Page 128 of Sweet Ruin

24

KANE

What am I to you?

What a fucking question.

There are plenty of easy answers I could have given her.

My debtor. My collateral. My property. The last white square on a map colored green.

All that is true.

But none of it explains why I did all the things I did tonight.

And none of it passes my lips, either.

She doesn’t know this about me, because Lilah doesn’t know anything about me yet. But I do not explain myself for an audience.

That’s a rule I’ve had since I was a boy with an armful of dishes, watching my father explain himself in a laughing speech to a room full of his cronies.

I won’t fucking be like him.

So I say nothing.

And she takes my silence for an answer.

“It’s okay,” she says. “No need to elaborate. I understand the situation perfectly.”

But of course she doesn’t. How could she? She doesn’t know what shaped me, what broke me, what scarred me…

“Lilah—”

“Happy New Year, Kane.”

Then she turns on her heel and walks away.

I’m left standing idiotically in place, with a champagne glass in my hand and enough anger in my chest to hurl it through the nearest wall.

Blyat’.

Fuck!

I could have stopped this. One true thing would’ve been enough to make her stay. She wasn’t asking for much.

Instead, I let a rule I have followed for most of my life send her running.

I put the glass down before I crush it.

Then I go charging after her.

Most people move out of my way. A few drunk fools try to speak to me, get one look at my face, and think better of it.

I reach the lobby just as the coat check girl starts to duck into the closet.

“Stop!” I call ahead. “Don’t get that coat.”

The girl sees me coming and her face goes pale. “M-Mr. Makov,” she stutters.