by J. A. Huss
“OK,” Ariel says. “Great.” And then we just stare at each other for a moment. “What?”
I shake myself out of it and smile. “Nothing. Yeah, I’m starving. What are you guys making?”
“Victoria has some Argentinean meal—”
“Aw, fuck.”
“Don’t be an asshole.” Ariel laughs. “Cindy says it smells great and she’s picky. So just relax. You look tense. Are you tense?”
“No,” I say, shrugging. “Not at all. Things are fine. Great, even. The website is having a great month.”
“Hey,” Ariel says, grabbing my shoulder as I try to pass her to go down the stairs. “If something was happening”—she looks me dead in the eyes—“you’d tell me, right?”
“Of course,” I say, smiling in that charming way I like to use against people. “You’re my best and favorite sister. So of course I’d tell you.”
She stares at me a little longer than necessary, which says, without saying, that I’m a bullshitting liar. But she nods and drops it. “OK. Then let’s go eat.”
We hop down the stairs, both pairs of boots clunking on the old wood, and head to the back door once we’re on the first floor. “You wanna ride bitch tonight? Or you gonna walk home?”
She always walks to work. She only lives a few blocks down on Mountain Avenue. Hell, I only live a few blocks down Jefferson in the other direction, but I ride the bike every day. Fuck that walking shit.
“Sure,” Ariel says, smiling at me, making her blue eyes bright in the glow of the yellow-colored streetlamp. “I’ll be your bitch tonight. Why not?”
I shake my head at her. I do trust Ariel to have my back. I should tell her about Katya. Not that she’s ever known anything about us, what we had in the past. But Ariel would not tell anyone. Especially Nolan Delaney.
I don’t though. I don’t say shit. I just hand her my spare helmet, put on mine, and swing my leg over the seat. I kick the starter and walk the bike backwards a little before Ariel settles in behind me.
I take off down the alley, looking up at the condos two buildings down.
I gun the throttle on the bike as I pass.
Making Katya a promise to come back.
Chapter Eight - KATYA
This is the cycle of life.
You struggle, fail, win. Struggle, fail, win. Struggle, fail, win. Nowhere in there is actual success because it’s a cycle and it never ends. What is success? Something final, right? Well, there’s only one final outcome to life so I’m convinced that success does not exist. It’s just struggle, fail, win.
I have won enough times. More times than I ever expected after the complete and total fuck-up that was my teen years.
I have enough money, and a nice-enough car. The condo isn’t mine. I can’t afford something this fine. But I have my own business—regardless of how people view it. It’s legitimate. I pay taxes on it and it has a steady track record of paying the bills.
I am almost free. That’s a big deal. Money is worthless without freedom. Hell, everything is worthless without freedom.
And I’ve been on my own since I was sixteen and I’m still alive, never been to jail, and managed to raise my sister through some turbulent times over the past several years.
So I’ve had a few wins. But it’s the failures that haunt me.
My parents are dead. My dreams shattered. My future as uncertain as it has ever been. I have no love life—have never had a love life aside from Oliver Shrike. And the scar on my neck is a constant reminder of my complete and utter defeat eleven years ago.
Half my life, I realize. I’ve been living with that for half my life. More than half. The anniversary of that incident was a couple weeks ago.
In those last eleven years I had one brief interlude of… not quite happiness, but I’d certainly call it contentment. And that was during the few months I spent with Oliver Shrike back when I was seventeen.
I was minding my own business the day we met. Kind of depressed, filled with hopelessness and defeat, and sitting at a bus stop wearing a mismatched Parson School for Girls uniform—a white silk scarf wrapped around my neck to hide my scar—as I waited for my first client.
He liked underage rich girls, which is why I was wearing the uniform. Lily and I were living in a hotel off Prospect, miles away down near the interstate, and I really needed this job if I was going to keep my promise to get her life back on track.
I can’t even laugh at my level of self-delusion when I think about that day.
