Running Deep, Saints Row fic (part 1)
Jan. 22nd, 2015 06:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
girlofpreyI FINISHED IT.
Title: Running Deep
Fandom: Saints Row series (video game)
Pairing: None, F!Boss + Dane Vogel gen
Wordcount: 34,396
Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, mentions of violence against sex workers, mentions of death, the two main characters are sociopaths and they don't live in a fun world.
Disclaimer: I don't own the Saints Row universe and I'm not making any money off this.
Summary: Hell is what you make of it.
1.
It was a beautiful day, and he was going for a swim, as usual. Normally he just used the pool in his apartment block, but at weekends he liked to go down to the beach and get out in the open water. He’d found a great little cove a few months back – it was big, it was clean, and it was usually completely empty.
Usually. Today there was someone in dark clothing and a blue cap hunched up against the rocks. They shifted when he looked over at them, hunching up. Probably a transient. He sighed. This was the downside of coming out to swim. He left most of his cash at home. He’d just have to do without the wallet if he needed to.
He stripped down to his trunks and waded in. There was a current today, which was nice. Something to brace against. He started doing his usual lengths of the beach.
He heard the engine just in time to look around and see the jet ski whizz by him, just missing his head by a hair’s breadth. Then all he could see or feel was water, as the wake of it flipped him around and dragged him down.
By the time he stopped spinning, he was completely disoriented. His limbs felt like lead. He kicked, trying to right himself. The current pushed against him. He realised he didn’t know which way was up – couldn’t get his body parts to move in tandem with each other. There was water in his mouth, he could taste salt at the back of his throat. The current was moving his hair, but he didn’t know which way he needed to move. He kicked harder. He still couldn’t tell where the surface was. His lungs started burning, fighting for air that wasn’t there. He kicked again, and just thought he could see sunlight sparkling above him as he finally had to open his mouth, and then everything was wet, and then everything started to go white…
And then he was coughing, coughing and coughing and coughing. He felt like he was going to cough his throat up. He pulled in a ragged breath and it was air, nothing but air. He fell back and let it fill his lungs, over and over again.
He could see light, and hazy shapes coming through it. Blue. The blue was bobbing about, making him feel dizzy. He closed his eyes again. He could feel something warm on his shoulder. And grit under his neck and back.
Sand. He was lying on sand. The sun was blazing into his eyes. He put up a hand to shield against it – a hand that was feeling increasingly shaky. There was someone leaning over him. The warm thing from his shoulder disappeared. He could make out eyes, and blue. A hand suddenly ran through it, and he realised it was hair. It was a girl, with green eyes, staring down at him.
“I’m gonna go for help, okay?” Her voice was pounding and distorted. Then she was gone. There was a slight spray of sand over him.
He let his hand fall back to his side. Every muscle in his body was screaming at him. He swallowed again, and tasted salt.
Goddamn it.
By the time the girl got back he’d managed to sit up. She flopped back down next to him, and stared worriedly at him. He did a small double-take when he noticed the great scar on her cheek. If she noticed, she didn’t say anything.
“Are you alright?” she asked. Her accent was harsh, but her voice was uncertain.
He nodded, and swallowed against the burning in his throat.
She tucked her hair behind her ear. It was dripping wet.
“Paramedics will be here in about ten minutes.”
Damn it. He was gonna have to go to the hospital, and fill in a bunch of forms. That was the day gone. He could probably still make the company bowling night, though.
He looked back at the girl. She was still staring at him, in an odd mixture of worry and awe. It was hard to tell her age past the insanely coloured hair and distracting scar, but he’d put at somewhere in the teenage years.
She’d saved him.
He was lucky she was there, he supposed. He looked down at her, at her white vest and tattooed arms. He could see her bra through the wet vest. She was still just staring at him.
Clothes. Where were his clothes? He looked around, and saw the folded pile down the beach, and his towel.
“Could you get me my clothes?” he asked. “Please.” His voice was scratchy, and he coughed again.
She sprang up, and jogged around him. She grabbed the clothes roughly, and came back and handed them to him. Then she stepped round him and wandered the other way down the beach. He watched her as she walked around a little bit, and then picked up a dark pile of her own, and then a shoe, and then another from by the waterline.
He dried himself off with his towel. He wasn’t injured, as far as he could see. His arms were starting to shake though. He put the towel down and ignored the rest of his clothes. He could still taste saltwater when he swallowed. He spat.
The girl came back, up close to him, and started putting on a dark, ragged hoodie, what the dark pile had turned out to be. He offered her his towel, which was still partly dry, but she waved it off. She sat back down and put her trainers on. They also looked like they’d seen better days. He wondered if she really was a transient. She kept looking up at him, eyeing him like he was going to disappear. She sat back and studied him, up and down. Then she looked like she was sort of in awe again.
He was grateful, really, but he sincerely hoped this wasn’t going to turn into another teenage crush. The least he could do was be polite about it, he supposed.
There was a noise from behind them, and her head whipped around, fists balling. He looked himself, and it was the paramedics, picking their way down the rocky path. When he looked back, her fists had unclenched.
When the medics arrived, she stood up and stood back, watching, fists clenched again. He realised he’d never asked her name. But he was busy with the paramedics now. They gave him a basic check-over, even though he insisted he was fine, that this great girl – he gestured to her and she stared stonily at him – had helped him. They had to help him to his feet, to his chagrin, and insisted he come to the hospital for a proper check-up. He agreed, begrudgingly.
One of the paramedics turned to the girl, still wet, and asked if she needed to be checked over too. She shook her head, defensively, stepping back. No insurance, probably. She gave him one last hard look – that turned a little soft towards the end – and then turned and walked off up the beach, hands jammed in her pockets. By the time he and the paramedics reached the top of the path, there was no sign of her.
2.
It was a month later when he saw her again. He was back at the cove, going for another swim, and as he reached the sand he looked around and saw that same dark shape topped off with blue. She hunched up a little when he looked at her – and then sat up. She paused for a second, uncertainly. Then gave a half-wave.
Damn it. If he was going to see her again, this was going to get awkward. And he hated leaving a debt unpaid. He hesitated for a moment, and then walked over to her.
She tensed up as he walked over to her, but didn’t stand. She had her fists clenched again by the time he got over to her. The scar was somehow bigger and smaller than he remembered.
“Hi,” he said. She just stared at him. “I never properly thanked you for saving my life. So - thank you.”
She shrugged, uneasily. Looked him cautiously up and down.
“It’s alright,” she said.
“Is there anything I can do? To thank you?”
She frowned, very slightly.
“I don’t want anything from you.”
Hmm. He looked around the beach, thinking.
“How about this – I’ll buy you lunch,” he offered. “It’s the least I can do.”
She still looked uneasy, and sort of annoyed. She studied his face for a moment. Then she shrugged, looking off to one side.
“Alright.”
“Are you free now?” he asked. “After I swim?”
She looked past him at the water.
“You’re going back in?” she asked, a little incredulously.
He’d been back in the following week.
He nodded. She stared at him, then quirked a little smile.
“You’re brave,” she said.
“Thanks. So – are you free? Now?”
She seemed to debate it for a minute, then nodded.
“Great,” he said. “Wait till I’m finished and we’ll go.”
He turned and walked a little way down the beach.
“I’ll keep an eye on you,” she called after him.
Ha ha ha.
He had the uncomfortable experience of stripping off while she was still behind him. He forced himself not to look back. He didn’t look back while he waded out into the water, or when he started his lengths. He did glance back at the beach during a short pause though, shaking the hair out of his eyes. She seemed to be leaned forward, arms around her knees. Watching him.
He finished his lengths – no problems this time – and came back out. He dried himself off and got dressed again. He walked over to her and she stood up, jamming her hands into her hoodie pocket.
She stared at him, a little warily, past the hair and the scar. He realised he still didn’t know her name.
“I never introduced myself,” he said. “I’m sorry – it’s Dane. Dane Vogel.”
He held out a hand for her to shake, and she stared at it, like it was potential weapon. She looked back up at him. He remained unthreatening. After a moment, she took one of her hands out of the pocket and shook it, cautiously.
“Darcy,” she said. She let go of his hand immediately and put her own back in her pocket.
“Great!” he said. “Where d’you want to go?”
~ ~ ~
Freckle Bitches, was where she wanted to go. He forced himself not to cringe. It’s not like he’d never been before – he took plenty of young athletes during his days as a sports agent, trying to hash out contracts. He’d just hoped those days were over.
At least the money he’d brought out with him would probably cover it. He’d rather not go back to his apartment and have her see where he lived.
She led him to one just a few blocks over. As they went in, he caught her smiling at him slightly. Like she was enjoying his discomfort.
He put on his biggest, brightest smile for the greeter. She looked a little dazed.
“Table for two, please,” he said.
She led them over to a booth, nearly dropping the menus as she did. Take took a seat, throwing his towel down beside him, and looked up to see Darcy grinning slightly at him again.
He was glad this was very amusing for her.
He could see her eyeing him from over her menu as he looked over his. Clearly waiting for him to crack. He didn’t give her the satisfaction. Just calmly picked out a salad and put the menu down.
She turned back to her own menu, fully, and he took the time to study her. The scar on her cheek was shiny, probably a few years old. Her dye job was patchy and harsh. There was dirt under some of her fingernails. But he still remembered muscles, on her arms, when she’d sat there in her vest. She didn’t look like she was starving.
She threw down her menu, and looked up at him, a little challengingly. Still smirking. Yes, this was an awkward situation and he was slumming it. He had faith that they could get through it, together.
She gave him another one of those little up-and-down glances he didn’t quite understand. It wasn’t like how people looked when they were attracted to him. Or when they thought they could take him for a small fortune. He didn’t understand it. It irked him.
The waitress came back as soon as they put their menus down, and he ordered his salad and orange juice. Darcy might not have been starving, but she ordered enough to feed a horse – a burger he didn’t want to think about, and a couple of sides. He wondered if she was trying to bleed him, or if she was just stocking up while she had a free lunch. Maybe this was just her usual meal. The waitress took the menus, and then they were alone together.
She was still looking at him a little challengingly. Hands still in her pockets. He struck up a conversation, because that’s what he was good at. It turned out she wasn’t homeless, she was a student at the nearby – ‘college’. He wouldn’t have thought she could afford it. She was studying mechanical engineering, apparently, in her second year. He figured he was right about her being a teenager – he put her at about 19. Ten years younger than him.
She’d lived in the city her whole life, grown up in Saints Row. She watched him a little carefully while she said that. He didn’t know what she was waiting for. All the neighbourhoods South of the river were the same to him.
She looked at him blankly when he mentioned Ultor. He explained it was a clothing store, and got a vague spark of recognition. He couldn’t exactly blame her –Ultor was sitting pretty squarely in the middle of the market. Not affordable enough for just anyone to shop there, not fancy enough to be instantly recognisable. It was a good position to grow a business from, though. He was hoping to be a high street staple within three years.
He glanced down at her hoodie, as they were discussing it, and suddenly realised that it wasn’t actually all black, it had a faded logo on it. He squinted, and realised it was the Stilwater Sharks.
