23. Rhaim

23

RHAIM

M y resolve to snuff out Lia's interest in me had stayed entirely intact until two-forty-five, upon which I'd been pulled from one meeting into another one by one of Nero's secretaries, a nervous blonde, making eye contact and giving me a tight smile outside the boardroom I was in. We'd just finished talking about quarterly financial reports and had accomplished as much as any meeting involving fifteen people could—which was to say, not much—and I almost welcomed her intrusion. It would save me from the small talk these things always degraded into at the end— how's your kid, how's your sports team, how's your boat? —and so I stood and bowed out.

"I'm double booked," I announced loudly, before heading for the exit, where she was already leading the way. I got into the elevator with her and watched her flash her card in front of the key reader to get us up to Nero's exclusive floor, the one for which his office was the only stop. When we reached it I got out but she stayed put, so she could take the elevator a floor back down to where her desk was.

Nero's view of the city was spectacular. While Corvo didn't have the highest of the skyscrapers, because compared to some of the money in the city currently Nero's cash counted as "old," the building had been built in an excellent location, and the area surrounding it was thriving, so much so that no other buildings had as of yet sprouted up to block the view. Nero himself was standing and looking out, his hands clasped behind him, looking like a king. He heard the elevator and spoke without turning.

"I've been thinking of going public."

The hairs on the back of my neck rose at once. "Why?" I strode over to join him, already convinced of his insanity.

"The money, of course," he said, giving me a glance and a grin.

But while I was his underling, I wasn't paid enough to be nice when confronted with stupidity. "I have access to all of our bank accounts. Money is not currently a problem." I'd been wondering what'd gotten into him after he'd insisted we purchase the distillery. It wasn't like him to saddle Corvo with an albatross.

"It doesn't matter, Rhaim, we're doing it," he said with a shrug.

"Explain to me again what the difference is between having nine-hundred ninety-nine million dollars you can't spend in a lifetime is, and a billion?" I asked, and when he didn't answer me, I went on. "If you just want another zero, break into your fancy cigars, and I'll blow you one from smoke up your ass."

He huffed in irritation, before turning fully towards me. "I want to make a mark, Rhaim."

"You have," I said firmly. "And we're not buying a stadium or a sports team."

Nero chuckled. "God, no. But—politics is where the real power is. And politics require funds."

One of my eyebrows ratcheted up. "Yes, I'm aware of that. We've bribed enough politicians over the years."

"You remember Senator St. Clair?"

"Of course," I said curtly. The man's face was inescapable during campaign season. He was somewhere between my and Nero's age, very jowly, very gray hair. I wracked my mind for what I knew about the man from the few times we'd interacted, and what I'd read about him for the past two decades of my life. He was conservative, he'd dodged an embezzlement scandal not long ago, and his tongue was slicker than geese shit on a glass window—I hated most of what he stood for, but he sounded good when he was on a stage. He definitely wanted to be the next president.

Plus, if my memory served me right, he had two sons around Lia's age—they'd gone on his redemption tour with him and it was clear both of them wanted to follow in his footsteps.

I got a sinking feeling in my stomach immediately.

"We can tie our wagon to his, Rhaim, with one simple little ring," Nero said, pointing to the empty fourth finger on his left hand—because he'd just divorced his sixth wife.

"What does taking Corvo public have to do with that?"

"Simple—we'll make a meal of it. One of the last venerable family corporations finally breaks? We'll be all over the evening news and papers for weeks. We'll host fireside chats, informational talks, have a gala, do some interviews and office tours?—"

"Essentially live my nightmares?" I cut in. "And for what?"

"Ostensibly, to fund the new casino. But in actuality, for fame—Senator St. Clair's not looking for money anymore."

"I fuckin' doubt that," I muttered.

"What politicians need now is the good kind of notoriety," Nero intentionally ignored me. "We can provide that for him, with a turn of the wrist. Then can you imagine? Lia will be like Jackie O. Ferreo-St. Clair has a fantastic ring. And she'll have the wedding of the century—you can even give that paper your beloved Isabelle used to write for the exclusive."

"I'm sure they'll be thrilled," I growled.

"Rhaim," Nero said, like he was the reasonable one. "After this happens, there'll be more money than any of us know what to do with—and with a senator with presidential aspirations on my side, do you know the private clubs—and yachts and islands—I'd have access to?"

