Page 30 of Ruthless Arrangement

A flicker of amusement crosses his face before vanishing. “Of course you do. We wouldn’t want you risking your prestigious career yet.” He pauses, letting the implication hang. “Go. Check in tomorrow morning. Give your editor enough verifiable details about our more public meetings to keep him satisfied. Bellamy’s, perhaps. Mention the Riverside project.” He leans fractionally closer, voice dropping. “Nothing more, Lea. Nothing about tonight. Nothing that compromises our arrangement. Understood?”

The subtle pressure is unmistakable. He’s not just allowing me to go; he’s dictating the terms of my report, framing my professional duty as another component of his control. Caught between Harrison’s demands and Nico’s veiled threats, the walls feel like they’re closing in tighter than ever.

“Understood,” I say, the word foul.

He gives a curt nod, satisfied. The driver opens the door, and the sterile air of the parking garage rushes in. Nico makes no move to follow me out, his eyes already distant, calculating his next move in a game where I am still just a chess piece.

As I step out of the car, the weight of the secrets I now carry feels heavier than ever. Tomorrow, I’ll walk into the Journal, back into the life I thought I knew, and deliver a truncated version of the truth dictated by the man I’m supposed to be investigating. Nico was right.That is what should frighten me.

CHAPTERTEN

Lea

I surfacefrom sleep like a drowning victim breaking the surface, gasping, the phantom stench of blood and ozone clinging to my senses. My own bed. My own cramped dusty apartment. It feels alien after the brutal concrete reality of last night’s warehouse and the cold luxury of Nico’s car.

That is what should frighten you.His last words are still fucking resonating in my head. He’s right. The violence hasn’t shattered me. The casual way he mutilated Vincent Gallos, the clinical detachment; it hasn’t sent me screaming into the night. It registers as data, as a demonstration of power I’ve observed with a disturbing lack of revulsion. That is terrifying.What’s happening to the woman who used to cry over sad movies?

Sleep has been a joke for three days now. Every time I lay down to close my eyes, I keep seeing the glint of Nico’s knife, the spray of blood, the chilling calm with which he resumed the meeting. And then I see his eyes in the car afterward, stripping away my journalistic pretense, seeing the disturbing lack of fear I felt.

My body is one big knot of residual stress, muscles locked from hours spent coiled, waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the violence to turn on me. I push my legs over the side of the mattress. The cheap flooring shocks my bare feet, so unlike the deep pile carpets I imagine line Nico’s place. Coffee first. Strong enough to strip paint. Then Harrison’s goddamn report. He’d left three increasingly irate voicemails yesterday demanding an update, demanding I show my face at the office.

Nico’s instructions, delivered with that chilling blend of permission and threat in the car three nights ago, are seared into my brain:“Bellamy’s. Riverside project. Nothing more, Lea. Nothing about tonight. Understood?”

Understood. Oh, I understand perfectly. He’s dictating my narrative, controlling the flow of information back to my editor, ensuring his sanitized version of events is the only one Harrison receives. And I, caught between the devil and the deep blue sea of unemployment (or worse, Nico’s displeasure), have no fucking choice but to comply.

Sitting at my cluttered kitchen table, nursing coffee that tastes like bitter grounds, I stare at my laptop screen.How do you write about power dynamics when you’ve just seen a man’s ear sliced off as a negotiating tactic? How do you describe “business meetings” that happen surrounded by armed guards in abandoned warehouses?

You lie. You obfuscate. You polish the turd until it almost gleams.

I type, delete, type again. Sentences feel hollow, sanitized beyond recognition. I write: “Observed Varela mediating complex stakeholder interests regarding the Riverside development.”True, technically. He mediated the fuck out of Vincent Gallos.I continue: “Noted presence of key financial figures, including Richard Calloway, showing Varela’s significant influence in legitimate markets.” Also true. Conveniently omitting the other figures present—the ones whose legitimacy was questionable.

It’s pathetic. A betrayal of every journalistic principle I hold dear. But the image of Nico’s face, expressionless as he wiped the blade clean, remains.Fear, I am discovering, is a meticulous proofreader.

* * *

By 7:45,I have a page and a half of the most carefully constructed bullshit I’ve ever written. I attach it to an email, fingers trembling as I type a brief, professional cover note to Harrison. Hitting send feels like pulling a trigger aimed squarely at my integrity.

Time for a nap.

It feels like I’ve just closed my eyes when a sharp knock rattles my apartment door.

Not the tentative tap of a delivery person. This is insistent. My chest tightens.Nico? Moretti?I look at my alarm clock. 10:30. I slept for almost three hours. I creep toward the door, peering through the peephole.

Sienna. Her face is tight with worry.

Relief washes over me, so potent it leaves my legs trembling. I unlock the door.

“Jesus, Lea, finally!” Sienna pushes past me into the apartment, her gaze sweeping the room before landing on me. “You look like hell. Harrison’s been blowing up my phone asking where you are. Said you sent some bullshit report this morning. What’s going on? You haven’t been in the office for three days, and now I find you looking like this?”

Then her eyes land on the walls. No longer a wall, but all the walls. The conspiracy cave. Her jaw drops.

“Holy mother of God,” she breathes, stepping further into the room, eyes wide as she takes in the chaotic web of strings, photos, notes, and clippings dominating the space. Her gaze snags on the cluster of Nico photos. “Okay, wow. Last time I saw this it was bad, but this… this is next level. Look at the sheer number of pictures of him! It’s like… like you’re trying to crawl inside his head.”

“It’s organized,” I defend, suddenly seeing it through her eyes, the obsessive grid, the slightly too-many pictures of Nico, the sheer manic energy radiating from the plasterboard altar I’ve built to the man I’m supposed to be destroying.

“Organized insanity!” Sienna turns to face me, grabbing my shoulders. “Lea, talk to me. What happened? What has Varela been showing you? Harrison’s worried, I’m worried. This isn’t just a story anymore, is it?”

Her genuine concern, the anchor she represents to the normal world I’m rapidly losing sight of, makes the constructed barriers around my secret crumble.

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