Текст книги "Mischief in Miami "
Автор книги: Nicole Williams
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Great Exploitations
Copyright © 2013 Nicole Williams
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events of persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All Rights Reserved.
68 80 71 82 79 85 80 32 69 88 67 76 85 83 73 86 69
Cover Design by Sarah Hansen of Okay Creations
Editing by Cassie Robertson
Formatting by JT Formatting
TABLE OF CONTENTS
The Beginning
The Meet
The Greet
The Heat
The Sheets
The Sweet
TEMPTATION AND FREEDOM. You might not find any relation between those two concepts, but in my world, they go hand-in-hand. In my world, we’ve discovered a way to market temptation, and freedom is calculated and strategized.
In my world, we sell both.
We’re known as the Eves, a tongue-in-cheek tribute to the woman who had the temptation thing down. You won’t hear about us in the news, or on the streets, or in the papers. Your best friend’s cousin didn’t grow up with one of us, and we weren’t in the same sorority as you.
We’re the hiccups in society. We’re women without names. Our fingerprints can’t be traced. We’re invisible.
How do we do this?
We hide in plain sight.
You might pass us every single day. You might serve us our morning coffee or fit us for a cocktail dress. You might swipe our membership card at the gym or wax our most private of parts.
You might think you can read me like a book, but you’d be as wrong as everyone before you who tried.
Eves don’t do personal. We don’t do happy hours, book clubs, or girls’ nights. We don’t rent apartments. We don’t keep a P.O. Box. We never get put on a case where our old acquaintances might be. We cut off all ties with our past. We don’t do boyfriends, boy-toys, or one-night stands.
I deal in one thing and one thing only. It consumes my life. It consumes me.
I generate temptation in order to impart freedom.
A freedom I was denied.
How do I manipulate the temptation/freedom equation?
I pluck the apple from the tree.
In twenty-first century terms?
Infidelity.
Yes, I know that right after the word adultery, infidelity is one of the most controversial and hated words. Just thinking about it can make a woman squirm in her seat. But if you remove all the emotion and bias, it’s nothing more than a word. The act behind that word is something else entirely. It can be unplanned, spontaneous, unintentional, or in my case, calculated.
We’re not a charity, and we don’t work pro bono. We charge a pretty penny, but I haven’t run across a Client yet who didn’t think the service we provide was worth every cent. Before anyone goes and calls the women’s movement on us, hear me out. It isn’t the men we’re benefitting with the service we provide. It’s the women. The wives, specifically.
Our Clients are the women who fell in love with a man with enough dollar signs behind his name to require a pre-nuptial agreement. That same woman who, months or years later, finds her beloved husband isn’t the loving, honest, and faithful person she’d hoped (perhaps, naively) he’d be. That same woman who would come out on the other end of a divorce with nothing. Not one damn dime because she fell in love, signed her name on some document, and the mister with a wandering eye and dick couldn’t keep either to himself.
That is where the Eves come in. That is where I come in. It’s what I know. It’s what I’m good at. And it’s what’s going to pave the road for my own freedom.
I’m in the business of great exploitations.
IF I HAD a dollar for every time the Meet took place at some posh, upper-crust spa, I could have made a down payment on the BMW 640 convertible I was zipping around in. Of course, with the balance in my international bank account, I could have purchased it outright, along with a dozen of its luxury counterparts. Even if I wanted to own the flashy, sex-on-wheels car I was cruising in, buying it was out of the question.
Car ownership meant titles, which meant personal information.
The car belongs to G. I think. G’s the top-dog. She’s the president, CEO, gate-keeper, and founder of the Eves. She discovered each of us, recruited us, and went on to train us. She gives us our marching orders and monitors us. We report back to her. Basically, she’s the almighty, omniscient, in G we trust. I don’t know what G stands for, or if it stands for anything, but I like to think of it as being short for The Godmother.
She watches over all of us, making sure our needs are met, but don’t piss her off unless you want to find a horse head between your sheets. I’ve followed that rule from day one, and it hasn’t yet steered me wrong.
G found me five years ago. Alone. Scared. Close to rock bottom. She picked me up, made me dust myself off, and trained me to be one of the most successful Eves in her little black book.
She’d never admit it, but I knew I was one of her favorites. She reluctantly dotes on me—that’s why I got the Miami case when it came up. She knows I’m a sucker for warm weather and white-sand beaches. After my four-week stint in Lansing during a particularly harsh winter, I needed a trip south. I felt the heat and humidity soothing my skin even inside of the car. I’d never taken longer than a month to finish a job, but I wouldn’t have minded if this one ran longer.
