Chapter Five
In which Iris is deeply alarmed to discover her defense attorney doesn’t seem all that invested in defending her.
Iris…
I've never been in a holding cell.
It's just as depressing as I expected, though.
A communal room behind bars, several benches bolted to the ground.
Most of them are already taken up by a group of exhausted sex workers.
I'm pretty sure their clients didn't get arrested, which makes it so much bullshit.
Only women get punished in the sex trade.
Three or four of my cell mates are obviously coming down from something, sweating and shaking, so probably meth, or heroin. And there's one really mean-looking woman with bristling short hair like a porcupine, she's been eyeing me for the last half hour.
"Look at you, little Rich Bitch," she says, getting to her feet and lumbering over to me. She's short like me, but with a much more muscular build. Over the last two years of mandatory self-defense lessons, I've been taught how to use my smaller frame and lighter weight to my benefit.
She'll still probably kick my ass, though.
"What can I do for you?" I sigh.
"I thought you were a hooker at first," she says, strolling around me in a circle. Typical intimidation tactic. "But you've got those fancy diamond studs, they didn't bother to take them off you when you were booked in? Are you getting special treatment, Rich Bitch?"
I should keep my mouth shut. Keep a low profile.
I don't. "Oh my god, please stop calling me Rich Bitch! Come up with something more creative like Bougie Bitch, or Ambitchous, or… there's Polo Princess, Cash Chucker. Hell, call me a Paris Hilton, that's an oldie but a goodie."
The holding cell has gone silent. Even the poor addicts cease their humming and rocking, everyone is staring at us with wide eyes.
"What did you just say to me?" she snarls.
"I just suggested some new names for your repertoire," I say reasonably. "I mean, if you're going to intimidate, you want to have something fresh and snappy to go with it, right?"
Her brows knit together, as if she can't believe I'm mouthing off to her. I'm pretty sure swinging her fist at my head is going to be her next move.
With perfect timing, a guard smacks the bars hard, making them rattle loudly. "Daisy Boston. Get your ass over here." She handcuffs me briskly and pulls on my arm to get me moving.
Rose and I had fake IDs made up a long time ago. Mine sounds painfully cheesy, now that a prison guard is saying it.
I should probably make up a new name.
The guard is younger, with a blonde ponytail. Her gaze travels from me to the angry wrestling porcupine lady. "You managed to pick a fight with Marlene within the first hour?" There's a slight smile hovering on her lips as she guides me down the hallway.
"What can I say?" I shrug, awkward in the cuffs. "Maybe I just have one of those faces that pisses people off."
She leads me into a smaller room, clearly meant for questioning idiots like me.
There is the standard steel table and two chairs under buzzing, intermittent fluorescent lighting.
Shackles, of course, resting under an iron loop on the table.
Then, the requisite big mirror that's not a mirror at all but a viewing window.
Shackling me to the table, she watches as I shift in my seat, trying to get comfortable.
"It might be a minute," she says with a sympathetic smile, which is kind of nice, given the circumstances.
"Understood," I say, trying to rub my eyes again, but rolling them instead as the cuffs rattle against the iron loop.
I have to stick my face almost directly on the smudged table to rub them, but they're so red and blurry.
I'm exhausted. Two nights of studying for my finals until 3 AM.
Then, this little failed venture, plus a spike of adrenaline, and the inevitable crash here at the police station.
She leaves me alone, locking the door behind her.
It's lonely. That's stupid, I should be grateful to be out of that holding cell, but I know what these rooms are meant to do. The shame of knowing unseen eyes are watching you. Waiting to catch you in a lie, dismissing you as trash.
Someone tipped off the police that I'd be picking up the Rolexes from that greasy douchebag. Hopefully, Roman has an attorney assigned to me and he'll be here soon. I shudder.
Anyone but Andrey, his horrible, scary cousin. I still remember him materializing from the shrubs to catch me putting the coins in my Range Rover. And his comment about locking me in the house? It almost sounded like a BDSM thing.
He's head legal counsel for Morozov Global and he is the spookiest bastard to ever walk into a courtroom. I heard he made a judge cry once.
Half an hour later I'm dozing when the door opens again and my head snaps up.
Oh shit. It's him.
Andrey Morozov, wearing a tailored blue suit, fitting smoothly over his broad shoulders, a crisp white dress shirt, and he's fucking gorgeous.
His hair is thick and blonde, and he has a surprisingly sensual mouth for a computer with legs.
There's been speculation that he's not actually human at all, but instead, some arcane combination of a male model and a Nvidia supercomputer.
He's carrying a briefcase and announces to someone out in the hallway, "Thank you.
I'll handle this." Taking the other seat, he taps his finger on the table, staring at me silently.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
Isn't there a torture where they just keep tapping until it makes the person insane? I hold out as long as I can before I lean forward.
"Are we waiting for something?"
His chilly gaze drifts toward the mirror and back again. "I was waiting for my associate to clear the viewing room and turn off the mic."
"It's always good to have one of those people in a police station," I nod.
