APOV
"Sir we're ready to land," Nanette says quietly over the movie Christian and I are watching. He nods and buckles me in before doing his own lap belt. He hasn't said a word about this trip since final arrangements were made a week ago so I'm following his lead and letting him dictate the pace of anything he wants to do or say.
I've noticed a definite decrease in his conversations, a retreating if you will into what I can only assume is a very dark place in his mind. He's increased his workouts with Claude to every single day and has added two miles to each run he goes on with Taylor. After utilizing the playroom only four times since the return from our honeymoon I'm not at all surprised that we've been in there six times in the last ten days, each visit a bit more intense than the last.
Not that I'm complaining. The man knows exactly what he's doing with every toy in there and while I've gotten used to the initial shock of some things, I have also come to learn to truly relax and give myself over to him behind that closed door because he never disappoints. Ever. I leave that room limp, sweaty, half asleep and sated while Christian carries me to our bedroom, the gentleness of my husband returning as the Dom disappears. For his part he leaves that room centered, exhausted and sated as well. A win/win if you ask me.
Last night I'd come home early from work to do some last minute packing, expecting to be tied to some piece of furniture for the duration of the night once Christian got home only to discover him in his office in jeans and an old college sweatshirt.
"I couldn't concentrate at GEH so Andrea sent me home to work from here," he'd said when I cocked my head to the side in question.
"Andrea sent you home?"
"Yes. Said I was messing with her productivity and that perhaps it would be a better fit for today if I operated from home." Christian had chuckled and reached for me, his nose burrowing in my hair for a deep breath like he does every evening when we both get home. "I think she was hoping you'd be here."
"I would have been had I known you were coming home early." Beneath my fingers I could feel the tenseness in his shoulders, a fact confirmed when he moaned as I rubbed a knot near his neck. It had taken nothing to entice him into the bathtub for a massage and much to my surprise instead of the playroom he'd carried me to our bed and laid me out there for his enjoyment…and mine.
I'd awoken at three to find him sitting by the window just staring out into the moonlight and for a few minutes I just watched him; this beautiful, strong, powerful man who has travelled the world and was now afraid to fly to the city in which he had been birthed, chewed up and spit out as a kid. Even now, his arm around my shoulder as we begin to descend he's the picture of calm but I know better. I know that with each minute that passes his anxiety rises because what he's about to face is the one thing he's avoided his entire life.
"Everything is in order, Taylor?" Christian barks across the walkway. Taylor nods, hits a button on his phone and tightens his seat belt much to Christian's amusement. "That guy was in a war but blanches every time he gets on a plane."
"Gail said he threw up on the way home from their honeymoon," I offer conspiratorially, happy that Christian has finally cracked a smile today.
"No shit," he laughed, reaching for my hand and placing it on his thigh. "When he first started he'd always sit in the back row so I wouldn't see how nervous he was but as stoic as he tried to be, he'd be white faced until his feet hit the tarmac."
I peek over and see Taylor check his phone and then close his eyes, his hands gripping the arm rests. When the plane hits the runway and finally stops in front of the private terminal he rolls his shoulders and stands, acting as if nothing was wrong. This tiny vulnerability, the first I've seen in all the time I've known him somehow makes me like him that much more.
"Sir, your brother said that the house passed inspection for the electrical. He's gone and scheduled the landscape architect for Monday before the frost sets in. He's requesting that you approve the plans he emailed to you for the pool today so that he can file for the permits."
Christian tips his head to me. "He cc'd you. Other than the stone bar-b-que the decisions are yours so while I'm in my meeting, take a look at what he sent and we'll go over it on the way home."
"Let's go over it at lunch," I try, determined to get him to at least entertain the idea of staying in Detroit long enough to give the idea of visiting some of his past. He's onto me though because all he does is raise a brow and help me out of my seat.
"You'll be ok with Sawyer?"
"Yup!" I put on a big smile and reach up to kiss his cheek as we get in the waiting car. An Audi of course. "We're going to the Eastern Market and depending on how long we have he wants to go to Tiger Stadium."
"You probably won't have time," he says quietly as we start to drive to the corporate complex where he's meeting with a local GEH acquisitions team before going to Detroit's City Hall where he has to legally sign documents that will give his company ownership of a local development group. I have never seen him so in his own head and while my heart hurts for him, I also know that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity for him to gain what I think is the closure he needs to really embrace where he came from and who he is.
While he looks out the window, I look at him. He's his usual gorgeous self, a faint dusting of scruff his only visual 'fuck you' to a requirement he thinks is bull shit. How long he fought the local government about having to come out here I don't know but this business he's gaining today must be lucrative with huge potential if he's willing to acquiesce to Michigan state law and fly here to sign in person. Outside of the scruff, which I admit only adds to his sex appeal, he's pristine right down to the light blue handkerchief that peeks out of his breast pocket.
The city comes into view but he shows no reaction until his hand tightens around mine and his chest expands on a deep breath.
"That's the hospital where Grace found me."
"You've never told me about that day." I say it quietly so that he doesn't feel pressured and so that I don't disturb whatever moment he's in right now but he hears me because he lifts his arm and pulls me against him so that my cheek is pressed against his side.
"One day," is his only response.
I watch the hospital go by, the big blue letters of the Children's Hospital of Michigan disappearing as we continue to drive. I want to go there and see it myself but I know if he hears that Luke and I went there while he was attending to business he'd flip out and the last thing I want to do is upset him more. So instead I file the name of the hospital away and make a mental note to ask Grace about that day.
Outside of a huge building made exclusively of glass the car stops and Taylor gets out, opening Christian's door for him.
"It's unlikely that anyone will know who you are here or that the media will follow you around but I still want you to promise me that you'll stay within arms length of Sawyer. I don't need to worry about you along with all the other shit I've got to deal with today."
"I promise. You go do what you have to do and we'll meet up in a few hours."
He moves to get out of the car but I pull him back in and kiss him firmly right on the lips. He grins sheepishly before swinging one leg out.
"Sorry. That is the first and last time I'll forget to kiss my wife."
And then he's gone, separated from me in a city that he loathes and fears. It's ridiculous to be afraid for him, his horrid memories can't actually physically harm him but if I'm honest with myself, I'm worried that just being here will undermine the progress he's made over the last few months.