When I pulled up to the spa where I was meeting the Client, the only parking option was valet. A super posh spa was to be expected when the Client’s an Eight. After a string of Sevens, it was about goddamned time I got an Eight.
Errands were named after the number of digits in the bank account involved in the Errand, or in laymen’s terms, job. If you were to look up the definition of errand—a short journey undertaken in order to deliver or collect something, often on someone else's behalf—that’s pretty much the exact definition of what we do.
A Seven Errand is basically a dime a dozen, Eights crop up a few times a year, and a Nine is practically unheard of. The last Nine one of the Eves worked was over three years earlier.
And Tens . . . well, they’re completely unheard of. Tens are the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow that’s always just out of reach. If I landed myself a Ten job, I’d be set. My retirement fund would be fully funded, and I’d be out. I’d be free.
A Ten would mean a fifty million payout. A twenty-five million take-home for the Eve and the other twenty-five to G and the “business.”
After working so many Sevens with a five-hundred-K fifty-fifty split, I was ready for something big. However, one doesn’t simply stumble upon a Ten. Tens don’t fall into your lap. Plus, I never knew what my next job would be. Maybe after wrapping up the Eight up for a one million fifty-fifty split, G would have a nice, fat Nine she’d be willing to send my way.
But it wasn’t time to dream of Nines and Tens. It was time to kick-start an Eight. Game time.
The valet who loped up to my car when I stopped in front of the spa doors flashed me a smile. I moved my sunglasses back onto my head, grabbed my purse, and slid out of my seat when he opened the door.
His smile shifted higher on one side. “Hello, ma’am.”
“Good morning.” I returned his smile with a small one of my own. He had a case of the ogly eyes, a PG way of saying something about me made his dick twitch. I was trained to notice those kinds of things—it was what made me good at my job—but this cute young man wasn’t the one whose dick I needed to get to do anything.
I handed him a twenty, grabbed my briefcase, and started for the spa entrance.
“I get off at three,” he said after me, confidence oozing from his tone.
When I glanced back at him, his expression was as confident as his voice . . . and I got it. I got where that confidence came from. He was good-looking, built, and had a killer smile. Women rarely turned him down. He was confident and obviously unused to rejection. Basically, he was the young, poor, valet version of what I deal with every day. He couldn’t be much younger than I was, but when I looked in his eyes, I felt old.
Old enough to be his great-great grandmother. So I looked away.
“And I get off on something else entirely,” I replied before whisking through the revolving doors.
I didn’t look back; I never did. Even if I had wanted to let that boy bend me over the hood of my car, that went against the rules. My body wasn’t my own to do whatever I wanted with it. It was on lease to the Eves until the day I retired or, lord forbid, the day I was disavowed.
I’d only known of one Eve to have been disavowed. She was found dead in a back alley a week later. I didn’t believe in coincidences, that one, which G assured me was one, included.
I shook off all thoughts of disavowing and back alleys as I meandered inside. The spa didn’t even try to be understated. From the floors, to the lighting, to the large, counter-shaped aquarium of a front desk, everything was ostentatious. I guessed if you would pay five bills for an eyebrow waxing or fifteen for a seaweed and gold dust body wrap, ostentatious was the theme of the whole shebang.
“Namaste,” the woman in a red silk kimono said as I approached the aquarium-slash-counter.
Even the greeting was ostentatious. Or was it more pretentious? It was something ‘tious.
“Howdy-do,” I said, just because I couldn’t resist.
“Did you have an appointment?” From her tone, she sounded as though she’d wound those chopsticks into her bun a bit too tightly.
“I’m meeting Mrs. Silva.” I wished I had a piece of bubble gum I could pop in my mouth just so I could chomp it loudly in her face.
The woman pursed her lips and scrolled through the tablet in her hands. “She should have just finished up her European facial, so she’ll be in the waxing wing.”
I didn’t even hide my smile. The place had a waxing wing.
They took hair removal seriously.
“Is there a room number I should be on the lookout for? Maybe a map and compass you could loan me in case I get lost?” I usually tried to stay professional when I was “on the clock,” but this chick was too much fun.
If lips could get more pursed, I’d never seen it. “Right this way,” she said, whisking out from behind the counter.
