The Kiss Plot by Nicole French

Twenty-Six

We got ready silently, the air filled with an eerie heaviness, like we were getting ready to go to battle. We showered together, scrubbing each other’s bodies nearly raw. Eric washed my hair, his skilled fingers weaving through my locks and massaging my scalp. He remained completely still while I helped him shave, his gray eyes glinting like steel the entire time.

When he made love to me again as the water cascaded down our bodies, it was with slow, deliberate movements akin to putting on armor. His teeth and fingers dug into my skin, memorizing the lines of my body with a new concentration I’d never really seen. When he found his release, it was with a furious shout that echoed off the tiled walls. It was almost like losing control that way allowed him to rebuild himself that much stronger.

We dressed silently for the cold. Him in a pair of tailored wool pants, sleek black boots, and a blue sweater that cast the same hue through his gray eyes; me in black jeans, knee-high black boots, and a chunky turtleneck with military-style buttons up one side. Eric worked product into his hair until it shone while he watched me apply makeup—a smoky eye and, of course, the bright red lipstick that was probably too garish for the holiday, but made sense tonight. After all, if anyone wanted to fuck with Eric, I was out for blood.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you wear that since law school,” he said as I took a moment to put in my nose stud.

I examined the tiny diamond in the mirror. “It was the first piercing I ever got. Did you know that?”

Eric shook his head as he continued messing with his hair.

“I was fifteen. And my mother still hadn’t let me do anything I wanted with my face, my hair, anything. I hadn’t even been allowed to pierce my ears yet.”

He examined me with amusement. “It’s hard to imagine you without all of that.”

I nodded in agreement. “I know. I remember when I was finally allowed to wear makeup, I felt like I found my real face.”

“You know I like the one underneath, don’t you?”

I cast him an obvious look. “Well, yeah. I like it too. I just mean…the ability to change things. That was my face.”

Eric smiled, and my stomach warmed. “I get it. You’re a chameleon.”

“I guess. Anyway, when I was in high school, I managed to pay off some seedy shop downtown with an extra fifty. I borrowed my friend’s ID—these guys couldn’t tell the difference between two Asian girls anyway—and got my nose pierced. When I showed up that night, Yu Na flipped. Like, grounded me for a month, no friends, no concerts, no nothing. But you know what? She told me when I graduated high school that she liked it.”

“I always liked it too.”

I shrugged. “She’s always been funny like that. She holds on to things. And then she’ll surprise you.”

Eric left to find his coat, and I examined myself sadly in the mirror.

There was a pang in my chest when I thought of my mother. More than ever, I wanted to talk to her. Let her know I was okay. That, despite all of our differences, I loved her so much.

My eyes started to water again, and I sniffed back the tears furiously. I wasn’t ruining my makeup right now. I could cry over Yu Na when this was over.

“Here.” Eric handed me the burner phone. He looked at me knowingly. “Call her. Wish her a merry Christmas.”

I took the phone. “Did you call yours?”

“No.” He pressed a sweet kiss to my forehead. “But I will. Call your mother, Jane. It doesn’t matter now. They’ve found us anyway.”

So, I did. But unfortunately, she wasn’t home. The call to her cell phone went to voicemail too, and after I left an awkward message wishing her a merry Christmas and asking to talk when she got home, I handed the phone back to Eric.

“She’s probably at Ji-Yeon’s for the holiday,” I said. “I don’t have that number memorized. I’ll try again when we get back.”

He took the phone and sat on the bed to wait while I finished braiding my hair into a severe fishtail and put on a pair of black cat-eyed frames.

“Jane.”

I turned, and Eric beckoned to me. He held out the necklace I had given him for Christmas. “Help me put it on.”

I crawled around him and clasped the chain, then lingered with my fingers dipping just below the starched blue collar of his shirt, feeling the line of his collarbone and the curve where his pectoral muscles lifted. Eric’s hand covered mine, and I pressed my nose into his neck. He had watched me clip my rings around my neck again, though he hadn’t put on his own. I didn’t want to press it, ask what the hell we were doing. I figured after tonight, maybe we could talk about what had to happen within about a week. Or not.

“I love you,” he said again.

I inhaled his scent—the musky hotel soap combined with the clean vibrance that only belonged to him.

“I know,” I replied with closed eyes.

