Chapter 5 – Ferrin
FERRIN
If she had any sense, any self-preservation, she’d pitch me out the window or feed me to her mother.
She’s desperate to leave but doesn’t think she can do it on her own.
That much is clear. Her mother is also a psycho bitch, and I mean that in the least affectionate way possible.
I don’t know if this girl is aware of this, if she’s fucked in the head herself, if this is all a game, or if she’s a victim.
I’m going with the latter.
She’s hiding me up here, pleading with me to take her to a stupid festival, and alternating between tears and homicide. She’s unstable and possibly suicidal, though I have to imagine anyone stuck in this cottage, unable to leave for their entire life, would reach that point.
The tiara is another situation.
I’m positive it was the woman downstairs who hired me to steal it. I’m a lot of things, but forgetful isn’t one of them. She has to be the one who somehow tracked me down and stole it from my safe. It’s too coincidental. All of this is, which is throwing me a bit.
Who is this girl?
“Why the festival?” I ask, needing to know, as something dark is niggling at me.
“Why do you care?”
“Humor me.”
She releases a defeated sigh and leans back against the bathroom door, the knife going with her. “It’s my last memory.”
I tilt my head. “Explain that.”
“It was my sixth birthday, and I was there with a woman.” She stops, and I can tell there’s a lot more to this than she’s saying. “I remember the lanterns. They were magical. I knew they weren’t for me, but it somehow felt that way anyway. My mother found me there and saved me, and that was that.”
Only that wasn’t that. There are a million things to question there, but for now…
“You know nothing about me. Why on earth would you want to spend the better part of a week with me?”
“I don’t,” she answers honestly. “If there were another way, I’d take it.
My mother told me no. Flat out. She said I’m never leaving this cottage, and I can’t…
” Her voice cracks, and her eyes go glassy.
She looks up at the ceiling, pushing her emotions down.
“I have to. I’m—” She cuts herself off with a self-deprecating laugh.
“Well, you don’t need my particulars. You’re the first person to find me. That has to mean something.”
God, she’s young. And na?ve. “I could kill you on the street, come back here, kill your mother, and tear this building apart stone by stone until I find my necklace.”
She shrugs. “You could, but I don’t think you will. I don’t think you want to kill me or even hurt me. If you do, well, I guess that’s a risk I have to take. I have no other options, and if you kill me…” Another shrug. “I’m not exactly living right now, am I?”
I lick my dry lips and try to settle myself together, even as an irrational anger builds within me. “If you’re breathing, you’re living, and there’s always a fight left to be had.”
“If you say so. I have no frame of reference.” She doesn’t. She’s utterly dejected, and if I leave her here…
I bluster out a frustrated noise. “What do you need me for anyway? Why can’t you have your rebellion on your own? Simply because you’ve never left before?”
She shifts, looking sheepish. “I don’t expect you to understand, but that festival means something to me, and I have to go. I will give you what you want. I swear I will. All I’m asking for is a few days of your time. I’ll even pay for whatever we need along the way.”
“And how is it that you have money?”
“I’ve been taking some from my mother for the last ten years. Small amounts with each visit add up.”
The other side of that is she’s scared. She’s been on her own for a very long time, and other than knocking me out, tying me up, and poking me with a knife, she has no real-world life skills.
I want to stick it to her mother. Hard. And not in a sexy, kinky way.
The bitch tried to play me and then tried to kill me. Then she stole the tiara from me.
But honestly, I think she’s holding this girl captive. She may not even be her actual mother. She could be the kidnapper in all this. It’s sick and demented, but people are more often than we care to think about.
I shouldn’t care. It definitely shouldn’t trigger a protective instinct I let die when I was seven. But it is. Regardless, if I can get the tiara back and my necklace while hurting her mother, I’m all for that. The girl is using me. I will sure as hell use her in return.
“All right,” I say slowly. “It seems I don’t have much of a choice. I’ll take you to the festival and bring you back here after. Then I get my necklace, and I’ll be on my way.”
A smile as I’ve never seen shines across her face, making her eyes sparkle like the ocean with the first crack of dawn.
Fuck me running, she’s dazzling. Drop dead gorgeous, and I might be a different sort of fucked here.
Keeping my hands to myself will be a trial by fire with a smile like that shining at me.