“Hey, are you a fan of the Sharks?” he asked. She just looked at him, then down at the hoodie. “I could get you tickets, if you want – I used to be a sports agent.”
The smile suddenly dropped from her face.
“I don’t need anything from you,” she said. Hissed.
He stared at her.
“I get them for free,” he said. He held her gaze. “It wouldn’t be some big favour – it’d be a phone call. You did save my life after all.”
She frowned at him, and then huffed and stared moodily at the window. Dane had to fight the sudden urge to laugh.
Their food arrived, which broke the tension. His orange juice was as bad as he remembered. He should have gone with tap water – can’t get that wrong. The salad looked oily – Freckle Bitches’ dressings left a lot to be desired, as usual – but he picked at it. Darcy dug into her burger with abandon.
Eventually the conversation got going again. He asked her about her family. She looked a little cagey about that, but said her dad lived in the city, and her mom worked out of it. She had an uncle and a cousin, also in the city. No-one else, from what he could tell.
She looked up at him testily.
“You?”
He smiled, and told her the truth. His parents lived in California. No siblings, one aunt, no cousins.
It wasn’t often he had casual conversations with the less fortunate, and she surprised him. She didn’t seem to be hedging her answers in any way, or ashamed of her background, even when he talked about his. She didn’t seem envious either – she didn’t even seem impressed. She wasn’t intimidated by him – which was odd, because he couldn’t even name a lot of his co-workers that weren’t that. And then sometimes he’d catch her looking at him with this sort of – fondness. A surprisingly genuine warmth, and the slightly patronising expression adults tended to have on their faces when they listened to a child describe their day at school. He should have been annoyed by it – was, a little – but was mostly too confused for that. And every now and again, those little flickering up-and-down glances. Then she’d go right back to looking smirking, or looking unimpressed.
He prided himself on being able to read people. He’d studied body language and tone of voice for years. But he couldn’t get a read on her. It irked him.
She asked about his job in that everyman sort of way (“so what do you actually do?”), and he tried to explain without making it too complicated, or giving away any actual details. She looked at him blankly through a lot of it, but certain concepts – like increasing market share and asset-stripping – seemed to click, and made her grin.
He asked about her course, and she said something about ‘liking cars’. He pressed her a little, and she turned out to know a hell of a lot about engines. It was actually quite impressive, although she didn’t look impressed. She even understood some basic things about construction. He asked her what job she wanted when she was done. She just looked at him.
He realised, as the meal was coming to an end, that he’d been waiting for her to ingratiate herself, or hint that she wanted cash. But she hadn’t. At all. She didn’t even want the goddamned Sharks tickets he was offering her.
He called for the check, and paid it. The waitress was still blushing. Darcy smirked at him. They got up and left, and she glanced around the street like she was already waiting for permission to go.
He studied her for a second, then made a decision.
“Give me your phone,” he said.
Her head whipped back round to his and she narrowed her eyes suspiciously.
“Why?” she asked.
He held out his hand, gently – no sudden moves. She stared at it.
“Just give me your phone, please. I’m not gonna steal it.”
She stared at him suspiciously for another moment, but then awkwardly shifted. She took out her phone, doubtfully. He reached out and took it.
He tucked his towel under one arm and opened her phonebook. He put in his number, under ‘Dane’. He gave himself a missed call and felt his phone buzz in his pocket – he’d assign ‘Darcy’ to the number later.
“That is my number,” he said, handing her phone back to her. “If you change your mind about those Sharks tickets, just give me a call. Honestly – it’s no trouble at all.”
She frowned down at her phone, then up at him. And then put it back in her pocket.
“Goodbye, Darcy,” he said. Turning slightly to leave.
She gave him another one of those up-and-down looks. And then stared right in his eyes.
“Goodbye, Dane,” she said. And then turned, uncertainly, and started walking down the street. She didn’t look back.
3.
He honestly didn’t think he’d hear from her again. When he was checking his phone two months later, and saw a missed call from ‘Darcy’, he had to take a moment to remember who it was.
He called her back in his office.
“Hey,” she said, sounding vague.
“Darcy?”
“Yeah.”
“You after those Sharks tickets?” He sincerely hoped she was.
“You get them for free, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then yeah. Could you hook me up?”
Only a matter of time then. He pulled a pad of paper over towards himself.
“Sure,” he said. “When?”
“This Saturday?”
Well, that was a stretch, but it was doable.
“Sure,” he said. “Do you care where you sit?”
“Not at the back.”
Obviously.
“How about middle row, on the right?”
“Sure.”
“Great. What’s your address?”
A pause.
“Darcy?” he asked.
“Can I pick’em up?”
“You don’t have an address?”
“I have a dorm room, but I’m not there much. I don’t trust my roommates with my mail. If I can’t pick them up it’s alright, it doesn’t matter.”
He tapped his pen on the pad. He hated awkward deals.
“How about this –” he said, “– I’ll meet you somewhere and hand them over?”
Another pause.
“It won’t be too much trouble?”
“It won’t be any trouble at all. It’ll have to be late though.”
“Okay. When?”
“I should have them by Thursday, so say Thursday? At nine?”
“Sure. Where?”
“Where do you want to meet?” He wasn’t meeting her at any of his usual places.
She sucked in a breath.
“Freckle Bitches?”
Naturally.
He rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“Great,” he said. “I’ll see you then. Call me if you need to change the time or something.”
“Yeah,” she said. There was a rustling, and then she paused awkwardly. “Thanks.”
She hung up the phone.
Well. He did give her his number. He picked up his office phone, and punched in the number for the stadium.
~ ~ ~
On Thursday at 8.55 he pulled into the parking lot. She wasn’t there – she must be inside. He got out and clapped his hands together. It was getting colder again. He hoped she wasn’t expecting another meal.
He entered the restaurant and saw an unmistakeable shock of blue in one of the booths. He walked over, to see her nursing a half-empty glass of cola. She smiled as she saw him approach. The scar glistened in the fluorescent lights.
“Two Sharks tickets,” he said, pulling the envelope out of his coat pocket and slapping it lightly down on the table. “Block 8, middle row, aisle seats.”
She pulled the envelope over and checked the contents, before putting it back down on the table. Clever girl.
He paused.
“I’m going to that game, actually,” he said. “I’ll be with a client though, so I won’t be able to talk to you.”
She looked up at him, a little bug-eyed, like she’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.
“What?” he asked.
“Um,” she said. “Well – I was gonna scalp’em.”
He blinked at her.
“I mean, you said you got them for free, I didn’t think it’d be a problem.”
He stared at her for a minute. And then laughed.
Well. He couldn’t fault her entrepreneurial spirit.
“No,” he said. “No. That’s not a problem. Just, uh – just try not to sell them to any hooligans, or neo-Nazis. That stuff gets back to me.”
She gave him a mock-offended look, and then smiled, and put the envelope away in her hoodie pocket.
He tapped his fingers on the table. Looked around the restaurant. And then sat down in the booth, opposite her.
“How’s the course?” he asked.
“It’s alright,” she replied, smiling. It dropped for a minute, and she gestured the tickets in her hoodie.
“You want a cut?” she asked, genuinely.
“No.” He waved her off. “I’d scalp them myself if was that interested. You keep it.”
Another grin. She looked down at his empty hands on the table.
“You want a drink or something?” Her face went a little hard. “I’m buying.”
“No thank you.”
“You sure? Coffee or something?”
The memory of Freckle Bitches coffee literally made him wince.
“No,” he said. “No caffeine after noon.”
She frowned at him for a second, as if waiting for the punch line. It didn’t come. She looked away.
She was wearing that same black hoodie, unless she had a series of them. No gloves. It was cold out tonight.
“You going anywhere after this?”
“Party, maybe.” She shrugged. She looked him over, and her eyes suddenly narrowed.
“You working late?” she asked, glancing at his suit.
“Yeah,” he replied.
“Not to meet me?”
“No,” he said. “I work late most nights.”
She frowned.
“Why?”
He shrugged.
“To get things done.”
She still looked dubious.
“Like what?”
“Paperwork.”
She stared at him for a second. And then laughed, a little, looking away.
He glanced out the window. His car was on the other side of the parking lot. If he’d known he’d be staying for a bit, he’d have parked closer.
“Don’t worry,” she said.
“What?” he asked. She had a sly smile on her face.
“No-one’s gonna take it,” she said. “Not out here.” He paused. Waited for her to continue. “It’s too lit up, and the police come by too regularly.”
“You saw me come in?”
“Yeah. Not many Socialites in this neighbourhood. 2001 model?”
“Yeah.”
“Nice,” she said. Then shrugged. “A little basic.”
“It’s a company car,” he said. “There’s not much I can do with it.” Not that he would.
She smirked at him.
“You getting your grades?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“What are you working on now?”
“Materials.”
They got onto talking about the other students at the university. Darcy didn’t seem terribly involved in student culture, but she knew what the other kids were into. It was like free market research. He got the feeling she knew what he was doing, but she just smiled at him, and kept answering questions. Gave him one of those up-and-down looks again.
They were there for about an hour. Then he really needed to go – had to be up for work the next day. Darcy handed a crumpled set of bills to the waitress as they passed the till, from right out of her pocket.
“You should get a wallet,” Dane suggested.
“Then people know what to steal.”
Cold hit him as he stepped out into the parking lot. Darcy didn’t seem to notice it.
“How you getting home?”
“Train,” she replied, shrugging.
He paused.
“Is that safe?”
Not that he really cared. He assumed she knew what she was doing.
She gave him a grin.
“I’ll be safe,” she said.
He looked at her for another moment. Then smiled.
“Get a good price for those tickets,” he said.
“I don’t take bad ones,” she replied, turning away.
He smiled as he walked back to his car.
~ ~ ~
That Saturday, at the game, he looked over at the seats he’d gotten her. Two young women were sat there, looking around, star-struck. He smiled.
4.
She called him the next month for more tickets, and he didn’t mind. She’d saved his life after all. And somehow it became a regular thing. They’d meet up, at the same Freckle Bitches just to keep things simple, and he’d hand over some tickets and they’d talk. Eventually he suggested they have lunch again, just so he wouldn’t be planning it around his late nights. He considered trying to change the restaurant, but then he imagined taking her somewhere he actually liked eating. Somewhere people might see him. Between that and her scornful looks, he decided to leave it as it was. sometimes, but between her scornful looks when he mentioned anywhere more
They talked about her course, and his job. It was kind of nice, actually, discussing things with someone who wasn’t probably after his job. She gave him a few more tips on parking his car. It wouldn’t get stolen somewhere like Saints Row, apparently, because a Socialite would be too noticeable to drive around in. He’d lose most of the parts pretty quickly though. Somewhere like the University campus, it’d probably get taken for a joyride as soon as someone drunk enough came along – he’d get back pieces of it, if not the whole thing. The worst place was apparently Downtown, after dark. There it’d just be gone completely.
They talked about what she was learning – she had a real grasp of mechanics – and about new cars coming out. Dane didn’t care, but Darcy knew what she was talking about, and there were always car people around Dane might want to impress.
