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close. I'm going to come. My back skids suddenly along

  the plaster as Austin shifts.

  "Paige! Goddamn it!"

  "Put your hand on my throat," I whisper.

  "Put your hand on my throat," I whisper.

  And Austin does.

  His hand can't close al the way around my neck, but it's

  big enough to come pretty close. We move together,

  sliding as sweat makes us slick and fucking leaves him

  unsteady. Something rips into me. A nail left from a picture

  knocked off the wal when once I slammed a door. I can't

  cry out, I can't breathe, he's done what I asked and taken

  my breath again.

  Austin's fingers close tighter and my fingernails dig deeper

  and we both come at the same time. Only after that does

  he put me down, his hands shaking, and then sink to the

  ratty tied-rag rug that always manages to slip out of place

  on the dirty hardwood floor. I don't quite fal, but I

  colapse into a crouch.

  My back stings. Hot blood drips steadily down my back,

  over my ass and down my leg. I sip in the air and wait for

  the world to stop rocking and my body to stop pulsing. It

  seems to take a very long time.

  He won't look at me.

  He gave me what I wanted, but it's the last time I'll ask

  Austin for anything for a long time. I move out the

  next day, letting the bruises on my neck and stitches

  on my back speak when I will say nothing. He gave me

  what I wanted, what I needed, but the price was high.

  Too high.

  Someone came into the bathroom and entered the stal at

  the far end. I couldn't stay there, holding back sobs and

  trying not to breathe. I washed my hands and face again,

  and looked in the mirror to be sure nothing was out of

  place. I went back to my desk and got back to work,

  wishing for a list to take up al my attention so I didn't have

  to think about the past.

  I was realy going to leave Paul. Move on. Move up.

  But what about the rest of my life? Was I going to move

  on and up from it?

  Chapter 35

  "Thanks for taking me." I gathered up my purse and

  sweater while my dad puled into the spot next to my car.

  "I appreciate it."

  "No problem." He drummed the steering wheel with his

  fingertips and stared out the window at the hospital. "So.

  Your mom's in there, huh?"

  I sat back against the leather seat of his BMW and

  nodded. "Yes. She has breast cancer, and there were

  complications with the surgery."

  He flinched, his cheeks paling. My dad swalowed hard.

  His fingers stiled and gripped the wheel. He didn't look at

  me. "How does she look?"

  It wasn't exactly the question I thought he'd ask, and it

  annoyed me. "She looks like someone who's sick and who

  almost died. How do you think she looks?"

  "I meant how is she," he said, but I didn't quite believe him.

  "You could go see her yourself." I knew he wouldn't. My

  parents weren't enemies, but in my entire life they'd never

  been anything like friends.

  "Yeah. Yeah, I could do that." He licked his lips, then

  turned to me with a bright, hard grin. "I don't think she'd

  see me, do you?"

  "I don't know." I shrugged. "Maybe you could just send her flowers."

  The easy way out. He nodded and hunched forward,

  looking upward to the hospital building as though he was

  trying to pick out which window was hers. Her room was

  on the other side, but I didn't mention that.

  "Thanks again for the ride," I said.

  "You know, I did love her, Paige. Your mother. I'm sure

  she's said otherwise—"

  "She's never said, either way." I shifted, my hand on the

  door handle. I wanted to escape this conversation before it

  happened, but I didn't get out.

  "She hasn't?" My dad looked surprised.

  "She never realy talked much about you at al, Dad."

  This didn't make him very happy, and his eyebrows

  beetled down. I caught a glint of silver threads in them,

  too, against the blond. He sat back in his seat and turned

  toward me.

  "She had to have said something. I mean…I'm your dad."

  "She never gave me details," I told him as gently as I

  could. "It realy wasn't my business, was it?"

  Not to mention how squicky it would be to hear details

  about the affair that had resulted in my birth. I'd known my

  whole life who my dad was, and that I only saw him

  sometimes. That he had a couple other families more

  important than mine, and that he always had more money

  that somehow never made its way into my mom's walet

  the way it should've. But I hadn't ever asked for details,

  the wheres and whys and whens. I'd assumed she loved

  him. I'd never considered that he might have loved her.

  "I did, though. Love her." My dad cleared his throat. "You look like her, Paige. So much now."

  He hadn't seen her in years, and I looked like him, but I

  He hadn't seen her in years, and I looked like him, but I

  smiled. "Thanks."

  "She was so beautiful, you wouldn't believe it. She knew

  just how to make a cup of coffee, too, my God, that

  woman was a wizard." He drifted into memories, no longer

  seeing me.

  I wasn't impressed with his recolection. She was pretty

  and made good coffee. Nice. What about she was smart,

  kind, generous, funny? That she made a wicked meat loaf

  and could stretch a budget so thin you could see through it,

  but stil come up with the cash for a new pair of sneakers

  or a birthday cake.

  "My first wife didn't realy understand me."

  I groaned. "Oh, Jesus, Dad. God."

  I got out of the car and slammed the door. I didn't want to

  listen to his crock-of-shit explanations for why he'd fucked

  his secretary, knocked her up and left her to raise their kid

  alone. I didn't want to hear his reasons for being unfaithful.

  Maybe if he'd married my mother, if the story had become

  a fairy tale with a happily-ever-after, with me, their pretty

  princess, in a white dress and white patent-leather shoes

  princess, in a white dress and white patent-leather shoes

  with a pony and a clown at her birthday party, I might

  have cared. I might have listened. But as it was, I turned

  my back and tried to leave him behind.

  My dad got of the car, too. "Paige!"

  There had been few occasions when my dad had to raise

  his voice tone. I'd always been so terrified he'd stop loving

  me, I'd never misbehaved. My feet stiled automaticaly,

  but I didn't turn.

  He caught up to me and reached for my arm, but didn't

  grab it when I glared. "Paige. Wait a minute."

  "Dad, realy. I have to get inside. I promised Mom I'd stop

  by and I have to get home to take care of Arty."

  He looked blank.

  "Arty. My brother." I didn't add the "half." "He's in an afterschool-care program, but I have to get back in time to

  pick him up."

  He looked up again at the building, then back at me. "I

  don't think I'd better go in there. But wil you t