by TJ Hamilton
“Charlie, please, call me Joe. You look like you’ve been in the wars. Just don’t take my girl too often. I miss her too much.” I slide into Tench’s outstretched arm and wrap my arm around his strong torso. He leans down and presses his lips against my forehead. “Say, Charlie. How about you stay for breakfast?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” Charlie says with a playful yet arrogant inflection.
“I have some work to do, gorgeous.” Tench wipes the corners of his mouth with a napkin as he gets up from the table in the poolside cabana. “Stay as long as you need, Charlie. Have some girly time together. Enjoy this sunshine.” He waves his hand up towards the sun. As he passes my chair, he tilts my chin up and drives his tongue into my mouth in a definite display of ownership. I reciprocate and hold the side of his face in my palm as I plunge into his mouth with long passionate strokes of my own. Right now, I want him to take me to his bedroom and feed the lust that I have for him, but I pull back and stare into his coffee eyes and try to hide my increasing desire. Again, I struggle with myself. I wish he were the one who was dead, not Nick, but the other half of me wishes I’d never learnt how evil Tench really was so that I could just be happy with him.
There’s something different about him today and I just can’t place it. The work mode within me kicks in and I smell something’s wrong with Tench. There’s reservation in all his actions this morning. They’re subtle but I can tell. I hope you’re watching this, Liz. I need to get the message to her to let her know that something’s up with Tench.
Charlie stares at Tench’s ass as it bounces snuggly inside his shorts when he walks away from us. Charlie’s mouth dramatically drops open just as Tench disappears inside.
“And you wanted to leave here because?”
I glare back at Charlie. “Because he might have something to do with Sally’s murder.” My voice is low. The fact that I’m talking quietly makes me wonder whether Tench is running his own surveillance around his mansion, or am I just becoming paranoid from being in this job? Better to be safe than sorry, I guess. I need to quiz Liz about that.
Charlie’s brow furrows. “And do you know about Sally for sure?”
I shake my head. “That’s what I’m going to try and find out.” I hate lying to Charlie.
“Don’t do anything stupid.” His overactive brow now furrows in a scowl.
Too late!
“Let’s get some swimming cozzies from next door and we’ll go for a swim … or is your eye too infected for that?” I screw my nose up at the thought.
Charlie chuckles. “I’ll just sunbake on the side for today.”
I pick out a Zimmerman black strapless bikini top and floral bottoms from the rack of swimwear in the cabana, change into them, then leap towards the pool and dive straight in. I pray for the water to wash away the emotional rollercoaster ride inside my head. I roll over underwater and stare up at the distorted reflection of the surface above. If I focus and get this job over and done with then I can be free. I want to feel as free as I do in the suspended weightlessness of the water … or I can just stay here. I close my eyes and imagine what it would be like to just float away.
My lungs beg for oxygen so I push off from the bottom of the pool and spring above the surface. Charlie frowns at me from the sun lounge. “That’s not the answer, you know.”
A smile rises across my face. He knows me too well. I launch out of the pool and lay the towel out across the sun lounge next to Charlie. I look around me quickly to see if anyone is lurking around the mansion or on the terrace near us.
“So, I’m having issues in the bedroom with Joe.”
Charlie sits up. He raises his sunglasses. “I knew there had to be something wrong with him. I never thought I’d hear those words come out of your mouth … ever. What’s the problem, kitty-cat? Let Uncle Charlie help you,” he says as he pats my laid out towel.
I chuckle and lay down on the lounge. “Tench loves to be in control …”
“Go figure.” Charlie rolls his eyes.
“So I want to let him be in control of me—as in, I want to be submissive in the bedroom so that I can manipulate him more outside the bedroom, if you know what I mean?”
Charlie smiles. “Now you have me interested. Go on.”
“But when I start to let him do what he wants, he stops. I don’t get it. I thought he would love it.”
