Page 13 of Little Deaths

“Well, maybe he wanted more. People often do.” Rafe leaned back expansively in his chair. The loose neck of his shirt gaped, baring a few dark curls of chest hair. There was a necklace draped around his throat, some kind of heavy pendant. He began to toy with it in a way that struck her as a little obscene. “What do you want me to do about it? We both know you didn’t drag me six hundred miles to cry on my shoulder.”

She barely heard him. She had just recognized the necklace, why it looked familiar. It was a prop fromSatan’s Key, a movie about a portal that opened to hell in the middle of a rest stop bathroom. She had starred in it. The director-producer hadn’t known anything about Satanism or the occult, so he had used the Norse rune ansuz for the amulet the portal spat out, which looked like a bent letter F and meant “god.” It was cheap metal, spray-painted silver. The years had worn it nearly black.

“Where did you get that?”

“What, this?” He dangled the rune. “I bought it at an auction. Did you know, it’s actually quite cheap to get a couple set pieces as long as the movies aren’t well known?”

Donni set her jaw. “No,” she said tautly. “I didn’t.” He was messing with her. These clothes, that necklace, all these little jabs—all of it was just more fucking mind games.

She had read the first of Rafe’s books and most of the second prior to this meeting. But if she had been hoping for insight, they gave her none. The first one,Incubus, was about a serial killer who raped and murdered women as they slept. The second,Voyeur, was about a stalker who went to various BDSM clubs and killed men and women while they were in the middle of their scenes.

The end ofVoyeursuggested that Madison’s own boyfriend, an experimental artist, might just be the killer she was looking for: a realization she’d sustained while he was in the middle of choking her during some truly aspirational sex. The headboard-slamming kind she hadn’t had in years.

Donni swiftly crossed her legs. Changing the subject, she said, “One of the families who died is suing the estate and it looks like it’s going to become a class-action. But there isn’t enough money left to pay what they’re asking. I’m going to have to sell the house.”

He clicked his tongue in mock sympathy and she wanted to grab him by that stupid hell amulet and strangle him with it.

“Can I get you two anything?” A perky blue-haired waitress appeared. She glanced at Donni briefly before fixing Rafe with a more assessing look. “Do you want to hear our specials?”

“Just a glass of white,” Donni said. “And your salad, if you have one.”

“Your best red,” Rafe said, dropping his arm from the back of the chair. “And the kebabs. You can leave the bottles for both the red and the white.”

“I can’t afford a bottle.” The admission pained her.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said easily. “I already paid in advance.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know.” He glanced at her sideways. “I chose to, just like I chose to see you.”

The waitress collected their menus and left. Donni watched her go, wondering if she was going to have to make a return to waitressing herself. But since there was a note of impatience in Rafe’s voice now that suggested he wanted her to get to the point, she got to the point.

“I’d like to borrow some money.”

He laughed—a quick, involuntary sound.

Donni opened her mouth to speak and closed it when the waitress came with their wines. She left both bottles on the table. One of them was from Riachuelo. “Not a lot,” she said defensively. She turned the bottle around so the label wasn’t visible. “Just enough to hire a lawyer and find a place to live.”

“The fucking nerve.” He arched a dark eyebrow, with a sardonicism that belied his years. “You kicked me out, Donni. You don’t see the irony in that?”

“I know how it looks.”

“I don’t think you do, or you wouldn’t have asked me.”

She froze when she felt his hand on her knee.

“Would you?”

You knew it would come to this, her brain chided her, as his thumb lightly glided over the crease where the back of her knee met her calf.You played right into his hands, just like you do with every man.

“Rafe,” she said, her voice cracking. “Please—”

“You won’t win the suit. I already consulted with my own lawyer, just to see where things stood. It’s called civil forfeiture. If my father didn’t leave enough blood money behind to pay for the damages, then they’ll wring it from his assets.”

His fingers spread, brushing the underside of her skirt.I should have worn pants, she thought, gripping her wineglass tightly.Why the fuck didn’t I wear pants?

“I’ll still help you,” he said, in a low, passionless voice. “But it’s going to cost you.”