Page 42 of Mr. North
“Who’s Chloe?”
A flicker of doubt passes over Thalia’s face. She hiccups, then bites her bottom lip, as if she realizes she’s said something wrong. “It doesn’t matter anymore. That was a long time ago. You’re here now. You’re here to make things better. You’re here to fix him. If you don’t, all of this has been for nothing.” Another loud hiccup echoes around the anteroom. She flops back onto the marble, her head rocking to one side as she looks out of the window to the city beyond. “We dreamed of this place, y’know?” She sighs, a sound of pure exhaustion. Her eyes glaze over; she stacks her hands on her sternum, crossing her feet at the ankle. “We used to sit on the rooftop at Paxton’s place and dream of being higher than the rest of the city even then. We wanted to be able to see the whole world from our vantage point. Money and power bought us the best view in New York, but still we weren’t happy with what we had. Raphael said he’d build this place. He already knew back then how special the Osiris would be. That it would be a haven for us.” She closes her eyelids, a tear rolling from the corner of the eye, streaking across the bridge of her nose. “Instead, it became his prison.”
“Thalia, stop.”
I look up, and Raphael is standing at the entrance to the penthouse, wearing sweat pants and a Star Wars t-shirt, ripped at the collar. Dark, bruised circles ring his eyes, exhaustion hanging over him like a black cloud. He is the very picture of a haunted man. Thalia nearly hurts herself in her hurry to get up. She scrambles, her feet sliding out from underneath her, and she has to slap a palm to the floor in order to stop herself from falling. Raphael flinches back and I can see it written plainly on his face: he wants to vanish back inside the penthouse and lock the door behind him. He does not want to see Thalia at all. He keeps his hands in the pockets of his sweat pants as she rushes across the anteroom and throws her arms around his neck. He tolerates her embrace, standing stiff as a board while she hugs him, his eyes locked on me over her shoulder.
He doesn’t breathe a word. Thalia leans back, her hands traveling over Raph’s face, brushing his hair back, her movements frantic, as if she’s checking him for injuries or something. A choked sob rips through the silence. “Raphael. Raphael, god, are you okay? I can’t believe you’re here right now. God, I can’t believe it. I can’t fucking believe it.” She sobs again, her voice filled with pain and sorrow. “She didn’t want this for you,” she whispers. “She didn’t want to see you like this.”
Slowly, with cold detachment, Raphael turns his head so that he’s looking directly into Thalia’s eyes. “You need to leave,” he says. “You can’t be here. You know that.”
She shakes her head, hugging him fiercely again. “You don’t need to do this anymore. It’s all over. It’s been over for a very long time.”
Raphael remains unmoved by her emotion. He might as well be made out of the same marble that stands beneath our feet. Eventually, with the most careful, measured movements imaginable, he reaches up behind his head and takes Thalia by the wrists, detaching her from him, placing her arms back down by her sides. “It doesn’t matter,” he says. His words aren’t unkind or callous. They’re simply resigned. “Go back down now. I need to talk to Beth.”
“I’ll come back. Tomorrow.” She sniffs, a pleading look in her eyes. I’ve never seen her like this before—so dejected and upset. I have no idea what’s happened between these guys, but whatever it is has broken them all so thoroughly that there’s never going to be a way back from it. Raphael knows it. It appears that Thalia just can’t accept it, though. Can’t or won’t.
“That wouldn’t be a good idea,” Raphael tells her. “I’m having new security measures installed tomorrow. You won’t be allowed into the elevator. Go home and rest. You can email me if you need to.”
“I’ve known you since I was three years old!” Thalia snaps. “I shouldn’t have to email you, Raphael. I should be able to come here whenever I want to. Whenever you need me.”
“I know,” Raphael agrees. “But that’s just not how things are. I’m sorry, Thalia, I really am.” I can hear how sad he is, how much he means it. He closes his eyes and kisses her temple, then he looks back toward the elevator, nodding. I’ve been so distracted by what’s happening that I haven’t noticed the two men in deep maroon blazers stepping out into the anteroom. Security guards. Both of them have shaved heads and earpieces, and look like they’re probably ex military.
“Is that…really necessary?” I ask quietly.
Raphael’s eyes are on fire when he looks at me. He doesn’t say anything, though. Thalia steps back, wiping her face with the back of her hand. “It’s okay. It’s really okay. I’ll go. I shouldn’t have come. I’m sorry, Raph.”
A flash of pain contorts his features, but then the blank, empty look returns to his face almost immediately. He strokes his hand down the side of Thalia’s face, and then turns and walks back inside the penthouse without looking back. I help Thalia gather up the contents of her purse, which are still spread all over the anteroom floor. Her hands are shaking, her cheeks red, as she stuffs makeup and notebooks back into the bag. I think she’s angry at me for a second, angry that I can stay and speak with him, to see how he is, that I’m able to spend time with a man she so obviously cares about. Then she grabs me by the hand and squeezes.
