He nodded and sat a little straighter, like he was ready to give his elevator speech. “I’m scoping out companies my father owned. He squared away a lot of his business dealings when he was more involved in his investments, but then the economy took a dive. Anyway, he’s been gone a long time and now I’ve taken over a lot of those dealings.”
I nodded, trying to sound interested. “Really?”
“No, not really.” He shook his head, and then his long lashes lowered over his eyes. He studied me like I was a rubix cube. “I don’t know why I want to tell you the truth, but it might just be I’m sick of Miami and I need some excitement. My business dealings aren’t exciting.”
“They sound great,” I said with about as much enthusiasm as I could muster. I didn’t want to sound bored with his businesses, but my mind took off easily if I wasn’t fully entertained.
“It’s boring as shit and you know it.” He dragged a finger down my nose, and my eyes met his immediately. Our touch was like a zap to the system and he seemed to know the pull he had when he did something like that because his smile flashed like lightning across his face.
I leaned back out of his reach. “It doesn’t matter. I’m sure someone else would be more interested in your work. I’m just more interested in your friend.”
“What for?” He crossed his arms.
“He’s safe!” I huffed, annoyed he hadn’t heard me the first time.
“What’s with you and being safe? You can’t live any type of life if you’re safe.”
“I live just fine where I’m from.”
He peered behind me, stared at my friend Linny, and then glanced back at me. “Have you been outside of where you’re from ever?”
“I’m here, aren’t I?”
“I could take you somewhere else, though.”
“Oh, are you offering to take me back to your apartment or hotel? Show me how you really work your magic stick?” I laughed at my own joke, sure he was about to use it as a pick up line.
He narrowed his eyes and his next words came out cold, almost condescending, but still he gave me a question, not a command. “Do you think I can’t show you a good time, Morina? That I couldn’t show you something new?”
“Of course you can’t. You’re just another guy wearing a suit.” I’d had my fair share of them come through the tourist town I’d lived in. I knew his type.
Sort of.
Something behind his dark eyes, that wolfishly fast smile and all the perfect angles of his face, made him different. He was nice enough, soft lips, or so I guessed, and was saying everything right, like he really was an accommodating gentleman… right up until he closed the door to his lair and ripped you apart.
“I’ve been with a lot of men like you before.” I searched the room for Dante.
“Like me?” The corners of his mouth lifted, but the warmth in his smile was gone. Bastian’s sheep skin was sagging, and the wolf was coming out to play. He had power or confidence or a sheer sense of knowing that he was greater than all of us.
It made me want to back away and lean in all at once.
Maybe it was the particular evening and how I knew my grandma was about to leave me. Linny lived on the edge for fun, but I was teetering on it. I was about to be alone in this world and at 23, that seemed a little unfair. Cruel, even. I questioned a lot on my good days and on my bad. I grabbed my crystals and hoped the planets and stars would work in my favor.
Tonight, the edge was close for a lot of reasons, but not for fun. The voice in my head echoed that we were doomed, like we tiptoed through a valley of razor-sharp rocks, about to trip at any moment.
I shut my eyes and tried my best not to spiral and fall. “Look, Bastian, right?”
He nodded.
“Bastian, you’re older, wiser, probably have a lot more experience with women. So I’ll tell you. I’m probably like a lot of women you meet. Like the really eccentric ones that you like to avoid. I watch for full moons. I’ve been known to sage my house. I’m a believer in signs. I’m not your thing. I read my horoscope yesterday, and my week is supposed to be filled with a lot of the same. It told me to avoid that and go down a rabbit hole.”
“What sign are you?”
“Oh, do you actually know signs?” I’d never met a man in a suit that wanted to discuss astrology.
Maybe, just maybe, our stars would align.
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