7. Evelyn
The obituaries said Nikolas Alexander died of a heart attack in an abandoned house on the outskirts of Arkham.
It called him a local business man, mentioned a wife and two kids.
I stared at the photo for hours, as if there were answers in the inky black eyes and ruddy face.
I figured out the name because of what the bouncer and Jimmy had said that night, and the photo gave me the rest.
Laszlo had intended to put a bomb on his car, and I interrupted. Now the last moneyman was dead, and a new one rose in his place.
I didn’t believe it was a coincidence.
And now the mysterious man was offering me everything I wanted.
All I had to do was keep my mouth shut about him being a killer, and I wouldn’t have to worry about the Family, or my arranged marriage, or that leak that won’t stop above my toilet ever again.
It felt wrong, like I was walking into a trap, but it was also exciting.
My entire life had been sequestered on the commune, and since escaping, I still didn’t have the luxury of freedom. I remained a caged animal, only this cage was poverty. I wish I’d asked him where he was sending me, but it didn’t matter. The money would give me the fresh start I needed.
The only thing that dulled my enthusiasm was the confusing feelings I was developing for him. I chalked it up to him being the first man outside of the Family that ever touched me, but it was more than that.
The way he kissed my forehead, my eyelids, was intimate. It filled me with want.
Hedonistic desire.
Maybe the serpent was at work in me, and I was tempted by the forbidden fruit.
But as usual, what I wanted didn’t matter.
He was sending me away.
In the early afternoons, when the apartment complex was empty of the working poor and their kids, I sketched.
I bought a notepad to sketch out new jewellery designs, like he’d told me to, but instead the pages were filled with him.
The crinkles of his eyes when he smiled, the sly curl of his lips.
The tattoos were hard to draw from memory, as intricate as they were, but I challenged myself to remember every inch of him.
I went to the mall and bought a new halter top and skirt, a nice pink, out of some of the money Laszlo gave me. It wasn’t anything fancy, but I hoped he’d like them on me. They were similar to what I wore the first time we met, but this outfit was in my correct size.
I was singing to myself when I got to work on Friday, and Roxy grinned at me.
“Well, someone’s in a good mood! You’ve been gone all week. Don’t tell me you’ve been seeing someone?” She’d gotten a tan that afternoon, and was putting on some bronzer to highlight her cheeks. It made her look older, more experienced. It suited her.
I giggled and shook my head. My long hair tickled the backs of my legs.
“Mhm. Okay, let’s pretend I believe you. Is that a new shirt?”
I straightened my halter top. The straps wrapped around my stomach, the pink fabric glittery. I wasn’t used to wearing something revealing, but it was time for a new perspective on life.
“Yea, I got it on sale. How do I look?”
Her golden eyes scanned me, then rolled back in her head.
“Beautiful, as always, Belle. It took me an hour to put on all this makeup, and you look like you’re in a Neutrogena commercial. Where’d you get the necklace?” She touched the chain, lifting the set stone to inspect it.
“It’s a chalcedony crystal from my grandmother; supposed to bring good luck. I made it.”
“Damn, you’re full of surprises. I should get you to make me one! I could use some luck.”
“Your investments not doing well?” I was still uneasy that she was trusting her money to Gorky.
“More like boy trouble. Speaking of, you got a repeat VIP, huh? He’s handsome. I didn’t know Tom Ford made clothes for goths.”
“Goth?” I asked. “What’s that mean?”
Roxy laughed, then realized I was serious. I flushed at my ignorance, but she was quick to recover.
“Oh, someone who dresses in black. You know, like the tall guy with the dark hair you keep swooning over. Wait…” Roxy turned, her attention fixed upon me.
“That’s why you’re here tonight. You’re waiting for him?
” She glanced at the duffle bag of my belongings, tucked behind my heels, and worry filled her face.
“He said he’d be here.” My voice was strained, my cheeks growing hot.
“Belle… Oh, Belle. Come here.” She drew me into her arms. “Of course you’d get the one guy capable of charm. I know it’s hard being rejected night after night. Having him choose you twice must feel like something special, but it’s not.”
She didn’t understand.
She thought he was appealing to my love-starved, lonely little heart.
I couldn’t tell her about how I’d seen him placing the bomb, how he threatened me into silence, how he didn’t need to threaten me at all.
And now he was sending me away.
He didn’t want me any more than my father did. I was, as always, a liability, and I couldn’t risk telling her farewell. She probably wouldn’t remember me in a month, but she was the best friend I’d ever had. The only friend.
I was too nervous to find that sad.
“Sweetheart, listen,” she said, her tone gentle. “A snake is a snake, no matter how smooth his tongue, no matter how elegant his scales. Don’t forget who he is. He never will.”
Her lecture wasn’t over, but it was interrupted by the arrival of the VIPs.
The silent cattle bell had rung and Roxy gave me one more warning glance before she turned her narrowed gaze on Laszlo.
By the time we were lined up, she was smiling and preening, but her worry for me was genuine.
My stomach turned, and when Laszlo’s gaze met mine, the hard stone in my gut turned to butterflies.
His black suit drew attention to his lean physique, the jacket a soft leather. His shoes were freshly polished. Unlike the others, he had a switchblade on his hip in place of a gun. His black hair was swept back, and his gaze instantly found mine, then dipped down to look at my new outfit.
Mr. Bodrov’s fleshy hands clapped down on Laszlo’s shoulders, and this time, he was distracted enough to stumble a half-step.
