‘You, Sal,’ she grimaces, lips twisted like the taste of my name turned bitter on her tongue.
‘Go on,’ I murmur, ‘tell me I disgust you. Go on. Tell me.’
She holds my stare, jaw clenched, and her throat works around the words that want out.
‘I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction.’
I smile.
She never stood a chance.
‘You could say everything is an illusion to some extent, Stella. Even butterflies.’
‘Butterflies?’
‘Yes. Do you think butterflies land on you because they’re attracted to beauty? No. They come for the salt. The iron. The blood. The scent of decay beneath your skin.’
‘Decay?’ she asks.
‘You don’t even feel their proboscis while they feed.’
‘STOP! Don’t say things like that. You’re making beautiful things sound cruel.’
‘Beauty is the mask cruelty wears when it wants to be loved. Life is cruel.’
‘Then when I die, lay me in a field of butterflies. Let them feast. Let them flutter and gorge. Let them carry me away in fragments,’ she answers.
‘And I’ll remain, watching, until the last piece of you is gone.’
I reach for the bill without glancing at it, sliding my card across the table with the same indifference I reserve for bad wine. As we head for the door, she pauses. ‘I need the toilet,’ she says, already her eyes scanning for signs.
I smirk, tilting my head. ‘Do be thorough, love. Wouldn’t want you sprinkling loofetti across this fine establishment.’
She stops mid-step. ‘Loofetti?’
I shrug, my eyes glinting. ‘You know, small bits of toilet paper. Rogue droppings. The tragic confetti of poor hygiene.’
She stares at me, half horrified, half amused. ‘You’re vile.’
‘Only mildly. Besides, you have nowhere to stash the evidence. You’re not wearing any knickers.’
She rolls her eyes. ‘You’re insufferable.’
‘And yet, here you are having enjoyed a wonderful meal that I paid for, and you’re off to powder your nose while I wait like a gentleman. A very patient and very misunderstood gentleman.’
She returns a few minutes later, and I offer my arm with mock gallantry. ‘The plumbing survived I see, and I didn’t have to rescue you from a soap dispenser uprising. Let’s go,’ I say. She follows, still rattled, but moving, and as we leave I hold the door, not like a gentleman, but more like a man who knows control isn’t something you give, it’s something you are.
CHAPTER 10
THE DIPLOMAT
TheParc Zoologiqueis a symphony of silence and shadow at this hour. Moonlight bleeds through tree branches, pooling in patches on the damp ground meant for pathways during daytime not midnight transactions. The zoo is half-heard half-felt, as the distant hoot of owls, the low, guttural rumbles from the deep depths of enclosures rumble through my bones. There’s a sudden rustling of something large, slow and deliberate, a soft snort, and the scraping of claws where somewhere a predator breathes. The zoo sleeps but not entirely.
Stella moves without hesitation, the crate of bats still tucked tightly in her arms like they’re sacred, not savage. Then, her contact emerges. Evelyn, exactly as Stella described; a ghost with government papers. A mercy dealer, just like Stella leaving unmarked graves in her wake. The job at the zoo is just a front and a convenient excuse for someone who deals in bad men and necessary endings. She doesn’t speak. She doesn’t need to. Her gaze lands on the crate, then flicks to Stella, then settles on me – with interest. There’s no introductions, no pleasantries. Just silence and an unspoken truth; this probably isn’t the first transaction, and it won’t be her last.
‘Take care of them,’ Stella says. The way Evelyn receives it with steady hands and an unreadable face – I know she will.
The zoo hums with its unusual sounds - but beneath it all, something is off. ‘We need to go.’