Charlie lays his head back against the lounge and shakes his head. “That is his control. Gah, you women, seriously. I thought you would know men better than this, Mi.”
I think about Charlie’s words for a moment. He’s right, as usual. The fact that I am so willing to give myself to him is all part of the game. He liked me better when I wasn’t so submissive. He wants to take whatever he wants from me when I’m unwilling to give it. For fuck’s sake! Why can’t this ever just be easy? I’m so grateful for having a friend like Charlie in my life. He’s my real knight in shining armour. I don’t know how I’m going to continue on in the world without him. I couldn’t just leave Charlie, and it would break my heart to think that he thought I was dead.
I’m going to have to tell him the truth. I don’t care what Liz and my brother think. I know Charlie better than them, and I want him to get the fuck away from Tench and me before it gets dangerous. If Tench ever became suspicious of me, then Charlie would be in serious danger anyway. So when the time is right, I’m going to have to tell Charlie everything. I can send him to that Seychelles place my brother was talking about, and meet him there later.
“You know you’re the real love of my life, Charlie.” I smile into the sky above me as I lay towards the sun.
“Honey, if I wasn’t gay I would’ve married you the moment I met you.”
I smile and relax into the sunshine, and think about my next moves with Tench. The dance studio flashes before my eyes and a sudden epiphany has me knowing exactly what I should do.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Charlie leaves the mansion just as the sun falls towards the city’s west. I wave as his car disappears down the drive. The moment it’s out of sight, I turn my attention back to the dance studio and go to my bedroom to pick out an outfit that’s just right for the occasion. I slip into a tight black leotard with a lace detail on the back. I’ve always carried a leotard around with me, and have loved buying new ones ever since I was a ballerina, but I never actually wore them. I had no reason to, until now.
I don’t know if Tench is still around the mansion, but I head to the dance studio and take the chance that he is. This is the one room that I’m glad the agency will never have access to.
I slowly push the door open and the smell of the wooden floorboards sends a flurry of memories back to me. My heart starts to race as I remember the dream I had about hiding in here with Tench looking for me. My fear of the studio stills me and I pause for a moment. I need to overcome these fears, and make them my tools.
I inhale the woody air and dim the lights to a soft glow. I press play on the control just inside the door. A song is selected at random and one that I remember from the soundtrack of Kill Bill. I let out a subtle puff of air in amusement. The track is called About Her, a remixed version of a song about a dangerous woman. A male slowly sings about no one telling him about “her”. How ironic. The main character in the movie was an assassin. But unlike her, I don’t want to kill Tench because of my broken heart. I want him to suffer every day that he lives. I want him to know what I’m doing with him now was all part of the operation to take him down. I want him to hurt as much as my heart does right now.
I step up to the barre along the mirrored wall opposite me, and start stretching and swaying into my battements. I repeat the sequence of movements until I’ve warmed up my muscles. The practised movements come back to me in a flash, as if I’d never stopped doing them at all. It’s been at least eight years since I’ve danced ballet. The last time I did any form of dance was around a pole for men to throw money at me at the end of it.
I extend my leg out in front of
me and bend my back leg down in a demi-plié. As I spin into a pirouette, the music slows down and another song starts. Strong piano cords play a tune over and over before a man’s beautiful solid voice sings about not knowing what to do without his love and how he loves her curves and all her edges. I love the lyrics and close my eyes and spin and leap through the darkness of the room. I’m lost in the music and think of Nick with every word that’s sung. Every piece of me evolves into my movements and it all comes back to me so naturally. I reach up onto the balls of my feet and spin in a mild version of theFouetté rond de jambe. I close my eyes again as I spin around and around, letting the words of the song flood my mind with images of Nick. His smile, his eyes, his arms wrapped around me. I will always carry these memories with me forever, and I’ll never let them fade.
