Page 14 of Ruby Mercy

“I don’t want you to have to do that.”

And I don’t even want to go.Though I kept that thought to myself.

What’s the point in reuniting with Dad right at the very end of his life? So we can make up and then regret all of the memories we didn’t make? All of the times we could have been together but weren’t?

Lana said something about closure once, but as far as I’m concerned, I’m already closed. I’m content. I have Yuliana to take care of and my own dreams to chase. Natalia seems determined to get her cafe up and off the ground. When she does, I’ll be busy helping her as much as possible.

I’ve made it this long without a father or a partner. Why should that change now?

Stroking Yuliana’s long brown hair, I make a decision. There’s no room for dredging up the past. Not when my present and future are bursting with possibilities.

Kirill can have the beach to himself.

5

KIRILL

All the curtains in the house are wide open. Every bird flying by a window, every shadow in the corner of my eye—it all has me on edge.

So the moment the rusted-out Mazda creeps to a stop in my driveway, I’m at the front door on high alert.

Something like disappointment curls around my spine when a woman with blue hair steps out of the car.

I open the door before she can knock, and she jumps back in surprise at the sight of me. “Oh! I didn’t—You’re answering doors now. That’s new.”

I frown. “Do we know each other?”

“Yes. I mean, no,” she corrects. “Not really. I worked for you… previously. Hence the past tense. As a maid.”

“You were on staff the last time I was here?”

“Yeah. That’s what I planned to say if I was being coherent today. I was actually a waitress the night that… well, the last night you were in the house. I worked the dinner party.”

My jaw clenches. “I don’t need a waitress.”

“Good. Because I was shit at that,” she says with a laugh. Then she seems to remember who she’s talking to and stands tall. “I’m here about possibly joining your maid staff again. I loved working here. It’s actually where I met my best friend.”

She looks up at me, her brown eyes communicating something she refuses to say with words. Then it hits me.

I do know her.

She was Rayne’s friend.

That last night at the house, she walked in on Rayne and me kissing in the hallway. I saw the two of them working together more days than not. They were inseparable. I wonder if that’s still true.

If I ever knew her name, which I doubt, it is now gone. “You had a shaved head the last time I saw you.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot about that.” She scrapes a hand over the right side of her head. “It was purple, too. I was feeling a little wild back then, I guess. Much more mature these days, as you can tell by the subtlety of the blue. The name is Natalia.”

I want to ask her if Rayne told her I was back in town. Maybe Rayne is the one who sent her here. It seems a little out of character for her to try and plant her own spy in my house, but nothing is impossible.

“Do you often make cold calls to your previous employers?”

She gives me a mischievous smile. “Only when I think it might be worth the time. If you worked for the wench I work for right now, you’d go door to door in search of a new job, too.”

She’s being evasive. I don’t know what Rayne has told her about what happened between the two of us, but Natalia knows something. That should be reason enough to send her packing.

Instead, I find myself saying, “You’ve got the job. Be here tomorrow morning.”

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