Chapter 12
Aurora
Curse seems extra cold and quiet when he comes around to the passenger side of the vehicle and opens the door.
“Get out,” he says, scanning the street and trees. “Keep your hood up.”
“What’s wrong?” I ask, panic firing along my limbs. My fingers start to shake.
“Just want to make sure that you’re not seen,” he says. He seems more worried about it now for some reason. And kind of cagey.
But I don’t press him on it. Keeping my hood up and my head down is just fine with me.
I don’t miss the way he seems to shield me with his body as I exit the vehicle.
He grabs the bag from the backseat as well, and then we head for the front door.
Curse has two different physical keys for two separate locks, plus a code he taps onto a pad.
Once the big door – made of solid metal – is open, he enters another code into a security system on the wall.
Then, he locks everything back up from the inside.
The inside of the house is just as pretty as the outside.
We’re standing in a marble foyer with a solid wood set of stairs and a carved banister straight ahead leading to the higher floors.
White carpet with pastoral blue designs runs down the length of the staircase like a fancy ribbon.
It reminds me of the patterns on those old-school Dutch teapots.
The white ones with cobalt windmills and flowers and birds.
Beyond the staircase is a wide, open-concept living and kitchen area, everything fresh and bright. There’s a fireplace with comfy-looking couches and chairs gathered around it.
Once again, this feels way too domestic for Curse.
“Did you decorate all this?” I ask.
“Bought it furnished,” he replies. “Didn’t see any point in changing anything.” He activates another button on the wall by the door. A loud beep rings out. And then the sun is slowly extinguished by security shutters that come rolling down over every window.
“Did the house come with those, too?” I ask, amazed by how dark the house has gotten. I feel like I’m in a tomb with him. Beneath the sleeves of the parka, the hairs of my arms stand on end.
“No.” Curse is nothing but a sculpted silhouette now. A shadow.
Without warning, without even realizing that I’m doing it until it’s too late, I reach up and brush my fingertips across his left cheekbone.
Heat radiates from him into my fingers. Even after shaving this morning, there’s the not-unpleasant scrape of stubble present there. A roughness to answer my softness.
He’s so fucking still. But he’s definitely solid. Not a shadow.
“Sorry,” I whisper, dropping my hand and curling it into a fist. “I don’t know why I did that.”
“Don’t apologize,” he says. His voice hardens. “But don’t let it happen again.”
I hunch into myself. I want to shrivel up and disappear. Loneliness comes at me like an ocean current, threatening to take me all the way down to the bottom. To a place Curse won’t save me from this time.
My parents are dead. Mia, my step-mother who was more like a sister or best friend, moved to Texas and remarried so quickly after papà’s death that she didn’t even bother to attend his funeral with me. The few friends I have left aren’t even in the same country I am right now.
I have no one here. No one besides the dark pillar of a man standing before me. A man who’s made it abundantly clear that he’s not my family and he’s not my friend. He’s not my rescuer, not my hero. Not even human, if his own words are to be believed.
And maybe I should believe him. Maybe I finally, truly do. Because someone with a human heart wouldn’t look at me right now, with everything I’ve gone through, and basically order me not to touch them. They’d probably try to comfort me. Maybe even let me hug them, for God’s sake.
But even so, I know that’s selfish of me.
Just because my life has gone to shit, and I’m lonely, and I’m sad, doesn’t mean I get to run my hands all over Curse when he doesn’t like it or consent to it.
An attitude like that would make me no better than someone like Carlo.
Which is a horrendous comparison to make, but my brain makes it anyway.
“It won’t,” I promise softly.
I want to apologize again, but he’s already told me not to do that.
So I don’t.
* * *
Curse largely leaves me to my own devices for the rest of the day.
It’s a jarring change after barely letting me out of his sight at the motel.
But I soon understand why. His house is like a fortress with the security shutters down.
There’s no way for me to open any windows or doors without triggering his security system because I don’t know the code.
And there’s no landline phone in here, either.
So if he was worried about me contacting someone in New York, or calling the police, that isn’t a possibility anymore.
There isn’t a spare laptop or tablet lying around that I can use to connect to the internet.
Even the TVs, of which there are several scattered about the house, don’t have any kind of cable or streaming services hooked up.
I pass the time exploring the massive house. I keep thinking that Curse is going to jump out from some dark corner and tell me not to go into a certain room or area, but he never does. If he has any skeletons in these closets, I guess he doesn’t care if I see them.
But I don’t find any skeletons. Just security cameras in room after beautiful room, decorated in warm shades of peaches and pinks, burgundies and cornflower blues. With every single window in the place covered, I turn on lamps as I go.
The only room I don’t enter is a large library-cum-office. That’s the room that Curse is in. He’s completely absorbed by whatever work it is he’s doing on a laptop at his desk, and he doesn’t speak to me or even look up whenever I pass by the open doorway.
At least there are books in other rooms as well. That’s what I’ll have to occupy myself with, I suppose. But it’s after 6pm now, and hunger drives me to the kitchen. I haven’t eaten since those beef jerky sticks this morning.