With a sigh, he pulls a file from his briefcase and opens it, frowning as he flips through the papers. "Felony theft charges. Felonious assault against a police officer –"
"What?" I say incredulously, bending over awkwardly and trying to point to the cut on my cheek. "They slammed me up against my own car and cut my face. Exactly when in that scenario would I have had time to assault a cop?"
He shrugs, elegantly indifferent to my indignation. "They can charge you with anything they like. Body cam footage disappears all the time."
"Are you here to get me out?" The question is more abrupt than I like, but I don't need him scolding me. Those watches were worth over five hundred thousand dollars. It's a felony. I'm quite clear on that.
Ignoring me, he scans the rest of the document, flipping to the next page. "They picked you up in that section of Long Island?" He frowns at me. "A bit out of your usual range of sorority houses and coffee shops, isn't it?"
I start tapping my index finger on the table. "It was very out of character for Jackson to send me there. It was not a usual pick up. Someone tipped off the police, they were there less than five minutes after I arrived."
"Quite likely," he agrees. After reading through the rest of the document, he places it precisely in the center of the table.
Leaning back and folding his arms, he eyes me thoughtfully, his eyes drifting from my face down to my breasts and back again.
If he was any other man, I'd be pissed at the disrespect.
But there's absolutely nothing in Andrey's gaze that indicates he is at all impressed with what he sees.
Maybe he finds women distasteful. He looks like the type. Like sex is too messy and might stain his expensive suits.
"You would like to get out of here, I imagine," he says.
"Yes, that would be ideal," I agree, hovering my face above the table, so I could rub my eyes again with my handcuffed fingers.
"There is a problem," he says, spinning the arrest report toward me. "They're also charging you with attempted murder –"
"Are you fucking kidding me right now?" I gasp. "Who did I attempt to murder? What the hell is going on?"
"It states that you attempted to shoot an innocent man with a Beretta - serial number filed off, of course - and another charge magically popped up from the Manhattan Police Department stating that you've been arrested three times -"
"I've never been arrested before!" I lean forward furiously. "I mean, Rose and I knew it was a possibility but no! My record is clean!"
"Three times before for felony theft," he continues.
I know my mouth is opening and closing like a goldfish’s, but I am so outraged that I can't even form a full sentence. "What the – How can – Sons of bitches, they –"
Andrey tilts his head, watching me until I run out of steam, and adjectives.
"Of course, it's a set up," he says. "Planted evidence, unreliable testimony.
I'm not even sure how they got that addict to make a coherent witness statement.
When I checked on him, he was sticking his tongue in a crack in the wall. "
"Yeah," I nod. "It sounds like the hallucinogens won out in the battle of the drugs.
" He raises a perfectly shaped brow. "Have you ever seen one of those?
" I'm babbling now but my head is swimming.
"When you can tell someone's popped three or four different illicit substances and it's sort of a race to the top? "
"Of course," he says noncommittally, still staring at me.
It's definitely not sexual, not appreciative even.
I've been told I'm gorgeous my entire life, but it's hardly reliable when it's from a guy trying to get in your pants.
Andrey is looking at me more… appraisingly.
Like he's trying to determine value. Does he sell girls in his spare time?
"The charges - as they stand - could put you away for over twenty years." He straightens the papers again. "The D.A. would consider it quite a coup to get anyone in the Morozov family convicted on these charges, especially someone this high up in the family."
"Are you saying I'm being targeted to make the D.A. look good?" I ask incredulously. "For hell's sake, I'm a sister-in-law. Don't they want someone more bad ass, like… a lieutenant or one of your Brigadiers?"
"Any conviction is good when it comes to the Morozov Bratva," he says indifferently.
That indifference shit is really starting to get to me. I realize now that he's trying to scare the hell out of me and it's certainly working. But he doesn't have to sound like he couldn't care less whether I lived or died. It's not inspiring confidence.
"Okay…" I say, rubbing an itchy spot on my jaw against my shoulder. I get all sweaty and itchy when I'm nervous. "What do we do?"
"That is the question, isn't it?" Andrey's goddamn finger starts tapping again. After a minute, I slide my hand out onto the table and start tapping too. It's almost syncopated. Two firm taps of his finger, strong, manly taps.
Tap.
Tap.
Three staccato ones of mine.
Tap!
Tap!
Tap!
This goes on for a while.
"Of course, the family's legal resources can make this all disappear," he says. "But you see, it will require favors from several people higher up in the court who might be unwilling to let go of this coup. Favors that I could be using for something far more valuable."
"Are you sure you're the defense attorney here?" I ask. "Because from where I'm sitting - and handcuffed - you're looking a lot more like the D.A. ready to put me away."
"I simply want you to understand the gravity of this situation."
I tap my finger again, ten times, very hard. It kind of hurts my finger so I stop. "What do you want from me, Andrey?" It comes out blunt and kind of awkward. I didn't mean it that way- did that sound sexual? Does he think I'm propositioning him or offering sexual favors?
"For a favor of this magnitude, something significant will be required in return," he says. His dark eyes, as black as Satan's jammies, narrow as he leans back, crossing his legs. "You're going to marry me."