The Willing (3 page)

"I won't." I didn't even know what
this
was, but if he was talking about mounting a smear campaign against a small fetish club and getting it shut down while its owners were investigated by the FBI, then he needn't have worried. I didn't play in that league. Hell, I didn't play the same sport. All I wanted was to be left alone.

He narrowed his eyes at me and with three long strides he was in my personal space, towering over me. I wanted to take a step back, but something inside me bristled at his nerve. I had just lost my job, suffered a lengthy back and forth on killer shoes and he thought could lob threats at me because eons ago I'd happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time?

"If you so much as lift a hand to me," I warned, "I'll break it."

Oliver froze, his mouth opened as whatever he'd meant to say tangled in his throat. I was five foot nothing and he had both bulk and height on me, but I didn't care. Not so long ago, I had spent my Saturday nights undoing men like him over my knee. He didn't scare me.

"Give me your hand."

I frowned, thinking I'd misheard him. "Excuse me?"

"Give me," Oliver repeated, "your hand." He gripped my wrist when I wouldn't obey quickly enough. With his other, he was fishing for a pen in his jacket. The warmth of fingers circled my wrist like a manacle. It should've been unpleasant.

The sharp, silver point of the pen glided across the inside of my palm. We were standing so close I didn't know if I should look at the scribbles he was applying to my skin or the circles under his eyes. When was the last time he'd got any sleep?

Abruptly, he released me and capped his pen. "You'll be at that address tomorrow evening at eight."

"I'm flattered, but--"

"You'll be there," he insisted, "or I'm prepared to leak word of Mrs. Madrigal's business endeavors to the feds. I think we both know I'll do it."

My breath caught. The son of a bitch had cornered me like one of his loaded moguls: he was going to leverage the only thing I had left against the last thing I wanted to do. The magazines had it all wrong; Oliver Shepherd wasn't just the pretty face of Emerson Industries. He was the Machiavellian brain behind its success.

I watched him leave with a sinking sense of trepidation. He was a good showman; he even kissed Madam's hand as he made his goodbyes in the foyer.

My own hands, I discovered, were shaking badly.

Chapter two

My problem was an easy one to fix.
Just don't go
, I thought. Madam Madrigal had more than one wealthy benefactor willing to bend the law to preserve the use of her services—and if that didn't pan out, I imagined she must have contingencies in place for these kinds of stunts. Or so I hoped.

If I stood Oliver up, I knew I'd be forced to tell Madam what had almost happened, to warn her about the trouble coming her way. I wasn't sure how well she'd react to my putting her business in danger simply because I didn't have the guts to face off against a control freak.

I would probably end up fired at the end of the day, with a bank loan to pay back that was well outside my means.

But suppose I don't stand him up...
Who knew what he expected of our meeting? I knew his type—all money and no mercy—and could easily imagine the aberrations loitering in his sick little mind. No doubt having a woman at his beck and call would be just the thing. I'd read those books, too, thank you very much.

Stumped by my lack of ideas, I did the only thing I could think of and called my best friend. Carrie picked up on the second ring with a drowsy "hello?" She worked nights just like I did, but her graveyard shift was served in the prenatal ward of St John's Hospice. I glanced at the clock on my bedside table. It was only ten in the morning. Carrie would've gotten home only a couple of hours ago, she'd probably just fell into bed.

She answered on the third ring.

"It's me," I said, biting back the flood of guilt. "It's not important, I'll call later."

Carrie wasn't so easily fooled. "You okay?" I heard shuffling in the background and realized she was sitting up. "It's Jo," she said, voice slightly muffled as she spoke to someone on her end of the line. "Duncan says hi. Are you home?"

"Hi back," I said and winced. "Yeah, I'm home. I'm fine…" I was suddenly hung up on another, far more salient detail: Carrie's husband was at home at a time of day when he should have already left for the office. "Is Duncan playing hooky again?" It was the most delicate way I could think of to ask if he'd had another episode without spelling it out.

