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As my eyes adjust to the living room, I take inventory of what’s around me. Àvia had quite the book collection, though hardly valuable, and in any case Sara is the only person in town I could sell them to, and she’d try to overprice them to give me the money I need. My grandmother’s aversion for talking boxes, as she called them, means there are no valuable electronics in the house to pawn off.
Wait a second. Pawn.
I climb the stairs two at a time in the direction of Àvia’s untouched bedroom. Barreling in like a bull in a china shop should keep me from seizing up. It sorta works when I fling the door open and manage to step through.
It doesn’t hit me all at once. It’d have been less painful if it had. Instead, every little thing is an individual gut punch stronger than the last.
Her perfectly made bed, with her handmade knitted blanket folder over it. The vanity lined with empty bottles of perfume which she liked to keep because they were too pretty to waste. That scent of orange blossom, her favorite hand cream, permeating every nook and cranny.
“No. Nope, no, nope,” I chant to myself before stepping back and pulling the door closed behind me. Sliding against it I do my best to regulate my breathing, but my body has a mind of its own, and I’m gasping for air, sweat trickling down the nape of my neck. A blend between a sob and a hiccup rattles my bones, sounding so foreign to my own ears it makes my shoulders jump in surprise.
I don’t know how much time passes before I regain control of myself. It could’ve been seconds, or it could’ve been minutes. It might have been hours, for all I can tell, but the dusky light filtering through the hallway window tell me it hasn’t, since it’s not dark out yet.
Her presence is too strong in her room, and it makes me feel like she’s farther away than ever. It consolidates how truly alone I am, how neither of them is ever coming back. I can’t stand it. If I could help it, I’d keep it forever locked the way Àvia did with Mamà’s.
But it’s not up to me, this time, because Àvia’s nightstand and closet might be my only solution to paying the bill that comes due tomorrow. There’s jewelry there. Gold, silver, even Àvia’s engagement ring. They might not amount to everything I owe, but it’s my best chance to get close.
Except I can’t step inside. Not on my own, anyway.
Another lightning-fast idea strikes me, and before I know what possessed me I’m sliding my phone out of my pocket and typing a text.
I only read it back after I’ve hit send.
Any chance you’re interested in a little scavenger hunt tonight?
Teizel’s response is near immediate.
Now you have my interest piqued. What are we scavenging for?
My future financial independence. Come to my house?
Then I type in the address. Three dots dance. When they stop, so does my heart thrumming in my throat.
On my way.
chapter 10
pearls, diamonds, and lies
teizel
I haven’t the slightest clue what Esmeralda’s plans are for tonight, but it hardly matters because she’s asked me to come over, and that’s all my body can focus on. Even if she hadn’t given me her address, I would’ve been able to track her down from the incessant pull of the game alone. It’s demanding a challenger enter the field, and it will continue to drive me to the brink of insanity until I make my move.
Maybe tonight is the night. Maybe Esmeralda is deeper under my spell than I’d anticipated. It’s impossible to stop my mind from wandering to last weekend, to the way her core felt warm and wet and greedy for release against me. The memory is enough to make my cock stir. I fight its rise, because whatever this absurd attraction toward my little prey is, it can’t be real. I don’t entertain the challengers — I refuse to have the same taste as the wench who damned me.
Esmeralda’s house is the picture of suburbia. Sage green, with a white trims and a white picket fence. Yes, a picket fence. Flower bushes not yet in bloom line the bay window out front. If there ever were any doubts of how far apart our worlds are, this house consolidates it. Memories of my own home, of the imposing castle of glimmering metal and stained glass, catch me off guard. I swat them away like flies. Nostalgia won’t do me any good.
The little door swings open before I can knock, and my chest puffs at the knowledge that the little prey was waiting for me.
A grin spreads across my lips. “I was promised a hunt.”
Goosebumps erupt on Esmeralda’s naked arms, but if she catches my double meaning, she doesn’t comment on it. “It may not be as exciting as I made it sound.”
Her voice is raspy, worn down, and only now I notice the other little things about her appearance, like how her bouncy curls are nested messily atop her head, or how her eyes are reddened and puffy.
My eyebrows fall low. “Are you all right?”
She sighs, a hand running over her face, and moves out of the way to let me through. The inside of the house, however modest, is as picturesque as the outside. There’s signs of life everywhere; hand-knitted blankets, black marker lines on door frames, well-read novels on the bookshelf, a wind chime singing in the evening breeze. Everything about this place screams family, and yet Esmeralda lives here alone. My lips itch with the questions I desperately want answers to, the ones I haven’t been able to pluck straight out of her mind.
