Distilled Duplicity

by Louise Furley

  Again, they sat for a while. Then he spoke, “You save me, lamb. You save me from myself more every day.” He lifted his head, lowered it to look at her. “You have pulled me out of the darkness, just your sweet presence, saved me today. Thank you.” He sounded drained.

  Kiri gently touched his face, caressed the rough whiskers. He leaned into her palm.

  “Still,” he said, “it eats inside me like rot, I can’t get away from it. You should go. I never should have taken you, I’m no good for you. But,” he kissed her palm, “I can’t give you up, I’m sorry.” A light chuckle rumbled in his chest. “Only three times in my life have I used that word, and they’ve all been with you.”

  She tilted her head, eyes half-mast, smiled up at him.

  “Baby,” he murmured, cupped her chin and kissed her. Then let her go, like she always says, he won’t stop at one kiss. He was filthy, drunk, had no business touching her with his dirty hands, cruel mouth, rotted mind. “You need to go, Kiri, back upstairs to our room,” he sighed.

  “Okay,” she said cheerfully standing up. She grasped his hand. “You’re coming with me. I have something we need to do.” Tugging his hand, she tried to pull him up.

  “No, baby, you shouldn’t be near me right now. I’m…fetid.”

  “Naithon,” she said quietly. “I never ask you for anything, ever. Do I?”

  His lips pursed, he shook his head. “No. You know I would give you anything you asked, except, to leave me.”

  Her smile slanted up at one corner. “Right. So, I’m asking you to come with me now, do something with me.”

  A brow wobbled quizzically. “What do you want to do?”

  “You’ll see. Come on.” She tugged his hand.

  Chapter Eighteen

  He’d been sitting for a long time; it took a minute for him to shuffle to his feet. He looked down at the vodka bottle sitting on the bench, and slipped his fingers to twine with hers, leaving it there. “Okay. I need to shower,” he frowned, scratching under his chin at the scruff.

  “No, trust me, you’re better off the way you are, come on.” She pulled him with her through the gloom and into the light.

  He squinted and covered his eyes with his arm. He didn’t see Mazonn sitting on the floor on the other side of the door, phone in his hand, with his surprised gaze on the pair.

  “Give me the key to the upstairs and our room,” she said to Maz with her hand out. The key could bypass the security of his thumbprint.

  His brows arched, he fished it out and dropped it in her palm.

  She grinned at his perplexity and tugged Naithon away down the corridor.

  When they reached the grand room, Kiri gave Naithon a little push so he flopped down on a chair.

  Wait here, I’ll be right back.” She ran off to the stairs.

  Mumbling, “Aye aye, Captain,” he saluted, missing his forehead. His hand fell heavily to the arm of the chair. Looking down he saw his shirt was unbuttoned, revealing the darker hair on his chest. Muttering drunkenly, “Can’t look the heathen my pigeon calls me,” with unsteady hands he buttoned it leaving the top two undone.

  Five minutes and Kiri returned carrying a case. “Okay, I’m ready.” She motioned to the door.

  At the front door, she said, “Naithon, we need a car.”

  “K,” he staggered, righted himself. “I got my Viper in the garage. I’ll get it.”

  “Uh, nope. We need a driver. I don’t have an American license and you are in no condition to drive. Call a driver.”

  “Geesh you’re bossy today.” He grinned crookedly and slurred, “Kinda like it.” Patting his pockets, he muttered, “Don’t know where my phone is.”

  “Excuse me,” Kiri said to a guard that was watching them, suppressing his grin. This was a lighter side of Naithon never seen before. “Can you get us a driver, please?”

  “Right away, ma’am,” he pulled out his cell and dialed. Hanging up, he rushed in front of them. Taking her case from her, he said, “Let me get that door, Miss. It’s really heavy.”

  Naithon scowled at him. “I can get the door for my girl, Shawn.”

  “Yessir,” Shawn grinned, holding the door open.

  “Come on, tipsy.” Kiri pushed Naithon out the door as he glowered at Shawn.

  “It’s too bright out here,” Naithon complained, covering his eyes.

  “After being in the dark for the better part of the week I would think so.”

