Startoucher Read online

  Jake feigned surprise, “Giles, I don’t know—”

  “Don’t try to bullshit me,” Giles said. He drummed his fingers against the edge of the desk. “Remember who you learned that from. You’ve had issues for months, and I know exactly what’s going on.”

  He did? It wasn’t entirely impossible. Giles had a reputation for obsessively researching everyone he worked with—client, associate, or partner. Perhaps he had managed to drill down into the furthest reaches of Jake’s childhood and somehow unearth his unusual visions.

  “It’s overwork!” Giles declared. “You think I haven’t seen it before?”

  “No,” Jake said. “It’s not that, it’s—”

  “I’ve seen it a thousand times,” Giles insisted. “Every year, a fresh batch of eager beavers work themselves to death to make partner. Heck, we work them to death, because what else are associates for, right?”

  Jake couldn’t disagree. While Giles believed in leaving no stone unturned, it wasn’t usually him turning them.

  “But when you make partner it’s different. We want you here for the long haul. You’re a moneymaker, and I’m not going to lose you. So you’re going to take two weeks off.”

  Jake started to interject.

  “No, no arguments,” Giles said, raising his right hand. “I don’t want to hear it. Two weeks off. Go to the beach. Swim. Surf. Whatever it is people do. Just don’t do it here. I don’t want to see you in the office, understood?”

  Jake tried to argue but realized he was in no position to. Perhaps Giles was right and the constant years of excessive work had finally taken their toll. Two weeks off could be just what he needed to recharge his batteries and put the strangeness of the last couple of days behind him.

  He sighed. “Understood.”

  Chapter Four

  The next day, Jake drove to the sea. He spent the late morning swimming off Venice Beach, cutting through the water smoothly, although not as smoothly as he once remembered doing. The salt water and sun felt good on his body, and it took some time before he emerged from the water to dry himself with his towel and walk along the shoreline.

  He found a quiet spot beyond the main crowd and laid his towel carefully on the sand before sitting down and staring out at the waves. It was a perfect September day, the sun glistening on the water, with a faint breeze and the temperature just right. But Jake couldn’t relax; his mind kept replaying the mysterious lights in the sky and the visions of the desert and of his old childhood home.

  He’d had his first vision when he was thirteen. He could clearly remember seeing Haylie Baxter, a girl who lived two blocks over, being hit by her father. He’d had the vision when he was out playing in the park, so real he could have been in the room, even though he was nowhere near. He remembered trying to tell his adoptive father and just getting an angry glare in response.

  “Boys like you shouldn’t go around making up stories,” he’d said. “You could get someone into trouble, lying like that.”

  But he hadn’t been lying, and Haylie and her mom had moved away the next summer.

  Other memories came to him. Seeing what some of the questions were going to be on a teacher’s surprise test. Most of his classmates thought he’d cheated. The county fair he visited with his mom, where guessing the number of marbles hidden in a jar had seemed obvious because the number had just appeared in his mind.

  Until the age of fifteen, the visions were sporadic, three or four a year. Usually he just zoned out and found himself looking at what he could only describe as a TV screen. A friend who was there once when it happened told him afterward that his eyes had gone blank and he’d swayed on his feet. He’d felt no pain. Then puberty hit with a vengeance, and the visions became more frequent and disruptive. Once he’d even fallen over unconscious at school, and the teacher had thought he was having an epileptic fit.

  After that, he began in earnest to try and block them as soon as they arrived. He quickly discovered that trying to resist brought on pain. A throbbing pain so intense, he gave up the first few times, crying in frustration as the images swamped his mind. But with persistence, and by summoning up previously unknown reserves of willpower, he’d learned to push through the physical agony and squeeze the visions out of his head. By the end of his fifteenth year, they’d stopped completely.

  Why had the sleepwalking and visions returned after so many years? He scanned the horizon of the sea from left to right. And what about the lights? He’d never seen anything like that before. One thing was certain: he’d pushed himself physically and mentally for many years, especially the last five. The most probable answer was also the most obvious. As much as he hated to accept it, his nervous system was fried.

