by Zara Cox
“Two weeks.”
“And you don’t know whose company you work for?”
I shrug. “I wash plates and glasses in the basement,” I murmur.
He stares me up and down, his mouth twitching with disdain. “Figures,” he mutters under his breath.
I swallow the anger that rises and force my fists not to ball. “If you wouldn’t mind pointing him out to me, I’d appreciate it.”
His gaze doesn’t move from mine. “Mr. Quinn Blackwood is sitting in his usual seat by the north window. He doesn’t like being spoken to, so don’t try to be clever and engage him in any form of chitchat. He takes his coffee with a dash of cream and two sprinkles of cardamom, in that order. Stir without touching the sides or bottom of the cup and leave it in front of him along with his meal. Think you can manage that?”
“Of course,” I respond briskly, while frantically memorizing the list.
I know firsthand what craziness power and wealth induces in people, but what the chef’s describing borders on the ridiculous. But I’m in no position to complain. Sully has promised more money for working up here today. Pandering to some rich dude’s peculiar lunch ritual will go a little way to increasing my chances of survival for a few more days.
While the chef returns to hovering over the poor minion who is preparing the tray, I look around again, trying to find my bearings. Where the hell is north? Geography wasn’t a strong subject in school. In fact, the only thing I excelled in was math and English, both of which account for zero when all you’re required to do is suck cock or lie on your back and zone out until whatever asshole on top of you is done.
My gaze frantically swings back and forth, trying to work out the exact position of the sun. On the third pass, I freeze.
He’s sitting beneath a window, sure, but then so are three other stylishly dressed guys. But while the other men are talking into cell phones or tapping away on tablets, this man is staring straight at the view.
I can only see the back of his head, but even that grips my attention. The slant of sunlight hits dark, glossy hair and lights up the silky, wavy strands that caress the collar of his grey suit. Whoever he is, he could easily be a top contender for a shampoo ad with that hair. My gaze drops to broad, well-muscled shoulders and thick arms. It’s clear, even from across the room that this man takes care of his physique. His seated position means I can’t see the rest of him, but as I watch him, I realize what has absorbed my attention.
He’s deathly still.
Despite the hum of activity round him, he hasn’t moved a muscle. It’s disarming enough to send a shiver down my spine. And I know, even without bruising my brain by further trying to work out which way is north, that he is Quinn Blackwood.
“Remember my instructions, Plate Girl?”
I jerk around, and stare down at the tray. Everything is laid out in pristine condition. China and silver that I’m sure costs more than Clayton’s prized hot rod sits at exact angles from each other. “Yes.”
“Lay it out precisely as it is on the tray. And come back here. You’ll wait until he’s done, then clear his table. Understood?”
I nod. He hands the tray to me. I take a step forward and realize my legs are shaking. I pause, take a deep breath.
It’s just food. It’s just a goddamn tray of food.
I make my way to where he’s sitting. The table next to his is unoccupied. I set the tray down on it and take the time to work out the angles and distances.
I pick up the gold-rimmed porcelain plate with the distinctive Tiffany blue pattern, and turn.
My breath dissolves to nothing.
Holy heaven above.
He’s…beautiful. Easily, the most hauntingly captivating man I’ve ever seen.
Quinn Blackwood doesn’t acknowledge me. He’s staring at the view, although his gaze is narrowed and lowered, stopping me from seeing the exact color of his eyes. But the square jaw, the dimple in his chin, the sculptured curvature of his cheekbones, all align into a face that is so visually and powerfully stunning, my limbs slack in shock, before blood pumps full bore through my veins.
He blinks, still without looking at or acknowledging me, but the tiny movement draws my attention to his lashes. Long, curved. Perfect.
And his mouth…
Jesus.
For a second, I wonder if I’m back in my alternate universe, where my life isn’t in danger and a million dollars is truly within touching distance. Is this another hallucination? If so, I never want to wake up this time.
