AMBER: His to Reclaim

Amber:

“What does everything else mean?”

Cold granite silence. Then…

“Everything else means you’re coming with me.”

My stomach drops. I’m not disabled—that’s what I always insist when I’m invited to speak at schools, classrooms, and programs for the blind. If anything, I tell them, the loss of my sight has made me more ambitious, more intelligent, and more confident than I would have otherwise been if it had remained. Stronger. My blindness has made me stronger than I could have ever hoped to be otherwise. It’s a very inspiring speech.

But Luca has rendered me completely powerless in the blink of a sightless eye. My three years of law school, five years of martial arts training, and six years of occupational therapy all became useless at his negotiation table. Pointless talents that might as well have never been cultivated at all.

He’s no longer the vengeful boy who couldn’t let go of what my father did to him. Now, he’s a ruthless don. And in the end, there’s no real negotiation between us. Only Luca’s display of absolute power.

“You’re going to get up now and walk calmly out of this house to my car,” he informs me as this new reality sinks into my brain. And clever as I usually am, I just can’t come up with a rebuttal to his order. At least not one that won’t put my best friend’s life in danger.

A few minutes after his pronouncement, I find myself in Luca’s backseat. Again. It could be a different car. I’m sure he’s racked up several by now. But I’ve got a sick scene of the crime feeling in the pit of my stomach as we drive off, some “yeah, you fucked up, girl” sixth sense tells me this is the same backseat where we had sex a little over five months ago.

But I’d die before asking him to confirm that suspicion. “Where’s Naima?” I ask instead.

No answer.

“Why isn’t she here?”

No answer.

“What did you do with her?” I demand in my best courtroom voice.

But that question gets answered the same as the others. With a big ball of silence.

He’s also not wearing cologne today, and I can’t even hear him breathing beside me, no matter how much I strain my ears. It’s like sitting next to a statue, emitting nothing but concrete silence as the driver—who didn’t bother to introduce himself this time—ferries us to someplace unknown. Stop and go city streets, intermixed with the short glides and slows of highways. Eventually, we come to a stop.

“This is where you get off,” Luca tells me.

Before I can respond the car door opens and a voice says, “Hey, Amber, it’s Rock. I’m going to help you out of the car now.”

Either Rock’s good with the visually impaired or he read up. Like a perfectly trained boy scout, he places a hand at my elbow before clasping my palm to help me out of the backseat. Then he keeps his hand right below my elbow as he guides me forward.

Though nothing’s been explained to me, I sense we’re in Manhattan based on the late morning quiet of the street I step onto with Rock, and the lack of accent, foreign or New York, from the doorman who lets us into the building with a cheery good morning.

We walk into a lobby, hushed, cool, and crisp. It smells like a modern construction project to me, thoroughly insulated and without any of the musty damp grandma’s attic smell that most of the 20th-century buildings in New York carry.

Rock guides me to an elevator that goes up and up and up for an impossible number of floors. So, either it’s slow, or I’m in a skyscraper. I get the feeling it’s the latter when the doors open on what turns out to be the apartment itself. My mobility cane plinks against marble floors. The real kind, I guess from the dense sound when my stick strikes it. Not the cheaper, plastic laced stuff that’s so popular these days.

“There’s a set of winding stairs coming up,” Rock informs me a few steps into the apartment. “We won’t both fit, so you’ll need to hold on to the handlebar—”

“Where’s Naima,” I demand, interrupting his helpful tip. “I want to be taken to her. Make sure she’s safe.”

A dull electronic thrum interrupts Rock’s answer. Fabric rustles as he pulls his phone out, and then comes a heavy sigh. “I have to take this. She’s already up in her room. First door past the stairs on your right. I’ll let you go alone, but keep in mind, there’s only one way out of this apartment, and we’ve got a guard at both the bottom of the stairs and the elevator 24/7.”

Way over my daily limit for threats, I walk away from his warning, and carefully navigate my way up the tricky stairs. But as soon as I reach the landing, all precaution disappears. I rush to the right, swinging my cane until I hit a door.

Pushing down on the handle, I let myself into a room that already smells like Naima’s citrusy perfume.

“Nai?” I say, hoping it’s not just a lingering scent.