“Great. We have a deal. I’ll bring you something to eat in a bit.”
With a bloody skip in her step, she turns, giving me her back—such an unwise move—and leaves the bathroom. I pull my phone from my pocket and search for the festival. I’ve never been before so I need more information, but a text comes in.
Lars: So, there’s something funny with this tiara. Did you know about it?
Shit.
Me: What’s that?
Lars: On the inside, pressed into the gold, it says replica.
Me: No!
Lars: Yes, so the necklace gets divided into three.
My fingers tap on my screen, and I retake my seat on the closed toilet.
I was never going to meet them at the rendezvous point.
I was always going to keep the necklace as mine.
And after I sell it, Rhys Stephan will no longer exist. They have no clue what I actually look like.
In fact, the only person to see me without some form of prosthetic is the girl.
Me: Last I checked, a necklace is a singular object and not divisible by three.
That necklace is my ticket out of this life and straight into retirement.
The tiara was supposed to be that, but how do you attempt to sell the Eye of Egypt without getting caught and questioned?
I sold two of the smaller diamonds from it.
That money is stashed in my account in Switzerland.
But the Eye of Egypt and some of the larger stones felt like a bad omen to try to sell. Like a jinx.
Not to mention heavily fucking traceable.
A child was stolen from her bed in the dead of night, never to be seen again, and yet I stole her tiara from a cruddy apartment in a shit neighborhood in France.
I don’t know how that Marie woman got the tiara in the first place.
No mention was ever made about the tiara going missing and being taken with her.
At the time, the papers reported that a man broke in and killed the king and stole the princess. They never caught him.
I assumed Marie and the woman I knew as A stole the tiara before Marie double-crossed her and kept it for herself.
Lars: If you think we’re going to let that stand, you’re nuts.
Me: Never said I wasn’t.
Given where I am, I wouldn’t know how to find me, so there’s no way they can. I have a buyer lined up for the necklace, and I plan to meet them in two weeks in Greece. After that, well, I can figure that out then.
It’s a fucking eternity before the girl finds her way back up to me.
I’m dying for a shower and a change of clothes, but I can’t risk the noise.
I’m also famished. I haven’t eaten since this morning, and now the sun is down.
My phone is nearly dead, and there’s nothing exciting in her bathroom drawers.
Some spare toilet paper, some tampons, a few beauty items, and that’s it.
The door opens as I’m going through a drawer, but I don’t care enough to make excuses because she’s holding a tray of food. My mouth waters, and my stomach grumbles loudly enough for both of us to hear it.
“Will you behave?” she asks.
“I’ll behave,” I promise, because I’m too hungry to try anything.
She nods her head over her shoulder, and I gratefully follow her into the studio space I caught on my way up. It’s loaded with canvas as well as murals all over the walls. She’s got some talent.
“These are nice,” I say.
“Thanks,” is her only reply.
The door to the stairs is closed, and after she sets the tray down on a table in the corner, she tells me, “It’s locked, and I have the key hidden.”
“You’re a clever one.” But I don’t wait. I go straight for the food and shovel it into my mouth, then wash it down with wine and water.
“You’re not. I could have poisoned you.”
I stop eating mid-chew. “Nah. You need me too badly.” I finish off the entire bowl of cassoulet, along with the bread and salad.
It’s easily one of the best meals I’ve had in a long time.
That could be because I’m starving, but I don’t think so.
I think when you have this much time on your hands, you become good at a lot of things, like painting and cooking.
She’s quiet the entire time I eat, silently watching me with an indiscernible expression.
She has my knife on her lap, but she’s not brandishing it or even paying it much attention.
I decided during my hours of confinement that I’m not going to engage her.
I’m going to keep my distance, do as she asks, get my necklace, and fuck off.
I don’t want to know about her problems, and I’m not her savior.
Yet with every encounter, my curiosity grows. It doesn’t help that her skin is like velvet and her hair like silk. I bet her mouth is honey, and her virgin cunt is just as delicious. Doesn’t matter. I won’t be tasting either.
“Are you tying me up to sleep?”
“Yes,” she says simply.
I figured. “Can I have the sofa?”
“That was my plan.”
“Thanks for that.” I put the fork down and wipe my mouth with my napkin. “Don’t suppose I can bargain for a shower?”