7. Clara
Chapter 7
Clara
A ll efforts made to ingratiate myself with Deniz have failed spectacularly. I’m not usually this accommodating, but I’ve basically uprooted my entire life out of guilt , which is unheard of for me. I could win an Olympic medal in compartmentalization, so it shouldn’t bother me that Deniz continues to be so cold and untrusting toward me. In fact, he would be na?ve not to be. But still, I itch to see something in his eyes other than discomfort and resentment.
I’ve moved into Deniz’s spare bedroom. It’s less comfortable than my home in Los Feliz, but I understand his hesitance to move in with me, especially since he actually needs to go into the office for his job. When it does demand my attention, the Costa Family Foundation is usually happy to see my face virtually or, more likely, have me fly to whatever event I’m expected to attend. It was an easy, if uncomfortable, concession to move into his condo. And maybe I hoped it would act as an olive branch.
Lee’s still living in my building, so I won’t sell it, but knowing it’s there makes missing it all the more unpleasant. I didn’t realize how attached I was to the creature comforts of living alone, but perhaps you merely notice something when it’s suddenly out of reach.
Although, living with Deniz has to be worse than other roommates. Like at Skyline, I can feel his eyes on me all the time. But each time I nearly catch his gaze, he looks away, like he’s angry I caught him. What’s worse, I can still feel his hands and mouth on me, especially sleeping in this house that smells like him. I was able to repress the memory of coming on his tongue as I extorted him, but I can only maintain that vicious, calculating version of myself for so long. And when I break, it’s always in this bed, half asleep and unable to stop myself from chasing the memory of his fingers inside me. My own are a disappointment, and it’s the phantom grip of his hands on my thighs that pushes me over the precipice.
It’s not fair to him to think of him like that, especially considering how much physical space he’s put between us now. I feel more guilty about the residual lust than the blackmail.
The closest we’ve gotten to improving our relationship is working together. It was a non-negotiable on Deniz’s part, being an active participant in The Syndicate's work. I’ve introduced him to some high-level basics—our family history, how we choose our targets, the ways we divide our expertise and focus our efforts. It’s nerve wracking to let someone I barely know into our world. I briefly considered calling my brother and asking for his advice, before realizing I’d rather drown before listening to how he just knew with Gwen.
I sit on the couch, feet dangling over the armrest as I stare at the ceiling. I have a Costa Family Foundation meeting this evening in Burbank, but otherwise my day is free. I should spend the morning chasing down leads on Konstantin or looking into Gia’s team, but I’m hesitating. Avoidance isn’t an admirable quality, but I know the end of this story is going to shake our family to the core, regardless of what we discover. I find myself missing simpler times, when the Costas trusted each other implicitly.
Maybe I should go for a jog, or hike Runyon and surround myself with the cacophony of tourists and irresponsible dog owners. I could walk around The Grove and pretend to enjoy the holiday decorations.
It all sounds unbearable.
I push myself off the couch, resigning myself to work, when the balcony catches my eye. The still water of the pool reflects the bright sunlight, casting little rainbows across the living room walls.
I haven’t been swimming in ages. As kids, we would jump off piers and stone facades into the Adriatic Sea, basking in the warm, clear waters and training our lungs to hold our breath as long as possible. As much as I love Los Angeles, I’m not particularly fond of the ocean here—its frigid temperature, the pollution from river runoff. I don’t think I’ve been in a pool in decades.
Now that the idea’s in my mind, I know I won’t be able to shake it. The glass doors fold like an accordion as I unlatch and push them open. It’s cold—of course it is, it’s nearly Christmas—but the temperature isn’t enough to deter me.
I start to remove my t-shirt but hesitate. There’s clearly a security camera in the corner, but it’s trained on the doors to the living room. I move directly beneath it, out of its line of sight. I think about running back to the spare room I’m sleeping in to search for a bathing suit, but decide it doesn’t matter. There’s no one here but me, and I’ll be out of the pool long before Deniz comes back. I shimmy out of my clothes, down to my underwear and bralette, and slip into the pool as quickly as I can. I’m not indecent, but still.
The water is tepid, clearly heated. I can’t convince myself to look for the mechanism to turn up the temperature, though. I let the slight chill take over, turning onto my back and floating on the surface.
My curls spill out around me, a heavy black halo dragging deeper and deeper under the surface as the strands soak. The outside world’s hum is blocked out by the pressure of water in my ears as I drift.
I haven’t felt this relaxed in months. Maybe years. I have to keep my hips lifted to stay afloat, but otherwise I uncoil my muscles, letting the soft ripples of water flow over my shoulders and stomach, leaving little trails against my skin. My heartbeat thumps in my fingertips, a metronome lulling me into a state of half-sleep.
