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Divan takes her back to the living area, and she casts her eyes away from the organ, although she catches its reflection in a mirror. When they reach her bedroom, someone’s there making her bed. He begins to work faster when he sees them.
“Almost done, sir.”
The man seems frail, and a bit fearful, as if he were caught doing something he shouldn’t. He doesn’t appear to be much older than Risa. When he turns to glance at her, she’s taken aback by his appearance. Part of his face is missing, and in its place is a formfitting biobandage, a paler pink than actual skin, covering his eye socket and most of his right cheek. He looks somewhat like the Phantom of the Opera with only one eye. The left side of his face doesn’t look much better, having several scars that seem somewhat fresh.
“Your henchman, I presume,” Risa says.
Divan is actually insulted. “I am not so arch as to have henchmen. This is Skinner, my valet.”
Risa gives up a bitter grin in spite of herself. “How appropriate that you call him Skinner.”
“Mere serendipity,” Divan says. “That’s his actual name.”
Skinner leaves quickly, obsequiously, closing the door behind him. Then it occurs to Risa that Skinner is also Grace’s last name. Could this be the troublesome brother she kept talking about? The more she pictures the half of his face that she could see, the more she’s convinced there’s a resemblance.
“What do you want from me?” Risa asks Divan, although she’s afraid to hear the answer.
“Something simple,” he tells her. “At least for you. I wish you to play the Orgão Orgânico for me. I have no talent for it, and it begs to be played by one with the skill.”
He lets the proposition hang in the air. Risa can’t dare to imagine herself sitting before the thing.
“No matter how well I play, you’ll tire of the music, and of me,” Risa tells him. “What happens to me then?”
“If our arrangement proves no longer viable, I shall let you go.”
“In how many pieces?”
Divan rolls his eyes at her skepticism. “Risa, I am not a bad man. My business may be unsavory, but I am not. Consider the cattle farmer who raises Kobe beef. Is he to be condemned because his stock must be slaughtered? Of course not! I am no different; I just provide a different nature of product . . . and I provide it in a manner far more humane.” He begins to walk toward her. “Unlike my associate who captured you, I have been able to separate myself from my work.”
She sidesteps, refusing to be made to back up, but still maintaining a safe distance between them.
“Your choices are simple,” he tells her. “You can choose to stay here, or you can choose to be auctioned. Here, I can promise you peace, patience, and respect. Which is more than I can say for the Saudi prince.”
The veiled threat has the desired affect, and in spite of herself, Risa feels a sense of claustrophobia closing in around her. Still, she pulls forth the courage to make her own proposition.
“I’ll do what you want under one condition.”
“Yes?”
“You let Connor go.”
Divan claps his hands together, overjoyed. “Excellent! The mere fact that you’ve entered negotiations is a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, freeing Connor is not an option.”
“In that case, you can go to hell.”
Divan is not offended, only amused. “I’ll give you time to reconsider. In the meantime, I have another high-profile Unwind to auction off.”
Risa can’t help but ask, “Who is it?”
“America’s most wanted,” he answers. “I paid Proactive Citizenry a small fortune for him, but the profit I’ll make will be worth it. There are many people out there who would like to own a piece of Mason Michael Starkey.”
46 • Argent
He must be smart. He must be shrewd. But more than anything else, he must be obedient.
“I pitied you,” Divan told him after the good half of his face had been harvested and given to Nelson. “Anyone else would have unwound the rest of you, but it’s rare that I feel true pity, so I chose to act on it.”
Pity, however, was not accompanied by charity. Rather than replacing the missing half of Argent’s face, Divan had it patched with the biobandage, like spackle over damaged drywall.
