“I feed off that energy.”
David said the same words to Talis that Aidan said to me.
Ten
Come over and party tonight. We’ve got snow we just need hos.
My phone buzzed with a typical Matt text. Deleting it felt amazing.
You too good for me now?
Another text waited for me when I went on break. Newsflash, Matt, I was always too good for you. I just wasn’t feeling desperate anymore.
The crowds had grown tired of the mall, the store quiet. I started the massive project of reorganizing the panty table. The week after Christmas, it looked like it had been hit by a dozen tiny tornados. Merchandise that belonged on the walls had been shoved in the drawers. Katie circled the store, half-conscious of her surroundings, planning the layout of the massive clearance sale that started right after the New Year.
A well-organized panty table gave me an inexplicable feeling of satisfaction. I hadn’t made much progress.
“Kyndra, I need you to ring.” Katie’s buried her head in a binder, making notes on the sale setup.
“No problem.” Man, it was a mess back here, too. Thank God I didn’t have to worry about getting into the shelter tonight. We were never getting out of here. What did everyone do here all day? I tidied up the best I could.
“Is there anyone in the front? Kyndra!” Katie hardly even looked up from her work.
“Do you want to switch?” I asked. “I could stay back here, and you could greet while you work on that?”
Katie sighed loudly, as if my suggestion offended her. “I’m working on the sale. I need you in the front.”
“But you need me to ring, too.” What was up with her lately? Was she still mad about the twenty dollars?
“We need someone watching the front room.” she insisted, and I headed back to the panty table, keeping an eye on the register.
“You’d look good in those,” Matt said. I swatted his hand away from my ass.
“What are you doing here?” He looked worse than ever under the fluorescent lighting, his eyes sunken in his sallow face. He smelled like he’d spent the entire holiday season passed out in an ashtray.
“Looking for you.” He ran his hand along the sleeve of my jacket, and I flinched. “Did your phone get shut off? Do you need money, princess?” He leaned in close, his hot, disgusting breath melting the skin on my neck. “I can get you some quick.”
Some girls were so desperate for what Matt had to offer—the drugs, not the person, God help the person who was desperate for that —they’d do anything to settle up on their bill. He loved showing his other customers the videos. I always felt embarrassed for those girls. Thank God I never got hooked using that stuff. No matter how good it made me feel, I hated what it did to people.
Matt had always had a way with words and women. His family lived upstairs from me and Memere when we were in elementary school. He was a couple years older than me, but only a grade ahead since he’d stayed back. I was pretty sure he never bothered to finish school. Academics bored Matt, but he’d always had a penchant for playing doctor. And he’d been finding a way to get me out of my clothes ever since.
“I don’t need to do that. I need to do this.” I motioned to the panty table. “You need to go. You’ll get me in trouble.”
“Oh, you are too good for me. Okay, princess. I’ll go.” He slapped me on the ass, the sound ricocheting off the walls. I stiffened. “I’ll see you at the party.”
I looked around, to see if anyone had watched that happen. A middle-aged lady with a little girl stared at Matt as he sauntered back to the mall, already hollering at one of his boys. A group of his friends congregated in front of the store. Katie glared at me.
“Sorry,” I mouthed and went back to work.
She peeled herself away from her perch. “You can’t have your friends in here all the time.”
All the time? Matt only came to the mall if he had a deal to complete in the food court. And she was one to talk. Her husband spent some nights holding up the cash wrap, while her baby destroyed the store.
“I know.”
“Can I be let into a fitting room?” A customer had an armful of lingerie she wanted to try on.
“Can you?” Katie asked me. “I need to start the registers.”
“Of course.” I let the customer in, and then snuck a peek at my phone. Ten minutes until close. Hopefully she’d be quick. “Let me know if you need anything.”
I stopped dead in my tracks when I came back to the front room.
One whole side of the panty table was empty.
We’d been ripped off.
