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Alcohol?
Where would that be?
I walk back to the main lounge and trail my fingers over every object I see on the way, tapping it to keep my rhythm in full swing. Funny how time changes perception. Last time I was here I felt like I shouldn’t touch anything, as if these things and this wealth and this atmosphere was not for me to intrude on. I didn’t even leave him a message after he gallantly left me to sleep after our drunken night, but now all this around me feels like an affirmation of him inside me, of his fingers on me.
Eventually, having found a decanter of what could be scotch, or brandy, but definitely not vodka, I pour half a glass and find a comfy spot on the non-comfy sectional seating to wait. Clearly he doesn’t ever sit and relax, contemplate, or kick his feet up and lounge. Not in here, anyway. It’s all hard lines and hard surfaces, as if positioned but never used.
The key-card taps gently against my thigh, as I sip, continue waiting, and stare out into the dark skies that surround me. Maybe I should go to Rick’s grave now I’m back, get words out of my mouth and spit on the granite to solidify our separation in death and life. It was messy before. Difficult to contend with, but now I’m new. Tougher for it. And this skull on my face seems befitting of death. I could loom over his grave, show my disrespect and hope he sees the image looking down on him.
The sudden noise of the elevator makes me look up from my musing, eyes trained on the long corridor that divides the lobby from this lounge. My legs cross, arms folding at the same time to cover some of my assets. Although, I don’t know why I’m bothering. Near naked is always best. I’ve become at my strongest then. Without too much care.
I drink again, still looking over the top of my glass, and listen to his footfalls as they stalk his space. Sharp, distinct. They’re more an inbuilt memory to me now than Rick’s ever were, as if I’d be able to hear them in a crowd of thousands. I squirm slightly at the thought, remembering the way those same strides moved around me on the floor, as I lay exhausted and bruised, and then how they left me without a word the next morning.
After a while the sound of him moving stops abruptly. I smile at that and sip, wondering if he can smell the perfume I’m wearing, perhaps hear my heartbeat in his space. Or maybe he’s finally noticed my long coat that I discarded somewhere when I came in.
Who knows?
The shadows move, change, and then the footfalls start again. They’re slow, torturously slow, and getting louder the closer he gets. I can smell wood-smoke, cigarettes. Aftershave. And then there he is in the entrance to the room, part blanketed by his own dark and obscuring shadow. He stands still, his hands in his pockets of his suit trousers, white shirt open at his neck, sleeves rolled up, and he looks me over from his position. No words. No sense of surprise in the arch of his brow either. Just a hard stare, flat lips, and those eyes baring down on me.
I swallow inadvertently, a light panic easing across me now we’re alone, regardless of this being my plan of action. The very thought amuses me beyond whatever fear I’m harbouring, and I giggle quietly at myself and take another drink to finish the glass. He can’t hurt me. He already has done and I enjoyed it, flourished within it.
His gaze drops to the card I’m still tapping on my thigh, his body stepping one pace forward so he’s engulfed in the light from the moon. “Malachi?” he asks.
He means the card.
I swallow again, part disturbed by the soundless glory of him in front of me, and throw it onto the table. I won’t be needing it again. And, of course it was Malachi. Malachi seems to be able to procure anything he needs, or drag up information on anyone he needs. Including this man. Sadly, he still refused to give me any information about what was being hidden from me when Gray abruptly left me at The Beekman, but he did give me a key-card so I could find out for myself.
Even if he did warn me off the intrusion.
“Hello, Mr Rothburg,” I murmur.
He smiles slightly in the low light, eyes creasing from their hardened stare. “Rather formal, considering your lack of clothes.” He moves closer, stalks slowly, and then swerves behind the sectional towards the drinks tray instead of coming to me. “But if we must. How are you, Mrs Tanner?”
The decanter clinks softly against the glass he’s pouring into and then his hand comes over my shoulder, taking my own glass from me. Another clink. Another glug of whatever it is we’re drinking being poured, and his body moves around in front of me again.
“You left me at Malachi’s, I’m annoyed by that.” I state. He nods and puts my glass on the coffee table in front of me. “I thought I was leaving with you.”
He frowns at that and drinks his liquor down in one, backing himself away from me as he does. More minutes of silence. It’s nice in some ways. Just us two. In this room. Surrounded by his penthouse and building. Dark corners again. Shadows and light playing tricks on my thoughts and imagination. We could almost be back at the castle if it wasn’t for the low ebb of traffic rumbling storeys below us.
“I realised something that night,” he eventually says, breaking the silence. “You had nothing to come back for. No need. You were free. Still are.” I watch as he sits in the chair opposite me and crosses his legs to mirror my own. “My covetous opinion was my problem, not yours, Mrs Tanner.”
“You didn’t even say goodbye.”
“Would that have made it easier for you?”
“It would have been less callous.”
He chuckles at that, as if the mention of anything other than callous intentions is ridiculous.
“We fucked, and then I left.” He reaches for his empty glass, frowning at the fact that it is, in fact, empty. “It was a simple calculation, Mrs Tanner. Any other type of leaving would have presented the possibility that the time spent was more than it was. It wasn’t.”
His throat bobs, fingers gripping the glass.
“You’re lying to me. Why?”
Another chuckle, one that builds this time rather than shutting off so succinctly. “Reality, Mrs Tanner. I’m not lying. I’m giving you the facts. We are nothing more than what we were under the pressure of that place. Seeing you earlier caused a reaction to that memory.”
“And you don’t want that anymore?”
