Driven (2 page)

Her hands are spread wide. They’re asking forgiveness. Part of me wants to believe she was trying to protect me. That she’s not simply a “survivor,” as Valac calls her, willing to suck the life out of me to save her own skin. But the betrayal still stings. Anger and hope take turns churning my bruised stomach.

I don’t let it show on my face.

She inches closer in her teetering spiked-metal heels, peering up at me with solemn eyes, like she’s hanging on every breath that’s heaving out of my chest. She’s close enough that I can smell her lilies-and-rose funeral perfume.

“Can you forgive me?”

“Maybe.” A sinking part of me wants to latch onto her explanation like a life raft. Practically speaking, I don’t have a lot of options for help inside the Kolek estate. If she won’t escape with me, then I’ll at least need her to not stand in my way. The last thing I want is to have to fight her. I’m not strong enough, even if I wasn’t half beaten up. Plus the idea of fighting Ophelia makes my stomach tie in knots. Part of me—the part clinging to the life raft—is still hoping she’ll change her mind. Want to come with me the next time.

She lets out a breath, a slow leak through pursed lips, like she’s gently blowing out a candle. It makes me want to touch her, but I’m not that much of an idiot. Touching Ophelia is like flirting with death and hoping it won’t decide to get serious with you.

“At some point,” I say, “I would really like to work up from Guppy status. Minnow at the least. I think I’ll start by not turning my back on you for a while.”

A small smirk erases the kissable look of before, but then it’s replaced by a frown. She reaches for my face. I lean away, taking a half-step that bangs my legs into the bed.

She pulls her hand back but the frown remains. “How bad did they hurt you, baby?”

I’m tempted to tell her they crippled me for life and it’s all her fault. “I’m fine,” I say.

She runs a look over my chest, then reaches for the bottom of my t-shirt.

I grab her wrist. “But I’m not in the mood to play show and tell right now.” I flick her hand away, keeping skin contact only long enough to let her know I’m serious. 

Her lips draw into a thin line. “I didn’t know… they wouldn’t tell me what they did to you. Even Valac refused to talk to me about it, just said you were still alive. I insisted they couldn’t send you out on collections, not yet. I told them I would do any collecting they needed while you rested.”

“So you’re responsible for a week of me being locked in my room?” I’m desperate for a life energy hit, but a week of no collections also meant a week of no payouts. That probably
did
buy me time to recover.

“I would have come to visit sooner, but they wouldn’t let me.” She takes a step closer again, and I allow it. Probably because I really am an idiot. She’s close enough to touch me, but she doesn’t, leaving a space of heated air between us. “Let me help you heal, baby.”

She reaches for the bruise on my cheek, and this time I don’t flinch away. Her soft hands are slightly cool until the life energy trickles in and heats my skin. I feel the buzz immediately, and I lean into her hand before I even think about what I’m doing. It’s been so long, and the rush feels so good… the ache from the bruise starts to fade. I should cycle this life energy back to her, but then again, she owes me. I keep my hand at my side.

With her free hand, she lifts the corner of my t-shirt to peer at the bruises underneath. This time, I let her. Maybe if she sees the full impact of her decision to betray me, she’ll be more willing to come with me next time.

She sucks in a breath. “Lirium… I’m so sorry,” she whispers. The transfer to my cheek stops, and she lifts my shirt with both hands. I let her pull it over my head. She takes a deep breath, gaze roaming my chest. It does something to me, and only then do I realize that letting Ophelia take off my clothes is a serious mistake.

I bend to reach for the t-shirt she’s dropped on the floor, but her hands on my chest stop me. I straighten, and she carefully lines up one of her small hands with one of my bruises and starts to transfer. The buzz ripples through me, right at my core, and I’m almost instantly high. She slides her other hand to find another bruise and floods it with life energy. She’s intent, gaze on my chest, soft breaths brushing against my skin. Her first hand shifts to a new bruise and transfers more. She’s reaching me deep inside, easing the aches and pains, bringing my whole body alert. She keeps moving, shifting, drawing her hands lightly across my chest as she seeks out my wounds.

