Package Deal (29 page)

Chapter 8

No one
came to
the office on Sunday
s
.
The late April shower meant few students were walking on campus, lending additional
quiet
to
Carlton’s
surroundings,
wh
ich
he
need
ed
, wh
ich
he
preferr
ed. No
one around to ask
questions he didn’t want to answer
. He opened the
office
door and stepped on a paper. He picked
it up, but didn’t recognize the
student’s
name.

He had been
us
ing the
office
daily,
even at times when it should have been Amanda’s, as he worked
on the final draft of his dissertation. He felt vaguely guilty about
hogging the office
, but the time taken to prepare
for
and teach his classes had
eaten into his writing hours
, and t
he time he spent in the library hadn’t helped. If he could just concentrate on the last chapter of
his dissertation, he could send
it in—ten weeks late, but at least it would be off his desk.Maybe that wo
uld get Hillier off his back
. H
is advisor, too
.

He
squint
ed at the
name on the
paper.
“
Must be o
ne
of
Amanda’s
,” he muttered under his breath
.
He’d
have
to
mend fences with her
so she
wouldn’t go whining to Greg again.

Thinking of Amanda brought Cecelia to mind.
He began to sweat. He
knew he
shouldn’t be attracted to the little girl, but child
ren were so much less demanding,
easier to control
than the women he
’d
tried to date.
He’d forced himself
to stay in the library on days when he knew
the girls on
Cecelia’s
soccer team
were practicing or
having a game
. Their field was between the library and his department office. He couldn’t help it that they were there
, tempting him as they ran and jumped,
when he walked between the buildings. The girl with the red hair had caught his eye, but he was afraid to approach her. Cecelia had said her father was the coach
, a big man who
se size
intimidated him
.
He sat back in the chair
and slid his hand down the front of his jeans
, recalling the other children
who had let him play with them,
especially the ones with
blue eyes
.
He’d always liked them the best.

T
hen there was that
dark-eyed one at the lake one summer.
If only
she hadn’t
pull
ed
away when he got cl
ose,
like Cecelia had
that one day in the office
. He
suspected she didn’t trust him
—
not yet anyway
. B
ut he didn’t think she had tal
ked to her mother
about him
.
He
suspected
Amanda would have said something to him
if she knew
what he’d done
. He just wanted to get close to Cecelia,
to get her to like him
more
,
like
that
other little girl
. She had been wary at first, too, but his interest in her playhouse had won her over. He wondered if Cecelia had a playhouse. She’d never said
and he’d never had a reason to go to her house
.

He shook his head.
“Focus
. I’ve got to focus
,” he said out
l
ou
d, as if that would help
him concentrate
.
He looked
around
the office, messy with
haphazard stacks of papers on
the desk
and
along
the windowsill
.
Maybe he would take
the
thesis
manuscript
home, do
his
final
editing there
. He
usually
felt better after petting the
skinny
kitten he had found in the street
and taken home to feed
. She always purred
l
ou
dly when he stroked her.
Why couldn’t little girls be like kittens
, letting him pet them, liking
it
when he touched them
?
That’s what he would do—give Amanda the pape
r and then go home to finish his
work, while the kitten purred on his lap.

If I drop this off at her house, maybe she’ll get off my case until I’m done with everything. I can’t have Greg talking to my advisor again.
He made a half
hearted effort to stack the
ungraded
bluebooks
on the windowsill
. Then h
e shoved the
student’s
paper under his arm and drove to
Amanda’s
house. T
here was no place to park.
He circled the block twice
. F
rustrated, h
e drove into the alley
and parked
in an empty space belonging to one of the apartment houses. He wouldn’t be there long
.

“Sweetheart. I had no idea we were out of milk. Marcus should be here any minute. I’m going to run down to the corner store. Will you be okay while I’m gone?”

Cecelia
nodded, barely looking up from the book she was reading.

“I’ll be right back. Tell Marcus the two of you can’t leave until I get back.”

