Chapter 4
Electra
Cillian tips his chin, which deepens the intensity of his stare. “I want to make you dinner, after which I’ll play the role of boyfriend for as long as you need me to.”
“No deal.” When his eyebrows slam low, I say, “First, you play the part of smitten boyfriend. If you do it well, then we’ll do dinner.”
“Okay.” The man is way too eager. Not only didn’t he try to barter, but he’s also smiling.
“You do realize that the only reason I’d take you up on your offer in the first place is to land a real date with someone I’m actually into, right?”
My frankness erodes his delight.
What makes it vanish fully is when I suggest, “How about I pay you instead. A hundred dollars a day?” At his scowl, I up the ante. “Two-hundred?”
He pushes away from the bar. I think he’s about to stalk off, wounded ego in tow, but instead he faces me and leans in until his face is dangerously close to mine. Too close. My nostrils flare from how he invades my space.
“I’m not an escort, Miss Serran.” He delivers the words with a heavy dose of repugnance. “I might not be rolling in riches like most of the people in this room, but I have my pride.”
“Yet you’re willing to accept payment in kind.” I don’t mean for it to be tinged with as much disdain as it is, but that’s how it comes out. “What do you call that?”
“Hope.”
I’m not giving this stranger hope that a mock relationship will lead to anything else. “Forget it then. Forget the whole thing. It was a stupid idea, anyway.”
He studies my face as though to commit each harsh line to memory, and then he beats me to walking away. I’m almost stunned. No one has ever walked away from me.
I do the walking away.
I expect the pride he alluded to earlier will have led him out of the gala hall, but when I reach the family table a few moments later, he’s seated next to Fiona, listening to one of her stories. She’s probably telling him about her Irish ancestors. She so loves talking about her dead relatives.
I head toward Calanthe’s side of the table when Fiona calls out my name…loudly.
“Yes, Fi?” I ask as Cillian stands.
To leave? Is it too much to hope for?
“You’re right here.” She nods to the chair that Cillian has just pulled out.
I sweep my tongue over my teeth, wondering if it’d be in poor taste to swap my name card with someone else’s when most of the someone else’s are already crowding the table? Why didn’t I think of doing this sooner?
I glance at the remaining empty spots. Find that Malachi’s name has been etched on the little name card beside mine. Calanthe’s doing? Fiona’s? Gaea’s?
With a sigh, I unglue my boots from the marble flooring and amble toward Cillian. I still can’t believe he stuck it out after I shut him down. I suppose there’s networking to be done and new customers to be found.
Before taking my seat, I lean toward him to murmur, “I thought you’d be gone.”
His eyebrows flex into a frown. “It would take more than profound disappointment with how my evening’s going for me to abandon my gala date. I owe Mrs. Murphy so much.”
Right… He thinks his date is Fiona.
I untuck my napkin and lay it flat across my lap just as Malachi finally arrives with Ines. After pulling out her chair—frustratingly, on his other side—he eases himself into his.
“I was thinking…” Malachi’s voice trickles down my spine, pinning it straight. “What about going out for a run tomorrow? Like we used to do.”
And now he’s murdering running for me.
“Elle?”
I stop toying with the edge of my napkin to huff out a short, “Yeah. Fine. Let’s go for a run.”
“Great.”
I look at Ines. “Just us, right?”
“I’d prefer it to be just us so we can catch up.” His attention drifts to Cillian.
Is it me, or have Malachi’s eyes narrowed?
“We haven’t been introduced. I’m Malachi Hadez.” He reaches in front of me and extends his hand.
Cillian clasps Malachi’s palm and shakes it. “Cillian Lowry.”
“I hear you’re a friend of the family.”
“The Blooms and Mrs. Murphy have been very kind to me.”
I wonder if he’s thinking: As opposed to the girl sitting between us.
“Cillian, here, is the sweetest boy in all of Hadestown.” Fiona pats the hand he’s got balled on the tablecloth between them.
“How did you two meet again, Mrs. Murphy?” Malachi enquires.
“Cillian’s my dance instructor. Came highly recommended by one of my friends. I had my doubts—mostly because he’s not of Latino descent—but he’s mighty good. Got my creaky hips swaying like you wouldn’t imagine. The ladies in my dance class can’t get enough of him.”
Cillian keeps eyeing the crystal centerpiece filled with votive candles and rose petals.
“How did you become a dance instructor?” Although Malachi’s tone is neutral, I don’t miss the slight amusement tinging the words, as though he finds Cillian’s profession trivial.
I bristle, Gaea only knows why, since I also had much to say about Cillian’s calling. I decide it’s sympathy pains for the human at my side, whose complexion is growing rosier by the second.