It wasn't worth asking if the St. Clairs knew where the seed money for our assorted operations had originally come from—once you breached the one percent, most generational wealth had come from tainted sources. Robber barons weren't called robber barons for nothing.

"Or it could fail spectacularly," I countered. "Or worse yet, we succeed, and all of a sudden we're beholden to a million squabbling shareholders, additional board members, and under even more scrutiny from not only the IRS but the SEC? I'm a genius, Nero, but I'm not a goddamned magician—there are very real boundaries to the edges of what I can do."

Nero pursed his lips. "But you've never let me down, have you? Not like Freddie and his wastrel son."

"That's hardly setting the bar high." I'd worked for Nero long enough to know that this was happening, whether I wanted it to or not. That was the thing about Nero—he always got his way. "Have you told Lia?" I asked.

Nero started walking away from the window and over to his bar, to begin making himself a Boulevardier. "How are her lessons going?"

"She's writing me a paper about the assorted uses for the distillery."

"Perfect. Amazing. Keep her just like that."

"I'm asking if you've told her."

He shrugged, while stirring ice in a glass. "There's nothing to tell—yet. Don't worry about keeping your story straight, because there isn't one. Just throw her a couple bones to gnaw. She gets obsessed with things rather easily. Toss her one and move on, let her overthink herself."

"And Mr. St. Clair doesn't care to meet her?" I wanted to know which senator's son Nero was setting her up with.

I would hate to kill the wrong one.

"She's young and gorgeous, and she'll be taken care of," Nero said, as though everything else should be self-evident. "Besides—that's none of your concern. You and I just need to time everything right so that this builds during campaign season. Start getting documents together in order to list us, I'll start whispering in the right ears, and we'll figure out who to parcel shares to."

"And the distillery?"

"That was my first plan to become a household name to secure this—I thought about being one of those assholes with their names up on billboards."

Which meant Nero'd been thinking about spending his daughter like a dollar bill for months.

"And what if she says no?" I asked.

"She won't," he said simply. "I know what's best for her." He took a calm sip of his drink.

I didn't like the sound of that—and I'd never heard that particular sentiment pass his lips before. Then again, he and his daughter hadn't been in the same time zone—or even much on the same continent—for most of a decade.

I remembered when Lia was sent abroad, right after a fire claimed Nero's gracious mansion outside the city. Nero had gotten burned pulling his brother from a burning bedroom.

At the time, I—like everyone else—had assumed it was an act of retaliation. The list of people we'd pissed off and hadn't gotten around to murdering yet was very long, so I presumed he'd shipped her away for her own safekeeping.

But after seeing her records courtesy of Sable, I wasn't sure he'd done her any favors.

There was nothing for it in the moment, though. "I'll come up with a feasible timeline by the end of next week," I said, and he nodded.

"Set something up with Eileen—she'll know when I'm around."

I'd gone straight from that into my meeting with Lia and I couldn't even fucking look her in the eye.

It would be one thing if she'd come back from Europe all spoiled, then I wouldn't have minded helping her father serve her on a platter. If she'd made a habit of coming in late, if she didn't take things seriously, if she hadn't tried to work hard—even demanding that I give her work to do.

But as it was . . . oh, moth.

There are too many spiders in the world for you.

I knew because I was one of them.

So I let her finish her little presentation even though none of it mattered, and all of her youth and beauty and intelligence was about to be wasted on some jackhole her own age who wouldn't respect her.

I'd braced myself to do the bare minimum and then extract myself from her purview—I had ten different underlings I could foist her off on regardless of Nero's opinion, all of whom would be immune to her charms.

But then she panicked and it was so beautiful it was almost breathtaking—the way her lips parted and her skin flushed and her pupils widened.

I wanted to give her more reasons to be scared.

I wanted to push her to the brink, and then catch her as she screamed.

And that gave her enough time to write her little note to me.

I was already familiar with her handwriting from the margins of her books, wherein she used other people's words to express her delicate, lacy feelings.

But instead of sweet things, it spoke in my language, of distances, accessibility, and shipping. Corvo Enterprises didn't need to smuggle anything anymore—we were well beyond that now—but it showed she was capable of quick thought.

