Page 67 of The Guru: Shadow
16
DEIS
PLAYLIST: WICKED GAME - LUSAINT
For reasons he could not grasp, it felt like losing when he left the hospital. Loosing was something he could not stand nor deal with. She had sent him away, with all the clarity. Even threatened him. The whole night and morning had been a rollercoaster ride, which usually thrilled him sweetly to the bone. Today was different. Something about her was unpredictable, and it left him in the suspense of not holding the power, which was dangerous.
He needed to get back in control. Starting by handling the Pearson boy, because there was more to him. He was sure it had something to do with Delilah and her father, but there was a single missing piece: Emma.
How does she fit in?
The only possible way was through her father. But she knew nothing about him or what he did. So, what did they want from her? Or was she just an irrelevant bystander, caught in the middle of the fire by coincidence?
But there’s no such thing as coincidence,he told himself.
He was sure the rape had been nothing planned from her reaction to it, especially as she drove him out. Something about her was so distant, and of course, people do go into denial or dissociate, but in the hospital, something about her was even robotic. Her facial expressions hadn’t matched her words, she was for sure occupied in her mind, but it was a mask she wore, only no one would see. And then a thought crossed his mind.
I’ll be damned.
Maybe the mask wasn’t a mask at all.
The only way to find out more was to squeeze whatever possible out of the Pearson boy and then let things play out.
“Greg, tell me he chirped like a bird?”
“Not a word. Sitting in interrogation like a fat smug-pot, I’m waiting for him to bleed out.”
“Ed, have Anderson do it, she will get every last bit of information out of him.” If she wouldn’t make him talk, no one would. “Greg, have him watched, I need you to follow Emma in the meantime, Ava and Cam are on standby. And have the others interviewed too, the fake police stunt worked awesome with Julie. I wanna know what they know.”
“On it.”
His phone vibrated.
Emma
I told you to leave
No, never, ma belle.
Her last message made him smirk.
Fuck off, classist asshole,he repeated in his mind.Such a righteous little blossom, ma belle. You’ll learn, too.
As he stepped into the diner, he saw her behind the counter. Her form from the back pressed into her uniform, aroused him. It would make a glorious play. Her, the waitress, him, the mysterious customer. And then he would have her on all the tables, on the counter, and kneeling in front of him.
“I told you to fuck off,” she hissed at him without even turning.
“Is that how you speak to customers? I might need to speak with your manager.”
“Feel free.”
Challenging as ever, Little Miss Moral.
The moment she turned around, he saw an Emma he hadn’t seen before. If he didn’t know any better, he wouldn’t have noticed any of what happened to her in the past three days. And as she passed him on her way to one of the other customers in the diner, he observed her. Her walk was light, she smiled with her mouth and eyes at the customers, and she even made a joke. Her body language was open and welcoming. Something that repulsed him as much as it impressed him. Because it was a mask. A mask so good, that no one else except him would see through it. Her extraordinary ability to deny what happened and even dissociate the emotions that came with it made him more than curious because nothing of it showed in her face.
He couldn’t help but imagine playing with her. She would be splendid at it.
“So, what do you recommend?” he asked her when she returned. Her face immediately switched. There she was again, the woman full of fierceness.