by J. A. Huss
Besides me, of course.
I look back at the beach and then up to the tip of the mansion’s roof that is just barely visible from this low angle. I sit in the helmsman’s chair and start the boat.
She purrs.
I smile.
God, I have missed the water. The beach is not the same. I jump up, untie the boat, and then take my seat and ease her away from the dock. The Pacific is strong and the waves are looming, but I’m not in a rush. So I take it slow. Just casually meander my way towards the yacht. It takes a good while for me to get close enough to see her name—Barely Legal, another very telling sign that these are Company people—and then a few minutes later I can see a crew member waiting for me in the garage.
Megayachts always have a tender boat. It’s a limousine used to shuttle passengers to the shore. Our yachts actually have two, but the sailing ship, the one I escaped from last year, only had one. A quick look inside the garage tells me this one has space for two, but none are here at the moment.
The crewman says nothing to me as he secures the vessel, and I ignore him as well. I’ve grown up around servants and I learned to ignore most of them very early. Not because I was snooty, just because it was a rule. I was not allowed to talk to people, status in life notwithstanding, and that was something I took very seriously. James didn’t even know my name until I told him that morning under the pier. He asked me on the beach back when we become Six, but I kept that secret like I was supposed to.
Actually—my mind wanders as I make my way through the garage and towards the entrance into the main part of the ship—Nick saw me drawing pictures in the sand. I was trying to give James a hint so I drew all the instruments I could remember from an orchestra. The last one was a harp and I had been hoping he would guess my name when he looked down at it.
But Nick came, calling me sister, which meant he was mad. And then he ushered me away from James and back to the ship.
Where I proceeded to spend the day not with James, as I had thought, but with Vincent.
I could not tell the difference.
Of course, I was six.
I open the hatch and walk into the ship. There’s a ladder so I climb, because I know full well I’m not going to find the owner of this boat down here. The next floor up also has a ladder, so I climb again. This floor has decks. But not the deck I’m looking for. So I go up one more level. This is a big-ass ship.
I hear soft music playing in the saloon area and when I step in, the cramped companionway opens up to a room filled with sleek, modern furniture.
“There she is,” a woman’s voice says from off to my left. She’s middle age, maybe mid-fifties. Her hair is dark and piled high on her head in an extravagant updo that contrasts with her beachwear. She tips her sunglasses down her nose and stares at me with brilliant green eyes.
So they get them from their mother, I catch myself thinking as she stands and extends her hand, walking towards me. “Harper Tate,” she coos as she waits for me to shake her hand. I do that, I’m on autopilot, and her grip is soft and so are her hands. “Finally, we get to see the golden child.”
I step back. “I’m sorry,” I say politely. “I’m at a disadvantage here.”
“Oh,” the mother coos again. “Albert, I do believe your son has neglected his manners.” She looks over my shoulder and I turn to greet Albert.
I’m so glad my back is to the mother, because Albert is a drooling old man in a wheelchair. His head lies against his shoulder and his hands are secured to the arms of his wheelchair with Velcro strips.
He’s wearing a bib.
This. Is James’ father.
The titular head of a Company family. And from what my father said, only this family competes with our rank. Company royalty, he called my future children.
I look back to the mother and take her in again, this time seeing her for what she really is. The actual head of a global shadow government. A woman who not only bargains the lives of girls but sends sons off to kill on command.
“Mrs. Albert Fenici,” she says as she watches me. “Now tell me, dear, what can I do for you?” If my stunned silence bothers her, she keeps that tucked away. “Oh, come now, Harper. Relax. We’re practically family now. I’ve been told you’re a nervous girl. Have a drink with me and settle down on the couch over there.” She points and I wander over there automatically.
I don’t know why I’m so off guard. I’m just… surprised to learn the person in charge of all these atrocities is a woman.
“How is Vincent treating you, dear? Well?” I don’t answer. “And how is your father? I haven’t seen him in ages.” She smiles and allows herself a small laugh as she drops ice cubes into a tumbler from behind the bar. “What’s your poison?”
“Huh?” I ask back, coming out of my stupor.
“Your drink, dear. What do you like to drink?”
“Bottled water, please.”
She laughs again and pours me something from a bottle all right. But it’s not water. “Try this.” She walks over to me, her gauzy robe flaring out behind her and her strappy stiletto sandals clicking on the hardwood deck. My nanny was wrong after all. Stilettos are perfectly acceptable footwear on a ship.
I put a hand up as she tries to give me the drink. “I can’t, I’m sorry. I took an Ativan today and I shouldn’t drink when I take the pills.”
“Oh.” She looks at me in a new way. She—studies me. As if she’s trying to detect the effects of the drug. But after a few seconds she takes the drink back to the bar and sets it on the stone counter.
I guess whatever she poured me is not her poison of choice.
“Are you not a talker, darling?”
“How?” is all that comes out.
“How what?” She blinks at me.
I consider my choices right now. “How do you live with yourself knowing you sent him off to kill?”
I could play her game.
