Chapter Sixteen Damien #2
She winced. “I know, Damien, I am paying attention.” She collapsed against the bar with a groan. “I’m just trying to lighten the mood. I hate seeing you this way. Try as you might, I’ve known you for too many years for you to hide. I know all your moves.”
I stiffened. I never got used to how openly she showed her emotions.
“I’m fine, really, Ruby,” I promised, more tenderly this time.
It took effort. “But if you could do your thing around the Void, the whole ‘nice and friendly’ act you play so well, and find out more about the missing people, and where they were before they vanished, that would help. I’ll even split what Wren’s paying me. ”
Ruby gasped in mock shock. “You? Offering to split? Something is definitely wrong with you.”
Again, she wasn’t mistaken.
“As much fun as this has been, I have things to do.” I could only handle so much prying. “I’ll see you.”
She snatched my arm before I left. “At the ball, right?” A light entered her eyes. “I planned on going, and I may have snagged an invitation from an attendee. We did well last time, and I figured I’d give it another go. See what I can manage.”
“Just blend in,” I pleaded. “One of these days you’re going to get caught.”
She dropped her hand and smirked. “Not if they can’t catch me first.”
Images of Ruby in the cells made my heart race.
I couldn’t live with myself if she got caught, even if I had nothing to do with her arrest. And the things they’d do to her…
We might not be the kind of friends who embraced and spoke of feelings—on my part, anyway—but she did mean something to me. Ruby and Cap were all I had.
I walked away, leaving her and her feigned sense of invincibility at the bar.
Fates, she was lucky she hadn’t been arrested already.
If the guards caught her for stealing from the north, she’d be more than interrogated.
They tended to just toss us in jail and let us rot until we were a pile of bones and ash.
As a child, I’d spotted more than one dead body in those cells, and I hadn’t even gotten as far as the mines where they sent most of the prisoners.
I didn’t need someone to look out for. I had enough on my plate keeping myself out of jail.
I made my way up the stairs and slammed the door to my room, locking it behind me. Immediately, my eyes skipped to the postcard Wren had studied yesterday. She couldn’t picture me as a farmer, she’d said. What she didn’t realize was that I didn’t choose this life. No one did.
In my far-fetched dreams, I was a farmer, alone on my land. My land. Watching the sun set with my hands covered in earth. If I shut my eyes, I almost imagined the fresh breeze and the smell of the orange trees I’d plant. Oranges were rare in the Void, but they were abundant in the deep west.
People weren’t always what they appeared.
A lesson I’d learned the hard way in this place.
I certainly wasn’t. Until I saved enough, I would have to remain the Ghost; not letting my guard down, and collecting as much dirt as possible on anyone who might be a threat.
It worked as a decent way to protect myself and keep up a particular image.
Like yesterday when those bastards accosted Wren with lewd eyes and vulgar remarks.
My blood boiled at the memory. I’d nearly lost my control right then and there.
With a frustrated groan, I lay down on my bed, tugging the worn blanket to my waist, my arms propped beneath my head. The water stain on the ceiling always reminded me of a squished frog. A lovely image to have right before I shut my eyes.
The day after tomorrow, Wren expected me at the tailor.
Expected to dress me for some high-society event.
Make me “fit in.” Yes, I required such luxurious garments for the mission, and I knew the tailor had been a way for her to offer an olive branch.
Her gifting me with a disguise so I could conduct some research on the younger attendants without gifts.
We were nowhere near finding out who stole the locket, and somehow, my insides churned, as if time were running out. Not that I could explain why.
I showed up. As promised.
Really, I should be angry with myself for following her directions like a trained pet, but I couldn’t turn down the opportunity.
Especially since I’d failed to retrieve names from the Registry.
All I’d amassed was more fucking trouble on my plate with a side of a guilty conscience.
It was a wonder I still had one of those.
