Page 25 of Iris
And get in trouble with his boss? I don’t think so.
But I’m beyond fucking bored, so I reach out and put my hand on the handle, dwarfing his.
He swallows hard, and then he steps back, holding out his hand for the envelope.
Not yet.
Instead, I tuck it back in my pocket and check over the crates. Everything’s there, as expected. His boss wouldn’t fuck with Killian, especially after he offered him a lucrative deal with these shipments.
I straighten and wheel the pallet to my truck to load it. Then I hand the envelope and the empty pallet to the guy. I reach into my back pocket, grab my notepad and pen.
Next time, don’t fuck with me. You could have earned a bigger tip.
I wrap the note around a twenty, then hand it to him.
I don’t look back as I get in the truck and drive back to the city.
On a whim I take the scenic route, down along the coast, near the exclusive holiday towns. There’s a rumor they’ll have a ball or an event for the Season in Crystal Beach, so I drive through there.
Big, gated places that lead to the private beach. Leafy and green and beautiful, the kind of idyllic that could make a man think this world isn’t fucked in the head with its insane hierarchy and social mores.
It needs something fresh, coconut, or what goes with coconut. A rum…and a cocktail. One with the clitoria to color it purple or blue, and maybe a white flower. An iris…
It’s money, the idea of a bespoke cocktail that isn’t sparkling wine. And it could be something we do for each of this Season’s events.
I take the road back to Sabine City, eager to share the thought with Killian. In a few hours we open anyway, so I want to be there, put everything away, but I think he might go for it.
Yeah… a pretty cocktail topped with a pretty flower. Just like the mouthy green-eyed Omega from the ball.
Not that I’m ever going to see her again.
CHAPTER
EIGHT
Iris
“Delores, we are lost.”
A little forlorn voice stops me in my tracks. Recognizing it, I round a corner into an alley to find that little blonde-haired girl I saw at the barbecue.
She’s sitting on a step, wearing a pretty blue dress that’s got big streaks of what looks like grease on it from some kind of engine—although what a kid would be doing around an engine is beyond me.
I should walk on. I shouldn’t be here, on this side of the city. I should be further up, toward where the boardwalk, the Townsquare, and the Council building on the Upper Side of Sabine.
But I had to get out. Facing the Monarch feels like too great a task, too much pressure, and my stomach is uneasy as it is.
I thought about taking a car to Violet and Stephan’s beach home, or even putting my toes in the sand by the boardwalk, but once I saw Mrs. Hyde chatting with Mrs. Jones in front of the corner market, I swung left before I could be spotted.
An Omega out alone, unchaperoned, during her Season? Unheard of. An Omega who is meant to be at the Council to meet the Monarch and her other Luxe-hopefuls but decided to run for it instead… Well, let’s just say I’d be a viral sensation on Stitch for the rest of my cursed life.
And as much as I don’t want to care about the Monarch and being this year’s Luxe Omega, bringing shame on my family is not something I want to do either.
So I hurried down the alley until the side streets started to twist and branch off into smaller ones. Soon, polished apartment buildings and artisan boutiques turned into crumbling facades and pot-hole ridden streets. Night clubs and seedy storefronts.
That’s where I’d found the girl, sitting on the stoop to a closed pawn shop with boarded up windows.
The little girl sniffs. “Oh, Delores,” she says, voice wobbly and breaking my heart. “What do we dos?”
