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‘You were perfect,’ I said, smiling as she bit her lower lip. ‘Just perfect.’
‘You weren’t half bad yourself,’ she joked, her fingers brushing against my collarbone as she grinned.
‘Not half bad. I’ll have to try harder next time.’
‘I’m not sure I’d survive coming any harder.’
‘You would. You will.’
‘Until I go home.’ Her eyes dropped to my chest as I sighed.
‘Yes, until you go home. I can’t change where you're headed, but I can make your journey more exciting if you want me to.’ God, I hoped she wanted me to.
‘Why do you want to take me back so badly? What difference does it make to you?’ There was no anger behind her voice for once, like she’d finally accepted that she would go back, regardless of what happened between us while on the road.
‘I value your family’s trust in me. They are the first people who ever believed in me. They made me who I am.’
‘By giving you a job?’
‘No. By pulling me off of the streets and taking a chance with me. My parents died when I was young, only four, and no-one ever adopted me. I bounced from one shitty home to another, causing more and more trouble wherever I went. I’d learned that fists often followed honeyed words once we were behind closed doors. That the nicest people on the outside could be some of the worst when no-one was looking. I spent years terrified. Not everyone was bad, but by the time I got out from the worst of them, I was too far gone. Too hurt to trust anyone, knowing I could be given up at the drop of a hat and thrown back into the group home. I wasn’t trouble when my parents died, but the system tortured me until I didn’t care anymore.’
‘That’s awful,’ Esther said, through a sharp breath.
‘I did okay from it. It hardened me. Made me able to do what I do. Made me worth something to people like your father. Like your brothers. People who need others to send in and do the dirty work. It took a while to build up to the point I wasn’t just instructed by the lower rungs of the gangs, but the big guys themselves.’
I lifted my hand and slid it into her hair, toying with the strands as I spoke. ‘Then I saw your brothers together, and fuck was I envious. The little boy inside of me, the part that never really grew up, was wildly jealous of them. Of all of you. I didn’t know what I wanted more, to ruin you all or join you. They treated me with respect, and I tagged along, desperate to belong. It’s sad. I know.’
‘It is sad, but not for the reasons you think. It’s sad that people did that to you. You should have a place you belong, a family.’ Esther said it without pity, just in that matter-of-fact way she had. ‘We would be lucky to have you.’
‘You barely even know me. I do bad, bad things to people for money. I’m no prize.’
‘I’ve grown up in that world. Condemning you would be condemning just about everyone I know.’
‘I know. But knowing about it differs from seeing it. Seeing what happens behind the money and the mansions. Seeing the people involved in keeping you guys at the top. It’s dirty, damning work.’
‘I watched you slit a man’s throat for hurting me. I’m not as weak as you think.’ She scowled up at me until I pushed her head back down against me. ‘You didn’t have to do that, by the way.’
‘I wanted to. He’s one of the few people that I’ve killed that I cared about seeing dead.’
We lay quietly for a time, staring at the blanket of stars while the fire warmed us. Comfort lulled me as she toyed with the collar of my jumper as the gently babble of the river filled the surrounding air.
‘Did you know I had the biggest crush on you?’ she said sleepily, a yawn stealing over her.
‘On me? Why? You could have anyone you wanted.’ My pulse quickened at her admission. I’d spent many moments in her home wishing I could touch her, taste her, kiss her. All the while, she’d been thinking the same.
‘I guess you weren’t like the guys around me. So many are just spoiled, entitled jerks who think that because of their dad’s name or the stacks of cash in the bank, they can do whatever they like. I guess they can, a lot of the time. They are whiney and demanding, and act like the big I am, but when things don’t go their way, they run straight to their parents like spoiled children. When I’ve given in and had a fling with one or two over the years, they’ve been just as selfish in the bedroom as they are out of it. You’ve always had this air of needing no-one to back you up. Being the one in control. And that piqued my interest. You are stoic and steady and not at all spoiled. I like that.’
‘I’m also not someone who would ever be an acceptable option.’ Her father would have a conniption if she wanted to date someone like me.
‘I know. I know you think I’m one of those spoiled brats too, and I am in some ways, but I’ve never revelled in the lifestyle. I’ve never wanted to be a part of a crime family. I wanted to backpack across Europe without an entourage of my father’s men. I wanted to get myself into stupid scrapes and have to get myself out of them. I wanted to know what it was like to make a name for myself, without it being because of who I was marrying or giving another family babies to carry on another generation of spoiled mafia kids. I was mugged and had everything I owned taken from me, and although I was scared and hurt, I’d never felt so alive. Serving people's coffee was probably the most useful thing I’ve done in my entire life. I wanted for nothing materially, but equally I’ve been wanted for nothing. A doll to sit on the shelf until I became useful enough to pass onto someone else who needed placating. And I almost put up with it. Until he chose Harold. The worst fucking option out there.’
It pained me to know I was going to have to hand her over to him. To know I’d be instrumental in letting him crush her spark, wipe out her beautiful smile and force her to become a shell of the bright, effervescent person she was showing herself to be.
‘You seem to have accepted that you are going back, though. Is that another trick?’ I asked.
‘No. I’m just so tired of running. I ache all over and I know they will never stop and just let me go. I’d hoped that Harold would get bored waiting and move on.’
‘Your sister is next in line if I can’t get you home.’