  Jake rolled up his towel and got up to walk back toward the boardwalk. He studied the others relaxing on the beach, apparently without a care in the world. If everyone else could find ways to relax, surely he could too. He strolled past the sun worshipers and the volleyball players and thought about how to spend his vacation.

  Maybe he could grab a package deal to Cabo San Lucas in Mexico. Giles had arranged a corporate retreat there a couple of years before, but Jake hadn’t had time to enjoy it. Now he did. The more he thought about it, the better the idea seemed. A luxury all-inclusive resort with plenty of water sports, amazing seafood, and attractive women.

  Jake already felt better and decided to book the vacation as soon as he could. But first he needed to eat. He walked off the beach to retrieve his beach slacks and polo from his car in the parking lot, and then wandered around the backstreets of the boardwalk. He spotted a small deli with a white-and-red awning shading a few tables from the sun. Jake sat down at a small circular table, and when the waitress arrived, he ordered a pastrami on rye with a double expresso.

  He checked a few e-mails on his phone while waiting, and then forced himself to set up an out-of-office message. Next, he surfed the net for deals to Mexico, and when the waitress brought his order, he put the phone aside to savor the richness of the pastrami and the bitter taste of the expresso. He paid the bill, and he was just about to return to his car when he saw the gallery.

  More importantly, he saw the woman standing in the sun by the entrance. The gallery itself was typical of the bohemian neighborhood, where someone had converted the ground floor of their home into a shop front to attract customers from the flow of pedestrians meandering back from the sand. Nothing typical about the woman, though. A curvy brunette, wearing a white long-sleeve tunic with a print that he knew without having to ask that she’d designed herself. Her glossy hair was tied back with a ribbon of the same material.

  Normally at this point, he would have ignored her, too busy with work to play. His determination to make partner had meant that his love life over the last few years amounted to nothing more than occasional one-night stands. But now he felt different. He’d driven himself too hard and needed to loosen up. He hesitated for a few seconds and then turned to walk toward the gallery. He crossed the street, squinting slightly in the sun as he walked toward the entrance. The woman stood with her eyes closed and her face tilted up to catch the rays. Jake guessed she was in her late twenties.

  “Enjoying the sun?” he asked.

  “Yes, I am.” She opened her eyes and laughed, unfazed by the interruption. Jake looked over her shoulder at the artworks on the walls. Quadrangles of vivid color hung on the white surface. She stepped to the left and gestured with her hand. “Would you like to come in?”

  “Sure, thanks.” He walked in. As well as the artworks, there was also a sofa and a narrow archway leading to a back room. Jake stepped around slowly, studying the paintings. They were better than he’d expected, with plenty of landscapes, beach scenes, and occasional pieces obviously inspired by the distant hills. Not quite photo-realistic—instead, semi-dreamscapes, mixing the real with views Jake couldn’t quite place. The woman followed him a short distance to his side, quite content to let him browse in silence. Jake felt a magnetism build up between
them.

  “I like the art,” Jake said, turning away from the paintings. “Are they yours?”

  “Most of them.” Her brown eyes sparked as she smiled. “A few are by my friends too.”

  “I’m Jake.” He offered his hand.

  “Nice to meet you, Jake. I’m Sarah.”

  “You live here?”

  Sarah nodded. “Above the shop. My mother owned the building before she passed. It seemed like a good place to set up.”

  Jake glanced outside at a couple walking by. “It’s a great spot to catch people’s eye.” Although initially it hadn’t been the art that had caught his eye. He began to smile and then noticed a large painting hanging on the wall in the room beyond the narrow archway. He gestured to it. “Can I take a look?”

  “Absolutely.” Sarah stepped through the archway, and Jake followed. The white walls were completely bare apart from the large canvas in front. A steep stairway to the right led to the upper floor, and he saw a long, battered sofa on the left. Above the sofa, a window provided light. The canvas dominated the room, and he stepped toward a herd of wild horses streaming across the prairie, a glorious sun rising over the mountains behind, painting the clouds in a range of gold and orange hues.

