Vermilion Desire

by Celia Crown

  “I’m alright with whatever you want.”

  Scarletta smiles brightly, blinding me temporarily as she closes her eyes. They snap open with her lips letting out a gasp. My fingers tighten in her hair, stopping her from doing anything reckless as she slowly moves away from her thoughts.

  “We have to go grocery shopping.” She takes my other hand, tugging on them mindlessly.

  We barely salvaged much in my home this morning to make breakfast, but it was worth it because I got to see my lovely Scarletta pouncing around the kitchen under the natural glow of the morning sun.

  It’s beautiful, and it’s not everlasting, and I desperately pretend that she isn’t too taboo for me to touch when she gave me a morning hug.

  It was fleeting, but it was love.

  “Come, come,” she ushers, grunting as she rolls off the couch with a thump.

  With quick movements, she whines and runs to my room, where she had slept again to change. I took the floor in the living room, and it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would have been.

  Scarletta skips out of the bedroom, knocking into my back and chuckling to herself while apologizing. It’s adorable, and I don’t chide her for blindly running around. I wouldn’t want her to get bruises from falling and bumping into corners with her small hips.

  “I’m ready!” She twirls, lifting a bold red dress to match her hair.

  This is one of the benefits of summer; she can wear anything she wishes and as little as she wants. However, that rule only applies within the house. She is not allowed to go outside with anything provocative, and if she wants to wear short dresses, then she will have to let me escort her.

  That rule was set yesterday when I sat her down to discuss house rules. I don’t have much; I just want to make sure she knows that they are instilled there to protect her and not to control her freedom.

  What a load of shit. That’s exactly what I’m doing. I restrict her freedom, and I sure as hell am not going to let any men near her.

  The grocery store is close by, just a ten-minute walk in the sun while honking cars pierce the peaceful morning. The man in a red sports car honks again at a minivan, and out comes a man bigger than me.

  His skin was inked; a cigarette dangled from his snarling lips, and black sunglasses framed his face into malice.

  Scarletta lets the scene trap her as I drag her along. The sports car man jerks his head back into his car, reversed and slammed into the car behind him.

  Everything is a mess as the owner of the car the sports car wrecked comes out as a woman with a forked tongue and a trail of profanities that could be made into a new language.

  As a detective and a law enforcement agent, it’s my duty to step in to prevent them from clawing each other’s eyes out. However, they aren’t doing anything to warrant me to step in yet, and I won’t as Scarletta laces her small fingers with mine.

  I forget about that foolish scene and focus on the way she fits flawlessly with me. Scarletta doesn’t seem to know what her action did to me, and I can only wordlessly follow her around the massive grocery store.

  When she lets go, I regret not holding on tighter.

  My job is to carry the basket. I refuse to push a damn malfunctioning cart around. Every time I take one, it’s always a broken one with a fucked-up wheel that either makes the bone-chilling squeaks or it won’t move at all once the momentum has stopped.

  The basket is filled with at least three weeks’ worth of food by my calculation. I only calculate how much we eat during breakfast and dinner because I have lunch at the station, and I can’t ever forget to put Cal into the equation with his big mouth.

  The ration of food should last us that long, give or take a few days if I’m so busy that I don’t even eat breakfast in the morning. Scarletta is not like me; she doesn’t have a body that’s used to quick meals and empty nourishment.

  That is another rule for her. She must have three meals a day, and at least two of them are homemade. Fast food is an emergency food in our house, and don’t even get me started on the ‘healthy’ restaurants.

  They leave out the harmful ingredients and who knows what the hell they substitute them with, and I’m not putting my baby’s stomach in a test of fate. Food poisoning isn’t a joke and based on her ability to fight off bacteria, there’s a low chance of her being able to skip pass poisoning.

  “Do you think we have enough?” She peers into the basket, contemplating with a small tilt of her head.

  “Yeah, it’s enough,” she answers her own question.

  Shoppers find us an abnormal couple. From their scrutinizing gaze, I look like either her father or her damn kidnapper. That doesn’t make sense; she isn’t calling for help or even look remotely distressed.

  Scarletta sticks to my side like glue and voluntarily holds my arm. It’s oddly domestic, and this experience deeply impacted my heart. I want more times like these to wash away the burden of being a detective with multiple unsolved cases due to cold leads.

  Before I met Scarletta, I had no faith in humanity. After her, I know there is still some good left in this rotten world that’s regulated by money.

  A few people rush past us, and flying through the aisles, they direct their path towards the entrance where a crowd of customers is surrounding something.

  “You think they have free stuff there?” Scarletta raises to her toes, using me for balance to see what the commotion is all about.

  “Huh.” She drops back on her feet. “Everyone is suddenly three feet taller.”

  I chuckle, taking her to the checkout line. This section allows us to hear the commotion and see it while we check out everything. Everyone is over there chitter chatting with whatever the center point of interest is, and it leaves rows of uneventful lanes.

  The lady at the end greets us with a smile and begins to process all the groceries. The total comes out, and I reach for my wallet, but Scarletta’s card is already in the machine. She cheekily grins at me, and the lady watches us with awe in her eyes.