But when I get to the kitchen, Curse is already there. I don’t even know how he got here before me, without me noticing. He moves like a goddamn ghost. I guess that’s why he’s the Titone famiglia’s most feared assassin.
And most merciless.
But that feared, merciless assassin currently appears to be putting a casserole in the oven. Which is so surreal I pinch the skin of my wrist to make sure that I’m awake.
“What are you doing?”
“Cooking,” Curse says. “Or as close to it as I ever get.” He shuts the oven. “Magdelena left all this shit for me.” He opens the freezer portion of a giant stainless-steel fridge, indicating tray after tray of frozen food.
“Magdelena.” My stomach knots. “Your girlfriend?”
“My maid,” he corrects me. He gives me a bit of an odd, lingering look. Maybe he’s worried I’m going to do something dumb, like try to touch his face again. Whatever it is, he seems to shrug it off, turning away to set a timer on the stove for fifty minutes.
I’m not sure I can make it an hour, but I’m feeling too weird and embarrassed to ask him for food now. Hopefully, he’ll just leave the room until the stuff in the oven is ready, and I can raid the fridge or pantry to tide me over without him seeing.
But he doesn’t leave.
“You’re hungry,” he says, once again giving me the unnerving impression that every insecurity, thought, and feeling inside me is freely open to his analysis.
“How do you know that?”
“Because you came wandering into the kitchen on your own, without me calling you or telling you to,” he answers.
OK. Fair. I guess I can’t argue with that.
“There’s stuff that isn’t frozen,” he says, nodding towards the fridge and a large door that I imagine must lead into a pantry.
He still makes no move to leave. Something like pride hardens my spine. Maybe it’s stupid, but I can’t stand the thought of rummaging around for something to eat like some starving orphan while he’s just standing there watching me. Not after today.
Don’t let it happen again.
“I’m fine.”
As if to vehemently disagree with that fact, my traitorous stomach growls loudly.
When I don’t open the fridge myself, Curse does it for me.
“You want Greek yogurt?” he asks. Before I can even answer, he pulls out a little container and holds it up for my eyes.
It’s lemon.
“No, thank you,” I say, grimacing. He puts it back, then grabs something else. It’s a cheese and charcuterie board covered with plastic wrap. He peels the plastic away and sets the board down on the butcher-block-top kitchen island.
“Eat.”
I want to rebel against his command, but hunger is quickly winning out over stubbornness. I slide onto one of the stools at the island and grab a few bits of cheese and salami, popping them in my mouth.
As predicted, Curse just stands there and stares at me.
“Aren’t you going to have any?” I ask, nudging the board towards him after I’ve had a few more bites.
“No.”
By the time I’ve eaten half the board, there’s still more than thirty minutes left on the dinner timer. I’m just trying to decide whether to stick it out under Curse’s unrelenting gaze or go somewhere else until the food is ready when Curse slides a small notepad and pen across the island to me.
“Make a list of everything you want or need,” he says. “Clothes. Cosmetics. Medication. Specific foods or drinks you like. Furniture. Whatever. I’ll have someone deliver it all tomorrow.”
“Oh.” The same awkward embarrassment as before washes over me. The feeling that I shouldn’t be asking him for things. I shift awkwardly on the stool. “I don’t need that much…”
“I said, ‘whatever you want or need,’” he reminds me. “Write it all down. Don’t leave anything out.”
Just like with the food, he watches me. As if to make sure that I really do it.
I sigh, clicking the pen on and off over and over again while I think.
My mind is oddly blank. All I can think of is underwear.
But I’m going to look insane if that’s the only thing I write down now.
I shut my eyes for a moment to focus, internally listing out all the things I use to get ready in the morning and the evening.
I don’t need a toothbrush or toothpaste, because Curse already has that covered, but I begin to write down the rest.
Body wash (any brand)
Shampoo and conditioner (any brand)
Fragrance-free moisturizer (any brand)
Lip balm (any brand)
Deodorant (any brand/fragrance)
Panties (size small)
Socks
Bras (size 32B)
Pants or leggings (size small or size four)
Shirts (size extra small)
Pyjamas (size small)
Tweezers
Hairbrush
Ponytail holders or a scrunchy
I stop writing for a moment, tapping the pen against my chin. He mentioned medications. I add a few more lines to the list.
Ibuprofen
Tampons and pads
I blink and draw back suddenly. I almost added condoms to the list. What the hell?
It’s just because it’s similar to pads and tampons, I tell myself frantically. Before any more batshit crazy ideas can pop into my head and nearly knock me off my stool, I shoot the pad across the island towards Curse. But I do it way too aggressively, and it’s going to go flying off the edge.
It doesn’t. Curse’s reflexes are too good for that. He catches it easily, then tucks it into a pocket without looking at it.
Once he has it, he finally leaves the kitchen.
Unsure what else to do, I stay sitting on my stool, watching the numbers on the stovetop timer tick down.