And then there was the day he accidentally locked his keys in his car, after a very busy week at work. He was standing there, kicking himself and trying to figure out what to do. Darcy looked at him, then around the street, and then bent over the door. She got it open in a couple of seconds. He looked at her. She looked back, smiling slightly. He revised some of his ideas about ‘Mechanical Engineering’.
They talked about the Sharks, who Darcy followed on TV even though she never went to a game. She didn’t have much head for strategy, but she seemed to enjoy the raw aggression well enough. It reminded Dane of his days as an agent. People were always so happy to be enthusiastic about sports.
When it became clear she didn’t care at all about the world of high finance, or largely understand it, Dane shared a little more about what he did at Ultor. He asked her not to tell anyone else, and she gave him a genuinely offended look. Still. She did seem to like hearing about him screwing people over.
She told him about fights or arguments she was having with people, what she was gonna do if they kept stepping up to her. That was kind of fun too.
The continued free market research was also nice. She always smiled at him a little when he was doing it. He asked her once if she minded, and she shrugged and said “the customer is always right, right?”.
She said if he ever wanted her face on a line of t-shirts, to just let her know.
They met up throughout the next summer. She apparently stayed on campus, and made some very vague references to ‘work’ she was doing to pay for it.
The third year of her course began, and he got a surprise one day when she came in wearing a letterman jacket, black and gold, rather than the old Sharks hoodie. He asked her what her sport was, and she grinned and told him how well she could swing a bat.
~
She’d turned up with split knuckles and split lips sometimes, or the fading remnants of a black eye. And of course there was the scar. But he didn’t actually see any violence from her until about a year after they met.
They couldn’t find a time to get lunch, so they’d met up late, and he was walking across to the subway station with her, finishing up a conversation. When suddenly, as they came around the bottom of the stairwell, a man jumped out from under the stairs.
“Give me your money!” he said, holding a gun on them shakily.
Dane paused. Well – this wasn’t an unusual situation, in Stilwater. He glanced at Darcy.
Which is when she jumped forward in a blur, grabbing the guy’s arm. She did something Dane couldn’t follow, but the mugger cried out in pain and she ended up with the gun. She snapped the safety off and aimed it at him.
“Give me your money,” she said.
The man stared at her, wide-eyed, hands in the air. She gestured sharply with the gun barrel, and his eyes bulged out and he started scrabbling around in his pockets. He pulled out a few filthy-looking bills and threw them on the ground in front of her.
“All of it!”
“That is all of it!” the man cried, his voice high-pitched. “I swear!”
“Give me your shoes.”
Dane looked at Darcy. She looked cold, and completely serious. And angry, burningly angry, underneath it all.
The man stared at her, for a second, open-mouthed. Then started scrambling to take off his trainers, trying to bend over and keep an eye on her at the same time. Finally he got them off, and kicked them over to her.
“Get the fuck out of here,” she said, low, dangerous. “Now.”
The man looked frozen for a second, transfixed. Then he took off running, barefoot, down the street. Darcy watched him go, gun still steadily aimed at him, until he was practically out of sight. Then she sighed, lowered it and looked down. She snapped the safety off on the gun and shoved it down the back of her jeans, and then bent down and started collecting the bills.
Dane just stared at her. Wow. Wow.
She finished with the bills and leaned over and actually picked up the man’s filthy shoes. Dane had no idea if she actually wanted them or if they were just some sort of terrible trophy. When she looked back at him, she was the girl he had lunch with again.
She saw him staring down at the shoes.
“You’ve got to make them regret it,” she said calmly.
He studied her for a second.
“You okay?” she asked.
He thought about it – and nodded. He’d barely even been involved.
“Where did you learn to do that?” he asked.
She shrugged and looked away.
“Around,” she said. “It wasn’t difficult. Asshole didn’t even have the safety off.”
She was looking at him, as the train rattled past overhead. He realised she was waiting to see if he still wanted to meet her again. If she’d somehow put him off and this was the end of it.
He thought about it for a second.
“Same time next month?” he asked.
She smiled, crinkling the scar, and looked down at the ground.
“Yeah,” she said. “Yeah. I’ll call you.”
She looked up at him, still smiling.
“You want the gun for the walk back to your car?”
“No,” he said. “Thank you. I’m good.”
She shrugged, and rearranged the back of her jacket.
“See you next month,” she said. She gave him one of those up-and-down looks, smiling, and then turned and walked off up the stairs.
5.
He got a promotion. She grinned viciously when he told her about it. It was strangely gratifying.
They got through another winter, and a spring. And then about a month before Darcy was due to graduate, she got kicked out of college. For fighting. She assured him that the other guy came off worse, because ‘she had the tire iron’.
She didn’t seem upset about it at all. Dane was disappointed for her though.
“Didn’t you want your degree?” he asked. “You could have gotten a job with that.”
She gave him a look that suggested he didn’t get it. She said she’d learned everything about engines she wanted to know. Then that she’d have to move back to Saints Row. That did seem to give her pause.
The next time they met she had another faded hoodie on.
He prodded her a little bit about possible careers. She just scowled at him. He couldn’t understand why she didn’t have a lick of ambition – her grades had been good, and she knew way more about cars than he did, than a lot of people he knew. Her ability to identify the make and model of a car on sight astounded him.
But she just rolled her eyes whenever he brought it up.
“Well, what about security then?” he asked.
She gave him a slightly warning look.
He wasn’t going to just bring it up openly, obviously.
“You seemed to handle yourself pretty well,” he said lowly. “Professionally, I mean. I’m sure a lot of firms would be glad to have you.”
“Security guards get shot,” she informed him, taking an aggressive bite of her burger.
Well. She wasn’t wrong. Especially in Stilwater. And the fact she apparently got a bit handy with a tire iron probably wouldn’t endear her to a lot of employers. She didn’t give him another inch about careers, so he dropped it.
But it made him think. She had handled herself professionally. Over the next couple of months, he asked a few careful questions about where she’d learned that. That wasn’t something she just ‘picked up’ – she must have been trained. She scowled at him, and gave him a few warning looks, but he wouldn’t drop it.
“My dad was a soldier,” she finally told him, one day. Glancing around the restaurant. “He showed me a few things.”
Dane stared at her.
“Like what?” he asked. It was a perfectly good explanation – but she wouldn’t talk about it…
She shrugged, looking down at her burger.
“Plenty,” she said. “Enough.”
She wouldn’t give him anything else, so he finally had to leave it there.
He wondered if their meetings would tail off now she was living south of the river, but she kept on coming. She was quieter, and a little more guarded, and he never saw that letterman jacket again, but she came, and they kept talking. Although never about Saints Row. They kept meeting up in the suburbs too, the opposite end of the city from where she was now living. But she never complained. So there was no reason to change it.
She kept on doing her roots, month after month, and he finally got the impression the blue maybe wasn’t just a phase.
Ultor expanded well in Stilwater. They were close to having a store in every neighbourhood across the North island, and their profits were steadily going up. He knew roughly what the next five promotions he wanted would be, and Darcy clearly still didn’t understand it or care, but she smiled when he told her about it.
He didn’t know how she lived, or where she lived, besides ‘in Saints Row’. She seemed to mention a different street every time they met. She still mentioned ‘work’ a lot – ‘deliveries’ was her code for it – but she also seemed to have actual jobs. As a store clerk, or a warehouse packer. They never seemed to last though. He mentioned once that he could get her a job at Ultor, if she wanted – nothing fancy, just in a warehouse or delivering stock. She looked at him the same way she always did when he tried to do her a favour. So he dropped it.
6.
Two and a half years after they started meeting, Darcy missed a meet-up.
She was never especially punctual – she was usually either a little late, or had been waiting at the restaurant for a while before he showed up. And it’s not like they were strict about it – Dane had often cancelled their meetings at the last minute for an unexpected work commitment, which Darcy took gracefully. But for one of them to just not show up had never really – happened. She didn’t even call.
He sat in a booth for half an hour. After forty-five minutes he ordered an orange juice, just to be polite to the waitress, who was giving him a concerned look – they recognised him and Darcy here now. He called her. No answer. After an hour, he considered leaving. He left it till an hour and a half.
If she was going to show, she’d have shown by now. And she had his number. He apologised to the waitress, giving her another big smile. She giggled and said it was quite alright.
It played on his mind on the way back to his apartment. He was annoyed, a little, but – it was just so unusual. He figured she’d at least call.
Maybe she’d lost her phone. Maybe she was caught up in something and couldn’t make a phone call right away. Family emergency, or job or something.
She didn’t call over the next few days. He saw a couple of reports on the news about Saints Row. They never really mentioned it in detail – wrong side of the river – but when he paid attention, things sounded…bad.
She didn’t really talk about it. He asked, sometimes, but she’d sit a little more hunched up and mutter something barely audible. A non-answer. She’d been showing up with less split knuckles and black eyes since she’d moved back, and he’d assumed that was a good thing.
On the Monday night, when he got home from work, he loosened his tie and called the Sangre Sedienta hospital. Practised his story in his mind.
“Hi,” he said as reception picked up, bright and little desperate. “I know this is a little out of the ordinary, but…my cousin’s gone missing, and I’m really worried about her. No-one’s seen her in days. Can I just check if she’s there?”
The receptionist was obviously reluctant, but when he mentioned blue hair and the woman’s breath hitched, he knew he was on the right track.
“She’s…she’s there, isn’t she?” he said. He tried to pitch his voice as disbelieving and worried, and for some reason he didn’t have to try very hard. “Please – oh God, is she dead?!”
The woman hesitated
“She’s fine,” she said, lowly. “She’ll probably be back on her feet in a few days.”
“What happened to her?”
She paused again.
“Please, my dad’s worried sick. I just want to know what happened.”
“There was a shooting,” the woman said. “That’s all I can tell you. She wasn’t hurt that badly.”
“Thank you,” he said, trying to make it sound extra warm and relieved. Familial. “Thank you.”
He put the phone down. Tapped his fingers on the desk. Checked his watch. Considered it for a few minutes. Then called a taxi.
~ ~ ~
He marched down the halls of the hospital, trying to look like he knew where he was going. He’d dressed down for the trip, to the best of his ability, but people were still giving him funny looks. He was relatively sure which floor of the hospital she’d be on, so he was just keeping his eye out for blue.
He finally saw it in a private side room, of all places. Maybe ‘deliveries’ paid better than he thought.
He took a quick glance around the corridor. Empty. He slipped inside the room.
Her head snapped up as he entered. When she saw who he was, she looked shocked. Then angry.
“What are you doing here, Dane?” she hissed, as he closed the blinds on the window.
“You weren’t answering your phone,” he replied, turning back around.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she said, looking like she’d be jumping up if she didn’t have an IV in her arm. “You’re gonna fuck me up!”
“You look pretty fucked up already to me.” He eyed her tubes, and the bandage around her left arm, as she slumped back down. She looked – okay though. Not at death’s door. He pulled a plastic chair over and sat down. “What happened?”
