by Stacy Gail
“If I come up with some baby clothes that somehow define House Of Payne, I know a baby and a toddler with parents who would be all for their kids being models. Would that be okay?” When this was greeted with silence and appalled looks from her competitors, Essie cleared her throat and gamely forged ahead. “I mean… it’s just that there’s a huge margin when it comes to baby clothes. It doesn’t cost much to make, considering the small amount of fabric that’s used, but I know a lot of parents would pay whatever you asked to get something from the House. In fact, the parents of these particular kids are insisting I design some exclusive House Of Payne playwear for their one-year-old son and two-year-old daughter. They basically want to show off to their fellow parents at the play park—parents who obviously aren’t as cool as they are.”
“Outstanding.” From looking borderline-murderous, Payne smiled and once again relaxed back against the desk. “Yeah, sure, as far as I’m concerned children’s clothes and baby wear are just more potential lines that you, the designers, can explore if that’s what you want to do. Just remember that I want both male and female versions of whatever you create. Now, if that’s all, feel free to hang out and soak up everything you can about House Of Payne.”
With that obvious dismissal, Essie clutched her book and hopped to her feet, careful not to look at anyone as she headed for the door. Before she could get there, Ezekiel Steele beat her to it, pulling the door open wide.
“Thank you.” She barely managed to push the words out, and she flat-out refused to look his way as she went through. She wasn’t exactly anxious to see the contempt that had been in his eyes like last time, and she sure as hell didn’t want to see the pity she feared would be there now.
Pretending he didn’t exist was the only option she had left, and she was totally comfortable with that.
Moving out into the common area outside Payne’s office, she glanced toward the frosted glass tattoo booths with the idea of dropping in on either Twist or Angel. But the discreet lights over their doors were both lit, indicating they were already hard at work slinging ink. So much for that idea, she thought, checking her watch. Since it was a couple hours before lunch, she’d do what Payne suggested and hang around for inspirational purposes while waiting—
“Would you like me to walk you to your car?”
For the second time, she nearly jumped into orbit at Ezekiel Steele’s unexpected closeness. She snapped around and found him only a foot away rather than holding the door open for the others, like she’d assumed. Before she could brace herself for the impact, her gaze slammed into his, and all at once she couldn’t remember how to make her lungs work.
Neither contempt nor pity were in those light eyes, just a detached sort of interest she couldn’t begin to read. “Oh. No, I’m going to hang around for a while.”
He didn’t move. “So that’s it? There’s nothing else you want to say to me?”
The words fuck off came to mind so clearly she could taste them. “How about good-bye?”
“How about thank you?”
It was a wonder her jaw didn’t dislocate, it dropped open so hard. “For what?”
“You’re still here. What’s more, I think it’s obvious you’re the frontrunner in Payne’s mind, since you’re the only one who knows how to keep it professional. That wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t pulled you back on-course. Throwing some gratitude my way wouldn’t be out of line.”
“You…I…” She’d been speechless before in her life, but that had been due to physical injury. This type of speechlessness was infinitely more frustrating. “You must have been dropped on your head when you were little, if that’s what you think. Either that, or you’re the one who needs a drug test.”
“So, you’re saying you’re not grateful that I talked you into staying in the competition? That’s pretty cold.”
“Talked me into…” Something snapped inside, and she tried to broil him alive with the heat of her glare. “You called me a stupid, uninteresting wallflower, you epic dick. The only reason you’re still alive is because I don’t have enough money to hire a hitman.”
“Like I said, I talked you into it.”
Wow. Just wow. “If that’s what you think happened, you need to check yourself into rehab like, yesterday. You didn’t talk me into anything.”
“You’re a fighter, Estella Santiago.” His voice was so low it garnered her full attention, despite the fact that she wanted to leave this first-class prick in the dust. Her gaze lingered on his mouth and those charmingly upturned corners. Just her luck, the jerk had a yummy-looking mouth. Sometimes life wasn’t at all fair. “Fighting isn’t something you plan to do, or strategize over. Being a fighter is just who you are.”
“Huh.” She rolled her eyes in lieu of kicking him in the shins. “That awkward moment when a stranger mistakenly thinks he knows you.”
“You didn’t fight Payne’s rules, or Scout’s pleas to stay, because there was nothing to fight against. A soft touch defeats you. But the moment you’re faced with a challenge—or an insult or two that pisses you off—you absolutely will not stop until you’re the last one standing.”
“Oh, really? That’s the excuse you’re going with to explain your shitty behavior?”
“No excuses. It’s the truth.”
“So, let me get this straight.” Grimly she forced her attention from his fabulous mouth, to instead focus on his equally fabulous eyes. “You’re hoping to pass off your jumbo-sized jackassery as a way of helping me? And better yet, you expect me to believe you did this, helping someone you don’t even know, out of the goodness of your sweet little heart?”
“You’re still here, aren’t you?”
“You really must think I’m as stupid as you said. We’re strangers, pal. Even if it’s impossible to believe you’d give a damn about whether or not I stayed in this stupid contest, there’s no way you could have known that antagonizing me would provoke me into doing an about-face. You don’t know me.”
