by S. L. Naeole
He opened his mouth to speak before shaking his head. My eyes dropped to his hands and I frowned at the fists they formed. “You are so important to me, Ri. You’re like the daughter I never had, so when someone hurts you or scares you…”
A wealth of emotions welled up within me and I stood, moving quickly to grab Del by the shoulders and hug him. It was brief, just a momentary touch of arms, shoulders, and the tops of our chests, and he didn’t return the hug—just leaned into it—but it was everything and Del knew that. He let me pull away, let me hide my face with a turn of my head, and let me move to sit behind my desk without uttering a word. The entire scene would have appeared awkward to the bystander, but we both knew how momentous the act was.
“Do you have my itinerary for Montreal?” he finally said when I’d settled into my seat and started fidgeting with the computer’s keyboard.
I lifted my phone and entered the password, the screen lighting up to the home screen. I pressed my thumb on the email app and scrolled down until I saw the email with his flight and hotel details attached. “Yep. Got it right here.”
“If you need anything while I’m gone, you call. I don’t care about the time or the reason.”
“Yes, Dad,” I said playfully.
Without another word he left and I got to work on the computer, bringing up and printing out the inventory for the artwork we had in our humidity-controlled storeroom, or HuCoStore, as we called it. Some of the pieces were a surprise to me, and as I compared the needs list with the restorers I had available, checking their current work status regarding their projects, I felt a pang of envy.
Typing with my left hand and slapping at the keys awkwardly with the fingers of my right should have been enough of a reminder that even if I wasn’t going to be busy with logistical bullshit, I couldn’t do the work that allowed me to get lost and hide from my thoughts, my dreams. But it wasn’t.
“Fuck it,” I mumbled before adding my name to the bottom of the list, just below the last freelancer. I probably wouldn’t have anything left to assign to myself, but I was there, on the list of availability, and that was at least a start.
Nodding in approval of myself, I then began to go over the manifest of the pieces for the AITTIA exhibit, checking off what had been done and what remained. I also checked to make sure that the pieces that needed to be reframed would be inspected by the insurance adjusters within the week since they would need to inspect the artwork both before and after framing to ensure that no damage was caused. I emailed Abigail, who oversaw events and displays, sending her the updated manifest of what was completed and what wasn’t, as well as correcting the spelling of a few of the pieces and their artists so that the nameplates that would go beside each piece would be correct.
When I received a reply with a prospective layout of the exhibit, I couldn’t help but grin; the Degas I worked on would take center stage.
On the desk, a loud vibration pulled me from my momentary elation. My phone was skittering across the surface of the blotter. Annoyed, I grabbed it and then saw that I’d received another text message. Swiping my thumb across the keypad, I unlocked the phone and opened the messages app, my gut plummeting to the floor at the name that appeared there, a name that I knew I’d never added to my contacts.
Michael Lachlan: Whenever you’re ready for lunch, so am I.
Michael Lachlan: Unless you’ve changed your mind.
He had put his name and number in my phone.
The realization made me slightly giddy. I tapped on his name and saw that not only had he entered his name and phone number into my contacts list, he’d also entered his email address, too. Suddenly, a suspicious feeling came over me and I closed out the message app before reopening my email app. I clicked on the sent folder in my work email box but saw only the emails that I’d sent out. Then I clicked on my personal email box and selected the sent folder. There were emails to Kara and Vonne, and a reply to Holly about car shopping tomorrow. And then there it was, an email to a [email protected]. I tapped the email that had been sent, unable to prevent a smile from forming on my lips at what had been written in the subject line: From the girl that is not the boss of me.
Embarrassment bloomed hot and pink in my cheeks before I closed out the email app and reopened the messages app, replying to him before my courage ran out.
Me: How’s about Monday at noon at the café inside the Museum of Arts and Theater?
I rested my phone back on the desk and returned my attention to the computer, taking in slow and deep breaths to try and calm my nervous heart. And then, a buzz. I looked at my phone and this time my smile came on full and wide.