The music slows down to the final words the singer repeats the line about giving all of me. I sink down onto the floor and kneel as my breath attempts to catch up with it self. Tench’s slow loud claps rip me out of my fantasy and straight back into the rawness of reality. My eyes shoot open and catch Tench’s stare from the doorway. My heart quickens. I can’t do this right now. I don’t want to. I’ve just been fantasising about my dead boyfriend while dancing in a dark room. This is not what I intended to happen here.
I push up onto my feet and make my way over to Tench, shoving the emotions inside me into the darkness of my heart again. I lift my hand up towards Tench to run my fingers through his hair like I always do, but he snatches hold of my wrist just before I touch him. He holds it still and squeezes it tight. I try and pull it from his grip but he’s too strong.
“What’s up with you?” I think I just failed at sounding nonchalant.
Tench smiles, but there’s no love in his smile. I can see he’s not happy. Something is wrong with him today. What if he knows about me?
“You know what this room does to me Miranda. Why did you come in here?” He jerks me roughly over to the barre. My heart quickens and I feel my body start to tremble. I need to pull myself together … but there’s something about Tench that makes me fearful right now.
He places my hands down onto the ballet barre and pulls at my loose bun. My hair unravels and I see his eyes narrow.
“I don’t like what you do to me, Miranda.” He speaks in almost a growl as he grips onto a fist of my hair.
He rips my head back and I’m restricted in this position. My heart is in my throat and my knees shake involuntarily.
“So now I’m going to show you what you do to me, and you’re not going to like it.”
I stare at him in the mirror but don’t say a word. A tear falls from my eye and catches the light on the way down my cheek, but I daren’t take my eyes off his. My nostrils flare as they draw in as much oxygen as possible to calm my terror. He’s not going to take from me anymore. He twists my hair and brushes it over my shoulder so that it’s hanging down the front of my chest. He runs something soft up the front of my body. I look down but he shoves my head back against him again.
“Uh-uh,” he whispers.
He pulls a red silk sash up and slides it across my face before he wraps it around my exposed neck. I hold my breath and continue watching him. I can’t move. This is my fear. He’s found it.
He ties the sash into a slipknot at the back and pulls softly on it. I cough subtly from the unfamiliar restriction around my airway, and the corner of his lips curl up as a smile sweeps across his face. I want my mind to take me away from here. I can’t deal with this right now.
I stare at Tench’s eyes, and everything else around him becomes a welcomed blur. The music in the background is a cool beat playing and a sultrily voiced man is singing about melting his happiness because he has some kind of fucked up mess. Thank God for music in my life at times like this, or else I would be some kind of fucked up mess, or maybe I am anyway?
The ripping of my leotard interrupts my hapless mind. Tench bends me forward just as I feel him slam into me without another moment’s thought. He fills me with an indescribable strangeness. My whole body tenses in reaction. I don’t know whether to stop this situation or encourage it. I don’t know how to feel. Now I have Tench right where I wanted him, but this is far from a victory. I watch his eyes as they take in every inch of me. When he catches my eye he pulls tighter on the sash.
“You look like you’re enjoying this too much, Miranda.” He continues to pound into me from behind.
I hear my body pulse in my ears and my head feels heavy as the sash tightens. My eyelids droop and I feel myself slipping away, but I don’t want him to win so I focus on staying conscious while he roughly slams himself into me with angry, punishing strokes. I try to swallow but I can’t; the sash is too tight around my neck. My legs start to give way and all my senses begin to fade. I grip onto the ballet barre and use it to stay upright and push back into his blows. The rhythmic thrust of Tench slamming in and out of me is the only thing keeping me conscious in this moment, so I focus on that. My mind doesn’t register whether I’m actually enjoying this or not—it can’t do anything other than maintaining consciousness. I stare back into his eyes in the mirror until they finally narrow in frustration. Tench wraps his hand around the sash once more and pulls tighter so that it now constricts me into a feeling that I can’t stop. The ballet barre becomes loose under my palms and I give in to the darkness as I fail to draw another breath.