She glanced over at the blinds, as if someone might be peeking through them. She still looked pissed. But she looked him in the eyes, letting out a breath.
“I got shot,” she said.
“What – was someone trying to kill you?”
“No, it was – an accident.”
“You were accidentally shot?”
“Yes!” He clearly looked disbelieving. She sighed. “It was a shootout, okay? I took a stray bullet. It happens.”
‘It happens’. Like it was an everyday occurrence.
But then – maybe it was.
He looked over at her arm.
“Is it bad?”
She shrugged, a little stiffly.
“Hit an artery,” she muttered. “Wouldn’t have come in if it wasn’t for that.”
He stared at her. She glared at a wall. He realised suddenly that she was uncomfortable. Vulnerable.
“Where were you?” he asked.
She gave him a look.
“Does it matter?”
“What were you doing?”
She curled her uninjured arm into a fist.
“Nothing,” she said, staring at the wall.
There was a moment of silence between them.
She sighed.
“Look, I’m fine. I’m going to be fine. You need to get out of here. I’ll call you next month – I’m sorry I couldn’t call, the hospital took my phone.”
He stared at her. Her friends probably knew as much about their meetings as his did.
He looked around the room.
“How do you have a private room?” he asked. “I didn’t think you could afford it – do you even have cover?”
She shrugged.
“They always do it with gang stuff,” she said. “So there’s less fights.”
“There’s a gang involved?”
“It’s not – I didn’t see anything.” She waved him off. “It’s just what they do. I’m not in trouble.”
He looked around the room again.
“So they’re not gonna charge you for it?”
She stayed silent, glaring at the floor.
“Darcy…how are you gonna afford it?”
“I’ve got money, I can get more,” she said. “Good morphine’s fucking expensive anyway.”
She looked up at him. He was probably giving her a worried look. Her brow creased.
“Get the fuck out of here, Dane!” she snapped. “You think I’m in trouble now? Wait till someone sees me with an asshole in a $300 coat!”
He watched her. She went back to staring at the wall.
He stood up, replacing the chair in the corner.
“Goodbye, Darcy,” he said. “And it’s $400, by the way. Deceptively simple.”
He turned for the door. Got his hand around the handle.
“Dane,” she called.
He paused.
“You get a taxi here?” she asked, like she was grinding the words out.
“Yes,” he said, looking around at her. He wasn’t stupid.
She seemed to be kicking herself, staring up at the ceiling.
“Don’t wait out front for it,” she said. “Stay in reception. Tell them to call you when they get here. And check their ID.”
He tapped his fingers on the doorframe. Then nodded at her, and left.
He took all of her advice. When he got home, he made a few calls. Paid off her hospital bill from one of his secondary accounts.
7.
They never talked about it, which he was happy with. He wondered if she realised it was him that had paid it, or if she thought it was her fairy godmother or something. One way or the other, he didn’t want to bring it up again. It hadn’t been her fault, so it shouldn’t have been her bill.
She wore a sling to their next couple of meetings, and had to eat one-handed. She was oddly good at it. Out of curiosity, he asked what she’d do instead of going to a hospital – just go to a free clinic or something? His mouth twisted on the word ‘free’, he was sure. Her smile was twisted in response.
“No free clinics on the Row,” she told him, looking slightly feral. “They can’t keep medicine in the building.”
There were a lot of freelance ‘doctors’ around, apparently.
By sheer coincidence, it was around this time that Ultor started getting interested in expanding across the river. The college campus alone was a tempting market, never mind the airport. It was Dane that was in charge of assessing the situation.
And he had a fairly reliable source at his disposal.
So he said –
“About the gangs…”
– one day, while they were eating.
Darcy froze, mid-bite. After a moment she forced herself to swallow, and put the chicken wing she’d been eating back down on the table. Her neck was completely stiff, and it looked like she was only just keeping herself from looking round the room.
“Stop talking Dane,” she said quietly, not meeting his eyes.
“We can’t even talk about it?” he asked, equally quiet.
She looked up at him furiously, and her eyes darted off to the side a little bit.
“Somewhere private, then?”
She looked at him like he was an idiot. He felt like they were suddenly in a mafia movie.
He took one of their napkins and a pen from the inside pocket of his coat.
“What are you doing?” she hissed. She yanked the napkin away from him.
“I want you to come to my apartment,” he said. “We can talk there.”
She stared at him in frustration. He held her gaze. Then tried to take the napkin back again. She pulled it into her lap.
“Call – call me,” she said. She looked at him furiously. Neck still stiff. “Call me later and tell me where it is.”
“And you’ll come?”
Somehow she looked even angrier. But he held her gaze, and eventually she looked down at the table and nodded.
He went back to his salad. After a minute Darcy went back to her food, like she was forcing it down. She moved mechanically. They finished the rest of the meal in silence.
~ ~ ~
He called her as soon as he got home and gave her his address. She didn’t say a word and just hung up the phone.
He told his doorman to expect her. The man gave him a knowing look, and Dane almost laughed. He wondered what he’d think when he actually met her.
He didn’t bother telling him to keep quiet about it. Discretion was part of the job.
At around quarter past seven there was a pounding at his door. He opened it to see Darcy staring furiously at him. She shouldered past him and into his hallway.
“Shoes off, please,” he said.
She gave him an incredulous look. He gave her a measured one. She huffed and yanked her trainers off, dropping them on the floor. Then she waited impatiently for him to kick them against the wall, and take her into a room. She glanced around at the walls.
He led her down to the main room.
“Drink?” he asked, making his way over to the minibar.
“No.”
Straight to business then.
He turned to look at her.
“Why couldn’t we talk about this at the restaurant?”
“Because people are listening, Dane. And they don’t like people asking questions.”
“What, they’ve got ears in every Freckle Bitches?”
She looked mad.
“Can you tell me if anyone in that place was in a gang?”
He blinked. It was colours, wasn’t it? Red or yellow?
“Or someone’s girlfriend? Or someone’s mechanic?”
Well. There was that, he supposed.
“And they don’t even like people asking about them?”
“Do you like people asking about Ultor?”
Hm.
“No. And neither do they.”
She shifted. Her left arm was out of a sling now, but she was still careful with it.
“Do you work for the gangs?” he asked.
She narrowed her eyes at him.
“I always figured…” he said, “…when you were doing ‘deliveries’ – I thought it was probably for the gangs.”
“No, Dane,” she said. “I try to stay out of it.”
She stared at him, suspiciously.
“Why are you asking about them?”
He opened his mouth and she glared.
“Don’t bullshit me!”
He closed it again.
“Ultor’s expanding across the river,” he said. “I want to know what it’s like over there, on the streets. How the gangs run things. So we can make a plan.”
She stared at him for a second. Then laughed harshly and turned away, running a hand up into her hair.
“Christ,” she said.
Silence, for a minute. She turned back to him.
“You want my advice? My advice is: don’t do it.”
He gave her a patient look.
“That’s not an option, Darcy.”
“How the fuck is it not an option?” she demanded. “You’re doing okay on the North island? You don’t want to lose your people? Or your money? Or everything? Then fucking stay there!”
“We’ve got to expand, Darcy – if we don’t expand, we die.”
“You’ll die south of the river!”
She turned. Grabbed at her hair again.
“You’ve got no idea what it’s like, Dane.”
No. He didn’t.
“That’s why I’m asking,” he said.
She turned and pulled a face at him. Then scoffed.
“People live there,” he said. “You live there. It can’t be that impossible to manage.”
“I grew up there. I know how to deal with it.”
“Yes, that’s why I’m – ”
He stopped and ran a hand over his face.
“We’re going round in circles.”
Another stretch of silence. She looked at him helplessly.
“Ultor’s going to expand, Darcy,” he said. “You can’t just hold back all the time because there’s gangs. You can either help with it, or don’t.”
She stared at him. Then screwed up her face.
“You want my help, Dane? Insure everything, and don’t send anyone you like to work down there.”
She stared at him again for a minute. Then turned and stormed out of the room. He heard his front door slam.
He leaned back against the minibar. Well, that went well.
8.
He didn’t call her – wasn’t sure if she’d want to hear from him, how they’d left it. Eventually she called, impatiently. Asked if he wanted to meet up. Didn’t mention the Sharks tickets. He said it was okay by him. He huffed on the other end of the line, and ground out a date.
When they met, she was still glaring at him. Like he was being difficult.
“So what did you think of the apartment,” he asked, smiling.
She blinked, surprised. Then slowly, rolled her eyes at him.
“It was great,” she said, looking down at her menu.
“Was it everything you expected?”
“No,” she said, mock-sweetly. “I thought it’d look more like an office.”
He smiled at her. She looked up and eventually, smiled back.
He didn’t ask about the gangs again. He relied on his police contacts, and some established South island businesspeople. What he gathered, essentially, was that the gangs did things differently down there. There were gangs everywhere, of course – even he’d heard of Ben King – but on the South island they were a little more open about things. Getting decent insurance wasn’t actually bad advice – the Stilwater P.D. backed Darcy up on that one. He figured out which the most dangerous, tumultuous neighbourhoods were – Saints Row was among them – and made a plan that avoided them, to begin with.
But just opening an Ultor store down there would be like throwing a watch into a blender. It was a like a warzone – Darcy had the shrapnel in her arm to prove that. Add onto that the amount of ‘protection’ they’d have to pay if they started doing well…it was a daunting prospect.
What they needed was a way to establish themselves that wasn’t first and foremost about money. Something public. Something that would make the gangs think twice about coming after them openly.
He considered a few PR stunts. But as luck would have it, he found out Stilwater Arena was looking for sponsors. And offering naming rights.
It was perfect. But it was a big ask. Ultor wasn’t in sports, and it was a big investment for very little immediate return. But the amount of publicity it would give them – even the people who didn’t appreciate it would know about it. Even people who didn’t buy from them – yet – would have Ultor’s name on their lips. And the sports fans – he remembered sports fans. All that loyalty, and devotion, just waiting to go anywhere. Anywhere they were promised a win. And there were a lot of sports fans in Stilwater.
His superiors were still dubious, but he convinced them. Apart from anything, it would give them an easy segue into sportswear.
He didn’t tell Darcy. Let her find out from the newspapers like everyone else. After it was announced, she turned up to their next meeting giving him a cynical look. But he swore, underneath that, she looked impressed.
9.
Three years since they’d met, and Darcy had still never stepped foot in an Ultor store.
“Don’t you trust me?” he asked.
“Your t-shirts are $20,” she said. “From what I hear. I’m good, thank you.”
He looked down at her outfit. It was basically the same one she was wearing when they met. There were holes in it.
“Where do you shop?” he asked.
She looked up at him, smirking around a bite of her burger.
“Sloppy Seconds,” she said, swallowing.
He controlled the wince. She enjoyed it anyway.
“You’d look really good in our new autumn range,” he told her.
She stopped for a moment, and seemed to consider.
“How do you feel about shoplifting?”
He blinked at her. Then laughed. She grinned back.
“I’ll consider it a test of our security,” he said.
10.