Michael Lachlan: It’s a date.
Saturday and Sunday were spent searching for a car that I could afford but nothing seemed to work. All were too new, and the ones that weren’t wouldn’t have lasted me six months and weren’t worth their four-digit price tags. By the time Vonne, Holly, Kara, Lara, and I came home, I was so exhausted and defeated that I went straight to bed.
Too soon, the alarm on my phone blared loudly, screaming the arrival of six o’clock in the morning. I groaned and turned off the alarm with a slash of my finger on the screen. I could smell coffee already, which was normal since Vonne was always up before everyone else. I hadn’t spoken to her about Tobias’ request, but I knew I’d need to have an answer soon and putting things off wasn’t my style. With a grunt, I sat up and swung my body around, placing my feet on the floor before heading out of my room toward the kitchen.
Vonne was moving like a machine in the kitchen, the portable griddle sitting on the counter covered in bacon on one side and pancakes on the other. A mug of coffee was perched between her fingers as her mouth formed a moue, her breath puffing across the liquid’s steaming surface. She looked up to see me and smiled softly. “Mornin’, hun. Did you sleep well?”
I shrugged before taking a seat on one of the stools lined up in front of the counter. We had no dining table, which meant the counter was where we ate most of our meals that weren’t consumed in the living room. Vonne poured out a mug of coffee and handed it to me before pushing the sugar bowl and the canister of caramel flavored creamer in my direction.
As I prepared my coffee to my liking, I started to speak. “Hey Vonne, you know the gala next month?”
She flipped the pancakes and removed the bacon before answering. “What about it?”
Different scenarios ran through my head as I quickly rifled through what I could say to convince her to go as Tobias’ plus one and the way she’d react to each one. Did I go with brunt honesty? Did I go with sly hints? Did I go with begging? Vonne never dated. At least, I never saw her go on a date. Even while I was in high school, I’d never once heard of her being with anyone. I didn’t know what she liked in a guy or, the more I thought about it, if she even liked guys to begin with.
With an intake of breath, I decided to go with the failsafe: guilt.
“Remember when you spoke to Gladys about my sick leave?”
“Yeah,” she answered as she poured out new disks of batter for more pancakes and slapped on several more strips of bacon onto the griddle. “What, is that old bag giving you shit because of how long you were out? I gave her the doctor’s remarks about how you should be monitored for a few more days.”
I snickered. “No. And she’s only a year older than you are.” I took a sip of my coffee and then snatched a crispy strip of bacon, taking a bite and chewing it before getting to the point. “Truth is, I only had seven sick days available and you put in for eight, so I kind of got in trouble.”
“What? That’s bullshit!” Vonne sputtered before angrily flipping the pancakes, some of the batter spattering out and splashing onto my pajama top. “I’ll take care of this, Ria. I promise.”
“Well,” I started, steeling myself against the forthcoming backlash, “if you mean that then you’ll go to the AITTIA gala with Tobias as his plus one.”
Silence met me. Eerie silence. The kind that allows
you to hear the sizzle of pancakes burning. Then…
“Fine.”
Vonne finished making breakfast but said nothing else to me, her body stiff in its movements. Kara and Lara emerged from their separate rooms, while Holly stumbled out of the room she shared with Vonne, oblivious to the tension between us, and together the five of us ate breakfast in the fog of Monday sleepiness. We all got ready and then I rode silently with Vonne in her late model Honda to MOAT, saying nothing as we parted for our separate wings.
I reminded myself to stop by and talk to her at lunch, to apologize and tell her that she didn’t need to go with Tobias if she didn’t want to, before I buried myself in work for the next few hours. The shipment for the Arizona exhibit arrived and I was neck deep in a very detailed manifest when my phone buzzed. Setting aside the detailed manifesto in my hand, I picked up my phone and squeaked at the text message that was there.
Michael Lachlan: Showed up early if you’re available now.