I had been doing private camming using the back-door access on the Hook-Me-Up website to make connections, but it wasn’t enough money since I was too young to actually take off my clothes. I wanted everything on the up and up. So it was just dirty talk.
God, I was delusional back then.
Eighteen was only a few months away so I was thinking about building an escort business. Not whoring, not exactly. I didn’t want to sleep with them. I only wanted to fulfill their fantasy. But one goes with the other, doesn’t it?
The guy I was waiting for was a good prospect. He wanted to seduce his daughter’s best friend, he told me. Not for real. He just wanted to live that fantasy… without actually living that fantasy. The threat of a pedophile charge was enough to keep him in check, I guess.
So I agreed to be Charlotte. I went to the Goodwill store down the street and pieced together a school uniform from the Parson School for Girls. We agreed to a time and that bench as the pick-up place, and I sat my ass down to await his offer of a ride home from school.
He was handsome enough for a man in his mid-forties and even though it was not how I planned my life before it all fell apart a few years earlier, I could think of a lot of ways in which things could be worse.
I had a condo lined up for us. Hotels were a no-go for me. I had to keep some semblance of self-respect. So I used the guy’s credit card to get a short-term vacation rental and that’s where we were gonna play out the fantasy. The key was left in a lockbox on the property, so I had picked it up that morning just to keep the fantasy seamless.
I did it all with no feeling whatsoever. Like nothing. I wasn't afraid. I had vetted this man carefully. I had his credit card, did a background check (courtesy of Hook-Me-Up, once again) and had the name of his employer and his wife, just in case I needed to make threats. I also had a gun tucked into the waist of my tartan skirt, hidden by my blue blazer, if I needed a little extra persuasion.
Fool me once, right?
My fingertips automatically go to my neck and I trace the thin white line down to the little dent at the base of my throat.
I wouldn’t be fooled again.
He drove up next to my bus-stop bench in a large black Mercedes. Rolled the window down on the passenger side and said, “Charlotte? Is that you?”
“Oh, hi, Mr. Jones. Yes, it’s me.” I stood up and walked to his car. Leaned into the window, hoping I was flashing the appropriate amount of cleavage to get him excited.
“Do you—”
He was going to ask me if I needed a ride home. And I was going to bite my lip, like I was mulling it over, and then agree and get inside the car with him. We’d chat about my fake best friend relationship with his daughter, school sports, classes… shit like that. He would take me to that vacation rental. And then when we got to “my house” I’d tell him I was afraid of being home alone and might he possibly come inside and keep me company until my father arrived in a few hours.
He was going to agree, of course. And then… well, his fantasy illicit relationship with his daughter’s best friend would start to unfold in the most natural way we could possibly plan. A hand innocently brushing against my leg as we sat on the couch, maybe. Or me stumbling into him, forcing his arms to reach out and steady me. An excuse to pull me close. Kiss me. I did agree to kissing on the first “date”.
We’d have an afternoon of fantasy play. Small touches, maybe fondling each other. Me worrying out loud about my father coming home and getting caught.
&n
bsp; But that’s not how it happened at all.
At least not with him.
Because I spent that afternoon playing out my own, much dirtier fantasy, with Oliver Shrike.
Chapter Nine - OLIVER
Ariel’s massive Victorian house used to belong to my mother’s family. They owned it jointly for like a hundred years or something. Ever since my gramps won it in a card game sometime last century. It’s on Mountain Avenue, the most desirable downtown neighborhood in Fort Collins, and it’s huge, so it’s worth a crap ton.
But Ariel bought it about three years ago after my Uncle Vic had been using it as a seasonal haunted house every Halloween for more than a decade. It looked like a haunted house. Straight-up Munsters, or Amityville Horror, or any of the other insert-iconic-creepy-place-here houses.
Unfortunately for my Uncle, and Ariel too, the house is part of the Fort Collins historical record and could not be renovated without approval. Which is why Vic had a hard time convincing buyers that the million-dollar price tag, as well as the million-dollar renovation, was going to be worth it.
