Chapter Eight
Zahra
Louis Armstrong was singing “What a Wonderful World” when I opened my eyes. I yawned and stretched my hands above my head, my legs taking that cue to stretch too.
Blinking my vision clear, my hand went under the white duvet and underneath the white shirt I wore; I rubbed my stomach and looked to the side at the open window. I caught the bright day, the clear and blue water, and the sky brightened by the sun.
I frowned, looking away and above me. I stared for a full minute before looking around the empty room.
The sounds of the music echoed against the walls, relaxing jazz, dreamy and soft—it made my thinking slow, gave the atmosphere a smooth edge that had me feeling like I was in the first scene of a mystery thriller, and I was that character who opened the film by dying.
The first meaningless victim.
Goose bumps traveled up my skin as I looked at the other side of the bed. Clearly, I was the only one who had slept here last night. Elio had probably stayed till I was deep in sleep and then left. I didn’t want to think about why I felt a sting at that tiny detail.
I looked out the window again.
“Shit.” I sat up.
He didn’t wake me.
I threw the covers off myself and got off his bed and out of the room.
My legs felt weak, like jelly, and I rubbed my eyes as another yawn left me.
The music grew less muffled when I reached the living area, stopping short after I spotted Elio at the bar, sitting on a stool, the side of his head leaning on his fist, while he stared blankly at the half-filled whiskey glass he held.
His shoulders were slumped in a way that showed tiredness. He hadn’t slept all through the night. Obviously, he hadn’t taken anything to help him either.
I suppressed a sigh and then started walking over to him. He didn’t look my way once; even when I reached his line of vision, his eyes didn’t leave the glass.
“Hey,” I greeted, seeing the slight dark circles underneath his eyes and a white bandage around his knuckles like he had sustained some injury.
“Hm,” he responded, still not looking at me. Body here, mind elsewhere.
“You didn’t wake me like I asked.”
“Hm.”
I stared at him for a bit, my head still asleep, and I was still sore between my legs from last night’s … activities.
“Right,” I said with a firm nod. “I need coffee to deal with this.” I gestured to him. “Whatever this is. Where’s the kitchen—”
“Left.” He cut me off, still not looking at me. It was like he wanted me out of sight so he could stare peacefully at the whiskey glass.
“Why are—”
A knock on the door cut me off as my gaze moved to its closed frame. “You expecting someone?”
He raised his head and then glanced at the door before responding, “No.”
The knock came again. “You’re not gonna answer it?” I asked.
He looked away from the door and then to me before his gaze moved to the door and back to me again.
“Answer it,” he said, pressing a button on a small remote beside him, stopping the music.
I frowned. “Do I look like your fucking butler?”
“With your hair like that, you wouldn’t pass as room service, so, no, you do not look like my butler.”
I gave him the middle finger with a sweet smile before walking past him toward the door and swinging it open with one hand while the other pushed my hair back from my face.
I frowned at the stranger I locked eyes with.
A frown had her brows dropping as she looked at me, too; bright blue eyes shone with confusion.
“May I help you?” I asked.
“Uh…” Her gaze darted to a space behind me, her eyes widening a bit in question, and I snapped my head back to see Elio watching, his face pointedly expressionless.
Looking back at the blond girl, I shifted to block her view of him, giving her a pointed stare. “Yes?” I pressed.
She was … uncomfortably pretty. There was a shine to her that made me want to frown.
Barely clothed, she wore bright blue shorts, unbuttoned and unzipped, showcasing her bright blue bikini thong, which matched the bra that barely covered the swell of her breasts.
Her blond hair was tied up in a ponytail, curly strands falling around her face like she woke up with the word PERFECT tattooed to her aura.
“Um … I’m sorry?” she squeaked out. “I think I got the wrong door; I was—”
“Wrong door?” I stated, confused. “You’re just allowed to wander into a platinum suite reserved for private use, and you got the wrong door?”
She blinked at me, but my frown didn’t let up.
“Um … well, I—I have—uh—uh, topographical disorientation.” She stopped, probably seeing the confusion in my eyes.
“I have directional issues; it would shock you how many times I end up somewhere that I—you know, didn’t initially want to go?
I—I don’t even know why the guards at the front didn’t stop me—um …
dumbblondmoment?” She rushed out the last three words, supplying me a half-assed laugh, and taking a step back while I squinted at her.
“I will leave you now, and um—go … go find the right door.”
