The Tin Man moved toward her.
“You will obey me,” he said again, the anger returning to his voice. “You can either cooperate and be happy here, or I can make every moment torture for you. Understand?”
She nodded slowly.
“Use your words,” he demanded.
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Yes what?”
“Yes, sir.”
He crouched down, reaching for her, ignoring the fact that she flinched. He grasped her chin, his touch firm as he pulled her face toward him, mere inches of space between them. It made her heart race and her body shake and not in a good way.
“Yes, Papa,” he said, “or Daddy, if you prefer. Your choice, but choose one, because you will call me as I am.”
She said nothing, trying to hold her breath, wishing he would let go, but he waited... and waited... and waited, staring at her.
He didn’t even blink.
“Yes...?” he prompted. “Use your words.”
“Yes, Daddy.”
His expression softened as he pressed his lips to her forehead, kissing the spot her mother had last kissed, taking it for himself. Tears filled the little girl’s eyes, but she held them back, knowing crying would make it worse.
“Good little kitten,” he said, standing back up, turning away without another look. “Go clean yourself up. I have something to do. I want you bathed by the time I return, and I want that nightgown burned. If you still stink when I get back, I will hose you off in the backyard.”
The little girl may not have known much, but she knew enough to believe him. He meant those words.
Chapter Eight
Picking up the cheap square coaster from the bar, I set it on its corner and attempt to spin it, watching as it wobbles and falls right over. A cliché in a kilt grins up at me from it, discolored, parts flaked off from a splash of rum destroying the pulp board.
Whistle Binkie.
It’s Scottish, obviously, but who the hell knows what it means? Probably something as horribly stereotypical as the rest of the place. As fucking formulaic as my life is becoming. I think about asking the bartender, figuring if anyone knows, it would be him, but that would mean interrupting the babbling blonde sitting to my left, and that’s not happening, considering I’m supposed to be listening to whatever she’s going on about—puppies or kittens or rainbows, I don’t know.
Besides, I don’t really give a shit. I’m just trying to distract myself until Blondie’s good and lit and willing to bend over for me in the bathroom.
Which, judging from the slurred giggling that reaches my ears as a hand slides along my thigh, is probably soon…
I shift toward her, just enough to see her, but not enough to give her a full-on view of my scar. She knows it’s there, of course—she saw it when I walked in after ten o’clock tonight, and she’s spent the past two hours just barely stopping herself from asking me how I got it. Women like a bad boy with a tragic backstory. Maybe it’s the thrill of it, the excitement of being with someone dangerous, or maybe it’s biological, something rooted deep within them, those mothering genes that makes women want to nurture those the world turns its back on.
You see, men and women, we’re wired differently. Women look at me and think, ‘poor baby, he just needs some love’, whereas men? Men take one look at my face and think, ‘stay away from that motherfucker’. But go ahead and tell a woman that. Tell her I’m dangerous. Tell her to stay away.
It’ll just make her want me more.
“You’re beautiful, you know,” I say when Blondie stops chattering long enough for me to chime in. It’s not a lie. She is beautiful, but all women are in their own way, aren’t they?
Well, all of them except for my mother, but I don’t know if woman is the word I would use to describe her. She was more of a raging bitch.
Blondie’s cheeks tinge pink, a grin on her gloss-coated lips. Her posture loosens more as she leans into me, giving me a whiff of her strong, flowery perfume.
My nose twitches.
“Can I ask you something?” she asks, her voice dropping low, the syllables lazily tumbling from her tongue. “Your, uh… scar.” She waves her finger in the direction of my face. “How did that happen?”
I start to answer, concocting a bullshit sob story to avoid spilling my truth to someone I don’t know, someone I’ll never know beyond what her pussy feels like, when the stool on the other side of me jerks out, the wooden legs scratching against the floor.
The noise is irritating.
I cringe.
Something slaps down on the bar in front of me, on top of the coaster, covering the little Scottish man.