"Ana?" Sawyer calls from the front seat. I've finally gotten him to call me by my first name when it's just him and I and even that was a fight I only won when Heather got into his ear. Before he pulls away I climb into the front seat and pull on the seatbelt a bit harsher than necessary. "He'll be fine," Luke offers as he starts to drive.
"I know," I mumble but really, I'm not so sure. Flynn thought Christian coming here was a great idea and prepped him as best as he could over the past few weeks but he did warn both of us that of all of the hurdles Christian has jumped, this one would prove quite difficult. Accepting that he'd been the victim of a pedophile was bad enough. Facing the fact that your birth mother chose drugs over you is an entirely different kind of pain.
'Remembering something and seeing the places in which those things happened is a very different experience.' Flynn had said that so many times that even I had begun to dread coming here but Christian was adamant about acquiring this company, excited by the prospect of so many new jobs being created in this admittedly blighted city.
He'd already relocated twenty nine employees here to start laying the groundwork, his enthusiasm at a new and promising company enough for him to push through the anxiety of having to come here. After today his HR department would begin hiring locals to fill in the rest of the positions that would open up and if things went well, there would be even more jobs to hire for next year. That knowledge, along with Christian's arrogant business pride had him striding into that building with his shoulders back and his head held high, all traces of hesitation gone. Me, however, well I'm a mess right now.
"The market's open for a few more hours." Sawyer does his best to distract me but it's not until he mentions asking Heather to move in with him that I finally check into the conversation.
"What? You are? That's great!"
He smiles, raises his brows over his Aviators and turns into the parking lot. "I've got to clear out the guest bedroom for her shoes to fit and I'm sure she'll make me break a wall down to make more closet space but yeah, I'm going to ask her this weekend. Her lease expires at the end of January so I figure asking her now gives her a solid six weeks to pack her shit and also gives her time to really think about it."
"Think about what?" I ask excitedly. "She loves you, trust me. She's going to say yes."
He shrugs and holds his arm out straight as some guy comes at us to sell us homemade pinecone ornaments. He doesn't say anything but at 6' 4" and a solid wall of muscle he doesn't have to. The guy backs up apologetically and moves onto another group of shoppers.
"She needs to think about it before she says yes because if I ask her to move in with me, it's because there's no going back. I've walked this road once before and it ended in shit. I'm not repeating that, not with Heather. She moves in she needs to know it means forever. I'm not saying I'm looking at rings or anything like that but that's where this is headed so if she takes this leap, the next one is the one. No bullshit."
"You won't get bullshit with her and you know it."
"I know, that's why I want her to move in." He says it like a man who has never known heartbreak but I know what he's experienced and I'm not letting him off the hook that easily.
"She'd never cheat on you, not even if you had to deploy again."
He laughs and humors me when I stop at a local artisan selling goat soap, rolling his eyes when I start to buy one of each scent.
"One, I will never, ever give my time to the United States Government again. Fuck those fuckers. Two, I know that. That girl may look like sin but she's all angel." He takes the bag from me and avoids my eyes.
"That was sweet, Luke."
He shushes me and answers a text from Taylor who is checking in every half hour. I'm sure it's to appease Christian so I wait patiently while he shoots off a quick reply.
"Don't tell anyone I'm sweet, Ana. I'm supposed to be a tough, taciturn, son-of-a-bitch. You start telling your friends I'm head over heels and have officially handed over my balls and I'll lose all respect."
"OK. Far as anyone knows you fought off attackers left and right with your sniper wielding ninja skills and saved my life."
"Perfect," he nods. "Now let's find a café, I need a latte."
CPOV
"Three million in current assets is encouraging especially since it was down four hundred thousand when we first started this process. Our projection is that within a year we can double that figure."
I listen as Belinda Lowe rattles off an impressive list of the improvements and financial projections Briarcrest Innovations is now showing since GEH's involvement. This is the reason I love this business. I've got more than enough money to never have to work again but knowing I just took a company that employed 41 people and was essentially circling the drain and will not just double their bottom line but also hire a minimum of 135 more people in the next few weeks is exciting.
I'm not an expert on computer technology but I am an expert on knowing when to invest in a company so when Ros and her team approached me nine months ago and laid out a proposal detailing a new data storage technology that was brilliant but lacked funding, I'd jumped at it. It was only as I was going over the finer details in my home office later that night that I noticed where the company was based out of.
Cowardly or not I have actively avoided any and all business in the State of Michigan for one reason. In order to purchase, acquire, merge or take over any existing company, the principal of the venture company must be present to sign the legal documents.
I'd bucked but Ros had been insistent, using my weak spot when it came to commerce in the US. This tech firm needed funding and mentorship, two things GEH was renowned for. What they could offer in the long run was employment numbers ten times their current 41 so long as they could get the capital necessary to complete and market their technology.
Which of course is why I now find myself sitting in a nondescript office building in the heart of Detroit, the piss poor neighborhood I was born in not two miles away. It's unnerving, sitting here in a six thousand dollar Seville Row suit with a sixty thousand dollar watch and a private plane waiting for me at the airport. I feel like a fraud. A little boy pretending to be something I'm not.
Rich. Powerful. Controlled.
I feel none of those things. Instead I feel as if at any moment my birth mother is going to walk in that door with her pimp and point her finger at me, a sneer on her face just like the one she'd give me when I used to tell her I was hungry. Which is impossible since she died over 25 years ago.
Belinda is still talking but her attention has shifted to the current CFO of Briarcrest. The man listens intently which is what I should be doing but instead I keep glancing at the conference room door like a pathetic little kid. Flynn told me I could expect this type of illogical paranoia but as usual I brushed him off. I now wish I had paid more attention to what he was saying.
My phone buzzes on the table and manners dictate that I should ignore it but it's a picture from the one person that I want to see right now so without so much as an apology I lift the phone and swipe, a smile spreading across my face at the picture of Ana blowing me a kiss.
"Are we ready to head to city hall?" I interrupt. I'm the boss, I'm allowed to and quite frankly, this meeting is becoming nothing more than a brag session. Around me the staff of Briarcrest stumbles and hastily gathers their belongings but my team, so used to my brusque manner simply stand and make their way to the door. Me being an asshole is just business as usual.
Taylor is waiting outside of Ros's rental car, a nod to me that I know is more about his acknowledgement that I want the fuck out of this city than it is about being polite. Instead of looking out the window or listening to Ros blabber on about business I take the opportunity to call Ana, immediately at ease when she answers on a laugh.