Mr. Bodrov was either drunk or high, and his smile was slimy. “Take a pick, my boy! Tonight, I want us to really celebrate. This is a special moment. You are on the verge of something big! Pick two!”
“Come,” Laszlo gestured to me, not entertaining the order.
“Again, with her?” Mr. Bodrov sneered.
“Maybe he prefers the flat ones, because they remind him of the boys. Just like the last moneyman! What’s with them?” Jimmy suggested with a leering smile.
“If you ever say something like that about her again, I’ll make you eat your tongue,” Laszlo growled at Jimmy without taking his gaze from mine.
“Hey now, we don’t talk about our big earner that way. I told the boy he could pick two!” Mr. Bodrov intervened.
“I said that I want her. Only her,” Laszlo practically seethed.
Blood rushed to my temples, and I gaped. Down the line, Roxy’s heated gaze was on us. There was the sense of a brewing fight, and I went into fixer mode. I wore the familiar mask of pleasant obedience.
“I’ve been waiting for you,” I said cheerfully, as if I were oblivious to Jimmy’s hand on the butt of his gun, twitching.
Laszlo pulled me into him affectionately, and heat rose in my chest, even between my legs. It wasn’t right to feel that way when I was terrified, but his presence did something new and exciting to my body.
“What a good girl,” he murmured into my hair as he guided me into the VIP lounge. We settled into our usual place, and he ordered me a glass of prosecco.
Did he know I liked it or did he just assume? His expression told me nothing.
There was a smacking in my ear as the man next to me tried to taste Fiona’s throat. Her calf encroached on my portion of the bench. Ever since that night I’d found her fighting with that man in an alleyway, she’d stared daggers at me, so I kept my distance.
I shifted away from her, into Laszlo, and breathed in his heady scent.
“Are you packed?” he asked quietly, and I nodded. His smile was intoxicating, his approval making the butterflies in my stomach flitter around. It wasn’t enough to make me forget how dangerous he was. How he was sending me away, so I’d never see him again.
“Laszlo?”
“Yes, Belle?” he said, his arm around my shoulder, his posture more relaxed and at ease.
“Can I show you something?”
He glanced around at the others, then back at me, as if reminding me to be cautious about what I said. “Sure. What do you want to show me?”
I opened my handbag and pulled out a small piece of paper. It was one of dozens I’d filled the notepad with, my most recent iteration. I opened it, and softened out the creases on his thigh, my heart pounding in my chest.
He stared at the paper, his expression growing more and more serious.
“I’ve never designed men’s accessories before, but you inspired me.
And I had an entire week with nothing else to do.
” I showed him a sketched image of a full finger ring, a snake wrapped around it with articulated scales.
“I’m imagining each piece as segmented, attached like a chain-link. It’d give some range of movement.”
There I was, fulfilling Roxy’s divination by drawing him a snake as a ring.
If he was a snake, then I was Eve, desperate for him to coil around me and gift me with forbidden knowledge.
“I love it.”
Warmth flooded me, my heart swelling in my chest. His approval was absolute, and his words echoed in my skull.
He loved it. He loved it. He loved it.
“What would it take to make something like this from platinum? What about gemstones?” He followed those questions up with more, to where I had trouble keeping track. He had a mind for details and planning.
He was offering me an opportunity to start over, to work on achieving my dream life.
It didn’t feel right, but I wouldn’t shirk away from this chance.
“Red eyes would go with your outfits, but have you ever heard of Oregon Sunstone? It has these, like, copper impurities in it, but I find that the impurities give it this wild fiery appearance.”
Laszlo’s eyes were wide with fascination, his mouth parted as he listened to me.
“I’ve never heard of it, but I love the sound of it. I like singular beauty, those things that shine brightest because they stand unique.” His hand came to rest on my naked knee as he leaned in. My breathing hitched, his next words ticklish against my ear. “Beauty like yours.”
I was floating, untethered from the mortal realm. The world swirled, and my head grew light as his nose grazed the edge of my jaw before he pulled away.
“You undersold your skills, Belle.”
“Ah. Oh.” I apparently lost the use of words after that intense moment. “Well, this is the sketch. I’d have to do some prototypes.”
“Okay. Then I’ll commission it.”
“I’ve never made something for a man before.” My hand found his, tracing his finger. It was intimate, despite my professional gaze. “Your index finger… size ten?”
“You’re good.”
Two simple words, spoken with a tone of respect I wasn’t used to hearing.
He was speaking to me as an expert to a professional. He knew how to spot talent, and he’d spotted mine. My fingers lingered on his, and he squeezed my leg. Soft and sweet, my smile bloomed on my lips. Laszlo was coaxing out the genuine, innocent part of myself.
“I want to be an early adopter in your future. Investing in you is investing in a precious work of art, one I want to preserve forever.”
He stroked the inside of my knee, the bare flesh, and a frisson prickled my limbs with excitement and shame.
Touching bare skin was something sinful with the Family, even among couples. I wasn’t completely sheltered, though it was hard to tell what parts of sex were normal and what parts were not. In some ways, what we were doing was more intimate than if we were just to have sex.
A secret part of me wanted his palm to move higher, to find the wetness between my thighs.
I flushed at the thought, my blood turning molten.
And then I remembered.
After tonight, I’d never see him again.
His thumb traced my lower lip. “Don’t pout. You’ll make my ring from Idaho. It’s all arranged.”
My future, once more arranged for me by a man who saw me as an unfortunate inconvenience.