“He pissed off the wrong woman, I’m guessing,” a sugary voice interrupts, so close it’s like she’s speaking right in my ear. “He’s got the kind of face you can’t help but want to fuck up.”
Blondie’s eyes widen, like she’s horrified someone would say something so cruel, like she’s offended, but all I feel is a slight stirring, a battle inside of me between amusement and annoyance.
I’m not sure which sensation is going to win that war.
“Well, she’s not entirely wrong,” I say, glancing at the bar, a thick stack of cash greeting me. “It was a man, though.”
She scoffs. “Some floozy’s husband, then.”
I pick the money up, shifting away from Blondie to relax back against the stool. My eyes flit to the right, to the exasperated brunette, her eyes not so doe-like anymore. They’re narrowed, aimed at me, her arms folded across her chest.
Scarlet.
Her guarded stance only entertains me more, a smirk tugging my lips as I sort through the cash, counting it. It’s been almost a week since I confronted her, which means the interest racked up quickly. A few hundreds, some twenties, and a shitload of ones… more ones than I’ve ever held at one time before.
“It’s all there,” she says, her voice turning as defensive as her presence.
I ignore that and keep counting, absently running through numbers as my gaze trails her. Her flimsy coat covers most of what she’s wearing, leaving only black fishnets visible. Black high heels peek out of a bag hanging from her shoulder, instead of being on her feet where they belong. Thick, dark makeup surrounds her eyes as a golden glow radiates from her cheeks. Some of it is smudged, like she’s been wearing it for a while, but her deep red lipstick looks fresh.
She shifts position when my gaze lingers on her mouth, like she’s uncomfortable with my attention, her skin shimmering under the dim bar lights, flecks of glitter coating her.
I turn back to the money, saying nothing until I finish counting. “There’s only thirteen hundred here.”
“I already gave you three hundred,” she says. “That makes sixteen hundred… the thousand I took, plus an extra six hundred, since it took me six days.”
“Seven days,” I say, glancing at my watch. “You missed midnight by about twenty minutes.”
She blanches, jaw going slack. “That’s bullshit. I’ve been trying to get ahold of you for a week! You haven’t answered any of my calls!”
Huh. “You called me?”
“Yes!”
I pull my phone from my pocket, opening my call list.
Missed call.
Missed call.
Missed call.
All blocked numbers.
“See?” she says. “Look at all those missed calls!”
“Number’s blocked,” I say, putting the phone away.
“So?”
“So, I don’t take calls from cowards.”
She blinks rapidly. “Coward? I left you voicemails!”
“I don’t listen to those. And before you even say it, I don’t text, either.”
“That’s just stupid,” she says. “You’ve been nowhere. I’ve looked. And people know who you are, sure, but nobody knows you. They don’t know where to find you. All they have is this stupid phone number that you never seem to answer. How is that my fault?”
&nb
sp; “Tough break,” I say as I pull my wallet out of the back pocket of my jeans. I shove the wad of cash in, barely able to fold it before putting it away. “You should get better friends.”
“That is… wow.” She laughs, not a stitch of humor to the sound. “I don’t know what I did to deserve this, but I must be the worst person in the world to have stumbled upon you.”
I don’t respond to that, watching her posture change, outrage washing away all restraint. She yanks her coat open, a little black dress greeting me beneath. She pats herself down, reaching into her bra and yanking out a stack of bills. More singles. She counts them, flicking through the money so heatedly I’m expecting her to rip a few.
Shaking her head, she tosses the cash on the bar in front of me. “Twenty-nine dollars. Oh, and…” She reaches into the bag on her shoulder, pulling out a small zippered pouch. She holds it upside down above the bar, a few coins spilling out of it. She scowls. “Like, sixty-six cents.”
“Look at that,” I say, snatching up the money—even the change—and shoving it in my pocket, not bothering to put it in my wallet this time. “Only seventy dollars and thirty-four cents to go.”