His phone buzzed on the nightstand. Keeping one hand over mine at his collarbone, Eric swiped open his messages, then quickly stowed the phone.

“That was Tony,” he said. “It’s time.”

My stomach was in knots as we rode the elevator down, my palms sweaty in the pockets of my coat. I was so tense that I nearly jumped when we walked out to the street and were met by three large men in black coats. Their thick boots left deep prints in the thin layer of snow on the pavement.

“Mr. de Vries,” Tony, Eric’s bodyguard from New York, greeted us with a nod, then gestured to the two men standing behind him. “Mrs. de Vries.”

Eric and I both stiffened, but neither of us corrected the name. Instead, he squeezed my hand tightly in his and nodded to Tony.

“This is Devon and James, colleagues of mine from London,” Tony said. “Best I could find after you called, sir.”

I looked curiously at Eric. “When did you…”

“When you were asleep last night,” Eric replied. “He already knew we were going to be here. I’m not interested in being dragged to another fucking dungeon anytime soon. And it’s like you and Nina said—Carson’s not the only one with resources. It’s time I trust some of mine.”

Tony nodded in agreement. “Devon is former MI-6, and James served with the Queen’s Guard. I trust them both with my life, sir. And, as you know, the Brits are no friends of Chariot.”

Eric shook the new men’s hands, and they both tipped imaginary hats at me.

I smiled again at Tony. I quite liked the fact that Eric had decided to trust his grandmother after all by keeping him in his service. Celeste would have enjoyed the fact that he had rehired her original picks.

“We scouted out the location,” Tony was saying. “Devon watched the square all day. No one’s been there. There’s no sign of John Carson in Lucerne at all, although it’s possible he arrived before we did.”

Eric took a deep breath, then sighed. “He’s here. He wouldn’t pass this up.” He turned to me. “Ready, pretty girl?”

For what? I wanted to ask. But instead, I just nodded. “Let’s tell El Chapo where he can shove it and go home.”

One side of Eric’s mouth quirked, and he delivered another lightning-quick kiss. “Let’s do it,” he agreed.

We headed out into the snow.

* * *

If Lucerne had feltquiet when we arrived this afternoon, now it was basically a cemetery. Though several churches were likely still open, nearly every one we passed had their heavy doors shut against the cold, their Masses held only in the morning. Most people were clearly home with their families to celebrate Christmas.

Led by Tony in front while the other two guards trailed us, Eric and I walked through the heart of the city, across the smaller of the two medieval foot bridges that crossed the river feeding into the lake. The interior of the covered bridge was striped by shadows and Christmas decorations, with garland and twinkling lights lining its interior everywhere. Below us, the famous swans of Lucerne floated in the water, heads tucked under their wings, seeking shelter from the snowfall.

Across the water, we climbed into the city, past the deserted shops and apartment buildings that were all uncharacteristically dark. Eric was silent, and so were the guards.

And then we reached the plaza. Tony, Devon, and James hung back in the perimeter shadows while Eric and I wandered to the center. Hirschenplatz was a small stone square surrounded by eighteenth- and nineteenth-century apartment buildings, several of them painted with charming old murals. Across one, deer dancing up and down the stucco sides (hence the name “hirschen”—German for “deer”). Snow stuck to the stone benches and the bricked ground; the city was swathed in a blanket of silence.

Eric looked around. The square was empty.

I checked my watch. “It’s five-oh-five. We’re right on time.”

“Actually, you’re late. I’ve been freezing my balls off for the last fifteen minutes waiting for you and your little pixie, Triton.”

We swung around, finding a tall man who looked vaguely familiar to me stepping out of one of the far shadows. I didn’t know his name, but he’d flanked Carson in the church when he’d interrupted our wedding. He’d watched Eric succumb to that strange call with something that, even in my desperate confusion, I understood as glee.

“You.” The word, so innocuous, slipped out of Eric’s mouth with pure vitriol. His generally unruffled demeanor had disappeared, instead replaced by such ugly, naked aggression that I almost didn’t recognize him.

“Triton, Triton. You didn’t really expect the Caesar to fly all the way to this backwoods town just to talk, did you?”

Eric and I both frowned. Lucerne wasn’t exactly a hut in the middle of nowhere.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Jude?” Eric snapped. “Where’s Carson?”

