“Come on,” I mutter into her strands, “let's see if we can make it a home for the night.” I don’t think it matters where we are, though. Everywhere with her is home. Wrapping her fingers around mine, Bunny trails after me out of the room, leaving little wet footprints in her path. Like carving your name into atree, her steps will forever stay in the dust—our mark forever standing.
In the main room, beside the window, we retrieve our pile of clothes and slip into something clean. I throw on a pair of jeans and a striped tee pretty quickly, but Bunny waits, refusing to put anything on until she’s completely dry. Her little oddities are fascinating to me, like the way she hates wet hair touching her back or how she picks at her skin when she’s nervous. I love watching her ticks. It makes us feel more real.
While she waits, I wander and find myself in the kitchen. There are still dishes in the sink, crusted with mold so old it’s black.Maybe it’s ash, my brain points out, seeing as the fire must have started in here. Right there beside the stove, the countertops are charred to a crisp; some areas are blackened beyond recognition, where the flames ravaged past the surface. Cabinet doors hang from their hinges. Their wooden frames warped and broken, exposing the remains of soot-stained dishes. Fragments of cups and bowls lie cracked on the twisted shelves; some, though, are perfectly fine, untouched by the damage.
Bunny never specified how long ago this fire had occurred, but the smell of scorched food lingered in the air, burned remnants of a past meal reduced to a horrible memory. On the stove's burner, a pan still sits, its base completely melted into the metal. On the wall that wraps all the way into the hallway, the drywall has crumbled, exposing nails and studs, and large flame marks that creep to the very top of the ceiling, evident of how rapidly the fire spread—how violently it consumed everything in its path. I didn’t notice it when I ran through the hallway, but it’s unavoidable now. For a beat, I stand frozen, taking in the loss and destruction before my lungs remember to breathe. Devastation… it comes in so many forms.
Moving without consideration, I find myself standing in front of the fridge, swinging the door open before a thought can even form. All at once, the sour smell of mildew wafts into the air. I scan the once-white plastic shelves, my stomach churning at the dark, sticky liquids that ooze from the abandoned leftovers. Containers full of half-eaten food sit bloated, threatening to explode if touched. In the top right corner, a carton of eggs waits, its shells cracked and leaking a thick, brownish fluid that has cemented over time.
The smell is overpowering now—foul with the stench of death. My stomach churns as I recoil, muscles twisting in disgust. Quickly, I slam the door shut, but the scent remains in my nose.Holy fuck. I rush away from the rot, trying to outrun the sights and the smells. “I don’t know why I did that,” I mutter to myself on my way into another room. I don’t even know what I’m looking for until I see it.
A bed—rotten and burned. I searched every room, hoping for better.Nothing. “Something got to that one, too.” Bunny laughs at my disgust, finding some sort of sick joy in my repulsion. She doesn’t seem to care about the decay and maggots. Her smile is as bright as ever as she takes my hand, guiding us back into the main room. With nowhere to sleep but the cold, hard floor, we used our shoes to make it clean…ish.
When we have a debris-free area, I pour my clothes out of the blanket I was using as a bag and drape them over the floor. It still smells like the inn—roses and cigarettes—a welcome aroma in a smoked-scented room.
Old newspapers swish into the air. I bat them away on my way to the ground, but Bunny holds one close, eyes gaping at the faded words, before a choked squeal emerges.
“Bun?” She doesn’t listen. Her concentration is fixed on the paper, now illuminated by faraway street lamps. I call her name again. “Bun, what is it?”
Her eyes shift to me, with a broad smile on her lips. “Each year,” she reads, “the Fighting Against Homelessness organization hosts its momentous fundraising charity event,The Mayor’s Ball. We bring together community leaders, sponsors, benefactors, and activists to raise the necessary funding to fight and put an end to our nation's homelessness issue.” Her pause is followed by an intense stare—one full of waiting and impatience. When I utter nothing in response, Bunny takes a deep inhale, calming herself and her wild heartbeat. “The 1993 event will kick off at 6:00 p.m. on Saturday, June 19th, at the Wilmington Crest County Convention Center. The black-tie function promises an evening filled with enthusiasm and celebration, promising gourmet cocktails followed by a night of dinner and dancing with live entertainment!Cade!”