My heavy eyelids lift slowly. I’m on my side on the wooden floor of the ballet room in the recovery position. Tench and the red sash flash before my eyes like a snapshot as I register where I am. I push up from the floor and look around the dark room. Tench is nowhere to be seen, and neither is the red silk sash. I put my hand to my neck and look at myself in the mirror. There’s not a single mark on my neck. Tench knew what he was doing. This is all part of his game.
I don’t know what to feel now. Unlike last time I was left on the hard wooden floor by Tench, I don’t feel sadness. I don’t even feel disgusted with myself. My next movements are crucial in this game of control. He’s not taking anything from me that I’m not willing to give. I pull at the remnants of the black leotard around my body, throw it across the floor, and leave the room without so much as a glance behind me. I casually stroll naked along the open hallway towards my own bedroom at the end. I open the door to find my small Louis Vuitton suitcase on the bed with a note on top of it. Does he want me gone? Have I gone too far with Tench? Does he know who I really am? I cautiously approach the note and pick it up.
We leave for Russia tonight at 22:10.
Your bag has been packed. You won’t need anything else. Dress warm.
I love you, Miranda.
I screw my nose up at the last four words. What he feels for me isn’t love; it’s fucked up. I fling my bag open and see that my clothes have been prepacked. I’m not surprised. Control freak. I need some more gadgets from Liz to take with me on the plane undetected.
“Liz. If you’re listening, meet at the Opera House in twenty minutes. Take my car and park it there,” I say into the air, hoping Liz can hear me through the bugs I planted within the room.
I pull on a grey long, tight dress made of T-shirt material and tie a denim jacket around my waist. I slide my feet into my favourite Cons and head downstairs to find Tench.
“You need to sort him out, Dima.” I hear Tench talking.
The second I recognise the name Dima and slow my descent.
“We don’t need any of this shit to get out, so you have him sorted out before I get in on Thursday. I don’t care if he’s your brother; between him and Luka, they’re asking for trouble.”
Jackpot! I want to squeal. Tench has just mentioned three out of the four top suspects in the agency’s sights. He’s finally letting his guard down. It’s worked! I need to get to Liz now. I bound down the stairs as if my day couldn’t be better and stop at the top of the foyer, in front of Tench. I look up at him and patiently wait for his phone call to end, which takes all of ten seconds.
&nbs
p; “See you Thursday.” He shoves his phone in his pocket before the other person can reply. “Where are you off to? We have a plane to catch in two hours.”
I smile sweetly, disguising the true reason for my happiness as usual. “Exactly. So I just want to pick my car up from the Opera House where I left it and bring it back here. Can Toni drop me off, please?”
Tench’s whole face softens and he lets out a breath. “Of course. You seem happy.” He runs his hand across my face, wraps it around the back of my head and pulls me toward him.
“Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?” I bite on the inside of my cheeks and force out another smile.
His soft lips press up against my forehead and he trails kisses down to my lips. He licks around the edge of my lips. I close my eyes and welcome the feeling. Parting my lips, I suck on his bottom lip and kiss him back with all the reserved passion that I can conjure up. I wish he were always gentle like this. He slows his tongues strokes and pauses for a moment.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” he whispers into my mouth.
I nod twice and kiss him with even more passion than before. In a parallel universe, I probably could love this Tench.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Range Rover pulls into one of the parks under the Opera House. Toni moves to get out of the car.
I don’t need him anywhere near me right now. “It’s alright, Toni, stay where you are. I can let myself out.”
My informality stuns his movement. “Okay Miss Miranda … but I’ve gotta stay here and follow you home ... The boss said I have to.” He shrugs apologetically.
I smile and bat my lids. “That’s not a problem, Toni. I shouldn’t be long. I just need to find Charlie to get my keys. I’ll meet you here shortly. Okay?”
He beams a smile and winks. I know my act has won him over. I slide out of the back seat and make my way towards the girl at the stage door desk. She instantly recognises me from before.