Laughter from Matt’s group in the hallway shattered my shock.
“Matt!” I hissed as I leaned out of the doorway. “Did you see anyone run out of here with a bunch of panties?”
All of his friends looked at me like I was nuts. One of them who had his pants belted dangerously low raised his jacket to show me his boxers. I shook my head and turned around to face Katie.
She totally ignored me while she finished ringing up the lady who’d been so disgusted by Matt. “What’s up?” she asked as she separated credit card slips.
“The panty table—“
“It’s okay that you didn’t finish. I open, so I’ll have whoever is in with me work on it.”
“It’s not that. Someone ripped it off while I let that customer in to the fitting room.”
Katie’s face fell. “You’ve got to be shitting me.”
“I wish I was.” The closing announcement echoed through the mall. “Let me check on that customer.”
The dressing room door had been left open, hangers and tags littered the floor. Whoever stole the panties had probably been working with the dressing room girl. The customers and the merchandise were long gone.
“We got tag teamed.” My heart pounded. Why did I feel like this was my fault? I hadn’t done anything wrong.
“Shit. Shit, shit, shit.” Katie said under her breath as she stormed to the gate, hanging on it as she looked out at the empty hallway. On the way back, she stared at the empty table.
“I just let that girl into the dressing room and then when I came back, someone wiped us out.” My words came fast.
“Yeah, I know.” Katie sighed. “Your friend was hanging out with all those people out front for a long time.”
“What? No. He wouldn’t have done that.” Matt might have been a criminal, but he wouldn’t screw with me like that, would he? He was awfully pissed I didn’t answer his texts.
“I hate it when that guy comes in the store.” Katie pounded the keys of the register angrily, starting the closing paperwork. “I swear he scares half the customers away.”
“I’ve told him not to come. I don’t know what else to do.” I looked down at the tags I’d picked up off the dressing room floor. That bitch got away with over two hundred dollars’ worth of lingerie.
“Why do you even associate with him?” Katie spat out the words. “People like that will drag you right down with them.”
“I stayed with him for a little while, but now I’m trying to move on.” Again I felt guilty about something I didn’t do, and if Katie had just stayed in the front room, none of this would have happened. But I didn’t have the guts to tell her that. I might be looking to the future, but in the present, I needed this job. “In fact, I wanted to talk to you about that.”
“Does it have to be tonight?” She sighed. “We have extra paperwork, again, because of the theft, and LP isn’t not going to be amused that it’s the two of us with a problem again. I have a mortgage, you know, Kyndra.”
“Why are you acting like this is my fault? It would have happened no matter who worked tonight. I’m not screwing things up to ruin your life. Shit happens, and lately it’s happening to us.”
“These drawers better balance to the penny.” Katie sounded like she was threatening me.
“Have I done something wrong? I mean, outside of this stuff. I feel like I can’t do
anything right here lately.”
Katie looked up at me, her lips still pursed. “Don’t say anything to anyone, but I’m trying to get on the training team. All these little screw ups hurt my chances.” Her face softened a little. “The hours would be more normal, and I could be home with Luke more. I hate not being able to tuck him in to bed.”
“That would be awesome if you got it.” I leaned up against the counter. “But don’t take it out on me like I’m trying to put you out on the streets. I wouldn’t wish that upon anyone.”
She jumped like she’d been zapped with an electric shock. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I always tell the rest of the managers how hard you work. And that’s why you always get scheduled with me. But I have to tell you, there’s been some talk.”
“What are you talking about?” My heart stopped beating, and I struggled for breath.
“Sarah and Jen didn’t like the fact that you were sleeping in the back room during overnights. You know, because of LP issues. We shouldn’t be in the backroom if we’re not on the clock. But I told them why you needed to stay—“
“You told them?” I thought I might fall backward. I’d told her about the shelter in confidence.
“I had to. Or else you would have been out on the street. Or you’d be depending on that dirtbag for a place to stay. I still think it was probably him that ripped us off tonight.”
