His gaze holds mine as he slowly chews the cracker. That dangerous glint I’ve noticed blazing in his eyes on a few occasions flares up in his icy depths once more. I find myself completely snared by the sight. Mesmerized. Tempted.
The shrill ring of a phone comes from his pocket. He slips out a sleek, black device and holds it up to his ear without breaking our eye contact.
“What is it, Brahms?”
An agitated male voice speaks fast and loudly on the other side. I don’t catch everything that’s said, but I do hear a mention of missing money, and then a point about the culprit being found.
I bet the thief won’t fare well with Ruffo. He’ll fire them for sure. Maybe even press charges to send them to prison.
The caller seems to have finished talking while I was musing. I don’t hear anything else on the line, and Ruffo hasn’t yet answered. He’s just watching me with his unnerving gaze, still holding the half-eaten cracker. Maybe he’s reluctant to reply with me only a couple of feet away?
“Cut off his fingers. One for every grand he embezzled.” He tosses the rest of the cracker into his mouth, turns around, and casually strides out of the store.
Chapter 12
Club Annex, Location Unknown
The door shuts with a familiar, barely audible snick, leaving me alone in the room with my guest. Leaving me in the now unsurprising stillness after so many visits with him.
“Hello again,” I say as I lean over to fix the hem of my dress. “Sorry, I’m not used to wearing heels.”
It takes me a few tries to free the fabric from where it got caught on the heel of my stiletto, then I sit back against the sofa, ready for another one-sided chat with my visitor.
As usual, there’s absolute silence in the room, but it doesn’t bother me like it did before. Neither the silence nor the awareness of my silent guest scares me as they did my first night at the Annex.
This is my sixth Saturday at the exclusive gentlemen’s club, and so far, everything has gone just as Maggie promised. I’ve been safe. There were no unexpected requests. No additional expectations, period. I’m still only required to talk, nothing more. And after every visit, I receive an envelope with five thousand dollars for my efforts.
But in addition to that, at the end of the night, as I get into the car to head home, I find a small gift waiting for me on the seat cushion.
Nothing extravagant.
Nothing that makes me feel bad.
After the expensive coat, which I returned, the things my silent visitor left me simply made me smile. Their value was probably insignificant for someone like him. To me, though, it was the opposite.
Each offering was somehow connected to something I had said. To one of my long and trivial ramblings. The week after I received the book, I found another white box waiting for me in the car. As soon as I lifted the lid, the most delicate fragrance invaded my senses. For a moment, I believed he had gifted me perfume, something I was prepared to give back right away. But it wasn’t. Instead, a single white bloom rested in a tiny glass vase.
A moonflower.
I’ve worked in the flower shop for years, and I’ve never seen one. Most people consider them weeds. The choice of the flower floored me. Why would he decide to present me with it? The note—another page torn from the planner—didn’t shed any light on this latest mystery. It simply said:
It blooms for a single night.
He was right.
Once I got home, I set the vase on my nightstand, and in the morning, the trumpet-shaped flower was done. Its iridescent white petals curled up.
I was so sad to see it perish, since it was the first flower I ever received, but on the other hand, it seemed like an accurate analogy for our meetings. One night of magic that disappears with the coming dawn.
Then came the teacup.
At one point, I mentioned being upset about accidentally breaking a cup from my mom’s favorite tea set. An old, cheap set, with only sentimental value, because my dad gave it to her. My mom dreamed of traveling, but we never had any spare money to spend on something like that. So this tea set was Dad’s way of giving her the world, with each cup depicting an iconic site from a faraway place. And clumsy me broke the one with the Eiffel Tower.
I regaled my guest with my unsuccessful efforts to find a replacement in the local thrift stores. Riding all over the city on my one day off. Eventually, I had to give up and beg my mom’s forgiveness. There wasn’t a similar cup to be found in Boston.
But, somehow, he found it. Exactly the cup I was looking for. The Eiffel Tower teacup.
The included note offered little explanation.
