Chapter 9 Mara #2
The woman in the back hesitates, then shakes her head. The auctioneer's gavel comes down.
"Sold! Lot twenty-three to paddle number forty-seven."
Richard whoops, loud enough that people turn to look. His arm goes around my waist, pulling me against his side. "That's my girl! Knew you could do it."
"Congratulations," I say, extracting myself from his grip and standing up. "I need to go register the sale. I'll be right back."
I don't wait for his response. I head toward the registration desk, my skin crawling where he touched me.
This isn't the first time a client has been inappropriate.
It comes with the territory, wealthy men often their money buys them access to more than just art.
I've learned to deflect their advances and maintain professional boundaries, while not offending them enough that they take their business elsewhere.
But tonight, with everything else that's been happening, I have no patience for it.
I register the sale, arrange for shipping, and return to find Richard at the bar, ordering another drink. Katie is nowhere to be seen—probably in the bathroom, or anywhere that isn't next to her drunk husband.
"There she is!" Richard says when he sees me. "Come have a drink. We're celebrating."
"I should probably get going." I glance at my watch. "Early morning tomorrow."
"Nonsense. One drink. I insist." He orders a champagne for me without asking what I want, then hands it to me with a smile that's probably meant to be charming but just looks sloppy.
I take the glass only because I can tell he’s in a stubborn mood, and I don’t want to cause a scene.
The bar area is less crowded than the main auction room—most people are still watching the remaining lots.
It's just us and a few other people scattered around, and I'm suddenly very aware of how isolated this corner is.
"You did great tonight," Richard says, moving closer. Too close. "Really great. I'm lucky to have you."
"Thank you. I'm glad you're happy with the purchase."
"Oh, I'm very happy." His hand is on my lower back again, and this time it doesn't stay there. It slides down, cups my ass, squeezes.
Hard.
Hard enough that I gasp. Hard enough that I know there will be bruises.
"Richard—" I start to step back, but his other hand grabs my arm, pulling me against him.
"You know," he says, his breath hot against my ear, "Katie's staying at her mother's tonight. My place is just a few blocks from here. We could continue the celebration. Just the two of us."
His hand squeezes again, fingers digging into the bruised spots, and something in me snaps. I don't think. I just react.
My hand comes up as if I’m seeing it from outside of my body and cracks across his face, the sound sharp and loud in the quiet corner. His head snaps to the side. My champagne glass falls, shattering on the floor.
For a moment, everything stops. Richard stares at me, his hand on his reddening cheek, shock and anger warring on his face. The bartender freezes mid-pour. A couple nearby turns to stare.
"Don't ever touch me again.” My voice is shaking with rage.
Then I turn and walk away, my heels crunching on broken glass, my whole body trembling with adrenaline.
I don't look back. I don't stop to get my coat from the coat check. I just push through the doors and out into the cold night air, gulping it down like I’m drowning.
My hands are shaking so hard I can barely call a cab.
When one finally pulls up, I climb in and give my address, then sit in the back seat staring at nothing, my heart pounding, my skin still crawling with the memory of his hands on me.
The driver says something, but I don’t hear it. I just watch the city slide past the window and try not to cry.
—
The moment I’m back in my apartment, I tear off the jewelry and throw it on the dresser, strip off my dress, and go to the bathroom, turning the water to scalding.
It burns when I step into it, but I stand under the spray until my skin turns red, scrubbing with a washcloth until it hurts, trying to wash away the feeling of Richard's hands on me. The heat of his breath on my ear.
I scrub harder, violently. Soap, rinse, soap again. I wash my hair twice, and then scrub my body again until my skin is raw.
When I finally turn off the water, my bathroom is thick with steam. I wipe the mirror and stare at myself—hair plastered to my head, eyes red, skin blotchy from the heat and the scrubbing. I turn around and look over my shoulder at my reflection, twisting to see my lower back, my ass.
The bruises are already forming, dark fingerprints on my pale skin, four on one side where he grabbed me, his thumb on the other. The evidence of his violation, written on my body in purple and blue.
I want to scream, or cry, or both. I want to go back to that auction house and hit him again, harder this time.
I wrap myself in a towel and go to sit on the edge of my bed, shivering now.
I should report him. I should call someone, file a complaint, make sure he faces consequences for what he did.
But what would I say? That a client grabbed my ass at an auction?
That he propositioned me? In the world I work in, that's barely worth mentioning.
Men like Richard Maxwell don't face consequences.
They just move on to the next young woman.
The police, or anyone else I tried to tell, would give it less credence than the cops did the open window and black rose on my pillow.
I’ve already lost him as a client and possibly the commission from tonight’s sale. I’ve definitely lost his recommendation to his other wealthy friends. If I push this further, he could get me blacklisted. He already might be considering it, after I humiliated him in public.
The thought makes me sick, but it's true. This is a crossroads women face every day: speak up and lose everything, or stay silent and let it happen.
I've always stayed silent before. I’ve always deflected, extracted myself, and then moved on.
But tonight, I slapped him. I made a scene.
The realization should feel empowering. Instead, I just feel tired.
I lay back on the bed, still in my towel, and try to fall asleep. But it’s impossible. Every time I close my eyes, I feel his hands on me and hear his voice in my ear. Smell his cologne.
At three in the morning, I give up and exchange the towel for pajamas and go into the living room. I turn on the television, letting some mindless show wash over me while I stare at the screen blankly.
I must fall asleep at some point, because I wake bleary-eyed with my head aching on the couch.
It’s later than usual, but I force myself up off of the couch and head into the bedroom to put on my running clothes.