  “Wow, is that yours?” he asked.

  “Yes. Mustangs. So much freedom.”

  Jake studied the lead horse at the right, its eyes blazing and its muscles undulating as it powered ahead. “Nice detail on the lead stallion.”

  Sarah laughed and raised her right hand to reach for a turquoise pendant that hung on a silver chain around her neck. Jake hadn’t noticed it before. “Men always think that.” She looked directly into his eyes. “It’s a mare. With herds of wild horses, she leads while a stallion guards the rear.”

  Jake took an involuntary step back as Sarah watched. He quickly recovered his composure and then laughed. “I guess I’m a typical guy after all.” He scanned the canvas but the horses emerged from the left-hand side and the end of the herd was out of sight.

  This time he looked directly at her. “So where is this mythical stallion?”

  She held his gaze. “He—”

  “Sarah, we’re here!” a female voice shouted from the entrance to the gallery, and they turned around to peer through the archway at two young women dressed in shorts and T-shirts holding trays of food.

  “Sandy, Jess, great.” Sarah waved them in and turned toward Jake. “We’re just getting set up for a party; you’re welcome to stay.” He glanced at his watch—3:40pm—and remembered his plan to book a vacation. “Thanks, but I have go. You’ll have to tell me about that stallion another time.”

  “Will do.” She smiled, and Jake walked through the narrow archway and said hi to the two women before stepping outside.

  Jake walked down the street and soon found himself on the crowded boardwalk. He looked at the throng of people, then remembered it was Saturday. Although when he left the gallery he’d intended to pick up his car and drive home, he was in a good mood and didn’t want to leave the beach quite yet. He strolled along the boardwalk, keeping an eye out for somewhere to stop and have a drink.

  There, perfect. He spied a small bar with tables directly on the sand, not too crowded and with a large canopy over each table to provide shade. He sat on one of the white plastic chairs and studied the menu. A waiter eventually came over, and Jake ordered a draught beer. It was ice cold when it arrived, and he sipped it slowly and watched a couple of kids a few feet in front of him kicking a ball around.

  He couldn’t help thinking about Sarah, and her painting of the wild mustangs. Maybe he should have accepted her invitation to the party. He could see her face now, her eyes defiant as she told him the lead horse was a mare. She’d obviously enjoyed that moment, and if he was honest, so did he. He smiled and took another sip of his beer before holding the frosty glass in mid-air. When did he last feel such an immediate attraction?

  Jake knew the answer. Eleanor Sullivan, Harvard Law School. Over six years ago. She was the daughter of a prominent Democrat with roots in New Hampshire, a gorgeous and ambitious blonde who fell in love with a poor kid from Queens, New York. He sighed and put the beer back down on the table. At first, it had been a whirlwind romance, almost a fairy tale. She was the key to the world of money, status, and power that he’d always dreamed about.

  But the dream soon turned sour. He remembered the exact moment: Christmas at the end of their first year together. She’d convinced him that the differences in their backgrounds didn’t matter, and had even persuaded her parents to give Jake a chance. The whole clan had gathered to sing carols around the crackling log fire in the living room of their New Hampshire mansion as a thick flurry of snow fell on the extensive gardens outside.

  Jake was singing along, a glass of mulled wine warm in his hand, when Eleanor looked over to him and smiled. He smiled back and then realized he was looking at his future. Predictable, conventional, and safe. He took a sip of the wine and choked, suddenly feeling stifled by the warmth of the fire and the cloying smell of old money. People who took their wealth and privilege for granted, and whose only desire was for more of the same.

  They split up soon after that. Jake gave the excuse that his recent appointment to Law Review left no time for a relationship. Eleanor took it badly and became bitter. She then used her connections to try and frustrate his progress. Jake grew to hate the cold winters at Harvard, and he vowed to move somewhere hot as soon as he graduated.