No wonder everyone had been treating me strangely the past couple of weeks. But it didn’t stop them from cutting my hours.
“Now do you understand why it looks bad when I have to call these things in on your shifts?” Katie continued. “There’s only so long I can fight for you to keep your job.”
“They’d fire me for being homeless?” I could hardly process what I was hearing.
“No, but it makes it a lot easier to believe you’ve been stealing.” Katie lowered her eyes back to the closing paperwork. Things seemed to be balancing.
“Oh.” I didn’t know what else to say, but then I remembered I was in the process of digging my way out of this hole. “I’ve found a place to stay.”
Katie looked back up, her eyes wide and mouth open in a surprised smile. “That’s awesome! Where?”
“A friend had an extra room.” It was a good place to start my talk. “I’m going to be starting school soon, too.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, January fourteenth. I’m going to need to change my hours, because it’s Monday through Friday until four.”
“Oh.” Her smile faded. “That might be a problem.”
“Why?” How could school be a problem?
“Well, to be a sales lead, you need open availability.”
“I have fifteen hours next week!” I cried.
“It doesn’t matter, those are the rules.” She shook her head. “You may have to go back down to being a sales person.”
Less hours. Less money. More reasons to move on from this place.
“It’s okay,” I said it like I wasn’t scared. Even if I knew I was doing the right thing, it was scary as hell. Being at this job was like standing on a burning bridge.
Aidan’s sleek black car waited by the curb, the cloud of exhaust blinking orange from the hazard lights turned on. Was he ever a sight for sore eyes. “I thought I was going to have to drag you out of that place.”
“I wish you did.” It would have been nice to show him off. My body melted into the leather seat, the heat blasting against my skin. “We got ripped off right at closing. And I found out that I’m pretty much about to get fired.”
I left the part about Matt out. He hadn’t been brought up yet, and I could be sure that Aidan would hate him.
“To hell with those people.” Aidan shook his head as he merged into traffic.
“Soon I’ll be a professional ass wiper and I won’t have to worry about underwear ever again.”
He burst out laughing. “I’ve never heard it put like that before.”
“That’s what a CNA does.” I giggled. “It’s okay, it’s still better than working at the mall.”
If nothing else, working at the mall gave me plenty of experience in dealing with shit.
Eleven
On New Years’ Eve, Mother Nature seemed to be in high spirits about new beginnings. I knew exactly how she felt. The bright sunny day warmed the city enough that I didn’t even need a jacket. Aidan told me I needed to dress for the evening, but he didn’t tell me why. My one outfit worth going anywhere in was in a box in Paige’s basement, wrinkled and probably getting moldy. Aidan insisted I buy an outfit, leaving money out on the table for me, and telling me he wouldn’t take it back. As much as I hated taking his money, I didn’t want to embarrass him.
The crowds might have left the mall, but the deals were better than ever. Anyone who wanted a glittery New Years’ dress had it already, and they’d moved on the blowout, the mani, and the pedi. I had the stores to myself. Why did it seem like I always wound up at the mall on my days off? In the recent past, it was to keep warm and pass the time. It was nice to have an actual mission for once.
It didn’t take me long at all to find a nude tank dress with a black lace overlay on the sale rack. I’d been admiring dresses like this all season, and never dreamed I’d actually get to wear one. It also wasn’t too bright after wearing black every day to shock me. The dress hugged everything and was kind of short. Man, it had been a while since I’d really looked at myself in a full length mirror. Without all the layers I usually wore, I was so skinny. The size I’d worn before Memere got sick hung off of me. I did my best not to let it bother me. I picked a pair of tights out of the clearance bin and called it a day. Hopefully this would work for whatever Aidan had in mind.
I got back to Aidan’s by midafternoon. I didn’t feel like reading, and I still didn’t quite feel at home, even in the room he set up for me. Every time I asked about what I should do around the house, Aidan avoided answering the question, so I didn’t want to touch anything. People got weird when you touched their stuff.
