Kristal visibly jolts at his question. “What’s wrong with me?” she asks, sounding confused.
“Yeah, why are you so glum?”
We all look toward Kristal, who doesn’t look miserable or glum, just perplexed.
“Rodge has a way of reading people, just like his father and his father before him,” Maeve explains. “It’s what makes him such a good innkeeper.”
“Yeah, it means I can spot the over-demanding idiots from the door and tell them, ‘Sorry, Bub, no room left at the inn,” Rodge amends with an annoyed huff.
“The man is a saint, I tell you,” Maeve continues with an insisting tone. “Why I was a single mother with no work history, dragging along a son behind me because I didn’t even have enough friends or money to get him a babysitter for my interview. He took one look at me holding Declan’s hand and said, ‘You’re responsible and loyal. You’re hired.’ And I’ve been working here ever since.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Rodge says, waving away her sentimental story. He turns what I’m beginning to suspect might be a semi-permanent scowl back to Kristal. “So what’s going on with you? Spit it out.”
“Rodge doesn’t like when his guests are upset,” Maeve explains. She seems determined to give the man’s cranky and demanding tone a saintly overlay.
“I’m not…” Kristal breaks off with a chagrinned grimace.
And I have a sudden recollection of her responding with the same pained look when I asked her why she couldn’t touch the real world on our first unexpected date.
“Oh, you know…because I’m an elf, and I only get to live in this dimension for twelve days a year.”
This time she carefully answers, “I’ve done something I shouldn’t have. And now, I’m trying to figure out how to live with the consequences.”
I stare at Kristal, wanting to ask and afraid to ask at the same time. I recall her words from yesterday…
“You don’t want me to care. You’re upset that I came to find you. That’s not how an escort is supposed to act.”
At the time, I had assumed she was genuinely upset about being perceived as someone who wasn’t doing her job well. But her carefully worded answer makes me wonder. These feelings I’m fighting…is she fighting them, too?
“Well, that’s vague,” Rodge grouses. “Could you be more specific, young lady?”
“Ma, if it’s coming down like Rodge is saying, we should get going,” Declan says before Kristal can answer.
Kristal appears visibly relieved, as she all but shouts, “Us too! We should get going, too! Don’t want to miss out on getting the chance to talk to Siobhan.”
Proving we’ve moved far beyond our usual professional relationship, Declan actually sends me an aggravated look when Kristal says this. Most likely because I had assured him in private yesterday that the offer was only to get his mother on board with a doctor’s visit and that we most definitely would not be showing up at his ex-girlfriend’s front door to recite a Gaelic love poem.
“Why would you have told him that when we promised his mom we’d do this for her?” Kristal asks thirty minutes later when we turn down the street where Siobhan lives.
We’re walking on the actual street since the sidewalks are covered in nearly knee-high embankments of snow. Frozen flakes continue to flutter down from overhead as we follow the cleared path toward this Siobhan’s house. Kristal is dressed perfectly for this unexpected morning trek in a red parka, green fleece leggings and the snow boots she somehow knew to wear to the airport.
I, however, am dressed the opposite of her perfect. My wingtips, scarf, and navy overcoat are fine for Tokyo, where it rarely snows more than ten days a year, and even then, fairly lightly. But here, my well-tailored clothes only offer me the thinnest layer of protection against the biting cold. No doubt my designer wingtips will be ruined by the time this silly and unexpected side trip is done.
Perhaps that’s why I don’t bother to disguise my irritation when I answer Kristal. “I didn’t promise. I said, ‘we could.’ There’s a difference. And, one of these options doesn’t necessitate a kilometer-long walk in the bitter cold.”
She glances sideways at me. “Do you do that a lot? Make offers you have no intention of fulfilling?”
A chill runs through me that has nothing to do with the cold. I have a feeling we are no longer talking about Declan and his mother. “If I’m dealing with unreasonable people like Maeve, then yes, I tend to do whatever it takes to achieve the objective. And I think we’d all agree that the most important objective here is to get Declan’s mother the medical help she needs.”
She turns to look up at me with sharp eyes. And I brace, mentally preparing for her to ask me the next obvious question: was my offer to meet this Jae-Hyun person as fake as my offer to talk to Declan’s ex-girlfriend?
But her next query has nothing to do with the old Korean man she wants me to meet. “Wait…you believe me? About Declan’s mother being sick?”
I shake my head. “Of course, I believe you. I provided my private jet, didn’t I?”
“No, it’s not ‘of course.’ It’s never ‘of course’—at least not for me.” She grabs onto my arm and stops us from walking. “And if you believe me about Declan’s mother, does that mean you believe the rest of it? About me being an elf who draws soon-to-be-dead people?”
My stomach constricts. I think about lying. It would be easier for both of us if I pretended that this relationship was exactly what I wanted it to be. Kristal making crazy assertions about her history and me indulging them, purely for the benefit of escort sex. It would be even easier if that was true.
But Kristal is staring up at me, her eyes wide and brimming with hope. Women never look at me like that. Most simper and smile coyly, trying to attract me with a childish version of flirting stolen straight from the J-Drama heroines they grew up watching. The wiser ones approach me boldly, matching my cool tone as if a relationship is a point of business to be negotiated.
Kristal, however, looks at me like I’m a man, not a goal. A normal man who she very much wants to believe her.
I am not a normal man, yet I find myself answering her questions…with one stiff nod of my head.
It is a mere nod, but Kristal lets out an audible cry and places a hand over her heart as if I’ve shouted a declaration from the rooftops.
“Kristal-san…” I start to say, only to trail off, not knowing how to finish this sentence. There is so much I want to tell her. But shouldn’t. In the end, I insist to both her and myself, “It is as the American say in a text. NBD—no big deal.”
Proving just how far away she is from achieving true escort status, she once again contradicts me. “But it is a big deal—a huge deal. No other guy I’ve dated has ever believed me. That’s why none of my relationships have even lasted this long. And, I figured the private jet was because of the…”
She turns her head away from me, and I have a feeling her face would be red if not for her dark skin. “…other deal,” she finishes.
“It was mostly for that,” I answer, glad to be on the slightly safer subject ground. “But also for Declan. He’s a good employee who has served me well over the years.”