“Don’t be so sure about that. Every employee at the House, including your brother, has had a thorough background check. Those background checks were done by me.”
She’d figured as much. “That doesn’t mean you know who I am. You might know my official history through Twist, I’ll give you that. But you don’t know me, who I really am behind those facts.”
“Here are the facts.” Again he gave her that side-eye, showing her an almost complete profile of the unscarred side of his face. “During the summer of your sixteenth year, a co-worker of Twist’s dropped in, claiming to be looking for your brother. You were home alone, but as he was a friend of the family who had been invited in several times before, you did the natural thing and opened the door to him. You were then sexually and physically tortured for hours in the privacy of your own home with no one to hear your screams.”
Essie flinched. To hear him speak so unemotionally of the hell she’d been put through at the hands of a demon in human skin was like getting stabbed. Did he know that hearing a stranger talk about her assault out of the blue like that was akin to tearing her flesh open with his bare hands?
If he knew—and he’d done it anyway—that made him almost as cruel as her attacker, Zane Hildebrandt.
“Those are the facts.” She nodded once, and the cold in her voice bit into her until she fought to keep from shivering. “Facts like that don’t exactly scream out fighter, now do they? If it had been an actual fight, I would have been the total loser, getting knocked out with the very first blow—the door hitting my face, in case you were wondering.”
“Depends on how you look at it. That animal crushed your face in—about half of it is now metal plating and implants, thanks to nearly a dozen reconstructive surgeries. That beating alone should have killed you, but it didn’t. So he tried strangling you, causing permanent damage to the nerves in your larynx. But you still didn’t die. Your brother Nick came home unexpectedly, putting an end to the attack, and shortly thereafter that monster was c
aught by Twist and nearly killed, an act which landed your brother in prison. Once you were released from the hospital, you were shipped down to an aunt in Texas to fully recuperate, as you understandably couldn’t bear to step foot in that house ever again. Your parents were able to sell that property about a year later, but by then you’d settled into your new life in Austin, and had a team of doctors working on getting you rehabilitated back to where you needed to be. Those are the facts and they tell me one hell of a lot about you. Do you know what they tell me?”
“That I was a frigging moron to open the door to that monster in the first place, and that I’m a terrible judge of character?”
“You don’t give up.” He swung around to face her fully once more, and there was something so fierce in his gaze it had the power to nail her to the spot. “I spent nearly a decade in combat duty, and I’ve never known any soldier to go through what you’ve gone through. Not one. And you did it without any physical or psychological training. You were just a kid enjoying a lazy summer day at home when you were plunged into an all-out fight for your life. It wasn’t a conscious decision on your part to not give up. It just happened. That means you’re a fighter who’ll never quit when pushed. So I pushed you. You didn’t quit.”
It was a struggle, but she pushed the horrors of her past to the side in order to focus on him. “So you decided being a total asshole was the best way to give me a helping hand. Is that what you’re saying?”
“Obviously.”
“Obviously to you. To me, you just came off as the supreme king of all dickheads.”
“I’m good with that, because hey, being supreme king of anything sounds kind of awesome. But mainly because being the supreme king of all dickheads got you back into the contest. Do I get crown with that, by the way?”
“What you almost got was my foot up your ass.”
“If those are my only choices, I’d prefer a crown. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m still standing here waiting for my thank you, Estella.”
“I hate the name Estella.” She heard the confusion in her tone, and wondered if her expression matched it. Probably. Maybe it was crazy for her to believe him, but… she kind of did. She didn’t want to, since basically hating his guts was what he deserved. But when he looked into her eyes as if daring her to call him a liar, she had the strangest feeling he was telling her the truth. “I was named after Estella Havisham, a character I personally cannot stand, so I prefer Essie.”
“Essie.” He said it as though he’d closed some kind of deal with her and was satisfied about it in a big way. Then he cocked his head. “Still waiting over here.”
“Thank you.” She swallowed, to make sure her voice didn’t fade at the last. “I mean, I guess.”
“You guess?”
“News flash, pal—it’s no fun being called names. But considering the outcome, I’m glad I didn’t bail.”
“You wouldn’t have,” came the offhand response, as if it was already a foregone conclusion in his mind. “You would have come back on your own. For one thing, you’re the only one I’ve seen so far who’s shown any sign of enthusiasm over designing for this thing. You’re always making notations in your book.”
“And designs. Though most of them center around either my brother’s work or Angel’s.” Before she could think better of it, she opened her sketchbook to show him a sketch of a snowflake cutout design on sleeves for a shirt that matched Angel’s winter wonderland work. On the opposite page was her brother’s famous hooded cobra running up the back of a fitted black hoodie so the hood itself was the cobra’s head. “I guess I should try to incorporate other tattooists into what I’m doing, just to be balanced.”
“I’d wear that. I’ve got a lot of hoodies, but if I had that one, I wouldn’t wear the others.” He pointed to the hoodie, then ran a curious finger over the ragged edge of the sketchbook’s cover. “You’ve had this a while.”
“My personal talisman.” She closed the ringed binder and smoothed a hand over the familiar leather cover. “My Aunt Victoria gave me this sketchbook after I moved down to Texas. I couldn’t speak, and I couldn’t manage to focus my eyes for any length of time. This book gave me something to work on, as well as distract me from smashing mirrors.”
