Page 8 of Mama Si's Paradise

Her brows shot up like my age surprised her. “Experience?”

My lips opened and closed a couple of times. “I’ve cleaned after myself and the people I’ve lived with my whole life,” I finally said. “That’s the only experience I have.”

One corner of her thin lips curled up, and she finally looked down at the shirt she was sewing. “And now you want to clean up after other people, too,” she concluded.

“Except this time, I want to be paid for it.” With actual money. Not with things that would never truly belong to me—withmoney. I could get my own damn things, and I wasnevergoing to let anyone provide for me ever again.

“As you should.” She put down the shirt and the needle for a moment. “However, holding an actual job is slightly different, I’m afraid. My question to you is, ar?—”

She stopped speaking.

The sound of something being thrown against the wall filled the air, followed by glass breaking—a lot of glass. Maybe a window? My heart jumped and I gripped the edge of the table, waiting for someone to start moving already.

Nobody did. They’d all stopped what they were doing and had turned to the outside, to where that sound was coming from.

Words in a language I didn’t understand were being shouted. Something else was thrown against walls, something heavy that shook the whole ground. Then came a growl, like a goddamn tiger was nearby, readying for attack, making every hair on my body stand at attention.

I stood up, ready to run if I had to.

But the woman who’d brought me here was suddenly at my side, head down and hands folded behind her, whispering: “Don’t make eye contact, and don’t say a word.”

It was a warning if I’d ever heard one.

Now I was practically hyperventilating. What the hell was going on?! Why were all these people suddenly turning toward the sun like that with their heads down and their hands behind their backs?!

Silence.

No more shouts or growls. Instead, the sound of footsteps—high heels piercing the white tiles like someone was hammering nails into my temples—made me shiver. Every step was precise and fast, like whoever was coming our way was either in a rush or pissed off. The smell of roses in the air seemed to be turning up, too, as the music sort of faded into the background. I swear, the atmosphere itself was conspiring to scare me shitless right now, like I’d done something terriblywrong by just being here, and I was about to get severely punished for it.

Get a grip,I told myself in my head because I was being ridiculous. It was just this day that had gotten to my head. Just this fucked up day that still felt like a dream to me, and those martinis probably didn’t help. This day was to blame, and whoever was coming wasn’t going to fuckingeatme like my instincts insisted. They had legs and wore high heels—just a person. Nothing to be so damn freaked out about.

And then I felt her, saw her shadow falling on the floor in front of me, and saw the black dress she wore that covered her feet completely. I smelled the scent of her coming at me in waves—roses. She smelled like roses, like her perfume had been the scent lingering in the air from the moment I stepped through those gates.

I raised my head, the words the woman whispered to me just a minute ago completely forgotten, because I had to see. I simplyhadto see who was walking like that, whose shadow touched my feet, who smelled better than a fucking garden, and who filled the air with so much raw energy.

And I saw.

She was a head taller than me, curly blonde hair falling on her shoulders, a black satin dress melting on her tall, thin frame, her big, perfectly round boobs on full display. Another woman was standing behind her, holding a beautiful white umbrella over her head so that the sun didn’t fall on her at all—and I couldn’t blame her. That face shouldn’t be in contact with the sun—or anything else that could potentially harm it.

Come to think of it, that face shouldn’t be real at all. No woman should have a face like that. Aweaponlike that.

Air no longer went down my throat. I looked at her as she went, bloodshot eyes ahead, gloved hands fisted in front of her, herchin raised.

Was she the one who’d shouted? Was she the one throwing things and breaking windows?

No idea, but when she was walking barely a couple feet away, her head turned slightly my way. She must have sensed me watching her. She must have known I’d raised my head because she stopped.

Our eyes locked and my heart became her prisoner when the second was over.

She looked older than me,mucholder, yet somehow the signs of time were nowhere to be found on her skin, and it really didn’t look like Botox or fillers. More importantly, I couldn’t pick a color in her eyes. They were pink and purple, green and blue, black and brown and grey and white. Her unearthly beauty seemed to be radiating heat or that scent of roses—possibly both. She’d stopped walking, frozen in place just as I was, just as everyone else in the half-open room was, and the woman holding her umbrella stopped, too.

The next moment lasted an eternity. Her hands were no longer fisted.Her eyes were no longer bloodshot. Instead, the colors in them painted her curiosity and I saw it clearly. I understood it.

Then she spoke. “Who’s this?”

Her voice was like a melody. A piano note. A song meant to soothe ears and mend broken hearts.

I breathed.

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