The man named Jude clicked his tongue. Yeah, that made me want to punch him in the face too.

“Language, Triton, language. Coarse words don’t become a man of your station. A soon-to-be chairman, isn’t that right? A little bird tells me the board will be voting next week. If, of course, you’re brave enough to show your face.”

Just like that, Eric’s stony mask resumed its place. And for once, I was glad to see its arrival. I didn’t want to give this bastard one iota of our emotions—it was clear that like most bullies, he was the type who got off on ruffling people’s feathers.

“Jane and I are returning to New York tomorrow,” Eric said.

I jerked. I certainly hadn’t been aware of those plans.

He glanced at me with a spark of hope. “Together.”

Jude, however, was not amused. “That’s taking some chances, Triton. You might not like those odds.”

“And why’s that?” I asked.

Jude turned to me like he had just realized I was there. “You shouldn’t be here, Cho-Cho-San.”

My eyes narrowed. “Did you just call me Madame Butterfly?”

He cocked his head like he was watching a circus exposition. “Look at that. She reads too.”

“Cut the shit, Jude,” Eric snapped. “What are you doing here? Where’s Carson?”

“First of all, Triton, let’s use our terms of respect, shall we? You should refer to the Caesar as Titan, and I’d prefer if your girl here wasn’t that familiar with my name either.” He turned to me with a wink. “It’s Hermes to you, my little courtesan.”

It took everything I had not to gather a snowball and chuck it in this asshole’s face. What in the fuck was it with people like him referring to me as a prostitute?

Jude—the fuck if I was going to think of him as a Greek deity—turned back to Eric with amusement. “You’re to leave the girl in New York and continue to Los Angeles,” he told Eric. “Tomorrow.”

“No.”

Jude sighed, like he was dealing with an errant child. “Need I remind you what happened the last time you disobeyed your Caesar’s orders, Eric? I can assure you that the next time, he won’t be so lenient. In fact, he might not be lenient at all.”

I blinked. Was that what I thought it was? This jackass was literally threatening Eric with death if he didn’t run to a meeting?

Shoulder to shoulder with him, I thought I could feel a slight shudder through Eric’s coat. But externally, he showed no sign of backing down.

“Carson—”

“Titan,” Jude corrected.

“John fucking Carson wouldn’t do that,” Eric spat. “He acts like a kingpin, but he’s no better than a common thug. A bully with a lot of big weapons who likes to swing his dick around. What you’re trying to be, I suppose.”

Jude narrowed his beady eyes. “I have a message for you, Triton, and you’d be wise to heed it: deorum vocas.”

I froze, and not because of the snow. There they were again: those two odd words that Carson had spoken in the middle of St. John the Divine. They had echoed off the stone walls, and the minute he’d said them, Eric had apologized and, without another word, had followed him out.

This time, however, when Eric didn’t move, Jude became visibly irritated. “Don’t make me recite the entire thing,” he said in a bored voice. “You know how much that annoys me. It annoys everyone.”

“That’s because it was a stupid verse to begin with,” Eric returned. “He was too lazy to find one that actually fit. He just liked the sound of the footnoted version so much better that he just had to use it.”

“That’s not really the point, Triton.”

“True. The point is that it doesn’t fucking matter at all.” Eric took my hand, his fingers gripping tightly around my glove. “You can recite Virgil until you’re blue in the face. It’s not a magic spell. I’m not coming.”

“Virgil?” I repeated. “Is this for real? You guys just hop around the globe reciting Roman poetry to each other as summons?” I couldn’t help but giggle. The whole thing was ridiculous, like something out of an Edgar Allen Poe poem. “Do you have a secret handshake too? Maybe some pointy hoods and matching canes?”

Ignoring me completely, Jude began to intone:

Medium video discedere coelum,

Palantesque polo stellas. Sequar omina tanta,

quiquis deorum vocas me in arma.

I turned to Eric. “What is that?”

“Latin,” Eric said quietly. “It’s the verse from The Aeneid.”

“Doesn’t know her classics either?” Jude’s voice boomed. “How terribly plebeian. This is what happens without a proper education, of course. Where did you attend school, Kanji State?”

I pressed opened my mouth, ready to tell him I went to the University of Fuck White Nationalism, but Eric cut in: “She attended Harvard, you racist dick. Before that, Northwestern. In Chicago, where she’s from.”

