Luvici nodded. “Sure,” he said,
reaching for the cigarette he’d set down when they started talking.
It had burned out already. He picked up his pack and tapped out
another one. His hands were still shaking as he sparked it up, but
after one enormous inhalation a sort of calm settled around
him.
“
I just don’t think you
realize all that goes into one of these arrangements.”
Pregnant pause. She had to prompt
Luvici to continue. “As in?”
“
Well, for starters, the
Immigration Department is a real bitch about this sort of thing
anymore. They’ll put you through the ringer. They’ll investigate
every aspect of you and your groom’s lives, including family,
friends, and work acquaintances.”
The family thing struck a
fairly dissonant chord for Lucy. How on earth would she explain
this to her grandmother?
Gram will kill
me...
“
And the penalty for trying
to pull this over on the U.S. Government and failing is steep. Five
years imprisonment and a fine…” He let that hang in the air for a
moment. Lucy felt her mouth go dry.
Prison?
She’d be just like her
father.
Luvici continued. “Then there’s the
mandatory two years you’d have to be married, and living as man and
wife with this would-be suitor.”
“
WHAT?” Lucy’s voice
exploded from her mouth. “Did you say two years?”
Luvici gave her a shrug and raised his
eyebrows. “Two years is the mandatory minimum. Plus you’ll have to
go through the fed’s scrutiny for that entire time.”
Two years...
The thought made Lucy’s stomach churn. That’s a
hell of a long time to pretend to be married to a stranger.
And even if I could make my family believe
it...
“
So, how much are we talking
about here? Payment wise. It would have to be a lot,
right?”
Luvici bit his lip as he mentally
calculated. “I’d say... somewhere between fifty to sixty thousand
dollars.”
There was a zero missing in that
figure. Lucy wanted to go to a good school, the kind that ran
around a quarter of a million dollars to graduate from. Not to
mention she wanted to have nice things: great clothes, an apartment
with a view, and a new car.
Fifty or sixty grand would only get
her to a state college, in a dorm, with a used car. She wouldn’t
even have enough to guarantee she finished.
“
The lump sum of that would
be paid only after the two year...” Luvici paused, obviously trying
to come up with a better word than the one on the tip of his
tongue.
“
Sentence?” Lucy finished
for him. It was the word that was on the tip of her tongue
too.
“
There would be some small
disbursements, but the balance would be withheld until the
end.”
“
Peachy,” Lucy fumed. “So I
sit around playing Little Wifey for two years before I’d get to
even start my life?”
“
Breaking the law isn’t as
easy as it sounds.” Luvici snubbed his cigarette out in the
ashtray, and then cracked his knuckles. “And don’t forget, one
little slip up and Immigration will bend you over until your knees
bend both ways.”
Ewwwww! So freaking
gross...
“Thanks for the
visual.”
Darla’s nasal voice buzzed over the
intercom.
“
Mr. Enoch is on line
one.”
For a moment Luvici looked down at the
phone console on his desk like it was a snake ready to bite him.
Seconds ticked by.
“
Franky? Did you hear me?”
Darla shrieked. “You know I hate talking with that guy!”
Luvici smashed the intercom button
with his meaty forefinger. “I freaking heard you!” he barked. Lucy
could’ve sworn he growled like an animal as he picked up the
receiver and pushed the button for line one. “Dante, I was just
going to...”
The blood drained from Luvici’s face
again. If anything, he was even paler than when Lucy had brought up
Kenny Fry and Luvici’s father-in-law.
“
I know,” Luvici croaked,
hand shaking as he reached for his smokes again. “It’s just... you
can’t find that kind of girl just standing on the street corner. If
you could, then I’d have a freaking chorus line of them for him to
choose from.”
Lucy didn’t hear the voice on the
other end yell or scream, but whatever it was saying to Luvici was
making him shimmer green. Even his eyes seemed to be trembling in
their sockets.
And then he looked at Lucy. He looked
downright surprised to see her. Whoever it was on the phone must’ve
been scary enough to make Luvici forget what he’d been
doing.
I really, really never want
to meet someone like that.
And then Luvici’s eyes got that sharp,
shark-like glint to them again, and his cracked lips peeled back
into a rather disturbing smile. “I think I might just have what
you’re looking for. Can I call you back?” Luvici listened to the
voice on the line, looking fairly anxious. “Sure, I can put you on
speaker phone.”
With the press of a button Luvici set
the receiver on the console and said, “You’re on speaker,
sir.”
“
My name is Dante Enoch,” a
most cultured voice spoke. “Whom am I addressing?”
Luvici gestured for Lucy to
speak.
“
Lucy Hart,” she almost
choked. Then with a quick little cough she said it again. “I’m Lucy
Hart.”
“
Well, Miss. Hart. I’m an
attorney, and I represent the Enoch family’s interests.”
The man’s brittle yet
refined voice made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on
end.
Great, another lawyer...
She looked to Luvici and mouthed,
“Who?”
Luvici shook his head with annoyance.
“Enoch Incorporated has its hands in almost every type of business
you can think of. It’s a multi—”
Dante’s voice cut across Luvici with
an edge of warning. “Let’s just say the family is well
off.”
She wagged a chastising finger at
Luvici, mouthing “Bad boy.”
I wonder if they have one of
their “hands” in the cosmetics industry.
The diamond sparkled in her mind’s eye.
“
What I am looking for, Miss
Hart, is a suitable young lady to play a part of sorts. Have you
had any acting experience?”
“
Sure,” Lucy said to the
chilling disembodied voice. “I was the lead in the last three
end-of-year productions: Clueless, Bring It On, and
Rent.
“
You can sing?” Dante
asked.
“
Nope.”
“
Uh-huh.” His sigh had a
definite edge of disappointment. “Any other experience?”