I should've crumpled up that piece of paper and thrown it away like it was nothing.

Any other man of my stature who got a note with stars drawn around a particular word would have laughed.

But I knew her.

I was afraid I knew what she wanted

Or at the very least—I was afraid that I wanted to find out.

And those tiny fucking stars splintered the last resistance I had left.

Lia was this awkward combination of worldly and childish—wearing professional clothing now, but her heart was shining shamelessly in her eyes.

I wasn't like other guys. I didn't need women clinging to me to give me a sense of self-worth, or to show off to other men like so much plumage.

But I also wasn't dead yet, and something about her interest in me was like giving a lighter to a toddler on the fourth of July. All the gunpowder in my soul that I'd kept wet for years with sorrow—that shit was drying.

And when she looked at me like that, it made me want to combust.

So instead of putting a stop to things right then and there, I'd pressed and watched her eat her note like a wartime prisoner, before showing me the soft pink insides of her open mouth—habituated, no doubt, from all the nuthouses she'd ever been in—and then she faded, almost visibly falling back into her shell, despairing from having tried so hard to take off only to be so instinctively outed as flightless.

It made me want to break her free—and I was excellent at breaking things.

"Lia," I said, having cupped her chin in my crooked fingers, halfway to a decision already. "What is it that you want?"

I felt her pulse flutter beneath my forefinger as she lied.

"I want Corvo."

She said it with so much conviction that I was almost—but only almost—convinced.

And then she attempted bribery and offered herself.

It was probably unfair for me to know the exact caliber of who she was and for her to not have a clue about the abyssal depths inside my soul. It was one thing for her to think she was offering herself to a man in good standing and another for her to know that the only thing that differentiated me from a killer who made the nightly news was that I had always been too smart to get caught.

Except for the once.

The moment that had destroyed everything for me.

And I wasn't sure I could risk that again, no matter how badly I wanted to hear Lia scream.

"You think tight pussy's worth burning down my world for?" I asked as snidely and crudely as I could, to deter her.

"Fuck me and then report back," she demanded, and then perhaps realizing she'd crossed a line, she added a contrite "sir."

If only she knew how much I wanted to.

How tempted I was to pick her up and throw her against the window, rip her tight slacks off her, lift her shirt up, and drag her bra down so that her breasts were pressed against the cold glass, to let the entire city see Daddy's little girl getting railed by me.

Whatever death Nero would give me then would be worth it, as long as I got to blow in her sweet cunt once first.

And that was what it really came down to, wasn't it?

It didn't matter if her goal was Corvo or me—she made me feel alive, while somehow being the only thing that could kill me.

Walking away from her now was as good as walking back toward death—because I'd been entirely ready to die at the farm, with my windows open and my curtains pulled back. Whatever I'd been doing post-Isabelle and before Lia had come into my life at Vertigo had not really been living.

Existing, maybe.

Breathing, walking, shitting—I went through the motions, kept myself afloat, and made Corvo profitable, but I couldn't claim to have actually felt alive in years.

Even when murdering someone.

Not like I did right-the-fuck now, standing in front of her, knowing she wanted me to take control of her.

The temptation was too great to bear.

And I realized it was better to die having felt alive again than just let myself slip away like I had been—it didn't matter if my new path damned me.

"Open," I commanded, and Lia parted her lips for me so I could trace my thumb around their edges. I watched her eyes for any horror or fear but found only devotion, and old feelings rose up from the depths, like ancient gods from their slumber. Suddenly touching her was not enough—I pressed my thumb in, like I was fitting her for a bit, and then decided to reach two fingers down her throat like I was fitting her for me.

Which meant she had all of my attention as I watched her drop into subspace like a penny tossed from the Empire State. She sank so profoundly it took my breath away, I could literally feel her giving everything about herself over. It was like a unicorn had come and found me in a forest and put its muzzle in my hand, especially after I reached down her throat to where the thick spit lived, and her eyes watered but she didn't gag.

We were both in trouble now.

Her, because she didn't really know me—and me, because I fucking knew myself.

I would be a daddy who wouldn't throw her to the wolves—because I was a wolf who wanted her for himself.

I would become whatever she needed, until I was the only thing that she could see.