"What's so funny?" I ask, my own mouth turning up in a smile despite the fact that we're passing the hospital again.
"Sawyer. We left the market early since he was uncomfortable with how many people there were but I think he just wanted to get to the stadium. They're letting him run the field with the team and I swear he's acting as if he really is playing in a game. You guys are all such little boys when it comes to sports."
"Sports and women. The two things that bring men to their knees. Elliot used to cry when the Mariners lost as a kid."
"Speaking of Elliot, Kate said she wanted us to pick the bachelor and bachelorette weekends now so she could plan around them. Did you guys have anything in mind?"
I refrain from telling her that Elliot's friends have already determined that he needed one last fling and planned on flying him to Vegas for a weekend away so he could do just that. Not that he'd get on board with that, he's not the type to cheat and frankly after all the bad press he's gotten lately the last thing he wants is to be seen partying in Vegas without Kate. I'm letting him deal with his idiot friends but if they ride him too hard about it, I'll step in and be the asshole. Happily.
"Ethan and I were talking about it at Thanksgiving. We were thinking about chartering a fishing boat for a long weekend but really, it's way too early for this conversation."
"Not according to Kate. She's become obsessed with the whole planning thing and I am one hundred percent sure she wants us to take her to Paris for her bachelorette."
"Not happening," I retort on instinct. "Paris is way too fucking far."
"Maybe we could combine it into a mini-vacation for us too. We could all fly out together, you and your brother can do something for a few days while we do the whole party thing in Paris, and then you and I can go off somewhere for a few days. I've always wanted to see the Matterhorn in person."
This woman. This woman can disarm me faster than anyone else ever could. She prattles on a bit more about crepes and pastries and something about little red hats and before you know it, I'm making plans in my head to take her over the Eiffel Tower in a helicopter at night. She makes me want to live, to experience all of these things that seemed so mundane and trivial before. And shit do I need that right now because looking out the window of this car as it winds its way through the city of my birth, I'm starting to feel those old familiar emotions I've worked so hard to dispel.
Worthlessness. Hostility. Apathy.
"...Oh and my friend from college Stephanie lives here now and said we should try Coach Insignia for lunch. I went ahead and made a reservation but we can always cancel it."
If she were here I'd probably want to spank her for that. I've come a long way but I'm still me. "Ana. I said we're leaving before lunch."
"I know, I know but how often are we going to be here?"
"Hopefully never again," I mutter but I know I'll have to come back again. With a business deal as large as this one I'll have to make an appearance at least once a year if not more. "We're on our way to sign the paperwork. Taylor will let Sawyer know when to make his way back to the airport." I may not be there to see it but I know there's disappointment on her face.
"OK," she answers cheerily. Because even if I'm being a total schmuck, she's going to support me and love me anyway and damn if that doesn't give me a bit more courage to do this. "Remember to smile for the cameras, Christian."
At City Hall we're ushered into the press room, a deep blue curtain behind us acting as a good backdrop for the television and newspaper cameras aimed at our group now standing around the podium. I may not want to be here for personal reasons, but as far as business goes, I'm happy as fuck. Besides being one of the most lucrative and easy deals I've ever been a part of, I know that my being here, my company putting roots down, my name on the side of a building, will bring some much needed cash into the City of Detroit. I also know that it will revitalize old businesses and encourage new ones to come in. A win/win so long as I can get the hell out of here before my anxiety strangles me.
Random reporters yell out question after question as if they really care about the nature of my business. But I'm no fool. Sex sells and according to Forbes, People and a slew of other ridiculous articles, I am the face of sexy business. I'd blush if I were capable of it. Andrea had thought it funny enough to change the screen saver on my computer to the cover of People Magazine and despite wanting to fire her over it, I could only laugh.
"Mr. Grey is it true that your company, Grey Holdings will also have a community outreach branch that will be available for public use?"
"Yes. Our mission statement has always been to encourage growth it the communities that we're in. Detroit is no different. Part of that mission is to hire only individuals who are already settled so besides our outreach program that will assist with living, financial and social needs, you can plan on a minimum 200 new jobs by this time next year." It'll probably be more like 250 but I've learned it's better to exceed expectations than to explain a failure.
"Mr. Grey, how does it feel to be back in your home city?"
Now this guy I would love to smack around because now the focus is personal and not business and the last fucking thing on earth I want to do is talk about my life here. What the public knows is common knowledge but anyone can be bought at the right price. I do not need some limp dick to start spouting off questions about my drug addicted mother, the state of my living conditions, my neglect and abuse and subsequent adoption. So I just shut him down before he can even start.
"I don't remember much of those years." A lie. "But I'm happy to be able to contribute to the growth here now."
"Would you humor us and tell us a bit about your life here?" a woman asks from the back. "You may be the King of Seattle but we still consider you one of us," she smiles, an attempt to soften the blow of what she must know is a completely out of the line question.
"No. I keep my personal life personal." A nod to a man sitting in the front dismisses any further questions that I deem prodding but inside I'm seething. These people were supposed to have submitted their questions ahead of time. Out of the corner of my eye I see my PR rep shredding apart the Mayor and his staff who are standing there with their mouths hanging open and their hands outstretched in a lame attempt at an apology. Asswipes.
Eventually the questions shift to the Director of Commerce here in Detroit and I take a breather as he answers questions about revenues, taxes and the impact this will have on the immediate economy. These people are dumb as shit if they're asking questions like that. The mayor makes his way back to the stage and offers me a grumbled apology before raising the golden pen we'll use to sign our agreement. I'm wishing Ana was here but her next to me, comforting as that may be for me, would cause a circus and I'm not doing that to her if I don't have to.
Instead I smile and shake hands, nod politely at the reporters who press forward for pictures and then pointedly ignore one of the bolder ones who ponies up next to me in a very inappropriate blouse. Dark blue and sheer with a few too many missing buttons but the look is planned and perfectly executed because every man in here is looking at her as she makes her way to me. She clearly uses sex to disarm so that she can get whatever it is she wants out of an interview but too bad for her, I'm all sexed out.
"Mr. Grey, Veronica Adams with Fox 2 News. Could I trouble you for a few on air questions for our viewers?"
