Page 53 of Darkness

“You think anyone enters my life without me making sure they aren’t a threat?”

“You thought I was a threat?” She bursts out in a fit of laughter. “I don’t even know your last name, nor do I know how to fight.” She finally stops laughing,

and brings her mug of tea to this side of the counter. “So, what did you find out about me?”

“It’s the quiet ones you have to watch out for. You are one hell of a figure skater, winning a lot. Then you never showed up to one competition, and no one has seen you since. You went to the hospital, that report is missing, and you went to the police a few times, but again, they are missing. Now I know why. But I don’t know why you were in the hospital.” I look over at the four laptops I have set up, watching the club so Lincoln can do his normal job and not worry about anything else there.

“The night he… I went straight to the hospital because he didn’t use protection, and I wanted everything.” She stops and finishes making her tea. “I wanted to be safe. I already knewthere was something he was going to do to make sure I couldn’t go to the police, and it wasn’t even for that. It was to protect

myself.” She turns her back to me as she does something else in the kitchen, which I can’t see.

I’ve already been looking into the piece of shit who thought he would get away with hurting her and think nothing will happen to him. Something will happen to him when the time is right. But the man comes from a family of powerful people in England. His grand-dad was the commissioner, top of the police department, then his dad is a politician, then you have him, who is trying to be like his grand-dad, so getting rid of him will not be easy.

Autumn-Rose sits back on the floor between my legs and looks up at me as I lean in for a kiss.

“I’ve been saving this one.” She lifts the blue box. “Are you going to open it?” She waves it a little for me to take off her. I can understand why she thinks the chocolate is better from England than here. I had one from a box which was called Roses, and it tasted better.

“What is it?” I ask to take the orange foiled ball out of its box.

“Okay, don’t take it out of the foil, just tap it on the table. Not hard, which is what you would do. Like your medium strength.” She giggles to herself, and I place my hand on her shoulder as I lean forward and tap it on the table. The smile on her face is beautiful as she watches me tap it once more. Handing it back to her, I lean back looking at the screen quickly to make sure everything is good, then get back to Autumn opening the orange foil as she lets the ball rest on the table. “I think you’ll like this. You enjoyed the orange flavor I gave you before.” She opens the foil, and I watch as the chocolate pieces fall, as it’s an open orange. “Try it.” She hands me a piece.

Taking a bite, she fully turns her body to watch me. The orange flavors in the chocolate are nice. I never thought I wasa chocolate, orange person, but if I’m eating something which tastes this good, I can see myself eating it.

“What do you think?” Autumn asks as she takes a piece for herself.

“I’ve tasted better.”

“What? No, you haven’t. Stop lying, this is amazing.” She takes another piece and turns back around, opening her notebook. “I want to know what tastes better than this.” I have to press my lips together to stop myself from laughing at how annoyed she is with me saying I’ve tasted better than this chocolate.

“I’m waiting.” She looks over her shoulder at me.

“You.” She licks her lips, then presses them together to stop the smile, but it’s not stopping her cheeks from turning red.

Turning back around, she turns the TV on. I roll my eyes. Another fucking reality show. She watches some shit on TV.

“For my window display-” she holds up her notepad. “-can you see it?” she asks, tapping her pencil on the pad.

“I can.”

“Do you think it’s a good idea?”

I let out a small chuckle. “I don’t know what this is.” She has been drawing in that paid for most of the evening. If she’s not dancing, she’s drinking her tea and drawing in there. But not once told me what she’s doing, because I’ve been doing things myself.

“So every season I like to have a new display window. I have to bring in the customers. At first I thought I’d do a nice flower display, but I did that already.” She flicks through her pad to a page of her drawing. “I didn’t like this, it was too blah-” Now I do laugh out loud.

“What the hell is blah?” Never in my life have I heard anyone use that word before.

“Blah, it’s not crap, it’s not okay, it’s in the middle. Blah. So then I came up with this idea, and I really like it. The coffee flower box. So it’s a box with one side of it with a nice flower arrangement, made by me. Then on the other side of the box, a cup of coffee, or tea, or whatever their girlfriend, wife, or other half drinks. Now if I had someone bring me flowers and a tea all in one-”

“You want to change that sentence?”

“Trust me, there is no one who can top what you are doing for me. I’m talking about the normal boyfriend, who isn’t…I want to say rich, but not sure if…you know what, let’s get back to my window.”

I lean in closer to her, taking the pad from her to look at it better, and kiss her neck. “And I am rich,” I whisper to her. “So, what’s the problem? I know nothing about flowers, and I drink simple coffee and whiskey.” I know nothing about this business, but I know she’s busy, so I know there is no need for me to even help her.

“I need a coffee shop who would like to become, I don’t know, become partners with me for this.” Autumn takes the pad off me and flicks through some pages. “I’ve even designed the box. You like it?” She asks, but I don’t answer while I call

Lincoln, and wait for him to answer. “Get to the fifth floor, and rough the asshole up so he remembers not to fuck around in my club again.” I end the call before he can say anything, and I wait until I see Lincoln and another security guy get to the floor. Autumn sits up to look at the laptop, seeing Lincoln grab the guy from the back of his neck. “And to answer your question, you know there is a coffee bakery four shops down from you. Taking her pad again I look at the design she’s done. “And you already know the owner.”

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