As I entered the ivy-covered brick shop off some fancy avenue—dressed in my black waiter’s attire—I shoved the mystery of that sterile room and the missing people of the Void to the side. I’d focus on that once we were done. In many ways, I shouldn’t care. It didn’t affect me. Yet…
Fuck. Was I getting sentimental like Ruby? She could’ve rubbed off on me.
A bell rang as I pushed open the door, and I was met by five pairs of eyes.
Men wearing suits crafted of fine wool and striped linen paused their perusal of the tailor’s bolts of cloth and gawked, a few snickering as they took in my wrinkled suit, which likely had been made of some horrendous fabric that offended their delicate senses.
I refrained from rolling my eyes and doing what I did best: steal from their pockets and wipe those sneers away.
Instead, I strolled into the room like I owned it, a smirk plastered on my face. What they couldn’t see, they wouldn’t know. And I’d been pretending since I knew how to walk.
“There you are!”
Wren popped out from behind a rack of colorful bow ties, a sunshine grin in a shop full of gloomy grimaces.
I paused as I took her in, watching the way her blue dress swished about her as she bounded for me.
It was a simple design, her dress, just like most of what she wore, and yet whatever she placed on her body gave off an air of elegance.
I noticed that she always sported a surprise of tulle or pearl buttons somewhere. Something intimately her, to stand out.
I frowned. Perhaps coming here had been a mistake. My mind currently hovered on the subject of ladies’ fashion.
“I’m surprised you made it,” she said breathlessly, as if she’d been running. When I didn’t answer, she prompted, “Damien?”
I cleared my throat and took a small step back. I didn’t belong here, and Wren wasn’t my friend—nor was she my anything. This was business. “I want to get into this ball, yeah? Then I have to look the part.”
It was curt. To the point. Effective.
No need for a mess. Not when I had to achieve my goal and get my mirror working again. If only Wren’s blasted locket weren’t tied to me. With my photograph to boot. Damn it, if that wasn’t some cruel joke from the Fates I didn’t know what was.
That sunny smile of hers dipped at the sides, and my throat constricted.
“Well, I’m glad you’re here, regardless.
” Her jaw clenched, but she turned on a heel and headed for the back of the shop, her hips swaying with confidence—real or feigned, it was difficult to tell.
I trailed behind, making a point to meet every haughty stare as I passed.
“Here’s the man I told you about,” Wren proclaimed once we’d entered the last room of the shop. Not that I was an expert, but this appeared to be where the fittings took place, a fancy wooden platform set up before a floor-length mirror.
A middle-aged man with a graying mustache that swooped up on each side of his face stood tall in the center, his simple white shirtsleeves rolled up. I froze when he regarded me with steely blue eyes, his focus straying from my head to my boots in a nearly clinical fashion.
“Bring out the suits I’ve selected,” he called to no one in particular. “As I told Lady Wren here, we’ll have to make quick adjustments to suits I’ve already created.”
A cart whirled by, pushed by a younger gentleman with beads of sweat staining his forehead.
“Here, Mr. Byrne.” He stood beside the tailor, his lean figure a tad too skinny for the suit he currently wore.
I couldn’t place him, but I made out a hint of his accent, which hailed from the south.
An image across my mind, there and gone in a flash—of the young assistant on a cold table, eyes shut and blood seeping from his lips.
I tore my gaze from him. Since discovering that room at the Registry, I swore my nightmares were seeping into the daytime.
The assistant appeared perfectly fine, eager, if anything, to be here. He was one of the lucky ones who’d gotten work outside the Void, and the fact that this tailor hired him made me feel a tad more at ease. Still, I wished I could rid myself of the haunting image of his face, cold and lifeless.
A hanger scraping metal stole my attention.
“Good, good.” Mr. Byrne snagged a simple black suit from a rack and held it up to me, one eye open and one closed. I swallowed thickly, suddenly feeling out of place. Well, it hadn’t been sudden. I was an outcast in the northern district, after all.
“This one. Brightens the darkness of his eyes,” he announced.
To me, he said, “Undress to your underthings. You may fold your…clothing on one of the benches in the changing rooms.” I didn’t miss the distaste in his voice as he commented on my attire.