And maybe I would have if she hadn't pressed her tits against my arm but that shit, even before I was married, pissed me off. There are men who love that. They love when a woman chases them down or boldly lets them know she wants to fuck them because it makes them feel powerful. But me? I already am powerful and that type of brazenness is only hot when Ana is standing in front of me in nothing but her perfect alabaster skin as she tells me what she wants me to do to her.
I don't even answer this woman. Instead I push past her and out of the press room, Taylor right on my heels. I expect a hallway but instead I find myself in a room, strains of Handel's 'Messiah' coming from a radio so out of place that I pause and look around.
"What is this place?" I ask curiously. I am surrounded by small 3D neighborhoods, all laid out on tables with flip charts on each one. Nobody's followed us but there is an older man and a younger woman sitting at desks in the corner. They both look up, eyes wide with surprise and then greet us with smiles.
"Mr. Grey, a pleasure. My name is Arnold Montecito and this is my assistant Anita. You went out the wrong door but to answer your question, this," he spans his hands over the room, "is our grand plan for revitalization and rebuilding for some of our less than desirable areas."
And I know then that if I look hard enough I'll find the neighborhood in which I grew up in. I want to run the hell out of there but instead Anita begins to engage us in a conversation, her hands flipping through the glossy bound books on each table that highlight the plans they have for each section. Her hope is inspiring even if her job is difficult. Impossible even.
"Your building isn't on any of these boards but this neighborhood here will be the one most likely affected by new foot traffic and employee use."
My building? The possessive nature of that word makes my gut drop. She knows where I was born? But then I notice where she's pointing and realize she means GEH's new building and I admit the irony is not lost on me. I actively avoided this place for my entire life and yet here I am, the owner of not just a business but a building as well. It makes me sad and strangely proud as well. Almost as if I won somehow.
When she and Arnold are finished Taylor nods and makes his way to the door that will take us out of here but I don't move right away. I can't help it. I look for the place in which my mother raised me. I use that word loosely but even I know it takes some effort to keep a child alive for four years so she had to have done some mothering at some point though I don't remember much of it. A few random flashes of memory is all I ever have. A quick vision of a brown flowered couch, the smell of Ramen noodles, the sound of a window as it scrapes open, these are the only things I remember. I can't visualize my actual residence until my eyes settle on a non-descript ten story building in one of the most run down replicas in this room.
There, I almost say out loud, catching the word before I give myself away. There is where my mother laid on her back for strangers so that she could feed me and fill her body with drugs. There is where I would fall asleep each night to the sounds of the next door neighbor beating his wife before he passed out drunk. There was where some man who will always remain nameless put out tiny fires on my tiny body.
What bull shit that is. He scarred me for life, has lent himself to my nightmares for as long as I can remember, and I don't even know his name. I can smell his sweat and cigarettes but I can't curse his name.
"Sir?" Taylor holds the door open for me and I walk through it but not before I read the street names that surround that cesspool of hell I called home. "Sir," he repeats as we step into the lift. "Mrs. Grey is waiting in the car downstairs for you. She was in the area and thought you could ride back to the airport together."
I nod. It's all I can do right now because for some inexplicable reason, I want nothing more than to go back into that room and smash that little building to the ground.
APOV
I can see by the rigid lines of his body and the robotic way he's walking towards the car that he's upset about something. Not that being here isn't upsetting enough for him but something set him off because not an hour and a half ago he was happily chatting with me about Paris. He slides in and slams the door before Taylor can do it for him and without thinking, my body goes to his and finds its place alongside of him.
"You had a good time?" he asks me, pretending nothing is bothering him. I play along with a smile and a quick kiss to his cheek but underneath my bubbly exterior I feel an urgency to keep pushing him towards closure. And there is no place that has left him gaping open like this city.
"I did. The stadium wasn't exactly my cup of tea but it was interesting to see how it all works. They rolled out the red carpet for Sawyer too complete with a jersey with his name on it and everything. He was gracious of course but he's a Cowboys fan through and through."
"Sounds like his problem," Christian teases, the football rivalry between them a never ending source of fodder when they're together. He adjusts the sleeves of his shirt and then his tie, nerves all just pouring off of him. "Nobody bothered you? Noticed who you were?"
"Nope. I mean, Sawyer's a giant so we did get some looks but nothing like at home."
"Good, good." Reaching up to his neck he pulls at the knot around his tie and tugs again. "I'm ready to go, you?"
I shrug because no, I'm not ready to go but I also don't want to pressure him into a nervous breakdown. But a breakthrough? I feel like there's one right on the horizon and leaving here is a huge lost opportunity. He looks at me then and slings one arm behind me.
"You really want to stay?" It's less of a question, more of an incredulous statement but I also know he's open to the conversation now. Like a switch he goes from fidgety to inquisitive.
"I don't know...I mean...one day we're going to have kids and this place," I wave towards the window, "is part of their heritage. Whether you like it or not."
He shivers and pulls me tighter. "I don't want them to ever see where I lived, Ana. It's nothing more than a hovel. I never, ever want my children to see their father as anything other than strong and capable and protective."
"Then they won't see the real you because you're more than those things, Christian." He opens his mouth to interrupt but I cut him off. "You are not that little boy anymore but he will always be part of what makes you you."
With an exasperated groan he runs his hand through his hair and lets his head drop back. "What time was our lunch reservation?"
"An hour ago," I laugh.
"No matter, we'll go anyway." And since Sawyer already had the directions I sit back and dispel the tension by telling Christian all about the box of Sander's Candy the team had personalized as a welcome gift.
Seated with salads and two glasses of cold white wine between us I venture away from our safe talk about bachelor parties and business openings and broach the elephant in the room. As casually as I can I take a sip, dab the corners of my lips and lift my fork to my mouth.
"Do you remember anything about living here other than the apartment itself?"
Christian snorts and leans back so that the waiter can put his salmon in front of him. "Not really. I remember more from the time I lived with the foster family before my parents were allowed to take me home. Malnutrition will do that."
"And you went right to Seattle?"
"No. We stayed here for a few weeks so that mom could finish her residency and to ensure that all of the paperwork was in order. For me to be adopted," he added as if I didn't know what he was referring to. "I got so lucky," he says wistfully as he chews. "To get Grace and Carrick and then Elliot and Mia on top of that? Fucking lucky as shit." The silence between us is reflective and not at all uncomfortable. He wants to talk about this, I can tell by the way he keeps gazing off into the distance, his mouth opening and shutting as if he doesn't know where to start. "I've always wondered why me. My mom must have seen a thousand neglected kids in her time here. Or anywhere for that matter. But I was the only one she adopted through her work. What was it about me that made her want to take me home?"
