The Priest (The Original Sinners #9) - Tiffany Reisz Page 0,51
but she sat up then and crossed her legs, patted the seat next to her. Cyrus wasn’t too sure about that.
“Maybe I’ll stand,” Cyrus said. “So what’s with the Doc?”
“When I’m not making my art,” Doc said, “I’m a bit of a card shark. You know the old Nelson Algren quote, his three rules for life. ‘Never play cards with a man called Doc. Never eat at a place called Mama’s.’”
“‘Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own,’” Nora said, finishing the quote. “You don’t want to play cards with Doc, I hear. He can bluff like a mother.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“I would never bluff you, majesty,” Doc said, kissing her hand again. Grossing Cyrus out again. “My heart is on my sleeve. Feel free to take it and put your high heel through it.”
“Doc, you really do need to dial it down, please,” Nora said. She swatted his knee which, from the expression that crossed Doc’s face, gave the old man an orgasm, another heart attack, or both.
“For the Queen, anything.” Doc picked up a cup and saucer and sipped at his tea. Cyrus didn’t miss the glint in the man’s eyes as he looked at Nora over the top of the cup. Cyrus couldn’t remember the dude’s name, but Doc looked a little like the bad guy from The Hunger Games. The president with the beard and the crazy eyes.
“Tea?” Nora asked.
Cyrus took tea and a scone, which was a weird thing to be doing in a dungeon. Or maybe not. This was his first time in one. “What’s with the ‘queen’ stuff?” he asked as he sat next to Nora.
“Young man,” Doc said, pointing at Nora, “this woman pouring your tea is none other than the Queen herself.”
“Queen of…?” Cyrus took a bite of his scone. Nice. Sweet. He wondered if Paulina could make him some of these.
“It was just my nickname in New York,” Nora said as she topped-off her own cup of tea. “King was The King. I was his Queen. As nicknames goes, not very creative.”
“Bah.” Doc waved his hand. “Had nothing to do with Edge at all. You were and are the Queen, because you are the most beautiful, the most wicked, the most vicious…oh, I could go on forever. Mr. Tremont, this woman is a legend.”
“A legend, huh?” Cyrus playfully elbowed Nora.
“Don’t get too excited. Like Doc said, I was the most vicious. The most vicious can charge the most money. I did things other dommes wouldn’t do. You know, because they didn’t want to go to jail. Didn’t have anything to do with being pretty. There are dommes who have me beat ten times over in the looks department.”
Cyrus didn’t know about that.
“The viciousness is true,” Doc said. “God bless her dark heart, I have heard stories all the way down here.”
“You into that?” Cyrus asked him. “Getting the shit kicked out of you?”
“By her? Who wouldn’t be?” Doc chuckled again, and Nora only looked to the heavens. But she was smiling the way a woman does when paid a good hard compliment.
“You say you heard stories down here? Did you ever meet Queenie over here before she came down to Nola?”
“Never had the pleasure,” he said. “But legend travels.”
“You ever had one of Nora’s red business cards in your possession?”
“If I did, I would wear it on a gold chain around my neck. Why do you ask?”
“Can you keep your mouth shut?” Cyrus doubted it.
“Let me handle this,” Nora said. “Doc, you keep your fucking mouth shut about this or no dominatrix—in this town or any other—will ever strip you, whip you, and make you her bitch again. Ever.”
“Yes, Mistress,” Doc said.
Cyrus wiped his hands on a linen napkin before taking the photo of Father Ike out of his breast pocket.
“Could you tell me if you know this man?”
Doc gingerly took the photograph from Cyrus and gave it a long hard look. Cyrus tried not to get too excited, but he knew from experience that if somebody didn’t know somebody, they knew it at once. If they kind of recognized somebody, it could take a long time to remember how and where and when they’d met them.
“Possibly,” Doc said at last. “Though if I had to swear I’d seen or met him in a court of law, I couldn’t.”
“We’re not in a court of law,” Cyrus said. “But can you tell me maybe where you saw him? How you might know him?”