Her smile drops and her jaw clenches. “James, you mean? Or Tony? Or perhaps you mean my daughter, Nicola?”
Or I could humor her.
“All of the above.”
“It’s Company policy, darling. You will send your children off as well. Soon,” she says, pointing her glass at my belly.
Or I could kill her.
“I could snap your neck right now.”
“What?”
“Just twist it, like I did that assassin on the dirt bike who tried to take Sasha.”
“You do know what side you’re on? Whose side you’re on?”
The familiar womp-womp-womp of a helicopter invades the conversation as it makes an approach.
“I could get even for what you made him do. I could—”
I say more and more, but the helicopter is so loud now it steals my words. But I look at her face and that’s all I need. I will remember the horror she feels in this moment when she realizes she underestimated me. When she realizes one half-dead man in a wheelchair can’t save her if I decide to end her reign of terror.
The ship rocks as the bird lands and she spills her drink because those fucking shoes really aren’t appropriate footwear for a boat and they make her stumble.
“Harper,” Vincent yells over the thumping blades as he grips the sides of the ladder and jumps down to our deck. He crosses the room and stands between me and his mother. His hair is a mess. In fact, he’s sort of a mess all over. His shirt is open at the top and he’s got no jacket and no tie on. Like he just rolled out of bed.
Asshole. He probably has a girl in that house who will fuck him. He probably spent the day with her.
“Let’s go,” he says, leaning way down into my ear. His grip on my hand never softens. It’s rigid and tight. He places a hand on my other elbow, guiding me past his mother as we make our way to the ladder that will take us to the heliport.
Her hand snaps out as I pass her and the ice-cold contents of her glass splash all over my face.
“Stop it,” Vincent yells, pushing her back when she comes at me
.
“How dare that little whore say such things to me.”
I wiggle in Vincent’s tight grip and manage to turn around enough to snarl at her. “Bitch. You’re a bitch who deserves to die for what you did. I will kill you! I will fucking kill you!”
Vincent actually picks me up and carries me over to the ladder, then places my feet on the third rung and orders me to climb.
I climb. But my heart is beating fast. And I realize, as I’m ushered into the helicopter like we’re in a war zone, it’s not from fear.
It’s from hate.
This is what it feels like to hate.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Harper
The ride back to the house only takes a few minutes. We don’t even bother to put our headsets. And from the look on Vincent’s face, he’s not in the mood to talk.
I’m not either.
When the helicopter lands Vincent pushes me to scoot out, and then he follows me. He puts his arms around my shoulders and walks me out from under the rotating blades.
We don’t talk. We just walk all the way to the house and I wait for him to open the door and allow me to pass through.
“Would you like to tell me what that was all about?” he asks, once we’re both inside the house.
I don’t want to think about it. “I’m tired.”
“Too bad.”
I look up at him with a sneer. “Yeah, too bad for you if you want to know. Because I’m not interested in talking.”
His jaw clenches but instead of continuing the fight, he takes my hand and leads me down the hallway towards the kitchen.
“What are you doing?”
“Eating dinner.” We stop at the entrance to the kitchen and he feels around for the light switch. After the darkness of the house, it’s blinding. I bow my head and close my eyes, too worn out from that confrontation to care about food.
“Sit, Harper. I’ll make us something.”
I walk over to the stainless-steel island and sit on a stainless-steel stool as Vincent rummages around the kitchen looking for things. My legs are so cold from the metal chair I begin to shiver. “I’m not hungry, Vincent. I just want to go to bed.”
“You’ll be in bed soon enough. But first we’re going to eat.” He stares at the assortment of things he’s collected on the counter and then goes looking for something else. “Tell me something, Harper.”
“What?” I scowl at his back. “I don’t feel like talking about it, OK? You’re not going to like the answer anyway.”
“Forget about my bitch of a mother,” he says, dragging a waffle iron out of a cupboard. “Tell me why I’m not good enough for you.” He starts measuring flour and pouring it into a bowl. And as he does that I study him from behind. His back is well-defined. I can see his muscles working through his white dress shirt. He stops what he’s doing and rolls up his sleeves, then proceeds with his preparation. “I look like him. I sound like him.” His voice lowers for that. A deep rumble that makes me swallow. Because he does look and sound an awful lot like James. “I’m sure the fuck nicer than him.” And then he stops what he’s doing and looks over his shoulder. “You’d have to agree on that.”
I shrug. “James is very nice too.”
“He’s insane. They all say he’s insane. He went off that first year to do his killing and he came back damaged behind repair.”
“Do you know what happened?” I bite my lip, not really sure if I want to know or not.
“Everyone knows what happened.”
“Everyone but me.”
He’s silent as he mixes up the batter, his motions unhurried and deliberate. Like he’s made a lot of waffles in his life and he knows just what to do. There’s no recipe either. He just threw some things in a bowl.
“Will you tell me?”
“Do you really want to know?” He looks over his shoulder again. “I should tell you. Then maybe you’ll change your mind about him and settle for this life instead.”
