Chapter 45 #4
She was sitting solemnly on the bed, eyes going straight to Nala but not her bags.
“What is it?” The bags went in her corner stash of meager belongings. “Bad news? Has something happened?”
“In a matter of speaking.” Varen showed Nala her phone screen. “I got an email from Ravenwood. You will want to take a look at this.”
Nala could barely swallow what fear bubbled up her esophagus before approaching her girlfriend. The email was set up in an elaborate, formal template. It looked like an Aviary invitation. Because it was.
She wanted to vomit when she saw what their old friend had written.
“Ms. Lake, you are a hard woman to get a hold of these days! Your presence has also been sorely missed recently. That said, The Aviary will be taking a small turn in the upcoming weeks. Instead of the usual meetings, we will be having one-on-one interactions.
Some of our members are not as loyal as we would like to believe. As an act of good faith and a token of your loyalty to our beautiful enterprise, I am asking you to please let me meet with your sweet Nightingale for one night. It is my sincerest promise to return her to you as you left her.”
Varen mumbled a string of obscenities. Nala almost choked on laughter. When her girlfriend looked askance at her, she said, “He wants me. Oh my God, he wants you to sacrifice me to him.” She had to laugh. It kept her from throwing up. Don’t think about it! Argh!
“Nala,” Varen said, evenly. “It’s a trap. He’ll make sure you never leave his house in anything but a body bag, and that’s generous. He might have you buried or dumped somewhere.”
“After he slaps me around. Come on, the man must have some priorities.”
“Nala!”
“What?” she sat back on her legs, Varen’s demeanor too delicious to pass up. “Oh, you’re funny, Ven. You think I’ll die before he does?”
“Don’t joke like that.” Varen did her best to soften her voice, but Nala could still hear the disdain deep inside. Not disdain for her… but for what Xan Ravenwood could do to her. “You know you would never have the opportunity to kill him, even if you had it in you.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Varen looked her right in the eye. Ripples of “this is the truth and you know it,” exuded from those frosty blues.
Nala shivered beneath the weight of it. “You are not a killer, Nala. You could never be like him or his merry band of assassins he probably has hiding around the world. You and I both know that the moment you confront him, you will freeze.”
She held up a hand to silence Nala before she could protest.
“I don’t say this to insult you. I say this because you are a good person. You wouldn’t be able to kill him unless you had to protect yourself, and even then, no matter how good the lawyer I hire is, you will still go to jail. I want revenge too,
but there’s no point in seeking out justice that puts you behind bars as well. Your sister wouldn’t want that.”
What the fuck do you know about Tasha? Then again, what the fuck did Nala know about her either?
I would have never guessed that she was dating Ravenwood…
Nala couldn’t think about it. She also couldn’t think about any glee Xan felt over the prospect of taking Tasha’s little sister too. Maybe their mother for all they knew.
“It’s moot, anyway,” Varen said. “You’re not going. We’re not members of The Aviary anymore. Even if we wanted to go back…”
She didn’t have to finish her thought. Nala knew what she was thinking.
We could have enjoyed that sort of arrangement after all.
Not to mention the potential friends they had made through the group.
I wish I could see Robin again. Nala didn’t know if she meant immediately or ever again.
Clara Montgomery might continue her life pretending Nala never existed.
It was doubtful she would return to The Aviary, either.
Yet all those people… almost everyone was there against their will in some fashion.
They were all acting and pretending to keep Xan Ravenwood from ruining their businesses, buying out their properties, or…
killing them. Killing the ones they loved to make a point.
Nala put her hand on Varen’s shoulder. “You better come up with a plan, then. Because right now I can only think of two things: sex and murder.”
Varen shook her head. “What in the world have I done to you?”
“You?” Nala laughed louder. “What makes you think it’s you who did anything to me? I’ve had this in me my whole life, lovergirl.”
That was the last thing they said in a long time.
I see I’m still as brash as ever. Nala went back to her couch and flipped open her notebook, the third draft of her script staring her in the face.
I’m going to need this. I need this to screw my head back on straight and stop being so stupid.
Varen hadn’t done a damn thing to make her the way she was, but she had the power to help this phase of Nala’s life end…
and let another, more positive one begin.
It all came down to whether the research panned out. And whether she could play her part in Nala’s fucked up fantasy.
Entry 23
The time has come. Nightingale and I must part, for her own good.
I’m not looking forward to telling her.