  His chuckle more of a slur, “Sarcasm becomes you, my sweet,” he lurched to kiss her but she ducked her head and he almost toppled. “But then,” he grinned wickedly, slurring, “everything becomes you, pigeon, ‘cause you’re as sweet and beautiful on the inside as you are on the outside. Maybe someday I can experience the inside,” brows wiggled, smirking his innuendo.

  His mouth curved downward, he sighed morosely, “What would I do without you, pigeon? You can’t ever leave me.”

  “We decided you weren’t going to call me that anymore, Naithon,” she reproached him. “It’s sexist.”

  He leered drunkenly at her chest. “I don’t mind. Those plump babies are calling me to crush them in my hands,” he tottered towards her with his hands out. Eyes rolling, Kiri moved out of his way, he was too unbalanced to easily follow her dodge. The car pulled up. The chauffeur exited and hurried around to open a rear passenger door, and the guard stowed her case in the front.

  Naithon swooped his hand indicating for her to get in first. She did and slid over to make room for him. He mostly fell inside and shuffled over, squishing her against the side.

  The chauffeur poked his head in, asked. “Where to, sir?”

  Naithon shrugged with his palms turned up. “Gotta ask the lady, she’s really bossy today.”

  Pursing his lips to hide his grin, the chauffeur looked at Kiri with a questioning brow raised.

  “To the distillery.”

  “The distillery?” Naithon frowned with a negative shake, blond hair flung over one dark eye. “We are not goin’ to your da’s. It’s too dangerous for you there.” He slurred, “An’ I’m not lettin’ that red-haired fucker get near you. He’ll try to take you away from me.”

  “No, silly, to your distillery,” she said with a smile and nod to the driver. He winked at her and closed the door.

  Only thirty minutes later, and a short snooze for Naithon, the limo stopped in front of the distillery. It was Sunday so the place was deserted. Perfect. No one needed to see Naithon in his condition. He’d drowned himself in liquor for days and wallowed in horrifying, dreadful memories.

  Still, he didn’t look disgusting to her, he looked roughed up. Black clothes wrinkled, Blond hair mussed, bleak eyes heavy and unfocused, the scruff made him appear a little more on the sinister side, but she didn’t fear him. Not anymore.

  Kiri hoped if she got him doing some kind of action he would sober up with less of a headache and feeling so bad. Because she wasn’t letting him near a drop of alcohol. They were going to the tasting room, it was still being renovated so there wasn’t any liquor in there yet. She asked the driver to stop at a drive-through to get some coffee for Naithon.

  Smoothly coming to a halt when they reached the distillery, the driver parked and hurried around to open the limo’s door. He stood to the side as the couple climbed out. The driver held out her case. “Miss, the guard said this was yours.”

  “Got it.” Naithon snatched the case from the driver. “Now what?” he burbled to Kiri, slurping his coffee.

  “Hmm, do you have the keys on you, Naithon?”

  “Dunno.” Setting the coffee on a ledge, he clumsily patted his pockets. “Don’t think so. Drinkin’, so can’t have keys when I’m drinkin’.”

  One side of her mouth pulled in. “Oh. I didn’t think about the key to get into the distillery. We’ll have to go back.”

  “No worries.” Naithon stumbled to the entrance. “It’s a combo pad.”

  Kiri followed him; the driver slipped into the car and opened a newspaper. F
olding the paper, he took out a pencil and started on the crossword puzzle.

  Naithon tried three times, but he couldn’t push the right combination of numbers. His thick fingers moved too clumsily over the buttons, hitting two or three at once.

  Sighing with amusement, Kiri said, “Tell me the numbers, Naithon.”

  He put a finger to his lips. “Shh, it’s a secret, don’t tell anyone.”

  Rolling her eyes for the third time that day, Kiri said with a dry grin, “Sure, who am I going to tell?”

  Rattling off the combination, he said with a lopsided smirk, “Dio, more sarcasm. You are so cute when you try to speak mean. But,” he leaned in to kiss her, “you are too sweet to be mean. Gimmie soma dat sugar, pigeon.”

  Kiri pushed the buttons, grabbed his coffee cup and stepped quickly through the door out of his reach.

