“What do you care?” I shot back. “I’ll do my job. Drive you around, fix your shithole of a house, clean your dojo, and I don’t need to wear a ball gown to do it.”
He broke out in a smile. “You’re a complete mystery, and I’m curious about you. That’s all. So, let’s start simple. What’s your name?”
“Banks.”
“What’s your name, Banks?”
I almost snorted.
Almost.
He was a little faster on the pick-up than his friends, wasn’t he?
Banks was my last name. I liked it, because I thought I’d get more respect sounding less like a woman, and my father preferred it, because he hated my first name.
And none of that was Kai Mori’s business.
Kai went on, “And where are you from? Where are your parents? Were you really home-schooled?” He began walking into me, and I tripped backward, stumbling. “Where do you live? Do you have any friends? How can you work for that disgusting piece of shit, huh? How do you sleep?”
I hit the glass door, and he closed the distance between us, hovering and dropping his voice to a whisper, “Or how about an even easier question?” His heat filtered through my jacket, and every inch of me hummed. “I’m going to confession today. Want to come…Banks?”
His eyes locked on my lips, and my breathing turned shallow. Oh, Christ. The wind carried in his smell, and I inhaled, the world in front of me starting to spin.
I blinked, turning away. The memory of our first encounter—the story he fed me that got under my skin that day in the confessional—God, I’d liked the way that felt. Talking like that with him.
I balled my fists and met his eyes again, forcing my tone to stay even. “Oh, Mr. Mori, have you forgotten?” I replied, faking innocence. “You always go to confession at the end of the month.”
I fixed him with a knowing smile, watching his amused expression fall and turn dark.
Yeah. Never forget I know all about you.
His eyes remained calm, but I could hear the acceptance of my challenge in his taunting words, “See you at work.”
And stepping around me without another word, he walked out of the room, leaving me by myself.
I stayed for a moment, staring up at the dangling threads of my scarf on the balcony above me.
I prided myself on always staying one step ahead. Information was power. It was more valuable than money.
But apprehension quietly crept in, anyway.
Kai wasn’t stupid.
Eventually, he’d catch up.
Banks
Present
Delcour sat on the other side of the river from the Whitehall district. I remembered seeing the building from a distance from our apartment downtown when I was a kid and lived with my mother. Tall, black, with gold trim, it reminded me of something out of an old movie. Gangsters in pinstripe suits, cars with whitewall tires, ladies in fancy gowns…. A tad of the art deco look, a bit of old Hollywood, and entirely too ostentatious, but it always filled me with awe when I would catch a glimpse of it. I didn’t know how anything could be glamorous and haunting at the same time, but Delcour proved that there was such a thing. It sat in the middle of the city like an ornate jewel on someone wearing a potato sack.
I didn’t fit in in places like this, and my nerves were acting of their own accord.
There’d probably be young people like me, but unlike me, they’d be hyper on a completely different set of priorities: designer shoes and triple, venti, no foam, soy lattes.
The elevator stopped, and the doors opened, the vibrations from the music under my feet hitting my ears now.
My mouth dry, I forced a step and entered Michael Crist’s penthouse.