Surely his staff know he has someone in here, but still. There’s no visible security, and that could mean one of two things; either he’s so confident in himself, and so underestimating ofme, that he doesn’t consider being left alone with me a threat…
Or he doesn’t know who I am.
He doesn’t recognize me. It’s a possibility. The last time he saw me, I was three years old. I’ve obviously changed a lot since then, in many ways, but mostly physically.
I always assumed he’d been keeping tabs on me over the years, which is why I’ve never had any social media, never done anything that could result in my picture being in the paper or online. I’m a ghost…
Like the rest of my family.
The Ivory has his ways, we know this, but still. Itispossible he doesn’t recognize me as the son of Arturo Alvarez.
Toying with my fingers, I squirm in place. “Wh-what am I… doing here?”
My voice is timid and fluttery, displaying nerves I want him to hear and see. I need to get a read on him, find out what heknows. And the best way to do that is to act like I don’t know who he is.
I’m just a nervous newcomer to this club, who was just being reprimanded by the manager for sneaking into a restricted area with my hook-up friend, now standing in a dark room, alone, with a baleful stranger in a devil mask.
“You tell me…” He murmurs.
That voice, so deep and smooth, like the quiet purr of a jungle cat. I remember it so well… But I can’t let him know that.
I can’t let him know I’ve been hearing his voice in my mind as the soundtrack to fantasies of slitting his throat for fifteen years.
“What do you think you’re doing here?” He sips again, watching me. Carefully fixated.
He’s staring at me like I’mliterallythe only thing in the room.
“You’re mad…” I mumble, tone questioning. “Because you caught me?”
His head cocks.
“I wasn’t supposed to be in the private area,” I project a timid quiver, clearing my throat. “I know that, and I’msosorry. Jonah just—”
“How do you know that boy?” His casually accusatory rumble cuts off my fake confession. “The bartender?”
His question actually freezes me solid for a moment, until I pull myself together and mumble, “I don’t. Notreally… I mean, I just met him the other day when I came here for the first time.”
He says nothing. Simply appraises me for many weighted seconds during which I’m questioningeverything.
I can’t even believe that I’m here right now, in the same room with him.Finally, after years andyearsof training and preparing for this moment,dreamingof being alone with him, just like this, so I could do to him what he did to my parents.
Now that it’s happening, I can admit that part of me nevertrulyexpected it would.
Certainly not after only being in New York for a couple of weeks.
I can’t help the stone of doubt that’s been tossed into my mind’s pond, causing a ripple of uncertainty. He’s at an advantage. He always is…
Can I really do this?
Finishing his glass, he sets it down on the bar, then saunters over to a couch.
Adroitly, he takes a seat, patting the cushion beside him. “Come.”
The hesitation in me is strong, and my rational side is preventing my legs from moving. The devil is beckoning…You’re not supposed to listen to him.
I shouldn’t go. Ishouldn’tget close to him. The voice of reason in my mind knows that. But the desire in my body is stronger, overpowering logic with emotion.
I want… to fucking kill him.
