Young and Scambitious (A short story) Read Online Free

"take this apart and make something else." Jane knew that right? Domingo had to be paid for this, and they weren't just going to trip over that money on the street.
    " Fine, " Chrysalis said, after what seemed like forever.
    " Can we go back out then?" Jane said, sounding like she was chewing. "I want something cold to drink."
    " I'm going home."
    " So early?"
    " Spending so much money makes me sleepy. Give me the ring?"
    " Here's yours. I'll keep the copy until you're ready."
    " Fine. "
    Wendy closed her eyes but kept her mouth shut, waiting as "Elizabeth" and Chrysalis said inane goodbyes. A car door slammed, its engine roared to life, and then roared itself out of earshot.
    And then she leaped out of the car.
    She found Jane outside the club, still chewing on a chili cheese roll, taking her sweet time. Wendy motioned for her to head back out to the parking lot, toward her, between two SUVs.
    " You're welcome," Jane said.
    Wendy was ready to just let it go. A simple "next time stick to the script please." But seeing the nonchalance, the complete cluelessness, the lack of—
    " You don't do that again, Princess ," she snapped. "You don't go off-script like that."
    " What are you talking about?" Jane said. "She said yes."
    " It's not over until I have the money, and this is not over. You could have shut down the whole thing!"
    " Your price was too low," she said.
    " My price is what we all agreed it would be."
    " You don't understand how she thinks. It's too low. You have to jack it up so she'll believe it."
    " How were we going to pay my supplier if she didn't take the offer?"
    Jane rolled her eyes. "She took it."
    Yes she did. Or at least, Chrysalis said she would. Kind of. No money had changed hands yet. "Don't make calls like that again," Wendy said. "Not when it comes to my shit."
    " I'm sorry," Jane said, not sounding sorry, "but it sounds like you're yelling at me when I actually did something right. So just get it out of your system now."
    " Get what out of my system?"
    " Whatever it is you hate me for. Please, let's have it."
    The real problem with Wendy, and the reason why she would always just be a fixer, was that she was no good at moments like this. She could write the script but not deliver it, and Jane had already turned the conversation against her.
    You're only here because I can't act rich.
    But it was what Jane was daring her to say, and that made Wendy not want to say it.
    "Don't congratulate yourself yet," Wendy said.
     

GABRIEL
     
    He wasn't sure what he would see, which version of her at least, when he arrived at the club. The Asylum Rose was in a part of town that used to be the place to be seen. That might have only been a year ago; now, it was the only establishment on the block that seemed to have any significant activity. He looked up the address before he dropped by and saw past news stories of brawls, shootings, and other modes of disorderly conduct. Of the rich and trying-to-be kind.
    It didn 't seem like the place where he'd see Jane del Mundo again.
    Or Lydia Santiago.
    One of the things he had learned to do in his line of work was not look back, literally and figuratively, but Gabriel risked it when he went back to Jane del Mundo's hotel. After already doing the somewhat-smart thing and not actually having sex with her. Only to discover that she had checked out.
    No, wait. That there had been no Jane del Mundo registered as a guest.
    Didn't she say she was on a month-long vacation? Was the month over? Did she say anything about leaving the next day? Was she actually staying with someone?
    Briefly he wondered if he had gone into a stress-related episode again and had imagined the entire incident, from when he noticed her at the souvenir shop, and again at Non-fiction, and then at Fiction - Thrillers. When she showed up at the same place where he chose to have coffee he wondered if he had finally developed the power to control minds. Or maybe she had been following him.
    He wasn 't going to