Weird Girl, page 26
He looked surprised. “What would make you say that?” he asked.
“You smell like diesel fuel. I don’t know how you run your drugs, but you shouldn’t get so close to the vehicles,” she responded, before turning to the other gentleman, a quiet man with a hint of a British accent. “Which makes you an ambassador,” she told him. He smiled and nodded in response.
“What I haven’t figured out yet is the other ambassador, and the thief,” she said, crossing over to the table to pick up a wedge of mango. She considered them all while she chewed the fruit. Jackson looked supremely amused, and also a little bit proud. This boosted her confidence more than she would have expected it to.
She wrinkled her nose at Maria, who still looked pissed. Examining the two male guests, she decided that since it wasn’t possible for the same person to be both ambassadors on the guest list, by default, the drug lord must be the other diplomat. Raising both eyebrows in surprise, she addressed him. “So, you’re into politics and drugs, huh?” she asked. He winked and replied, “You’d be surprised how helpful certain substances can be in maintaining friendly relations.”
She took another piece of fruit. “So that means, that the thief is…” she narrowed her eyes at the soft-spoken man, and then again directed her gaze at the diva. They both seemed like unlikely candidates, one from an intelligence perspective, and the other from a personality perspective.
“Ah, that would be me,” said Marco, stepping forward smoothly and holding out one of Cleo’s diamond earrings. She immediately pinched her earlobe, shocked that she hadn’t noticed anything was missing.
He took her hand and dropped the earring into it, an apologetic expression on his face. “Well done, dear. Very well done!”
As he and the other guests crowded around the dessert table, Cleo stood frozen, clutching the earring and staring at the back of Marco’s head. Suddenly, Jackson was at her side, gently prying open her hand. “Please tell me you don’t have the knife on you,” he said softly. “You look like you’re ready to kill somebody,” he added as he carefully threaded the wire through her earlobe, adjusting the diamond teardrop so that it was once again secure. She remained like a statue throughout this process, finally turning to look Jackson in the eye. “Why did you bring me here?” she whispered.
“We’ll talk about it later,” he said cryptically as he once again put his hand in the small of her back and forced her to rejoin the party.
***
Once they disbanded to go to their rooms, Cleo made it a point to slip away from Jackson and find her own way. This time, she locked the bedroom door before she slipped out of the dress and shoes and went back to the bathroom to dig through her suitcase for something to sleep in. Annoyingly, someone had anticipated her need. Neatly folded on top of her suitcase, she found her purple robe, a pair of fur-lined slippers, and a long black cashmere night shirt. She slipped on the shirt, grabbed a pair of gym shorts that were completely hidden by the nightshirt’s length, and stuck her lock picks in one pocket and the switchblade in the other. Heading back into the main bedroom, she noticed a package on the edge of her bed. Cautiously unwrapping it, she revealed a mottled black and white notebook, a tortoiseshell fountain pen, and a note:
C—
So you don’t forget the details.
J.
She hadn’t even realized that she had forgotten to pack a notebook. Sticking her tongue out at the note, she wadded it up and tossed it in the waste basket. Then, she turned off all the lights and waited for the rest of the household to go to bed.
33
A little after 3am, when she was fairly certain that all human inhabitants of the house were asleep, Cleo eased open the door of her bedroom and listened for thirty full seconds before venturing out into the hall. The stone was cold beneath her bare feet, and she almost went back for socks, but decided instead to suck it up and deal with it. Her eyes had adjusted by this point, and she could make out the doorways of three other bedrooms to the right of hers on the curved landing of the second floor. There was one door to her right. She tiptoed down the stairs to the first floor and tried to get her bearings, finally locating the dining room where they had eaten their meal. Moonlight drifted through the French doors, enough to illuminate some of the paintings hanging on the walls. Cleo spent some time really looking at the artwork this time, locating three Diego Riveras, a couple of Gaugin’s works, and a lot of pieces by people that she didn’t recognize, but that, based on the quality, were probably famous. There was even a small Monet tucked in right above the rosewood buffet.
Now she was intensely curious about Marco. How many of these had he stolen? Or was he even that kind of thief? Perhaps he was an embezzler, and he had bought the artwork with his stolen millions. Spying a door in the far corner of the room, Cleo decided to explore further. The hallway on the other side held six locked doors, four on the left and two on the right. Listening at each one to make sure that the coast was clear, Cleo quietly picked the locks and poked her head in. Three of the rooms were uninteresting, holding only extra chairs and tables for large dining parties. The fourth room was an office that contained a simple desk with one drawer, a computer, a fax machine, and a telephone. The remaining two doors both led to the same room, a large library complete with curved iron staircases ladders on wheels to give access to the floor-to-ceiling built-in bookshelves. Soft leather chairs and loveseats were arranged throughout the room.
Again, Cleo wandered in the moonlight, running her fingertips down the spines of leather bound first editions, trying to get a read (pun intended) on her host. Sighing, she dropped down into a wing chair and sat with her chin propped on her fist, thinking about her life over the last three days. Well, mainly thinking about Jackson.
