Chapter Seventeen - Evangeline
Stunned silence is my reaction to what he just wrote. In fact, I have to read it several times over to make sure I’m getting this right.
But I am, in fact, getting this right.
He’s an asshole.
No. He’s a psychopath.
I look up at the nearest camera and shake my head. “Total exposure,” I whisper. “Well, you’re not getting that. I’m getting exactly what I need from you and there’s no way in hell I’m gonna tell you anything. I don’t even know you. And what kind of name is X anyway?” I huff out some air. “X.” I toss the notebook on the counter. It goes sliding across the smooth stone surface, stopping just short of falling off the edge.
I turn away, walk into another hallway and follow it to the ballroom. There’s a nice view of the tree with the swing. I sit on the couch facing the window and imagine him in here, watching me out there.
“Are you sure that’s how you want this to go?”
The voice is gruff and crackly, coming through an intercom positioned on the wall that looks like it’s decades old. Masculine behind the static. Hard-edged and deep underneath the distortion.
“Not knowing might kill you,” the voice continues. At least that’s what I think he said. One or two words are half missing from the bad connection.
“I don’t think so,” I say back to the empty room. “I think… I think I’m gonna walk out of here today and go home. Because I’m pretty sure my doctor never authorized this sick game you’re playing.”
“How sure are you?”
“One hundred percent,” I say.
She didn’t, right? I ask myself. Lucinda didn’t set me up with this… this fucking psychopath. Did she?
“You can call her and find out,” he offers.
“I broke my phone. As you well know because I asked you to get me another one.”
“There’s shops a few blocks down. Go out and get one yourself.” The crackle in the speaker makes his words skip. So what I hear is, “Go… and… yourself.”
But I get his meaning. His threat. Because that’s what that was. “Maybe I will. Maybe I’ll just walk out, get a phone, and never bother her or you again?”
“Maybe you’ll die alone.”
“Fuck you,” I say. “You don’t even know me.”
“Not yet.”
“Not ever. I don’t know who this Jordan guy is, but I do know neither of you are getting anything from me other than the peephole you’re being paid to look through.”
He grunts a laugh. Which is very clear. And I have to admit—reluctantly—that I like his laugh.
“That peek doesn’t include talking,” I add. “You’re not supposed to talk to me. Not supposed to contact me in any way. You’re supposed to shut up and watch. So why don’t you go back to doing that and let me worry about my future.”
“You talked first, Evangeline.”
A shiver runs up my spine when he says my name. Even if it is missing the first syllable because of the intercom.
“You wanted to play earlier. When you were naked in the room. You did that for me and only me. To give me pleasure. Were you masturbating? Or just pretending?”
My face flushes hot with embarrassment. But I rally. “What do you think?”
“Coward,” he sneers. “I think you’re afraid of everything. I think—”
“Well, I think you’re an asshole.”
“So leave.”
“No.”
“Then do what you’re told.”
“I’ll do what I want.”
“Why are you here?”
“That’s the question you want answered so badly, is it? Why am I here? Because I’m tired, that’s why.”
“Of what?”
“Waiting.”
He pauses for a second, thinking that through, then says, “Was it worth it?”
“Was what worth it?”
“The thrill you got upstairs. That’s the real reason you’re here. So I hope that little tingle was worth it, because if you don’t play with me that’s all you’ll get. Probably for a long time, because you’ll run back to wherever it is you keep yourself and spend the rest of your life in hiding.”
“What is your problem? You’re mad because I was masturbating and you had to watch? Then I stopped and let me guess, you didn’t get off? Poor baby. Not my fault you took this stupid job.”
He’s silent for a little bit. Long enough for me to wonder if he misjudged me. If Lucinda told him to play with me like this, then my temper wouldn’t surprise him. She’s seen it enough over the past year to know that’s just part of me now. Like the color of my eyes.
“Why are you really here?” he finally asks again.
I huff out a half laugh. “Why are you here?”
“You tell me, I’ll tell you.”
Now it’s my turn to think. Maybe I should play? For a little bit, at least. Maybe I can get some answers out of him? A better picture of what he looks like. I’m not leaving, not tonight, anyway. So it would be nice to picture him as he watches. “How old are you?”
“Why?” This time his response is almost a laugh, and even though it’s combined with the static, it almost sounds real.
Yes. I like his laugh. “Because you want to picture me?” he asks. The intercom cooperates a little more now. Like he adjusted it. There’s still static, and his voice is still very much distorted, but I hear most of his words instead of disjointed pauses.
“Yes. You can see me but I can’t see you.”
“I’m here to watch you. You’re here to be watched.”
“Is that your turn-on?” I ask.