I have no answer for that. "Why don't you ask her? You're supposed to have lunch with her next week on Thursday, why not ask her then?"
He shrugs and rolls his head around on his shoulders as if the world was pressing down on them. "I doubt she wants to talk about something so vile."
"Christian. I'm not a mother but I bet your mom would want to talk to you about anything that was on your mind. And where you see neglect and abuse and abandonment, she sees love and hope and completion. That day is both the worst and the best day for you both." We eat in silence for a few more minutes as he digests what I just said until his head cocks to the side and he studies me.
"Why do you want to stay here? Why are you interested in seeing the hospital and all that shit?"
"Well, for one it's part of your history and therefore it's important to me. It's also going to be something we'll need to tell our children one day and I want to be able to do it with you as an insider. Plus, in some offbeat kind of way, this is part of their history as well." His eyes light up just like they do anytime we talk about our future children. "But mostly, Christian, I think you need to face down the memories you have. You've been like a steam roller these past few months. Locking up Elena, letting me touch you, believing you're lovable. Why stop that momentum? Let this be the year to slam the door shut on all of the pain of your past."
"And you think standing in the decrepit apartment my dead mother laid in for four days is going to do that?"
My gut twists because sometimes the fantasy of something is much more easy to imagine than the reality. "No," I say slowly as I try not to recoil from his bitterness. "I don't think I've ever encouraged you to go into the apartment. But I do think stopping by her grave is a good idea. Take a few minutes to say what you've always wanted to."
He snorts and tosses his napkin down on his plate. "I would never utter the words of what I feel for her out loud. I don't want to be that person even if it's who she deserves." He pauses and takes a deep breath. "But I can see that this is important to you and Flynn said the same shit so..." One hand runs over his hair while the other reaches for mine. "One day. Today and that's it."
He grins when my eyes go wide but then they fill with tears at the sheer pride that runs through me and that grin turns into a frown. I wave my hand in front of my face and laugh. "Happy tears. I'm proud of you."
He huffs out a laugh and rises to leave. "Let's see if you feel the same when this is all over with."
A few minutes later he's assigned Taylor to finding us a room for the night and has dismissed both he and Sawyer for the night. There is no threat to us here but I think he just wants to do these things alone. So I happily hop into the front seat of the car and slide over so that I can hold his hand as we navigate through Downtown Detroit, the tension in his body increasing with every turn we take and every pot hole we run over.
"I have a head ache," he mutters as he looks at the map on his phone screen. He hasn't told me where we're going first but by the residential look of the buildings, my guess is he's jumping in with both feet and heading towards the apartment. Suddenly this idea seems like a really bad one, especially when his fingers begin to sweat with anxiety. I debate calling Dr. Flynn but I already know he's going to tell us to keep going. The hard things in life are the ones that make us sick to deal with but sometimes it's the only way.
"Here," I offer, two Advils in my hand along with the bottle of water Taylor always keeps in the glove box. Christian mutters thanks and takes both pills right before he pulls up in front of a non-descript gray building with an abandoned basketball court along side of it.
"This is it." Gently he puts the car in park and presses himself back into the plush leather seat and damn if the contrast of settings isn't blatant. He sits in a hundred thousand dollar car in a suit that costs at least a few thousand next to his wife who has on a few million dollars worth of jewels. But this building, vacant, desolate and falling to ruins has him clutching the steering wheel as if it were a lifeline.
"Do you want to go in?" I ask hesitantly.
"What for? I wouldn't take you in that building if my life depended on it. Which it may considering the floors are most likely rotted through."
"I can handle it, Christian. I can and will do anything to help you bury this." My hand reaches for the door and he lets me open it but rushes out to stand next to me, pulling me along side of him tightly.
"We're not going in there, Ana. Besides not wanting to, it's not safe."
I nod and pull my coat tighter, the acrid smell of urban decay and stale water swirling around us as the wind blows.
"There used to be a store right there," he points to what is now a beauty salon. "She'd walk over there every day to buy her cigarettes and I'd watch her from that window up there." This time he points back to the building to a window high on the 10th floor. There is no curtain, no glass, not even a way to discriminate it from the other windows but I can see him sitting in it. Copper hair and skinny arms that hang out over the ledge as he's left alone so his mom can get her nicotine fix. It disgusts me.
"And there," he points the other way, "was a bar called Swanky Road." He laughs and holds out his arm. "Here. They had that audacity to name a bar Swanky Road in this neighborhood." Shaking his head he stands up straight and looks around. "The S was always out though. My...Ella used to gripe about it reading Wanky. Like that somehow was what was bringing down the neighborhood."
We walk towards the apartment building stopping in the middle of the basketball court. I know that this is as far as Christian will go and that's ok because this is way further than I ever thought he'd let himself.
"Did you watch the kids playing here?"
He is withdrawn and pensive and so clearly trapped in his own mind that I begin to feel a slight bubble of panic. His body is tight, his jaw ticking as he grinds his teeth and fights the urge to yell. Where I am cold and shivering, he is burning with fury and hate. Where I am sad he is angry. Here is where he was forgotten, abused and ultimately abandoned.
"Nobody played here, Ana. It was always run down and dangerous. I remember seeing kids, older kids but still kids, doing drugs in here. At four I knew what heroine looked like because I'd seen my mother do it so many times." He turns and looks at me. "I used to wonder if she'd used when she was pregnant with me but Walsh got my medical records from the states adoption files and there were no drugs in my system at birth. I guess I should be grateful for that at least." He hangs his head and my heart just...it just tumbles down into my belly. His arms fly out to mock himself.
"So this is where your husband is from, Mrs. Grey. Not exactly a place I want to bring my kids to." Grabbing my hand we head back to the car but even after belting in and turning over the engine he doesn't leave. Instead he sits and stares at that window. "I should tear it down," he mumbles before roaring off.
I don't ask him where we're going next, I just sit back and let him type something in his phone. Directions it seems because Siri is telling us to turn left and then right and then right again but there's no need because as we do, the huge looming building of the hospital comes into view. He parks on the street instead of the garage and gets right out to open my door.