And then she bolted out of sight. I tilted my head as I closed the door slowly before turning to regard Elio, who was finishing the last of his drink, completely unbothered.
“That was weird?” I voiced. “Is there really such a thing as topo-whatever she said?”
He glanced my way for a brief moment before going to pour himself another round, ignoring me.
Not wanting to acknowledge that or the girl with a screwed-up sense of direction, I made my way in the direction he had gestured to, another yawn leaving me as I padded barefoot into the large kitchen, grabbing a mug without really looking around, and then proceeded to the coffee—
My soul left my body alongside the scream that escaped my throat. It was so loud as I jumped and kicked something warm and soft that had brushed my feet.
It only took a glance for me to catch the black furry animal by my side, very still with a low warning growl, its fur standing erect all over.
My instincts told me to remain in place, but my legs were already working ahead of me; I bolted right out of the kitchen with the creature hot on my tail.
I think I was still screaming, still in flight mode, as I spotted Elio on his feet, approaching with a frown on his face.
“What happened—” He didn’t complete that statement because I was on him in the next instant, my hands falling around his shoulders, my legs around his waist, inching up as he stumbled back with the impact of me jumping on him.
His arms came around me protectively.
“There’s a fucking cat, a fucking panther. I don’t fucking know, but it’s—”
“Stopped.”
My heart beat five times per second as I turned my head slowly backward to see the cat standing still in front of us, swollen with anger.
It was too still, bright eyes watching, waiting for a movement, an excuse to attack, to chase, and I was breaking out in a sweat even though I was clinging to him in panic.
“Relax.” He gently rubbed my back. “Your heart is beating so fast. Are you really that scared?”
I looked away, dropping my head onto his shoulder. “No—I mean—yes, b-but just don’t fucking let go of me.”
“I will have to let go eventually—”
I tightened my hold around him, knowing if it were possible, I would climb up onto his head just to—His grip loosened, and he moved to put me down; the deep purring sound grew a little louder.
I gripped his shirt, tightening my legs around his waist, refusing to let go. “Please, please, please don’t let me go, I beg you.”
“You’ll be fine.”
“No, no, no, fuck no, I swear to God, Elio, if you let me go, I will stab you until I hit a vital fucking organ; I am not bluffing.”
He chuckled, bringing his lips to my ear. “This is a surprise,” he said, his tone low.
“How do we get rid of it—”
“You can’t; she lives here, for now.”
I frowned, scared to even move. “What the fuck? You have a fucking cat? Why do you have a fucking cat?”
“She is not mine; that is Mimi. She’s Angelo’s.”
My grip was still tight around him. “I don’t give a fuck who her owner is; I just need her to stop looking at me like that.”
“Hold on.” Amusement laced his voice. “You can shoot people in the face, enchant a whole room filled with strangers, make me your subject, stop a bomb on a moving school bus, and the thing that scares you is a … cat?”
I gritted my teeth. “Gloat all you want; just don’t drop me.”
He patted my back reassuringly. “I am not gloating; I am just surprised. You keep surprising me at every turn.”
“Glad I serve as your constant element of surprise, but that cat is not backing down from wanting to attack me.”
Elio shifted slightly. “We just need to distract her, that’s all.”
I swallowed. “How do you suppose we—”
He made a tst-tst-tst sound, and something furry came running out of the kitchen storeroom, ginger and huge.
I inched farther up into his hold. “Oh my God, there’s another one. There’s another one!”
I couldn’t see him, but I could hear the smile in his voice. “They are harmless, Sport.”
“It chased me.”
“That’s because you ran from her, screamed, and scared her.”
Elio stepped to the side, his arms still strong around me. I watched as the ginger cat came behind the black one, watching us too.
Surprisingly, the black cat—Mimi—had stopped growling, but it still watched us as Elio moved toward the kitchen until we were completely out of sight of both cats.
I released the breath I’d been holding, willing the pace of my heart to calm.
“Am I free to let you go now?” Elio asked.
I cleared my throat, releasing my hold on him as I managed a slight nod, unable to meet his gaze when he settled me atop the kitchen counter, his focus entirely on my face.
Pressing my lips together, I succumbed, and looked at him because I wanted to get the shame over with once and for all. “What? You don’t have your own embarrassing fears?”
“If I have an embarrassing fear, I am yet to be acquainted with it.”
“Yeah, whatever. I’m only human.”
“A human who fears cats.”