“And my mother’s Korean,” I added. “Not Japanese.”

Jude rolled his eyes, like we were pointing out the differences between two shades of blue, not entire nationality differences. “Regardless, I’ll have to enlighten her.” His green eyes pierced, even through the twilight. “Deorum vocas is a calling. It refers to a loose translation as follows:

“I can see the cloud parting, the stars riding

The arching skies. I follow a sign so clear,

Whoever you are, the gods who call me into action.”

When he was finished, Jude looked triumphant, like he was a spelling bee contestant. “We’re all supposed to know the Caesar’s call, Triton. Everyone picks their verse to call upon members’ obedience. Just like your father did.”

I blinked back and forth. “What’s a Caesar? You keep saying that.”

Jude turned to me, now visibly irritated. “It’s a salad, Yoko. What do you think?”

I scowled, but before I could cut back at him, Eric gripped my wrist, pulling my attention to him.

“It means king,” he clarified. “Like Julius Caesar. It’s…someone who is voted in, but also remains in power until his death. It’s how the leadership of the society works.”

Realization dawned on me. “And your father…”

“Held the position, yes,” he said. “As did my grandfather before him.”

“Barely.” Jude suddenly appeared next to us, apparently not wanting to be left out of the conversation. “Poseidon had what, six whole months before his little boat was smashed?” He chuckled. Eric’s jaw tightened. “Pity, really. His death ruined your family’s nearly spotless line of succession.”

“Okay, I gotta ask,” I interrupted. “What’s with the names? Greek? Roman? Why not just use your real names all the time, since you obviously all know each other?”

“It’s none of your business,” Jude said, his smooth demeanor finally decomposing. He turned to Eric. “She shouldn’t be here anyway, Triton. Carson might forgive it because she’s his offspring, but considering he forbade this liaison to begin with, I sincerely doubt it. Just one more penance you’ll have to serve.”

“So, we’re back to ‘Carson’?” I mimed obnoxiously large finger quotes, enjoying the way my continued poking seemed to break Jude’s smug exterior. “What happened to ‘Titan’?”

“You would do well not to test my temper, chickie,” he snapped. “I’m not very nice to people who do.”

“You would do well not to threaten my wife, Hermes,” Eric’s voice cut through Jude’s and my banter like a machete as he stood to his full six feet, two inches, nearly eye to eye with his adversary. “And I’ll remind you right now that your contributions to the society don’t happen without my family’s ports. Hard to smuggle girls and drugs to meetings without customs looking the other way, isn’t it?”

Jude examined Eric, looking very much like he wanted to throw something much worse than a few cutting phrases. But instead, he took a breath and turned his attention back to me.

“Wife?” he asked. “Have you made it official, then?” He looked down at my hand, which was, thankfully, covered by my glove. “We haven’t seen any papers filed, Triton. And believe me, Titan has been watching very closely.”

I had been holding my breath since Eric said the word, and now I waited for him to answer Jude’s question. To say in no uncertain terms that we were on our way back to New York to do exactly that—sign the papers, file the contracts. Resume our life, this time married, just like we had wanted.

“We’re on no one’s timeline but our own, Jude,” Eric said. “And if you’re going to tell Carson anything, it’s that I officially abdicate my position in the Janus society. I want nothing to do with it. Ever.”

“You can’t just—”

“Watch me,” Eric snapped. “He can cite all the idiotic Latin he wants. He can storm into board meetings. Kidnap me again. But I won’t be making the same mistakes twice. Did you know he tracks us, Jude? He replaced all the coins we wear so now they record everything we do. The corrupt bastard is spying on us.”

He pointed to the bracelet that was peeking out from under Jude’s sleeve. From the man’s suddenly blank face, I gathered he was unaware of this development.

“It’s time for Carson to learn that he doesn’t dictate the terms of my life or anyone else in this society,” Eric continued. “And that includes marrying his daughter, whether he wants me to or not. It’s not his choice.”

“Oh, Triton,” Jude scoffed. “Don’t you understand? He just doesn’t want you to have her. It’s your lesson in obedience. Carson doesn’t care about this massage parlor refuse any more than he cares about what gets put out on the street for the trashman.”

