by Dirk, Delia
Curves in the Dark
by Delia Dirk
Copyright 2012 Delia Dirk
Cover art by Marcus Ranum
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, events, and locations are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to persons either living or dead is purely coincidental.
There was a screech of metal on metal before the world gave a stomach-turning lurch and lay trembling for long, anxious minutes. Then the lights flickered out.
“Jesus,” choked out the man next to Dominique, “what the hell was that?”
“Are you alright?” she asked. She had stayed upright, but only just.
Some silence and shuffling. Then a terse: “Fell down. Went boom. I'll live.”
“You aren't from around here, are you? I'm pretty sure that was an earthquake.” She sat down heavily so she could ignore her shaking knees. “I've never been in an elevator for one but - - actually, we should probably try to not move as much as possible. I don't know how elevators take earthquakes.”
“I don't know either.” The panic was leeching out of his voice, despite the subject matter. “Aren't these things supposed to have emergency phones or something?”
Dominique could hear him pawing at the elevator wall. “Here, I can -” she pulled out her cell and made a call to her colleague upstairs. The phone's light against her cheek was a signal flare in the darkness of the tiny room.
“Why would they make an elevator without a safety phone or something?” Dominque heard the man mutter under his breath as she talked.
“Right,” she said a few minutes later. “First off, elevators have heavy-duty safety breaks so we're not about to – um – fall down, go boom.” She cringed at the joke before it finished leaving her mouth. “It looks like the power's out in this part of the city. I guess it was pretty bad for everyone. We're going to have to sit tight until they come and get us. Whenever that is.”
He snorted derisively, lighting a spark of anger in Dominique. “I have a sinking suspicion that won't be any time soon.” What the hell was she supposed to make of that?
“Why's that?” Damn this darkness. She couldn't even get a read on him.
“They weren't exactly looking forward to me coming today. Uh, y'know, upstairs.” Was he doing this on purpose?
“What? Dynacorp?” she gibed, “Are you their landlord or something?”
“Or something,” was all he said and there was more shuffling. “Sorry, you know how confidentiality is.”
“Yeah. Funnily enough, I know that really well.” Dominique sighed and ran no-longer trembling fingers through her hair. That didn't mean she wasn't curious as all hell about it, though. “They were definitely looking forward to me today. Hopefully more than they didn't want you. We were closing an important deal, you see,” she said in hopes that the kernel of information would tempt more out of her mysterious companion.
The man didn't respond, however, and somehow the silence was a little strained. Dominique only let it last about half a minute before she decided it was too much.
“Are you Irish, then? British? Welsh?” she asked, since continuing their current trajectory would lead nowhere good.
“Irish. From Galway, but I've been here for almost 25 years now and I've gone a bit native.” He sounded delighted by the change in subject.
“God forbid you start to sound American,” Dominique laughed. Somehow she was almost glad they had no light. It left the conversation feeling somehow unburdened. He didn't know who she was, he couldn't make any assumptions based on what she looked like, and moreover he wouldn't judge her for her weight. That left the option to flirt open for the first time in ages.
“You have no idea. I'm not going to subject you to jokes my family makes. Gun jokes were never funny and they don't get any funnier with repetition. I'm Leo, by the way.”
“Dominique.” He was a talker. She ran into a lot of them in her line of work. The kind of guy with just enough charisma to scrape by and more ego than they'd ever need. Still, it didn't feel forced or fake like a lot of the time when she had to talk to people who obviously had no interest in her. It was a nice change, even if it was entirely based on being blind.
“There's a name I haven't heard in a long time,” he said reflectively, “Are you sure you're not a French nun?”
She laughed and crossed her legs.“I don't know, are you sure you're not about 50 years behind?”
“So is it Dom or Dee or...”
“Dominique, usually.”
“Oh but that's too formal. Still, I guess it's better than the kinda awkward implications of 'Dom', don't you think?” Was he hitting on her? At the very least it was real banter. Dominique wouldn't get half as much with the lights on. Either it'd be forced and trite because they were worried for their careers or it'd be tense mental chess with an associate.
“I think,” Dominique smirked, “I'm stuck in an elevator with a middle-schooler.”
The comment got no acknowledgement from the other side of the elevator. “I like 'Domino' best, I think. It's got that whole 'badass' vibe. Like Domino Harvey, you know? She was a bounty hunter.”
“God, I can't even get you back for this. You might as well be named 'Bob' or 'Jack.'”