It just so happened that Ariel and I were flush with money that year from the website and she needed a tax writeoff quick.
Eighteen months of missed deadlines and a blown budget later she was ready to move in.
Four months after that the local kids forgot it wasn’t a haunted house anymore and trashed it on Halloween when she was out of town.
Yes, long story short… Ariel lives in a huge six-thousand-square-foot money pit with six bedrooms, seven bathrooms, and it still looks creepy as hell, even though she painted the whole thing pink and white.
The Munsters in Pink. And. White.
It looks like a strawberry milkshake.
Only one of my princess sisters would paint a haunted house pink.
Ariel lives on the other side of College Avenue from me, so I don’t go over that way much. I stick to the office, Shrike Bikes, the tattoo shop, the theater, and my house when I’m in downtown.
So color me surprised when I pull up in front of the Milkshake Mansion and see a twelve-foot-tall inflatable Santa Claus waving at me from the front yard and holding a digital sign that is counting down the days to Christmas.
We get off the bike and take our helmets off.
I give her a look.
She shrugs. “What? These fucking kids around here. I just got one last week asking when we were gonna have a real ax murderer again. Can they not see the bazillion signs all over town telling them the FoCo Theater is the new haunted house? I’m skipping Halloween and going straight to Christmas.”
I shake my head, but she’s already walking up her front sidewalk.
Those kids are probably gonna trash it anyway because an ax murderer is a bazillion times cooler than a strawberry milkshake Santa. But I don’t say that. I just follow her inside.
The aroma of something delicious permeates the air, and since Ariel was in the mood for gutting the entire downstairs when she renovated, you can see the kitchen from the front door, and it’s filled with women.
Victoria and Ellie are doing something at the stove and sipping drinks while they do it. Cindy is sitting at the breakfast bar slurping down what might be a strawberry margarita, and when Ariel approaches, she stands up and hands her one too.
West, Mac, and Pax are sitting at the real bar on the other side of the massive main floor, looking up at a Bronco game with a bottle of Stoli in front of them.
Good to know we’re all gonna be liquored up for this conversation. Because obviously this is a Mister meeting. The only problem is that we’re missing a Mister.
I walk over and take off my leather jacket, draping it over the back of a barstool, and then point to the bottle. “Since when do you drink vodka?”
I’m looking at Pax, since he’s the drinker—which kinda pisses me off, since the last thing I need is his drunk ass as my potential brother-in-law.
But West is the one who answers. “It was a gift,” he says.
“From who?” It’s not her, I tell myself. It’s not her, it’s not her. Every one of these college kids in this town probably drinks Stoli…
“It was in the apartment.”
“My dad’s place?” Hmmm.
“Yup. What’s that condo for, anyway?” Pax asks. “Just a crash pad so he doesn’t have to drive home late at night?”
“Yeah,” I say, still thinking about that bottle. “He’s had it longer than I’ve been alive. Usually he rents it to students but he kicked the last tenants out for partying too much and hasn’t bothered to put it on the market again.”
“Fucking college kids,” Mac says, still looking up at the TV.
“So,” West says.
“So,” the rest of us say back.
“Where the hell is Five?” Pax asks.
“Why would he be here?” I say, pouring myself a drink.
“Um,” Mac says. “Why wouldn’t he be here? I mean, he shows up every other time we seem to have a meeting.”
“Yeah, and we’re in his town,” West says. “So we figured he’d be around.”
“His town?” I laugh into my glass as I drink. “He doesn’t live here.”
“What do you mean?” Mac asks. “Sure he does.”
I squint my eyes at Mac. “Did he tell you that?”
“No. But… you guys are family, right?”
“He’s ten years older than me, man. He doesn’t hang out with me. It’s just business.”
“He doesn’t live here?” Pax asks, going all serious on me. “Where the fuck does he live?”