At their next lunch, Darcy was wearing Ultor sunglasses and a big smile.
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Title: Running Deep
Fandom: Saints Row series (video game)
Pairing: None, F!Boss + Dane Vogel gen
Wordcount: 34,396
Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, mentions of violence against sex workers, mentions of death, the two main characters are sociopaths and they don't live in a fun world.
Disclaimer: I don't own the Saints Row universe and I'm not making any money off this.
Summary: Hell is what you make of it.
1.
It was a beautiful day, and he was going for a swim, as usual. Normally he just used the pool in his apartment block, but at weekends he liked to go down to the beach and get out in the open water. He’d found a great little cove a few months back – it was big, it was clean, and it was usually completely empty.
Usually. Today there was someone in dark clothing and a blue cap hunched up against the rocks. They shifted when he looked over at them, hunching up. Probably a transient. He sighed. This was the downside of coming out to swim. He left most of his cash at home. He’d just have to do without the wallet if he needed to.
He stripped down to his trunks and waded in. There was a current today, which was nice. Something to brace against. He started doing his usual lengths of the beach.
He heard the engine just in time to look around and see the jet ski whizz by him, just missing his head by a hair’s breadth. Then all he could see or feel was water, as the wake of it flipped him around and dragged him down.
By the time he stopped spinning, he was completely disoriented. His limbs felt like lead. He kicked, trying to right himself. The current pushed against him. He realised he didn’t know which way was up – couldn’t get his body parts to move in tandem with each other. There was water in his mouth, he could taste salt at the back of his throat. The current was moving his hair, but he didn’t know which way he needed to move. He kicked harder. He still couldn’t tell where the surface was. His lungs started burning, fighting for air that wasn’t there. He kicked again, and just thought he could see sunlight sparkling above him as he finally had to open his mouth, and then everything was wet, and then everything started to go white…
And then he was coughing, coughing and coughing and coughing. He felt like he was going to cough his throat up. He pulled in a ragged breath and it was air, nothing but air. He fell back and let it fill his lungs, over and over again.
He could see light, and hazy shapes coming through it. Blue. The blue was bobbing about, making him feel dizzy. He closed his eyes again. He could feel something warm on his shoulder. And grit under his neck and back.
Sand. He was lying on sand. The sun was blazing into his eyes. He put up a hand to shield against it – a hand that was feeling increasingly shaky. There was someone leaning over him. The warm thing from his shoulder disappeared. He could make out eyes, and blue. A hand suddenly ran through it, and he realised it was hair. It was a girl, with green eyes, staring down at him.
“I’m gonna go for help, okay?” Her voice was pounding and distorted. Then she was gone. There was a slight spray of sand over him.
He let his hand fall back to his side. Every muscle in his body was screaming at him. He swallowed again, and tasted salt.
Goddamn it.
By the time the girl got back he’d managed to sit up. She flopped back down next to him, and stared worriedly at him. He did a small double-take when he noticed the great scar on her cheek. If she noticed, she didn’t say anything.
“Are you alright?” she asked. Her accent was harsh, but her voice was uncertain.
He nodded, and swallowed against the burning in his throat.
She tucked her hair behind her ear. It was dripping wet.
“Paramedics will be here in about ten minutes.”
Damn it. He was gonna have to go to the hospital, and fill in a bunch of forms. That was the day gone. He could probably still make the company bowling night, though.
He looked back at the girl. She was still staring at him, in an odd mixture of worry and awe. It was hard to tell her age past the insanely coloured hair and distracting scar, but he’d put at somewhere in the teenage years.
She’d saved him.
He was lucky she was there, he supposed. He looked down at her, at her white vest and tattooed arms. He could see her bra through the wet vest. She was still just staring at him.
Clothes. Where were his clothes? He looked around, and saw the folded pile down the beach, and his towel.
“Could you get me my clothes?” he asked. “Please.” His voice was scratchy, and he coughed again.
She sprang up, and jogged around him. She grabbed the clothes roughly, and came back and handed them to him. Then she stepped round him and wandered the other way down the beach. He watched her as she walked around a little bit, and then picked up a dark pile of her own, and then a shoe, and then another from by the waterline.
He dried himself off with his towel. He wasn’t injured, as far as he could see. His arms were starting to shake though. He put the towel down and ignored the rest of his clothes. He could still taste saltwater when he swallowed. He spat.
The girl came back, up close to him, and started putting on a dark, ragged hoodie, what the dark pile had turned out to be. He offered her his towel, which was still partly dry, but she waved it off. She sat back down and put her trainers on. They also looked like they’d seen better days. He wondered if she really was a transient. She kept looking up at him, eyeing him like he was going to disappear. She sat back and studied him, up and down. Then she looked like she was sort of in awe again.
He was grateful, really, but he sincerely hoped this wasn’t going to turn into another teenage crush. The least he could do was be polite about it, he supposed.
There was a noise from behind them, and her head whipped around, fists balling. He looked himself, and it was the paramedics, picking their way down the rocky path. When he looked back, her fists had unclenched.
When the medics arrived, she stood up and stood back, watching, fists clenched again. He realised he’d never asked her name. But he was busy with the paramedics now. They gave him a basic check-over, even though he insisted he was fine, that this great girl – he gestured to her and she stared stonily at him – had helped him. They had to help him to his feet, to his chagrin, and insisted he come to the hospital for a proper check-up. He agreed, begrudgingly.
One of the paramedics turned to the girl, still wet, and asked if she needed to be checked over too. She shook her head, defensively, stepping back. No insurance, probably. She gave him one last hard look – that turned a little soft towards the end – and then turned and walked off up the beach, hands jammed in her pockets. By the time he and the paramedics reached the top of the path, there was no sign of her.
2.
It was a month later when he saw her again. He was back at the cove, going for another swim, and as he reached the sand he looked around and saw that same dark shape topped off with blue. She hunched up a little when he looked at her – and then sat up. She paused for a second, uncertainly. Then gave a half-wave.
Damn it. If he was going to see her again, this was going to get awkward. And he hated leaving a debt unpaid. He hesitated for a moment, and then walked over to her.
She tensed up as he walked over to her, but didn’t stand. She had her fists clenched again by the time he got over to her. The scar was somehow bigger and smaller than he remembered.
“Hi,” he said. She just stared at him. “I never properly thanked you for saving my life. So - thank you.”
She shrugged, uneasily. Looked him cautiously up and down.
“It’s alright,” she said.
“Is there anything I can do? To thank you?”
She frowned, very slightly.
“I don’t want anything from you.”
Hmm. He looked around the beach, thinking.
“How about this – I’ll buy you lunch,” he offered. “It’s the least I can do.”
She still looked uneasy, and sort of annoyed. She studied his face for a moment. Then she shrugged, looking off to one side.
“Alright.”
“Are you free now?” he asked. “After I swim?”
She looked past him at the water.
“You’re going back in?” she asked, a little incredulously.
He’d been back in the following week.
He nodded. She stared at him, then quirked a little smile.
“You’re brave,” she said.
“Thanks. So – are you free? Now?”
She seemed to debate it for a minute, then nodded.
“Great,” he said. “Wait till I’m finished and we’ll go.”
He turned and walked a little way down the beach.
“I’ll keep an eye on you,” she called after him.
Ha ha ha.
He had the uncomfortable experience of stripping off while she was still behind him. He forced himself not to look back. He didn’t look back while he waded out into the water, or when he started his lengths. He did glance back at the beach during a short pause though, shaking the hair out of his eyes. She seemed to be leaned forward, arms around her knees. Watching him.
He finished his lengths – no problems this time – and came back out. He dried himself off and got dressed again. He walked over to her and she stood up, jamming her hands into her hoodie pocket.
She stared at him, a little warily, past the hair and the scar. He realised he still didn’t know her name.
“I never introduced myself,” he said. “I’m sorry – it’s Dane. Dane Vogel.”
He held out a hand for her to shake, and she stared at it, like it was potential weapon. She looked back up at him. He remained unthreatening. After a moment, she took one of her hands out of the pocket and shook it, cautiously.
“Darcy,” she said. She let go of his hand immediately and put her own back in her pocket.
“Great!” he said. “Where d’you want to go?”
~ ~ ~
Freckle Bitches, was where she wanted to go. He forced himself not to cringe. It’s not like he’d never been before – he took plenty of young athletes during his days as a sports agent, trying to hash out contracts. He’d just hoped those days were over.
At least the money he’d brought out with him would probably cover it. He’d rather not go back to his apartment and have her see where he lived.
She led him to one just a few blocks over. As they went in, he caught her smiling at him slightly. Like she was enjoying his discomfort.
He put on his biggest, brightest smile for the greeter. She looked a little dazed.
“Table for two, please,” he said.
She led them over to a booth, nearly dropping the menus as she did. Take took a seat, throwing his towel down beside him, and looked up to see Darcy grinning slightly at him again.
He was glad this was very amusing for her.
He could see her eyeing him from over her menu as he looked over his. Clearly waiting for him to crack. He didn’t give her the satisfaction. Just calmly picked out a salad and put the menu down.
She turned back to her own menu, fully, and he took the time to study her. The scar on her cheek was shiny, probably a few years old. Her dye job was patchy and harsh. There was dirt under some of her fingernails. But he still remembered muscles, on her arms, when she’d sat there in her vest. She didn’t look like she was starving.
She threw down her menu, and looked up at him, a little challengingly. Still smirking. Yes, this was an awkward situation and he was slumming it. He had faith that they could get through it, together.
She gave him another one of those little up-and-down glances he didn’t quite understand. It wasn’t like how people looked when they were attracted to him. Or when they thought they could take him for a small fortune. He didn’t understand it. It irked him.
The waitress came back as soon as they put their menus down, and he ordered his salad and orange juice. Darcy might not have been starving, but she ordered enough to feed a horse – a burger he didn’t want to think about, and a couple of sides. He wondered if she was trying to bleed him, or if she was just stocking up while she had a free lunch. Maybe this was just her usual meal. The waitress took the menus, and then they were alone together.
She was still looking at him a little challengingly. Hands still in her pockets. He struck up a conversation, because that’s what he was good at. It turned out she wasn’t homeless, she was a student at the nearby – ‘college’. He wouldn’t have thought she could afford it. She was studying mechanical engineering, apparently, in her second year. He figured he was right about her being a teenager – he put her at about 19. Ten years younger than him.
She’d lived in the city her whole life, grown up in Saints Row. She watched him a little carefully while she said that. He didn’t know what she was waiting for. All the neighbourhoods South of the river were the same to him.
She looked at him blankly when he mentioned Ultor. He explained it was a clothing store, and got a vague spark of recognition. He couldn’t exactly blame her –Ultor was sitting pretty squarely in the middle of the market. Not affordable enough for just anyone to shop there, not fancy enough to be instantly recognisable. It was a good position to grow a business from, though. He was hoping to be a high street staple within three years.
He glanced down at her hoodie, as they were discussing it, and suddenly realised that it wasn’t actually all black, it had a faded logo on it. He squinted, and realised it was the Stilwater Sharks.
