I couldn’t even if I wanted to!” I cry, throwing my hands in the air, still chasing the orange I’ve just knocked further away from myself.

  “That’s not the same as not wanting to,” Lennox says when I turn to face him. His face has darkened to an almost thunderous expression.

  Dropping the orange again, I stoop to pick it up.

  “It doesn’t matter if it’s the same or not. It’s not ever happening. Did you not see the hiding? I want to see him even less than I want to have this conversation with you.”

  “Why?”

  “Because of this very conversation!” I cry, throwing the orange at him. “Because...”

  The words won’t come out. I’m at the crux of it and they won’t come out. I try again, but nothing comes. Groaning again in frustration, I brush my hair back from my face, shoving it over my shoulder. My cheeks are burning and I feel hot all over. Too hot. And I can’t breathe properly.

  “This isn’t over,” I tell him, already walking towards the door. “I’m saying what I came to say, I just need some fresh air for a sec.”

  Yanking the door open, I growl at how cheerful the bell still sounds as I step out into the cold. Walking in a small circle, I take a moment to collect myself. Reaching for the door to go back in, movement further down the street catches my eye and I throw the door open, lunging inside.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck a fat salami!” Slapping a hand over my mouth as soon as I say it, I skid past Lennox, fall to the floor and scramble as quickly as I can back behind the oranges.

  Cursing loudly, Lennox drops to my side. “Are you okay?!”

  The door’s bell jingles and I cringe, hunching low and squeezing my eyes shut.

  Taking my hand in his, Lennox gives it a gentle squeeze and starts pulling me to my feet. “And that’s how this stand supports that much weight,” he says, giving us a random excuse for acting weird. “Hello, Sir.”

  “Uh, hi,” Andy replies, returning Lennox’s smile politely as he looks beyond him. “ThunderKat?”

  Sucking up my guts, I step out from behind Lennox, trying to feign surprise. “Andy! Hi.”

  I’m not fast enough to figure out how to stop him before Andy’s across the floor, picking me up in a spinning hug and kissing me on the lips - briefly, but still. Aaaargh!

  “Of all the stores, in all the world!’ he exclaims, holding me at arm’s length before pulling me in again.

  Lennox observes it all. I know this because my wild eyes find him over Andy’s shoulder while I’m looking for an escape route.

  “I’m so glad I ran into you,” he says, letting me go finally. “I knew you wouldn’t call.”

  “You did?”

  “Yeah, well...” Pausing, he shifts his feet uncomfortably as he looks at Lennox, who hasn’t moved an inch.

  “Oh. Um, Andy, this is Lennox Green.”

  “Drew,” Andy states as he and Lennox shake hands. Turning back to me before he’s finished the handshake, he shrugs. “I go by Drew now. Corporate lawyers don’t find Andy very intimidating.”

  I nod, doing my best not to freak the hell out.

  “That makes sense. I um actually have somewhere I need to be, that’s away from here. Some way from here,” I correct, wracking my brain for a real excuse. “So I should really be going.”

  “Kat, please. Just give me a minute.” Andy follows me as I make a run for the door. “I talked to Dad.”

  Stopping dead in my tracks, I don’t turn around. “You did?”

  “He told me about the money.”

  Staring out the door, I try to work out how things are about to go. Killing two birds with one stone, I’m about to ruin two relationships with one shitty conversation. Taking a deep breath, I turn around slowly to face up to my crime. “He did?”

  “He doesn’t hold it against you, Kat. He knows times were hard and you couldn’t pay him back,” Andy says, stepping closer and reaching for my hand in a gesture of comfort.

  I pull mine away. “He... I beg your pardon?”

  “The money you owe him. I know about it, so you don’t have to keep running from me. He doesn’t care. It’s not like he needs it. But I know you’ll be overwhelmed with guilt about not being able to pay him back. That’s why you were behaving weird, isn’t it? And why every time my dad was around you’d hide? I noticed, so I hit him up about it. I’ve settled the debt, Kat. Sent him a check last week. It was the least I could do after being gone when you needed me most. Kat?”

  “He told you I owed him money,” I repeat to myself, trying to believe what I’m hearing as bile begins to creep up my throa
t. My head nods, then shakes, as if it can’t decide which side to take. “Excuse me, Andy - Drew. There’s somewhere I need to... I really have to run if I’m going to...” I don’t bother to finish, because I’m already out the door.