“I dunno.” I shrug. “He lives all over, I guess. He’s got a house in Vail, I know that. Some place in London, I’m pretty sure.”
“How could you not know where your… fucking… whatever he is, lives?” Pax asks.
“He’s, like, barely a cousin. Our parents are friends. And like I said, he’s ten years older than me. We’ve never been, like… buddies. We don’t hang out, for fuck’s sake. I call him when I need him. And up until this past year, that wasn’t very often.”
“Hmmm,” they all say together.
“That’s weird,” Mac says.
“Whatever,” I say, already bored with this shit. All I want to do is go back to my office and watch that video of Katya over and over and over again. Plan my next move. What will I say? Should I make another video? Find her phone number? Should I go up to that apartment two buildings over and knock on the door?
“Oliver?” Pax is saying.
“What?”
“Jesus Christ, are we boring you? Can’t keep up with the conversation?”
“Just zoning out. What do you want from me?”
“So nothing weird going on here?” West says, taking over.
“Nope. Just the same old small-town bullshit as usual. Work is the same, home is the same. Everything is the same.”
“Well, that’s good news,” West says.
“Makes me nervous,” Mac replies.
“Yeah,” Pax adds. “Like we’re missing something.”
I try to concentrate on the football game. Katya isn’t unusual. Yeah, she’s a girl who came back from my past, but this is Katya. I know her better than she knows herself. I don’t care how long she’s been away, I know her deeply. I know her inside. I know her heart. And every bit of it is good. Not one ounce of her is manipulative or evil. Not one ounce.
If she wanted to fuck me over, she could’ve done it many, many times.
She is clean, she is good, and most of all, she is loyal in the only way that counts. She loves me, I know it. And I love her, she knows it. We’re gonna work out this bullshit that’s happening and come out the other side just fine.
Nothing to worry about here. Nothing to see at all.
“Dinner’s ready!” Ellie calls from the kitchen.
We all get up, hungry and wanting to put the Mister shit behind us. But Pax grabs me by the arm as Mac and West walk off.
“Hey,” he says, leaning into me a litt
le. “We need to talk without the girls after dinner. You got a place we can do that?”
“Well, we can’t leave together from here if you want it to be secret. They’ll follow. Ariel for sure. Victoria probably.”
“So where?” He’s looking at me like this is urgent. “I don’t want Ellie to find out until I tell Mac.”
“Find out what?”
“Where can we talk that won’t make them suspicious?”
I look around the main floor and my eyes stop on the door to Ariel’s office. “In there, I guess. I’ll tell Ariel I need to make a phone call, then you guys follow me in there. I bet they don’t even notice.”
Chapter Ten - KATYA – FOUR YEARS AGO
“Excuse me?”
I cancel my provocative body language and stand up to see what’s happening. A man is walking across the street. A very… good-looking man. Tall, light brown hair, maybe blond in the sun, his arms covered in tattoos and his jeans spotted with rips and tears.
My client startles, redirects his attention from me to the stranger interrupting our business. “Can I help you?” he asks, with that air of superiority some men seem to wear like a coat.
“Do you know this guy?” the stranger asks, having reached the car. He peers over the roof at me.
“Do you mind?” my client says.
“I actually do mind. You see, that’s my house over there and I don’t think it’s appropriate for perverts to pick up schoolgirls at the bus stop while I’m watching.”
My client looks at me. I expect him to explain our story. I’m his daughter’s friend. He’s offering me a ride home.
But he just steps on the gas and leaves.
“That’s right, asshole,” the stranger says, watching the black Mercedes turn the corner a block down until it disappears. “Was he coming on to you?”
“What?” I am so shocked at what just happened, I don’t know how to answer that.
“Did you know that guy? Or was he trying to pick you up?”
“Um…”
“Look, I get it. You probably think you’re old enough to be in control of that situation, but you’re not, OK? He was wearing a wedding ring. Don’t get involved with men like that. Bad news, take it from me.”