13
Damon
A drink after a long day was too tempting an invite to turn down.
Actually, I’d been the one to make the invite, calling Felicia up to see if we could meet at a relaxed bar somewhere, but I still went by the principle that it was too tempting to turn down. I supposed Felicia would have come up with the idea if she’d thought of it first, knowing that, like me, she too had a busy day in a new role, but I’d decided to be helpful in calling her up in case the idea slipped her mind.
I may have been the one who was astute enough to recognize that a drink at the end of the day was just what we needed, but it was Felicia who started before me, and when I arrived at the bar, I found her already fairly merry on beer.
“You know the way,” she said, sliding off her barstool to give me a friendly embrace, “that when you’re tired alcohol just goes to your head so much quicker?”
“So you’re telling me you’ve only had one of those?” I asked, knowing the estimate to be quite wide of the mark.
She grinned. “I swear, I’ve only had two. I’ve been sitting here for ages waiting, that’s why.”
“Sorry. Traffic. Thought I’d be here sooner.”
“It’s okay….you just need to catch up with me! I’m already two drinks ahead.”
I chuckled. “Just the one drink for me, I think. Your first day in a new position might have gone well, but let’s not have you start the second one with a hangover.”
“I still can’t believe I got the job!”
“Nice of them to give you some warning.”
“That’s the thing about that kind of job, everything happens all of a sudden. More importantly however,” she continued, clearly wanting to get right to the point rather than talking any more about work, “spill the beans about this dream girl of yours. Come on, Agony Aunt Felicia is good and ready.”
“She called it off,” I replied with a shrug, having previously hinted over the phone that all wasn’t well.
“Seriously?” Felicia replied, sounding even more disappointed about it than I did. “But…how?”
“How what?”
“How did she do it? Give me some context, what went wrong?”
“Nothing went wrong. I just think her life is complicated.”
“But how did she tell you?”
“Just a simple text, that’s all.”
“What! You haven’t even spoken to her?”
“No…”
“Call her and speak to her! People who choose easy routes are liable to change their minds.”
“Is that a famous saying?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Either it is or I made it up just now…but whatever, just call her! She should at least give you an explanation.”
“Calm down, Felicia,” I replied, trying to cut her off before a full-on drunken rant was underway. “I’ve got more news. Things are a bit…complicated.”
“How’s that?”
“I have a new job.”
“A new contract, you mean?” she said, her face turning somber. I never gave her details about what I did, but she had a fair idea—she wasn’t an idiot, after all.
“I mean a contract of a different nature.”
She wrinkled her forehead in confusion. “What sort of nature?”
“Not one I’m going to go into.”
She rolled her eyes. “Of course.”
“But it’s important. So important, in fact, that if it goes well, it could be my way out of the mob. For good.”
Felicia almost choked on her beer before slamming it back down on the bar.
“Are you kidding me? Damon, that’s amazing!”
All she’d ever wanted for me was to go straight and leave the seedy underworld of society, so I knew this was probably some of the best news I could’ve given her.
“Exactly why I need to stay focused,” I replied. “I can’t get too obsessed with this girl, for a few very good reasons.”
“Well, I’m going to be so happy if it’s true. Why is it they have you doing something different?”
“It’s an undercover job and they need someone discreet.”
Her face turned deeply serious again. “Is it dangerous?”
“No more so than usual. It’s at a security service. I went to my first briefing this morning.”
I proceeded to gloss over a few of the details concerning my new assignment, without going into too much depth so as to burden her with risky information—or to bother her alcohol-induced brain with anything too complex.
The morning had seen me taken over to the house of Caruso’s friend Maurizio, who was one of the mob’s guys on the inside. I’d known him for a while, and I’d built up a strong relationship with him based on trust and respect—although I always wondered how he would respond if the order came from up high to get rid of me. For the time being, however, we would continue to work together, something that I was pleased about seeing as I considered Maurizio to be among the more broadminded of the organization. Even the sharp ones could be very insular, but Maurizio managed to come across as a normal person and so dealing with him had always been quite refreshing.
Proving to be every bit as slick on this new endeavor, he’d had several suits tailored and ready in order for me to be made up as a Secret Service agent, as well as all of the necessary details concerning my security clearance and fake identity.
“We had very little trouble getting you in,” Maurizio had said at the time. “So many more politicians are taking security seriously, as long as they’re still scared of all the terrorism. There’s a shortage of men and all your “colleagues” are there just to chalk up an easy wage. They won’t give you any trouble as long as you look the part. Just act like a humorless prick and you’ll fit in just fine.”
Maurizio told me that my cover name was Max, then proceeded to help me memorize a bit of fake life history; that I’d been a NYU graduate with an economics degree who was working with the FBI in order to serve my country, but decided on a career change with the Secret Service.
There was a second undercover agent joining me, because the mob thought having a good-looking woman involved would be an easier way of getting the trust of everyone else (or distracting them depending on how you looked at it). I only had to exchange one glance and handshake with her—an older agent by the name of Jacqueline—to tell that she was someone who was ultra-confident in getting men to do exactly what she wanted…a man-eater who would have you groveling on the floor for her own amusement in no time if you weren’t careful. She hadn’t wasted any time on small talk before giving me some come-to-bed eyes, and she was clearly delighted the two of us would be working together. A week or so ago, I would’ve jumped on the opportunity and fucked her brains out.
But now?
Now I had no interest, because Bea was still on my mind.
“Oh, no!” Felicia said, once my story had got round to including Jacqueline. “Don’t tell me you’re going to forget about the girl of your dreams all because there’s some blonde bimbo who probably spends more time out of her panties than in them.”
“Calm down,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I haven’t touched her, and I’m not going to.”
“Try telling yourself to calm down next time she’s fluttering her eyelashes at you – that’s going to be the problem, Damon!”
“Oh, shush. I’m going to leave blondie alone. I haven’t given up on Bea yet. I was left hanging for sure but, just maybe…fate will find a way of bringing us back together. In fact, I know for certain I’m going to see her again soon.”
Felicia’s eyes suddenly widened slightly. “She’s called Bea?”
“Yes, Beatrice. Why?” I replied, expecting her to start prying over what I’d planned to ensure that we met up again.
She hesitated, then smiled. “No reason,” she said. “Just nice to put a name to an imaginary face. Anyway, it’s about time I go. There’s a pillow up the road with my name on it.”
The two of us left the bar, and the name of my mystery woman wasn’t raised again. Once I’d walked Felicia home, I thought about heading back to my car, but I decided that a longer walk was needed. I had a lot of shit on my mind. Lighting a cigarette, I had no choice for now but to accept a feeble substitute for the lips I longed to kiss again, and I didn’t care how bad it was for me. Health concerns were of no concern at this moment in time, not with the things looming over the horizon ahead.
Very soon I’d be in the position of introducing myself to Bea again, as the Secret Service agent Max Foster. I couldn’t explain why the thought made me feel so…alive. We’d only been on one date, and already this obsession was something I’d never experienced before.
What the hell was it about this girl?