Chapter 56 - The Halyard

Chapter 56: Chapter 56 - The Halyard

[Ding!]

[Spending Milestone Reached! You have unlocked 1 Lucky Draw!]

[Do you want to draw?]

Jesse glanced at Danielle, who was busy tapping through screens on her tablet, then at Carrie, still frozen in the middle of the living room.

’Draw,’ he thought.

[Congratulations! You have drawn: Sharp Reflex!]

[Sharp Reflex: The host’s reaction speed is greatly enhanced. The host will read an opponent’s movements a split second before they happen and respond faster than an ordinary person can follow.]

Jesse read it twice.

His mind went straight to the alley. He remembered the fist coming out of the dark and the brick wall slamming against his cheek. He’d never even seen the first punch coming.

Next time, he would.

’That’ll come in handy,’ he thought.

[It will, host.]

He flexed his fingers at his side. At first he didn’t notice anything. Then a gull swooped past the glass wall outside, and he tracked it without trying. Every beat of its wings looked crisp and slow, as if someone had turned the speed of the world down a notch.

"Here are your key fobs," Danielle said, pressing two small black discs into Carrie’s palm. She turned to Jesse. "Is there anything else I can help you with, Mr. Byrne?"

Jesse looked around the apartment again. He took in the pale oak floors, the cream sofas and the way the light off the river fell across the marble island. Everything had been chosen to work together, right down to the small brass lamp in the corner. The place felt like someone’s home.

"Who did the interiors?"

"Ingrid Vale. She designed every model unit in the building." Danielle smiled. "She’s very good, and very booked."

"Could I get her number?"

Danielle pulled a business card from the case of her tablet and handed it over. "Tell her I sent you. She’ll pick up."

Jesse slid the card into his pocket. He was already picturing his mother’s building: the cracked stoop, the dim stairwell and the cardboard taped over the second-floor window. Once Ben Pruitt was finished with the Goldfinches, Ingrid Vale was going to be very busy.

Carrie stood in the middle of the living room with two key fobs in her palm and couldn’t stop staring at them.

Three days ago she’d been sitting on a bar stool in a blonde wig, laughing at a stranger’s jokes while Angus waited outside. This morning she’d woken up in a plastic chair beside her sister’s bed in a strip-mall clinic, wondering how she’d ever pay Dr. Varga back.

Now she lived on the nineteenth floor of the Halyard.

She looked across the room at Jesse. He was talking quietly with Danielle by the kitchen island, one hand in his pocket, completely at ease, as if he paid sixty thousand dollars for apartments every morning before breakfast.

It was like something out of a fairy tale. A prince had walked into her section at Marlowe’s and decided, for reasons she couldn’t begin to understand, to rebuild her life one piece at a time. First came the clothes, then the dinner and Aileen’s bill, and now a home.

Then there were the things that didn’t fit.

She’d stood in his apartment yesterday. She’d seen the sagging couch, the radiator ticking under the window and the faucet that wouldn’t stop dripping. His place was smaller than the one she and Aileen had just lost. A man who could hand over sixty thousand dollars without blinking lived in a walk-up in Astoria, and he’d just moved her into a tower with a doorman.

Why? And why her, of all people? She was the woman who’d lured him into that alley.

The questions crowded onto her tongue, and she swallowed every one of them.

From now on, you don’t ask me any more questions.

She’d said yes. She’d said it pressed against his bedroom wall with his hands on her, and even now, remembering it, a flush crept up her neck. She didn’t know why that promise mattered so much to her. She only knew she wanted to keep it.

Aileen sidled up beside her and bumped her shoulder.

"Car," she whispered. "I don’t care what his deal is. Marry him."

"Shut up," Carrie whispered back. But she was smiling.

Jesse checked his watch. It was 10:40. He was due at Bethesda Terrace at noon, and Manhattan traffic was never kind.

"I have to go," he said.

Danielle shook his hand and said she’d let herself out after showing the ladies the building’s amenities. Aileen waved from the couch, where she’d already curled up under one of the folded blankets with the TV remote in her hand.

"Bye, Jesse. Thanks for the palace."

"Get some rest."

He let himself out and started down the hallway toward the elevators.

He was halfway there when he heard the door open again behind him, followed by quick footsteps on the carpet.

"Jesse. Wait."

He turned.

Carrie stopped a few feet away, still wearing his gray sweater, the sleeves pulled down over her hands. Her hair was a mess and her eyes were red-rimmed from a night without sleep, but she was looking at him like he was the only thing in the hallway.

"I just wanted to say thank you," she said. "Properly. I know I keep saying it, and I know you keep telling me it’s nothing." She shook her head. "It means everything to me. You saved Aileen’s life last night. And now this." She gestured helplessly back toward the apartment. "I don’t know how I’ll ever pay you back."

Jesse stepped closer. He tucked a loose red curl behind her ear, then leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

Carrie’s eyes fluttered closed.

"Keep the door locked," he said quietly. "Don’t open it for anyone you don’t know. And keep your phone on you."

She nodded without opening her eyes.

By the time she opened them, the elevator doors were already sliding shut behind him.

******

Jesse caught his reflection in the rearview mirror as he pulled away from the curb. Two level eyes and a straight nose looked back at him. He still wasn’t used to it.

Nobody at Standard & Silk had seen it yet.

His phone lit up on the dashboard mount, and the car’s speakers started to ring.

ANDREW HYLAND.

Andrew’s name had flashed across his screen several times yesterday, and Jesse had let every call go to voicemail. He’d had other things on his mind, like getting his face rebuilt.

He tapped the screen.

"Hello—"

"What the hell do you think you’re doing?"

Andrew’s voice exploded through the speakers so loudly that Jesse turned the volume down two notches.

"Two days, Jesse! Two days you don’t show up for work! No call, no email, nothing! You strong-arm your way into a VP office and then you just disappear? Do you have any idea what’s going on here? The Giza shipment is still sitting at Port Newark waiting on paperwork with your name on it. The runway team has been begging for the logistics schedule since Thursday, and nobody can find it because it’s locked in your goddamn head!"

Jesse kept driving. He didn’t say a word.

"Are you listening to me?" Andrew’s voice cracked with fury. "Answer me! Answer me, damn it!"

Jesse eased to a stop at a red light, rested his wrist on top of the steering wheel and waited.

"You think because you’ve got some leverage over me, you can do whatever the fuck you want? You think the rules don’t apply to you anymore? Let me tell you something, you cross-eyed piece of shit. I will find a way to bury you. Mark my words. I’ll make sure you—"

Andrew finally ran out of air. Jesse could hear him panting on the other end of the line.

The light turned green.

"Are you done?" Jesse asked.