“Smashing mirrors?”
“Uh, yeah.” She grimaced, mortified. Sure, why not just pour out her whole screwed-up life story to this total stranger? Clearly it was important to see just how awkward she could make this situation. “I smashed every mirror that came within reach. The monster that I’d become…I didn’t recognize my face, so I just couldn’t handle mirrors. Not back then, anyway.”
Something terrible in his eyes surfaced. It was a strange mixture of bitterness and pity that was hard for her heart to take. “You weren’t the monster.” Again he gave her his profile as he looked away, this time to rub an absent hand over one side of his face. “You were never the monster.”
“Try to convince a once-pretty teenage girl of that when she can’t recognize her own reflection.”
“You’re still pretty. You’re beautiful.”
“Well, uh, I…thank you.” Shockwaves rolled through her so hard they nearly knocked her off her feet, and it took her a moment to realize why. No man had ever said those words to her before. Her father and brothers, sure, but they didn’t count. Ezekiel Steele was definitely a man who counted. Even if she couldn’t believe words said out of pity and kindness, it still knocked her flat on her ass to hear them. “Um…since I was hard to communicate with during that time, my aunt gave me this book so I wouldn’t drown inside myself.”
“Interesting way of putting it. Or maybe I should say accurate.”
“At first I thought it was a stupid idea, putting whatever was inside me down on paper. What was inside of me was so awful, no one would want to see it or read it. But eventually this book became everything to me. It was my way of communicating with the people around me as well as being my outlet. Ultimately it gave me something to focus all my energy on. Even if it was just drawing, it gave me something I could hang onto, even when I wanted to die.” Then she winced. Wow. Just when she thought she couldn’t get any worse, she went and gabbed about a fun subject like death. “Okay, share-time’s over. Forgive my awkward social skills. I don’t get out of my head very much to be amongst actual people. I’m sure I’ve now convinced you that while I do have a few screws loose, I’m nowhere near the fighter you thought I was.”
“You’re still here,” he said simply, his tone gruff. “You’re not the first to curse the fighting spirit that kept you anchored to a life you didn’t want after that life changed. What matters is that you’re still here.”
She blinked, shocked he understood. “That’s what I keep telling myself.”
“I hope you listen when you tell yourself that.”
“Absolutely.” She nodded firmly, making sure she didn’t sound self-pitying. She’d gone down that road once long ago, and it had been so all-consuming in its darkness that she now made a conscious effort to avoid it whenever it popped up. She might be stuck on a lonely road with no off-ramps, but she didn’t have to drive herself into the dark. “I’m lucky to be alive, and luckier still to be doing what I love, which is creating. So, um… thanks again for keeping me on track, Ezekiel.”
“Steele.” Those upward tilting corners of his mouth curled even more, and for no reason her heart pulled off a slow-rolling somersault. “I don’t like my name either, though I’m glad you remembered it. Just call me Steele.”
“Steele.” She tried it out, and discovered she liked how it felt rolling off her tongue. “That’s a cool name. I think it suits—”
Out of the corner of her eye she saw movement, but it didn’t register that it was the door to Twist’s booth opening until he arrowed straight at them like a sister-seeking, overprotective brother missile.
“Meeting’s over already? Great timing. Why don’t you come downstairs with me and my client and keep me company while he
pays up? No need for you to hang around up here all alone waiting for me.” An arm came around her shoulders, and before she knew what was happening, Twist had her marching toward the stairs.
“I wasn’t alone, I was talking to someone.” Appalled at Twist’s rude behavior, Essie twisted around to yell an apology to Steele, but he was already walking away.
Chapter Five
David Bowie’s “Fame” pulsed overhead as Essie entered House Of Payne’s gift shop. She’d managed to escape the confines of her brother’s frosted glass tattoo booth when a client had arrived for a session, but up to that point Twist had been on a stranger-danger rant. A rant, moreover, that had become his favorite thing in the world since he’d dragged her away from Steele days ago.
Clearly, Twist thought she was a child.
She wasn’t an idiot. When it came to her safety, she understood the very real trauma that still existed in the dark corners of Twist’s soul. She had it too. But at some point they all had to step out of the horrible shadow of the past and into a new day. That was what she’d decided to do when she’d moved back to Chicago, where her attack had happened. It was past time that she started living a normal life, and embracing every aspect of it to the fullest. That meant getting a job, hopefully at House Of Payne.
At this point, she’d take just about any job that came her way, she thought wryly, browsing through the gift shop’s shelves. Since she’d come back home, not a single dime had been put into her savings. Two months from now, when this crazy competition came to an end, her savings would be just about done as well. If she didn’t win, she’d be broke with no job in sight, and no doubt moving into her parents’ house until she got a job.
Nothing said loser quite like moving back home with Mommy and Daddy.
She had to win, she thought, her preoccupied gaze falling on a display of colorful mugs. She had to dig deep for every lesson she’d ever learned in both fashion design and in theater to create wearable statements that conveyed what House Of Payne was all about. If she didn’t, she’d be ruined.