“Okay
, Mom
.” She turned back to her book. Several minutes later, the doorbell
rang
and
she
trott
ed downstairs. “I’m coming, Marcus
. Now we can go shopping,
to surprise
M
om for her birthday.”

She stopped smiling when
she opened the
door.

“Oh. It’s you,”
she
said, under her breath,
and
began
to shut the door.

The man she didn’t like pushed the door open
. “I’m here to see your mother, Cecelia.”

“She’s not here.” She backed away from him
, her heart starting to race
, not liking how he always seemed to stare at her without blinking
.

“Then I’ll
wait for her.”

“My mom isn’t here
,” she repeated
.
“
She won’t like it that you—I—” Her chi
n trembled. “I thought you were
…
someone else.”She went to the
front
window and looked down the street. “I’m not supposed to let anyone in when my mom’s not here.”
Except Marcus. He’s my friend.
Our friend.

The man followed her.
“You must like those jeans with the polka dots on the pockets. I’ve seen them before.”
The
icky
man
smil
ed at her
, his dark hair falling onto his forehead, almost covering his eyes
. “And that’s not a nice way to talk.
We can wait together.
Why don’t you just sit here with me?”
He
s
trode
into the room
, leaving the door ajar
.

When she didn’t
answer him
, h
e grasped her arm and
pulled her closer as he
sat down on the couch,
forcing her
to sit next to him. “What’s the name of that pony on yo
ur shirt?” He poked at it with the
rolled-up paper in
one
hand.

“I don’t want to.” She tried to pull away, but his grip was tight on her arm
, almost hurting
.

“Why don’t you
want to
talk to me, Cecelia? You never talk to me,” he said. “Even when I’m nice to you.
I want to be your friend.
”
He looked at her with those eyes that never blinked
, like Francie’s cat when he was getting ready to pounce on a toy mouse
. “Do you have a playhouse, Cecelia—where you play tea party?
I could play with you.
”
His voice had a sing
song quality that made her shiver.

She shook
her head.
“Your hair is dirty. You should wash it.
And your shirt is stinky.
” She knew what her mother would say if she heard her, but she didn’t care that she wasn’t being polite.
Maybe if she wasn’t nice, he would go away.

“You’re right. I’ve been busy. I
’ll have to do that. I’ll do i
t
tonight.
Okay?
”

She squirmed to move away from him.
She hated that
he
looked squinty
-eyes
when he stared
at her
.

“Be ni
ce and sit here, right
next to me.”
He placed
the paper on the table. “I
just want you to be nice to me,
so I can be nice to you.
Don’t you want me to be nice to you?
”

When she didn’t try to get up,
the man
loosened his grip on her arm, his hand
snaking
down her blue-jeaned thigh. “Where did your mother say she went?”

“To the store, t
o get some milk.” She tried not to look at
him
, not liking that his
pale
eyes seemed to bore into her.

“Do you like it here?”
His
hand slithered
up and down her leg and he leaned closer to her.

She nodded
, pulling her leg away as far as she could, but he had her cornered
. “It’s okay.”

“What is it you like the most?” He stood up
,
placed one arm around her shoulder and then sat down again, bringing her closer.

“Soccer
…
and my S
cout troop.”

Hi
s arm brushed against her neck and then moved slowly down her back.
The way he was touching her gave her goose
bumps.
She tried to
edge
away from him before he slid his other arm around her, trapping her between his knees.

She tried to remember what her mother had said a long time ago when they had that talk about touching.
The man
pulled her onto his lap.
She froze when
the man’s
hand
suddenly
moved around to the front of her stomach and
began to
slid
e
downward
. Then
something hard pushed
up against her
bottom.
She remembered
what to do
.
Scream, Cecelia. Run away!
The icky man
was breathing funny and making a
weird
noise.

“Stop it. Let me go.” Without warning, she
jumped
up, twisted her body and shoved his hand away from the front of her jeans.
His
other
hand slid off her arm as she twisted away from him.
As she moved, her
left
foot came down on the top of his shoe—hard—
and
she turned
toward
the half-open
front
door, screaming
l
ou
dly.