  “Hey, mister!” He snapped out of the past to see the kids’ soccer ball underneath his table. He smiled and picked it up to throw it back. Whatever it was that Jake wanted from life, he definitely wanted to feel free. He didn’t know exactly how to achieve that, but the painting of the wild mustangs and Sarah’s challenging yet enticing eyes had stirred something deep inside.

  He downed the rest of his beer, paid his tab, and started to walk back toward the gallery.

  As Jake approached the gallery in the late-afternoon sun, he saw Sarah by the entrance in jeans and a white tank top, greeting an influx of people ambling in from the street. Most looked like what Giles would have labelled “artistic” types, which meant they would have been reprimanded back at the firm for the unusual style of their hair or the number of tattoos they had. One carried a beat-up acoustic guitar.

  Sarah gave a friendly wave as Jake stepped toward the entrance. “I thought you had something more important to do!”

  He smiled and threw his hands up. “Priorities change.” They looked at each for a few seconds until a couple of tanned surfers walked up, and she invited Jake in.

  “There’s plenty of food and drink. I’ll catch up with you later.”

  “Great.” Jake stepped inside and could see that a table had been set up on the left of the room opposite the sofa. It held bottles of wine and trays of food, with plastic cups and plates on the side. Under the table were a variety of buckets with beer stashed on top of ice. A few people crammed together on the sofa, eating and chatting. Reggae music blasted out from a couple of large speakers in the back room. He stepped up to the narrow archway and could see a young couple dancing with bottles of beer in one hand and cigarettes in the other. A young guy with frizzy, bleached hair stood in front of the large canvas peering intently at the mustangs.

  Sandy and Jess clomped down the stairway carrying more trays of food, greeting Jake as they walked through the archway to place them on the table. He grabbed a beer and cut a piece of quiche from one of the trays, then took them to sit down on the long, empty sofa in the back room and watch the party coalesce. The vegetarian quiche was surprisingly good, and the cold beer was refreshing.

  More people showed up, and both rooms started to fill, but it never felt too crowded. Sometimes there was a slight bottleneck at the narrow archway as people went back and forth, but everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. As the drink took effect and night fell, the music got louder, and the dancing became less inhibited. People began to spill out onto the street
.

  Jake got up to grab another beer, his third, and returned to sit at the end of the long sofa to carry on talking to Jimbo, the young guy with bleached hair. Six people were now squashed together on the sofa, and a joint was making its way down the line. Jake found himself feeling relaxed for the first time in months, even before the joint reached him. He took a drag. The world seemed calmer in the moments after, and his gaze drifted across the room to where Sarah danced unselfconsciously. She looked over, their eyes locking as Jake exhaled. Sarah stopped dancing, and almost as if drawn by the pull of his gaze, she began to make her way across the room toward him.

  It seemed obvious the two of them should take a walk, away from the noise and movement of the party. They threaded their way through the people dancing in the gallery and emerged into the cooler air of the street. The two surfers were talking to a couple of girls, a line of empty beer cans at their feet. Jake and Sarah stepped to one side.

  “Great party,” Jake said.

  “I’m lucky to have such good friends.”

  “I’m sure it’s not just down to luck.” Her dark-brown hair fell to her shoulders and her eyes shone with the same intensity as when she’d talked about the mustangs. Wild and fierce, yet also captivating. Jake glanced over at the surfers and the girls and suddenly felt like going somewhere more private. “How about a stroll to the beach?”

  “Let me see… can I trust you?”

  “Of—”

  “Only joking.” Sarah laughed and started to make some karate chopping motions with her hands. “I’m a big girl and can take care of myself, let’s go.”

  They walked down the street toward the boardwalk, past the closed deli and a small still-open clothes shop. Sarah stopped to chat briefly with the owner, and Jake discreetly checked his watch—eleven p.m. The boardwalk was deserted, save for a lone cyclist with a small, yapping dog trailing behind. He greeted Sarah as he passed. Bright streetlights illuminated the colorful graffiti of the shutters on the closed shopfronts. She crossed over to the sand and turned right, flipping her hair over her shoulder with one hand.