I followed that fury of red silk to, indeed, the waxing wing. From the size of the spa, they probably had wings for everything else, too.
When she stopped outside of a door, she knocked once, then opened the door a crack. “Your guest has arrived, Mrs. Silva. Would you like to see her now or would you like me to have her wait in the visitor’s lounge?” I didn’t need two guesses to know where red-silk-kimono wanted to put me.
“Send her in,” a soft voice replied. I’d never spoken with Mrs. Silva, but her voice sounded exactly like the rest of my Clients at their Meet: shaky, hesitant, a shade below scared-shitless. That was good. I’d be worried if I ever met a confident Client.
The woman opened the door farther and gave me a Fine look before stepping aside.
I gave her an overdone smile as I slipped inside. “Namaste.”
That Fine look flew five rungs up to an impressive Fuck you.
Pissing off stick-up-their-ass bitches = perk of the job.
After slipping inside, I closed the door. Mrs. Silva was reclined on a table and mid-wince. I wasn’t sure if that was due to me or the waxer about to rip a strip from her calf.
The woman tore that strip off, and Mrs. Silva flinched. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d flinched over a waxing. I barely blinked when the final strip of my last Brazilian was torn off.
“Hello, Mrs. Silva,” I said formally. “It’s nice to meet you.” I gave the waxer, who was busy preparing another strip, a purposeful look.
Thankfully, Mrs. Silva caught it. “Sara, could you give us a few minutes alone, please?”
With a nod, Sara headed for the door. Once we were alone, Mrs. Silva cleared her throat and adjusted her robe, but she didn’t make eye contact with me. Again, that was nothing new. I’d never known any of the “Mrs. Silvas” before to be able to look me in the eye.
Maybe it was because they were ashamed of our cloak and dagger arrangement, or maybe it was because they knew I would be in bed with their husband soon, or maybe it was because they were just so beaten down by life they couldn’t look anyone in the eyes anymore. I didn’t know, and I’d never asked because, quite frankly, I didn’t care.
I wasn’t a shrink. I provided a service. A means to an end.
“You’re younger than I would have thought,” she said.
“Oh?” I’d heard that one a bunch, too. When Eves went to a Meet, we didn’t dress the part. In fact, we tried to dress the opposite part so, god forbid, if anyone tried to prove a link between the Mr., the Mrs. and the mistress, the woman I looked like with the Mrs. would be the total opposite of the woman I looked like with the Mr. With Mrs. Silva, I wore no makeup, hair in a loose braid, a simple cotton dress, and sandals with no heel. With Mr. Silva . . . well, that would be a different story. “If it’s any consolation, I’ve never come across a man who has an issue with a younger woman.”
I hadn’t meant that as a jab but as a fact to reassure her. I might as well have slapped her from the pain flashing across her face.
She stared absently at the sparkling rock on her left hand. “No, I’m sure you haven’t.”
“Do you have the file?” Enough small talk. Time to get down to the reason I was there.
Mrs. Silva lifted her chin at the chair across the room. “It’s the manila folder inside my bag.”
I dialed the access code into my briefcase as I headed toward her bag. “Everything’s in there?”
“Yes,” she replied, “I think so.”
I made a face only because my back was to her. “You think so? We’re not going to get this done with you just thinking so, Mrs. Silva.” I pulled the thick folder from her bag and lifted it. “Is. Everything. In. Here?”
“It is.” Her voice took on that tell-tale wobble. That twinge of nostalgia for the good days with her soon-to-be ex combined with the overtone of what-the-hell-am-I-doing? The surest way to get rid of the wobble before it turned into anything more was to barge ahead.
Once I’d stuffed the file inside my briefcase, I slid out one of the shiny black phones. “Here’s your phone.” I held it up for her to see before dropping it into her bag. “You only use it to call or text me, and it had better be an emergency if you do call or text me. Okay?”
Mrs. Silva nodded her head. A nod wouldn’t cut it. We weren’t playing a child’s game of truth or dare; the job was an intricate task that needed to be meticulously executed in order for all of the chips to fall just the way we were orchestrating them.
“Okay, Mrs. Silva?” There was an edge to my voice when I repeated the question.
“Okay,” she said, bobbing her head. She couldn’t look away from the ring on her left hand. Too bad she hadn’t gotten cold feet on her wedding day instead.