Another laugh. “In a way. But not the way you think.”
“Then how?”
“Write me your story,” he says. “And if it’s a good one I’ll give you one back. How’s that sound?”
“Just play your game?” I ask. “Lucinda did not sanction this. I could make you stop, ya know.”
“Then do that. If you want to be a quitter. You’re good at quitting, right? I expected as much. Believe me, I didn’t get my hopes up over you.”
Well, that’s a curious way to respond. Asshole. Psychopath. I think through my options as he remains silent, then say, “I’ll write a story for you.”
“Not just any story, I want to know why you’re here.”
“And if I give you that, then you give me what I want.”
“What’s that, then? What do you want?” I don’t know if it’s the fucking intercom or what, but his tone has gone dark, his voice deep. Maybe that’s called seductive? Maybe it’s called sinister? I’m not sure I can tell the difference.
I hesitate, thinking about how to put this without coming off as desperate.
“Evangeline?” he asks. “What do you want in return?”
“I want to go home,” I whisper. “Walk out of here feeling safe, and free, and not have to think about”—I swallow hard—“gloves, or hoods, or sunglasses. That’s what I want.”
“It’s not a very big ask,” he says, that darkness I heard just a moment ago gone now. “You just have to do the work, that’s all.”
“Yeah,” I say. “But that doesn’t include telling you my personal story. It’s mine, OK? I have very little left of my old life. That story is pretty much it.”
“I offered myself up in return,” he says. And even though the intercom is skipping words again, making him sound like unreal and artificial, it’s the way he says it that has me intrigued. “Don’t you want to know what happened next?”
“Happened when?”
“After Jordan and I grew up. Do you think there’s no story there? I mean”—he laughs—“come on. I’m here, watching you. Cameras all over this fucking house on Jordan’s orders. There’s a very fucked-up story behind all that. Aren’t you a little bit curious, Evangeline? How filming women like you became our job?”
“Yes.” I say it automatically, heat pooling between my legs. What did they do? And what are they doing with me now?
“Want to know who we watched?” he asks.
“Yes,” I whisper.
“What they did for us on camera? Do you like to picture that, Evangeline? Do you like to watch people?” The intercom is nearly all static. So much that I can barely make out his words.
“Better than the alternative,” I say softly, my focus on the empty swing out in the yard.
“OK,” he says. “Get the notebook, write your story, then leave it on the counter and go outside so I can read it. If you satisfy me, I’ll satisfy you.”
That last part comes out crystal-clear. Like it’s the only part of this conversation that matters.
“Why can’t I see you?”
“Because I make the rules.”
The crackling of the intercom speaker cuts off, the conversation over.
Dear Stranger. That’s how I begin my entry in the notebook.
I am here because…
God. I really don’t feel like telling personal things to someone I don’t know. Hell, I hate telling people I know things too. Not that I know a lot of people.
You’re procrastinating, Evangeline.
Yes, I am.
I am here because…
I let out a long breath and write…
I am here because I gave up a while back and… and I don’t want to give up anymore. This fear, which, as you so callously pointed out, will cause me to die alone, started back when I was about ten years old. My public debut started at the age of four. I was one of those special children. Prodigy. Gifted. Old soul. Call it whatever you want, that was me back then. I don’t play the violin. I am the violin. It’s part of me, like an arm or a hand.
But everything has a price. My gift is no exception. I was watched constantly. Not the way one usually watches a child. It’s different. And most people don’t understand it. But I don’t care. This fear I have comes from all the attention I was subjected to when I was young. It got to a point…
I stop and take a deep breath. I’m back in the ballroom, sitting on the couch facing the window, staring out at that stupid empty swing.
It got to a point where I couldn’t have people around me. It started with my staff. Managers and agents and lawyers. I refused to see them. I imagined all the things they thought about me in my head and… and I didn’t like it. Eventually, it spread to everyone, including my parents, and then one night I was in the studio recording a Christmas CD so my parents could afford to pay some of the monumental bills they racked up in my name, and I said, “I can’t do it anymore.”
I put my violin away and walked out in the middle of a song. They never did release that CD. The production company took my parents to court and they had to pay back the advance. Well, I had to pay it back. They were penniless and I was emancipated by the time that was settled.
And that was it. I never performed again.
But your question was, why am I here? Assuming you know that I’ve booked a comeback performance and that date is fast approaching, there’s another reason. I’m out of money. I need to make some fast if I want to maintain my lifestyle. And since playing the violin is the only skill I have, that’s my only option.
And now you owe me. So make sure your story is a good one, Mr. Stranger. Because if it’s not, I’ll be the one walking out on you.