My eyes darted to the time at the top of my screen and then groaned as I remembered too late about lunch with him. I placed the manifest into its folder and then shut down my computer. I grabbed my purse and phone and then headed out of my office. I took the stairs up the single flight to the first floor where the museum and theater’s entrances were, as well as the gift shop and the café. I could smell ham and garlic, my stomach rumbling as I remembered with glee that Monday’s menu at the café always included ham and spinach quiche with garlic and cucumber sauce.
But then a new hunger appeared in my belly as I caught sight of him, my Shadow Man. He was seated at the countertop bar that faced the wrought iron grated windows which looked out onto the gardens behind MOAT’s art museum. Most people who sat there looked out to take in the sight of the intricate flower artwork formed by the planting of different colored perennials. Shadow Man, however, was turned in his seat, his eyes pinned on the entrance.
Pinned on me.
I suddenly felt very self-conscious of the way I appeared. While he was dressed in a gray suit so dark it might as well have been black, his jacket unbuttoned and draped on the back of the stool, I was wearing my MOAT uniform, a burgundy polo and a khaki pencil skirt with black heeled loafers on bare legs. He looked like sin. I looked like I was going to take his lunch order.
“H-hello,” I said, hating how nervous I sounded as I approached him. Needing a distraction, my gaze quickly drifted to Marta at the counter and nodded before flashing two fingers at her twice. She looked over at Shadow Man and then nodded, an almost imperceptible smirk tilting her lips up before she disappeared behind the kitchen door.
Missing nothing, Shadow Man frowned. “What was that about?”
Taking the stool beside him, I couldn’t help but smile at his reaction, my confidence returning as the familiarity of my surroundings buffered me and boosted my confidence. “Well, you didn’t think I suggested this place because it was neutral territory, did you?”
Surprise flickered in his eyes before he leaned back, his posture stiffening. “Am I going to be poisoned? Is that it?”
I rolled my eyes at him, ignoring the sudden flare of anger that flashed across his face at the act. “And I thought I was the one with the concussion-induced paranoia. Just to ease your mind, I ordered lunch for both of us. Spinach and ham quiche and southern sweet tea to drink.”
He shifted in his seat as he leaned against the counter, his hands clasped near his chest. I blinked and looked up before I witnessed his thumbs doing what I knew they would and regretted it almost immediately. His mossy eyes were almost golden green as he looked at me, the intensity of his gaze almost a glare as once again I was pinned, this time in my seat and unable to move.
“You ordered...for me.”
It was a statement. His voice moved through space and time like the ghost of clouds and thunder, haunting me with its deep rumble that both whispered around me and drowned out all other voices but his. I swallowed at the underwater sensation I felt hearing it, my head moving on its own to bob once in affirmation. A tightness tugged at the corner of his mouth, a movement I didn’t miss despite being trapped by his eyes. “What if I don’t eat eggs? Or ham? What gives you the right to presume what I like to eat and drink?”
That air of authority that drowned each word clanged in my head like a warning bell. Back off, Ria, I told myself. But something about him made it impossible to listen to my conscience. Something about him made me incapable of being…me. “The fact that this is the best quiche you’ll ever eat and the best tea you’ll ever drink is what gives me the right,” I told him with utter conviction. “If I’m wrong, well then it won’t matter because not only am I buying but after we’re done you’ll never have to come here to eat or see me ever again.”
I frowned at the bitterness that coated my last words, the idea of never seeing him again somehow causing them to weigh heavily on my tongue. It made no sense, really. I didn’t even know him. The last thing I wanted—should want—was to see him again. He wasn’t my friend. He wasn’t even an acquaintance. He was the guy who’d hit my car from behind. He’d hacked into my phone. Invaded my privacy.
Touched me.
“And if you’re right?”
Exhaling at his question, I shrugged. “Then you had a great lunch and know a great place to take a date out for quiche and sweet tea. I mean, really. It’s a win-win for you.”