I continued, so familiar with the speech I felt like a flight attendant giving the pre-flight spiel. “My number’s programmed in there. I will text you four times and four times only. You won’t talk to me or see me after today.” One meeting, that was it. Eve rule number two? Keep contact with the Client to an absolute minimum. Why? Each wife might have contracted us to do the job, but they were women trying to divorce their husbands for cheating, which meant jealousy ran deep and heavy in the blood. The less they saw of the woman about to seduce their husband, the better. “I will send you a G when I’ve made contact with your husband. I will text you an H for when I’ve got him on the hook. I will text you a time and an address where the Errand will be finalized, and I will text you a V when it’s done.”
“Errand?Finalized?” Mrs. Silva’s eyebrows came together. “Why don’t we just call a spade a spade and exchange finalizing the Errand for you fucking my husband?”
Bitterness. We were moving right along the roller coaster of emotions at the Meet. Only a couple more to go, and I’d be out of there.
I kept calm because it served no purpose for both women to become emotional. “If you want to call it like it is, I think finalizing the Errand would be better characterized as me fucking your husband because you want out, you want your cut, and you hired me to.” I arched an eyebrow and approached her. “Since we’ve got that out of the way, may we continue?”
Oh, and there it was. The first tear.
Sadness: check.
“How can you be so calm? How can you stand there and pretend I’m asking you to do nothing more than drop my husband’s shirts off at the dry cleaners?” she said, flailing her hands about as she struggled to catch her breath. We were getting close to the next one: mild hysteria.
My instinct was to hug her, or grab her hand, to offer some measure of comfort. But I didn’t. I wasn’t one of the best because I’d turned off my instincts; I was one of the best because I’d learned how to manage them.
Don’t get personal.
I’d held to that rule, and it had never done me wrong. Offering comfort was too personal. Tough love was even too personal. I strived for apathetic logic.
“I stay calm because emotion is a handicap,” I explained, clasping my hands to keep from reaching out. “I’m not pretending when I behave like you’ve hired me to do something no more intimate than dropping your husband’s shirts off at the Laundromat. There is no feeling in what I do. No intimacy in what I share. It’s sex. The act removed of any and all emotion.”
Mrs. Silva gave a little huff and shook her head. “Sorry, sweetheart, but sex is intimate no matter how you try to slice it.” Mrs. Silva no longer struggled to calm her breathing. She was back at sad.
I made a non-committal shrug. It had been so long since I’d had “intimate” sex, I forgot what it felt like. I’d forgotten how it felt to fall apart with someone I loved. “Not the kind I have. Sex for me is like a French kiss with a bit more skin and sweat.”
She closed her eyes, almost cringing at my words. “I’ll take your word for it.”
Okay, time to shift the conversation. Avoid talking about the actual seducing and sexing of the Target.
“Once I’ve sent you the time and location where I’ll final—” Mrs. Silva flashed me a quick look of warning. Fine. She wants it straight, I’ll give it to her straight. It wasn’t me I was softening the truth for. “Where I’ll be fucking your husband”—to her credit, Mrs. Silva didn’t flinch—“get ahold of your private investigator, detective, photographer, or whoever it is you’ve got lined up to catch us in the act, and make sure they’re there. You’ve got one chance. Make sure the Contact you’ve hired will be there because I will not be happy, and G will not be happy, if you drop the ball.” I paused, hoping she’d look me in the eyes so I could impress upon her the seriousness of our conversation. She wouldn’t look anywhere but at that ring of hers. “I’m the person who does their job. Make sure you are, too.”
After a few moments, Mrs. Silva tightened the belt on her bathrobe and sat up taller. “Anything else?”
Ah, there it was. We were almost done. She’d almost reached acceptance. Once we were there, I was out.
“Yeah, there is,” I said as I snapped my briefcase closed. “I’m sure G pounded it into you already, but in case you missed any of the keep-quiet-or-else speech, here’s a recap. Don’t. Say. Anything. About. The. Eves. Not to your Contact, not to your mother, not to your B.F.F., not to your priest, and not even to your little fee-fee dog. We help you now, you help us by keeping silent in the future.” To date, not a single Client had slipped, but if one ever did, the fallout would be disastrous.
Mrs. Silva almost smiled, although it wasn’t a particularly friendly one. “Not to mention I help you out by paying you.”
Look who was playing the moral high-road game now? I hadn’t seen that rebuttal coming from the mostly sad and silent Mrs. Silva, and I could usually spot a holier-than-thou show before I stepped foot into the Meet room.