"This one's not so bad," he says with a wink. "Actually, this one's pretty good because it's where I finally ate enough to not feel sick and they let me watch TV." He doesn't mention meeting Grace or Carrick but it's not because he's not thinking about it, it's because it's just too monumental to verbalize. But I know.
We enter through the main doors, immediately greeted by a young girl who, after blinking back her shock at how hot my husband is asks what she can help us with.
"A tour," he says curtly as if that's the most normal thing in the world to ask for.
"Are you...a tour of the maternity ward? We usually ask that you make a reservation with your doctor and then schedule with a group at specific times."
I give him credit for not laughing at her. "Please call whichever director you have on call right now and tell him or her that Christian Grey would like to speak with them. Today and preferably right now."
It's clearly not something she's used to but she picks up the phone and calls someone who must clue her in to who Christian is because her eyes get wide and then she's standing, offering us a drink while we wait. Which isn't long because before we've even sat an older woman and a younger man come bounding off of the elevator, frenzied energy at such a surprise visitor making them overly enthusiastic.
"Mr. Grey! Welcome to Children's Hospital. I'm sorry we weren't expecting you. Had I known you were visiting us I would have greeted you myself."
"No matter," Christian says with a flick of his wrist before shaking both of their hands as they introduce themselves. "My wife Anastasia Grey," he says with pride as his arm snakes over my shoulders. My wife. God I'll never get used to that. "We were hoping for a tour of your pediatric emergent facilities. My mother was a doctor on staff here many years ago and I'd like to see where it was that she worked."
"Of course. Neither one of us were here when Dr. Trevelyan-Grey was here but we are familiar with her even now since you are the adopted son of Detroit. The way she adopted you is one of our favorite stories to tell around the hospital." The director says it with pride but Christian winces.
We follow them both through sterile but warm hallways, the ever present click of Ms. D'Uva's and my heels seemingly too loud for a place that demands such serenity. She rattles on about what each floor is for, how successful they've been with some of the more aggressive forms of childhood blood cancers and then flings the doors to a nurse's station open. "This is where we house children who are not in extreme risk of disease or injury but aren't well enough to be released into a home yet. It's a step up from the emergency room and also where your mother was staffed."
The air leaves my lungs in a long exhale as I take in my surroundings and the profound reality of what this place is to him. This wing is where they cleaned, fed, dressed and loved my husband 25 years ago. The walls are a muted peach, the floor tiles a matching shade though they are old and worn. The equipment is new but the overall feel and look is dated. I wonder if this isn't exactly how Christian remembers it.
"Can we have a few minutes?" he asks as he walks to a window that overlooks the top of the parking garage. The directors make themselves busy behind the desk and let us roam a bit, respect for patients keeping us from wandering too far. There is an empty room, the lights off, bed made up ready for a child to inhabit it. Christian walks in and stops. "It looks the same," he breathes out slowly. "I couldn't tell you which room I was in but it looked just like this one."
He's contemplative and the mood is heavy but it's not like it was at the apartment complex. There he was filled with despair where here, here he seems almost respectfully awed. "I was born at this hospital too."
"Twice," I offer softly.
"Yes," he answers with a smile. "Twice my life started in this place." For a minute he's quiet, the gentle whir and distant beeps of monitors down the hall the only sound that fills the air. "The officer who took me out of the apartment walked me in here but a nurse took me to a different room so they could bathe me. My hair was long and they assumed I had lice." He steps towards the window. "I didn't."
"I wanted to fight them off but I was so little and confused. Nobody was telling me anything other than to ask if I was hungry and to explain that they were going to give me a bath." He turns to look at me again, his eyes distant but needy. "I remember some woman sitting at the edge of this huge white tub telling me every single thing they were doing. Now we're going to wash your hair, now your face, now your arms. Then they got to my chest and I freaked so bad the nurse handed me the washcloth and let me do it myself and only after I'd sat in that tub for a long time and scrubbed the dirt away did they see the burn marks."
I shudder because in my life I never thought I'd hear all of this from him. He looks back towards the window and walks further in the room, his hands in his pockets, his shoulders rigid. I close the door to ensure our privacy but he doesn't notice.
"One was still new and blistered. They all stopped talking then and called for the doctor." He takes a deep breath and lets his head fall back. "That's when I met Grace."
For a long time he stays quiet. I want to go to him but there's this hesitancy in me to just let him be. To let him take this entirely at his own pace and not mine. I can be there for him but ultimately he needs to walk through this alone.
"She got her sleeves wet. I remember feeling badly about that because the water was dirty and her sleeves were white but she didn't seem to care at all. She just washed my hair and looked at my burn and then asked if she could wash my back. I shook my head so she handed me some long brush thing and told me how to do it myself. You know, I never thought about it but I doubt doctors are the ones who brush hair and cut toe nails but she did mine that day."
Because she loved you even then, I want to say but I don't. He's realizing it all on his own and that is so much more powerful.
"Anyway," he shrugs, the spell broken as he turns to leave. "She taught me how to bandage my own burn and then put me into a clean pair of pajamas and a clean bed and then gave me about a hundred ice cream cups. You know, the ones with the flat wooden spoon?" He laughs and opens the door after giving me a quick kiss on my forehead. "She let me eat any and everything when I was in here but the second she got me out? She went straight into mom mode and sugar was suddenly the enemy."
In four strides he's at the nurse's station, the director and her assistant jumping up to show him more but he's done. In the elevator he asks to have someone contact him about renovating that section of the hospital and renaming it the Grace Trevelyan-Grey Wing.
"Of course, Mr. Grey. I'll have someone contact your offices within the next few minutes. Are you looking to be hands on or..." Ms. D'Uva's voice fades away, her hopes of huge donations making her suddenly meek.
"I'll assign someone from my team to oversee everything. We'll be here for the dedication of course."
My heart jumps in my throat because if he's planning on coming back, then this whole day isn't such a bad idea after all.
"I want to put a playground in too. Use the roof of the garage so that the kids can look down and see something fun instead of tar paper."
"The structure isn't made for anything on top of it," she begins but he cuts her off at the entrance.
"Then we'll re-do that as well. Thank you for your time, I'll be in touch."
There is only one other place on the list of things he should visit but I'm not bringing it up. Instead I get in the car cheerfully and jump on him the second the door shuts. At first he's unresponsive, unsure of what I'm doing but it doesn't take him long to start kissing me back, the confused smile on his face so adorable I want to pinch his cheeks.
