I leaned forward a bit. “Yes,” I replied. “Actually, it does.”
“But why?” Her voice sounded generally confused.
I stood up and took my place back behind my desk. Any more time spent so close to her, and I was liable to just take her in my arms and start kissing the fuck out of her.
And so much more.
Leaning back in my chair, I said, “Contrary to all the gangster movies you’ve seen, that’s not how this works, Devi. People don’t just walk in here, demand a specific amount, and walk out with it.”
“I’m…sorry. I didn’t mean-”
I held my hand up. “I’m not in the Mafia, Devi. I don’t work for the Mob or anyone else. I work for myself, and I’m a businessman at the heart of everything I do. Money lending included.” I made sure to hold her gaze as I schooled her on who I was and what it was I did. “If you’ve never heard of me, that’s a credit to the clean life you’ve led. But having never heard of me puts you at a disadvantage because you have no idea who you’re dealing with.”
She stood up again. “Okay, I…I need to leave.”
Once again, I was around the desk and had my hands on her shoulders before she could escape. “I’m not trying to intimidate or frighten you, Devi-”
“Sure could have fooled me,” she bit out.
“I’m just trying to explain that I haven’t gotten to where I am by loaning money to anyone who walks into my office.” I pressed down on her shoulders, forcing her to take a seat again, and the image of pushing her to her knees, so she could suck my cock, flashed in my mind like an explosion of fireworks.
I’ve had a lot of women in my day, and felt attracted to half of them, but this was something new. Devi Westland was affecting me in a way I didn’t completely understand. My dick understood perfectly fine, it was the rest of me that was trying to get a grip on the realities of love at first sight, or whatever the fuck this was.
When she was still looking at me like I was full of shit, I explained, “So, say someone comes in here asking to borrow ten-thousand dollars because his health insurance doesn’t cover an operation his wife or child needs. I’m inclined to believe he’ll do his best to repay the debt because he’s borrowing it for legitimate reasons. He’s borrowing it for a reason that holds value. Understand?”
“Yes,” she answered, though she sounded reluctant to give me points for logic.
“Now, if someone comes in here asking to borrow ten-thousand dollars because he wants to gamble it all at the racetrack, well, I’m a bit less inclined to see that transaction through.” Her shoulders sagged at that. “The last thing I want to do is kill someone whoIwas stupid enough to lend money to, Devi. And since you can’t collect money from a dead man, I’d hardly consider that smart business. And like I said, I’m a businessman at the end of it all.”
“What…what’s the interest on a loan that size?” she asked, the fire extinguished from her voice.
“Why don’t you tell me what the loan is for first?” I suggested. “If you’re here, so you can make it rain at the strip club, the rest of it doesn’t matter since you won’t be getting the loan.”
“I-”
“And before you think to lie to me, I will find out what you used the money for, Devi,” I warned her. “I have eyes and ears everywhere.”
Devi pulled her shoulders back and straightened in her seat. Looking me dead in the eye, she said, “My brother owes Alvin Fischer thirty-thousand dollars, and if he doesn’t pay up at the end of three weeks, Alvin will kill him.”
Out of all the things I expected to hear come out of her mouth, that one never crossed my mind. I expected money for a car, or the pipes bursting at her house, or something civil like that. I never expected she’d be here, borrowing money from a loan shark, to pay off another loan shark. Though Alvin Fischer didn’t run in the same high stakes circles I did, he was still a formidable presence on the streets.
“Why does your brother own Fischer thirty-thousand dollars?”
There was a deep sadness in her eyes that was unmistakable. “My brother has a gambling and drug problem, though the drugs are more recreational than a dependent habit, and he tends to get in over his head every now and again.”
“And you believe that if you give your brother, the admitted drug user and gambler, thirty-thousand dollars that he’s going to pay off Fischer?”
Devi shook her head. “No,” she replied. “I would pay the debt off myself.”
That got my back up immediately.
The idea of Devi seeking Alvin Fischer out to pay her brother’s debt did not sit well with me. Never mind that it was dangerous on so many levels, but Alvin was reputed to cancel debts by other means of payment when dealing with women.
However, short of denying Devi the loan, I couldn’t very well forbid her to handle the transaction. And if she was here to save her brother, what else would she do to save him?
The thought had me close to seeing red.
“So, say I give you the money.” She nodded. “What guarantee do you have that your brother won’t just do it again.”Maybe I could send Sergio to follower her when she paid Fischer.