The blush has climbed to the tips of his ears, which jut through the thick tangle of his hair. “I needed to make a living and didn’t have a college degree.”
“How long are you in Boston for, Mal?” Fiona cuts in, probably to help Cillian save face.
“If I can help it, for at least a month,” Malachi says.
Ines sighs. “I can’t tell you how eager I am not to dig clothes out of a suitcase every day.”
I am just dying to ask her where she’ll be digging them from if she stays in Boston—Malachi’s closet? A waiter shears off my line of sight before I can formulate my question in a way that won’t make me sound like a lovesick tween.
I reach for my glass of wine, then think better of mixing liquors and ask the waiter for a fresh cocktail. Even though I don’t look Cillian’s way, I feel his judgment ooze through his lenses.
At least he’s paying attention to me. Unlike Malachi, who’s focused on the conversation between Ines and my brother.
“I rarely drink.” I’m not sure why I feel the need to defend myself.
“I didn’t say anything.” True, but I’m sure he’s thinking a lot of things.
I recline in my seat. “You should work the room. Score some new customers.”
He fists his fork. “I have too many already.”
While I wonder if one can truly have too many customers, Cillian digs into his meal. Watching him eat—utensil clutched in his palm instead of daintily speared under his index finger—tosses me a decade back, to the first time I sat at Saul Hadez’s table.
Malachi’s father had observed my table manners, upper lip curled in disgust. It hadn’t stopped me from wiping my plate clean, but it had made me feel like trash.
I wonder if anyone’s ever made Cillian feel like trash. What if I did?
Unease settles in the pit of my stomach. “How many lessons do you give a day?”
“Depends on the days. I try to cap it at eight.”
“Every day?” I place my elbow on the table and cradle my head on the tips of my fingers, face turned toward him.
“Every day. Seven days a week.”
“How much do you charge per lesson?”
“For you, it’d be free.” He swipes his last bite of food, then sets his fork down.
He might hold his eating utensil like a dagger, but he chews with his mouth closed. Something that took me weeks to master.
I roll my eyes. “I’m serious… What’s the going rate on a private dance lesson in Boston these days?”
“Enough to put food in my belly and fuel in my car. Not enough to put much away in the bank.”
“Vague.”
“I don’t like talking about money.”
“Then you attended the wrong event, because that’s all people talk about at these galas. That, and what everyone’s wearing.”
“I didn’t come here to discuss investments or fashion. Just to celebrate what Lisa and Mr. Hadez have achieved. It’s life-changing.”
“It is.”
“Big pharma must be salivating for the company to go public.”
“No doubt, but it won’t. Lisa and Tarian aren’t looking to make a profit; only a difference.”
His throat works over a swallow of bubbly water.
“So, how did you start?” I ask. “Did you take classes?”
“My mother taught me. It was her passion.”
“Was?”
“She died a little over six years ago.” At the look of pity that floods my stare, he says, “She’d stopped dancing for years by that point.”
“Because of an injury?”
“No.” His pupils retract. “She stopped dancing because of my stepfather. He couldn’t stand her loving anything that wasn’t him.”
“He sounds like a world-class jerk.”
“He had his moments.”
“He’s dead too?”
Cillian nods.
“So you’re like, an orphan?”
“I’m a little old to be an orphan, but yeah, I’m on my own.” He looks around the table. “You’re lucky to have such a big family.”
“I am, even though there are days when they can be a lot. But I’m not complaining,” I rush to add, feeling oddly guilty for griping to someone who has no one.
“I’d kill to have a big family.” He filches the mini baguette off his side plate and breaks off a piece, which he tosses into his mouth.
“Maybe someday you’ll make one. Or marry into one.”
“Where do you see yourself in ten years, Miss Serran?”
“You can call me Electra. As for where I see myself…married.” I should probably slow down on the cocktails before I suggest braiding daisy chains with Cillian—or learning to salsa.
“Kids? Dogs? Cats?”
“Preferably not.” Unless Malachi wants children and pets? He’d have to want me first, though.
I glance over my shoulder only to find him gone. As well as Ines.
“They went to the bathroom,” Cillian informs me, his eyes digging into my face, scrutinizing my reaction.
A vision of Malachi and Ines sharing a stall—and not to pee—plants itself between my temples and develops into a pornographic reel, complete with sound effects. My teeth click.
Once I feel the horrible fantasy recede, I look at Calanthe. She gives me a smile, but it’s small and smacks of pity. Nothing like her usual grins. I see her pick up her phone and type. A second later, my phone vibrates in my pocket.
I retrieve it, then angle the screen away from Cillian. She’s finally answered my earlier query.
CALLIE: Not that I know of.