"You're proud," he states, hair unruly from where my fingers just held it.
"Inordinately proud. And hungry. You didn't let me finish lunch and it's almost dinner time."
"Fuck, that is not okay. But I know just where to take you."
"Pizza?" I ask a few minutes later as we slide into the booths of a local joint.
"I have it on authority that this is the best pizza in the State of Michigan."
"From who?"
"Some woman who rambled on and on and on this morning. I admit I didn't pay attention to much but this was easy enough to remember."
Seated at Buddy's Pizza with root beers and a four square pie in front of us I almost laugh.
"What?" he asks as he takes a bite, the cheese hot on his lips.
"You. In a suit and tie sitting there eating pizza. I've never seen you so relaxed out in public before." Which is true. This is what normal people do everyday. Sit at their favorite pizza place and dump cheese and hot pepper flakes all over greasy slices as they bitch about their day and plan for the weekend. I've missed this simplicity. Caviar and tuxedos are nice but this kind of life is far more fitting for me. And as I watch him shovel his third piece in, apparently it is for him too.
"Nobody gives a shit about me here," he shrugs, pushing my slice towards me. "Eat. You're the one who said you were hungry." He reaches for yet another piece and drinks his soda. Soda! From a can! I can't believe this is my husband. "That woman may not know how to stop talking but she does know her pizza," he puffs out, patting his belly when he's finally had is fill.
"What now?" he laughs a few minutes later when the table's been cleared and the bill has been settled.
"You drank that entire soda."
"I'm in the mood for new things." He's laughing and light and somehow not at all like I thought he'd be but I'm not about to argue with him or show my concern that this devil-may-care attitude is just a cover for the fear of what lies ahead. I take his hand when he offers it and smile demurely when he opens my car door for me.
His mood shifts when he turns the ignition, the brief respite of a normal dinner a thing of the past as he debates the next step in this trip down memory lane. If he chooses to go back to the hotel, I'll be disappointed but I'll not say a word. Since I don't know where we're staying, I don't know where we're going either but it seems neither does Christian because after a good 30 minutes we seem to be driving with no destination in mind.
"Do you want me to put in an address?" I venture to ask when our mundane chatting falls silent. Gone is my carefree Christian and in his place is a sullen and introverted man whose gears have shifted again. We are going to the cemetery and I only know this because he is wasting time getting there.
"Welch already did. I just need to upload it."
"So do it," I say softly, his only answer the pad of his thumb swiping along the top of my hand where we're joined. Another ten minutes of silence goes by before he hits the button and starts following the directions that bring us to a sprawling cemetery on the outskirts of the city. I'm not exactly thrilled to be here when it's dark but I'm also not about to make this about me so when Christian gets out I get out. When he takes my hand in his, I let him and when he starts to walk down the pathways that indicate the rows of plots on the ground I follow him.
He holds his phone out and reads the instructions Welch sent him until we're at a crossroad.
"It's down this row," he says with a whisper. "Seventeen plots down on the left."
In this area of the cemetery there are few headstones and the ones that are here are small. Nothing more than raised stones out of the packed earth. There are no flowers or adornments, no weeping willows or strategically placed benches. These graves are for the nobody's. The poor and the forgotten who have nobody that would care for their spaces anyway. Suddenly I am ashamed and overwhelmingly sad that I didn't think to bring flowers.
When Christian squeezes my hand and then lets it drop I'm surprised and relieved that he wants to do this alone. I don't think I could handle watching this or hearing what he has to say. For another minute he stares down that darkened row and then he kisses me, turns, and walks away.
I don't pray often. I should but I don't. I have so much to be grateful for, so much that I have been blessed with in my life but like so many others instead of thanks, I begin to plead with God. That he would comfort my husband, that he would keep his heart safe, that he would find the closure he's fought so hard for and that above all, that he would find a way to forgive his mother for the things she did to him.
I turn frantically to try to find something, anything that we can leave behind on her stone but there isn't so much as a leaf. There is just stillness and fading twilight and sadness around me.
Christian calls my name then, a soft, "Ana," that startles me. On feet numb from the cold I rush to him and let him hold me tight as we stand on the tiny ground that houses his mother. I can't bear to look at his face for fear that he's been crying and I can't bear to look down to see the name of the women who gave him life inscribed on something as cold and impersonal as a stone so I squeeze my eyes shut and silently cry for all that's been lost.
Against me I can feel his heat and the steady strength that emanates from a man whose body is conditioned to fight but there is a soft underbelly of emotion that runs between us in this moment. We will experience the birth of our children, the death of our parents and the acceptance of old age together but we will never be as vulnerable as we are in this moment.
"She should have a stone," he says finally, pulling back a bit so that I can see the quick movement of his hand as he runs it along the underside of his eyes. "She deserves that much at least."
I look down then, her name staring up at me in a way I know I will remember for the rest of my life. Ella McIntyre. Aged 22. She gave birth to one of the most powerful and influential men of our time and that is all there is to recognize her by. A name and an age. Younger than me. A girl really. Dead longer than I've been alive.
"Ready?" he asks softly, his arm shaking slightly as the biting cold wind eats its way through his suit jacket.
"Are you? Did you...say anything?" I look down again and notice a small smooth rock balanced between her first and last name. "Did you put that there?"
"I'm ready to go," is all he says as he steers us back towards the waiting and warm car. The engine is the only noise in this entire place but my ears are desperate to hear more from him. But nothing comes. Not on the 45 minute drive back to the hotel, not in the elevator or in the foyer of our suite.
I take his lead and ignore the plush and beautiful living room and head straight into the bathroom where he strips and then stands in a shower so scalding hot I can't watch. This is his self flagellation. A screwed up sense of guilt over what he should have done as a four year old to save his mother. He's in there so long I go into the guest room and shower quickly there, startled when I walk out to find him standing in the doorway, his skin red and raw.
"I would have turned the temperature down. You don't belong in the guest room. You are my wife, you belong with me." There's no edge to his voice but he's abashed nonetheless.
"I thought you wanted to be alone maybe." His face falls so I go to him, the white towel I wrapped around myself falling open at the side. "Which is fine, Christian. I'm ok with whatever you need to do right now so long as you don't hurt yourself."
