4. This Girl is on FIRE!

Madison

After a long day working in the kitchen, I’m exhausted. Working at Victor’s fancy restaurant was exactly what I expected: hectic and stressful. Yet the work isn’t what got my heart pounding a mile a minute. The phone call I received from Gustaf yesterday is the reason behind my tiredness.

I didn’t sleep at all last night.

The anxiety of Gustaf coming to find me prevented me from falling into a peaceful sleep. And whenever my eyes would close, nightmares snared me like a deer caught in a trap in the woods. I honestly think I woke up a billion times, drenched in a cold sweat and tears not far away. It was a terrible night, and needless to say, something needs to be done about the Gustaf situation.

“Hmm...” I hum to myself while holding up a book named, “How to stop worrying about your stupid ex-boyfriend,” that I found at the store.

“Okay…aha…I see…” I tap my chin while thinking, and then I speak out loud—I never claimed to be perfect. “It says I need something from my ex-boyfriend to burn for the catharsis to take place, but that I can also draw him and burn the paper… this is very important for the inner cleansing…”

I immediately walk into Stan’s kitchen to find a blank paper and some pens. A quick sketch of Gustaf with devil horns is made within seconds, and then I grab my brother’s stainless steel bucket to fill it with firewood—it’s where I will light the fire.

I open a couple of windows and the door to the balcony, and then I put on the kitchen fan before setting the contents inside the bucket on fire. I’m so into my ritual that I don’t even notice the door opening before someone shouts, “Surprise!”

Frightened by the sudden voice, I manage to kick over the bucket, and my eyes widen when fire dances over the wooden floor. “OH-MY-GOD!”

The new person inside the apartment is Victor. He is holding a cake and silver balloons that say, “Congrats on your new job!” but he immediately releases the cake on the floor, and the balloons fly up to the ceiling as he grabs the fire extinguisher.

Seconds later, white foam fills the kitchen to put out the flames. Surprisingly enough, the sprinkler system doesn’t start, but the harm is already done. Stan’s floor is ruined, and Victor glares at me with his intense blue eyes.  

“What the fuck were you thinking?!”

I jump at the tone of his voice and gulp before holding up my hands. “I…I-I was just trying to do a cleansing ritual.”

“Cleansing what?!” Victor sighs in disbelief and makes this eye-roll gesture that is typical for his character. He always used to do it when he was furious with something I had done back when we were kids.

I swallow thickly. “I had the fire under control…”

“Sure you did.”

“I did,” I argue.

Victor folds his thick arms underneath his chest and stares me down. His face is uncompromising. I won’t win this argument. “Uh-huh…”

I sigh. “What are you doing here anyway?”

He pulls his lips into his mouth to wet them, probably weighing his options: keep being angry with me or move on. In the end, he decides to move on. “Stanley and I were going to surprise you with champagne, balloons, and cake to celebrate your new position. But your brother is working late, so I came alone. The champagne is in the car,” his eyes narrow, and I shiver when I realize the anger is back all over again. “But I’m not so sure if you deserve that champagne. Seriously, Maddie, what the hell were you thinking?!”

Just like last time, I raise my hands in surrender, knowing better than to argue with Victor when he is like this. His eyes are darkened with rage, and he looks ready to murder.

“I’m so sorry, Victor,” I say, my voice barely above a whisper as I peer up at him. “I didn’t think it through...”

“Clearly,” he grunts and takes off his expensive suit. “You need to be more careful, Maddie. You could have burned down the entire apartment.”

“I know. I’m sorry,” I say, feeling guilty for my actions. The book had me excited and hopeful. I thought burning Gustaf’s picture would help me sleep, but instead, I almost burned down the entire apartment. “I will make it up to you and Stanley, I promise. I just got so caught up in this ritual that was supposed to cleanse my negative energy, but...then this happened. I’m so sorry.”

Victor breathes a laugh, his eyes softening. “There is no need to apologize to me, Maddie. It’s not like this apartment belongs to me anyway,” humor curls the corner of his lips as his eyes flicker down to scan the floor. “Stanley is going to throw a fit once he sees this, though.”

