Page 56 of Forbidden Fate

“A little,” I say, thickening my fake French accent.

He smiles and holds out the water.

I hesitate just long enough to look afraid. Then I take the bottle.

“They say you have no one,” he says to me.

I look down at the bottle. “No.”

“No father? Mother?”

“No.”

“Boyfriend?”

I shake my head.

He leans closer. “Pretty girl like you?”

I run my hands through my stringy hair. “I’m not pretty now.”

He laughs softly. “You are.” He taps a finger against the side of the bottle. “If you have no one out there… Maybe you look for boyfriend, yes?”

22

CRUZ

The brothel looks different from the inside when I’m not coming here to collect money, deliver messages, or make sure one of Vega’s men hasn’t gotten too drunk and too rough with one of Señora V’s girls.

It looks softer, somehow.

What a lie.

Robin walks beside me with her chin up, shoulders back. She hasn’t said much since we left Señora V. I lead her down the narrow upstairs hallway. The floorboards creak under my boots.

“This way,” I say.

The door at the end of the hall is painted dark green, the brass knob polished to a shine. Señora V didn’t give us one of the rooms used for business. She gave us a space for favored guests, men she respects or fears, and sometimes the women she wants to protect from them.

The room is empty. One bed. One wardrobe. One small table with a pitcher of water and two glasses. A faded rug covers most of the wooden floor, though not enough to hide the places where the boards dip near the wall.

The sheets are clean and fresh. A folded quilt rests at the foot of the bed, pale blue with tiny stitched flowers, almost too innocent to belong in a house like this.

A normal room on its face, but with a million tiny cracks in the plaster.

Robin stops in the doorway behind me. For a second, she doesn’t move. She’s staring at the bed.

“Robin.”

She turns to me. “What?”

“You’re safe in here.”

She lets out an unsteady chuckle. “That’s a big promise from a man who kidnapped me.”

I don’t reply. I simply close the door behind her and lock it.

Robin takes two more steps inside. The floor creaks beneath her bare feet.