My gaze drops to his hands. They’re big, a little out of proportion with the rest of him, but they in no way detract from the magnificent package.
As I stand there, caught in a web of what I can truthfully term as my very first genuine sexual arousal, his eyelids flutter. His chest continues to rise and fall in even, unhurried exhalations, but a spark of awareness lances through the air.
Perhaps it’s another dimension of this weird hallucination. But whatever it is, it takes hold of me, fires through my body to the very soles of my feet and back up again. My mouth dries and I firmly refuse my body’s urge to blink. I don’t want him to disappear. I don’t want him to be a figment of my imagination. Just for a little while, I desperately want this feeling to replace the constant fear that blankets me.
I’m not sure how long I stand there.
His forefinger taps once. Twice.
The movement jumpstarts my spatial awareness. My fingers tighten on the plate when I feel it slip in my clammy grip. I take a hurried step forward and set it down before him. I instinctively know not to step into his light, so I arrange the place setting from the side of his table, his profile a constant threat to my equilibrium. Somehow, I manage to finish laying the table.
I recall and follow the instructions about his coffee and when I’m done, I step back reluctantly.
“Thank you,” he murmurs. His voice is low, coarse, as if he hasn’t used it in a while.
The sexy tenor of it shivers over my skin and I’m stuck in a vivid loop of imagining how it would sound were he to murmur something hot and incredibly inappropriate in my ear.
From the corner of my eye, I see the chef and servers looking my way. It’s clear I’m at risk of crossing some sacred server-employee line. Fighting everything inside me to avoid another torrid glance at Quinn Blackwood, I grab the tray, clutch it to my chest. “You’re welcome,” I reply before I remember that I’m not supposed to address him.
I risk a glance at him, gauging to see if I’ve earned a black mark.
His gaze doesn’t stray from the view, but he reaches for the pristine napkin, unfolds it with a viciously sexy snap, and drapes it over his lap. There’s an animal grace in that move that almost halts the step I’m about to take.
But the chef is rounding the counter, heading my way. I unfreeze myself and hurry away from the table.
He intercepts me halfway across the room. “Serve him and return to the kitchen. That was your brief!” he hisses at me.
“And that’s what I did,” I clip out.
“No, it was most certainly not what you did. You were just standing there, gawping at him like a decapitated fish,” he snarls.
The heat that rises up my face is unavoidable. “I just…” I pause, because what can I say? That the man is a visually arresting masterpiece? That he’s the first ever member of the opposite sex to make my panties damp just by existing? That even now, the urge to turn around, feast my eyes on him again is proving almost impossible to resist? I clear my throat. “It won’t happen again.”
“No, it won’t. That is not how we do things here, Miss Plate Washer. Now, are you able to follow simple instructions or would you like to return to more familiar subterranean surroundings?” he sneers.
The money, Lucky. Think of the money. “I want to stay and work.”
He stares at me, thin-lipped, for a handful of seconds, then thumbs the opposite side of the restaurant from where Quinn Blackwood is sitting. “Tables need cl
earing over there. Try not to break anything. Each plates costs more than you’ll earn washing plates in a year.”
I lower my head and walk away, reminding myself why I can’t let anger take over. It burns like a bitch, but I’ve learned the hard way that in a fight for survival, there is no place for pride. I have to let some things go.
I stack used plates from three tables in quick succession and return them to the kitchen. As I return from retrieving the remaining dishes, my gaze swings to Quinn Blackwood’s table. His gaze is still glued to the view, but he lifts his coffee to drain the cup.
I can’t help myself. I stop and stare.
There are men who command attention for varied reasons.
From the way everyone around him gives him a wide berth, I get the feeling this man commands visceral awe and respect without lifting a finger.
He sets the cup down and rises. Sunlight bathes him from head to toe.
He’s tall, over six feet, and my initial assessment that he’s a man who takes his physical wellbeing seriously is evidenced by his streamlined physique. Every inch of Quinn Blackwood demands attention. I realize I’m staring again and rouse myself as he fastens the single button on his business suit and turns away from the table.