Eric threw a punch so quickly it was over before I blinked. His fist landed on Jude’s nose with a sickening crunch, and a second later, Jude was lying on the ground after his head slammed against the brick.

“Try that again,” Eric said, sounding like a man who had just shouted loud across the entire city for an hour. A lock of hair flopped onto his forehead while he shook out his hand. Flecks of blood landed in the snow, relics of a split knuckle. “Say one more fucking word about her—even think it—and I’ll break a fuck lot more than your nose, you spoiled fucking prick.”

“You’ll regret this,” Jude hissed as he pushed up from the ground. From the way his nose was bleeding, I guessed it was actually broken. He clutched at the bridge, red-faced from blood and anger alike.

“Not as much as you’ll regret disrespecting Jane,” Eric snapped. “Carson wants me to remember who he is? You tell him to remember who I am. Eric Sebastian Franklin de Vries. Son of one of the oldest families in this country and every leader of the Janus society for the last hundred years. Carson wants to mess with me, he messes with a fucking dynasty.”

Jude took a step forward, but before he could even think about launching a counterattack, Tony, James, and Devon appeared from the shadows, three looming figures forming a small fleet of muscle behind Eric’s determined form. I just watched, slack-jawed. I’d never seen this side of him. Even though I’d practically begged it to come out, now that it had, I wasn’t sure I knew what to do with it.

Jude sneered. “It’s never been in the best interests of the de Vries men to put a woman before Janus, Eric.”

Eric started, then stilled. “What in the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

Jude smirked. “I think you know.”

“Penny.” The word was a whisper, nearly carried away on the wind. But it came from Eric, and in that moment, his hand dropped mine. “You bastards. You didn’t.”

Jude smiled, a nasty red smile through which the whites of his teeth shone like a skeleton. “I guess we’ll never know. But I’ll say this: the poor girl was certainly an easy target. She never belonged in Dartmouth or anywhere near the likes of you. And deep down, I think she knew it.”

Somewhere in the distance a bell rang. The gravity of the name slowly sank in as Jude spoke. Penny. Penelope Kostas. Eric’s former fiancée. The girl he was convinced his family had bullied into suicide had died because of Jude. Carson. Janus.

The question was…why?

Unfortunately, Eric didn’t have time to ask. He launched at Jude, moving with fury, if little grace, and running on enough surprise and adrenaline that he was able tackle the bigger man into the building behind him. Bits of painted stucco fell from their impact in a spray of pastel green that mixed with the bloody snow in a hideous parody of Christmas cheer.

“Do you know what the statute of limitations is on murder, you slimy little sociopath?” Eric shouted as he shoved Jude to the ground. “You’re going to jail, asshole. You and the entire fucking society! You murdered an innocent girl, and—”

“Eric!”

Tony jumped forward and pulled Eric away, but not before he landed one last kick to Jude’s ribs. I cowered back, my arms wrapped firmly around my waist. A few lights around the plaza actually went on. We needed to get out of there.

“You’ll pay for that, Triton.”

“The name is Eric, you entitled son of a bitch.” Eric spat, the saliva landing perilously close to Jude’s face. “I don’t need to hide behind anonymity. I’m proud of who I am.”

“That’s right,” I chimed in. “He doesn’t like nicknames, Gatsby. The only one allowed to use them is me.”

But it wasn’t the time for laughs. Eric looked like he was two seconds from delivering another round of heat. Jude, however, cowered against the wall, above which a painting of Goethe, the poet, witnessed everything.

“You can tell Carson I’m no longer at his beck and call,” Eric said, still held at bay, but just barely. “And if he has a problem with that, he can talk to me himself. Because the next time I see you or any of his little messengers near me or mine, I’ll do a lot worse than break your fucking nose. I’ll break your entire fucking life.”

Before Jude could respond, Eric finally extricated himself from Tony, shaking off his shoulders and head like a wet dog after jumping into a lake. When he had finally calmed, he turned to me with eyes like stone.

“Come on, Jane,” he said, though he didn’t extend a hand. “Let’s go home.”

Part Four

Anaphora

On the day you left,

the sky was bright,

New York an open groan.

The sun, it shined,

the clouds, they laughed

as I stood there alone.

The pond, it gleamed,

the people sang,

their words a weary drone,

and books became

my resting place

as the ground became your home.

“On The Day You Left”

—a poem from the journal of Eric de Vries