“He’s not okay, Beth. Don’t believe him if he says he is. He’s hurting. He’s afraid he’s lost you. Don’t give up on him. Please .” Desperation colors her voice. Her nails bite into my skin as she clenches hold of me, and once again I find myself tumbling down the rabbit hole, so confused and turned around by her attitude. She’s so sure I’ll be the Band-Aid to fix whatever hurt Raphael is suffering from. The thing about Band-Aids is that they’re temporary. They only mask the problem. The body heals beneath, or it doesn’t. A Band-Aid only hides the progress.
“Tell me what’s going on,” I whisper. “Please, Thalia. I can’t stand this anymore. And now, with the entire world watching…”
She blinks, her mascara streaking down her face in twin, thick black lines, and for a second I think she might tell me. The entire thing is sitting there on the tip of her tongue. A heartbeat later and it’s gone, though. With one last squeeze of my arm, she says, “Just don’t give up on him, Beth.”
* * *
R aphael isn’tin the vast lounge area when I walk into the penthouse. Nor is he in either of the VR studios. I haven’t been through any of the other doors that line the hallways, haven’t seen inside any of the rooms beyond, so it feels rude to start opening them up one by one on my mission to find him. I call his name until the sound of my voice rings out like a struck bell through the painfully silent space; there’s no way he doesn’t hear me, wherever he is. He doesn’t answer, though.
I find myself back in the formal dining room where Denny brought us steak the other night. Raphael is nowhere to be seen. I give up trying to be polite. I open up two offices, five guest bedrooms, a small library along with an actual movie theater, but I can’t seem to locate him. I’m about to call him on his phone when I notice a door at the far end of the hallway I find myself in standing ajar, and a tall column of sunlight cutting through the shadows.
When I peer through the open doorway, a flight of stairs leads up into what looks like open air. The sky is so very blue overhead. I creep up the stairs, uncertainty filling me from head to toe. Raph didn’t tell me to leave. He told Thalia he needed to talk to me and he left the door from the anteroom into the penthouse open. The security guards didn’t wait to escort me out of the building the way they did with Thalia. So why is it, then, that I feel like I’m intruding? Breaking the rules somehow?
At the top of the stairway, I find myself in the middle of the most beautiful rooftop garden imaginable. Plants, flowers…even trees. Everywhere I look, something green is growing. Terracotta pots form pathways leading from one section of the garden into the next, and on the far side of the roof, a step drops down onto a lawned area where Raphael is standing with his back to me. With a shotgun in his hand.
I stop dead in my tracks.
“It was a drone,” he calls out. “I heard it when we were together, but I didn’t think anything of it. There are always so many helicopters buzzing around the skies here that it didn’t even register at the time. I’ve shot down two of the fuckers since this morning. None of them have had markings on them, but I’m pretty sure they belong to the news crews.”
My heart is a fist in the hollow of my throat. At his feet, I see it—the debris. Broken pieces of plastic and glass. Twisted pieces of metal. I heard the whir of blades the other day, too. I assumed the same as Raphael—that it was just another helicopter. I’ve always been kind of entertained by the idea of drones. The prospect of having goods delivered by them, anywhere, anytime, always seemed like such an amazing idea. Now, I hate them beyond measure. They should be outlawed, banned countrywide. Fucking perverts, using them like that to spy on unwilling, unwitting people. I suppose technology has already been used to spy on unwitting people for years now, but drones make it too fucking easy.
My skin prickles, ice running through my veins. Raphael turns around, and the look on his face says it all. He’s ready to commit murder. He’s ready to tear someone limb from limb. He’s ready to go to motherfucking war. He lunges for me, taking three long strides, and then his arms are around me, holding onto me tight. I haven’t really given myself permission to think about how I might feel when I saw him again. I’ve purposefully stopped myself from even considering it, because when I left the Osiris yesterday evening, I felt light. Safe. Smitten, and so vulnerable. I kept thinking about the amazing, intense, private moment we shared, where he touched and caressed me, made me come alive under his hands. I couldn’t stop thinking about the way our bodies joined together and how perfect everything felt.
As soon as I saw that footage on the news, though, all of that changed. Listening to those bastards on the screen tearing apart every touch, every look, every moment our bodies met, made me feel like I’d imagined it all. They made me feel like the emotion and the pleasure I experienced when I was with him wasn’t as perfect as I’d originally thought. That maybe Raph was as unimpressed by me as the gossip columns and the reporters were.
Now that I’m standing here in his arms, feeling his heart beating out of his chest the same way mine is, I’m filled with anger for doubting myself. This is real. It was real yesterday, and it’s real now. I can feel the connection between us pulling taut, something physical, a tether that links us together. That can’t be seen on a television screen. And just because an entire city of people analyzed our interaction, doesn’t mean it’s no longer invaluable.
It did mean something. It still does. One second, I’m trying to catch my breath, my face pressed into Raph’s torn Star Wars shirt, the next I’m clinging to him, my fingernails digging into his shoulder blades, and I’m sobbing. I can’t decide if I’m sad or relieved. All I know is that I am so glad to be in his arms right now, no matter the circumstances. Raphael runs his hand over my hair, whispering soothing things into my ear. “It’s okay. It’s okay, Beth. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. This is all my fault. I won’t let it happen again, I swear it. I will never let them attack you like this again. Shhh. Shhh. It’s okay.”
