I laughed inside and out at Sophie anticipating my own idea. I fell back into the couch, cratering it, and resting in that humor. Sophie’s reflection became perplexed, but she continued with her own thought process when she saw I wasn’t laughing at her. And I wasn’t – I was confident Sophie could manage the group and provide them enough information to act as additional sensors at the party without giving them so much as to cause problems. It was just enough controlled chaos to throw off whatever anyone else had planned and maybe learn something about Sergei, or the Corsican, or his mystery girl.
In the sofa, tempted to give into sleep, I had to admit to myself it wasn’t just the ludicrousness of crashing a gangster’s party with a group of uninvited prostitutes that made me giggle. It was the joy of being known: To have thought up the idea knowing Sophie would be OK with it and to have her anticipate it in kind, highlighted a synchronicity that I hadn’t felt since…
Since I had left my wife unburied in Venice.
I stopped chuckling, the sudden and unexpected joy compressing down into a cold burn, the kind you get from handing a folded flag to a mother who will never see her son again. It felt like getting drunk while sitting on a tombstone.
I only escaped that dark gravity by charging up and out of it, moving myself off the couch with such rapidity that it made the room lurch and Sophie whip around with a surprised vulnerability in her eyes. Right then, in an inexplicable perversity, I wanted to have Sophie, to throw her on the couch and take her, no matter the cost or maybe because of it. Even if I was that far gone, though, my self-preservation probably would have stopped me, knowing how close she was to the Opinel and what she could do with it. I breathed for a long moment, blinking wet heat out of my eyes and getting my respiration under control.
Sophie watched me warily, compassion and confusion battling in her expression. That caused me to think of Cheryl again and how at moments like these she could calm me with a touch. In Sophie I saw a sliver of the fear I induced in most people at times like this and how Cheryl had never even cringed.
Feeling again the pull of from that well of grief I reached for an artifact of violence. Out of of my jacket I took one of the photostats of Sergei, handing it to her. “This is the man who is missing from Mitnick’s crew. His name is Sergei Molotov.” Sophie slowly took the picture, her eyes still on me me. Once she decided whatever tribulation had passed from between my ears she stared at it for a brief, becoming increasingly disinterested as my comment set in. I might need to find out what happened to Sergei, but Sophie’s interest in the party was clearly in the possibility of learning more about the mystery girl. I gestured for her to keep the photo. “Don’t let anyone know you have it. You’d have to explain where you got it from.”
Pointing out something that Sophie would have deduced herself, for some reason, caused me to doubt the wisdom of the entire idea. I went to Sophie for confirmation with a, “Are you sure about this? They might not like the idea of you coming in with your friends.”
Sophie placed a light hand on my shoulder, leaning closer to me with an easy confidence that gainsaid the past moment’s storm. She held up the picture of Sergei and stared at it for a moment as if to consult the dead man within. Turning the blond bruiser to me, she rotated herself slightly, as if flirting for a camera . “Are you going to say no to such women?”
I smiled, this gesture providing me with all the assurance I need. It was only a reflection of her cool confidence, which I knew would make her a perfect fit. Men like Sergei or Whip or maybe even Sarti would try to impress women like Sophie and the skein with her. They wouldn’t be able to help themselves, anymore than a bird showing off his plumage.
Thinking of the kind of behavior Sophie could inspire snapped my emotional array back to concern, remembering that in at least one case it had morphed into obsession. I had never asked about the particulars of how she had gotten involved with Verdicchio, but I knew how it had ended, with him unwilling or unable to let her go and driven to destroy her beauty before time or something else forced him to release her. I felt foolish saying it, but I did. “They might want to touch you.”
Something passed through Sophie like a mild electric current, something that might have been a trace of panic. But she shrugged then, as if shunting into a cuirass. She touched my lips then saying, “You cannot have all the danger.” She returned to the mirror and I contemplated that statement for a time, unsure if she meant to help with a burden or share a joy. Whichever it was, the decision was made.
To read the previous chapter go here.
To read the next chapter go here.
See the author’s published work here.
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