You call that a plan?
“It’s better than nothing.” I feel so unmoored. It’s not just that I have nothing to do until this afternoon. For so long, the possibility of my mother someday waking up was what kept me going each day. But as the years ticked into decades, that hope became more fairy tale than reality. The truth is that the doctors were right when, three years in, they told us there was no possibility of her waking up.
I didn’t take that answer as truth then.
Now, lying in the guest bedroom of my enemy, I can’t help wondering where I’d be if I’d just…let her go. If I’d grieved her back then, at thirteen, instead of making the trek to the Underworld and throwing myself at Hades’s mercy. If I’d allowed myself to admit that she might be my mother, but she was barely more than a stranger to me, and the fantasy future I’d painted in my head was exactly that—fantasy. Would I have moved away from Carver City after high school? Maybe met a nice person and fallen in love? Had a couple kids and a white picket fence?
I don’t know. When I try to picture what that life might look like, it’s as flimsy as mist.
Frustrated with myself, I sit up and look around the space that is mine for the next two weeks. The guest room is a replica of Malone’s, though on a smaller scale. The color scheme is all gray and black with those same pops of red I’ve seen in the rest of the penthouse. Even the bathroom follows it: classy gray tile interspersed with a delicate, red-rose tile. Black marble counters. A large, white claw-foot tub. Deep-red towels.
I shower and decide to explore the closet. I’m not sure if she wants me wandering the place naked, but I’d feel better if I had some kind of clothing on while I’m snooping.
I stop short in the doorway, shock rooting my feet to the floor. This is… She… The closet is half full. Does someone else stay here? As far as I—or people at the Underworld—know, Malone is single and doesn’t even have a normal fuck buddy. Certainly, no one close enough to keep clothing at her place.
But when I finally manage to walk the rest of the way into the closet, I find the clothing is a wide variety of lingerie in pink, black, and red. There are some dresses and even a suit, but it’s primarily sexy stuff designed to seduce.
It’s all in my size.
Coincidence. It must be. Except I don’t really believe that, do I? Last night, she said she had everything she needed for the next two weeks. I assumed she meant toys and the like, but Malone is the type to prepare for any eventuality. She planned this, must have planned this for some time, because I recognize several of the pieces as ones designed by Tink and, these days, the waiting period for her stuff right now is measured by months.
I run my fingers over the lines of the suit, feeling conflicted. The pieces are gorgeous and, yes, probably things I would have chosen for myself. The fact that Malone not only knows my size—or at least did the homework to find it out—but my style… I don’t like it.
I’m not exactly surprised she did this if I think about it logically, but there’s nothing logical about the fluttering in my chest. Panic. It must be panic. All I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember is revenge for what Malone did to my mother. She could have taken over the territory without that one-on-one fight. She practically already had at that point. My mother might have been ruthless and occasionally cruel, but she wasn’t a warrior. Malone had to know that, and she didn’t care. She simply wanted to remove an obstacle, and she never once considered who that obstacle might be to other people. Mother, daughter, loved one.
I want to make her pay.
Standing here in this closet full of evidence of how many moves she thinks ahead, I start to shake. Maybe Allecto really was right. I’m never going to be able to pull this off if I’m just reacting. That whole thing about playing checkers while your opponent is playing chess. I can’t take the woman in a fair fight. I’ve had years to examine her legal business in an attempt to find fault to exploit. There is none. On the criminal side