He names the number.
I hold very still with the glass halfway to my mouth.
It is an astonishing number. A beautiful, dramatic, life-ending number. The kind of number that should arrive with orchestral accompaniment and a priest.
I lower the glass. “That can’t be right.”
Mysk tilts his head. “Would you like an itemized statement of your collapse?”
“Actually, yes.”
He gestures. One of the enforcers taps a slate and flicks the record onto my wall display.
There it is. Every dazzling act of idiocy. Every table. Every marker. Every extension. Every drunken little moment where I apparently looked fate in the eye and said,again.
My stomach turns.
I keep my face loose anyway. “Mm. Ugly font.”
Mysk smiles wider. “Still stalling.”
“Not stalling. Processing. There’s a difference.”
“There is,” he agrees. “Processing is what prey does right before it runs.”
I laugh under my breath and set the glass down. The apartment is too warm suddenly. I can smell my own stale sweat, the citrus cleaner from some long-ago optimistic attempt at domestic dignity, the electric tang from the busted door panel. My headache has become a bright hot spike between my eyes.
I spread my hands. “All right. So. Let’s not be theatrical.”
Mysk actually looks offended. “Bron. Everything worth doing is theatrical.”
“That explains your coat.”
One of the enforcers coughs into his fist to hide a laugh. Mysk doesn’t look at him, which is somehow worse.
I lean against the counter like I’m unconcerned, like my pulse isn’t hammering hard enough to bruise. “I have income coming.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“From?”
I make a show of mild annoyance, as though I hate explaining success to less glamorous men. “Royalties. Licensing. An upcoming tour package. There’s a delay, that’s all.”
Mysk watches me. His eyes are small and black and bright as polished seeds.
“An upcoming tour,” he repeats.
“That’s what I said.”
“With whom?”
I wave vaguely. “Promoters. Venues. People who value art.”
“Name one.”
I click my tongue. “That is profoundly insulting. I don’t interrogate you about your hobbies.”