“Hey, are you a fan of the Sharks?” he asked. She just looked at him, then down at the hoodie. “I could get you tickets, if you want – I used to be a sports agent.”
The smile suddenly dropped from her face.
“I don’t need anything from you,” she said. Hissed.
He stared at her.
“I get them for free,” he said. He held her gaze. “It wouldn’t be some big favour – it’d be a phone call. You did save my life after all.”
She frowned at him, and then huffed and stared moodily at the window. Dane had to fight the sudden urge to laugh.
Their food arrived, which broke the tension. His orange juice was as bad as he remembered. He should have gone with tap water – can’t get that wrong. The salad looked oily – Freckle Bitches’ dressings left a lot to be desired, as usual – but he picked at it. Darcy dug into her burger with abandon.
Eventually the conversation got going again. He asked her about her family. She looked a little cagey about that, but said her dad lived in the city, and her mom worked out of it. She had an uncle and a cousin, also in the city. No-one else, from what he could tell.
She looked up at him testily.
“You?”
He smiled, and told her the truth. His parents lived in California. No siblings, one aunt, no cousins.
It wasn’t often he had casual conversations with the less fortunate, and she surprised him. She didn’t seem to be hedging her answers in any way, or ashamed of her background, even when he talked about his. She didn’t seem envious either – she didn’t even seem impressed. She wasn’t intimidated by him – which was odd, because he couldn’t even name a lot of his co-workers that weren’t that. And then sometimes he’d catch her looking at him with this sort of – fondness. A surprisingly genuine warmth, and the slightly patronising expression adults tended to have on their faces when they listened to a child describe their day at school. He should have been annoyed by it – was, a little – but was mostly too confused for that. And every now and again, those little flickering up-and-down glances. Then she’d go right back to looking smirking, or looking unimpressed.
He prided himself on being able to read people. He’d studied body language and tone of voice for years. But he couldn’t get a read on her. It irked him.
She asked about his job in that everyman sort of way (“so what do you actually do?”), and he tried to explain without making it too complicated, or giving away any actual details. She looked at him blankly through a lot of it, but certain concepts – like increasing market share and asset-stripping – seemed to click, and made her grin.
He asked about her course, and she said something about ‘liking cars’. He pressed her a little, and she turned out to know a hell of a lot about engines. It was actually quite impressive, although she didn’t look impressed. She even understood some basic things about construction. He asked her what job she wanted when she was done. She just looked at him.
He realised, as the meal was coming to an end, that he’d been waiting for her to ingratiate herself, or hint that she wanted cash. But she hadn’t. At all. She didn’t even want the goddamned Sharks tickets he was offering her.
He called for the check, and paid it. The waitress was still blushing. Darcy smirked at him. They got up and left, and she glanced around the street like she was already waiting for permission to go.
He studied her for a second, then made a decision.
“Give me your phone,” he said.
Her head whipped back round to his and she narrowed her eyes suspiciously.
“Why?” she asked.
He held out his hand, gently – no sudden moves. She stared at it.
“Just give me your phone, please. I’m not gonna steal it.”
She stared at him suspiciously for another moment, but then awkwardly shifted. She took out her phone, doubtfully. He reached out and took it.
He tucked his towel under one arm and opened her phonebook. He put in his number, under ‘Dane’. He gave himself a missed call and felt his phone buzz in his pocket – he’d assign ‘Darcy’ to the number later.
“That is my number,” he said, handing her phone back to her. “If you change your mind about those Sharks tickets, just give me a call. Honestly – it’s no trouble at all.”
She frowned down at her phone, then up at him. And then put it back in her pocket.
“Goodbye, Darcy,” he said. Turning slightly to leave.
She gave him another one of those up-and-down looks. And then stared right in his eyes.
“Goodbye, Dane,” she said. And then turned, uncertainly, and started walking down the street. She didn’t look back.
3.
He honestly didn’t think he’d hear from her again. When he was checking his phone two months later, and saw a missed call from ‘Darcy’, he had to take a moment to remember who it was.
He called her back in his office.
“Hey,” she said, sounding vague.
“Darcy?”
“Yeah.”
“You after those Sharks tickets?” He sincerely hoped she was.
“You get them for free, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then yeah. Could you hook me up?”
Only a matter of time then. He pulled a pad of paper over towards himself.
“Sure,” he said. “When?”
“This Saturday?”
Well, that was a stretch, but it was doable.
“Sure,” he said. “Do you care where you sit?”
“Not at the back.”
Obviously.
“How about middle row, on the right?”
“Sure.”
“Great. What’s your address?”
A pause.
“Darcy?” he asked.
“Can I pick’em up?”
“You don’t have an address?”
“I have a dorm room, but I’m not there much. I don’t trust my roommates with my mail. If I can’t pick them up it’s alright, it doesn’t matter.”
He tapped his pen on the pad. He hated awkward deals.
“How about this –” he said, “– I’ll meet you somewhere and hand them over?”
Another pause.
“It won’t be too much trouble?”
“It won’t be any trouble at all. It’ll have to be late though.”
“Okay. When?”
“I should have them by Thursday, so say Thursday? At nine?”
“Sure. Where?”
“Where do you want to meet?” He wasn’t meeting her at any of his usual places.
She sucked in a breath.
“Freckle Bitches?”
Naturally.
He rubbed the bridge of his nose.
“Great,” he said. “I’ll see you then. Call me if you need to change the time or something.”
“Yeah,” she said. There was a rustling, and then she paused awkwardly. “Thanks.”
She hung up the phone.
Well. He did give her his number. He picked up his office phone, and punched in the number for the stadium.
~ ~ ~
On Thursday at 8.55 he pulled into the parking lot. She wasn’t there – she must be inside. He got out and clapped his hands together. It was getting colder again. He hoped she wasn’t expecting another meal.
He entered the restaurant and saw an unmistakeable shock of blue in one of the booths. He walked over, to see her nursing a half-empty glass of cola. She smiled as she saw him approach. The scar glistened in the fluorescent lights.
“Two Sharks tickets,” he said, pulling the envelope out of his coat pocket and slapping it lightly down on the table. “Block 8, middle row, aisle seats.”
She pulled the envelope over and checked the contents, before putting it back down on the table. Clever girl.
He paused.
“I’m going to that game, actually,” he said. “I’ll be with a client though, so I won’t be able to talk to you.”
She looked up at him, a little bug-eyed, like she’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.
“What?” he asked.
“Um,” she said. “Well – I was gonna scalp’em.”
He blinked at her.
“I mean, you said you got them for free, I didn’t think it’d be a problem.”
He stared at her for a minute. And then laughed.
Well. He couldn’t fault her entrepreneurial spirit.
“No,” he said. “No. That’s not a problem. Just, uh – just try not to sell them to any hooligans, or neo-Nazis. That stuff gets back to me.”
She gave him a mock-offended look, and then smiled, and put the envelope away in her hoodie pocket.
He tapped his fingers on the table. Looked around the restaurant. And then sat down in the booth, opposite her.
“How’s the course?” he asked.
“It’s alright,” she replied, smiling. It dropped for a minute, and she gestured the tickets in her hoodie.
“You want a cut?” she asked, genuinely.
“No.” He waved her off. “I’d scalp them myself if was that interested. You keep it.”
Another grin. She looked down at his empty hands on the table.
“You want a drink or something?” Her face went a little hard. “I’m buying.”
“No thank you.”
“You sure? Coffee or something?”
The memory of Freckle Bitches coffee literally made him wince.
“No,” he said. “No caffeine after noon.”
She frowned at him for a second, as if waiting for the punch line. It didn’t come. She looked away.
She was wearing that same black hoodie, unless she had a series of them. No gloves. It was cold out tonight.
“You going anywhere after this?”
“Party, maybe.” She shrugged. She looked him over, and her eyes suddenly narrowed.
“You working late?” she asked, glancing at his suit.
“Yeah,” he replied.
“Not to meet me?”
“No,” he said. “I work late most nights.”
She frowned.
“Why?”
He shrugged.
“To get things done.”
She still looked dubious.
“Like what?”
“Paperwork.”
She stared at him for a second. And then laughed, a little, looking away.
He glanced out the window. His car was on the other side of the parking lot. If he’d known he’d be staying for a bit, he’d have parked closer.
“Don’t worry,” she said.
“What?” he asked. She had a sly smile on her face.
“No-one’s gonna take it,” she said. “Not out here.” He paused. Waited for her to continue. “It’s too lit up, and the police come by too regularly.”
“You saw me come in?”
“Yeah. Not many Socialites in this neighbourhood. 2001 model?”
“Yeah.”
“Nice,” she said. Then shrugged. “A little basic.”
“It’s a company car,” he said. “There’s not much I can do with it.” Not that he would.
She smirked at him.
“You getting your grades?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“What are you working on now?”
“Materials.”
They got onto talking about the other students at the university. Darcy didn’t seem terribly involved in student culture, but she knew what the other kids were into. It was like free market research. He got the feeling she knew what he was doing, but she just smiled at him, and kept answering questions. Gave him one of those up-and-down looks again.
They were there for about an hour. Then he really needed to go – had to be up for work the next day. Darcy handed a crumpled set of bills to the waitress as they passed the till, from right out of her pocket.
“You should get a wallet,” Dane suggested.
“Then people know what to steal.”
Cold hit him as he stepped out into the parking lot. Darcy didn’t seem to notice it.
“How you getting home?”
“Train,” she replied, shrugging.
He paused.
“Is that safe?”
Not that he really cared. He assumed she knew what she was doing.
She gave him a grin.
“I’ll be safe,” she said.
He looked at her for another moment. Then smiled.
“Get a good price for those tickets,” he said.
“I don’t take bad ones,” she replied, turning away.
He smiled as he walked back to his car.
~ ~ ~
That Saturday, at the game, he looked over at the seats he’d gotten her. Two young women were sat there, looking around, star-struck. He smiled.
4.
She called him the next month for more tickets, and he didn’t mind. She’d saved his life after all. And somehow it became a regular thing. They’d meet up, at the same Freckle Bitches just to keep things simple, and he’d hand over some tickets and they’d talk. Eventually he suggested they have lunch again, just so he wouldn’t be planning it around his late nights. He considered trying to change the restaurant, but then he imagined taking her somewhere he actually liked eating. Somewhere people might see him. Between that and her scornful looks, he decided to leave it as it was. sometimes, but between her scornful looks when he mentioned anywhere more
They talked about her course, and his job. It was kind of nice, actually, discussing things with someone who wasn’t probably after his job. She gave him a few more tips on parking his car. It wouldn’t get stolen somewhere like Saints Row, apparently, because a Socialite would be too noticeable to drive around in. He’d lose most of the parts pretty quickly though. Somewhere like the University campus, it’d probably get taken for a joyride as soon as someone drunk enough came along – he’d get back pieces of it, if not the whole thing. The worst place was apparently Downtown, after dark. There it’d just be gone completely.
They talked about what she was learning – she had a real grasp of mechanics – and about new cars coming out. Dane didn’t care, but Darcy knew what she was talking about, and there were always car people around Dane might want to impress.