I’m not sure if that last part was intentional. Her stare is wild and uncontrolled—almost primal—ready to attack if I fail to understand. It’s a risk I have to take because I have no idea what the hell she’s talking about. “Okay…”
Sighing with rolling eyes, Bunny slides on her knees to my side, shaking the newspaper in my direction. “This gala,” she hisses between her teeth, “is always held on thesamenight, at thesametime, at thesamelocation, every year.”
Again. “Okay?”
“Okay?!” she snaps, throwing the paper entirely at me. “This is intwodays, Cade!Mayor Williams will be here, surrounded by his people.” The look in her eyes… It’s unreachable. It’s dangerous… “He wouldn’t suspect a thing.”
It’s reckless.
“Bunny…” I breathe, staring back and forth between her and the paper. “There’s no way we can get inside,” I mutter, “and even if we do, we’d never get out alive.”Please see the truth in my words, Bun… please.
“You’re right.” And for a blissful second, I believe it’s over. “But I’ll bet you anything he doesn’t leave out the front door.”
I want to say I can’t believe it, but from the moment I met Bunny, I knew this was inside her. And I have to admit it, it’s what made me fall in love with her. I’ve grown angry at her ambition—it’s the truth—but I admire her more for it all the same. I wouldn’t change Bunny. I wouldn’t even suggest it. Still, it doesn’t ease the worry.
If she’s dead set on this, then we need to be prepared for every last fucking thing that could go wrong. So, we spend our night curled together on the soot-covered floor, making one plan after another until we’re mumbling it in our sleep.
“Tell me again.”
Exhausted, Bunny sits up. “Mayor Williams drank a lot whenever he partook in Marone’s festivities,” she reminds me. “He enjoys a good party. So, I assume tonight will be no different. He’ll want to avoid the negative press, which means he’ll slip out through the rear exit. His guard will order the driver to meet him there.”
Walking through a dirty stretch of the room, I wave my hand, pushing away the thought. “I don’t want you to worry about that.” From what I’ve gathered in my time spent below the earth, the important ones never leave the way they came—especially when they’re misbehaving. He’ll be alone because he has a reputation as a good man to uphold, but anyone who knows him will know the truth. They’ll help him leave. From there, he’ll slip into a blacked-out car and sneak off to one of Marone’s establishments. We were the biggest, our hole underground, but I know of the others.
The spas that deal in happy endings.
The restaurants that serve more than meals.
Perhaps he’ll need some gas and ask for the full-service option.
Maybe he’ll go to Paradise. A lot of Marone’s high-profile clients would visit when they were done watching the fight or fucking the girls. The underground was business, I learned, but in Paradise… that’s where their wishes and dreams could come alive.
Just thinking about it, the things I’d hear them whisper… shivers rake down my spine while the acid in my stomach threatens to rip me open. “Bunny.” Her name comes out of my strangled throat, and for the first time, I don’t try to mask my fear. I’m afraid. “Bunny… I need you to understand what we’re doing here—what you’re asking for.” Everything slows, my heartbeat and time, while I break it down to her. “We’re planning on killing not just another person, but themayor of New York. This is agovernmentofficial. He will have drivers and security. There will be cameras and hundreds of people. This isn’t breaking into a home, Bunny. We are killing someone important. We may not—” I pause, the room spinning in circles around me. “We may not make it out of this one alive.” We could die.
I don’t want to die… not when I’ve fought this hard to stay alive…
Bunny mulls over my words, fully taking in what may happen to us. But in the end, her answer is still the same.
