Page 82 of Fairy Tale Lies
The taxing workload did nothing to stave off loneliness. Waking each morning without his body wrapped around hers was a level of misery she hadn’t anticipated.
She had three weeks off until her final semester began, and the plan was to spend every one of those days with Jacob. The only gray clouds in her blue skies were the upcoming family holiday obligations. Those deflated some of her joyful buoyancy.
Her father wasn’t who made her head throb with uncertainty. During these last couple of months, he and Jacob forged a friendship built on mutual respect. No, her worries rested with Mother and Nigel.
The times she’d spoken with her mother, their conversations were tense and peppered with disparaging remarks aimed at Jacob. Mother’s position was clear. He wasn’t the man for her daughter, more like an unfortunate, passing phase. She even tried to set Greta up with one of her haughty friend’s sons.
The scheming hadn’t surprised Greta. She was used to it and let it fall away like a handful of sand at a beach.
However, the fallout it caused still made her shudder. It ignited an explosive fight between her and Jacob.
It had been their only real argument during those weeks he stayed at her apartment. It had been a bad one. Remembering his anger and hurt was still upsetting. She desperately hoped to avoid repeating it during this visit.
The whole thing played in her mind like a terrible movie she couldn’t stop watching on repeat. The day had started innocuous enough. She was studying at the kitchen table, and Jacob was dozing on the couch with an old telephone manual from the late 1800s spread open on his chest. When her cell vibrated with a call, she’d been going through class notes and didn’t bother checking caller ID before answering.
That had been her first mistake.
Mother jumped right in with her antics, going on and on about one of her friend’s perfect sons, who would be home for the holidays. Greta politely told her mother she had enough plans for the short visit and ended the call.
Though, before she even set the phone back on the table, Jacob was off the couch and full of ire. “Why don’t you tell her to piss off? You have a boyfriend.”
“Jacob, she’s my mother! Could you have a little respect?”
“I’m your boyfriend. Where’s mine? Why are you afraid to tell her you have no interest in finding a new one?”
His questions were a rapid fire of accusations, confusing and annoying her. Why couldn’t he see fighting with Mother wasn’t worth the effort?
“Because it’s easier to brush aside her schemes. Anything else will start her on a litany of lectures and debates, fueling her crusade.”
“That so? Does your mother even know I’m here? I’ve been here since the arrest? Or am I still your dirty secret?”
“Would you stop? You weren’t then and aren’t now,” she said with exasperation, her own anger starting to bubble to the surface. “Why do you not believe me? Why do you always assume my intentions are deceitful?”
He rose from the couch and stomped to the kitchen table, keeping it between them. “Because you say one thing with me and act another with others,” he shouted. “Greta, I’m fine with who I am. Don’t expect me to change for them. If you can’t acknowledge our relationship, or accept me around your family, we’ll never last.”
Jacob stormed from the living room to the bedroom, slamming the door behind him. He had a point. She should have said she was with Jacob and wasn’t interested and ended the call. However, he was overreacting. He’d acted like she’d accepted the date.
She left him to cool off, not knowing what else to do.
Later, when she’d begun to drown in the oppressive silence of her solitude, Greta tiptoed into the bedroom, fearing he’d want to continue the fight. However, when she stood at the side of the bed, he’d brought her to him and apologized for shouting.
They ignored the fight. Instead, made love, in a subdued and generous way. With their bodies, they asked the other for forgiveness.
The next day, and every day since then, they ignored the quarrel. However, the subject was far from resolved. Rather, they left it to fester out of sight, waiting to rear its ugly corrosive head.
Greta sighed, flipping on the car’s blinker and pulling onto Jacob’s street. That argument was why she was dreading but also hopeful for New Year’s Day. Her mother requested Greta bring Jacob to the annual party at the Petite Bois country club. She’d agreed, with the utmost trepidation, because, while she hoped the invite meant Mother and Nigel finally accepted Jacob, Greta worried the actual outcome would be a day full of stress and open hostility.
Ice crunched under her tires when she slowed and pulled into Jacob’s driveway. Knowing he was near had tranquility melting into her skin and blood. She let her worries scatter from her mind, like the snowflakes dancing around her car.
Studying Jacob’s house, her heart sank. There were no cars in the driveway, and his place was dark and lifeless.
Did she have the wrong arrival time?
Locking her Audi, she wrapped her coat closer to her body as the icy wind tried to whip it open. She scurried up the sidewalk, head bowed, trying to avoid the snow biting at her skin. At the porch, she sprinted to the door. Before her gloved hand even knocked, it swung open.
A pair of powerful arms shot out and grabbed her around the waist, bringing her inside. Fear clogged her throat, then Jacob’s scent of cedar and man engulfed her, and her panic turned to lust.
His lips were on hers with a soul-searing kiss, leaving no doubt he’d missed her. She gripped his shoulders, holding him tight. “I worried you weren’t home. The house looks deserted,” Greta said after they’d come up for air.
