Emiliano
PERMISSION
From where I stand just in the doorway between the kitchen and dining room, I see her posted at the window, alone.
She doesn’t speak to anyone, just stands there looking outside, tugging at the hem of her dress, like it can get any closer to her knees. The black dress hugs her lush breasts, waist and round ass in a way that makes me jealous of motherfucking fabric.
Her hair is different this time, straight and down her back in a sheeny dark curtain.
My eyes trail from the back of her head, following her hair as it meets her waist, the deep convex of one hip, and onto the one leg I can see.
Fuck , she’s got those stockings with the seam up the back of her leg, and her heel looks thin enough to do damage to someone’s jugular.
I know when she eventually turns to look back at me, I’ll be blessed with flush cheeks and deep-red lips. I’ve committed the color to memory, and sure enough, she turns to walk away from the window and our eyes meet.
I’m about to make my way back over to her, noticing how she doesn’t immediately look away, but her father calls her over, stealing her attention.
Did I imagine a grimace?
I down the remaining champagne I snagged after she stole my drink and had my blood rushing to my other head. Before I can find a surface to set the flute on, a voice rings out from behind me.
“I’ll take it,” Mrs. de la Matta tells me, holding out her hand. Her hands look like they’ve never known a day of hard labor and the soft life has been good to her.
It’s strange how she looks exactly the way she does on TV, in her home, her cream cashmere sweater pristine.
“Sure,” I say as I hand it over with a shrug. When she gives it to a server walking past her, I wonder what the hell was the point.
Not my house, not my problem.
“I see you’ve met my daughter.”
I notice that this isn’t a question, and it doesn’t sound like small talk.
“Hard not to.” I smile, glancing in her direction before focusing on her mother again. They have the same eyes, only her mother’s don’t have that melancholy that makes me want to scoop her up and protect her.
I don’t know if she ever had it.
“She’s a beautiful girl,” she muses, looking in her daughter’s direction. I’m a complete stranger, watching a mother stare at her daughter with an exhaustion that reminds me of how my mother looks at Carlos when she thinks no one’s looking at her.
Features pointed downward, an eyebrow slightly raised, all punctuated by a deep sigh.
“Girl?” I ask, wondering if I’m lusting after an underage girl. That would be my luck.
“Oh, no. She’s twenty-two now. Nearly twenty-three.” She clears her throat, facing me. And then she speaks in a tone that I’ve never been faced with in my entire life. Condescension. “ Pero …it’s best to keep business separate from your love life.”
I allow her to walk away without informing her of how her words could be perceived.
As a threat.
And that would get her killed.
I’m sure this woman has no idea who I am. She probably thinks I’m some green baby attorney, trying to earn my way to the top.
Maybe her husband doesn’t want her to know about his dealings with us. For her sake, I hope that’s the case.
My family doesn’t ask for permission, we give it.
Taking stock of the room and noticing her disappearance, I step off into the hallway, determined to find the bathroom. There are only two doors here, and upon inspection, one of them is a closet.
I rap my knuckles against the second door, certain it’s a bathroom. I don’t hear anything, so I twist the knob, only for it to be twisted on the other end and yanked open.
I’m standing the closest I’ve been to her, and the way her face is screwed up like a pissy little kitten makes me want to grab her by the face and kiss her until she purrs.
“Oh,” she says on a sigh. “I thought you were my mother.”
Her features still aren’t quite relaxed, and I try to connect with her as much as I can so she’s comfortable.
“Intense mother? I know all about that,” I joke. But we’re eons away on that spectrum. Mami is a cartel wife. She’s killed and bled for her life.
Mrs. de la Matta is a coddled woman who grew up to seem like a pain in the ass.
“You have no idea,” she mutters, and I wish I could lay it all out for her. But I’m fairly certain that would scare the fuck out of her, which is the last thing I want to do .
“Mind if I…” I begin, gesturing toward the toilet she’s blocking. Champagne tends to run right through me.
“Oh!” She starts, waiting for me to move before she passes me. “Yes, of course.”
I give a wide berth, despite wanting to be so close to her that I breathe in her exhale.
“Only if you promise to wait for me here,” I try, hoping she’s bored enough to be entertained by me. I know I’m bored as fuck myself.
Instead, she rolls her eyes and turns, telling me to meet her out back as she walks away. My eyes are planted on her ass like they belong there, and when she turns the corner to walk upstairs, I duck into the bathroom.
I’m pretty sure I take the fastest piss I’ve ever attempted, pumping the sanitizer I keep in my pocket in my hands to avoid taking the time to scrub them clean.
It was pretty cool outside when I arrived, so I’m sure it’ll be colder now.
But I don’t grab my coat, ambling through the house to find a backdoor of some sort.
I pass the waiters handing out the hors d’oeuvres and champagne.
In the kitchen, there’s a flurry of action from the caterer as she wipes her forehead before calling out what food to take next and to crack open another bottle of champagne.
I’m able to slip by without being noticed.
When I find the back door, I see her standing under the moon, wearing a black hoodie over her dress that stops at her hips. I’m not sure she hears me walking up behind her, so I speak so I don’t startle her.
“I love the look,” I call out, stepping beside her to peer up at the moon as well. “Is this where you find your peace?”
She shakes her head, and I want to press but opt not to.
Nice and easy. Whatever’s tough will find us in due time anyway.
There’s a confidence I have with her that isn’t typical of me. But it’s like…I can read her. I can see her. And if what I’m seeing is incorrect, why would she invite me outside?
“I typically find my peace in a joint,” she says, pushing her hand into her hoodie pocket and producing one like magic.
She holds it up, and I notice her perfectly manicured nails.
Thin French tips that I only know about because Mami gets a manicure every Saturday morning.
Sometimes I join her to get my nails clipped and buffed and a pedicure.
Men shouldn’t touch women with hands that look like shit.
At least, that’s what my father used to say.
“Did you just conjure that up?” I smirk at the way she rolls her eyes again, and she hands me a lighter with a tilt of her chin.
Lighting someone else’s cigarette is said to bring you good sex. I’m not sure if it works on marijuana, but the idea makes me grin as I stare at her.
“Want some?” she asks as she holds up the joint before pinching it between her red lips, her eyes finally meeting mine. “Or are you too pussy because your bosses are inside?” The words are muffled around the joint, but I hear her loud and clear.
She wears the closest thing I’ve seen to a smile on her face, as if she’s enjoying a joke that no one else is privy to.
What the fuck?
Who is she and where the hell did she come from?
And if she knew who I am, she’d think twice before speaking to me this way.
Rather than anger me, it excites me. I’ve never experienced someone speaking to me so freely, even if it’s in a negative way. I want to taste her slick-ass mouth, make her call my name from the same lips that insult me.
Without an answer, I lift the lighter, and once I flick it on, her face comes to life under the dim yellow light of the flame. Her eyes move from the end of the joint to me before looking down again .
I could tell her she’s stunning and that I’ve become obsessed with trying to figure out what she’s going to say next. Or that I’m curious about how she ended up like this with parents like hers.
They’re stuffy, entitled, and willing to do almost anything for relevancy.
Not her.
She takes a pull, making the flame lick higher, and once I see the end of the joint is now bright orange, I pull away.
But not before I catch her scent.
She smells like…a bakery full of sophisticated women. Vanilla with likely floral elements that I can’t place. And just the hint of baby powder.
The scent is as complex as she is.
I watch her take another pull before holding it out to me, keeping the smoke in her lungs. She releases it in a steady thin stream of smoke.
I can’t be a pussy in front of her, so I take it.
But if I’m being honest, I place it between my lips because it’s the closest I’ll get to touching hers.
For now.