by Rachel Cade
Oliver sank his fork in deep, slicing his first bite. “ I will.”
Chapter Two
One Year Earlier
Having a full stomach all the time.
Nik could get used to this.
She chowed down on the chicken at the green card table. Some of the guys were playing video games on a huge flat screen creating most of the noise in the room. Others were playing cards. She wasn’t the only girl there, but she was the only one not in a short skirt.
Most of the time she didn’t talk to anyone, just ate and observed until someone decided to point out how quiet she was. She’d learned from growing up in foster homes that it was best to be quiet and blend into the walls if it was possible.
“Six watches; not bad, girl.” Donnie pulled a seat across from her. “They didn’t put tomatoes on your sandwich, did they?”
Nik’s mouth was full, so she shook her head in response.
“This was good, thanks,” she said after swallowing.
“You know I got you.” He winked.
She figured he must have liked the newness of her. At some point, he was probably going to make his move on her. But she wasn’t sure; she knew he had at least two girlfriends. One of them was in the room.
But Donnie had a nature people gravitated towards. He was like a big brother to a lot of broke and desperate kids that were scared and alone.
Like her.
He’d helped her when she’d aged out of foster care and given her a place to stay. Fast food shifts weren’t paying for any NYC apartments. The shelters were full a lot of the times she’d swallowed her pride and gone.
She had a knack for stealing, which started with shoplifting clothes and other things when she was underage. Sometimes she’d take things she needed, other times it was stuff she wanted.
And, honestly, it gave her a little thrill to get away with it.
To take something from a world that had given her nothing.
But the skirts and candy were only going to get her so far. And that’s when she moved up to cherry picking Upper East Siders on crowded streets and subways.
“I want you to go on a run with us,” Donnie said. “I like the watches and the wallets, don’t get me wrong. But you know the real money is the drug game, sweetie. Can’t get around it.”
“Do girls usually do that?” she asked.
He smiled at her. “You’re a special girl.”
“You don’t have to try to sweet talk me or nothin’.” She held up the fry. “I’m good with the food.”
“That’s why I like you, Nik.” He grabbed a soda and sipped the straw. “You cut through the bullshit. Most women don’t do that.”
Nik smiled back.
“Is that Cole?” he asked, glancing up at the ceiling.
Cole had barely passed the door leading out of the room above and behind Donnie. There was no way he could have known that.
Someone snickered as Cole entered the room.
“I was looking for you.” Cole was a pretty big guy, maybe in his late twenties. He used to talk about playing high school football all the time, that he wanted to play for Alabama in college. Then he fucked up his arm and it all went to shit. Now he worked for Donnie.
“Good. What do you have?” Donnie’s face was blank as Cole laid money out on the table, crinkled up fives and twenties. “This looks like change. Where’s the money?”
“I’m gonn-”
Donnie stood like a flash and grabbed the guy’s whole head before slamming him down into the table. Nik’s drink tipped over, but luckily, the lid didn’t pop since there was only ice inside.
“Three weeks of your bullshit. ‘I’m gonna do this, and I’m gonna do that.’” Donnie banged Cole’s head each time for emphasis. Then he pulled out his gun and rested it at Cole’s temple.
The room was quiet, frozen. Everyone stared in their direction.
Cole was staring directly at Nik, blood running from his nose. He winced at the steel against his temple. “Don’t look at her! Don’t look at her!”
Cole whimpered through clenched teeth, slamming his eyes closed.
“She earns her keep here. You don’t!”
Nik also stood still and her face remained blank. She was in the middle of the room this time, and couldn’t fade into the wall.
Was he actually going to shoot this guy right here?
A quick glance to a few other faces showed they were just as unsure as she was. And they’d known Donnie longer.
“Now you’re gonna get my money,” he pressed the metal hard into his skull, “like you’ve got a fucking gun to your head.”
Two Days Later
I have it.
Oliver: You’re quite resourceful I see.
Nik: Can we meet in the same place as before?
Oliver: That’s not possible.
Nik: Where are you then?
Oliver: You have a habit of being intrusive.
Nik: If you’re busy just send me the arrangements and I’ll be there whenever.
Nik sighed, lying back on her bed. Trepidation had sat in her gut like a brick since this guy had found her. She just needed it to be over.