  When they were inside the lobby, Kiri took hold of Naithon’s wrist and pulled him through the complex then through the glass-enclosed walkway leading to the structure containing the tasting room. It was still being worked on, but the carpenters had almost finished the room. The walls were freshly painted a week ago. The room still retained a hint of the pungent paint smell.

  Naithon’s brow wrinkled in puzzlement. “Why are we here, pigeon?”

  “Naithon,” she said with a frown.

  “Sorry. Why are we here, lamb?” He grinned at the face she made at him.

  Slapping the coffee cup into his hand, she reproved the recalcitrant man, “Really, lamb to slaughter isn’t any better. You can set the case on that table, please,” Kiri pointed to a nearby table.

  “Ookey doke,” he complied, plodded to the table and thumped the case down.

  Kiri shook her head with a smile. This playful Naithon was fun. And endearing. She went over and lifted the lid on the case. Naithon peered over her shoulder and looked puzzled. “Paints? Why did you bring paints?” Inside the case were extra-large tubes of paint.

  “Well,” she said removing tubes and brushes, “I had an idea for this place.” Glancing over, she smiled at seeing several buckets of paint the painters had left stacked near the door.

  “K.” Naithon watched her set some things on the table. He was up for any of her suggestions, as far as he was concerned she was a freakin’ Michelangelo. A girly one. Trying to be discrete, he clumsily scanned her curves, smiled with a not so subtle nod, oh ja, all girl.

  Ignoring his wolfish leering at her, she said, “Yeah, remember I said romantic and mysterious for this tasting room?”

  He nodded wobbly, agreeable. Finishing the last of the coffee he set the cup on the bar counter and combed his hair with his fingers. His eyes were growing clearer, stance steadier, he was sobering up. A miracle considering how much booze he’d put away.

  She took out a pencil and gestured to a wall. “I thought about some paintings and pictures of Hawaii I’ve seen. There were some that were twilight darkish, yet iridescent. A mountainside barely discernable in the indigo nightfall, halfway down is a shack partially covered with palm trees and thick dark foliage.”

  She moved to the wall and pretended to trace a picture. “A mural, Naithon. The mountain on the right side, deep mossy green and botanic, shadowed and bold and mysteriously curving down as it slants to the ocean, and the dark violet sky and glittering stars on the left. Silver moon partly shrouded with wispy bands of clouds. Just a hint of inundating ocean below.”

  Naithon stared at the wall, following her gestures, the flowing descriptions of her imagery.

  “High up in the background, the barest slash of a blueish waterfall disappearing into the dark side of the mountain. Stars in the midnight sky twinkling along with moonlit glistened points on the mountain and the waterfall.” She raised the pencil high for the waterfall then dotted all the way down it then the mountain where she imagined sparkles sprinkling areas from the silvery moonlight, all the way to the slightest glittering ripples of the ultramarine sea.

  “See, semi-dark, everything almost invisible, but a smidge of red color from a flower, a bit of lighter green on parts of the mountain, trace of grey and beige in the shack, faint blue and white of the waterfall in the distance, and the slightest pinpricks of iridescent sparkles throughout.” She turned to him. “What do you think?”

  Naithon stood mutely staring at the wall.

  “Naithon? With the black velvet shelves, your luminescent colored vodka from the crystals and lights, I think the mural will pull it all together. A lot of greenery in the corners of the room. Make people feel like they are there, in the scene, at the mysterious mountain. Later in the evenings you can dim the lights, all the sparkles will light up, get a fire flaming in the fireplace, it’ll be totally romantic, atmospheric. Well?”

  He stared, unmoving.

  “Naithon?” she said louder.

  He blinked, shook his head, turned to smile at her. “You are fuckin’ amazin’ my beautiful lamb, amazin’. When can you start?”

  “Well,” she drew a line on the wall. “I’m going to draw the picture, you and I will paint it.”

  “Huh?” His lips pushed out in confusion. “Me? I can’t paint.”

  “Sure you can. I’ll help you. You will love it, watch.” Kiri went to the table and squeezed out some green paint on a board, dashed a brush in it, traipsed over to him and put the brush in his hand. She wrapped her hand around his, as best she could it was so big, and pulled him to the wall. She raised his hand, set the brush on the wall, and pulled his hand down leaving a streak of green on the white wall. She stood back. “See?”