“
Well, I have had
boyfriends, and they all believed I would sleep with them. But not
one actually got to.”
Luvici groaned and his head fell into
his hands again.
“
Fascinating, Miss Hart. I
can’t wait to meet you.”
The feeling’s not mutual,
creepy lawyer guy.
“
Francis...”
Francis?
Lucy couldn’t stop the smile from blooming across her lips.
Luvici shot her his middle finger.
“
Yes, Mr. Enoch.”
“
The usual place, in let’s
say... an hour?”
Luvici gulped and shot Lucy a look of
horror, looking her over from head to toe. “Of course. No problem,
sir.”
“
Don’t be late.” The line
went dead.
“
Shit!” Luvici growled. He
kept looking Lucy up and down. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”
“
So you’re meeting this guy
in an hour?”
Luvici shot out of his chair and
grabbed his rumpled jacket from a coat rack in the
corner.
“
Not just me.
We’re
meeting
them.”
It was Lucy’s turn to
gulp
. I really don’t want to meet this
guy.
Then Luvici’s words caught up with
her. “Them?”
Luvici held open the door and gestured
with his free hand emphatically for her to get up and get out the
door. “You’re the one who said you wanted an arranged marriage kind
of deal.”
“
Sure, but—” Lucy was on her
feet and Luvici was shoving her out the door and past
Darla.
“
I’ll be gone for the rest
of the afternoon,” he barked at a wide-eyed Darla. “Reschedule all
my appointments.”
“
Do you want me to wait for
you?” Darla’s shrill, laser beam voice suddenly dripped with heat
and honey. Doe eyed, she smiled with what looked like genuine
affection. Either the chick was one hell of an actress, or she had
it bad for her schmuck of a boss.
Luvici stopped and looked at her, his
eyes turning soft, his breathing slowing—even his meaty head cocked
ever so slightly to the side. “This could take a while. But yeah,
would you mind waiting for me?”
Lucy felt like she was watching a real
live Life Time romance of the week movie. And then she remembered
that Luvici, the schmuck, had a wife at home—whether she was
waiting for him with open arms and pot roast, or not.
Yuck…
“
I’ll wait,” Darla said
enthusiastically. “I’ve got loads of filing to catch up
on.”
Luvici smiled, kind of laughed once
under his breath, then turned and dragged Lucy out of the office by
the arm.
Chapter 6
“
LET ME GO!” Lucy hollered,
grabbing hold of the knob of a passing office door for leverage.
Four inch heels were never good for putting on the brakes. Luvici
looked back at her. His eyes had turned back to their previous
glaring mode. “We have to hurry, princess.”
Okay, that’s it! Now he’s
calling me that too...
“
Get off me, you freaking
troglodyte!”
Luvici let go of her arm like she’d
burnt him. He rounded on her and stood there, practically nose to
nose with her. His breath was making Lucy’s eyes water, but she
wouldn’t back down. This guy was just a big bully, and after all,
who’s the one doing the blackmailing around here?
“
I—am—not—a—caveman!” He
looked so pissed Lucy thought he was going to strike her. “I went
to Stanford, just like your old man.” Suddenly his face seemed to
crumble, and she saw that his eyes were getting glassy.
“
Are you going to
cry?”
“
NO!” Luvici roared. But his
face was starting to look like he was indeed getting ready to
cry.
I really don’t need a
blubbering fool right now.
“
I’m not a caveman, the
missing link, or a freaking giant...” His hands were out, palms up,
beseeching. “I’m just big boned, for crying out loud!”
Lucy shook her head, and then switched
to nodding in agreement. “Sure... I totally see that.”
“
Then why’d you say that?”
The hurt in his eyes made Lucy cringe. Where was the nasty,
lecherous weasel who was checking her out just ten minutes
ago?
“
Everyone said that,” he
grumbled. College... even my goddamn wife calls me a
Cyclops!”
“
Oh.” Lucy couldn’t help but
feel sorry for him. Okay, his eyes were a little close together,
but with a little creative eyebrow plucking...
A tear was threatening to leak out of
his left eye. Lucy couldn’t take it if he started to cry
now.
“
So, where is this place,
where we’re meeting creepy phone guy?”
Luvici got back that annoyed
look on his face
. I can handle annoyed,
just not weepy.
“
We don’t call Mr. Enoch
creepy phone guy. So remember that. He’s rich and powerful... hell,
the entire family’s rich and powerful. They all work for the
company. Hell, they are the freaking company.”
“
Okay, okay.” Lucy put up
her hands in surrender. “He’s now only known as Mr. Enoch. So where
are we going? And why were you in such a hurry?”
This prompted Luvici to check his
watch, groaning and swearing under his breath as he gestured again
for me to walk.
“
We’re meeting Mr. Enoch and
his nephew at Caulderon’s.”
Lucy smiled. Her father had taken her
there the day she’d passed her driver’s license exam. And he’d said
they’d go again when she got accepted to Stanford. It was
expensive. They didn’t even serve tap water, only fancy French and
Italian stuff with bubbles.
“
Excellent!” she
chimed.
Luvici started moving down the street
with some real speed. Now that he wasn’t dragging Lucy behind him,
she suddenly had a hard time keeping up with him.
“
Caulderon’s is just a
couple blocks away,” Lucy yelled after him. “Why are you in such a
rush?”
He stopped abruptly and turned to face
her again. Looking down at her he said, “We have to dress
you.”
Dress me? But I’m not
naked...
But then it hit her. Jeans and a
frumpy top weren’t going to impress people who were rich and
powerful, or that frequented Caulderon’s. And then Lucy remembered
that creepy phone guy—er… Mr. Enoch—had said he was looking for a
“suitable young lady.”