  She has seen couples before or those who look like they are together; this grocery store is one of the most frequented shops around here.

  “I invaded your house,” she reasons.

  The car machine beeps, and she slides her card into her wallet before shoving it into her backpack.

  “Call it mid-month rent!”

  “You’re living in my house for free,” I tell her.

  She shakes her head. “No way, we share the house.”

  Even Cal knows that arguing with her means wasting his breath in an already lost fight before it starts. She has this look that makes me feel guilty for not letting her do what she wants, and she wants to pay rent.

  Any sane person would jump at the chance to not pay rent.

  She paid, and I take the bags in one hand while she helps with a single bag in her other. Scarletta steps closer to me as we approach the crowded area near the entrance, her small hand curling around my arm, so I don’t lose her in the struggle.

  Roots of hatred wrap around my feet, planting them firmly on the ground as a seed of anger emerges and grows endlessly in the pit of my stomach.

  Fucking Braxton Berkshire. In a grocery store. Near my fucking house.

  With confident steps, he closes the distance between us with his fans trailing behind him in lines of desperate homeless pets formation.

  I step one foot forward to let Scarletta blend into my side more and take the despicable criminal’s eyes away from her.

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Charity, detective. It is what I do with my hard-earned money.”

  Smug bastard and his vain façade. He doesn’t acknowledge Scarletta, nor does he even notice she is there, and I want it to stay that way. My patience with him is thin; any sudden movement would have his head under my combat boot.

  “How generous of you.”

  Braxton’s eyes fall to Scarletta’s short figure. His eyes shine with something indescribable, and a growl e
rupts from my chest, chilling the atmosphere around us.

  “Indeed,” he agrees with that self-absorbed jab from Scarletta. “I believe in karma.”

  “Well,” she gasps. “Does that mean you’re here to pay for everyone’s groceries to atone for your misfortunes?”

  “I have not done anything immoral, miss.” The mockery and the faux hurt is a show he puts on for his ignorant fans.

  These are the type of people who shouldn’t have any sympathy from others when they are pulled into a dumb pyramid scam.

  Scarletta haunts, getting a twitch on his groomed eyebrow and a tight-lipped smile. “So, you’re not as generous as you say you are if you aren’t even willing to help out these poor civilians.”

  “Of course not, I was planning on doing it as a sign of good faith.”

  Braxton’s perfectionist façade begins to shatter. It’s only a little bit, but he’s riled, and this is the first time I have seen anything less than a controlled presence from him.

  “I’m sure your dear fans will appreciate you giving out your hard-earned money to ward off misfortunes.” Scarletta lays her head on my arm, haunting him with more not-so-subtle jabs.

  “I do not have misfortunes. These hands are pure, made from the history of Berkshire, and they are valued for greater things.”

  In our first interrogation before he called for his lawyer, he had not cracked under any pressure we put on him, and that’s when we knew that he wasn’t too right in the head. Normal people would show something on their face, but he was nothing but a plain surface.

  It’s pleasing to see the man trying to compose himself with another thin smile.

  Scarletta throws in another blow. “That’s what guilty consciences say, and I wouldn’t put too much value on inbreeding in today’s society.”

  When our background check comes back, we don’t look at genetics going that deep, and that small information gets a round of gasps from his fans and another piece of his perfect façade falls.

  “You are different, miss.” He claps his hand as if he is praising her for her hard work on finding out another dirty little secret in his family.

  Family heritage is public knowledge, and with a name as big as Berkshire, people are very interested.

  “If you think having an opinion is different, then I hate to know what you call those who are actively opposing you.” She shrugs nonchalantly.

  I enjoy seeing the bastard get knocked off his high horse. I want to find a time to study her more closely because there is so much that I could learn from her to help me get better at interrogating suspects.

  “They just need the right guidance, and my piano will make them take the blindfold off their eyes.” Berkshire tips his chin up, a symbolic image of rich looking down at the poor.

  She yanks my arm for me to leave with her. “Yikes. Delusional too.”

  The crowd parts a way for us to move through. There is a piercing stare at the back of my neck, and I don’t have to turn around to know that he is pissed. Scarletta isn’t like me; she stops at the automatic doors and stares straight at him.

  He doesn’t catch up to us; his body is firmly stuck where he is before. He only turned around, eyes burning with anger but with his fan’s favorite smile.

  Braxton reaches into his suit pocket and pulls out a white card, probably his business card, and jerks it up to motion Scarletta to receive it. She is not a dog, and she refuses to be treated as one, so she simply mimics that symbolic fuck-you chin tip to him.

  His jaw clenches, and an uncontrollable grin of gleeful satisfaction flares in my chest. Scarletta is my good girl, a brave and smart girl who just challenged one of the most powerful men in the United States.

  Braxton takes that challenge with one right leg taking a small step, then he stops and retreats. It’s an awful sight and uncommon for him to not have the last laugh when he knowingly wasted police resources during his time in interrogation when he hasn’t called his big shot attorney yet.

  He likes to play games, but Braxton is backing down for some reason.