  He stood unmoving, blinking at the green streak. Then he turned and grinned at her, “Show me more, lamb.”

  An hour later, Naithon went out to speak with the driver. He told him to go to the mansion and ask Mazonn to get his phone, he’d left it in the suite.

  “Of course, sir,” the driver acknowledged, lowering his head in a slight bow. “Anything else, sir?”

  “Ja. Have Mazonn get me a clean pair of jeans, shirt, boxers, socks, a toothbrush. I can shower here in the men’s lockers. I want you to go to Gariellos and tell Marty the owner to pack up a really nice dinner for two.”

  The driver bowed again. “Wine, sir?”

  A full bodied red would be appealing and romantic. Candles too. But, Naithon sighed, next time. He wanted to show Kiri he didn’t need to drink alcohol, only when he slid into those devouring black funks. He had to drink to drown the demons that threatened to pull him under and bury him for good. “No. Ice tea. Oh, and candles and a blanket. That’s it.”

  Covering his smile, the driver nodded and left. Naithon stopped in the kitchen, grabbed some salt, rubbed it on his teeth, gargled with it, spat it out. He washed his hands and face then went back to painting. He loved it. Talk about cathartic. Damn his girl was smart. Best thing he had ever done was kidnap her. Brushing aside the twinge of guilt in taking her, he hurried back to the tasting room.

  After deciding to start with one of the walls that was painted black, Kiri let him choose the colors he wanted to put down. And he eagerly got right to it.

  As he laid his paint over the wall, Kiri went over his work blending and pulling things together, making areas sharper, deepened dimension with contrasting lighter shades. She outlined the shack and the waterfall, the trees and flowers. It was going to take a few sessions to complete it, which was fine with both of them.

  They chatted comfortably while they worked, stopping briefly when the driver returned. He gave Naithon the clothes and his cell, and put the dinner in the fridge in the employees’ break room. Naithon told the driver he could go home, he’d call him when they were ready to leave.

  Back to work, eventually their light chatter grew more in depth, serious, as they asked the real personal questions. She told him about her early life, having to dodge Duce, he and Piero killing her pets for fun.

  Melonie had played endless malicious tricks on her like cutting limbs off her dolls. Once when Kiri was very little, Melonie told her she could be
like Supergirl, and Kiri could use mind-control to control the vicious guard dogs down the street. If Janero hadn’t been near to stop Kiri, Melonie would have pushed her inside the fence to play with the pit bulls. Kiri would have been torn to bits.

  Then, Ignacio shipped her off to an isolated, highly secured female boarding school. Her father wanted to keep her as chaste as possible for whatever arranged marriage he could broker for the most land or money.

  Naithon nodded as she spoke, he gripped the paintbrush on the verge of snapping it in two in his escalating rage. That bastard, some father. He was as bad as Naithon’s old man. But Naithon could fend for himself, Kiri was a defenseless little girl. Ignacio should have protected her from her sadistic siblings. Her sister Melonie was as bad as his own brother, Misolav.

  She told him Rueford had come in with the highest bid for her, and her father had a wedding planner already on the job. Naithon didn’t ask her questions about Rueford, he would lose it for sure and go storming off to take the old pig down. Undoubtedly the bastard had been grabby with her, something that would send Naithon off like an attack missile if he thought about it. He would take care of Montoblanco later, right now he wanted to stay in the moment.

  “Naithon?”

  “Ja?” He slashed a bold angry stroke of jungle green.

  “Tell me about you. Mazonn told me your dad stole from you and threw you out on the streets. He said you hung with a gang and went to prison.”

  Face scowling like he’d bit a sour lemon he growled, “Mazonn has a big mouth. He has no business telling you that shit. You have a low enough opinion of me.”

  Kiri feathered almost imperceptible lighter green over his dark mountain adding depth. Standing back, she regarded their work. “You are holding me captive, Naithon, I think I have the right to know a little bit about you, what formed you into the man you are today.”

  Making a sound of irritation, he jabbed his brush into black paint, slapped it on some green and mixed them making the green darker. “Hell and Satan and my brothers along with my da took serrated icicles and stabbed and scraped and gouged me into who I am, little innocent pigeon. They created me, ice cold and broken. The gang and prison only sharpened and twisted the corrosion that they created.”