What was going on? She hadn’t seen him since she was ten years old. Now, at nineteen, she had settled on her own, and suddenly here was Jackson, annoying as ever, saving her ass even though she didn’t need him to. Or maybe she did, which was a disturbing thought. Cleo had never needed anyone before. Not really.
And there was the incredibly annoying way that he always anticipated her needs. Like breakfast and pain pills when he knew she’d have a hangover. Like a dress and heels for a strange dinner party. A night shirt and slippers. A notebook and pen. Even the switchblade and hat, all those years ago, had been exactly what she needed to get over him leaving. The way that she sometimes thought he looked at her now, even though she knew it had to be nothing. A big brother, he had said. And then he had to go and make her nervous. She scowled into the darkness. He probably did it on purpose. She didn’t know what his end game was, but it was clear that Jackson was playing her for some reason.
Suddenly, she was bugged by something. The room seemed too…short. There were two doors leading into this room. One of them had at least fifteen feet of wall extending beyond it. The other one, the first one, was flush with a corner. And yet…there was quite a bit of hallway between that door and the dining room. She went back out to make sure. Yep. The wall of the library was here, and the wall of the dining room was another fifteen feet away. That made no sense.
Cleo went back into the library and looked at the wall, sometimes standing close enough to touch her nose to it, sometimes backing away to look at it from across the room. Finally, it struck her—all of the books on that wall were the exact same height. All of them except for one. She walked back toward the shelves and bent down, angling her body so that enough moonlight shone over her shoulder to illuminate the title. The Third Door it read, the gold-embossed green leather spine a good two inches shorter than its companions. She didn’t know whether to laugh or roll her eyes. “Really?” she whispered to the empty room as she pulled on the book and stepped back to allow part of the bookcase to swing out. Crouching a little to let the moonlight shine beyond the opening, Cleo recognized…Marilyn Monroe? In shades of pink and yellow, Marilyn stared back at her with a mixture of seduction and humor. Cleo stepped through the doorway, and the lights came on.
“Hahaha, she’s just as good as you said she would be,” said Marco, stepping out of a corner. He clapped his hands together and beamed at her. “Well done, Cleo.” He came over and squeezed her shoulder. “This is going to be exciting,” he said as he edged past her. “We’ll start tomorrow, Jackson,” were his last words before he wandered out of the library.
Jackson was casually leaning in the corner of the room, which was approximately fifteen feet deep and twenty or twenty-five feet wide. The Andy Warhol portrait of Marilyn was just one of around thirty paintings hanging around the room. Cleo said nothing as Jackson lazily peeled himself off of the wall and walked toward her with a grin. He was barefoot and wearing a white t-shirt and black cashmere sweatpants, the most dressed-down she had ever seen him.
“What the fuck is going on, Jackson?” she asked angrily. Her entire body was trembling, as though it couldn’t decide whether she should kill somebody or run away.
“This is why I brought you here, Cleo,” he said, stopping a short distance in front of her. He exhaled slowly and a wave of peppermint washed over her.
Yep. She was going to kill him. “You brought me here to find a creepy guy’s creepy secret room? Which you already knew about, considering the fact that you’re standing in it? Or maybe you brought me here to have a laugh with your buddy Marco.” Cleo was furious.
“You’re amazing when you’re angry,” he said, laughing softly. “But seriously, you’re not here to be laughed at. You’re here to be trained.”
She let that sink in. “Trained?” she said angrily. “Trained for what? What kind of lesson has the Almighty Jackson decided that little Cleo needs to learn?”
He took two steps toward her, until he stood no more than a few inches from her. “Marco’s going to teach you how to be a better thief,” he whispered, reaching out to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear before slipping past her and out the secret door.
What. The. Hell. Cleo stood in the hidden room under Marilyn’s watchful eye and tried to figure out what she was feeling. The best she could get was that it was a mixture of rage, embarrassment, curiosity, excitement, and a little more rage. Who did Jackson think he was?
***
She left the lights on, mainly because she didn’t feel like looking for the switch, and tugged the bookcase closed as she left the library and numbly went back to her room. “Peppermint?” asked Jackson as she let herself in. She nearly jumped out of her skin. He was lying on her bed, his bare feet propped on a throw pillow and his hands clasped behind his head. When she glared at him, he bit the candy between his front teeth and laughed.
“Get off my bed, asshole,” she growled as she walked into the bathroom, where she quickly divested herself of the lock picks and switchblade, splashed water on her face, and brushed her teeth. He was still stretched out like a cat when she came out, so she tried again. “Get. Out,” she enunciated as she reached under the long shirt and pulled off her gym shorts, tossing them to one side.
“Come here. Let’s talk,” he said, patting the bed beside him.
She flipped him the bird. “There is no fucking way I’m getting in that bed with you,” she snapped.
He rolled his eyes. “Jesus, Cleo, it’s a king sized bed. I’m not going to touch you. I just want to have a conversation. Which we can do with at least three feet of space between us, if you’re that nervous about being around me with no shorts on,” he said, grinning devilishly at the end.
