Page 50 of Things We Burn

I took a deep breath, putting down the toner before toying with a moisturizer.

“I guess I considered him a mentor. Almost a father figure. Which, in hindsight, is an insult to my father’s memory.”

I gulped down fire and shame, remembering how part of me had wished for a man like that as a father instead of the easygoing, loving and jovial man I remembered. Because if I had a tough, stern and cold father, maybe it’d be easier to lose him.

“I stayed late often. To clean up, scrub ovens, counters, to experiment with recipes of my own. Gerald had given me free rein of the kitchen after service… A huge gift.”

I thought back to the serene nights, the sizzling of the pans, the clang of pots and the faraway noises of Paris. I stayed until after midnight plenty of times, even when I’d have to be up at six to prepare for service.

“I was always alone in the kitchen,” I rubbed lotion onto my neck. “Gerald was always at events and parties, being celebrated.He liked that. Bathed in the attention and praise he got for being a genius.”

I rolled my eyes. I’d always found him a little narcissistic and pompous. But again, to survive and thrive at that level, you always had to have a certain level of narcissism and delusional belief in yourself.

“But then one night he was there,” I whispered.

I still smelled him. Expensive port and aftershave couldn’t cover the bitter twang of sweat.

“He’d been drinking. But he wasn’t drunk. Not that that would’ve been an excuse for what happened next,” I scoffed.

Kane had been intently listening, his elbows resting on his knees. That was his way. When I had his attention, I had all of it. He hung on my every word. Previously, I’d liked that. But at that moment, I didn’t.

I was suddenly aware of my body, of his body, of the story that I’d shoved down so deep that it tore out bits of me while coming back up.

Kane pushed up from where he was sitting, crossing the short distance between us. He gently angled me away from the mirror to face him, his breath on my face, his enticing scent mingling with that of my memories. “What happened next?” he asked quietly.

Kane was hyperaware of everything. Of minute details. Of gestures I made, expressions, the tone of my voice. He had learned who I was in the short time we’d been together. Actually, knew me.

I swallowed past the lump of dread in my esophagus. The memory had made nausea swirl in my gut. I regretted going there. Thinking that I was strong enough in Kane’s arms, his presence. But I also knew I couldn’t let myself retreat. Knew Kane wouldn’t let it go now.

The only way through was forward.

“He, um,” I pulled in a long breath. “He came on to me. Not very elegantly either.”

There was the smell of the port. What I’d been cooking. Beef Wellington. Something I’d never put on a menu since that night.

His hands were fumbling, invasive straightaway.

I’d swatted them off, tried to push him away even as he backed me into the door to the walk-in freezer.

I hadn’t been aware enough of my surroundings, of him casually talking to me with a strange gleam in his eyes, herding me to an area of the kitchen where I couldn’t escape from.

I hadn’t thought I’d need to be on guard in a way a woman needed to be on guard—when she was walking to her car at night, when she was breaking up with someone unpredictable, refusing the advances of someone at a bar.

No, I thought I didn’t need the skills each woman unfortunately learned, not with this man. One I trusted. One old enough to be my father. A mentor.

After that night, I didn’t think there was such a thing as a man I could trust. Or feel safe with.

“You know you want it,” Gerald had whispered, lips against my neck. “I’ve seen the way you look at me.”

“No,” I replied, quietly at first, trying to push his roving hands away. “No!” I said louder as his hands crept even lower. “I don’t want it. I don’t want you.”

I’d thought a lot about those words. Whether what happened next was my fault because I’d said it so plainly, without adornment or gentleness to stroke his ego enough to hide the straight up rejection.

I’d wondered if there was something I could’ve said, something I could’ve done to make him stop.

It was only in hindsight, with time to pad me from the trauma, that rage replaced those feelings of blame and guilt. It was not my responsibility to let him down easily so he wouldn’tassault me. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, a woman could say to make sexual assault her fault. Nothing she could wear. No looks she could give.

No.