This time the silence was comfortable. Familiar. Dominique decided she was very glad not to be stuck here alone, especially since he had given her a little mystery to puzzle over. Even if she did find him a little obnoxious.
“It's been half an hour,” she said, checking her phone.
“Like I said, they're in no hurry to get me out of here. Sorry you've been caught in the crossfire.” Dominique wished she could see his face. It made him really difficult to read, especially for someone with a voice as emotive as his.
“You don't have a water bottle or anything else on you, do you?” she asked.
“No but I do have a bunch of Tic-Tacs.”
“I have a bottle of port that I was going to give to the CEO as a gift but I think that might actually make things worse.”
“At least we're set in case of emergency, then,” Leo commented drily. His face, she decided, was probably as expressive as his voice.
“Not likely,” she snorted, “It's probably worth more than you are.”
“Either you have a remarkably low estimation of my worth or you're here for something more important than I thought.” And of course she couldn't forget the man was sharp. It was becoming clearer and clearer that Dominique would not be in for an easy ride with him. Luckily she thrived on difficulty.
“Definitely important. I hope you didn't think I was someone's secretary.”
“To be honest, I didn't even really see you before the lights went, so I had no idea what to think.”
A silky smile touched Dominique's lips. She couldn't tell if it made it to her voice. “Oh, nothing bad, I hope. We're in the same position, after all. I wouldn't want to have to change my ideas to match yours.”
“Oh but you know more than that about me. You know I moved to the States less than 30 years ago so given my age it was probably for school. You can also take from my age that I'm a practising catholic.”
“And I can tell how old you are without being able to see you?” she said with
a voice dry enough to make the water situation all that much worse.
A breath of a laugh made it to her ears. “You'd be wrong about the Catholic thing anyway. Well, the 'practising' part, at least.”
“You'll never convince me you're Sherlock Holmes at this rate.”
“How do you know I'm not Sherlock Holmes?” he teased gently.
“Well he's supposed to be charismatic for one.”
That one also got ignored as he barrelled on into another thought. “We could trade questions. Better yet, we could trade deductions. You know, to get to know each other better.”
“What? So you can keep doing your bad Holmes impression?” But it wasn't a bad idea. Not at all, since maybe she could work around to figuring out why he was so unwelcome here.
“I'm serious. I think it'd be fun. I want to see what you make of me.” That was definitely too much smugness for one man.
“And what if what I make of you isn't good?”
“I think we both know you wouldn't hesitate to brush me off if you thought badly enough of me, broken elevator or no. I can deduce that much.”
Dominique brimmed with pride at the complement. “I think that counts as a deduction, Leo. That means I get to go first.” The darkness made the whole thing a bit more interesting, if interesting was the right word.
“Let's see,” she began, “you said you moved from Ireland to the US for college. Ireland has some really strong schools, so it's got to be somewhere especially good. Plus you're obviously doing something important today, so you've gotta have a good job. I'm going to say... Ivy League?”
“Good guess.” Dominique pictured a conceding nod. “It was Harvard.”
“Well someone's got to go there, I guess,” she laughed, not unkindly.
“And from your accent and your name I'd say you were from some equivalent of the Hamptons,” he said shrewdly. Entirely too shrewdly for her.
“Wow. It's that obvious?” she asked, her good humour evaporating. “I guess I should put out a PA that I think the whole old money business is bullshit.” D ran a hand through her hair, happy to have the darkness there to separate them. Then again it might have been the reason he could see through her: she didn't exactly look like a fragile socialite. Normally her past wasn't a problem – hell, it was an advantage in the business world – but she didn't want to come off badly to the man and she somehow felt judged.
“It's probably not obvious to an American,” Leo soothed. “I'm just good with accents. Plus I get around a lot. I don't even live here in LA.”
A few of Dominique's feathers unruffled but Leo's quick observation left her feeling raw, not to mention a little too much like lashing out. “Do you travel for work?” she blurted lamely. Not exactly the cutting observation she was going for.
“Yeah. A lot right now and a lot a few years ago but it's not a regular thing.” He must be eager to get off such an uncomfortable subject.
“Like every... four years?” Dominique ventured.
“Oh! That was good. You're right on the money there.”
“Well it's been on everyone's mind lately.” Smugness was quickly disarming her again. “So you work for the president's campaign?”
“Not quite.”
She considered. “The White House?”