“Not to mention we’re helping you come out on the other end of a divorce with fifty percent of your husband’s worth.” I made my way to the door. I had a file to study, and Mrs. Silva had legs to be waxed. “I’d say that’s the gift that keeps on giving for the rest of your life. Wouldn’t you, Mrs. Silva?”
She laughed tightly. “You and G aren’t nearly as intimidating as you think you are.”
Oh, dear god. Right after the actual act of screwing the Target, the Meet was my least favorite part of the whole gig. “That’s because you just met us. This isn’t a threat, and it’s not a warning. It’s the truth. Get your divorce, take your money, and forget about us.”
“Just don’t forget to pay you, right?”
I knew she was trying to ruffle my feathers. So many had tried before her, and like her, every one of them had failed. To ruffle my feathers, they had to have some sort of emotional pull over me. My Clients didn’t. Neither did my Targets.
“You can forget if you want,” I said, giving her a tilted smile. “But G won’t.”
Mrs. Silva chuckled again. Not quite as much ice but still enough to make the room a bit chilly. “My husband’s careful—discreet,” she said, and there it was: acceptance. I saw it in her eyes after she’d finally managed to look me in mine. I was out. “He won’t just tumble into bed if you bat your eyes at him. I hope you’re good.”
No wife ever wanted to know just how good I was.
“You and I wouldn’t be here now if I wasn’t.” Before I slipped out of the door, I worked up a small smile. Less than five minutes we’d ever speak to one another, and yet, two lives were affected by that handful of minutes. It had taken me some getting used to at first, but eventually, the goodbye smile came naturally. The smile that said I’m sorry, Good luck, and Nice doing business all at the same time. “Goodbye, Mrs. Silva.”
“Goodbye . . .”—interrupted by a long sigh—“Eve.”
I closed the door and headed down the hall. Clients never knew our names. Our real names or the names we took on for the Errand. It was easier when there wasn’t a name. Names were personal. Even fake ones.
After navigating my way down the wax “wing,” I headed past the aquarium counter and red-silk-kimono girl again. Plastering on a smile, I folded my hands beneath my chin, made a small bow, and said, “Namaste” in as saccharine a way as I could.
If not for the guests milling about the waiting area, I was certain kimono girl would have flipped me off or tried scratching my eyes out. I couldn’t be sure, but her brand of pissed was especially impressive.
Since it wasn’t past three o’clock yet, guess who was first in line when I whisked out of the spa doors?
“Hey, Romeo,” I said, totally unaffected by the panty-melting smile he gave me. I was too jaded by men to be affected by a smile. A smile was never just a smile. “Anytime today.”
Grabbing my keys from the valet box, his smile jacked a little higher as he jogged by. “Anytime, any day.”
I withheld the eye roll that wanted to follow. The guy had a pick-up line for everything. I was sure if I told him to go get bent, he would turn it around into some sort of illicit proposition.
As he ran toward the valet lot, I took the opportunity to check him out. Really, he had one of the finest asses known to woman. The rule was I couldn’t touch, not that I couldn’t look and looking was the only male satisfaction I got these days.
Valet Look-Can’t-Touch was just about out of sight when someone else whisked out of the spa doors. I had to do a double-take because, other than being a little shorter, she looked an awful lot like I did. Or I had before I’d become an Eve. After five years of being dyed, weaved, cut, sculpted, molded, nipped, and tucked, I’d almost forgotten what I’d started out like. But forgetting was impossible with that woman pacing beside me with her cell to her ear.
The resemblance was . . . uncanny.
“You know my situation, Mar,” clone girl said into the phone, not exactly trying to be discreet. “Unless I want to lose everything, I’m going to live, wrinkle, and die with that sorry excuse for a man.”
Even when I was “off the clock,” I never really was. More than half of our business came from these kinds of happenstance encounters. Blatantly wealthy woman bitching on the phone, or to her hair stylist, or to the poor waiter, et cetera when an Eve or G was in earshot.
I was already unlocking my briefcase when she paced my way. “Why don’t I just leave him? Why. Don’t. I. Just. Leave. Him?” she practically shouted into the phone. “Because, Mar, I signed a little piece of paper before I walked down the aisle. In case you’re not familiar with a pre-nup, let me give you a quick run-down. In the event of a divorce, I get nothing. Noth-Ing.”
I slipped the black business card out of the holder and clutched it. Judging by the way she was decked out and that her handbag alone cost what a middle-class family made annually, I knew this one would be a solid Eight. Maybe, just maybe, a Nine.
