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"I'm Landon," he says.
I hesitate before reaching out to shake his hand. It feels like more of a binding contract for a deal I'm not sure what the terms are, rather than a simple handshake. He brings my hand to his mouth, and brushes his lips against my skin. I break out in goosebumps, and I realize that my chest feels fluttery. It's been so long since my heart has been capable of feeling anything that I don't recognize the sensation for what it is at first. Attraction.
"Juliet," I whisper, in a voice that comes out more choked than I would have liked.
"Do not swear by the moon, for she changes constantly then your love would also change," he tells me confusingly, and it takes me a moment to realize that he's quoting from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Clara's a big fan of Shakespeare so she has me reading all of his work.
"Were your parents big Shakespeare fans?" he asks.
"Something like that," I respond, unable to tell him that I was actually born over a hundred years before the play was written.
"What are you?" I blurt out.
He raises one eyebrow at me.
"What do you mean, "what am I?"" he asks.
I gesture to the entourage that remains standing or sitting close to our table. Most of them are watching us with rapt expressions. I turn back to him and roll my eyes.
"Just in the last ten minutes I've seen more guns, diamonds, and money than I've ever seen in this life. Are you some sort of politician or something?"
He gives me a huge smirk.
"Something like that," he says smugly, spitting my earlier words back at me.
Seeing that I'm at a dead end with that line of conversation, I move on.
"Why am I here?" I ask softly. He looks at me so intently I feel like he can see everything I keep so carefully hidden.
"You're here because I make sure that I always get what I want, and when I saw you across the room tonight, smiling at that schoolboy, I suddenly found that I had never wanted anything quite so bad in my life."
I'm frozen at his words, but before I can come up with anything to say, one of his men comes to our table and whispers something in Landon's ear. Anger flashes across his face, and I see the whites of his knuckles as he momentarily clenches his fists. A moment later his face is so blank it feels like I just imagined it all.
"I have to attend to some business," he says, and I'm immediately intrigued by what "business" he needs to attend to at midnight. "I'll pick you up tomorrow," he orders, and I'm again in shock at his audacity.
He stands up and leans over me, brushing his lips against my cheek. I hear him inhale and I realize that he's smelling me. It feels...interesting.
"Parting is such sweet sorrow that I shall say goodnight till it be morrow," he whispers to me, once again catching me off guard by the fact that this fierce, powerful man is actually sweetly quoting Shakespeare in my ear.
"I'll see you soon, Juliet," he says in a voice so low, I might have imagined it. He then swiftly walks away with a bark at a few of his companions who jump up to follow him.
One of the other men that was with him ushers me out of the front of the club, where a black Chrysler is waiting. He opens the door for me, and then gets into the passenger seat of the car, bellowing an order at the driver. Without asking for my address, we arrive at Clara's deli. We live above it as most shopkeepers in the area do. The man gets out of the passenger seat, and opens the car door. I feel like I'm having an out of body experience as he nods at me and waits for me to get inside the deli before the car pulls away. How did they already know where I live? A delicious thrill trickles down my back. What have I gotten myself into?
Landon Torrio
I awake the next morning, sure that I had dreamed up everything from the night before and am actually suffering from delusions brought about by a high fever or something. I go through the motions of getting ready to work in the deli, and walk downstairs.
Clara is behind the counter, holding a large, wrapped package, and wearing a big grin on her face.
"You have an admirer," she all but yells, her smile growing ever wider with her delight. She wipes away a grey streaked strand of hair that has escaped from her usual bun, and walks towards me with the package. I take a moment to soak her in. She's become home to me. She's petite, perhaps one of the smallest women I have ever seen, but what she lacks in height, she makes up for in personality. At fifty, her looks are starting to age, but her youthful exuberance for life hasn't faded a bit.
I walk towards her and take the package, unable to keep myself from smiling back at her.
"Open it," she says with a clap, and what looks suspiciously like a jump for joy.
I examine the package. The wrapping paper is thick and silver, with a red ribbon wrapped around it. There's a small note tucked into the ribbon, and my hands are shaking slightly as I read the message.
Wear this. I'll see you at 7.