The moment I start to cross the room with my heaped tray of dirty glasses, I know our paths will collide.
I should stop. Turn away. Lower my head.
But I keep moving, my feet gripped with unbreakable compulsion. My gaze drops to adjust the tray, but I sense the moment his lands on me.
The sensation is electrifying enough to snap my head back up.
He’s smooth, I’ll give him that. But I witness the tiny stumble when our shadows merge. Glimpse the ephemeral hesitation that tenses his body before he regains absolute control of himself.
It is worth absolutely nothing to me in my life’s ultimately fucked up dynamic, but a tiny part of me frees itself from debilitating terror long enough to perform the smallest of cartwheels.
That is until our eyes meet.
Eyes of piercing silver blue surrounded by a jagged ring of black stare at me. My cartwheel disintegrates and I wonder if this is why everyone avoids this man.
Quinn Blackwood’s eyes are soulless pools.
Staring into them is like staring into a bottomless abyss in the middle of a post-apocalyptic nightmare.
Something inside me wants to recoil, but I can’t look away. The power of his stare is extremely hypnotic. I stand, frozen, as he remains in front of me.
“Your name.” It’s not a question. It bristles with ultimate power, and demands an answer.
“L…umm, Elly.”
“You served me.”
“Yes.”
He stares for a fistful of heartbeats. “Thank you, Elly.”
“Yeah…sure.”
He walks way without a backward glance, leaving me with a strong notion of what it feels like to be a victim of mind control.
Because Quinn Blackwood, in those thirty seconds he pinned me with his eyes, could’ve talked me into doing anything for him.
I return the tray to the kitchen in a daze. Although I do my job, I remain in a mild fugue state until Chef Fancy Pants dismisses me from his lofty kingdom.
Sully calls me into his office when I return downstairs and hands me an envelope. Inside I find two hundred dollars, enough to secure a roof over my head and food for a week if I’m careful. I form the appropriate words of thanks, but when he dismisses me, I hardly recall changing my clothes and leaving Blackwood Tower.
The incident upstairs still has me in its grip.
I regain my common sense long enough to mind my surroundings as I take the subway back to Queens. I devour half of the leftover sandwiches I took from the rec room and wash it down with a can of soda, then shower with tepid water from a barely functioning showerhead.
There was no time to pack personal items when I fled The Villa, save for a couple of precious keepsakes, one of which is a picture of my mother and me, taken on my sixth birthday. I fish it out of my backpack and stare at it beneath the harsh motel room light.
She was stunning. According to some of the girls at The Villa who knew her back in the day, she used to be Clayton’s prized whore until she messed around behind his back. Knowing Clayton Getty, I’m not exactly sure how she managed to talk him into letting her stay at The Villa after I was born.
I lie back on the bed that stinks of urine and other unthinkable fluids, clutching the picture. Out of the meager possessions I grew up with, I know why I’m hanging on to the photo.
Amid the telltale signs of her losing battle with alcohol abuse, there’s hope in Renee Gilbert’s face. She didn’t give up hope despite Clayton Getty’s single-minded mission to turn her life into a living hell. It was that hope with which she clung to my hand.
Despite the futility of my situation, a part of me desperately channels that hope.
Eventually, my body and mind let go of the perpetual fear long enough for me to fall asleep.
I jerk awake somewhere around two a.m., heart hammering. The glaring lightbulb blinds me for a few seconds before my eyesight adjusts. I raise the picture from my chest and stare at my mother’s face, wondering if my fate will echo hers and we’ll both perish at the hands of Clayton Getty.
As my fingers glide over the glass, another face slides into my mind.
Quinn Blackwood.
There’s no room in my life to ponder other people’s shit, but I find myself intrigued all the same.
His body.
His deathly stillness.
His mouth.
His unwavering focus on the view.
