Page 78 of Into the Dark
I hover uncomfortably for a few minutes before my friend returns looking pleased with himself. As I cast my eye over his shoulder I see not Jake but Kevin, Jake’s creepy friend. He looks well considering the disappearing act and death of his father. As soon as he spots me a smirk moves over his face, dark eyes roving over me in a way that makes me feel uncomfortable. He pats the doorman on the back and tells him he’ll take it from here.
“Doctor! Good to see you again. Been a while innit?”
“Hello there. I was looking for Jake. Is he here?”
He gives a leering kind of smile and nods. “He’s here.” He beckons me with a flick of the head, the kind he might use on a dog, and I follow him back inside the club.
The foyer looks and feels different from how I remember it. Less imposing, but still intimidating. Right now, it’s busy with people checking in coats and shouting names loudly over the music. I follow Kevin toward a door marked “private,” which he uses a shiny black key card to unlock. Almost politely, he holds it open for me to follow him through.
“So, you an’ my boy all loved up again, are you?” he says as we walk down the quiet corridor into the bowels of Jake’s club.
His boy? Jake is his boy? I can’t even bring myself to answer that, so I give him a flat smile. I gather from the comment, however, that Jake hasn’t told him about our stupid fight, meaning they’re not that close at least, or that this fight isn’t as huge as it’s felt to me the past twenty-four hours.
“So, even the smart ones love fucking bastards…” He chuckles in amusement. “Wanna take the lift?” he asks with almost childlike enthusiasm.
I shrug my indifference, which he takes as an affirmative and reaches out to press the call button. I breathe a little breath of relief when the elevator pings open immediately because honestly, I’d rather not spend any more time in Kevin’s company than necessary.
Once inside the enclosed space, he presses “3” and the lift jerks upward, making me stagger a slightly. As I steady myself against the cold metal wall I look over at Kevin, who’s still smiling at me as if he’s party to some private joke he’s dying to tell me.
Though not unattractive, he has an exceptionally mean face, Kevin. The potential for immeasurable violence lives in that face. Dark navy eyes sink deep into his square-jawed head—eyes that are almost too large and too wide for the other features next to them. He looks dangerous. Not in the way Jake can sometimes look dangerous, but in a constantly threatening way. To avoid looking at him, I look at my shoes and nails, and then at the specks of silver on the rubber floor of the elevator.
Finally, the slowest elevator on earth jerks to a stop and the doors spring open, allowing me to breathe again.
We’re deposited into another corridor with lots of doors leading off it, all of them with those key card devices similar to downstairs. When Kevin uses his key again to open another door, I understand that while Jake may not share his relationship woes with him, Kevin is certainly trusted as a senior member of staff inside the club.
We’re let into a small corridor, a compact kitchen off to one side and a shower room off to the other. Ahead of us is another door, slightly ajar so I can hear the sound of the music from the club downstairs as we move toward it. Kevin pushes open the door to Jake’s office, and I see him. He’s not alone. A slender woman with long legs and long, dark hair, dressed in a tight black business suit with what looks to be only a bra underneath, sits on the sofa close to him. Very close to him. This is his bloody manager? She’s leaning into him with her head thrown back as she laughs at something he just said. Her hand is on his thigh too. I feel my fingernails sharpen into claws.
Jake looks relaxed, chuckling quietly and clearly enjoying her company. He isn’t touching her, but he isn’t throwing her off either. He rests a glass of brown liquid on his vacant thigh, and she’s drinking champagne by the looks of the half-empty glass and ice bucket in front of her. The rage practically sears through my body, lighting up every nerve ending.
So this is revenge? For a kiss and dinner while we were apart. Or has this been going on the whole time?
I feel sick. I clutch my stomach as beside me Kevin makes a sort of low whistling noise. It’s enough to get Jake’s attention, and he turns his head, eyes widening when he spots me across the low-lit room. His mouth sort of falls open, and he sits up, his manager’s head turning toward me.
“Shit, mate, sorry. Totally forgot you already had company,” Kevin says. He doesn’t sound sorry in the slightest. That’s when I know: he wanted me to see this. Jake clearly didn’t because he looks caught out. Guilty. Tears sting the backs of my eyes.
“Yes. Apologies for intruding,” I seethe. “I had no idea you were this kind of busy.” My rage propels me out into the corridor and along toward the stairwell. I’m a few steps down when I feel a hand on my arm, Jake spinning me around to face him. He doesn’t look panicked or guilty now though. He looks irritated.
“Where are you going?”
I try yanking my arm from his grip, but it doesn’t give as he tightens his hold. I climb back up so I’m level with him. “Where the hell do you think I’m going? I’m going home. You can go back to your company.” I go to move away again, but he doesn’t let me. He guides me away from the stairwell as if I’m an unruly child and crowds me with his body against the stone wall. Christ, the fury inside me is a thunderous, crackling thing, a storm raging. It feels flammable.
“What are you doing here, Alex?” he asks.
I narrow my eyes. “Because last night you walked out on me after coming down my throat, and so I don’t know, Jake—maybe I just missed feeling humiliated,” I spit. “You’re screwing around already? Fast work even for you. Or have you been fucking your manager this whole time?” I hate how pathetically scorned I sound.
“That’s not my manager,” is what he says before dropping his head back to the ceiling, running a hand over his mouth and beard. “I said I’d call you later. Why can’t you ever just do as you’re told…?”
My face burns with incredulity. “Do as I’m told?”
“It’s fucking business, Alex. Nothing happened. I never had dinner with her, I never kissed her, and I certainly don’t want to fuck her. How’s that?” His mouth clamps shut when the door to his office opens suddenly and the woman who isn’t his manager sashays through it, followed by Kevin. She stops and looks between Jake and me.
“Aah, prichina.” She smiles at me, all perfect white teeth and immaculate red lipstick.
She’s Russian? The reason? I’m the reason? What the hell does that mean?
I narrow my eyes at her. “Izvinite?” I ask her in my best Russian.
Her eyes widen in surprise, and Jake blinks at me. What she says next, I don’t quite catch it entirely. It’s fast and with dialect, and my Russian is barely-there and very rusty, but I hear “don’t worry” with some condescending term of endearment and “he’s yours” in there somewhere.