What else was there to do but take a nap? Putting my pajamas back on and slipping in between the sheets, I fell asleep with a smile on my face.
Waking up just as the light coming through the window started to gray, I made myself a cup of coffee, and started my day completely over. I wanted to be ready to go when Aidan woke up, but I didn’t know what to do with myself. I found myself wandering around the house in a daze.
We were kind of going on a date.
Kind of.
Now that it was time to get ready, my excitement was bubbling over. He’d asked me to come out with him, but refused to give me any details. My curiosity sent my imagination into overdrive. No one had ever brought me out on a real date before. It felt so grown up and sophisticated, yet like a fairy tale all at the same time.
“Just get yourself something pretty.” That was all he would tell me, grinning wide enough that his face threatened to split.
I rubbed hair goo between my palms and worked it into my hair before using Aidan’s hairdryer to blow it out. I found it amusing that he had one, since it didn’t seem very manly. Since I’d been couch surfing, I’d streamlined my makeup routine for the nights I couldn’t find a couch. People got the wrong idea if you were too pretty, as much as no one liked to admit it, especially when you really didn’t have any place to be. All I had left was mascara, bronzer, and lip gloss, but it was enough to bring out my eyes and make me look finished. Parting my hair on the left side, I twisted the two sections back and brought them together in a messy chignon. It didn’t look as good as all the pictures I saw on the internet, but not bad for the first try. Then I went back to my room, shimmied my dress up over my hips not to screw up my hair, pulled on the tights, and sat on my bed to wait. I felt a little foolish, all dressed up with nowhere to go. Yet.
And nothing to do. A Piece of My Heart laid on the nightstand. I pulled the cover flap that held my place out so I could rejoin David and Talis.
War was
on everyone’s lips, and the masquerade party was a welcome reprieve. Talis wound her hair tightly in a high bun and donned the black lace dress I had made for her. The dress’ heavily sleeves, adorned with lace insets, looked like wings. How could such a devilish creature look just like she had fallen from heaven?
I hated to see her pull the mask over her lovely face. Everyone’s heads turned as we entered the grand foyer. No one saw me, they all stared at this mystery women. The crowd grew thicker and Talis laughed before letting go of my hand and disappearing into the crowd. She’d have no problem finding a playmate for the night. Someone’s wife would be leaving this party alone. The next time she’d see her husband, if at all, would be to bury him.
How could something so horrific seem so romantic? I rested the book on my chest and reached up to touch the hair gathered at the nape of my neck, considering rewrapping it at the top of my head. Since I’d barely pulled this thing off, I changed my mind.
Every time I picked up this book, the story mirrored what happened in this house. It was starting to freak me out. Was I imagining it? How could I just happen to be doing the same thing as this fictional character did almost three hundred years ago?
I jumped out of my skin when Aidan knocked on the door. I’d been so absorbed in the story I’d almost forgotten I had plans.
He didn’t say anything right away when I opened the door. He didn’t come in, either. He had on black dress pants and a gray button down shirt. Shit, I got it all wrong. By pretty he meant something pink and frilly and I’d picked out this borderline slutty dress.
“You look gorgeous.” His voice was low and husky when he finally spoke. His eyes seemed different too. I couldn’t keep looking at them, the dark fire that burned behind them would paralyze me. If this hadn’t been a date before, it certainly was now.
“Thanks.” My heart pounded harder the longer he looked at me like that. “I didn’t know what to get, so I hope it’s all right.”
“It’s better than all right, it’s perfect.” His eyes softened as his gaze slid down my body. My skin tingled as his eyes fell lower and then came back up to meet mine. He held my hand out to me, and I took it, my fingers practically on fire when they touched his. “I’ll be the envy of the city.”
Silent Night: Vampire Holiday Romance (The Night Songs Collection Book 4) Page 6