Duncan and Carrie had been high school sweethearts: he'd been the star quarterback—or the equivalent thereof for lacrosse players—and Carrie had been the nerd who wouldn't give him the time of day. Junior prom had changed things and they hadn't left each other's side since. I think they would've gone to nursing school together if Duncan could stand the sight of blood. He couldn't, so he'd settled for accountancy. He had a good head for numbers; Carrie would sometimes joke that she only married him so she'd have someone to do her taxes. I didn't believe her for a second. One look at the pair of them together was enough to restore my faith in all the sappy, Hollywood-fuelled nonsense about finding true love. 

I didn't want to bring up Duncan's MS if I could help it. Every time I did it seemed unkind, like I was deliberately rubbing salt into an open wound.

Carrie took it in stride. "Leg's giving him trouble again," she told me, yawning. "You want to come around, try a few wheelies?"

"I'm good." I didn't want to bring my problems into their home. "Meet me for lunch later?" With our biorhythms all out of whack, Carrie and I often got together around five in the afternoon to grab a bite to eat. Normally I'd be rushing from work around that time, but today my agenda was perfectly free. Madam Madrigal hadn't even booked me for a party.

Well
, I thought,
almost free
. I still hadn't decided if I was going to answer Oliver's summons.

I heard Carrie sigh into the phone, dubious. "You sound off. Sure you don't need me to come over?" She'd never had trouble reading my moods. I could still remember the first time we'd met and the concussion our clash earned me. It had been a bewildering but very literal run-in. Carrie was driving home from her folks' place and all but hit me with her Beetle. I still teased her about befriending people by knocking them off their feet.

My throat tightened. Carrie was one of the few people who knew exactly what I did for a living. Both the legal and not so legal aspects of my work were familiar to her. She wasn't thrilled, but she'd never judged me for it openly or asked me to quit. She had told me once, in the beginning, that she often saw teenage girls come into the clinic, still just children themselves and eight months pregnant—red-eyed, too, because their parents had just discovered that their little angels weren't so little anymore.

There were all kinds of choices in life, all kinds of deals we made as women. She didn't believe in pointing fingers.

I urged Carrie to get back to bed. "Had a bit of a weird night," I confessed, "but I'm okay. Are you working again tonight?" Sometimes she had a night off. I tried to keep track, but the scheduling at the hospital seemed to follow no rhyme or reason—or at least none that I could understand with my high school diploma and two years of an undeclared major.

"Yes," she said. "You, too?"

Much as I wanted to, I couldn't explain on the phone. I settled on "not exactly" and promised to meet her a little later, for our blatantly deferred routine lunch.

I tried to follow my own advice and give sleep another shot once I got off the phone with Carrie. No luck. Eventually, sick with dread and restless with nerves, I turned on the TV and went to run a bath.

My apartment is practically a shoebox and my landlord never cares to answer his phone when something doesn't work, but it does have the single benefit of a real bathtub arranged just so I can see through the door into the living room. I've spent more than a few evenings just soaking my feet and watching West Wing reruns until the water turns cold. Few things in life are more perfect than that.

Bath salts and I had never quite seen eye to eye, so I went for store-bought bubbles and let the faucet run. It would be a while before my personal version of nirvana was ready. I spent that time checking mail—both snail and not—and washing the mountain of dishes that had piled up in the sink. Once I was finished with that, I took to brushing last night's wig: even the most mundane tasks would do to keep me from thinking about Oliver and his boorish arm-twisting.

It was just my luck, then, that just as I was sliding into the near-overflowing tub, enjoying luxury otherwise well beyond my means, his smarmy face should appear in full alabaster glory on my TV screen. I groaned, letting my head thump back against the enamel rim. Fear of electrocution meant I didn't have the remote on hand to change the channel, so I sat there, soaking while the newscasters announced the merger of Emerson Industries and an internet start-up whose name I only vaguely recognized.

Oliver's all-white, all-even teeth flashed on screen as he was shown shaking hands with none other than Cecil Holland. The footage wasn't very recent; on screen, Holland still had most of his hair and I knew for a fact that last night his hairline had been receding dangerously. Evangeline was nowhere to be seen. I couldn't help think of her in that white suit, lounging in an armchair as she patted her slightly distended belly and pulled strings.