It’s insane how much I want to pull her down to the bed. Even though I’m still angry as hell. A fire heats my cheeks that has nothing to do with the life energy coursing through me. Am I really this easy to manipulate?

I grab her wrists again, gently this time, and pull them from my body. “I’m fine. Really.” I bend down to scoop up my shirt and slip it on. Maybe I’m not a complete idiot after all. “Did you come here just to apologize and heal my wounds?”

She steps back, dropping her gaze.

“I didn’t think so,” I say. “So, what is it? Valac letting me out to play again?”

“He wants you to come on collections today.” She looks up at me. “I can tell him you’re still healing. You don’t have to go. I can do them myself.”

“I told you. I’m fine.” And more importantly I need to collect again to build up my strength. I don’t want to fight Ophelia, but if I have to go up against her—or Valac—I can’t afford to be drained and half-dead. Valac is right: Ophelia is a survivor because she’s smart. She doesn’t make stupid mistakes, and she doesn’t waste her life hits trying to cope with the horror of what she does. I need to be stronger than that to have any chance of getting out.

Ophelia frowns, like she doesn’t think it’s wise for me to leave my room. Like I’m still a wounded puppy.

I give her my best stone-cold look in return. “Do I need to dress up for collections this time? More life hit parties?”

Ophelia gestures to her club-ready dress, like it’s obvious.

“Right,” I say. “Tell Valac I need some new clothes.”

I’m riding with Ophelia and Valac in the mob-mobile, the same black sedan we used on my first adventure out with Kolek’s two henchmen. The same two who turned my chest into a mosaic of their fist-prints. Ophelia’s boost has gone a long way in easing the lingering aches and pains, but I’ve hardly forgotten. I’m sure they haven’t either, judging by the smirks Nico keeps sending my way from the front seat.

I’d say something, but the bullet proof glass between us is fairly sound proof as well.

I glare at Nico until he turns forward and says something to the two-pints-of-ice-cream thug, whose name I still don’t know.

I turn to Valac. “Are these guys going to be a problem?” I flick a look up front. Nico’s having a laugh with two-pints, at my expense, I’m sure.

“Just don’t give them a reason to do anything,” Valac says. “Kolek is very unforgiving when his minions damage his debt collectors. Unless it’s by his orders.”

“Well, then, we should have no problems.”

Valac gives me a sideways look. He’s even more fashion-forward today, in a starched gray-silk shirt and a tie that is a dead match, both of which contrast with his black leather pants. The patches on Valac’s jacket echo Ophelia’s midnight-metal dress and silver stiletto heels. My black silk shirt and tailored pants complete the set. We’re obviously coordinated, but I can’t decide if it’s Ophelia or Valac dressing us. Probably Valac.

“Nice jacket,” I say, just to throw him off guard. It does so… spectacularly. His blond eyebrows fly up, then furrow, like he’s trying to figure out if I have a head injury. “It suits you,” I add with a smirk to confuse him more, and he half-turns in his seat to regard me anew. Ophelia rolls her eyes behind his back, and I try to tame the grin, not wanting to be too obvious. I want to convince Valac I’m fully on board with being a mob collector, but being too chummy will only make him suspicious.  “So, who are we all dressed up to impress this time? More socialites getting high on life hits?”

Valac hesitates, still thrown by my brief fashion commentary. “No, little bird.” He gives me an intense look, like he’s trying to figure me out again. “I was starting you out easy before.”

“Life hit parties are beginner level?” I ask. “What’s advanced? Resurrecting someone from the dead?” We’re only inches away in the car, and I just touched a live-rail from Valac’s past—that someone died. Someone he couldn’t save. I know it. He knows it. Even Ophelia leans forward a little, trying to gauge Valac’s reaction, but his gaze is locked with mine. The moment gets a bit thick, so I break it off, smoothing the fabric of my slacks, and saying, “Well, whatever it is, I’m up for it. I’ve had plenty of rest. I’m ready for more.”

