No, but I had a good idea. A statue of Dionysus riding a tiger consumed the expanse of the foyer at the Winthrop Estate. Virginia used to pet the tiger each time she passed it. Right along the jugular vein.
“Because Dionysus rides the tiger.” I hitched a shoulder. The outstretched Tupperware stilted the awkward movement.
“No.” Nash pushed the container until it shotgunned to my chest, still squeezed between my palms. “Because the tiger cannot be tamed. The tiger rules the jungle, and only a god can worship the tiger properly. Your mother is an uncultured idiot, who mistook a tiger for a panther.” His scathing laughter tasted like candy against my lips as he leaned close. “Dionysus doesn’t ride a tiger. He rides a panther. The tiger is his sacred animal.”
And gods worshipped sacred animals.
It’s why I’d chosen Durga as my username.
A goddess known as The Inaccessible.
The Invincible.
Her sacred animal is the tiger, and I wanted to feel sacred.
“What are you saying?” I asked, hoping Nash would give me an answer that would make me hate him more. I clung to the container, the only thing separating us.
His breath fanned my cheeks.
Actually, it also sounds fucking cute.
“I’m saying eat the cookies, Tiger.”
Saudade.
Sciamachy.
Thanatophobia.
Useless words.
Nothing could tamp my frustration.
“We need a centerpiece!” I waved a picture on my phone of a giant abstract monstrosity we had no budget for.
This had become my hill to die on.
Destined to perish from a wound in the shape of Chantilly’s indifference, and my tombstone had better be a damned centerpiece.
Ida Marie flicked her eyes between the two of us, lips pressed together. She swallowed her saliva every ten seconds.
She agreed with me. So did Cayden and Hannah… but they also agreed with Chantilly’s point—we didn’t have room in the budget.
“We’re done talking about this.” Chantilly shut the meeting books and shoved them inside Cayden’s desk.
I shot up from the couch. “It has to happen,” I said, wondering why I even bothered. We’d all die eventually, and none of this would matter.
You are dust. Small and solid, but destined to vanish.
“We don’t have it in the budget!” Chantilly tossed both hands in the air. “And even if we did, it’s not happening. It’s all useless. Mr. Prescott doesn’t care about this location. You’re supposedly chummy with him,” she spit the words out like she wasn’t sure whether to be confused or disgusted. “Can’t you see that?”
Would speaking slower help this seep into Chantilly’s skull?
I wondered whose side Nash would take if he were here. Chantilly’s, most likely. His priorities laid with the Singapore location. Even now, he’d left for the penthouse to go over offers with Delilah.
“He may not care, but I do.” I jabbed my chest with my pointer finger. It hurt, but so did everything.
“Why?”
She could send me to Guantanamo Bay, and I still wouldn’t tell her. Not when it meant revealing just how much I knew Nash and the Prescotts.
“Because,” I began, forming my lies as I spoke, “this location is my first job, will go on all of our design portfolios, and should matter regardless because it’s our damn jobs to care. Why am I the only one who cares?”
Security interrupted our argument with Chipotle catering trays. My eyes swung to the door, but I already knew Nash wouldn’t be there. I didn’t feel him in the room. No heavy air. No heat around my body. Nothing.
The giant servings of chicken, steak, and barbacoa consumed most of the tablecloth Chantilly laid out, so Cayden opened another one next to it. I helped the guards fan out the containers of tortillas, cheese, rice, beans, guac, and salsa, but I didn’t dare grab a plate.
It looked good.
It smelled better.
I hadn’t eaten all day, and if we continued through the night, the soup kitchen would be closed by the time I clocked out.
Logic told me to eat.
My body told me to eat.
Even Ida Marie turned to me and told me to eat.
My heart refused to.
That same dumb organ jostled inside my ribcage as soon as the elevator pinged in the hall. This is why ribs form a cage around the heart. It’s an untamed animal, and wild animals can’t be trusted.
If my coworkers thought I had a serious eating disorder, none of them bothered to suggest I seek help. They dug into the food, piling glutinous layers onto their paper plates. I envied the hell out of them.
Grateful I hadn’t succumbed to the temptation, I pulled out the sketchpad and continued with my shading, knowing this one-hundred percent would end up at the bottom of the trashcan.
“Are you sure this is from Nash?” Ida Marie frowned at the food, eyeing the beans like they might be poisoned. “It doesn’t seem like something he would do for anyone, except maybe…”
Her voice trailed off, but we all knew what she meant to say.
Anyone except Emery.
The divide deepened. I stood stranded on one side of a canyon while Cayden, Hannah, Ida Marie, and Chantilly stood on the other. Except Chantilly refused to see it like it was. She’d sprint over to my side on a tightrope if she could.
Her nose scrunched as she shook her head.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Ida Marie. It’s definitely for us. I’ve been working late. Putting in so many extra hours.” She loaded extra meat onto her tortilla, and I. Was. So. Jealous. “I deserve it—and the fridge. Totally. Plus, I think he really likes me. I caught him staring at me this morning.”
“I can assure you, I do not like you. You remind me of a dog begging strangers to pet her, and as far as kinks go, bestiality isn’t mine.” Nash rested a hip against the door frame, staring me down without paying a lick of attention to Chantilly. “I was staring at Emery. You kept getting in the way.”
My heart hiccupped before chasing its normal pace. Cue the awkward silence as everyone and their mothers misconstrued Nash’s words. The stare-down had lasted five minutes over the extra white chocolate macadamia nut cookies he’d slipped into my Jana Sport when I wasn’t paying attention.
One—he was right. I loved them. Everyone who knew me knew I loved them. Not exactly a national secret.
Two—I couldn’t hand them back without drawing attention to Nash’s fixation on feeding me. They still sat at the bottom of my Jana Sport, taunting me each time I pulled out a different charcoal pencil to sketch with.
Three—I hoped he never found out that I’d eaten the ones in the Tupperware container he gave me days ago.
Ida Marie’s cheeks turned pink for me. She tapped my shoulder and held a paper plate in her outstretched hand. “Are you sure you’re not hungry?” Her wide eyes avoided Nash. “There’s so much food here. One of us will end up taking a feast home.”
Nash had approved our 3D rendering with minor changes, which meant flooring, cabinets, and finishes were already installed with furnishings ordered and arranged soon after. It also meant I would be here even later today. The soup kitchen might end up closing before I left.
Stop letting your pride eat at your sanity, Emery. Nash is right. It’s okay to accept help. It doesn’t make you any less of a person. Maggie lets you make coats for her and the kids. You allowed Reed to hook you up with a job. Getting food from the soup kitchen never deterred you. It’s starting to sound like you only have trouble accepting help from Nash.