She tilts her head, staring at the pitiful fool by her feet. “You gave them your soul and you’ve become the abomination you’re meant to be. Now you shall burn for your greed.”
Greed? Can she not see how wrong she is, this glorious creature of myth. She calls me the abomination, yet she’s the embodiment of all that shouldn’t exist. Proof that what happened a decade ago—me selling my soul to that bedraggled woman—was real.
Proof that there’s a world beyond human pettiness, poverty and glitz, desires and strife.
I jerk my head, unblinking, drunk on the sight of my intended executioner. Not that she’ll have the chance to become that. She’s here for something much worse. “They sent you here to kill me, but that’s not what you’re here to do. You’re here to own me . . .”
An undeniable truth.
A damming one.
A punishment far worse than my death.
I don’t know her, yet my molecules recognize the danger she poses.
Her expression flashes; fire-framed fingers twitch at her sides. Every inch of her is in denial of my claim—ready to destroy the lowly being that would dare to utter such a claim. She’s a vision of incoming disaster.
A symphony of bad intentions.
“The only thing I own, foul creature, is the life still coursing through your veins. And I shall be taking that now.” She lifts her hand, the flames bursting into an even more blinding whirl—
Last thing I see is that fire coming for me.
The disgust in her gaze.
My own limbs shifting within the shackles, overcome with . . . fur?
Someone’s haunting howl is the last thing I hear.
And I’m pretty sure that sound came from me.
Champagne flows freely throughout the room. No one asks what kind it is, but we all know it’s the expensive shit. It has to be. Louis Westfeldt would have no less.
Within seconds, his need to brag takes over, and he’s proudly announcing that what we’re toasting with is no other than Louis Roederer Cristal Gold Medallion. Twenty-five K a bottle. Purchased in honor of me because my achievement deserves “nothing but the best”.
I toast.
I smile.
Graciously offer my thanks.
It’s all about playing the part. So what if this fucker probably got this stuff not only because he shares a first name with the man who named the company, but also to show off his ability to throw someone’s yearly salary on a single bottle? It’s not like we’re actually drinking it. It’s toast-and-dump here. Hold the expensive stuff up like an offering to the gods and then move on to the real liquor.
Cognac.
Bourbon.
Drinks that make them feel like “real men”.
Every bottle equally as expensive as the wine we so callously disposed.
Clearly.
“Another one, LeBlanc!” One of the new lawyers to the firm gushes, face split in a smile, as if we’re already friends.
I know he hopes we’ll be.
I’m one of the top attorneys in this crowd, second only to the family that owns the firm itself. Everyone wants to cozy up to me.
The newbie’s enthusiasm is mimicked throughout the room, a perfect parody of ass-kissing.
Westfeldt LLP—that’s right, one name, no partners in the title—has scored another huge, unpredictable win.
Unpredictable to the outside world. I, for one, knew I’d win the moment I was brought onto the case.
I always win.
Funny, it wasn’t always like that, but that was an era long past. Ten years past. Not worth thinking about.
Yet, as the entire penthouse of young and old attorneys, as well as their assigned booty calls for the night, flow to me like the joyful bubbles in the discarded champagne, nothing but congratulatory smiles and awe on their faces, I’m oddly fixated on that time in my life.
Those memories I’d rather forget.
The shell of a person I once was, worthless to the point of deserving death.
I push away the memories and focus on the stunned glee on the partners’ faces.
The rank envy of those beneath me; those that wonder how the fuck I do it. How I keep winning case after case, no matter how obviously guilty the client is.
Even with the entire media painting a picture of corruption and culpability.
It’s sheer talent, my friends. My unnatural knack for picking apart facts and repainting the events into any picture I choose.
Nothing at all to do with that woman. That hallucination. The deal you keep dreaming about lately.
There was no deal, and there’s no room for paranoia in tonight’s festivities. Laissez les bons temps rouler, as we say in New Orleans. Let the good times roll.
I’ve done what I do best—the money being deposited into my account takes me one step further from who I once was.
Adds another layer of security to my life.
Assurance that I’ll never go back to being the good-for-nothing I was originally born to be.
Someone claps me on the back. Again. I take it and dish out another gracious smile. Thank them for their praises. Pretend to be one of them—New Orleans’ crème de la crème—and the entire time the whispers grow louder.
Outside the wall of windows, the Big Easy glows like the unique jewel it is.
Not the part I was born into. Hell no. That part is like a festering rot upon this city.
This is the view the world sees. The infamous Canal Street. The best of Vieux Carre—the French Quarter.
This suite in the Ritz-Carlton? Only a select few ever see its grandeur outside of pictures.
“They went all-out for this one, huh?” Travis, one of the only people I can actually stand at the firm, murmurs with a smile on his face.
I simply tip my head in acknowledgement and continue to work the room.
Louis and his father, Herbert Westfeldt, acquired it for the night in order to host this celebration. In “my” honor, you see.
As if they don’t view me as nothing more than an asset to advance their own names.
Not that I care. My own name is well known in the upper ranks of this city. My bank account? Perfect. Right where I need it to be.
I’ll never go back to being that penniless, unworthy nobody again.
Making a deal with the devil has its perks.
I didn’t make a deal with the devil!
“What was that, Silas?” Joanna, a fellow lawyer, asks. Her green eyes are wide, blinking rapidly, brain failing to compute the stupidity I clearly blurted aloud.
My forehead prickles with sweat.
I’m saved from responding by another wave of ass kissers. Their eager, sparkling gazes are like hungry spotlights following my every move.
Every tilting, wobbly move.
Shit, am I swaying on my feet? I’ve barely begun drinking.
The stares turn questioning. Concerned.
There’s a pounding in the back of my head.
I back away from the crowd, but there’s nowhere to go. There’s upwards of a hundred people crammed into the living room of this penthouse and they all want a piece of me.
Because they’re just like me—soulless, insatiable leeches obsessed with their best interests. Looking for ways to further their own agendas.
Huh? Where are these thoughts coming from? I never think of myself like that.
Not anymore. I became somebody. There’s no need to.
But it’s true though, isn’t it? It’s what you are. Lowest of the low. That’s why you made that deal.