Nor his raised brow. I supposed his generosity ended at cheap suits.
Wren stood off to the side, silent for once. When I stole a peek, she made a point to concentrate on the tailor. She’d stiffened since my arrival. Since I snapped at her.
I slipped into one of the two changing rooms and undressed, forgoing folding my wrinkled suit altogether.
If I hadn’t needed to get into the ball, I wouldn’t choose to go through this hell.
I despised shopping of any kind, and my three shirts and the two pairs of trousers I owned were enough for me.
When I exited, I was fully prepared to be met with more scornful faces, but I saw only one face, and it stole the very air from my lungs.
Wren was bathed in the trickle of light cascading from a high window, the sunlight grazing each delicate feature and highlighting her in golden brilliance that rivaled her smile.
I sucked in a sharp inhale, taken aback by how wide her eyes grew, how her breathing stuttered as if she was surprised by my appearance. Pleasantly so, if I had to guess.
Something twinged inside my chest, not painful, more like a warm squeeze. I hadn’t experienced it before.
It wasn’t until her turquoise eyes traveled down that her face blossomed in red. I wore my underthings; that was all, and the simple black underwear did nothing to hide my bare chest.
Wren’s eyes trailed across my skin, her path leaving each inch of me burning. When she reached the dusting of hair at my abdomen, leading down past where the fabric hid, she visibly swallowed.
Her reactions to me…they screwed with my head. Because it couldn’t be attraction she felt, not the genuine kind. And me; I thought her stunning standing in the gilded room, a creature born from a daydream. But her beauty and wits, which often drove me mad, couldn’t be enough for anything more.
She’s a ward princess. A silly, ignorant girl. Someone I detested. The reminder left a sour taste on my tongue.
“Oh. Oh. I should probably leave,” Wren hurried to say, clearly flustered. “I t-trust you have it in hand, Mr. Byrne.”
When she picked up her skirts, her face flushed and eyes avoidant, my heart pounded, that same odd sensation worming its way under my skin. Was it panic? Something else entirely?
“No.”
All eyes snapped to me. Shite. I’d said it out loud. “I—I need your expert eye,” I mumbled before I could take back the words. An excuse. A cowardly one.
I didn’t wish for her to leave. These were all strangers.
Another excuse. Seemed like I had plenty of those these days.
A whimper-like whine left her throat but she nodded, scooting to the far back of the room like the shadows would swallow her up.
Even from there, I noticed how that telltale blush of hers traveled down her neckline.
Fates, she would never survive a poker game.
I opened my mouth, about to tease her, but promptly shut it. I’d made myself a promise.
All I had to do was picture my little secret—my farm. My freedom. A true future.
My muscles loosened and I relaxed. The tailor’s assistant didn’t wait to grab hold of my arms and place me on the small platform before the mirror. Now that I stood a good two feet taller than everyone else, all the tension rolled back up my spine, my muscles taut.
“Relax,” Mr. Byrne demanded, and I flinched like a schoolboy being scolded.
“This won’t take long at all. Just a few adjustments.
” He peered up at me, though the expression he wore wasn’t unkind.
“Lucky you have a woman who won’t take no for an answer.
She wouldn’t leave my shop until I agreed to the fitting. ”
My gaze darted to Wren, who pretended that a nearby silken tie was the most interesting thing in the world. She could’ve just bought me a ready-made suit, but she’d fought for me to stand here, to have something created just for me.
“I can only imagine it’s a wondrous occasion,” Mr. Byrne mused, his pins nearly poking me as he worked. “You two make a beautiful pair as well.” He spoke that last part so quietly, I was certain only I heard. I didn’t correct him. My lips had forgotten how to move.
I felt like a bastard, standing up on that pedestal.
Tonight I’d be among the enemy.
And my guide? A woman I’d betrayed. One I loathed and desired in equal measure.
I might be confident, but I wasn’t a fool.
I was screwed.