“Let’s sit down for dinner,” my mother suggested and began to usher people to their assigned chairs.
I took my place in the middle of the table on the left, between Mr. Warren on one side and Javier on the other. Immediately, they both leaned toward me, moths to the flame of my youth and beauty, to the glimpse of my breasts nestled in the draped folds of my satin pale pink chemise.
“Louise,” they both said at the same time and then chuckled.
“Please, guests first,” Mr. Warren said with an elegant wave of his hand. “I can speak to Louise any time.”
Javier’s lips thinned but he nodded his acceptance then waited until it was Mr. Warren’s turn to frown and turn away to speak with my mother on his other side. Only then did Javier lean even closer to me to say, “You look absolutely lovely in that dress, Louise.”
“Thank you,” I said neutrally, curious to see where he would take the conversation.
In my experience, it was either to issue a backroom invitation to test my virtue against their lascivious intentions or to offer me up as a possible candidate for their son or grandson.
In this case, I thought it might be something else.
“I can see why your parents are so proud of you,” he continued as our cook, Mrs. Henry, served him an individual portion of her famous French onion soup.
“They raised me right,” I preached.
I was almost surprised I remembered how. It’d been awhile since I’d had to do any ass kissing but I guessed after years of it, it was muscle memory.
“I’m sure,” he agreed but there was vein of dark humor in his voice that I wanted to excavate.
So, I said, “What is your business with my father?”
He laughed softly. “Assertive. I like a woman who knows what she wants.”
I sent a skeptical glance at Irina that had him laughing again, this time louder so that my parents both sent me approving glances from each end of the table. This was, after all, what I was there for; lubricating the guests with my looks, youth and charm so that my parents could swoop in and take from them whatever they needed: political merit, money, social connections or extramarital affairs.
“Irina would surprise you, I think. She is very involved in my businesses and quite successful with her own.”
“Mmm.”
“As for my business with your father, I hope to open a Canadian branch of my import/export company. In order to do this, I need his political support getting the right tax exemptions and his moral support, as I won’t open a business in a town where outlaws run rampant.”
I startled slightly, hesitating with a spoonful of gooey onion goodness suspended and dripping halfway to my mouth. Carefully, I settled it back down and turned my eyes to his bright, intelligent gaze.
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean you have a cancer…” His dark eyes caught the light of the chandelier and reflected like obsidian, inhuman and deadly sharp when pointed, as they were at that moment, at me. “In this town, I mean. The Fallen MC, as I understand it, have run roughshod over this city for years. I plan to rectify that.”
“And how might you do that?” Lionel asked from across the table.
I wasn’t surprised he was listening. We weren’t friends exactly because he was a good nine years older than me, but we’d been around each other all our lives and I knew him well enough to know that he listened to everything and missed very, very little.
Javier smiled at his wineglass as he stroked the faceted stem of it. “When there is an infestation, you must not kill one rat at a time, you understand? You must take them all and to do that there is an order to things. First, you take away their food, their basic means of survival. If there is no food, the rats will panic. Then, you set the traps. Those eliminate the stupid rats, the young and the old, the women and the children, maybe. All that remains are the male rats and they are hungry, growing mad. Finally, you smoke them out and as they spill out their little rat holes you shoot them one by one until the last rat remains, the strongest rat of the bunch but the one who had to watch all the other rats die before him. And then you put a bullet in his brain too.”
There was a long stagnant silence full of disgust like a still pond filled with breeding mosquitoes.
“I’ve heard rat poison works too,” Lionel suggested drolly.
I hid my surprised laughter behind a cough I covered with my napkin, but our eyes caught and danced at each other from across the table. His were green, greener than wet grass and ripe Granny Smith apples.