She storms away, nearly knocking over the stool as she goes, charging through the bar and disappearing outside into the cold night. I turn in my seat again, facing Blondie, not surprised to see she’s watching me warily, no doubt trying to make sense of that exchange in her drunken state.
“Where were we?” I brush a curl from Blondie’s face, my fingertips grazing her warm cheek, making the blush return. “Oh, right… my scar.”
I launch into a story about a doomed afternoon in Central Park with my family, how we witnessed a mob hit and became collateral damage in the process. Leave no witnesses behind. I survived, vowing vengeance on those that attacked us. I’ve got her eating out of the palm of my hand, more hero than villain in her mind, as I place a hand on her knee and slowly run it up her thigh. I’m about to take it further when the door bursts open. Coldness sweeps through the bar, footsteps loud as they stomp my way, even though the woman is in her bare feet for some reason. She’s fucking crazy.
Scarlet shoves in beside me again, holding a black leather wallet. She flips it open, the driver’s license of some middle-aged white guy greeting me from the plastic window inside. She raids it for cash, counting out loud.
“Twenty… thirty… forty… fifty… fifty-five… sixty… sixty, uh, seven.” She groans. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
“Did you just pickpocket someone else to pay me?”
She shoves the money my way. “Save your self-righteous pandering for the floozy over there. I’m three-dollars short.”
“And thirty-four cents,” I point out, taking the cash.
“And thirty-four cents,” she mocks. “Unbelievable.”
“I’ll give it to you,” I say. “The few dollars you’re missing.”
“Really?”
“It’ll cost a hundred dollars for every day it takes you to pay me back, of course, but sure…”
She groans. “Of course.”
Her gaze scans the bar, settling on the bartender as he heads our general direction. It’s the same one from every other time. He gave me a bottle of rum as soon as I sat down again. He’s learning.
I watch as Scarlet’s expression shifts, a flit of a smile on her lips. She shoves the stool further away to get closer to the bar, reaching up on her tiptoes to lean across it, gathering his attention. He approaches, looking at me warily, like he’s assessing whether or not she’s with me right now, before focusing his attention on her. There’s a glint in his eyes, apparently deciding she’s fair game.
He smiles. “Hey, Morgan.”
She arches an eyebrow, her face lighting up. “You remember.”
Her voice changes when she says that, growing sweeter. She’s exaggerating every syllable, blatantly flirting.
I wonder if she’d be doing that if she knew he was the one who ratted her out to me.
“Of course,” he says. “What can I get for you?”
“Well, uh, actually…” Her smile grows sheepish as she gently bites down on her bottom lip, a moment of silence passing before she whispers, “I was kind of hoping you’d do me a favor. It’s totally okay if you can’t, I completely understand, and I really hate to ask…”
“What do you need?”
“To borrow four dollars,” she says. “Like I said, you can tell me no, but it’s just that, you know, it’s been a long night, and…”
“Oh, don’t worry about it,” he says, pulling a wad of crumpled cash from his pocket. Tips. He wades through it, handing over four singles. He doesn’t question it, just dishes out what she asks for.
She takes the money, beaming at the guy. “Oh my god, you’re my hero. Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
Heat rushes up his neck, flushing his face as he laughs a bit. “It’s just a couple bucks, no big deal.”
He wanders off to help another customer. The second he turns the other direction, Scarlet’s smile dims. She shoves the money at me. “Now that guy is a gentleman.”
I grab it. “He’s a doormat. A pussy. A parasite.”
“Says the asshole who just bled me dry.”
“I didn’t,” I say, looking her in the eyes, my voice low. “I could’ve, though. I could’ve slit your throat and took your life instead… could’ve turned that red room just a little bit redder while your little cop friend took you from behind, if you would’ve preferred it that way.”
The color drains from Scarlet’s cheeks as the spark dims in her eyes. It’s fleeting, a flash of emptiness, like she’s nothing more than a shell of a human. Cold. I don’t have to wrap my hands around her throat to kill her, no… those words take the life right out of her.
She knows I watched them.
