Page 15 of Belong to Me
He leans against the railing. The black suit against the black sky. His face is half in shadow and half in the amber glow from the casino’s upper windows, and he is beautiful and I’m tired of pretending he isn’t.
“Why did you bring me here?” I ask.
“You know why.”
“As your paralegal.”
He turns his head. His eyes find mine. “Is that what you think you are?”
“It’s what I am.”
“It’s what you tell yourself. There’s a difference.”
I should leave. I should drop his hand and walk back through the casino and call a taxi and go home and hang the navy dress next to the green one and add them both to the growing collection of clothes my aunt bought me for purposes I’m only beginning to understand. I should do all of these things.
I don’t.
I step closer. I don’t decide to. My body decides. My feet move and my hand tightens in his and I’m standing in front of him with the harbour below and the music behind and his face above mine and the distance between us is the width of a held breath and I can feel his heartbeat through our joined hands, that same fast beat from the file room, the one that wasn’t performance.
He lifts his free hand. His fingers find my jaw. The touch is featherlight and it goes through me like voltage, temple to collarbone, and I don’t flinch, I don’t pull back, I tilt my chin up and his eyes are on my mouth and his thumb traces mycheekbone and I’m falling. I’ve been falling since the conference room and the five thousand miles and the coffee that was black with one sugar, and I don’t want to stop.
He kisses me.
His mouth on mine. Warm. Certain. A man who has kissed before but not like this, not standing on a balcony with the city burning below and his hand trembling against my skin, and I feel the tremble and it undoes me because trembling is not what powerful men do. Trembling is what boys do at school dances when they’re terrified the girl will say no, and Anton Almazov is trembling against my mouth and I kiss him back.
I kiss him back before I remember I shouldn’t.
His hand moves to the back of my neck and he pulls me closer and I let him and my free hand finds his chest, that same place from the file room, and his heart is hammering and mine is hammering and the harbour light is gold on the inside of my eyelids and his mouth tastes like champagne and need and something underneath both that is urgent and careful at the same time, and I’m kissing a man who offered me an arrangement at a restaurant and I don’t care.
For a breath I don’t care.
Then I remember.
I pull back. His hand stays on my neck for one beat, his fingers in my hair, and the loss of his mouth is physical. A cold spot where warmth was. I step back and the railing hits my hip and his hand falls and we are apart and breathing hard and his expression isn’t triumphant.
That’s what I expected. Triumph. The smile of a man who has proved a point, who has won a negotiation, who has kissed the girl and confirmed his thesis. But his face holds none of that. What I see instead is raw and unguarded and gone in a moment, tucked behind the grey eyes so fast I almost miss it, but I don’t miss it, and what I see is fear.
He’s afraid.
Of what, I can’t tell. Of me, of himself, of the thing that just happened between us on this balcony with the harbour below and the music behind and the taste of each other still on our mouths. He’s afraid and he’s hiding it and the hiding is so practised it’s nearly invisible, and I only catch it because I have been studying his face for weeks and I know every version of every expression and this one is new.
“I have to go,” I tell him.
He nods. Once. He doesn’t argue. He doesn’t charm. He stands on the balcony of his casino with his hand on the railing and his eyes on me and he lets me leave, and the letting is the most confusing thing he’s done yet because a man running a game would follow.
I walk back through the casino. I collect my coat from the front. I pass the rose petals and the crossed swords and the black marble that reflects me like dark water, a girl in a navy dress walking alone through a world that was never hers, and I don’t cry until I’m in the taxi.
MONDAY MORNING.
I arrive before nine. The coffee cup is on my desk. I pick it up. I hold it. I drink it because it’s perfect and he brings it himself and I kissed him on a balcony and I can still feel the tremble in his hand against my face.
Blythe is at her desk when I sit down. She doesn’t greet me. She doesn’t ask about my weekend. She pulls her chair close to mine and her voice drops to a register I’ve never heard from her.
“We need to talk.”
I set the coffee down.
“Not here,” she tells me. Her eyes are dark and urgent and afraid. “Outside. Now.”