"
Shepherd
," the news anchor went on to say, "
who is very private about his personal life, was recently spotted at the London Fashion Week with Latvian actress and runway sensation Tasha Kornushova. What do you think, Larry? A bit of a crush in the air?
"

The weatherman chuckled lamely. "
Maybe even wedding bells
."

I sunk the rest of the way under the foamy waters, until I could neither hear nor see Oliver-fucking-Shepherd anymore. The speculations about his private life were gross enough, but they were made even worse because I knew what kind of a man he was. The news anchor could sigh and moon over his pretty face; I'd seen the real Oliver Shepherd—twice.

The hours crawled along until five PM mercifully rolled around, and I saw Carrie waving at me from the other side of a busy street. I had summoned her to a new address, one she'd never been to before. Confusion flashed into her eyes as she pecked my cheeks with kisses. There were no restaurants around, no cafés. Only a brownstone with a red door slotted neatly between two story townhouses. A flurry of leaves whipped around us.

"So?" I asked, trying to contain my glee. "What do you think?"

Carrie glanced around. "The chestnut trees are really nice this time of year?"

"I bought an apartment!"
So much for containing anything,
I thought. I was too full up with excitement not to share the happy news. It was also true that a small part of me wanted to get Carrie's approval first, before I went and literally prostituted myself for a job. I wanted someone to tell me my first real estate buy would be worth the shattered pride.

"Oh wow," Carrie grinned. "Congratulations!" She gave me a hug before she punched me, lightly, on the shoulder. "That's for not telling me. Are we going upstairs? I want to see everything. When are you moving in?" If she'd looked a little weary before, then the surprise had transfigured her completely. Either that or she was putting on a brave face for my sake.

I decided I'd believe the former. It took us a good five minutes before I finally got the apartment door open; there
was
an elevator in the building, but Carrie insisted we take the stairs all the way to the third floor. She called it invigorating. I was more of the opinion that hiking was best reserved for outdoorsy folks—of whom I wasn't one. It was with some pleasure that I heard Carrie take a deep breath as she stepped over the threshold. "Does it smell bad or something?" I quipped, feigning witlessness. I earned another playful jab just for that, but Carrie wasn't looking my way anymore, so she mostly hit thin air.

The view had got me, too, the first time I'd visited. Now I couldn't help think of yesterday's Presidential Suite and the city lights glimmering at my feet. Still, I tried to sound cheerful. "Isn't it awesome?" On the subject of the move, I remained silent for the moment and hoped she didn't notice.

Carrie whistled. "I'm sensing a sleepover in my near future."

"Won't Duncan feel lonely?" I quipped, setting my purse and the small paper bag with our lunch on the kitchen counter. It was all open plan here, no more walls to break up the space, no more feeling cooped up in a tin can.

"He can have a boys' night. They'll marathon Project Runway or something..." Carrie opened the bay window, letting in a stream of humid air. I shivered, though not just with the cold gales seeping into the apartment.

"Carrie?"

"Hmm?"

"How is he?" I could tiptoe around the subject all afternoon, but it didn't change the fact that Carrie's husband had relapsed and was probably in pain right now. I often wondered how Carrie managed to go through the days knowing it would eventually get worse and worse, that this was only the beginning.

Carrie leaned against the windowsill, wind-swept strands of chestnut hair brushing her rosy cheeks. "I left him bravely hacking away at mountain trolls, so you know... Remind me to take some pictures of the apartment before I go. He'll be
so
jealous we didn't invite him along." She almost sounded gleeful at the thought, but as she turned to me, I could see her smile was tinged with effort. "You've found a jewel, that's for sure. Question is... why aren't you jumping up and down, chica?"

I smiled back. "I'm being modest in my excitement."

Carrie wasn't convinced. "Sure, you are," she snorted. "You should be celebrating! If I'd known, I would've brought champagne and confetti." Considering her limited budget and Duncan's accumulating medical bills, I was glad she hadn't splurged for my sake. I valued her friendship above all liquor—and coming from me, that was saying something.