  “Oh?” She thrums her nails on my arm, a smile on her lips when she notices his sudden retreat too. “Yes, yes, very curious.”

  For a split second, he glares and shows his true colors. Her nails dig into my arm with a sharp inhale, and his face returns to the perfection he displays while I glance down to Scarletta’s wild glint in those amber hues.

  We leave the store without any further ado, following the sidewalk back to our home. I’m still attempting to get all that scene into my head and find out what really happened.

  That was too enjoyable.

  “You shouldn’t provoke others.” As much as I enjoyed that, I don’t exactly approve of what she did without consulting me first.

  “I promise it’s not for petty reasons, Mr. Wolf.”

  I scowl, hating the bright sunlight in my eyes. “Then why did you do that?”

  “I wanted to see if he would get angry. He’s always putting on this prince-like face, and it’s spooky.”

  Having known Scarletta since she was a young girl, I understand every moment of her, and she is lying right now. Not a full lie, but she is holding something back from me.

  That’s not acceptable.

  “Whatever you are thinking, is it going to hurt you?”

  She considers her options with a purse of her lips. “Well… I don’t think so.”

  “I want a guarantee, baby.” The more she is able to accept the pet name, the easier for me to restrict her freedom to me.

  “I can promise you that I won’t seek out foreseeable danger, but I can’t control what comes to me.”

  Another car whizzes by us, speeding down the street, and we come back to the street where three curious characters had a face-to-face in the middle of the streets.

  “That’s a start, but I want you to be careful about him. Berkshire is a sly bastard.” I lift my shoulder, nudging her head with my arm, and she nods obediently.

  “It’s easy to make people like him angry.” She giggles as our house come to view. “I just have to find bait, set it down with some waves in the pond, and watch him destroy himself.”

  “Explain. I’m interested.” I open the door and let her in first.

  I follow her into the kitchen to drop the bags on the table. She digs around, pulling groceries out with a grin. Her red hair falls to her shoulders, amber eyes glowing with mirth, and a smile of glee.

  “Pride is a sin, and he values that. In his eyes, he is perfect, and nothing is wrong with him.”

  I recall the moment his façade truly cracks. “You mentioned his inbreeding history.”

  “It’s not a good association with the Berkshire family name, and he can’t maintain that fairy tale lifestyle with that dirt.”

  She opens the refrigerator and begins packing food away. I help her with the cupboard section, but I still want to pick her brain. She lives up to her title as a gifted child chosen to be in the international program.

  The chances of us meeting without that would be slim to none, and I can’t bear to think of a dull life without my precious little Scarletta.

  “You would be a great police consultant.”

  She pokes her head out with a smile. “Are you trying to steal me away from the research facility?”

  “Yes,” I say, not bothering to hide the desire leaking in my voice.

  “You’d have to go through Beth Senior and Beth Junior.”

  Her laughter echoes in the refrigerator. One is her supervisor, and one is her other coworker, but I can’t recall which is which. I believe she didn’t clarify when she mentioned them before.

  “No one can stop me from taking you, baby.” I nearly crush the cereal box in my hand as I take in her crouched form on the ground.

  She whips her head around, red hair flying like a ring of fire halo and prettily flushed round cheeks.

  “You’re making me blush, Mr. Wolf!”

  Her words are unintentionally provoking, and to a
man already addicted to her, she is luring me one step at a time to my demise in her sweet, sweet, love.

  Chapter Five

  Scarletta

  When an animal is injured, they lick their wounds and arm themselves with bared teeth. When a human is injured, they fall into a pit of self-deprecation and vengeance.

  Braxton Berkshire is a combination of the two. He comes bearing a gift after he had returned home to stew in his hate and tend to his wounded ego.

  It’s almost comical to see him react the way I would have predicted. I have been prepared for his counterattacks after humiliating him in public, and it’s amusing to see the news dragging the family name.

  Unclean, filthy, disgusting. Inbreeds. Many people contribute to the Berkshire family members’ narcissism and cult-like thinking process with inbreeding. Braxton’s fans believe that he is a king that has been reincarnated from the past, and his bloodline is pure due to inbreeding.

  They are beyond brainwashed. Beyond redemption, and they don’t want to be saved because their precious King Braxton Berkshire is untouchable and the one who will lead them to a life of fulfillment.

  I close the letter, folding it neatly and sliding it back into the envelope. The man in front of me sips his coffee, a smile pleasantly displaying on his lips while performing a scene for his fans in the café.

  “How fragile,” I croon, eyes curving with malic and ridicule.

  He raises an arched eyebrow, groomed to perfection without one hair out of place. “May I ask what is?”

  A soft squeal from beside us gets ignored as I know he had intentionally let his fans stay to watch him try and put me down.

  “Your pride.” I stir the cup of coffee in front of me. I haven’t tasted it, and I don’t want to despite how the flavor must match the dark, roasted coffee beans.

  The entire café has been dominated by employees of Berkshire, and this cup of coffee had been brewed with a specialty machine and imported coffee beans.

  “I wasn’t aware that Berkshire men could not handle a friendly conversation.”

  He smiles. “You must have misinterpreted, Miss Scarletta.”