“Do you want me if I have to settle?”
“I want you any way I can get you.” He finishes his mixing and sets the bowl aside before turning around to face me. “But it’s not fair to take you. It’s not fair to you, and it’s not fair to me, and it’s not fair to our future children.”
God. He’s handsome. I can’t deny it. He’s so much like James. “I don’t think it would change my mind if I knew what happened to him. I think it would make me love him more.”
“Huh,” Vincent says as he crosses his arms in front of his chest. “I doubt that.”
“Tell me, then. Maybe this is your chance to win me over.”
He stares hard at me. His gaze is like steel. Cold and hard. He doesn’t look like the man who’s been trying to win me these past few days. He looks like I’ve pushed him past his breaking point. Like this confrontation with his mother was the last straw. “Twelve years ago James Fenici went on a mission to Central America and never came back.”
“He came back. He just came back later than expected.”
But Vincent shakes his head. “No. James never came back. Tet came back.”
“He’s not two people, Vincent. He’s just James.”
“He’s not two people, you’re right. He’s just Tet. James died in that Honduran prison. They starved him. Deprived him of water. Of basic facilities. They locked him in a cell that was not long enough to stretch out and not tall enough to stand up. And when it became clear that the Company wasn’t going to negotiate to get him back, even though he was the son of one of the most powerful elite members, they made him a slave and tortured him.”
I’m stuck on the word slave.
“But we all get mentors when we come of age. And James got One as his mentor. One. The same man who tried to kill you last week is the man who saved James that first year. It was a large debt to owe. Do you understand that?”
I never stop looking at Vincent. I can’t take my eyes off him. His arm muscles are contracting even as he tries to keep them steady across his chest. His jaw is clenching again. His hands are squeezed together into fists. “I don’t understand it, Vincent. I don’t know what that means to have a large debt.”
“Neither did James.”
Vincent turns around and starts pouring batter into the waffle iron. I watch him work and then when he’s done, he closes the lid and pushes a button before turning back to me. He looks slightly calmer than he did, but he’s still very tense.
“It means he owed One his life. He owed One his loyalty. He owed One everything. So every time One came to him with a request, James had to say yes.”
My heart is beating faster now. “What did he say yes to?”
“Vengeance murders. Drug dealing. Torture. And…” The waffle iron beeps and he turns to flip it over.
“And what else?”
“And… he kept secrets. Secrets One had. Secrets that need to be told.”
I wait for Vincent to elaborate, but he keeps his back to me. “That’s not enough,” I tell his back. “That’s not enough to change my mind about him.”
“That’s because you have no details, Miss Tate.” He turns his attention back to me. “The details are what change the hearts and minds.”
“He told me he killed hundreds of people. He told me all this. But I’m a killer too. You know that. I’m not innocent. I keep secrets. I have lots of secrets. Secrets about very bad men.”
“James Fenici is the worst of all those very bad men, Harper. The worst.”
“What secrets then? If the devil’s in the details, then give me details.”
Vincent lifts the waffles out of the waffle iron with a fork and plops them down on a plate. The delicious smell is in stark contrast to the conversation we’re having. It feels surreal. He spreads some butter over the little checkered pattern in the pastry, then dribbles maple syrup on top. His fingertips reach into a bag of powdered sugar and he flicks that over the syrup until it’s coated in white specks.
He walks the plate over to me and set
s it down on the metal counter with a ting that rings through the room. “Fork?” he asks, holding one out for me.
“Thank you.” I take the fork and cut a little piece of waffle off as he leans over the counter and watches. I bring it to my mouth and for some reason, eating in front of him stirs me. My sex throbs for a moment as I take in the food and realize his gaze is trained on me. Only me. “Aren’t you going to eat?”
The smile wipes away the tense conversation and his eyes light up a bit. “Feed me.” And then he sends me a wicked grin that makes the throbbing grow.
I cut off another piece of waffle and bring it to his lips. “Tell me what secrets James kept.”
He opens his mouth and I place the food on his tongue, unable to stop watching his lips as they close around the fork. I pull it away and have to remind myself to breathe.
He points to the plate. “How about I feed you? You eat, and I’ll talk.”
I’m surprised it’s so easy to get the answers I’m looking for, but I’m in no position to argue, so I nod and hand him the fork.
He cuts off a piece of waffle and brings it to my mouth. I open for him, but at the last second he leans in and kisses me. He tastes like syrup and pastry. He tastes like breakfast with someone you love. He tastes like the life I wish I had. A normal life with no secrets. I’ve never wanted secrets. I’ve never wanted to know them. All my life I’ve been running from the facts, and now here I am, begging for them.
“You have to kiss me after every secret,” he whispers into my mouth. “You have to kiss me when I tell you these things or I won’t be able to do it.” And then he pulls back and brings the fork forward. I open my mouth for the food and he places it on my tongue until I grab it with my teeth and begin to chew.
“Say yes to that, Harper Tate, and I’ll tell you everything you think you want to know for the price of a kiss.”
