“Where is your driver?” he repeated, giving his signs an even harder emphasis.
“I wasn’t due to get off work for another hour, and he’s not due home for another two. Anyway, it doesn’t matter, my bike’s right over there….”
She nodded toward a bicycle rack. There was only one bike attached to the rusty structure. But even if there had been ten, Victor would’ve known which one was Dawn’s. Her bike was painted a deep purple with neon yellow wheels. Also, the front basket was filled with a bushel of fresh flowers.
The flowers were a useless feature, to be sure. They made the basket unusable for anything else. But the colorful bike probably sparked joy in everyone who saw it. Everyone save Victor.
How long had she been riding a bike home every day through one of the more dangerous neighborhoods in Providence? Icy fury replaced his confusion about her missing driver.
“Operation Good as New—that’s what we’ll call it. This new dynamic of ours,” she declared as she pulled the bike off the rack. “You’ll probably have to wait for me at the house. It usually takes me about an—”
He snatched the bike from her before she could finish that sentence and started walking toward his Audi.
“Okay, I guess we’re driving then,” she said with a wry chuckle, falling into step beside him. She whistled when she saw his car. “This one’s even more lux than Yaron’s. As Byron still says, noice! So you finally learned how to drive. That’s great!”
He opened the trunk and threw her bike in without answering.
But Dawn didn’t seem to need him to answer to keep going. “New York license plates. Does that mean you’re living there now? Is that the real reason you didn’t want me to do my internship or attend med school in New York like I originally planned?”
Again, Victor didn’t answer.
The car ride home was very tense. But only for Victor.
Dawn prattled on, catching him up on everything that happened over the last year. All of her new hobbies, her weight loss journey, her shocked reaction when Nitra Mello announced that she was leaving RSW: College Mic Drop after just one season.
She spoke to him like they were old friends all the way home. Which they weren’t.
After they arrived at the house he’d chosen as her prison, Dawn welcomed him inside like he was a long-awaited guest.
“So this is actually great timing,” she said as they walked through the door. “I just finished jarring up some homemade kimchi, so I can make my mom’s spicy garlic pork bulgogi tonight. Plus, I got this great bottle of Riesling that I picked up at the Newport Wine and Food Festival. It was kind of expensive, and I was saving it for a special occasion, but now you’re here. Serendipity!”
She dropped her purse on a side table and headed straight to the kitchen without waiting for his response.
Apparently, she expected him to follow her now. He did after a few baffled moments, slightly more curious than he was annoyed. When he entered the kitchen, he found her bent over a wine refrigerator stuffed with bottles.
Why did one person need that much alcohol?
“Found it!” She stood and held up a bottle of wine with an elegant white label on it. “Do you know this one?”
He did, actually. Phantom had recently proposed that The Silent Triad acquire a floundering high-end Chinese baijiu distributor in order to launder more of their money in eastern territories. Of course, Victor had done his research into other luxury brands before agreeing to pursue a deal.
This particular wine was an umbrella brand under Wondrous Spirits, the Rustanov family’s multinational alcohol company. Victor had taken a particular interest in everything the Rustanovs did, because they had also started as mafia before becoming a legitimate business outfit.
He took the bottle from her and gave it an appreciative nod.
She beamed under his silent approval. “Just let me get two glasses, and we’ll have some while I make dinner—”
She cut off when Victor walked over to the trashcan sitting to the kitchen island’s left and dropped the bottle into it unopened.
For the first time since she’d introduced her inane Operation Good as New plan, outrage seeped into her expression. “Why did you do that?”
He signed his next words slowly. “I am not one of your frat boys, willing to fuck you when you’re drunk. I want you fully aware.”
A satisfying flash of fear lit up her eyes. But she smothered it in the next moment under a smile. “Okey-dokey then. Water it is. That pairs with bulgogi too.”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “I’m not here for dinner. I’m here for punishment.”
She paused. Then with an equally serious look, signed back, “Can’t you have both?”
A beat passed between them. Charged and electric.
“No,” he answered. “I can’t have both.”
“I think you’re only saying that because you’ve never had my mom’s bulgogi,” she insisted with an irreverent grin. “Dude, it’s so crazy good. Tell you what, if you don’t like it, you can sweep the table and hate fuck me or whatever. When you think about it, that might be even better for you, because I’d be sooo upset that you didn’t like my dinner. Like…”
She made dramatic sobbing sounds. “I was trying so hard to impress Victor with my cooking, and he hated it! What a terrible punishment! This is so much worse than a regular hate fuck!”
Dawn broke off her hypothetical impression to give him a sympathetic look. “You know, I almost wish this bulgogi I’m about to make for you wasn’t so good. I want that vision to come true for you, Victor.”
A ripple of amusement welled inside of him, so unexpected it almost reached his lips.
“See, you’re already almost smiling super reluctantly,” Dawn pointed out with a pleased grin. She grabbed two wine glasses from the overhead cabinet. “Now, please sit down at this way-too-nice-for-me marble kitchen island while I make you an amazing dinner. You’re going to love it, I swear.”
With that promised, she filled the glasses up with water from the fridge. He noted that she put ice in her stemmed cup but not in his. Perhaps she remembered that he preferred it that way.
Somewhat bemused, he took the wine glass filled with water from her and spent the next hour watching her cook. Save for when she ran upstairs to change out of her work clothes into a pretty yellow skater dress, she chattered the entire time.
“Sorry for talking so much. It’s been a while since I had the chance to speak with someone my own age,” she admitted sheepishly as she put the bulgogi in the bowls she’d set out. “Yaron and all my co-teachers at Young Souls are parents in their 40s. And the kids only want to talk about Yo Gabba Gabba and who did what at school. This is so nice—speaking of nice, the weather’s been amazing. Want to sit on the front porch? Which is, again, way more front porch than one person needs?”
Dawn didn’t wait for his answer. She simply handed him their bowls, filled with meat, rice, and various vegetables, and said, “Okay, lead the way.”
She grabbed a third bowl before following him out of the kitchen, Victor noted. Who was it for?
He soon found out. After he set the bowls down on the porch’s little table, she kept on walking toward the carport at the end of the long driveway where her driver was now parked.