And if eery-look-alike girl did come to the Eves for help, G better toss it my way since I’d brought the business in. That’s generally the way it worked, and I sure as hell wouldn’t give “generally” a break when it came to an Eight, possibly a Nine, Errand.
“He was worth a lot when I married him, but now?” she continued, either not noticing or not caring there was a stranger close by. “You’ve seen the articles. You know how much that son of a bitch is worth.”
At least an Eight.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ll think of something.” After a clipped goodbye, she slid her phone into her purse.
When opportunity knocks, I don’t keep it waiting.
As I approached the woman, I held out the card. The matte, black card was blank expect for The Eves scrolled in elegant white lettering on the front and a number on the back.
The woman studied the card for a few moments before studying me in the same way. With skepticism. “What’s this for?”
I saw my car coming around. I had less than thirty seconds to get the card in her hand before the opportunity was gone. “For your husband problem.”
She lifted a sculpted eyebrow. “I’ve got an attorney. A bunch of them, in fact. If some of the best lawyers in the industry can’t help me, I doubt you can.”
“I’m not a lawyer,” I said. “I deal with the gray area in between the laws.” I had her interest. I saw it in her eyes.
“What . . . gray area?”
My car pulled up the circular driveway, so I extended the card again. That time, she took it. “Give this number a call, and it will all be explained. And that’s for your eyes only. No one else sees it, and you don’t tell anyone about it. If you choose not to call us, burn, shred—basically, destroy—that card. Got it?” Usually I preferred to ease potential clients into the fine print, but I didn’t have time for easing.
The woman flipped the card over and back again before sliding it inside her purse. “Got it,” she said, giving me a once-over. Standing taller, she asked, “How do I know you’re for real?”
“How do I know you are?” I lifted a shoulder. “Life’s a sequence of gambles. You’re going to win some. You’re going to lose some. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t play the game.”
The valet had that same smile on when he leapt out of my car. He flashed me a wink and waited outside of the door for me to climb in. “Have a nice day,” I said to the woman.
“I will now.” She patted her purse.
I handed another twenty to Valet Romeo before sliding in. “See you around, ma’am,” he said with a wink before closing the door.
Tomorrow, I’d look different, and next month, I’d be in a different city in a different state. People never just saw me around. I sighed before punching the gas. “No, you won’t.”
MY HOTEL FOR this Errand was smack in the center of Ocean Drive in South Beach. G had gone all out and rented me a suite. She wanted me comfortable and happy, which meant the job was an important one. Not that all of them weren’t, but some were more high profile than others. Some jobs were high profile because of the risks involved, some because the Client, the Target, or both were public figures, and some were high profile strictly due to the money involved.
Other than his last name, where he lived, how much he was worth, and that I’d be in his bed within the month, I didn’t know anything about Mr. Silva. That would be different come morning, though. I’d know his shoe size, the day he was born, his preferences when it came to women, and what he liked in the bedroom. I’d have all the knowledge I’d need to work my way under Mr. Silva’s skin so I could work myself into his pants.
But tonight, I had a date with a heavy manila folder and a cherry Coke with extra cherries. I crashed onto the chaise and punched a quick text into my phone strictly for my interaction with G. On any given Errand, I carried around three phones. One for Client communication, one for G communication, and another that was used for the Target. At the end of each Errand, the Client and Target phones were destroyed, and I was given two new ones at the start of the next. It was a pain in the ass, but I hadn’t been drawn to the Eves because it was easy.
I suppose, at first, I wasn’t as much drawn as I was intrigued, but G helped me change my mind. Our meeting had seemed totally happenstance, but I’d realized after a while that G did nothing by happenstance. Everything was painstakingly strategized, especially when it came to selecting her Eves.
Five years ago, I’d walked into the mall back home with one goal in mind: I would sit in a booth at my favorite little cafe, order a mocha and a bagel, and prove to myself life could go on even when it didn’t feel as if it could.
By the time I was standing outside of the cafe, my body betrayed me. I simply couldn’t step foot inside of it. It wasn’t just my favorite place. It had been our favorite place, but there was no more our. There never would be again.
So instead, I collapsed onto one of the mall benches and stared at that cafe for the rest of the day. Staring at the couples going in and out, glaring at the ones smiling and laughing.
At closing time, a woman took a seat beside me. She was older, but she was one of the most stunning women I’d ever seen. The kind that almost make you want to reach out and touch them to see if they’re real.
