With the news of the firestones, however, it gave Dravka renewed hope. Hope that he hadn’t felt in a long time.
“We have to talk about Valerie,” he said, “and Dumera.”
Chapter Twelve
Valerie watched the property agent slide into a driverless car at the end of Eve Tesler’s walkway.
She was leaning against the front door, shaded by the overhanging porch, a Nu device clutched in her hands with the contract for the closing. There was a buyer who had already made her an offer for the townhouse.
The number shone up at her, more credits than she’d ever seen in her lifetime at once.
1.2 million.
It had taken all of a day and a half to have an offer drawn up. Property was scarce on the colonies. A detached townhouse in the Garden District of Everton was even more rare. The tree-lined streets of the quiet, exclusive neighborhood had made it an easy sell.
And all Valerie had to do was sign the documents on her Nu device, send them to the property agent, and the credits would be threaded into a private account she’d set up yesterday. An account that Madame Allegria would never know about, one Valerie had made for Dravka, Tavak, and Ravu, which they’d be able to access once they left Everton.
Valerie knew she could probably get more for the townhouse, which was what the property agent had told her a few moments before. This was only the beginning, she’d said with a small smile on her ruby-red lips.
But Valerie didn’t have the time to wait for more offers. 1.2 million credits were enough for now. She would only add to that number once the buyer from Genesis sent her the credits for the collections and furniture within the townhouse.
It will be enough, Valerie thought, swiping her signature on the numerous documents flooded across her Nu device. The property agent wasn’t even down the street by the time she was finished.
Madame Allegria was on her way back to Everton at that very moment. As if in reminder, her left shoulder ached a little. She pressed her fingertips to the back of it, skimming them across the bone where her tracker had been implanted years before.
Valerie sighed, knowing she needed to hurry.
It was the late afternoon, two days after Dravka had kissed her with the taste of brandy on his tongue. And like a coward, she’d avoided him since. Every spare moment she had, she was at the townhouse, making final preparations.
And now that she’d agreed to its sale, she felt like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders. She felt like she could breathe.
Turning back inside the townhouse, she saw the carefully packed boxes were lined up in the sitting room, boxes that would soon be shipped off to Genesis. The top floors were already bare. She’d already hired a transport to take the boxes away. She wouldn’t need to return.
Valerie reached out her palm to run across the wall. For a time, it was nice to be free of the brothel. To be within a house that had obviously held special memories. Love. Valerie could almost feel it.
But now, she’d picked the home clean. She’d sold it off quickly. She didn’t even feel guilty about it.
With one last look, she left and ordered a driverless car to return her to the brothel. Just as she slid inside, she received a call from the property agent, who told her the buyer would wire the credits that night and would give her time to get the boxes shipped off before taking full possession.
When the car slid up to the front of the brothel, which had been her home for over five years, she felt…hope. For the first time in a long time.
Things were working out…almost flawlessly. A part of her couldn’t help but wonder when they would start to go wrong again.
Once inside, she snuck down to her bedroom with a quick glance at the stairs. It shamed her that she was hiding from Dravka but she didn’t know what else to do. That kiss changed things between them.
Once down in her bedroom, she changed out of her dirtied, loose clothes just in case Madame Allegria came early. The smell of smoke still permeated the basement level. It had seemed to thread between the fibers of her clothes. It was in her sheets, in the walls.
But it made Valerie smile. She wasn’t even afraid of what her aunt would do when she found the burned ropes and whips lying in a useless heap next door. Because shecouldn’tdo anything. Not anymore.
She was just smoothing back her hair, wrapping it up into a tight knot on the top of her head, when a knock came at the door of her bedroom. Just one…and then it was opening.
Valerie froze. It was Dravka.
He was dressed in a black, soft shirt and black pants. His feet were bare. And his eyes were on her, intense and observing her carefully as he stepped into the room.
Slowly, her hands lowered from her hair but since she hadn’t finished tying it up into a knot, it fell down her back, a few tendrils drifting across her cheeks.
“Dravka,” she said quietly, her eyes flickering to the open door behind him. “What are doing down here?”
