FascinatingRhythm (16 page)

Hunter drove to Stockholm. Bitterly shocked at Sabina’s
rejection after he and Chick and Beverley had worked so hard, he couldn’t
understand her selfishness, her refusal to listen.

Did she think his mother was the only one with access to the
press? He could have worked it out for her, given her all the access she
needed.

His rage drove him all the way to Emmelie’s house. For a
change, he slammed the front door behind him after he’d jabbed in the series of
numbers that gave him access to the front gate and the main door. The nasty
little camera outside snapped a picture of him and he hoped it gave it some
pleasure in its miserable little life. He’d sleep here instead of in Sabina’s
bed or the chair next to it and get a plane in the morning.

Past midnight now. His mother always had at least six people
staying, probably more considering her new venture, but none of them should be
up at this time of night. She’d have a few interviews, press and so on. As far
as he knew, she hadn’t arranged any evening functions, something else she used
some of the bigger rooms in the house for.

It was silent except for the reverberations from the slam,
which did nothing to ease his mood.

Neither did the sudden appearance of the blonde woman in her
robe, one he’d never seen before. But then that wasn’t strange because he
rarely saw his mother in anything but immaculate business attire or equally
immaculate evening wear. Now she wore her hair down, albeit tied back, and her
face was bare, stripped of makeup. She was still beautiful.

She lifted her hands and signed, “I came to see what caused
the vibrations, but now I know. Come with me.”

Jolted straight back into his youth, when he’d come back
drunk or wasted in some other way, he felt guilty and foolish, but his temper
still burned through everything else. Nevertheless, he followed his mother to
her room.

Emmelie had a suite on the ground floor near her office. It
was the only part of the house she kept for herself. A large, comfortable
sitting room with a view through French windows of the garden beyond, a small
kitchenette and a bedroom with an en suite. As much as most kids had for a
starter home, except that the rooms contained comfortable, expensive Swedish
designer furniture. Hand-knotted rugs reposed on the highly polished floors and
the bathroom had the best shower and tub available. He knew because his own
rooms here were similar.

Something Sabina had said pierced the veil of anger and
unhappiness surrounding him like a shroud. She’d never had money to spare. She
was right in one thing—before he’d left home, he’d taken the way he lived for
granted. But she didn’t know him that well. She saw a man from a comfortable
background get even wealthier. She had no idea what had gone in between.
Perhaps he’d tell her.

No he wouldn’t.

Emmelie took a seat in one of the wide chairs and motioned
to the sofa. He took it, feeling more like a little boy than he had in years.
“I thought you were in China,” she signed.

“I came back after the concert to see Sabina.” His fingers
flew and he hardly had to think about switching. If Sabina wanted someone for
her project, he could do it and then some.

“How is she?”

“She can hear.”

Emmelie tsked. “I know that, I spoke to her earlier today.”

“With Skype?”

“Texted.” Of course. His mind flashed back to the concert,
when she’d spent most of the time texting. Not listening to him. All his life,
he’d taken that from her. No more. “Why didn’t you watch me when you came to
Malmö?”

“What? Oh, that.” She dismissed it as if it meant nothing.
“I’m profoundly deaf. I can’t hear. Does that mean anything to you?”

“Yes of course,” he signed, his expression bitter. “It’s
what drove my life until I left home. Eventually I couldn’t bear it anymore.”

She raised her brows. “Couldn’t bear what?”

“Being the only hearing person in the house. I couldn’t
bring my friends from school here, and when I visited them, I found myself
signing to their parents. Signing! They laughed, they jeered.”

“You fought back, I hope.”

“To survive. They weren’t laughing at you, they laughed at
me. I learned and then I grew. Six inches in one year.”

She smiled. “I remember that. Suddenly you towered over me.”

He didn’t return the smile. Memories of that time still hurt
if he let them. “I was alone. You were too busy for me, I was an oddity at
school.”

She shrugged. “You think you were the only one?” Her
pale-blue robe almost fell open with her agitation and she paused to draw the
edges together and refasten it. “I had hearing parents, although they could
sign because my aunt was deaf too. Still, they didn’t know how to cope or what
to do.”

“You repeated that with me.”