He seemed ready to say something in retort, a thought almost visible on his lips, when Marta arrived with two plates perched on her arm and clutching two mugs of tea in her other hand. She placed the plates and mugs on the counter table and then pulled out utensils and napkins from her apron before setting them beside the plates. “Tuck in,” she told us, giving me a wink before leaving. I swiveled my stool to look at my plate of food, my stomach once again roaring in hunger at the sight and smell of ham and garlic. Home fries sat piled on the plate beside a healthy wedge of steaming quiche. A ramekin with the garlic and cucumber sauce sat between both.
Without waiting for him, I dug into the potatoes, dipping a chunk into the sauce and then shoving the bite into my mouth, groaning at the savory bite of garlic melding with the cool cucumber in the sour cream and yogurt base. I could feel Shadow Man’s eyes on me as I ate, that eerie burning sensation that tickled my skin and sent my heartrate into orbit, but I refused to look at him. Instead, I cut into the quiche with my fork and then dipped that, too, into the sauce before placing it into my mouth.
It was when I reached for my mug to sip my tea that he finally began to eat. I watched him from the side of my eye as he repeated my motions, first stabbing at a chunk of potato and dipping it into the sauce, then following it with a piece of quiche. If I could have done so without being noticed, I would have turned and spent the rest of my time watching him eat. The act of him lifting that fork to his mouth was one of the most erotic things I’d ever seen, his tongue flicking out with each bite to lick the bottom of the utensil in a way that almost mimicked a kiss.
Get a grip, Ria!
With a silent sigh, I focused on my food, enjoying the saltiness of the ham and the green freshness of the spinach even as I grew more and more uncomfortable at the silence that sat between us. I didn’t look at him again, even when I felt the burn of his eyes looking at me once more. When Marta came to refill my mug, I bit back a smile as she reached for his empty one and topped it off. He thanked her, his voice thick with appreciation. She blushed and told him he was very welcome before disappearing again.
It was the first thing he’d said since before our food had arrived and I realized then that despite the satisfied weight of food in my belly, I was starved for his voice. He’d called me sweetheart a million times in my dreams and my ears hungered to hear him say it again. Say anything, really.
As if he could hear my thoughts, he turned in his chair and spoke.
“I don’t like being handled.”
The fork in my hand dropped, clattering loudly on the plate as my head twisted around to look at
him. “Excuse me?”
His eyes were dark, his mouth a strict line of seriousness as he explained. “I like being in control. I need to be in control. I don’t deal well with people thinking they can handle me, thinking they can remove my options and my control. Most people that do so find themselves on my shit list.”
I tried to swallow but my throat was dry. My voice was almost hoarse as I stated, rather than asked, “And I’m on that shit list for ordering you a quiche.” His dark head moved forward a hair, an imperceptible nod that confirmed that I’d “handled” him in his eyes, and that had pissed him off.
Needing no further confirmation, I leaped off the stool, biting back a hiss as my bare legs brushed against his, the feel of his heat beneath his slacks barely perceptible and yet still hot enough to nearly singe me. “My lunch break’s over. Thank you for joining me, Shadow Man,” I said, not caring that I’d just called him the name I’d given him.
I was almost past him when a strong hand gripped my left arm, stopping me from moving. It was as a grip of authority, demonstrating with just the touch of a few fingers and a palm the power and control that existed within them. Instantly, flashes of another grip took over, morphing into a deathly cold reality that filled my vision with unwanted faces and sending sheer terror shooting through my body swifter than lightning. I yanked myself away with a sharp cry and stole a quick look, confusion and relief at the actual face that looked back at me a quick balm to the suffocating terror that swiftly took hold of me once again as my arm throbbed from the memory of his grip, from the memory of dozens of grips.
Blindly, I ran out of the café, a loud buzzing filling my ears as memory twisted reality and all I could feel were cruel hands and pain. Pain everywhere. All I could see were sneers and blood and the glint of something sharp and deadly coming for me, over and over again.