Page 83 of Pay the Piper

Conor pours himself a generous tumbler of liquor, lights a cigar, and sits in his desk chair, staring at me through squinted eyes, as if to see through my motivation for returning without a fight. Finally, when he’s drained one glass and poured another, he breaks the tense silence.

“It’s been wonderful not having you around, Niamh.”

The emphasis as he spits my name in his venomous, hateful voice makes me flinch, and he laughs. Silence is my friend, though, so I don’t respond. There’s nothing I could say that would have any effect except making my life far, far worse. And it’s already a low bar.

“Are you already so unaccustomed to the name I gave you? Well, I suppose technically your parents gave it to you, but I really made Niamh Fitzpatrick, didn’t I?”

Quiet.

“Everyone here thinks you’ve been in rehab, did I tell you? We leaked a little of this here, a little of that there, until you were the city’s fallen heiress. Too much coke and booze, and anorexic to boot. My patience and understanding, plus the fact that you’ve been treated in the best rehab facility in the world, have actually made my polling go up quite a bit if you can believe it.”

He transforms in a blink from the sleazy, lecherous demon who just sent a woman to a fate worse than death into the perfect society husband and mayor. His smile, charm, and caring gaze are enough to fool the public, my family, investors, voters, me…

It’s more terrifying to see him like this than when he’s showing his true colors. The mask is so persuasive it makes me nauseous, as if I’m trapped in a room with something I know is evil but can’t quite put my finger on why.

“Why did you have to make things harder on yourself, again?” he asks, slowly rounding the desk to lean against it in front of me. It’s impossible not to react to his proximity, and I can’t help the tremble that he immediately notices in my hands.

Quiet.

“You had a very simple task. The oldest task in the world for a woman like you. Open your legs, get some information. But you’re so incompetent that you couldn’t even accomplish that.”

Quiet.

“Instead, you manage to become the seducee, ‘falling in love’ and allowing a goddamn Bratva nobody to fuck you and convince you that you meant something to him!”

His air quotes describing my love for Misha threaten to ruin my resolve, and my trembling continues not only from fear but from anger.

“And you provided me with absolutely no information. Thank God we sent someone else capable of doing their fucking job.”

He finally moves away, and I sink a little more into my chair.

“Your posture has always been terrible,” he chides, pulling a thick leather binder from his desk drawer that I recognize immediately. It’s his twisted version of our wedding album, beginning with perfectly normal photos of us on dates and enjoying dinner with my parents and continuing through blackmail material of me being used.

“Why do you keep that?”

My quiet voice surprises us both, and I brace for impact, but he only laughs.

“I keep it because it’s hilarious. I keep it because it shows your progression from thinking you were special to learning your place in the world as holes for me to use as I see fit. And I keep it because I looked really fucking good in my suit on our wedding day.”

He flips through a few pages, cigar forgotten in its ashtray, and laughs intermittently before turning it to show me a picture of us with my parents, just before he had them cut out of my life permanently.

“Do you remember this day? Your pa was still so mad at me for marrying you, and your ma thought I could do no wrong.”

“Why?” I croak, unable to stay quiet as tears begin to streak down my cheeks. “Why were you so intent on marrying me of all people? If you hated me and wanted to tear me away from my family so badly, couldn’t you have found someone easier?”

“Ah, Niamh. Finally asking the real questions, aren’t you? Maybe you did learn something in Thunder Bay after all.”

Leaning forward, he places a capsule, no bigger than a multivitamin, on the edge of his desk nearest me.

“Keep an eye on that. You might want it later.”

As he rustles through his desk drawer, I eye his offering warily. The lime-green capsule doesn’t look fit for human consumption. Finally, he slides a laminated piece of paper across the desk.

It’s impossible to stop the bile from rising in my throat, and I barely choke it down as Conor laughs.

“You’re a monster. They told me…but it was hard to believe, even after everything—”

“Hard to believe I lead the most fearsome Mafia outfit in Canada? I’m almost offended, Niamh.”