Page 7 of A Touch of Dark
“I-I don’t—”
“Fifty, then.” I step closer to the painting, leaving her to decide on an answer, even as I reach into my pocket for my checkbook.
Odd. This painting makes for the first birthday present I’ve wanted in years. One dark enough to rival even Simon’s grim offerings.
Happy birthday to me.
Come out, come out, Juliana…
I bolt upright, drenched in a cold sweat as my eyes fly open to my empty room, and the icy noose of fear loosens with the realization that I’m alone. It was just a bad dream, though Simon wasn’t the nightmarish figure who chased me awake this time.
No. My pursuer sported a blindfold, his motives a mystery but his hatred more electric than the flashes of lightning greeting me from beyond my window.
An omen?
Or a reminder. Simon’s days of gift giving aren’t over yet. He always allows me twenty-four hours in between our games, but no more.
Usually, I’d spend that time stocking up on wine, but I’m forced to oversee the cleaning crew tasked with reassembling the shambles of my apartment first. They fix my bedframe and repair the damage to my closet, assembling the clothes in the correct color-coded order. One benefit of using the same company every year is that the workers know my preferences—but they never ask questions. I pay extra to ensure that.
I also order them to avoid the bathroom. For now, anyway.
Afterward, I catch up on a bit of work and find a message on my cell phone from Heyworth Thorne.See you tonight, sweetie.
Every year, he humors just one request, a truce of sorts: We forsake dinner on my actual birthday, but the night after, he insists.
How he loves to show me off. Perfect little Juliana: the traumatized brat he took in out of kindness and turned into an upstanding citizen. Presto! Like magic.
Love makes it easier to withstand the lying, but never the guilt. God, I wish I could be that person for him. The perfect daughter. I try. I’ve tried. But being her is like wearing a pretty dress. After a while, it itches. The material wears away at the seams. It tears.
Until it isn’t so beautiful anymore.
Tonight, my disguise will be a black Vera Wang paired with something navy. Hmmm. I scour the glass display case along the back wall and hunt for a fitting necklace. The sapphire Daddy gave me a few years ago will do.
With my costume all picked out, I linger in the living room and watch the world waste away down below. The real estate agent referred to this view as “to die for.” Maybe she’s right. Three years spent where Simon can easily find me and one glance from the window makes the torment almost worth it.
I can watch people play out their lives from this height without them ever being the wiser. That woman walking her poodle has performed the same routine for two hundred and seventy-two days in a row. There are no calls from Simon to disrupt her charming façade. No. It’s the scruffy man she lets creep into her house late at night when only the glow of passing traffic can illuminate him.
They do their song and dance day in and day out, but she never forgets to wear her pretty smile in the aftermath.
I practice mine in the reflection on the window. Wide, but not too wide.
I almost fool myself.
A sudden knock on the door interrupts my practice and a frown flutters across my lips, displacing my hard-earned expression. But then I remember.
Giddy. That’s the only way to describe the bubbling sensation building in the pit of my stomach as I pad across the foyer and answer the door.
The blond woman from the gallery stands on the other end of it. She’s exchanged the pantsuit for a gray skirt-and-blouse combo.
“Ms. Thorne?”
I nod, and she steps aside, revealing a man behind her pushing something long and square balanced on a utility cart.
“I took the liberty of accepting your bid on Mr. Sampson’s behalf,” the woman explains. “Were you still interested in the painting?”
“Yes.” I lurch out of the way, allowing them inside.
Due to disposal limitations, the earlier cleaners left the glass shards of my grandfather clock in a bin near the door for later pickup, though I had them wipe the blood from the walls, at least. The woman eyes the mess before directing her attention to the empty wall adjacent to the floor-to-ceiling windows. Prime real-estate for a morbid portrait, apparently.