So peaceful. If I focus hard enough, if I let go of the clench of my jaw, I can almost hear the sounds of home, the gentle memory of the noises of Trani in the saltwater.
The door to the balcony opens and I startle, dropping below the surface. My pulse skyrockets, and I back against the wall of the pool as I catch Deniz’s eye.
The sight of him doesn’t slow my heart down at all. He’s shirtless, gym shorts riding low on his hips, an expanse of lean muscle available for my viewing pleasure. He’s drenched in sweat, every inch of him glistening like a weird, objectifying magazine cover. There’s a towel slung over his shoulder, and his bottom lip is bruised and cut.
That’s not attractive. That will not be attractive.
He stands frozen, halfway out of the apartment. Both of us seem unable to move.
Until his eyes shift. They trace down my shoulders, to my chest, ending where the waterline rests against my stomach. Back up, lingering on the curves of my body, replacing the brush of cool air with a trail of fire along my skin.
I know he can see my nipples through the thin, pale pink material of my bra, hardened by both the weather and the intertwined hunger and loathing in his eyes. Like he resents the effect we have on each other as much as I do.
The tension is broken the second our eyes meet. He turns back to the living room, angling his body away from mine, maybe to give me privacy and maybe so I can’t see the look on his face.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were…” he stops, dragging his hand down his face, clearly not bothered by his lip.
“I was about to get out,” I lie, pressing my palms to the concrete ledge and pushing myself out of the pool.
“Do you not own swimwear?” he asks, his tone stilted as he shuts his eyes, like he’s forcing himself not to look.
He’s stronger-willed than me. There’s a faint scar on his left shoulder I have the urge to lick, a bruise blooming on his ribs I want to tend to. My fingers itch to reach out, to finally connect the live wires between us and let the shock wreck me.
Without looking back, he tosses the towel across the pool at me. I barely react in time to snatch it out of the air and keep it from falling into the water.
“I couldn’t find it,” I lie again, unable to justify jumping into the pool in my underwear. I quickly change the subject as I wrap the soft towel around my body. “Did you get in a fight?”
The muscles of his shoulders finally seem to relax now that I’m covered, and I hate that I have half a mind to drop the towel again. What the hell is wrong with me?
“Boxing,” he grunts as I walk around the pool to grab my clothes. Now that the desire is gone from his expression, I’m swimming in a shallow pool of shame and guilt, emotions I’m ill-equipped to handle.
I don’t have the capacity to do more than mumble an acknowledgement as I slip by him in the doorway. Both of us are half-naked, and the heat of his body draws me in as the saltwater of the pool dries on my skin.
I keep my eyes on my feet as I make my way toward the room I’ve occupied, and I don’t feel his gaze on me again. No matter how badly I crave it.
Burrowing into bed, I seek the comfort of my own sheets on top of a strange mattress as I attempt to untangle the mess of emotions Deniz has wrought on me. I stare at the room around me, trying to catalog items in an effort to distract myself. The spare bedroom is comfortable but cold, a little soulless. The furniture is clearly high quality, but still and sterile. The sheets were so crisp, before I got the chance to switch them out with my own, I got the feeling I was the first person to sleep in them in a long time. The blackout curtains made me feel like I was sleeping in a cave, so I opened them to let the soft light of the Sunset Strip shimmer over everything. Comforting, but not quite enough to fall asleep.
I've been adjusting over the past few nights, but I know tonight’s sleep won’t be restful, the vision of Deniz’s bare chest taking over my mind every time I close my eyes. I’m like a teenager, unable to control my hormonal impulses.
Lusting after him doesn’t do us any good. He still doesn’t truly understand our world. And how can he, when I’ve basically given him a book report on sex and labor trafficking every night? It feels distant and intangible when you read about victims and perpetrators on paper. Unless you’ve seen it firsthand, it’s hard to understand the magnitude of the evil The Syndicate is clawing against.
I grab my phone off the nightstand, temporarily ignoring the stream of emails Emily sent me with random data and information on Deniz, flipping through folders on our family cloud server. Throwing Deniz in the deep end might be cruel, but there hasn’t been anything kind and gentle about this arrangement. Maybe taking him to a low-level mission will help him understand why I needed to guarantee my position, and what this work means to us. I’m not often in the field anymore, usually delegating more hands-on missions to our employees, or even Charlie. But there’s an operation a few hours south of here that could use disrupting. I provide updates via email to the council informing them of my plan, identifying resources for both the perpetrator and victims in the pool of Syndicate connections at my disposal.
Over an hour later, the sky is dark and the sound of traffic has faded into a low hum behind the thick glass of the window. My muscles are heavy with exhaustion, and I fall asleep hoping I dream of anything but him.