She signed faster now, always a sign of increased agitation.
“You learned. What was I supposed to do with you? How could I teach you or care
for you?” She paused, still holding her hands up, staring at him. “I did what I
could.”

“Employed people.”

“You needed someone to teach you to speak. I couldn’t do
that.”

Time to tell her the truth. He’d never told her before
because it left him vulnerable. She was so strong, she’d have taken advantage,
added it to her armory. But now he had his own armory—Murder City Ravens, the
music they made and the consequent wealth and influence. He would speak and
people listened these days. “I thought you didn’t want me.” It sounded so
pathetic, so needy, but it was the truth.

“I loved you more than life itself but I was afraid.”

“Of me?” Did she take him for a fool? “You were never afraid
of anything in your life.”

“Not until my husband left me. Not until I had a child who
needed more than I could give him, one I was terrified of failing. So I put my
mind to other things. You managed perfectly well. You never told me if you were
afraid so I thought you were not. You never came to me with problems, outside
of your homework.”

A memory came to him, of sitting in her office with his
algebra homework, the only time she ever paid him personal attention. He’d
pretended to be much worse at algebra than he was just to get something from
her. That was until he hated his own neediness and decided that if she didn’t
want him she wouldn’t have him.

“You’ve always been stubborn and independent,” she signed,
smiling. “You were probably better that way.”

It made her sound like a saint. And yet she had abandoned
him to caregivers and professional helpers. The cook had fed him and someone
had always been there to make sure he came to no harm. “You didn’t care.”

“I told you; I was scared, I didn’t know what to do with
you. Then I found people I could really help.”

“Why didn’t you let my grandparents care for me?” They were
good to him, loved him. He saw them as frequently as they could manage, and
more than once they’d offered him a home.

“Because they told me I couldn’t cope.”

She didn’t have to say any more. Anyone who told him that,
he proved them wrong. He’d always done it but never realized he’d got that
trait from her. He’d have done the same.

Now he thought back, he could remember gentle suggestions
that he might be too much for her. The pieces began to fall into place. While
he couldn’t erase his miserable childhood, he understood it better. Under it
all, he suspected Emmelie was never cut out for motherhood. Even if she’d been
hearing, she’d probably have farmed out much of his upbringing. She had a
coolness he didn’t think was entirely due to her deafness. But she’d always
faced problems dead-on, and he was definitely a problem. Something for her to
solve.

She got to her feet. “You want a coffee?”

“Yes please.”

“Decaf or ordinary?”

“Ordinary.” Even that simple exchange made him realize she
didn’t know him at all. A notion crossed his mind. Could they start again,
become friends? She’d probably function much better as a friend. But then he
realized, no. Too much had happened, and even more not happened between them.
He respected her more, understood some of the decisions she’d made but it
didn’t make those decisions any better.

Awareness stirred deep inside him. What had he done? Was he
more like his mother than he’d imagined?

She brought in the coffee with sugar and cream separately.
She didn’t even know how he liked his coffee. He added cream and stirred.
Usually he took it black but he got the feeling the stronger shot of caffeine
would make the growing sense of agitation inside him worse.

The conversation with his mother had projected his
concentration elsewhere, and now he could think of Sabina without the red,
unreasoning cover of rage obscuring what he did and thought. He put down his
cup. “Sabina said she might come here.”

“I’m expecting her soon.”

“What do you want with her?” No way would his mother not ask
for something in return. It was the way she was made. Look for opportunities in
everything. If they didn’t exist, create them.

“I want to talk to her,” his mother answered readily. “I
want to know what the operation was like.”

“You want it?”

She shook her head vigorously, her hair loose enough to
become ruffled by the movement. He’d rarely seen her without hairspray welding
her hair to her head either. He’d seen Sabina more than once that way, and
always found the sight adorable. The thought that he might never see her that
way again pierced him with longing.

He’d worked something out that would mean they could be
together, and arrogantly assumed she’d fall in with his plans when she had
plans of her own.

“When do you expect her?”

“Tomorrow or the day after, if they agree to let her go. She
is calling me.”

Texting.

He couldn’t bear it, not seeing Sabina, not having the right
to touch her and kiss her. His temper left in a cloud of regret and sorrow. At
the least he should apologize.

He hadn’t realized his mother was watching him so intently.
He should have known better. She watched everyone that way. “You lost your
temper, didn’t you?”

