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“There’s no shhhame in it,” Chiara says, slurring slightly. “Maybe I’d like you better iffyou acted human sometimes.”
“How am I meant to take you home in this state?”
“Inwhatssstate? Imfine.”
I should get her into my car and make her drink cokes until she sobers up. I pull her to her feet and walk her across the floor, but her knees keep buckling beneath her, so I scoop her up in my arms and carry her through the casino to the elevator.
“Hey! Put me down. I’mfine.”
Heads turn to stare at the woman who’s yelling at the top of her lungs.
“The mayor’s daughter is drawing so much attention to herself in my casino. I hope this doesn’t get back to her father.”
Chiara claps a hand over her lips, her eyes widening. She whispers around her fingers, “Dad will be angry if he finds out that I’m drunk in a casino.”
“We won’t tell him, baby.”
“But he’ll find out. I don’t know who he is anymore. Since Mom—” She breaks off, her eyes filling with panic and tears. “I’m going to die, aren’t I?”
“Shh,” I say, my lips against her temple. “That’s the tequila talking.”
“Liar,” she whispers, her eyes glistening. “Women who don’t do as they’re told by men like you end up dead.”
I get her out to the Bentley and pour her into the back seat. Well, this is a fucking train wreck. I should have kept a closer eye on her.
“Take us to the Maxim,” I tell the driver. It takes Chiara a moment to raise her head and realize what I’ve said. Tears have spilled down her face and there are black mascara tracks on her cheeks.
“The Maxim Hotel? You’re not taking me home? Don’t try any funny business, mister.” She wags an admonishing finger in my face.
Drunk Chiara seems like she’ll start a fight with her father or fall apart if I deposit her back at home in this state. This is my fault, so she’s mine until she sobers up.
Fifteen minutes later we pull up at the Maxim Grand Hotel at the other end of town. Out front is an enormous white marble fountain. Every fifteen minutes, water shoots out of hundreds of jets, lit up by colored lights.
The perfect drunk-girl distraction.
I help Chiara out of the car and perch her on the edge of the fountain. I stand back and watch her dangling her fingers in the water, gazing at the colors as the lights change. There’s something strange about this tableau that I can’t put my finger on.
Then I realize what it is.
Chiara’s smiling.
I don’t think I’ve seen her smile before.
A moment later, water shoots into the air behind her in a great rush, lit up in yellow, turquoise and pink. There’s a gasp from the crowd, and Chiara lifts her head and laughs. The spray makes rainbows in the air around her and her bare skin is burnished in jewel tones.
A moment later, her gaze shifts to my face, and I feel a lurch as the full force of her smile slams into my chest. I wait for her smile to dim as she remembers who I am, but she merely raises her eyes to the water jets above her head as if inviting me to share in her delight.
Suddenly, I remember why I brought her here, and I can’t fucking breathe. Ophelia. The last time I saw her was sitting right where Chiara is now.
Saw heralive.
I saw her plenty after she was dead.
My fists clench at my sides. Chiara’s smiling and watching the fountain jets, pushing damp strands of her hair back from her face. The image glitches in my mind and becomes blood red. I try to hold back the graphic images from pouring into my brain but it’s like trying to hold back a tsunami with a chain link fence.
The corners of her mouth slit with razor blades in a grotesque smile. Dead, staring eyes. Her nipples slashed. Her stomach cut open and her intestines dragged out in fat, shiny ribbons. The black and bloodied petals of a flower, just glimpsed among the broken teeth in her mouth.
Chiara goes on smiling and reaches out to run her fingers through a jet of water. There were black mascara tracks on Ophelia’s cheeks too, as she grinned the permanent grin that had been cut into her face.
