Page 30 of Rogue

He took off his watch and handed it to her.

The watch was an analog type with a steel case, and it had a blue face and band. Under the silver hands, there were three little dials, showing the day of the week, the date, and the phase of the moon.

Dree squinted at it. “What, you don’t have an Apple Watch?”

“That’s a Patek Philippe Grand Complications, and it’s worth about ninety thousand dollars, American.”

Dree dropped it like it burned her fingers.

The watch clattered on the counter.

“Oh, my God. I didn’t break it. It’s fine.It’s fine!”

He laughed. “I would hope it could take a fall better than that.”

She gingerly poked at the watch, pushing it across the counter toward him. She finally grabbed a clean napkin and shoved it at him because she worried that her fingerprints would decrease its value. “No. Take it back. I don’t want it. I might hurt it.”

He laughed again, even leaning over. “It’s your insurance that I’ll pay you for services rendered.”

She did not touch that overpriced watch. “Well, then what’s your insurance that I won’t run off with it, and you’ll never get butt stuff?”

He picked up another croissant and buttered it. “Because I’ll pay you more than twice that amount if you stick around until Thursday.”

She considered it. “Okay, but you don’t have to give me your watch. I’m fine without it.”

“No,” he said. “You keep it until I pay up.”

She carefully buckled the leather strap around her wrist on the tightest hole, but it still slipped up her arm. “I’m afraid I’ll lose it.”

“If you do, I’ll still pay you.” He looked up at her and smiled. “You’re worth it.”

Dree didn’t want to argue because that kind of money would change her life and Mandi’s, too. She stuffed a croissant in her mouth so she wouldn’t say something stupid.

Augustine asked her, “Are we still lying to each other?”

She nodded and swallowed the hunk of pastry. “After these four days, we’re done. I have to go home or wherever and go on with my life. This is just an interlude, not real life.”

Real life was sewing up people in an ER and keeping them alive through the night.

Real life was working hard and putting money away in her savings account for a rainy day.

He said, “I seem to know quite a bit about you, despite the lying.”

“That was all lies,” Dree lied. “I’m really a person of ill repute who works for the IRS.”

Augustine chuckled again. “Fine. As you wish. After we’re done eating, pack your things. We’re going to my hotel.”

“Oh, I couldn’t,” she said.

He fixed his dark eyes on her. “Yes, you will, because you’ll do everything I tell you, or else it’s ‘butt stuff’ tonight.”

Chapter Six

Shopping

Maxence

No one had ever argued with Maxence so much in all his life.