  Taking Marv’s Alley, I rush past him in a blur of tears as I cut behind the restaurant and loop back around to hide behind the crates outside Green’s Roller door.

  It’s there that Linc finds me, not two minutes later, having just returned from his deliveries.

  “Holy fuck. Kat?” Jumping down from the truck, he looks about for signs of an aggressor as he comes down to my level. “What happened? Are you okay?”

  Again, my head both nods and shakes.

  “Could you please take over the store?” I ask wiping my eyes. “I really need to finish talking to Lennox.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Lincoln lets me through the back door with him and continues out to the front of the store to fetch Lennox. Pacing a length of path back and forth, I braid and un-braid a section of my hair, eying the trashcan by the door every time I get the urge to throw up. Standing above it and thanking the stars I was too nervous to eat today, I’m dry-retching when Lennox arrives.

  Several curse words later, he’s rubbing my back to ease my jerky movements. Closing in, he surrounds me with soothing tones and touches, urging me to move away from the trash and breathe. Pulling me into his chest, he continues to rub my back a while, before sweeping me into his arms and carrying me to his garden.

  Setting me down on the lawn, he takes my restless fingers and brushes them gently over the soft grass until I do it on my own. Unlacing my boots, he pulls them off along with my socks and plants my feet firmly on the grass as well.

  Gentle fingers brush my cheek before untangling the braided mess I’ve made in my hair and redoing it tidily before re-settling it over my shoulder. With one crooked finger beneath my chin, he lifts my face to look into his. With a tenderness beyond belief, he closes my eyes as he wipes away my tears and kisses me on the forehead before leaving me with just the meditative sound of trickling water from the fountain in the corner.

  When I open my eyes again, he is sitting quietly beside me with a glass of water. I open my mouth to thank him, but he gives the smallest shake of his head and hands me the water.

  I feel even better after drinking it, but keep hold of the glass, circling it in my hands to keep my fingers busy.

  “You don’t owe anyone money, do you Katarina.”

  I shake my head. “I did everything he paid for.”

  Fresh tears begin streaming from my eyes, but I keep talking, because it’s out now and I’m angry. “I don’t owe that man a damn thing.”

  Looking up at the glass paneled ceiling, I shake my head. “Five grand, Andy would’ve paid him.” Shaking my head again in disbelief and disgust. “That man took five grand from his own son - after turning a desperate young girl - his son’s best friend, into a prostitute.”

  Covering my mouth as I retch again, I force myself to keep the water down and focus on my breathing. Sitting taller again, I hold a hand to my forehead and close my eyes. “I’m so sorry Lennox. I had to tell you before... I wanted... I just... I’m so ashamed. I hate that I did it. I hate...” Shaking my head again, I just let the tears fall. The ache in my throat is too much. Complete agony. The kind you feel ten times worse because the rest of your body has shut down the hope of feeling anything else.

  Moving in closer beside me, Lennox brings his hand to my back, gliding it in comforting circles. “Tell me what happened,” he coaxes gently, starting me where I’d left off, “The funeral, the furnace, the washer, the wires...”

  “And the car,” I add miserably, huffing a huge sigh. “I’d been biking to work for weeks. I cleaned three houses before lunch - four, if you count my own, biked home to prepare dinner for the kids, cleaned two more in the afternoon before serving the after-school crowd at the ice-cream parlor and waiting tables for the late crowd at Jessie’s Bar and Grill.

  “Mr. Coulson - Brett,” I correct myself again, admonishing my brain for continually keeping him in a position of power. “He found me crawling around the gaming slots out back, hoping someone had dropped anything from a quarter to - heaven-help-me, part, or all of their winnings.” Laughing a little at my stupidity, I sigh. “Most I ever found was fifty cents. I should’ve spent the time greasing up the clientele to get bigger tips. The other waitresses were always telling me to wear lower cut tops and shorter skirts, but I wasn’t like that, you know? Not then any way,” I add with another sad laugh. “I was innocent in every sense of the word.”

  Reflecting a moment on that, I wonder why I took so much offense to Lennox calling me innocent. There’s nothing wrong with innocence, though naivety is maybe the downside of it.

  “Anyway. He knew then, that I was absolutely strapped, and he knew I had the kids to care for. If he’d been able to see much beyond his own disappointing life, he would’ve known that his wife was already helping us by giving Tim hand-me-downs from Andy and letting me clean their house. He won that night,” I say, turning to Lennox briefly, only to lower my eyes to the grass as I let my fingers weave into it.