And then there was the day he accidentally locked his keys in his car, after a very busy week at work. He was standing there, kicking himself and trying to figure out what to do. Darcy looked at him, then around the street, and then bent over the door. She got it open in a couple of seconds. He looked at her. She looked back, smiling slightly. He revised some of his ideas about ‘Mechanical Engineering’.
They talked about the Sharks, who Darcy followed on TV even though she never went to a game. She didn’t have much head for strategy, but she seemed to enjoy the raw aggression well enough. It reminded Dane of his days as an agent. People were always so happy to be enthusiastic about sports.
When it became clear she didn’t care at all about the world of high finance, or largely understand it, Dane shared a little more about what he did at Ultor. He asked her not to tell anyone else, and she gave him a genuinely offended look. Still. She did seem to like hearing about him screwing people over.
She told him about fights or arguments she was having with people, what she was gonna do if they kept stepping up to her. That was kind of fun too.
The continued free market research was also nice. She always smiled at him a little when he was doing it. He asked her once if she minded, and she shrugged and said “the customer is always right, right?”.
She said if he ever wanted her face on a line of t-shirts, to just let her know.
They met up throughout the next summer. She apparently stayed on campus, and made some very vague references to ‘work’ she was doing to pay for it.
The third year of her course began, and he got a surprise one day when she came in wearing a letterman jacket, black and gold, rather than the old Sharks hoodie. He asked her what her sport was, and she grinned and told him how well she could swing a bat.
~
She’d turned up with split knuckles and split lips sometimes, or the fading remnants of a black eye. And of course there was the scar. But he didn’t actually see any violence from her until about a year after they met.
They couldn’t find a time to get lunch, so they’d met up late, and he was walking across to the subway station with her, finishing up a conversation. When suddenly, as they came around the bottom of the stairwell, a man jumped out from under the stairs.
“Give me your money!” he said, holding a gun on them shakily.
Dane paused. Well – this wasn’t an unusual situation, in Stilwater. He glanced at Darcy.
Which is when she jumped forward in a blur, grabbing the guy’s arm. She did something Dane couldn’t follow, but the mugger cried out in pain and she ended up with the gun. She snapped the safety off and aimed it at him.
“Give me your money,” she said.
The man stared at her, wide-eyed, hands in the air. She gestured sharply with the gun barrel, and his eyes bulged out and he started scrabbling around in his pockets. He pulled out a few filthy-looking bills and threw them on the ground in front of her.
“All of it!”
“That is all of it!” the man cried, his voice high-pitched. “I swear!”
“Give me your shoes.”
Dane looked at Darcy. She looked cold, and completely serious. And angry, burningly angry, underneath it all.
The man stared at her, for a second, open-mouthed. Then started scrambling to take off his trainers, trying to bend over and keep an eye on her at the same time. Finally he got them off, and kicked them over to her.
“Get the fuck out of here,” she said, low, dangerous. “Now.”
The man looked frozen for a second, transfixed. Then he took off running, barefoot, down the street. Darcy watched him go, gun still steadily aimed at him, until he was practically out of sight. Then she sighed, lowered it and looked down. She snapped the safety off on the gun and shoved it down the back of her jeans, and then bent down and started collecting the bills.
Dane just stared at her. Wow. Wow.
She finished with the bills and leaned over and actually picked up the man’s filthy shoes. Dane had no idea if she actually wanted them or if they were just some sort of terrible trophy. When she looked back at him, she was the girl he had lunch with again.
She saw him staring down at the shoes.
“You’ve got to make them regret it,” she said calmly.
He studied her for a second.
“You okay?” she asked.
He thought about it – and nodded. He’d barely even been involved.
“Where did you learn to do that?” he asked.
She shrugged and looked away.
“Around,” she said. “It wasn’t difficult. Asshole didn’t even have the safety off.”
She was looking at him, as the train rattled past overhead. He realised she was waiting to see if he still wanted to meet her again. If she’d somehow put him off and this was the end of it.
He thought about it for a second.
“Same time next month?” he asked.
She smiled, crinkling the scar, and looked down at the ground.
“Yeah,” she said. “Yeah. I’ll call you.”
She looked up at him, still smiling.
“You want the gun for the walk back to your car?”
“No,” he said. “Thank you. I’m good.”
She shrugged, and rearranged the back of her jacket.
“See you next month,” she said. She gave him one of those up-and-down looks, smiling, and then turned and walked off up the stairs.
5.
He got a promotion. She grinned viciously when he told her about it. It was strangely gratifying.
They got through another winter, and a spring. And then about a month before Darcy was due to graduate, she got kicked out of college. For fighting. She assured him that the other guy came off worse, because ‘she had the tire iron’.
She didn’t seem upset about it at all. Dane was disappointed for her though.
“Didn’t you want your degree?” he asked. “You could have gotten a job with that.”
She gave him a look that suggested he didn’t get it. She said she’d learned everything about engines she wanted to know. Then that she’d have to move back to Saints Row. That did seem to give her pause.
The next time they met she had another faded hoodie on.
He prodded her a little bit about possible careers. She just scowled at him. He couldn’t understand why she didn’t have a lick of ambition – her grades had been good, and she knew way more about cars than he did, than a lot of people he knew. Her ability to identify the make and model of a car on sight astounded him.
But she just rolled her eyes whenever he brought it up.
“Well, what about security then?” he asked.
She gave him a slightly warning look.
He wasn’t going to just bring it up openly, obviously.
“You seemed to handle yourself pretty well,” he said lowly. “Professionally, I mean. I’m sure a lot of firms would be glad to have you.”
“Security guards get shot,” she informed him, taking an aggressive bite of her burger.
Well. She wasn’t wrong. Especially in Stilwater. And the fact she apparently got a bit handy with a tire iron probably wouldn’t endear her to a lot of employers. She didn’t give him another inch about careers, so he dropped it.
But it made him think. She had handled herself professionally. Over the next couple of months, he asked a few careful questions about where she’d learned that. That wasn’t something she just ‘picked up’ – she must have been trained. She scowled at him, and gave him a few warning looks, but he wouldn’t drop it.
“My dad was a soldier,” she finally told him, one day. Glancing around the restaurant. “He showed me a few things.”
Dane stared at her.
“Like what?” he asked. It was a perfectly good explanation – but she wouldn’t talk about it…
She shrugged, looking down at her burger.
“Plenty,” she said. “Enough.”
She wouldn’t give him anything else, so he finally had to leave it there.
He wondered if their meetings would tail off now she was living south of the river, but she kept on coming. She was quieter, and a little more guarded, and he never saw that letterman jacket again, but she came, and they kept talking. Although never about Saints Row. They kept meeting up in the suburbs too, the opposite end of the city from where she was now living. But she never complained. So there was no reason to change it.
She kept on doing her roots, month after month, and he finally got the impression the blue maybe wasn’t just a phase.
Ultor expanded well in Stilwater. They were close to having a store in every neighbourhood across the North island, and their profits were steadily going up. He knew roughly what the next five promotions he wanted would be, and Darcy clearly still didn’t understand it or care, but she smiled when he told her about it.
He didn’t know how she lived, or where she lived, besides ‘in Saints Row’. She seemed to mention a different street every time they met. She still mentioned ‘work’ a lot – ‘deliveries’ was her code for it – but she also seemed to have actual jobs. As a store clerk, or a warehouse packer. They never seemed to last though. He mentioned once that he could get her a job at Ultor, if she wanted – nothing fancy, just in a warehouse or delivering stock. She looked at him the same way she always did when he tried to do her a favour. So he dropped it.
6.
Two and a half years after they started meeting, Darcy missed a meet-up.
She was never especially punctual – she was usually either a little late, or had been waiting at the restaurant for a while before he showed up. And it’s not like they were strict about it – Dane had often cancelled their meetings at the last minute for an unexpected work commitment, which Darcy took gracefully. But for one of them to just not show up had never really – happened. She didn’t even call.
He sat in a booth for half an hour. After forty-five minutes he ordered an orange juice, just to be polite to the waitress, who was giving him a concerned look – they recognised him and Darcy here now. He called her. No answer. After an hour, he considered leaving. He left it till an hour and a half.
If she was going to show, she’d have shown by now. And she had his number. He apologised to the waitress, giving her another big smile. She giggled and said it was quite alright.
It played on his mind on the way back to his apartment. He was annoyed, a little, but – it was just so unusual. He figured she’d at least call.
Maybe she’d lost her phone. Maybe she was caught up in something and couldn’t make a phone call right away. Family emergency, or job or something.
She didn’t call over the next few days. He saw a couple of reports on the news about Saints Row. They never really mentioned it in detail – wrong side of the river – but when he paid attention, things sounded…bad.
She didn’t really talk about it. He asked, sometimes, but she’d sit a little more hunched up and mutter something barely audible. A non-answer. She’d been showing up with less split knuckles and black eyes since she’d moved back, and he’d assumed that was a good thing.
On the Monday night, when he got home from work, he loosened his tie and called the Sangre Sedienta hospital. Practised his story in his mind.
“Hi,” he said as reception picked up, bright and little desperate. “I know this is a little out of the ordinary, but…my cousin’s gone missing, and I’m really worried about her. No-one’s seen her in days. Can I just check if she’s there?”
The receptionist was obviously reluctant, but when he mentioned blue hair and the woman’s breath hitched, he knew he was on the right track.
“She’s…she’s there, isn’t she?” he said. He tried to pitch his voice as disbelieving and worried, and for some reason he didn’t have to try very hard. “Please – oh God, is she dead?!”
The woman hesitated
“She’s fine,” she said, lowly. “She’ll probably be back on her feet in a few days.”
“What happened to her?”
She paused again.
“Please, my dad’s worried sick. I just want to know what happened.”
“There was a shooting,” the woman said. “That’s all I can tell you. She wasn’t hurt that badly.”
“Thank you,” he said, trying to make it sound extra warm and relieved. Familial. “Thank you.”
He put the phone down. Tapped his fingers on the desk. Checked his watch. Considered it for a few minutes. Then called a taxi.
~ ~ ~
He marched down the halls of the hospital, trying to look like he knew where he was going. He’d dressed down for the trip, to the best of his ability, but people were still giving him funny looks. He was relatively sure which floor of the hospital she’d be on, so he was just keeping his eye out for blue.
He finally saw it in a private side room, of all places. Maybe ‘deliveries’ paid better than he thought.
He took a quick glance around the corridor. Empty. He slipped inside the room.
Her head snapped up as he entered. When she saw who he was, she looked shocked. Then angry.
“What are you doing here, Dane?” she hissed, as he closed the blinds on the window.
“You weren’t answering your phone,” he replied, turning back around.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she said, looking like she’d be jumping up if she didn’t have an IV in her arm. “You’re gonna fuck me up!”
“You look pretty fucked up already to me.” He eyed her tubes, and the bandage around her left arm, as she slumped back down. She looked – okay though. Not at death’s door. He pulled a plastic chair over and sat down. “What happened?”