Valac nods, but I’m not sure he agrees. “We’ll be collecting first.” Something over my shoulder, outside the window, catches his eye. The car rolls to a stop. “And… we’re here.”

We climb out, one by one. The neighborhood is run down, but still alive. A couple of businesses have people wandering in and out, but the main traffic is a gambling salon with wall-sized screens that showcase all the online and social gambling games available. I frown as I check out the steady stream of decidedly low-rent customers trailing into the salon. With most gambling online, the few physical casinos tend to cater to high-potentials with lots of cash to burn. You can get anything from a high-end sex worker to a Broadway show at the casino palaces, but this place is no palace. And the people shuffling past the blaring screens aren’t the kind to lay down serious money on a show.

We head toward the casino, but then veer from the main entrance of the salon and enter a building with a plain, concrete façade next door. Kolek’s thugs lead the way up a set of rotted-out stairs to the second floor. Valac brings up the rear, like there’s still a possibility I might make a run for it. We enter a room that’s filled with hard-backed plastic chairs, the uncomfortable kind that hospitals use. The people in them look just like the customers filing into the casino next door—low-rent, mussed hair, some appear to be junkies coming off a bad run of skeet.

A chill silences the room, all eyes on us. At first I think it’s our clothes, or the fact that Kolek’s thugs are oversized enough to warrant that response. But then I see one end of the room is a wall of screens, each with a different view of the casino. A small line of customers shuffle by a short, scraggly man who looks like Renald’s cousin—the donor wrangler Valac made me kill for selling out to one of Kolek’s brothers.

Then it hits me. Of course. The casino is a front for Kolek’s mob. And since we’re here, that means a front for trafficking life energy. And maybe more, judging by the bookie. His stringy hands fuss over an old-fashioned lap screen. He’s taking information from each of the customers and handing them a swipe card from a stack next to him. Are they being paid for their donations? Or are they placing off-book bets? Either way, I’m sure the lap screen is off grid. Gambling, in general, is legal. But running odds on life energy transfers is as illegal as the trafficking itself. I look back to the wall screens and there’s a list of names. Celebrities. Politicians. They have odds and dates.

Mortality stats.

There’s a really good, long-odds bet on the President’s life.  

Before I have a chance to process all that, Valac drapes an arm across my shoulder and pulls me close. “I’m not sure you’re really ready for this, junior,” he says with a small smirk. “There’s a lot of life energy in this room, and I’d hate to see you go crazy with the high and attack one of Kolek’s men, like you did with Renald. That wouldn’t end well for you, Lirium.”

“Maybe you can teach me, then. Oh wait—” I glance at the burn marks across his palm. “That’s right. You’re not that patient.”

“I’m not,” he says, holding my gaze. “I don’t linger. I don’t take it slow. I take what’s mine and get the job done quickly. I just don’t fly off the handle and do stupid things with the high.”

“My mistake,” I say, like I don’t really mean it. “Still, I think Ophelia would be a better teacher. Not to mention she’s more fun.” Taunting Valac has entertainment value, but mostly I need to convince him that I’m over the beating and seriously in the game.

He drops his arm from me. “Ophelia,” he says without looking at her. “Why don’t you teach your Guppy how you manage a slow burn.” Valac turns away, and I think he’s actually miffed. He strides to the bookie, who is slowly processing the line of people and sending them to  wait in the chairs.

Ophelia’s heels tap metallic strikes against the cracked tiled floor until she arrives at my side. She has a knowing smile on her face. “He’s a lot like you, you know.”

Not what I want to hear. “I doubt that.”

“It’s true.” There’s a laugh in her eyes. “You’re both reckless. Naïve. Care too much about people.”

I eye Valac as he menaces the bookie, probably making sure he has enough donors lined up for us. “Yeah, well, I think he’s gotten over it.” I look back to her. “Are you ever going to tell me the history between you two?”

“You should ask him.”

I flick a look to Valac. He stares at us, then nods to Nico, who’s hanging out next to the donors in the hard-back chairs. The shaking addict next to him shrivels into his chair, nearly spilling out in his attempt to keep his distance from Nico.