"Ugh," Bobby complained, sucking on the slim pen, only to be apparently denied the vapor he craved. "Out again."

"So this is what you do? You lounge around in romantic farmhouses, complaining about lack of vape juice?"

"Sure. Mostly. I mean. There's torture and things too. I should be torturing you, really."

"Oh. Why aren't you?"

Gemma made the inquiry while lounging on the couch in what she guessed were Bobby's rooms? This place was so large everybody could have an entire suite to themselves and still have enough accommodation for a hunting party. She was wearing one of Bobby's shirts as a dress because she hadn't brought a change of clothes when Angelo busted her undercover attempt. A few days had gone by, and what had started as a terrifying ordeal as a captive had kind of turned into a chronic chill out session.

"Because you're incidental. Leverage. Baggage."

"Charming," Gemma noted.

"And you're easy."

"Easy?" She tilted her head to the side, and her curls fell in a curious fashion much like the ears of a spaniel.

"You know. Soft," Bobby clarified.

"Soft. Okay. I mean, it's true. I don't want to be… whatever it is you people do to people. Thanks for not doing that."

"No problem," Bobby said, hunting around in a drawer. "See, this is the problem. We run from one house, and Angelo says we're all set up somewhere else, but we're fucking not. Do you know what it's like to not be able to get attached to anything bigger than a keyring? I don't even know my own fucking phone number."

Bobby was clearly nicotine-deprived, but there was more than that to it. He was upset at the vagabond lifestyle, being transient no matter how rich they were.

She almost felt sorry for him. Almost. He was, after all, a violent maniac leading a life of intense criminality who had taken her captive and might kill her if it became convenient. Though she surprisingly did not get that feeling. She got the feeling he was if anything, lonely.

Angelo wasn't a good partner. Angelo was a force of nature. Angelo was a phenomenon. But he wasn't a good lover. Or a boyfriend. Or a husband. Or anything. He was the domineering, overpowering, all-controlling force that animated spaces that were otherwise empty and devoid of meaning.

This house, for instance. It wasn't a home. Not even with them all in it. The last place, that hadn't felt like one either. It had things in it, but they didn't mean anything. It was like everything had been staged for a play that Angelo was directing, and the people were just props.

Did Bobby know? Maybe not. Bobby didn't seem like the sort of person who really thought about things like that. From surveillance and general history, Gemma knew that Bobby had begun his life with Angelo as a captive. She'd wondered at the time how you could ever fall for someone who was keeping you against your will and hurting you all the time. She'd only been in Angelo's custody for three days, and already she was starting to feel some kind of attraction to Bobby.

"That sounds really hard," she commiserated.

"What?"

"Being uprooted all the time. It sounds hard."

"Oh," Bobby said, seemingly caught off-guard by her empathy. "Yeah. I guess. Better than ending up in prison or dead."

"That's a really stressful way to live life."

"It's how we live our lives. It's how you live yours, isn't it, being a spy?"

"I'm not a spy. I'm just the idiot who helped Willow set up a DVR one time and got sucked into this. I didn't even know who you were."

"But you came to our house. You knew where we were. You knew who we were. Why would you do that if you weren't invested?"

That was a smart question. If she wasn't careful, she'd give herself away. But there was an easy answer, one that he would understand.

"I do what Willow wants. Like you do what Angelo wants."

"Why?"

"I don't know. What else is there to do?"

"Live your own life?"

"Like you live your own life?"

"I never said I did, but you don't have any reason to be serving Willow."

"Look. It seemed like a good idea at the time. She said you were evil, so I thought…."

"You'd dress up like Mario, the plumber?" Bobby smirked.

Gemma laughed. "I don't know. Anyway, I was an electrician."

"You were bait, and we took you. You don't even know why you're here or what you're messed up in."

Gemma guessed that a lot of the statements Bobby was making also applied to him. Did he really know what Angelo was up to? Did he even really know who Angelo was?

"Stop looking at me like that."

"Like what?"

"Like you're trying to understand me."

Gemma shrugged. "Maybe I am."

"Well. Don't. I'm the one doing the interrogation."

"If only it were possible to ask questions without giving away your own ignorance," Gemma mused.

Tags: Loki Renard Crime
Source: readsnovelonline.net