“If you think I waited all of these years to lose my virginity just so I could throw away my Stanford education to settle down and be some rich guy’s wife and a mother to his kids, you’re sadly mistaken!” I protested angrily. It wasn’t that I was opposed to marrying or becoming a mother, but I wasn’t even twenty-two years old. We hadn’t graduated college yet. And he was so sure. How could anyone be that damn sure of anything?
“You’re overreacting.”
The anger that moved through my body was uncanny. Not only had he said the worst thing you can say to any woman when we’re upset, the cavalier and casual way he’d said it pissed me off even more.
“Get out!” I yelled.
Robert’s scowl, while intimidating to most, I’m certain, did little to dissuade my anger.
“I’m not going any fucking where.”
“Get the hell out! I am not talking to you about this anymore.” I glanced at the clock on the wooden, circular table in the corner of the room. “We have to be on the bus in an hour. I need to pack and I don’t want to look at you anymore.” At that point, I wasn’t even certain why I was so angry. I just knew I was.
“I said I’m not going any goddamn where. At no point did I ever say you needed to quit on your professional goals or sacrifice the education you’ve worked so diligently for.”
I was too busy throwing clothes into my suitcase to respond to him.
“Deborah!” He reached for my wrist, halting my movements.
“I—”
“Robert!” someone called from the opposite end of the locked door, knocking loudly.
“Fuck! What?” he yelled, responding to the male on the other side.
I didn’t recognize the voice.
“Open up, man. We’ve been looking for you. It’s an emergency.”
Robert growled, giving me one last glare, as if to say this wasn’t over, before releasing his hold on my wrist and moving to the door. He yanked it open. “What?” he barked at the guy on the other side.
As soon as I saw his face, I recognized him. He was one of the freshman that’d accompanied us on the trip but I couldn’t recall his name. I didn’t waste time trying to, either; I went back to packing. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the guy lean in and say something low in Robert’s ear.
“Shit!”
That one curse had me startled, alarm bells shooting through my body. Something wasn’t right, and in spite of my earlier anger, I felt the deepest urge to comfort him. But he turned and gave me a sharp look, stopping me in my tracks.
“I have to go, but this isn’t over.” It sounded like a threat, a warning, and a promise.
My body shivered and my lips parted to ask him what it was that had him leaving so abruptly. Call me crazy, but my instincts were telling me that something was seriously wrong for him to drop the conversation we’d been having and to rush out. However, before any words could come out, he was gone and I was left standing in my empty room, missing his presence just that quickly.
I didn’t know it then, but it would be another five years before I had contact with Robert Townsend again.
Chapter Nine
1979
Deborah
“I don’t understand why we had to have lunch here,” Cohen stated as he glanced around at the crystal chandeliers lining the roof of the Crown Jewel hotel’s restaurant we were sitting in.
I frowned, already annoyed by his tone. “Because this place is only a few blocks from my job and I love the food here,” I retorted rather tersely.
However, Cohen didn’t seem to pick up on it, or not care about my attitude at the moment.
“This place is ridiculously overpriced. The only people who come here are the ones who want to be seen or make everyone else believe they have money.”
I narrowed my gaze, unsure of whether or not my boyfriend of the last two years had intentionally just called me some sort of social climber.