“Sorry?”

“What did you do? Ask her to marry you, try to sweep her off
her feet? Sabina isn’t the kind of woman who wants that. Didn’t you know that?”

He finished his coffee, pondered his reply. “I do now.”
Because of his temper, he’d decided to adopt the quiet, laconic personality in
public. It forced him to think. After a few regrettable incidents in London,
which lost the bands he’d belonged to their gigs and then got him fired, he
decided he needed a way to give himself time.

It hadn’t helped him with Sabina.

He dropped his chin, put his hands to his temples and wailed
in despair, “God,
Mamma
, I’ve really screwed up. I need her so much.
What the hell can I do?”

Sabina stood on the platform at the railway station knowing
her life would change. She just didn’t know whether it would be for better or
worse.

She’d had a very bad night. After showering and changing her
nightdress, she could still detect the scent of his skin on her sheets. The air
was perfumed with raw sex, although since they’d used protection, much of it
would be in her vivid imagination. She didn’t know whether to remember or try
to forget, and the thought of never seeing him again except on TV, never
hearing from him except in public drove her to despair.

Hearing from him. But her plan, her precious plan meant a
lot to her. It had kept her sane when she thought she’d go mad wondering if
she’d hear or not, once they took the bandages and ear defenders away from her.
But more than that, it gave her something useful to do, a direction in which to
take her life.

Yesterday she woke up smiling. Today she awoke with tears in
her eyes. She knocked them away and got on with her day.

By noon they’d released her. She had to return tomorrow.

She’d already texted Emmelie and received a terse “Your room
will be ready” in return. She knew better than to expect anything but a
courteous and cursory interest from her ex-employer. With her political career
gaining ground, Emmelie would need people for the grunt work—envelope filling,
that kind of thing—and Sabina would offer to help. She wasn’t averse to it and
it would give her a chance to talk to Emmelie.

But it wasn’t Emmelie who kept creeping into her mind
unaware. The memory of Hunter’s loving, of his gentle words and fiercer
endearments in the throes of lovemaking would stay with her for the rest of her
life.

Consolation didn’t come easy but she’d had it, known what an
affair with the man who’d haunted her dreams for six years was like. It didn’t
make parting any better but perhaps, eventually, she could close the door on it
and remember it with pleasure instead of this pleasure-pain, the recollection
of ecstasy followed by agony so fierce it felt like a physical pain lancing
through her, destroying her happiness.

Again she felt it, like a sword slicing through her stomach
and abdomen and she tensed, although she knew the pain had no physical cause.

Physically, the hospital was very happy with her, although
she’d had to lie and say someone was coming to fetch her before she used her
phone to text a taxi company. She still didn’t feel comfortable calling,
although her implants were doing everything they should.

It felt strange. She couldn’t gauge distances, for instance,
so someone speaking could sound closer. Traffic made her start.

Once she’d alighted from the taxi at the train station, the
announcer seemed unnaturally loud to her, so much that she contemplated getting
out the headphones and putting them on to block out the sound.

But what did it matter? She felt listless, let down, and she
wanted to howl to the moon. Sighing, she reached into her purse for her reader.
She could read and listen for her train to arrive. She didn’t have to check the
board every minute. Even that didn’t make her smile.

The announcer told them they shouldn’t leave luggage
unattended for what felt like the millionth time. People sighed and someone
standing behind her swore softly. Sabina agreed, but she wouldn’t have dared
speak out loud, strangely reticent to say anything at all. Even buying her
ticket proved too much, and she eventually used the machine instead, chickening
out of facing the clerk.

She’d be fine. She’d taken this route before so she’d be
fine. Or so she kept assuring herself, although her stomach roiled and her
throat tightened.

She loved being on her own. Didn’t she? What she didn’t love
was this aching feeling of aloneness. This
loneliness
.

“Sabina.”

Now she was imagining voices. The doctors hadn’t warned her
about that.

Just to reassure herself, she turned around, only to nearly
collide with a hard male chest. Starting back, she nearly lost her balance but
he caught her upper arms, releasing her only when she was steady on her feet
once more. “What are you doing—?”