She glanced over at the blinds, as if someone might be peeking through them. She still looked pissed. But she looked him in the eyes, letting out a breath.
“I got shot,” she said.
“What – was someone trying to kill you?”
“No, it was – an accident.”
“You were accidentally shot?”
“Yes!” He clearly looked disbelieving. She sighed. “It was a shootout, okay? I took a stray bullet. It happens.”
‘It happens’. Like it was an everyday occurrence.
But then – maybe it was.
He looked over at her arm.
“Is it bad?”
She shrugged, a little stiffly.
“Hit an artery,” she muttered. “Wouldn’t have come in if it wasn’t for that.”
He stared at her. She glared at a wall. He realised suddenly that she was uncomfortable. Vulnerable.
“Where were you?” he asked.
She gave him a look.
“Does it matter?”
“What were you doing?”
She curled her uninjured arm into a fist.
“Nothing,” she said, staring at the wall.
There was a moment of silence between them.
She sighed.
“Look, I’m fine. I’m going to be fine. You need to get out of here. I’ll call you next month – I’m sorry I couldn’t call, the hospital took my phone.”
He stared at her. Her friends probably knew as much about their meetings as his did.
He looked around the room.
“How do you have a private room?” he asked. “I didn’t think you could afford it – do you even have cover?”
She shrugged.
“They always do it with gang stuff,” she said. “So there’s less fights.”
“There’s a gang involved?”
“It’s not – I didn’t see anything.” She waved him off. “It’s just what they do. I’m not in trouble.”
He looked around the room again.
“So they’re not gonna charge you for it?”
She stayed silent, glaring at the floor.
“Darcy…how are you gonna afford it?”
“I’ve got money, I can get more,” she said. “Good morphine’s fucking expensive anyway.”
She looked up at him. He was probably giving her a worried look. Her brow creased.
“Get the fuck out of here, Dane!” she snapped. “You think I’m in trouble now? Wait till someone sees me with an asshole in a $300 coat!”
He watched her. She went back to staring at the wall.
He stood up, replacing the chair in the corner.
“Goodbye, Darcy,” he said. “And it’s $400, by the way. Deceptively simple.”
He turned for the door. Got his hand around the handle.
“Dane,” she called.
He paused.
“You get a taxi here?” she asked, like she was grinding the words out.
“Yes,” he said, looking around at her. He wasn’t stupid.
She seemed to be kicking herself, staring up at the ceiling.
“Don’t wait out front for it,” she said. “Stay in reception. Tell them to call you when they get here. And check their ID.”
He tapped his fingers on the doorframe. Then nodded at her, and left.
He took all of her advice. When he got home, he made a few calls. Paid off her hospital bill from one of his secondary accounts.
7.
They never talked about it, which he was happy with. He wondered if she realised it was him that had paid it, or if she thought it was her fairy godmother or something. One way or the other, he didn’t want to bring it up again. It hadn’t been her fault, so it shouldn’t have been her bill.
She wore a sling to their next couple of meetings, and had to eat one-handed. She was oddly good at it. Out of curiosity, he asked what she’d do instead of going to a hospital – just go to a free clinic or something? His mouth twisted on the word ‘free’, he was sure. Her smile was twisted in response.
“No free clinics on the Row,” she told him, looking slightly feral. “They can’t keep medicine in the building.”
There were a lot of freelance ‘doctors’ around, apparently.
By sheer coincidence, it was around this time that Ultor started getting interested in expanding across the river. The college campus alone was a tempting market, never mind the airport. It was Dane that was in charge of assessing the situation.
And he had a fairly reliable source at his disposal.
So he said –
“About the gangs…”
– one day, while they were eating.
Darcy froze, mid-bite. After a moment she forced herself to swallow, and put the chicken wing she’d been eating back down on the table. Her neck was completely stiff, and it looked like she was only just keeping herself from looking round the room.
“Stop talking Dane,” she said quietly, not meeting his eyes.
“We can’t even talk about it?” he asked, equally quiet.
She looked up at him furiously, and her eyes darted off to the side a little bit.
“Somewhere private, then?”
She looked at him like he was an idiot. He felt like they were suddenly in a mafia movie.
He took one of their napkins and a pen from the inside pocket of his coat.
“What are you doing?” she hissed. She yanked the napkin away from him.
“I want you to come to my apartment,” he said. “We can talk there.”
She stared at him in frustration. He held her gaze. Then tried to take the napkin back again. She pulled it into her lap.
“Call – call me,” she said. She looked at him furiously. Neck still stiff. “Call me later and tell me where it is.”
“And you’ll come?”
Somehow she looked even angrier. But he held her gaze, and eventually she looked down at the table and nodded.
He went back to his salad. After a minute Darcy went back to her food, like she was forcing it down. She moved mechanically. They finished the rest of the meal in silence.
~ ~ ~
He called her as soon as he got home and gave her his address. She didn’t say a word and just hung up the phone.
He told his doorman to expect her. The man gave him a knowing look, and Dane almost laughed. He wondered what he’d think when he actually met her.
He didn’t bother telling him to keep quiet about it. Discretion was part of the job.
At around quarter past seven there was a pounding at his door. He opened it to see Darcy staring furiously at him. She shouldered past him and into his hallway.
“Shoes off, please,” he said.
She gave him an incredulous look. He gave her a measured one. She huffed and yanked her trainers off, dropping them on the floor. Then she waited impatiently for him to kick them against the wall, and take her into a room. She glanced around at the walls.
He led her down to the main room.
“Drink?” he asked, making his way over to the minibar.
“No.”
Straight to business then.
He turned to look at her.
“Why couldn’t we talk about this at the restaurant?”
“Because people are listening, Dane. And they don’t like people asking questions.”
“What, they’ve got ears in every Freckle Bitches?”
She looked mad.
“Can you tell me if anyone in that place was in a gang?”
He blinked. It was colours, wasn’t it? Red or yellow?
“Or someone’s girlfriend? Or someone’s mechanic?”
Well. There was that, he supposed.
“And they don’t even like people asking about them?”
“Do you like people asking about Ultor?”
Hm.
“No. And neither do they.”
She shifted. Her left arm was out of a sling now, but she was still careful with it.
“Do you work for the gangs?” he asked.
She narrowed her eyes at him.
“I always figured…” he said, “…when you were doing ‘deliveries’ – I thought it was probably for the gangs.”
“No, Dane,” she said. “I try to stay out of it.”
She stared at him, suspiciously.
“Why are you asking about them?”
He opened his mouth and she glared.
“Don’t bullshit me!”
He closed it again.
“Ultor’s expanding across the river,” he said. “I want to know what it’s like over there, on the streets. How the gangs run things. So we can make a plan.”
She stared at him for a second. Then laughed harshly and turned away, running a hand up into her hair.
“Christ,” she said.
Silence, for a minute. She turned back to him.
“You want my advice? My advice is: don’t do it.”
He gave her a patient look.
“That’s not an option, Darcy.”
“How the fuck is it not an option?” she demanded. “You’re doing okay on the North island? You don’t want to lose your people? Or your money? Or everything? Then fucking stay there!”
“We’ve got to expand, Darcy – if we don’t expand, we die.”
“You’ll die south of the river!”
She turned. Grabbed at her hair again.
“You’ve got no idea what it’s like, Dane.”
No. He didn’t.
“That’s why I’m asking,” he said.
She turned and pulled a face at him. Then scoffed.
“People live there,” he said. “You live there. It can’t be that impossible to manage.”
“I grew up there. I know how to deal with it.”
“Yes, that’s why I’m – ”
He stopped and ran a hand over his face.
“We’re going round in circles.”
Another stretch of silence. She looked at him helplessly.
“Ultor’s going to expand, Darcy,” he said. “You can’t just hold back all the time because there’s gangs. You can either help with it, or don’t.”
She stared at him. Then screwed up her face.
“You want my help, Dane? Insure everything, and don’t send anyone you like to work down there.”
She stared at him again for a minute. Then turned and stormed out of the room. He heard his front door slam.
He leaned back against the minibar. Well, that went well.
8.
He didn’t call her – wasn’t sure if she’d want to hear from him, how they’d left it. Eventually she called, impatiently. Asked if he wanted to meet up. Didn’t mention the Sharks tickets. He said it was okay by him. He huffed on the other end of the line, and ground out a date.
When they met, she was still glaring at him. Like he was being difficult.
“So what did you think of the apartment,” he asked, smiling.
She blinked, surprised. Then slowly, rolled her eyes at him.
“It was great,” she said, looking down at her menu.
“Was it everything you expected?”
“No,” she said, mock-sweetly. “I thought it’d look more like an office.”
He smiled at her. She looked up and eventually, smiled back.
He didn’t ask about the gangs again. He relied on his police contacts, and some established South island businesspeople. What he gathered, essentially, was that the gangs did things differently down there. There were gangs everywhere, of course – even he’d heard of Ben King – but on the South island they were a little more open about things. Getting decent insurance wasn’t actually bad advice – the Stilwater P.D. backed Darcy up on that one. He figured out which the most dangerous, tumultuous neighbourhoods were – Saints Row was among them – and made a plan that avoided them, to begin with.
But just opening an Ultor store down there would be like throwing a watch into a blender. It was a like a warzone – Darcy had the shrapnel in her arm to prove that. Add onto that the amount of ‘protection’ they’d have to pay if they started doing well…it was a daunting prospect.
What they needed was a way to establish themselves that wasn’t first and foremost about money. Something public. Something that would make the gangs think twice about coming after them openly.
He considered a few PR stunts. But as luck would have it, he found out Stilwater Arena was looking for sponsors. And offering naming rights.
It was perfect. But it was a big ask. Ultor wasn’t in sports, and it was a big investment for very little immediate return. But the amount of publicity it would give them – even the people who didn’t appreciate it would know about it. Even people who didn’t buy from them – yet – would have Ultor’s name on their lips. And the sports fans – he remembered sports fans. All that loyalty, and devotion, just waiting to go anywhere. Anywhere they were promised a win. And there were a lot of sports fans in Stilwater.
His superiors were still dubious, but he convinced them. Apart from anything, it would give them an easy segue into sportswear.
He didn’t tell Darcy. Let her find out from the newspapers like everyone else. After it was announced, she turned up to their next meeting giving him a cynical look. But he swore, underneath that, she looked impressed.
9.
Three years since they’d met, and Darcy had still never stepped foot in an Ultor store.
“Don’t you trust me?” he asked.
“Your t-shirts are $20,” she said. “From what I hear. I’m good, thank you.”
He looked down at her outfit. It was basically the same one she was wearing when they met. There were holes in it.
“Where do you shop?” he asked.
She looked up at him, smirking around a bite of her burger.
“Sloppy Seconds,” she said, swallowing.
He controlled the wince. She enjoyed it anyway.
“You’d look really good in our new autumn range,” he told her.
She stopped for a moment, and seemed to consider.
“How do you feel about shoplifting?”
He blinked at her. Then laughed. She grinned back.
“I’ll consider it a test of our security,” he said.
10.
At their next lunch, Darcy was wearing Ultor sunglasses and a big smile.
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
