Prologue
Arden
My body is melting. I’m sure it must be. If not, then I don’t know what all the sweaty stickiness means.
I stand at the bottom of the staircase that leads to my third-floor attic apartment and sigh. It’s not that the climb is so terrible. I’m a very healthy 25-year-old woman who’s taken these stairs at a run—while carrying groceries, thank you very much. It’s just that the entry areas of this old house aren’t air conditioned, and it’s so damn hot.
What do you expect? demands a sarcastic voice I can always depend on to get straight to the point. It’s July in Chicago. You know the drill. All the heat and humidity you could ask for. Free of charge!
“Thanks for nothing,” I mutter as I start climbing.
It wouldn’t be so bad, I try to convince myself, if the AC hadn’t gone on the fritz at work. We struggled in silence for well over an hour before the powers that be relented and let us leave. The repairman was another hour away, the heat was becoming oppressive, and nobody was getting anything done, anyway. They just wanted to keep us at our desks because we get a day off later in the week to celebrate the 4th of July.
“Like a few more hours are going to make a big difference,” I grumble to myself and pretend it makes me feel better. I can’t decide if it does or not.
I circle the second-floor landing, and then I’m at the third—and top—floor. It’s a big old house that was converted into apartments years ago, and I love it here. I especially adore my little one-bedroom attic space. It’s oddly shaped and perfect for somebody with my eccentric tastes, according to my boyfriend Eddie.
He pissed me off the first time he said something like that. I have perfectly ordinary tastes, thank you very much. It’s just not that everybody else shares them. That doesn’t make me strange. Does it?
No. Hell, no!
Besides, Eddie moved in with me a few months ago, so my apartment—and I—can’t be that eccentric. The setup is kind of a loft/studio combination but with a separate bedroom and a tiny little bathroom.
What’s wrong with that?
I stop in front of the door and fish around in my oversized purse for my keys. I find my phone first and take a quick peek at the screen.
No text from Eddie, darn it.
He was out of the office when the air conditioning fiasco happened and doesn’t know about it. He’s a CPA at the same financial firm where I work as an accountant, so he’d want to know. I texted him the good/bad news, suggested he come straight home after his meeting, and . . .
Well, I sent the eggplant emoji. Shorthand for sex. Things between us have been a little lackluster lately, so I thought an unexpectedly free afternoon might spice things up for us.
After I shower, I remind myself as I wrinkle my nose.
I slip my phone back into my purse and pull my keys free of the collection of sunglasses, ink pens, receipts, and assorted change. I shake my head and make a mental note to clean the thing out.
Unlocking and opening the door, I hear sounds. Odd, unintelligible noises that are totally out of place.
Did one of us leave the TV on? I step all the way inside, glance around the main room, and see that no, the television is off. Maybe it’s the radio. The sounds are coming from the bedroom, and so I start in that direction. Another of my eccentricities, according to Eddie, is that I still own an actual working clock radio with an alarm. Maybe I left that on.
I drop my purse onto the couch and take two steps inside the bedroom when I get it. In spades.
The noises have nothing to do with the radio or the TV or anything like that. They’re coming from the bed, where Eddie’s very familiar ass is displayed for my viewing pleasure. More than that, a pair of shapely legs are draped over his shoulders, and he’s pounding in and out of the body that I presume is attached to the legs.
“Take my cock, baby,” he grunts as he slams forward again. “All the fucking way.”
“Yes, yes, yes! Fuck me, Eddie!” shouts a female voice.
I stand there for—how long? Seconds? Minutes? Days? I don’t know, but I’m immobile.
What are all the useless words to describe the chaos in my brain?
Confused? Shocked? Hurt?
I know I’m in the right apartment. This is my bedroom, that’s Eddie’s ass, his voice, but . . . it doesn’t make any sense.
Does it?
Maybe. It must. Somehow. I just don’t have the deliberation or heart or stamina to figure it out right now.
Disgust and betrayal churn together in my stomach, forcing me to swallow back a sudden wave of nausea. Searching for a ragged gasp of air, I slowly become aware of a new emotion that’s trying to push forward. Determined to wade through all the others.
It picks up bits of strength and purpose and resolve along the way until I’m lost to what it’s become: The monster of everything inside me right now.
Anger.
I search for anything I can get my hands on that I can use to whack that son of a bitch over the head. Nothing is close enough, so I slip off my shoes. My goddamn sensible pumps with chunky heels that are supposed to be part of the uniform for a woman in my position. I chuck the first one at his head and snarl a satisfied smile when it smacks against the back of his head.
“Ow! Motherfu—”
He twists, catches sight of me, and pulls back from his slut buddy. I sling the other shoe in his direction, he jerks out of the way, and it bounces harmlessly off the headboard, right onto the head of the other woman.
“Ouch! Jesus fucking Christ!”
“Arden!” shouts Eddie.
I’m aware on some level that he’s moving again, pushing those legs from his shoulders. His dick is suddenly free, condom-covered, at least, and bobbing obscenely between his legs.
Mostly, though, I’m staring at the other woman. The slut buddy. The person he brought to my bed to fuck instead of me.
Susan.
“You’re fucking my goddamn sister?” I shout, searching vainly for something else to throw.
“Just wait, okay?” He crawls from the bed, his hands outstretched with his palms showing. “Let me explain.”
“Explain?” Goddamn, but there has to be something I can toss at his lying, cheating head.
I step toward the dresser, find a framed picture of the two of us at my mother’s house last Christmas, and I sling it at him.
“Ouch, goddamn it!” he snaps when it catches him on the shoulder. “Will you just fucking stop?”
“You’re fucking my sister?” I repeat as my fingers close over a decorative silver hairbrush that belonged to my grandmother. I lob it in his direction, but it bounces harmlessly—and disappointingly—to the floor.
“It’s not what you think!”
“Not what I think? Not what I think?” I repeat, my voice soaring. “You wanna know what I fucking think? You stuck your dick in her and fucked her. It’s not like you can argue the fact—since I caught you in the fucking act!”
“Okay,” he gives a quick nod but otherwise doesn’t move. “Just calm down and let’s talk.”
“Talk?” I screech. I hate the sound, but I’m just so goddamn mad and hurt and appalled, I don’t have any control over it. Any of it.
Right now, I don’t care enough to try to do anything about it.