Instead of answering immediately, he went down on one knee
before her. For a horrified moment, she thought he was going to propose, here,
on the platform with everyone watching. And she’d have to say no. With everyone
watching.

Already people were getting out their mobile phones and
pointing them at Hunter and her. She stood uncomfortably before him, preparing
to turn him down and become the laughingstock of Sweden, because hey, who’d
turn down a romantic proposal with the hottest drummer with the hottest band on
the planet?

Where was that train?

He reached for her hand. She let it lay limply in his, not
responding. He stared up at her, face taut with tension. “I want to apologize,”
he said.

Sabina couldn’t be sure if it was her new sense of hearing
or whether he really had spoken loudly. “I was a complete jerk. I made the
plans and it took some time and effort, so naturally I thought you’d fit in
with them.”

His voice dripped with bitter irony, but even if she’d been
lip-reading, she’d have known from the expression on his face. “I don’t deserve
that you forgive me, Sabina, but I am asking you to anyway. I can’t bear that
you feel so badly about me. Please, take me back. I’ll do anything you want to.
I’ve already talked to Chick and the guys about leaving the band, and after the
European leg, I’ll do so.”

“No.” Not the negative she’d planned but she’d practiced it,
so she might as well use it. “What do you mean, you’ve spoken to them? Why?”

“So I can concentrate everything I have on you. If you want
me, of course.” He gave a half-smile. “You see, I’m taking nothing for granted
this time.”

She tugged on his hand. “Get up.” At least they were
speaking English, but since it was compulsory in Swedish schools to learn the
language, she doubted that gave them any privacy.

Keeping the smile, he got to his feet in a smooth, easy
movement. Sabina heard the female gasps and murmurs.

Whatever he was about to say was drowned by the blare from
the speakers announcing the imminent arrival of the train to Stockholm and the
arrival of the train itself, thundering down the tracks.

She planted her feet apart and kept her balance, but it was
a near thing. As it was, she nearly forgot her bag and, mortified, she watched
Hunter pick it up and follow her. At the narrow door, she climbed the steps and
then turned around to take it. When her hand brushed his she shivered, unable
to stop her response. Angry with herself for demonstrating such a lack of
control.

He wouldn’t let go. “You can’t come,” she said. “You don’t
have a ticket.”

“I’ll get one on the train.”

She searched for a different excuse. “You drove here, didn’t
you? What about the car?”

“I’ll tell them where to find it. Nothing is more important
than this. Please, Sabina. Move back, there are people waiting to get on.”

She glanced over his head. “No they’re not. They’re watching
us.”

He sighed. “Get on.”

Frantically she went through the journey in her head,
wondering if this was a local train or an express. Seeing the size and the number
of carriages, she realized it was the fast one. They’d be in Stockholm in an
hour. She could handle that.

She found a vacant double seat and, after stowing her bag in
the overhead rack with insulting ease, Hunter sat next to her. He reached for
her hand again, as if he couldn’t bear not to touch her. “Sabina, please
forgive me at least. Say something. Are you deaf again?” He half turned in the
seat to face her in case she needed to lip-read. These seats were rather
cramped for sign language.

“I can hear. Too well.” She thought of the traffic and the
announcer. “Is it me, or is this coach really quiet?” From what she remembered,
trains were packed with people talking on their phones, talking to each other,
babies crying, children chattering. This carriage sounded strangely hushed.

He grinned. “They’re listening to us.”

“At least they’re not queuing up for your autograph.”

“Swedish people are cool like that.”

Not for long
,she thought. They’d arrive,
paper and pen in hand, she was sure. But they wanted the drama, like people
watching a play. “I don’t feel comfortable here.”

“Would you prefer we spoke about this in Stockholm?”

“No. Why did you leave Stockholm and not look back? All the
truth now.”

His Adam’s apple moved as he swallowed. Tension, even more than
before, tightened his features and put lines on either side of his mouth. Lines
she yearned to ease, but she had to know. He replied, his words slower, as if
he wanted to explain it to himself as well as to her. “You know most of it.
Because there was no place for me at home. If I wanted to pursue my career as a
drummer I had to leave. But there’s something else, and it doesn’t have
anything to do with my career. I was scared. I ran, Sabina.”

“No, I’ve changed my mind. Tell me later.” She couldn’t let him
bare his soul here, in public.