“I think you've passed one deduction,” Leo said. D huffed softly. She was on a roll. “My turn.” He hesitated before saying, “You must be in business. That's pretty much a given. You said you were closing a deal with them. Rich girl like you...” and she could practically hear him wince over the misstep, “You must have gone to a good school. Definitely Ivy League as well, if not something in England. Probably Ivy League, though. People like your folks usually like to keep it in the country. Probably have a tradition about the whole thing.” He was rambling. Nervous. It was a bit sweet, really, and kept the subject from being distasteful.
“You sound like you were probably a bit of a rebel, though,” he continued, “so I could be wrong.”
Dominique snorted. “I guess rebel's about right. I started out with a degree in French poetry of all things from NYU. They didn't like that much.”
“Woah I was way off the mark there,” Leo cackled.
“Let me tell you they liked it even less when my boyfriend and I bought a pair of motorcycles and decided to ride off to California – not a trip I'd recommend, by the way. Especially over the rockies. Lots of really bad dirt logging roads.” Dominique wanted a cigarette. Something to smoke on was always good for these kinds of stories.
“But you're in business now.”
“Yeah, but your turn is over.” Dominique was having a remarkably good time of it. Not something she would have expected today. Or, like, ever. “So you work for the White House.”
“Yes.”
“In the White House.”
“Yep.” He should have a cigarette too. This whole conversation would look better if there was smoking involved. Luckily she could supply whatever images she wanted.
She shook her head. “How on Earth does and Irishman get to work for the President?”
Leo breathed a laugh. “Well they don't exactly ban all non-Americans. I'm pretty sure that'd qualify as discrimination.”
“Yeah but aren't something like 90% of those guys lawyers? You can't have an American law degree,” Dominique said skeptically.
“I don't. Do you want to guess what I have or should I just tell you?” He didn't wait for her to guess it and just kept talking. “It's in journalism. I'm the Deputy Communications Director.”
That was just absurd. “So you... write the President's speeches?”
“Yeah, that's part of my job.”
“You're fucking with me, right?” What were the chances of being stuck in an elevator with one of the White House senior staff? Probably about as high as one of them being an Irishman.
“If I were fucking with you, why would I say I was the Deputy Communications Director?” Leo said sharply.
“Because it's more believable.”
“Here – look.” And suddenly there was a piercingly bright light as Leo pulled out his cell phone. Both of them cried out, unprepared for the break in the darkness.
As her vision cleared, Dominique caught a glimpse of soft-looking slightly curly brown hair and dark bedroom eyes before the light was suddenly shoved at her face. It was a Wikipedia page, complete with photo. She was right about the eyes and, my, he did have a blindingly lovely smile. Dominique decided she was right on point with the whole expressive face thing.
“Bit defensive, aren't we?” she teased.
“I don't like being called a liar.” Then the phone was gone and blackness swept back in. “You don't get to read it, though, that'd be too easy. Ruin our game.” Dominique imagined that brilliant grin playing on his lips now.
“Alright then, how does an Irish journalism major get to work with the president?” This had become more of a question and answer session than deductions, hadn't it? Well that threw a wrench into her little plan.
“Ah, ah,” he admonished, “my turn. Now I get to figure out how a biker chick ends up doing big business in LA.”
“More hippie than biker chick, I think,” Dominique corrected him. More Gypsy than hippie, actually, including the whole fortune telling thing.
“They're not mutually exclusive terms. Hm. You must've gone back to school at some point.”
“I went and got a degree in business from Berkley about ten years later than I should have. Turns out it was right up my alley. You'd be surprised how much society balls in New England are like boardroom negotiations.” Her parents had practically pissed themselves in joy over the whole thing.
“That's surprisingly fitting.”
“Yeah. And now it's your turn. How does an Irish immigrant journalist start writing speeches for the president?” Dominique asked, wondering exactly when this had become story time.
“It's actually not very interesting. I went to school with his Chief of Staff. He offered me
the job.”
“Does that mean I get another go?”
“Sure, I guess,” Leo said hesitantly.
“Are you here for campaign donations?” There. Now she was turning this in her direction. Campaign solicitations seemed the most likely reason, though it didn't exactly explain why Dynacorp would be so reluctant to see him.
“Actually I'm visiting my parents. They're here on vacation.”
“But you're working.”
“Something unexpected came up.”
“Something bad,” she said boldly. It had to be something bad if Dynacorp wanted rid of him so much. “They don't want you to get there.”