“Go ahead, kill yourself.” His smile fades, and his eyes narrow. “It doesn’t mean your problems will go away. You may wake up and find yourself trapped in a new undead reality. Slave and servant to your greed and jealousy. The signs are all there.”
“Is that what happened to you?” The words slip out of my mouth, and I regret it instantly.
His eyebrow shoots up as his eyes assess me. “Brave enough to try and follow my path?” Erik leans forward, invading my personal space with a creepy, tooth-showing smile. “I didn’t think so,” he says, referring to my silence. “You should do what Vikings do. We don’t fret over another man’s wife. We take her for our own. Perhaps, you would feel better, and we would be able to get through the workday, if you were to do the same.”
Chapter 2
Camilla
“I’m calling about the storefront on Shallow Lake Drive. I’m from out of town, and I’d like the details on the store and building. Are they both for rent? For sale?” The machine beeps just as I finish leaving my phone number. I sigh, frustrated.
“How’s the search going?” Mom asks, fixing herself a cup of tea and sitting with me at the kitchen table.
I hold my head in my hands. That should be answer enough. I don’t want to admit that it’s going the way everything else in my life is. Nowhere.
“Camilla,” Mom pries a hand away from my face. “It’s not working because you’re meant to stay here, not run away. You have to learn to face your problems and work through them.”
I sigh. I need to take this step, and I wish my mother didn’t insist on making it harder. It seems the only thing my parents care about is marrying me off.
“Ineedto leave.”
“Stay and fight for your man,” she says, slapping a hand on the glass table top with fire and indignation.
“I don’t have a man. I tried making things work with Miguel, but I couldn’t. I’m done looking backward. I can do better than staying with a man who thinks he needs to dip his spoon in every pot of honey.”
“That’s because he’s a musician, not a doctor,” I hear the disdain in her voice.
“You say that like it’s my fault.”
“You encouraged him to go to open mic nights, when he should’ve been home with you, studying.”
“Miguel would have done it whether or not I wanted him to. He was done with medicine. He used me as an excuse, that’s all.”
“Fine. Forget him.” She’s the one who keeps bringing him up. “There are other men around. Good, wholesome husband material.” Mom says with the same certainty she has that the sun will rise tomorrow.
“Did it ever occur to you that I’m not good, wholesome wife material?”
My mother shrinks back with a look of horror on her face. “Why on earth would you say that?”
“Because I’m—” I look into my mother’s warm brown eyes as I worry my lip and see her love for me reflected back. She doesn’t understand. How can she? Body size has never been an issue for her. She’s bounced between a size three and a size seven her entire life. The seven was when she was nine months pregnant with me.
“What, Cami? You’re beautiful? And kind-hearted?” She holds my hand tight, bringing it close to her chest. There isn’t an ounce of sarcasm in her voice. “And you don’t fall into bed with every available man in town. Do you? Women do that these days, you know.”
I shake my head. “I don’t.” Is she really this naïve, or is she pretending for my benefit? I’ve come to terms with it; it’s about time she does, too. “But, I’m fat.”