Sighing wearily, Cleo muttered, “Whatever,” and climbed into bed, although she did get in underneath the covers, thereby causing her stellar legs to disappear. Jackson hid his disappointment well.
“So, talk,” she said, the irritation clear in her voice. She refused to look at him.
“You like to break into places,” he said. “Marco has made a career of that very thing, except Marco, unlike you, has never gotten caught.” He grinned at her scowl. “You’re great with locks and hidden doors, but crap when it comes to security systems and anything not involving doors. So, Marco offered to show you the ropes, provided you showed a certain degree of talent.”
“So, you and your buddy Marco have been talking about me behind my back for how long?” she asked sleepily, trying to suppress a yawn. The bed was so soft, it was getting harder to stay mad.
He didn’t answer for several seconds. “I’ve known Marco for around eleven years,” he said, not actually answering her question.
“I thought we were here for business,” she mumbled.
He looked down at her. “Marco acquired something for me. I came to pay him for it, and also to visit. It’s been a while. And I wanted to do something for you. I figured you would enjoy an experience like this. So, I called Marco, and he arranged a few little tests, like the thing at dinner. I told him you’d sneak around after everyone went to bed, so we waited for you to leave your room, and then we followed your progress.”
“You’re always following me,” she mumbled petulantly as sleep claimed her.
“Yeah,” whispered Jackson, trying not to think too much about it. He was just looking out for her. She was the most interesting person of his acquaintance, and she had risked herself to get him out of a life-or-death bind, and she deserved to be taken care of. That was it.
***
Big brother. Big brother. Big brother. As a mantra, it left much to be desired, especially since Jackson’s thoughts were far from brotherly. He had dozed off in Cleo’s bed, only to wake up with her snuggled in the crook of his arm, breathing softly against his chest. She was under the blanket, and he was on top, but he still felt her warmth pressed against his side. Sometime in his sleep, he had put an arm around her to hold her close.
He had vowed not to think deep thoughts about his feelings for Cleo. It was just too complicated. However, his current thoughts were not at all deep. This was also a problem. He should have left. Instead, he remembered the way she had looked in that dress. He smelled her hair and thought, Well, shit.
Cleo woke up with her nose in Jackson’s armpit. He was so still, she thought he was asleep, but when she lifted her head, there were those blue eyes, watching her. “Morning, Cleopatra,” he said, his voice much calmer than his brain was at that moment.
“My name’s not fucking Cleopatra,” she mumbled, squinting and sitting up. “What time is it?”
“A little after 9am,” he said, smoothly sitting up and scooting off the bed to put a little distance between them. “Marco wants to see you at eleven, so you can sleep a little longer if you want.” He didn’t have to say it twice. She heaved a sigh of relief and flopped back on the pillow, falling asleep almost immediately.
Jackson watched her for a minute or two before beating a hasty retreat to his room, where he spent the next two hours trying not to think about Cleo—the first time he saw her in San Francisco; the first night that he followed her through dark streets; watching her in nightclubs; that entire night, seventy-two hours ago in her apartment, from her pulling the switchblade, to the way she looked in that t-shirt, to him carrying her to bed after she had passed out on the sofa. Even just the last thirty-six of those hours—haughty Cleo on the plane; Cleo in a robe; Cleo in that blue dress; Cleo asleep on his chest.
He knew that at some point he was going to have to really reflect on his motivations where she was concerned. Why had he really kept tabs on her? Why had he followed her? Why had he gone to her apartment when she wasn’t home? Why had he decided, without hesitation, to insert himself in her life three days ago? Take care of her? Flirt with her? Goad her? Argue with her? But today was not that day, he decided, heading for the shower to get rid of the scent of her shampoo on his skin.
Meanwhile, Cleo was waking up with her face buried in a pillow that smelled like peppermint and…guy. It was disconcerting to feel well-rested and incredibly cranky at the same time. Thinking back, she remembered waking up in bed with Jackson. She had to rewind a little to make sure nothing weird had happened (it hadn’t, she decided). Unless you count the fact that she woke up snuggling Jackson, which hadn’t felt weird at the time, but the more she thought about it, the weirder she felt. Officially deciding not to think about it, she rolled out of bed to brush her teeth and get dressed.
***
He was waiting for her at the foot of the stairs, looking dashing, as always, in a suit and tie. She wondered if he even owned a pair of jeans, or, God forbid, a t-shirt with a hole in it. She was bothered by the fact that his smile didn’t reach his eyes when he nodded in greeting. In fact, he looked pissed about something. This worried her for the fraction of a second that passed before she remembered that she was definitely not thinking about Jackson as a human being today. So, she nodded back, and breezed right past him.
As soon as she spotted Marco, sipping juice from a chair on the terrace, she walked right up to him, put her hands on her hips, and demanded, “Where are the tunnels?”
He nearly choked on his drink. As he leaned forward to cough, Cleo pounded his back three or four times, possibly a little harder than necessary. She was excited about learning from him, but she was also still pissed about last night.