Seems they were too preoccupied to notice my presence as I lurked around that night. And the look that passes across her face right now? She wore it then, too. She wore it as he fucked her. Not a stitch of enjoyment. Not a stitch of anything. It was as if a switch got flipped inside of her, shutting off her humanity, turning her into a puppet with strings. He fucked her, yeah, but he didn’t fuck her. Whatever made up who she is vanished the moment the man put his filthy hands on her.
The look is short-lived, though, life rushing right back into her. Her nostrils flare, hands clenching into tight fists, like maybe she wants to hit me, like maybe she’s considering clocking me right in the eye for having the nerve to witness something she wanted to go unseen. She shoves closer, brazenly pressing up against me, her voice barely a whisper as she says, “You probably should’ve killed me.”
“And why’s that, Scarlet?”
She hesitates, like she doesn’t know how to answer my question, and turns to leave as she says, “You wouldn’t understand.”
I snatch ahold of her arm, keeping her there.
I’m not done.
Her eyes shoot daggers my way, her hands still balled into fists as she tries to yank away, but my grip is firm. Heat radiates off of her, like anger is literally burning up her core, an explosion imminent. It might be fun to watch her go kaboom.
“Let go of me,” she says, her gaze on my hand. “Now.”
“Sit down,” I tell her as I nod to the empty stool, loosening my hold on her arm.
She pulls away. “Why the hell would I do that?”
“Because I told you to.”
She scoffs, dramatically rolling her eyes. It strikes me as wrong. Childish. The woman has a spark in her, a fire running wild, but that kind of immaturity seems beneath someone with brass balls of her caliber. Sure, I don’t know her, so maybe she really is just a brat. I’ve met my fair share of those since coming to New York. Hell, I’ve fucked my fair share of them. But my intuition tells me something different.
Besides, I’ve seen her innocent act. She plays people like they’re a piano and she’s Chopin, pounding away at their keys, and the ignorant fools don’t even hear her music. I h
ear it, though. It’s pretty goddamn loud to my ears, the kind of music that resonates with the deepest, darkest parts of the soul… or whatever bit of it you might have left. Her own little Funeral March. Dun, dun, da-dun…
“Sit down,” I say again, this time shoving the stool toward the bar, damn near pinning her with it. “You look like you could use a drink.”
“Do I look like someone who can afford a drink?”
My eyes scan her when she asks that, knowing she doesn’t have a penny to her name at the moment. It’s curious, though, why she does what she does if she’s not rolling in money...
“Sit down,” I say for the third time, “before I make you.”
“I’d seriously like to see you try,” she says, but despite those words, she slips up onto the stool beside me, not putting up nearly as much of a fight as I expected. While I tend to appreciate people surrendering, it’s a pity, because I probably would’ve enjoyed making her.
I lean her way, my mouth near her ear. “Good girl.”
“I’m not sitting here because you told me to,” she says angrily. “I’ve just had a really shitty night, yeah, a really shitty life, so I could use a drink. But don’t think this means I’m staying here for you, or because of you, or that I’m interested in having a threesome with you and Goldilocks over there, because that’s not happening.”
“Not a fan of threesomes?”
“Not a fan of you.”
“Ah, that’s crazy,” I say, snatching up the empty shot glass the bartender gave me earlier tonight. I pour some rum into it before shoving it Scarlet’s way. “Everyone likes me.”
She picks it up. “Nobody likes you.”
I grin as I turn back to Blondie. Even she doesn’t seem to be fond of me at the moment, annoyance crossing her face as she glares in Scarlet’s general direction. “You like me, don’t you, beautiful?”
Her sky-blue eyes turn my way, no longer cloudy from the alcohol haze. No, that window of opportunity has passed. Her expression is guarded, like maybe she’s seeing me for the first time, self-preservation rearing its ugly head. You see, while women like bad boys, they don’t really like them. They want a bad boy in reputation, not one in execution. They don’t want to see it. They don’t want to be reminded we’re not good people, that it’s not a role we’re playing.