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“Don’t be like that. I didn’t forget about you. We’re going to have our own celebration.” He sets down the boxes and opens them for me. Fried chicken tacos from one of my favorite places (and a couple of fish ones for Boudica), and half of a pink frosted birthday cake, the swirls of icing like the lace of a prom dress. Gabriel’s voice swirls around me.
…there’s a hole in the world where you used to be…
“There’s only half a cake in here.” I frown at the box. I want to hate Antony for something, because my veins hum with rage and if I don’t get it out of me I’m going to implode.
“It’s just the two of us.” Antony makes a big show of unfurling an oversized napkin and tucking it into the collar of his shirt. He picks up one of the tacos and takes a bite, juice dribbling down his chin.
“Three of us.” I press my finger into the frosting and give it to Queen Boudica to lick off. Who gives a fuck about being civilized? Who am I saving my mother’s immaculate manners for? “It’s always just us in this big, creepy house. Except when it’s just me and the cat.”
“We’re nearly halfway through your five-year purgatory,” Antony says, his mouth full of chicken. “I didn’t say it would be easy. You have to be patient.”
“Easy for you to say – you get to go outside. Smell the roses, stick your dick in someone warm and living. All I’ve got is ugly statues and Howard Malloy’s porn collection, which let me tell you is not to my taste. I’ve been hiding away most of my life, and I’m fucking done. I’m going crazy in here.” I roll my eyes at the ceiling as Gabriel lets out a tortured scream. “And with those fuckwits crowded at the gate, I feel like I’m an exotic fish or a creepy doll trapped in a glass cabinet.”
“If you were a doll, you wouldn’t be nearly as creepy as the ones upstairs.” Antony reaches for another taco. “You need a hobby that’s not listening to emo music and simmering existential rage. I’ll bring you some crochet supplies. You can make a hat.”
“Only if you want a crochet hook up your asshole.”
“Such a mouth on one so young and beautiful.” Antony nudges the box. “I’d be nicer to me if I were you. We’re going out tonight.”
“We are?”
“We are,” he grins. “But you’ll have to go in disguise. Can you do that?”
We finish off our tacos and cake, and I skip upstairs and throw open Mackenzie Malloy’s closet. I’ve already raided Ainsley’s for her comfy designer loungewear and garish evening gowns, but Mackenzie has some slutty dresses appropriate for Antony’s club. She only disappeared two years ago, and as well as being similar looking we seem to be the same dress size, so they fit okay.
Antony watches from the bed as I perform my own fashion show for him, trying slutty dress after slutty dress until he nods. “That’s the one. It’s just slutty enough.”
His throat sounds tight. I glare at him, arms folded across the tight black bodice. “Don’t get all fatherly on me now. I need to get out of this house, and you’ll be right there beside me if anyone tries anything.”
I twirl around, admiring the way the flared black skirt swishes around my knees. It fits so snug and perfect it feels like it’s made for me, which I guess is kind of true. This is Mackenzie Malloy’s dress, and she looks an awful lot like me.
“You need a wig,” Antony says. “And to shave those gorilla legs of yours.”
Ainsley Malloy has an impressive fashion wig collection. I select a black one and do my face with dark, smoky eyes and plump red lips. I look like a goth whore, but I also don’t look anything like me. Perfect.
I tuck my arm into Antony’s as we head down to the garage. I know exactly where we’re going. He’s taken me to Colosseum before, as a treat. He doesn’t like to do it because he spends all night worrying about me, and he needs his head in the game when he deals with club stuff.
But I love everything about Colosseum. The crunch of arena sand – pink-colored particles coating every surface and glittering under the floodlights. The smell of sweat and sex and blood heavy in the air. The crowd a many-limbed monster, writhing and undulating as it gorges itself on a feast of debauchery.
Antony grips the steering wheel so hard his knuckles glow white. He keeps looking over at me, frown lines etched across his face. He’s starting to regret taking me out, but it’s too late to turn back. We pull into a space behind one of the abandoned warehouses and walk out to the old roundhouse.
As soon as we enter the crowd, I’m swept up in the hum of anticipation. All around me, people mill in small groups – the men in dark, expensive suits, the women resplendent in figure-hugging gowns, their throats dripping with diamonds. Cigarettes and glass pipes are shared freely. People rush to Antony, talking a mile a minute about all sorts of things I’m not familiar with. Some he greets in friendship, others he brushes aside as he leads me behind a velvet rope and up a narrow staircase.
He has a whole life here, a whole world of responsibilities and friends, that I’m not part of. Why can’t I have that too?
Antony settles me into a table at the rear of the VIP area. Waiters and staff bustle around, setting the tables. No one gives me a second glance. I’m just another of Antony’s nameless dates. How many women has my cousin sat in this very same chair? I shift my ass, trying to get comfortable.
Antony plonks a blood-red cocktail in front of me and goes off to tend to his duties.
As the moon rises over the mangled railway tracks, the fairy lights illuminating the audience dim and people take their seats. In front of me – in the prime spot directly overlooking the arena – are the tables reserved for the Imperators. Nero Lucian bends to whisper in the ear of Marion, his second wife. No one knows what happened to the first wife, but everyone agrees she was annoying and her three sons by Nero are as much use as a hedgehog at a condom factory. Two of Marion’s sons and her daughter are here tonight – they’re about my age and are both staring at their phones, looking bored. They’re hardly an improvement in the brains department.
At the second table, Constantine Dio sits with a group of his top assassins. They sip their drinks, eagle eyes surveying the room. Constantine’s back is to the staircase, but there’s an edge to his posture, an ease in the slope of his shoulders that implies he’d be impossible to surprise. Constantine isn’t married, and is rarely seen with a female date. The gossip around my father’s house parties was that he’s gay, but it’s never been proven. Gay or not, he’d better find a woman quick, or he’ll be without an heir. The life expectancy of crime lords isn’t exactly stellar, and a dead Imperator without an heir will leave the entire system unstable, vulnerable to a coup.
At the third table, accepting a plate piled high with creamy spaghetti, is Brutus.
Brutus the betrayer.
Brutus the murderer.