Her phone buzzed on her nightstand again.
Oliver: 1000 5th Avenue.
Nik: When?
Oliver: Now, Miss Pearson. Dress appropriately.
Nik sat up while reading it then quickly googled the address.
It was the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
After tearing everything out of her closet, she finally found a black mini dress that still had the tag on it. It was going to have to do.
Nik took a quick shower and concentrated on efficiently grooming herself instead of thinking about the night ahead.
*
A glowing navy covered the sky.
She was a lifetime New Yorker, but spent most her time in Brooklyn, Queens, and Harlem.
The Metropolitan was so huge and imposing from the sidewalk, she almost forgot why she was there.
Nat climbed the steps, not regretting wearing flats. She scanned the scattering of people that hung around outside. They seemed to be mostly college students, dressed in street clothes. She frowned.
“Miss Pearson?”
It was the old man again. He stood near the door, offering her a gentle wave.
For a split second, Nik considered that Oliver had just played a game to see if she’d show up.
“Hi,” she said when she reached him.
“Follow me,” he answered, leading her inside.
They entered the museum and Nik immediately lost her breath to the high ceilings in the overwhelming space.
Despite being older, the man had a quick gait that forced her to double her normal pace to keep up.
The deeper they walked into the museum, the more isolated it became until there was nothing but the sound of their heels clicking against the polished floors.
“Wait here,” he said.
She was in a large room where a long piece of artwork hung along the wall, cast in soft lighting. Aside from a bench facing it, it was the only thing in the room.
“For how long?”
When she turned, she realized the man was gone.
Her voice echoed in the emptiness.
“Shit,” she murmured.
Nik decided to make use of the bench, praying he wouldn’t make her wait for hours just because he could. This place had to close down at some point, right? It was already after eight. Unless he had made some deal for them to stay after public hours?
Rubbing the side of her neck, she realized her hands were sweating.
“Almost, almost,” she whispered. The white bench was wooden, but she wiped her hands on it anyway.
Across from the painting on the other end of the room was a sculpture she hadn’t noticed when she was led in.
It looked old as hell, probably Grecian: a warrior holding a spear, nude, and very detailed.
The spear pointed at her.
“Do you like it?”
To her credit, she didn’t jump.
“Waiting?” she asked before she could think.
He was wearing a hunter green tuxedo that fit him like a glove. His hair was down, fanning his face in waves as he leisurely entered the room.
Those silver eyes cut at her and he shook his head slowly before joining her on the bench.
“I requested that you dress appropriately.”
Anywhere his eyes touched flamed her skin. His knee was a couple of inches from hers, but she resisted the urge to move.
“I wore a dress,” she answered, snapping her gaze toward the statue.
“With flat shoes.”
“This is just a meeting between me and you.” She reached into the front of her dress to grab the wad of bills before offering it to him. It wasn’t classy, but she wasn’t going to risk having her purse snatched on the way here. That was irony and a problem she didn’t need.
Oliver squinted, staring down at her hand, but thankfully said nothing. When he retrieved it from her hand, his fingertips skimmed the center of her palm.
Smoothly he placed the bills into his inner coat pocket.
Nik was stunned. “You’re not going to count it?”
“It’s not short. You’re honest when you’re forced. Like most people,” he added quietly.
“Okay, well…” She stood up, relief washing over her. “This has all been real.” She began moving toward the exit. “I wish you well in your future endeavors.”
“Are you firing me?” he questioned.
She stopped her walk. “Is that what it sounded like? No. No of course not.”
He waited. In the awkward silence, she realized all of this could have gone really left and ended terribly for her.
“Listen, taking your wallet… was wrong. And I’m sorry,” she apologized sincerely while walking backward.
“I accept your apology, Miss Pearson, which is something I rarely do.” Oliver casually gripped the side of the bench. “One question before you go.”
Nik stopped and swallowed, saying, “sure,” as if she had a choice.
“Why’d you stare at me so long on the subway that day?”
No.
No, this wasn’t the question she was expecting.
“Sizing up my mark,” she answered.
“You didn’t look at anyone else like that though; just me.”
Nik hissed under her breath. “You caught my attention.”