He shook his head. “I have to tell you now or I’ll lock it
up again. It’s hard to talk about because of how ashamed I felt. I was scared I
would go deaf, because music meant so much to me. I was terrified that I might
have to give it up. Every day I was surrounded by people coping with the very
thing I was scared of.”

She listened, horrified that he would think in that way. He
swallowed and finally, after a fraught interval that nearly broke her nerve, he
spoke. “It’s something I’m afraid of but something I’ve learned to cope with.
The fear, I mean. I wake up not hearing. I dream deaf sometimes, like you dream
hearing, I suppose. Growing up in that quiet house, well, it taught me how much
I love sound.”

“So you learned an instrument you could play if you lost
your hearing.”

He shook his head. “Not with Murder City Ravens, not the way
we work. I have to know what they’re doing so I can do my part.”

She’d always regarded her condition as something she just
got along with since she didn’t have much of a choice. Not until recently.
“I’ve never been scared. Not even when it first happened. It was just something
to handle.”

He took her hand and lifted it to his lips, kissing her
knuckles in an old-fashioned, respectful gesture. “That’s why you’re so much
better than me. It took me a year to face the real reason. And I didn’t want to
fall in love. Not at that time in my life. I couldn’t have cared for you the
way you deserved.”

She choked out a laugh, but really she felt relieved. He’d
been twenty-two when he left home, barely out of university, sheltered and
privileged. Those years in London and then America had changed him. For the
better, she believed, despite his behavior yesterday, which was as much her
fault as his. She should have listened to him and discussed the situation, not
driven him away out of hand. “You found the band. I bet you didn’t always eat
either.”

He shrugged. “Musicians don’t always eat regular meals. But
yes, you’re right. And I found that some drugs and drink, which people used to
send us while we were performing, filled the gap. I didn’t have it as bad as
some members, but we all survived so we’re a lot luckier than some.” He gave a
wry grin. “I didn’t really indulge badly. I dabbled, then I gave it up when my
drumming started to go off. In the end, my work meant more to me than the
drugs.”

In other words, what he did was complex and highly skillful.
He couldn’t do what he wanted high.

“I have another plan for you to consider. I can finish the
European leg of the tour and visit you between the gigs. After that, I’ll come
home with you. You can say no, you don’t love me, and send me away. I’ll go if
that’s what you want.”

She didn’t want any more soul-baring, not on this train.
Anyone could be listening. So she changed the subject and asked something she
needed the answer to. “When do you write the songs?”

He sighed. “In the downtime between concerts. But they don’t
need me for that. I just play the drums.”

“You’re lying. You do a lot more than that.”

He didn’t deny it. He couldn’t. “You’re more important. I
love you, Sabina.”

She touched his lips to try to stop him, an instinctive
gesture. He kissed her fingers. She took them away hastily and decided to ask
him the question that had bugged her ever since he’d reappeared in her life.

And she realized something else. Berlin was three, four
hours away at the most by train. She could manage that. “I want to hear the
band,” she said.

“Then come with me.”

Excitement rose within her. “That doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven
you.”

“I know.” He stroked her palm with his thumb, softly
seductive. “I have a long way to go before you’ll do that.”

“But I want to come.” She really did.

As if driven by something out of his control, Hunter leaned
forward, kissed her, but kept the kiss sweetly loving, not passionately rough.
She wanted both, but that wasn’t the problem, she reminded herself. She’d
always wanted him, even in the years when she’d hated him. Now she knew exactly
what he was like in bed, it made the longing worse. She wouldn’t deny it. She
wouldn’t even fight it.

“I’ll make you come,” he growled. “Any way you want.” He
caught his breath and leaned back, obviously as turned-on as she was. She
didn’t have to look down at his crotch to see that. “Sorry. I’ll ask Beverley
to book you a separate room.”

“No.” She took all her courage in both hands. “With both of
us feeling this way, that would be counterproductive.”

“One way of putting it.” He touched her chin, urged her to
move closer and then kissed her again, but longer this time, letting his desire
show even if he didn’t unleash it completely. If he had, she’d be lying across
the seats by now. As it was, he’d pushed up the seat arm between them without
her noticing. When he pressed his body against hers, she responded, unable to resist
his potent allure.