"It was just hot water," he states flatly but with a small raise of his brow. He knows it was stupid.
"When you hurt, I hurt. Even if you're doing it to yourself. You were four, Christian. And her problems began before you had even been born."
His inhalation is labored as he wrestles with everything. "I can't help feeling like if she had loved me more, if she had wanted me more that she would have stopped using and would have gotten herself out of there."
"Then you don't understand addiction and maybe that's something we can explore together. You blame yourself for something you have no responsibility over."
Slowly he shakes his head, his fingertips skating along my back as he holds me. "No more talking tonight, ok? I don't want to think or talk or figure anything out anymore."
So we don't. We walk back to our room and slip between cool sheets that soak up the warmth of our bodies as they press together in a bid to forget the day. His hands explore me as if they hadn't hundreds of times already and I let him, my entire being his for the taking. There is emotion behind his restraint tonight, desperation hidden in the deep silver of his eyes as he looms above me and spreads me wide.
I had expected roughness, the outward exhibition of what was going on inside of his mind but instead he reduces me to ash with each tender thrust, the need and urgency building behind his façade until he falls forward and grips me tight, his face burrowing into my neck as he stills inside of me.
I want to tell him I love him, that I'll never leave him like she did, that our children will never know the jagged edge of abandonment but he moves again, one arm curving around the top of my head while the other slides beneath my back to lift me even closer. I meet him where he's at and wrap my legs around his waist at the same time my arms tighten around his shoulders and only then, when we couldn't be closer if we tried, only then do I feel him relax.
For a moment we stay like that, continuous and connected until he moves one hand and presses his finger against my clit, already so sensitive from his thrusting. Like a fireworks show colors blaze before me as the blood roars in my ears, Christian's moans eclipsing mine as he digs his toes into the mattress to push into me even further. And then he breaks apart in my arms. Inside of me he pulses and empties, his cock lodged so deep it hurts but I will never tell him to stop when he's finally found the solace he's been looking for. Instead I grip him as hard as I can and make a mess out of his back with my nails, his satisfied grunts as he jerks above me all the encouragement I need.
When it's over, when my arms and legs are numb and his breathing is nothing more than a gentle rhythm against my shoulder, only then does he move. I roll to get a towel but he flings his arm over his eyes and sucks in a long and labored breath, his pain so raw it stops me in my tracks. I move back to him and lay still, every part of me primed and ready for whatever he wants to say or do.
"I told her I was sorry for hating her." One minute, then two go by before he speaks again. "I don't think...I don't think I ever really thought about how young she was. Or what it would be like to have a kid as a teenager and not have any help." When he says no more I lay my head on his arm and curl up into his side, his hand automatically smoothing down my hair. "I don't want to hate her anymore, Ana."
This I have no response for because 'Then don't' seems awfully trite and anything else sounds too preachy. Instead I kiss his sternum and then his chin before finally landing on his lips. He smiles then, brilliant and free and rolls me under him again.
"Six months ago I didn't even know you existed and now here you are, making me do things I never in a million years thought I'd want to do let alone be able to do." He huffs out a laugh and rests his head between my breasts. "I don't understand it."
"What?"
"You. How you make me feel invincible and bring me to my knees at the same time." Lifting his face to mine he kisses me, his tongue brushing against mine in a familiar greeting. "My need for you makes me weaker than I've ever been but somehow, I'm stronger than I ever thought possible." He turns me, rests his entire body against my back and kisses my neck with a groan. "You push and demand and expect so much from me and then you submit completely when you know I can't give anymore." With one smooth stroke he sheaths himself inside of me and stretches upwards so that I feel him as deep as he can go.
For hours he goes on like this, pressing himself as tightly as he can against me, positioning me so that he can go deeper. He says little but he doesn't have to. If this is the way he chooses to exercise the trauma and tension from the day, I am more than happy to oblige.
And in the morning, when I wake too sore to walk to the bathroom he carries me and washes me and then feeds me fresh fruit and crepes as our plane departs from a city I once dreaded but am now forever connected to. There is a lightness to his smile, a freedom in the way he lounges on the chair and brushes his hand through my hair that wasn't there before.
It follows him throughout the day even after we land and part ways to go to our offices and though his workday has demanded his undivided attention, I still feel more connected to him than ever. At home he changes and then sits at the breakfast bar with a beer while I throw together a quick dinner. I have all but taken over cooking for Christian and I since I enjoy it so much and though he originally protested, I know that this part of our day is one of his favorites.
"I'm going to demolish the apartment building and put up something new," he throws out in between talking about Christmas in Aspen and the New Year's trip to Montana we're taking.
"Oh?" I gamble and turn to look at him but his gaze is fixated on a spot on the marble in front of him, his finger mindlessly scraping at it even though there's nothing there.
"I had someone on staff call the guy in charge of the restoration project in Detroit. I don't have any real plans yet but he's already got some ideas he'd like to see come to fruition." Standing he puts his bottle in recycling and stands behind me, his arms wrapping around my waist and his chin resting on my shoulder. "I'm flying him and his assistant out here on Monday."
"That sounds great, Christian. Have you thought about what you want to see there?"
His hand reaches out to stir the sauce simmering on the stove as he nods. "I'd like to see something that supports young women. Unwed mothers, women at risk, maybe a place that offers self defense classes along with a work program." I smile because what he wants to erect is a center that houses all of the tools his birth mother didn't have.
"What will you name it?"
"Not after her if that's what you're asking. I don't want my name attached to it at all actually." He exhales and turns me so that my arms wrap around his neck. "I really do want to leave that part of me behind but it feels wrong to do it without making it right first." He shrugs and leans back against the island, his arms braced on either side so that his chest is at its widest. "Maybe I can prevent one kid from going through what I went through."
"Christian," I say, resting my hand over the gentle thump of his heartbeat. "You'll help more than one kid."
"But I can't help her."
"No," I whisper. "You can't. But you can change her legacy. Her life was never wasted, not when it breathed you into existence but you can take her life and use her story to change the lives of others who are struggling. Make that the legacy that she leaves behind."
For a few moments he's quiet and reflective until a rueful smile breaks over his beautiful face.
"That's what we'll name it."
"What?" I ask, lost in the intensity of the moment.
"Legacy House."
Authors Note: A special thank you to my friend Stephanie who gave me all of the Detroit references. I've only ever been there on a layover so thank you!