“To be a mark?” Oliver grimaced briefly before his face relaxed. “I’m fascinated.”
“Why?”
“Because a little girl like you decided in her mind that I was someone to fuck with.”
“My mistake, sir. It won’t ever happen again,” she stated flatly.
“You don’t like authority at all, do you?” he questioned. When she didn’t answer, he stood. “Even when you’ve done something wrong, you can’t help being a brat about it.”
“I apologize.”
“But you don’t really mean it.”
She didn’t. And she was hiding her offense over being called a brat.
He was a few feet away from her now, quietly assessing.
“How did you get the money so fast?” he asked quietly.
Another question she wasn’t expecting, and it annoyed her. “Isn’t it more important that you have it?”
“No,” he answered.
She blinked.
His response was to smile briefly. It did something to her insides that pressed her heels into the ground. Nik felt smothered despite the fact he hadn’t invaded her personal space.
“Answer me.”
He wasn’t going to let this go.
Son of a bitch.
“I owe someone a favor.”
Her admission caused him to sigh.
Clasping his hands behind his back, Oliver leveled his gaze at her. “That wasn’t very smart.”
“It seems I’ve got a knack for it lately. But it’s really not your concern, so-”
“My concern is whatever I say it is.”
Her tongue bit down before she told him off.
“There it is.” A long index finger was under her chin, lifting her face to him. “Say what you were going to say.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
Oliver raised a brow and waited.
“What’s going to happen when I leave here?”
He released her chin, but didn’t back away. “You get home safely and go back to your life, stop pick pocketing forever and ever.”
She listened closely to his response, ignoring the fact the he was wearing the same cologne again. And that every time she inhaled, the scent burned her lungs like his finger had against her chin.
“That’s one scenario, anyway.” Oliver slipped his hands into his pockets and backed away. His voice was as smooth as his movements.
Despite common sense, she bit. “What’s another scenario?”
Oliver’s face was only a few inches from the pointed spear of the statue as he analyzed it. “You leave here - with me.”
Chapter Three
“Leave here with you,” she repeated, like his words were foreign.
“Like I said, it’s another scenario.” He rounded the statue, checking his watch. “Your choice, of course.”
Nik tilted her head, letting the sarcasm drip. “So now I have a choice?”
“Yes, Miss Pearson.” Turning on his heel, he began leaving the room. “But make it quickly.
And just like that, she was left by herself. Nik glanced from the painting to the spear-throwing gladiator.
“Damn it.” She rushed behind him into a smaller hallway. This was the opposite way she’d come in. She didn’t want to be left to find her own way out.
After following behind him down a third hallway, she had to break the silence.
“How do you know your way? All these halls are the same.”
“I used to work here.”
Nik voiced her disbelief while shaking her head. “You’ve never had a real job.”
He stopped suddenly and she’d been following so close behind that her chin brushed the back of his arm. She held her mouth, trying to smother her surprise. It was like running into granite.
“Now you’re just speculating.” There was a door in front of him that he swiftly opened, revealing they were on the side of the building. “That can get you into trouble as well.”
Trouble.
She just wanted to get out of the building.
Oliver walked ahead of her to the street and opened the passenger door of a silver Maserati.
All the fresh air Nik had taken in evaporated from her lungs.
Aside from brushing against a BMW once, she’d never been inside a luxury car.
In that moment, there was nothing she wanted more than to feel the seat’s leather against her skin.
*
Oliver took in a bit of the night air while he waited for her to get inside the vehicle.
It wasn’t too chilly, but there was a nice breeze coming from the south.
“Thanks, but I really need to get home.” He wasn’t sure if he heard correctly; perhaps the wind carried her voice.
Standing there, he continued to hold the door, waiting for her when she started walking in the opposite direction.
She left him completely alone on the street and disappeared into the night.
On that realization, he shut the car door, got into the driver’s side, and started the engine.
“Enjoy your evening, Miss Pearson,” he said quietly before pulling away from the curb.
All the way home, she was out of breath. As much as she wanted to and as alluring as his looks and wealth were, she just couldn’t do it. She’d given him his money and they were done, but that didn’t stop the panic attack welling up inside of her as she sat on the subway. As she made her way to her apartment, Nik was grabbed by a strong hand.