Oh shit!

He is right!

“Stanley is going to kill me...” I whisper with panic rising in my chest. My heart is beating so fast that I, for a moment, worry that I’m going to pass out.

“He might,” Victor chuckles. “I will help you clean, though, but you have to promise me that you won’t pull a stunt like this again,” he laughs again. “Cleansing? Seriously? Is this what they teach in those books?” He nods at the ex-boyfriend book resting on the table. “To burn down apartments to get over your ex-boyfriends?”

I blush. “It wasn’t the apartment I was supposed to burn! It was this...” I pick up the drawing of Gustaf, and Victor ducks his head to hide a smile.

“Right...because that makes much more sense.”

I flip over the drawing and study it with a content smile. “It does, doesn’t it?”

“Just one question.”

“Shoot.”

“Which mental hospital did you escape from, and where do I find their number?”

“Oh my god, you’re such an asshole!”

I pick up Stan’s butt pillow from his special chair and fling it at Victor. He laughs in response, and, to my disappointment, he grabs it before it can hit his face. What is even more irritating is that his arm is at an angle that does interesting things to his thick biceps.

“Still a lousy thrower, I see,” he grins, and I stick out my tongue at him, which results in him snorting at me. And while I shouldn’t be affected by the smile spreading over his face, there is a slight flutter in my chest.

It grows stronger until I realize I’m staring, and I abruptly leave the kitchen. “I will grab some cleaning items! Be right back!”

We clean up the mess together, Victor and I, and it takes us the rest of the evening to rid the apartment of the smoke smell. After we are done, Victor opens a beer in front of the TV while I’m sitting on the couch. My phone chimes with a message, and Victor turns his head.

“Is it from Stanley?”

My eyes flicker down to my phone. “Let me check...”

I swipe to unlock my phone and almost choke when I see Stan’s message.

Stan the best: Don’t get mad, but I went to the bar after work, and this woman invited me to her place. So... don’t stay up for me, okay? Enjoy your cake.

Traitor...

“Is something the matter?” Victor asks.

I plaster on a smile. “No, it was just Stan saying he won’t be coming home tonight.”

“Oh, that’s no problem. I have nothing planned.”

I blink in surprise. “What do you mean?”

He arches a perfect eyebrow. “That I’m not letting you sleep in the apartment alone. I can take the couch, but that—” he points at the bucket. “Tells me that you’re not alright after your ex-boyfriend. And while I won’t ask you what he did, I’m not leaving you alone tonight.”

His words are final, and while I should be mad that Victor is treating me like a child that needs babysitting, I’m not. Instead, I’m touched by the fact that he cares about me enough to stay the night.

“Thank you,” I say, smiling softly at him.

He nods and takes another sip from his beer. “I mean, it’s not like I have any grand plans tonight anyway.”

I raise a teasing eyebrow. “Really? No hot date or anything?”

He chuckles. “Unfortunately, no. My dating life has been pretty nonexistent lately.”

“Well, that’s surprising,” I say, tilting my head to the side as I take in his tall body. His tattoos are new, and I avert my gaze. Looking at his muscles isn’t wise. “If I remember correctly, you dated more than one woman at once back in high school.”

“We are no longer in high school,” there is a distant look on Victor’s face as he stares at the TV. It looks like he is hesitating about telling me something, but eventually, he talks. “The last woman I was dating… she…she betrayed me. I’ve had a hard time letting people in after that. I don’t trust easily.”

“Oh,” a sad smile touches my lips. “Then we are two.”

Victor glances over at me. “Gustaf betrayed you?”

“Yes,” I take a deep breath. I don’t like to talk about Gustaf, but something about Victor makes me trust him. It must be his calm and somewhat intimidating persona. He also carries the air of someone who is loyal. I continue. “Gustaf definitely betrayed me, but maybe not in the way you think.”

Interest shimmers in Victor’s intense eyes as he strokes his jaw. He has shaved. “Care to tell me what happened?”