Chuck Hogan - Devils in Exile

Maven looked around. “Go ahead. Pick somebody out.”

“Can I sic you on some old boyfriends?”

“That’s already been taken care of. You won’t be running into those clowns anymore.”

She smiled, then tapped at the enamel of her front teeth with her fingernail. Probably feeling a little numb from the drinks.

“Here’s a question you’ll love,” said Maven. “What are you going to do now that you are out of school?”

“Ha.” She shook out her hair. “With my incredibly valuable double major in psychology and communications, you mean? The sky’s the limit. My parents want me to move back to Jersey. Which I’m not. I really want to stay here, but my lease is up September first, and... I guess basically I’m putting off what I need to do. Which is — decide.”

“You’re waiting for something to happen. Hoping that something will decide things for you.”

She pointed to him. “You’ve been there.”

“I have.” He downed a little more Ketel One. “I told you I work for a Realtor, right?”

“I was going to ask about that. So do you, like, have your pick of great apartments?”

“Something like that.”

“Where do you live now?”

“On Marlborough.”

“You live on Marlborough Street?”

“Right.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I think I do.”

“How do you afford that?”

He enjoyed her astonishment. “How about we give this table to some of these braying donkeys over here, and I’ll take you over. I live above the office, we can go down and check some listings, then get a bite to eat.”

She pulled out the two purple stirrers and finished off her drink. “Sounds great.”

“One more question. Have you ever been on the back of a motorcycle?”

It was a Harley Night Train, done out in sinister black and chrome, low and lean, barely a week old. He handed her the extra helmet. She said, “Maybe I should have had another drink.”

He stood astride the seat, standing the bike off the kick. “You’ll be fine.”

“Okay.” She took a breath. She pulled the helmet down over her ringlets. “Killing my hair.” She climbed on behind him, putting her hands first on his shoulders, then around his waist.

He started it up, and she gripped him harder, pressing her front into his back as he eased away from the curb. Heads turned as they rode through the city, guys wanting the bike, girls wanting the ride. Once they got into the Back Bay, he could feel her starting to have fun. He turned into the brick alley between Marlborough and Beacon, pulling in at the carriage-house garage behind their building. He parked next to Suarez’s and Glade’s identical Harleys.

“Was there a special?” she asked, pulling off her helmet, trying to resuscitate her hair.

Inside, climbing the stairs to the second floor, Maven felt a tinge of concern. He had had plenty of girls back to the pad, of course, but always late at night, and rarely half-sober.

Glade was in the kitchen, standing at the counter in his underwear, eating Thai food out of a carton with chopsticks and a fork. After the requisite introductions, Glade said, “This is nice, Maven, you dating girls for a change.”

Maven shed his motorcycle jacket. “You putting on weight, Glades?”

Glade smiled a Fuck you, shoveling more rad na into his mouth.

Samara was bemused by Glade’s showmanship, but more impressed with the pad. “ Wow, that’s a lot of phones.”

Their work phones lay in the corner next to the refrigerator, twelve units charging, a thicket of wires feeding into the bank of outlets in the tile backsplash.

“Yeah, well, Realtors, you know,” said Maven, ignoring Glade’s taunting stare.

Suarez came hobbling in on crutches, wearing shorts underneath an open bathrobe, his thigh wrapped in tape and gauze.

“Motorcycle accident?” Samara guessed.

Maven said, “Cut himself shaving.”

Suarez said, “Maven ever offers to show you his knife-throwing trick — say hell no.”

Maven felt a little looser. “Fixing to go out?”

The front door opened then, Termino walking inside. “You fucking dinks not dressed yet?”

Royce entered behind him. He immediately zoned in on Samara’s presence, putting her together with Maven.

“Milkshake here had to eat,” said Suarez. “And we have a guest.”

Maven rushed the introductions. Royce smiled and took her hand. “A pleasure.”

Maven found a key labeled OFFICE on the peg rack by the wall phone. He regretted bringing her up now, his words coming fast. “We were on our way downstairs. Samara’s lease is up at the end of August, and I said I’d show her some listings.”

Royce said, still with a careful look behind his eyes, “College student?”

“Just graduated,” said Samara.

“Congratulations. Don’t let us hold you up.” He looked at Maven with nothing hard in his eyes, leaving it to Maven to read his displeasure. “Perhaps you can even talk Maven into giving up his finder’s fee.”

Still gracious, still smooth. Maven felt that he was getting away easy as he steered Samara to the door — and walked right into Danielle.

Danielle wore a smoking-hot dress, black and dangerous, topped by a perfect groove of cleavage.

Danielle took in Samara at a glance, then turned a funny little smile on Maven, seeing right through him. Knowing that this was why he had brought Samara around. He had wanted Danielle to see him with someone else.

Royce said, “Danny, this is Maven’s friend. Samara, isn’t it?”

Danielle smiled at Samara with too much levity, her dagger heels giving her a few extra inches of condescension. “How perfectly strange to meet you,” Danielle said, and Maven closed his eyes a moment, swallowing his defeat.

Maven went from desk to desk searching for a printout of recent market listings, trying to head off any discussion of what had just occurred upstairs.

Samara watched him, still bothered, pretending not to be. “Which desk is yours?”

“Me?” said Maven, finding what he thought he was looking for, then realizing it wasn’t. “Oh, I just float around.”

Samara became quiet again as footsteps descended the main stairs, past the wall behind them. Glade’s voice was loudest, telling jokes no one laughed at, the talk fading as they exited through the back basement to the garage.

“Who was she?” said Samara.

“Who?”

“There was only one ‘she’ up there.”

“You mean Danielle?”

Samara didn’t respond.

“She’s with Royce.”

“Royce is your boss.”

“Right.”

“She’s his wife? Girlfriend?”

“Girlfriend.” Maven looked up, confronting it rather than doing a dance. “Why?”

Samara backed off, shaking her head, looking out the window to the street. “Just curious.”

Maven wasn’t getting full value out of his new bike, riding stop-and-go around the city. So he took off one afternoon on his own, heading west on Route 2, losing the helmet for a while, putting his face in the wind. He returned to the city that evening and was idling near Charles Street, thinking about dinner, when he saw a woman who looked a lot like Danielle exit a restaurant. She had her back to him, her head down — Maven was across the traffic lane, two cars in back of the light — but the more he looked, the more he became convinced it was her. Strolling under the gas lamps, arm in arm with some other guy. Maven knew her form anywhere, her gait, her calves. He also knew that the guy wasn’t Royce, though Maven barely looked at him, he was so tunneled in on the mystery that was Danielle.

They walked to the curb and ducked into an SUV with livery tags before he could see her face. The SUV pulled away, and Maven jumped the small median, rolling after it, remaining a safe couple of car lengths back, his heart pounding more than it did during a takedown.