I watched her carefully as she sat down and the boys went back to smoking, drinking, and playing cards.
She shouldn’t have fit in this room, but somehow she did, or at least she was good at faking it. I had to admit, I was impressed by her performance. Camillo wanted to intimidate and scare her, but she didn’t give him what he wanted, and that won her more points with the others.
That was good. That was real fucking good.
I needed harmony in the crew right now. If they started talking shit about having a girl at the table then things might start going bad, and with the Jackals breathing down my neck, I couldn’t have that.
Leigh was here to stay. And they were going to have to accept it.
I drank my whisky and let the night unfold, and when it was over and the guys left full of steak and drink and reeking of cigar smoke, I took Leigh back to my house, dragged her into my bed, and tasted her until the sun rose the next morning.20LeighI stood at the front desk of my store and stared out the windows at the familiar view. Couples walked past, groups of young men laughed and pushed each other, old women in workout gear traveled in tight-knit packs, and the world moved along like it always had.
The shop was different. I couldn’t make it look exactly like it used to and maybe I didn’t want that. I was starting fresh, starting a new life—and I needed a decor to match.
I sold a few shirts in the morning, and around noon a guy came in wearing khakis and a button down. He leaned on the counter, looked around like he was searching for cops, then my eyes.
“You got the best shirt in the world?”
I smiled, nodded, and held out my hand. He plunked the cash down in my palm.
I shoved it into a box under the counter, walked into the back, got his shirt with his pills in the middle, and handed them to him.
He must’ve known the drill, because he took the shirt without comment and left.
That was my real job. Sure, I sold my own products from time to time and that brought in money, but the pills were the real goal. Everything else was just a front.
I leaned forward on my elbows and stared out the front window again.
Just a front. Those words played through my mind all afternoon as a few more pill customers came and went, accepting their shirt without argument. It felt like my whole life was a front these days—a front for something else, maybe the thing I’d always wanted to be, the person I dreamed of when I looked in the mirror and pretended to see my future-self smiling back. When I stood in the shop and smiled and sold my shirts and handed out pills, there was a strange emptiness in my chest that I couldn’t quite define.
And that disappeared as soon as I saw Owain again.
I knew it was him. I didn’t want to admit it, even if I knew it, more and more with each passing day, with each passing night spend in his bedroom feeling his body against mine, his sweat on my skin, my lips on his chest—his hands on my hips. He was the thing keeping me in this, not the money or the power or the seat as the table, but him.
Every time I got close to that truth, I had to shove it away. I couldn’t face it, not really. I couldn’t think about it and still rectify myself as the person I wanted to be or though I used t obe, as the girl with a brother and a mother—even if that brother was dead.
I couldn’t picture myself as enthralled with a gangster, but I was, so much deeper than I ever imagined.
The door rang as it slid open. I stood up straight, expecting a customer, but finding Rolan instead. He smirked at me and ran a hand along the shelf to his left, his fingers brushing over the t-shirts, until he got close to the front and stopped. He leaned up against the rack and crossed his arms over his chest.
“Place looks good.”
“I hear you had a lot to do with that.”
He shrugged. “A little bit.”
“What can I do for you?”
“Figured I’d stop in and say hello, since we’re equals now.”
I gave him a tight smile. “Yeah? We’re equals in your eyes?”
He smiled right back. “Owain says so at least.”
“What’s with him and all of you, anyway?” I leaned forward on my elbows again and I caught Rolan’s eyes flip down to my chest. Fine by me—let him look, maybe it’ll keep him distracted and talking.
“Not sure what you mean.”
“Why do you all follow him? I could tell some of the guys weren’t happy about the war and all that stuff.”