His soulless eyes…
My breath catches. Mild shock engulfs me as I set the picture aside to watch my nipples peak beneath the T-shirt I wore to bed. I’m semi-fascinated by my body’s reaction. Enough to jerk upright in bed seconds later when I feel a distinct tingle between my thighs.
What the fuck is wrong with you, Lucky?
He’s hot, granted. But he’s clearly fucked up in that special way only rich, powerful people can be, despite having the world at their feet. Fantasizing about Quinn Blackwood will bring me nowhere near finding a way to get Clayton off my back.
In a last-ditch act of desperation, I grab my phone, take a deep breath and turn it on.
My heart leaps into my throat when the mail sign pops onto the screen. Fingers shaking, I press it.
Monday. 6pm. Midtown. Be punctual.
5
THE SCOUT
She walks in at 6pm on Monday.
I watch her through the monitors, and finally admit to myself what I’ve shrugged off all weekend. The unexpected twist of her turning up at Blackwood Tower has turned the tide in her favor.
Lucky. Elly. And whatever the hell other names she has tucked beneath that cheap uniform and velvety skin, has managed to achieve the impossible; she piqued my interest for a second time.
There’s a deliciousness in knowing she could be serving me by day without knowing I’d be fucking her by night. That unanticipated morsel has elevated my mood from deadly lethargy to mere languor since Friday.
Well, that and keeping Maxwell twisting in the wind.
Avoiding Maxwell won’t last, of course. He won’t let it. He’s never been great with being ignored. And after almost a week of unanswered summons, it’s only a matter of time before that particular bough breaks. Languor fades, and I imagine I can feel something.
The intercom next to my elbow buzzes from the team I have waiting next door. “She’s here. Shall I take her in and explain the procedure to her?” Fionnella Smith, the team leader asks.
“Not yet. I want to talk to her for a minute. I’ll send her out when I’m done.”
“Okay.”
I slide my voice distorter into place and wait.
She’s shown into the room five minutes later. She pauses at the door. Her eyes warily assess the room, her body poised with more than a hint of self-protection. Intrigue hei
ghtens.
She’s scared of something. Or someone.
The urge to bloody myself with her secrets escalates.
I cross my legs and wait for her to enter. When she doesn’t, I speak, “It’s good to see you again. Come in, Lucky. No one’s going to bite you today.”
The provocative words achieve the desired results. She steps in and shuts the door behind her, while one eyebrow spikes. “No one’s going to bite me any day.”
“Is that your definitive view on the subject of biting?”
She drops her tiny backpack and pulls out the chair in front of the camera, a frown crawling over her exquisite features. “Do I get docked points if I say no?”
“This isn’t a game show, Lucky. I merely want to assess your boundaries. I bite sometimes when I fuck. Will that be a problem?”
Heat engulfs her face, and her fingers drum on the table before rising to curl around the ends of her ponytail. One shoulder lifts. “I’m okay with it, I guess, as long as you don’t draw blood.”
“Noted.”
Her gaze flickers for a second, then she does what I’ve wanted her to do since she walked in. She stares straight into the camera. She’s better composed now than she was in my executive restaurant on Friday. She’s had time to prepare for this meeting whereas then, her reaction to me was raw and unfettered.
I muse over the possibilities as I stare back at her.
Eventually, the question spills out, “So, I’ve got the gig?”
I pause for a long minute. “Yes, Lucky, you have the gig.”
The sharp breath she takes is curious. Her expression isn’t one of happiness or the ecstasy of gluttony satisfied. It’s overwhelming relief that stems from abated terror, like a person snatched back from the jaws of certain death.
Her whole body trembles with the release of the paralyzing feeling. Her lower lip quivers, but she kills the telltale action by catching it between her teeth and gnawing on it.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me just yet, Lucky. There’s a reason I’m paying you a million dollars for your time. You will be fucked with, and not always in ways you’ll find…pleasant.”