  “He won five thousand dollars and as he sat in my section nursing his bourbon, he left the wad of cash on the table. As if he was taunting me with it. I hated him for that. He never liked me, because his son looked at me with... love, I guess. But I wasn’t good enough for his Andy. He wasn’t going to let his only son end up stuck in little ol’ Franklinville because he married a pathetic, nothing girl with four extra mouths to feed.

  “He’d always found ways of keeping us apart. Ways that were exciting and rewarding for Andy, so he’d go willingly and wouldn’t know he was being distracted, but I knew. When Andy left for college, Mr. Coulson informed me any hopes I might have had for the far-fetched romance were over, because Andy was going to be a man of the world and if I truly loved him I should set him free. I guess me doing exactly that wasn’t enough to convince him, because that warning clearly wasn’t his crowning glory. Oh no. That was the moment when he offered to solve all my money problems if I just spent the weekend as his whore.”

  Sniffing, I realize I’ve clenched my fists in the grass. Scared of pulling it out, I release the blades and smooth them carefully back into position.

  “He chose Buffalo. Told his wife it was for business, booked us into the Embassy suites and started the clock. Five thousand dollars bought him my virginity, and four times after that. Probably would’ve been more, but he couldn’t get his dick up again. Still, he got laid five times, destroyed my self-worth and any chance I’d ever have with his son - all in one weekend, so he probably felt like an absolute winner. Whereas I was the girl who’d betrayed her feelings for her best friend by fucking his dad for cash.” Wiping my eyes, I find my tears have eased.

  “After a week back in Franky-town living next door to the Coulson’s, it was clear to me that I had to leave. I couldn’t stop crying and it was causing everyone in the house distress. I paid the outstanding debts with the dirty cash and sat down with Tim. I explained the finances, and how stressed I was, because I was failing everyone, and how our best chance of making it through would be if I moved to the city to look for better paying work. He supported my analysis, and when we had a plan in place, I managed to hold myself together a little better. We got through our final assessments, divided up roles, worked out what we each could do with a little help from Jem, how often I’d need to be back, and as soon as I could, I left for Buffalo.

  “That was a really shitty day too - the day I arrived in Buffalo. I had nowhere to live. Nobody wanted to hire a fresh-off-the-bus, small town girl with no high school diploma. I sucked up my pride and went down the road I already knew could earn me cash. I hit the strip clubs, hoping that my dancing and my body would get me in the door and onto the stage of the first club, or the next. Twice I was told the job was mine if I fucked the guy in charge, and when I came to the third one, I couldn’t br
ing myself to go in and hear the same thing again.

  “I sat in the gutter and cried, and that’s where Prez found me - outside The Horny Buffalo. I hadn’t even noticed it had been closed down. She took me up to her tiny apartment above the club, listened to what little I would tell her and then made me a bed. In the morning, she explained what she wanted to do to the club downstairs, and that she’d need help to do it. I became her assistant and using all the skills I’d learned organizing my own household, I helped her bring her therapeutic vision to fruition. When the club opened, nothing could keep me from that stage and my life became what it is. Time flew by, and the rest you know.”

  Taking a deep breath, I release all of the tension I’ve been keeping inside for... years. “You’re the first person I’ve told all of this to,” I whisper, risking a peek at the man worth telling.

  Listening and observing all this time, Lennox remains quiet, but his eyes say a million things. He crosses his legs in front of him as if he were a little kid in school. Then, leaning over, he wraps his arms around me and pulls me into his lap, where he just holds me.

  Resting my head on his shoulder, I let myself be held.

  It feels wonderful.

  I can’t even remember the last time I was held. Not hugged, but held. Before my father left? Maybe quite a while before that even.

  I’m not sure how long we stay like that, but eventually I open my eyes, because Kimber says, “Oh there you are. Hey Kat.”

  No: Hey Kat, what are you doing here? Or Hey Kat, why are you sitting in my Dad’s lap?

  Lifting my head from her dad’s shoulder, I turn to her. “Hey Kimber. School okay?”

  “Eh. Same old. You guys want a cup of tea?” she asks, moving behind the wall.

  “That’d be great actually. Thanks,” I call after her.

  Lennox chuckles at my expression, then looks in the direction of the kitchenette. “Make yours a weak one, Sprout. I’m not having you up all night again.”

  “Yeah, yeah. What’s for dinner?”

  “Stir-fry.”