I’m not going to let that asshole screw up my routine more than he already has.
Besides, a run is always good for clearing my head, and I need that badly right now.
I’m in such a hurry to get out of my apartment that I almost trip over the medium-sized white box sitting in front of my door.
I catch myself, and look down. It’s about the size of a basketball, but square, glossy-looking and tied with a matte black ribbon. My name is written on a card attached to the top in elegant script.
My first thought is that it's another gift from my mysterious admirer. My second thought is that I should leave it there and call the police. I definitely should not touch it.
But I’m also curious. And exhausted. My defenses are low, and before I can stop myself, I reach for it.
It's heavier than I expected, and ice cold.
I carry it inside and set it on my kitchen counter, staring at it for a long moment. The black ribbon is silk, tied in a perfect bow. The box itself is the kind expensive stores use, thick cardboard with a subtle texture.
I should not open it. But I do anyway. The ribbon slides off easily, and I lift the lid.
At first, I don't understand what I'm seeing. There's plastic wrap, and dry ice—the source of the cold—and something flesh toned…
Oh god.
Oh god oh god oh god.
It's a hand.
A severed hand, pale and waxy and packed in the dry ice like a piece of meat. The fingers are slightly curled, and on the ring finger is a gold wedding band with a sapphire in the center that I recognize because I saw it last night, when those fingers were attached to an arm.
To Richard Maxwell’s arm.
I’m going to be sick.
My knees buckle and I make it to the sink just in time before I vomit, my body heaving, my mind refusing to process what I just saw. I retch until there's nothing left, until I'm just dry heaving, my throat burning and my eyes streaming.
When I can finally breathe again, I sit on the floor with my back against the wall, staring at the box on my counter, trying to make sense of this. There's a hand in that box. Richard Maxwell's hand. The hand that grabbed me, that squeezed hard enough to bruise.
Someone cut it off.
Someone cut off his hand and packed it in ice and left it at my door like a gift.
I should be screaming. I should be calling the police right now, this second, before I touch anything else.
But instead, I sit there and stare at it, because underneath the horror, underneath the visceral revulsion and the shock and the fear, there's something else—something dark that I’m afraid to acknowledge.
Part of me is glad.
Part of me is thrilled that someone punished him for what he did to me. That someone saw, or knew, or cared enough to make him pay for putting his hands on me without permission.
Part of me wants to know who did this so I can thank them.
The thought makes me think I might be sick all over again, but I can't deny it.
It's there, alongside the horror, a dark satisfaction that Richard Maxwell is somewhere right now, missing a hand and in agony, learning that there are consequences for treating women like objects he can grab whenever he wants.
I sit on the floor for a long time, my mind spinning while I try to reconcile the person I thought I was with the person who's feeling these things.
Finally, when I think I might be able to stand up without being sick again, I push myself to my feet and slowly, warily, approach the box.
The pale, waxy hand is still there. But this time, I notice something else. There’s a card next to it, made of that same cream-colored stock.
I pull it out with shaking fingers and read the message written in the same elegant script as my name on the outside:
No one touches what's mine. – I.S.
I stare at it for a long moment. Briefly, I almost expected to see his name. Alexander Volkov. But I have no idea who I.S. could be.
Unless…
Unless those are his real initials. If the reason I couldn’t find anything about him was because he’d given me a fake name, a fake identity.
No one touches what’s mine.
This is the final gift, I think. The culmination of the past weeks… the takeout, the book, the jewelry, the flowers. This is him staking his claim.
It’s a much more violent, bloodier claim than the one Richard tried to stake on me last night. But this feels different.
I’m terrified. But I don’t feel violated.
I feel… protected. Avenged.
He still broke into my apartment. Left me a rose. That’s a violation, of my space, if not my body. What am I thinking?
I’m thinking that whatever lines he might have crossed, he got my revenge for me, a revenge I couldn’t have taken, not like this. He cut off Richard Maxwell's hand and left it at my door like a promise, a strange token of courtship.
I stand there in the kitchen, frozen, holding a card from a man who just committed a violent crime on my behalf, and part of me is thrilled.
The other part of me knows I need to call the police, if only because this crime is going to be reported, and after I was seen slapping Richard last night in public, I can’t hide something like this.
I should give them the card, too. They might be able to trace the handwriting. This, at least, could be construed as a threat, even if I don’t see it as one. This will make them take the break-in seriously.
I walk to the sink slowly, and stare at the card for a long moment. Then, before I can stop myself, I reach for a lighter in the nearest drawer.
Clicking the flame to life, I hold it to the edge of the card and watch it start to blacken and curl. I can’t seem to let go of it until the flame has burned mostly through it, almost reaching my fingers, and then I drop it quickly, turning on the water to wash the ashes down the drain.
I just destroyed evidence.
I feel unmoored, unhinged. Slightly loopy, as if the lack of sleep and the stress is making me constantly drunk. I feel like I could either start crying or laughing hysterically at any moment.
Slowly, as if in a dream, I go to get my phone and call the police station for the second time in as many days.
When the dispatcher answers, it takes me a moment to speak. "There's a—" My voice breaks. I try again. "Someone left a box with a severed hand. Outside my apartment. I brought it in. I—"
The operator's voice is remarkably calm. "Ma'am, I need you to stay on the line. Don't touch anything else. Officers are on their way. Can you tell me your address?"
I give it to her, then sink down onto my couch, the phone still pressed to my ear, and wait. I can see the box from where I’m sitting, the evidence of violence committed for me, on my behalf.
I feel as if I’ve crossed into another dimension. Another life.
And I’m not sure if I’m ever going to find my way back.