Spiders in the Grove (In the Company of Killers #7)(8)

She smirks. “That. Right there”—she points at me again—“is how I know you’re perfect for the job. You’re more concerned with what you’ll get, than with what the job entails. And what I can give you, I’m confident will keep you loyal to me.”

“And that would be?”

Cesara stands; her black dress, tied with a dangling silk belt around her slim waist, drops just above her knees.

“We’ll start with ten thousand a month,” she says, and then she paces the cobblestone patio. “After six months, depending on how well you do, we’ll negotiate a raise.”

I pinch my mouth on one side, contemplating. “Hmm. OK, I admit you have my attention.” Pfft! Ten thousand is pocket change compared to what I make.

Cesara smiles, walks past me, and I follow her back into the mansion; as always, the same slave girl stays close behind.

As if the other girls tending to things moments ago know Cesara wants their attention, without demanding it, all stop what they’re doing simultaneously and scurry to the center of the room the moment they hear her voice.

“These girls,” Cesara begins, “are the product. But not just any product; think of them as blood diamonds”—she glances back at me—“You’ve seen that movie, right?” She doesn’t give me time to answer before turning her attention back on the girls. “People die in the process of getting them here; the diamonds with the purest clarity are worth a lot of money.” She reaches out to one girl the most beautiful of the group, and brushes the back of her fingers across her cheek; the girl never raises her eyes. “Our job is to sort through those brought here by those disgusting men; pick and choose which of them go where, which of them, visually, will attract the wealthiest buyers. Then we send them to the governesses to be broken before they’re brought back to us to be trained.” She motions for me.

I walk up and stand next to her.

“A man will pay one million for this girl,” she says with admiration and dollar signs in her eyes. “She’s perfect. In every way”—she glances at my throat—“unblemished; not even a freckle anywhere on her body.” She releases the girl’s chin, turns fully to face me and says, “But beauty means nothing if she isn’t broken and trained properly—it’s our job to make sure that when she walks out on that bidding stage, she’s ready. If she stumbles, if she speaks or raises her eyes or slouches her shoulders or shows emotion, it could be your head.”

What happened to her use of ’our’ all of a sudden?

“My head?” I ask.

Cesara smiles, and nods. Then she walks around the girls, inspecting each of them as she speaks, hardly ever looking at me but speaking only to me.

“Of course, I’m not only recruiting you for your companionship,” she says.

“So, I take it there have been other…colleagues, who’ve worked in the position you intend to put me in? You need somebody to blame and punish if something doesn’t go right.”

“The world is dark place, Lydia. You have a choice; I can’t force you to do it.”

“But you’ll kill me if I don’t.”

“Yes. I’ll kill you if you don’t.”

I sigh dramatically, look upward at the chandelier dangling from the high ceiling above me, and I pretend to take this all into serious consideration, but she and I both know what my answer will be.

“All right,” I say. “But I want fifteen thousand a month to start.”

Cesara grins.

“Bargaining now? Maybe you shouldn’t push your luck too far?”

I glance at the million-dollar slave girl. “She slouches a little, if you look at her from this angle.” I point at her bare shoulder. “And if you’ll look closely, you’ll see a scar. Almost unnoticeable, but it’s there.”

Cesara comes closer and peers in at the spot. When she finally sees it, she straightens her back with a sigh.

“I really do like you, Lydia,” she says. “OK, fifteen it is.” The grin reappears at her lips. And I see something else in her face, in her eyes, something as faint and as devastating as the scar on the girl’s shoulder. Another obstacle I’ll need to overcome, perhaps? A test of my abilities? An unforeseen scenario? It’s all of these things, I know. I feel it in my gut. Can I do it? Can I do the things I know I will have to do, without feeling guilty?

I leave the room with Cesara, and my conscience with the slave girls.





Fredrik


Dante, my self-proclaimed sidekick, looks like a rat in a suit. I help him with his tie, and affix his cufflinks properly, and smack him across the back for the tenth time when he falls into another slouch. The guy came from back alleys and heroin blowjobs, and there’s only so much I can do with him. But he’ll have to do, because I trust nobody else. I don’t trust Dante, either, but he’s terrified of me, and it would take a lot for him to betray me. I suspect he will someday, but today is not that day.

“I don’t know, boss,” he says, “I’ve never done anything like this before. What if I screw it up?”

“With enough money,” I begin, “nobody is going to notice anything else. Don’t worry too much about how to act, just make sure everybody knows how rich you are, and everything else will fall into place.”