She rushes into my arms, crying. She’s only four years older than me, and the maturity gap has all but disappeared as we’ve gone from a social worker and visually impaired college mentee to best friends, ready to move in together in order to raise my baby.

But right now our original roles have completely reversed. In fact, I feel like a helpless mother, holding her tight as my swollen stomach will allow as I assure her, “I’ll figure a way out of this, I promise you. I’m sorry. So, so sorry.”

I tell her everything. About the unprotected sex with Luca and the “hey, you’re already pregnant, dummy” shocker when I went in for my fertility consult. Naima had been right about one thing she told Stone. That first visit had been out-of-pocket, so I’d ended up paying hundreds of dollars for a blood test that told me I was already pregnant with Luca’s baby.

Basically, our momentary hookup had been a perfect storm of bad timing. After the miscarriage, I’d gone the condom and pill route with Pascoal and never had so much as a scare. But after our break up I’d immediately stopped taking the pill in preparation for fertility treatments. That was just a few weeks before Sylvie’s party, which gave any birth control still left in my system plenty of time to wear off before I accidentally hooked up with Luca in the backseat of his car.

“I was so stupid, and I didn’t know how to tell you, so I just didn’t. But this is all my fault, and I’m so sorry you got dragged into this.”

Strangely, my confession is what stops Naima’s panicked tears.

She takes a deep breath. “No, this isn’t your fault. Who wants to co-parent with a mafioso? I would have kept it secret, too. And now that I know the whole story, I’m glad that azaroso with the gun decided to take me prisoner too. If Luca’s going to straight kidnap you, I want to be here, trying to help you get out of this—not back in Jackson Heights worried to death about you and the baby.”

This right here is why I love Naima. Why I consider her a sister, even though we’re both only children and not related by blood.

“Plus, if we’re going to be kidnapped and imprisoned, this place isn’t bad at all,” Naima says, her voice taking on a new cheer. “Like three of the walls are all window, and the room looks like a five-star hotel! There’s only one bed, so we’ll have to share, but it’s huge! And there’s not too much extra furniture. A few chairs and one of those half-couches, half-loungers—I think they call them settees. Anyway, I can just move them against a wall so they won’t get in your way—”

The door suddenly clicks open, and Naima cuts off with a scream. “Stone’s back!” she says, panicky as she wraps her arms around me.

I shake my head, because Stone’s scent is a whole bunch of soap and “not really here,” without a trace of cologne. But the man who’s entered our room smells more like Luca. Expensive, refined.

“No, that’s not Stone,” I explain to Naima.

“No, it’s him. It’s definitely him. He’s back to kill me now that they’ve got you trapped here!”

Before I can answer her, Rock says, “Hey, hey, don’t be scared. I’m not Stone. I swear I’m not Stone.”

I feel Naima’s body loosen inside my arms. Then she pulls away from me.

“You look just like him,” Naima says. She sounds both cautious and pitiful.

“I know. Have since the day I was born. He’s my identical twin.”

“Oh…” Naima says, her voice becoming even smaller. “Uh…sorry I screamed.”

“No, I’m sorry, sorry he scared you,” Rock answers emphatically, his voice careful and gentle like he’s dealing with a cat too petrified to come down from a tree. “There wasn’t any need for that. Your name’s Naima, right?”

“Right,” she says. And though she’s a thirty-six-year-old woman, she sounds more like a shy teenager now. “And you are…?”

“Rock,” he says, “It’s really nice to meet you, Naima—though of course, I wish it could’ve been over something like dinner.”

She giggles, and I just stand there, stunned. Because I swear, it sounds like I’m back in the Longacre Theatre, listening to Jane and Calogero meet cute in the first act of the A Bronx Tale musical with my assistive app.

After exchanging introductions, Rock and Naima go over the details about packing her bags and mine and bringing them here. Like this is a previously planned vacation, not a total snatch and grab.

“Is it okay if I make a list?” Naima asks shyly. “There are a few extra things I’ll be wanting, including a picture of my parents.”

“Nai, c’mon,” I say. “We won’t be here that long. I’m going to figure a way out of this.”

“Of course, I can make sure we get you that picture of your parents,” Rock answers as if I didn’t say anything. “Just tell me which one or I can have our guys bring over all of them. Whatever you want,” Rock answers. Somehow he sounds more like a concierge than a warden, totally at the bidding of my monstrous ex-husband.

At least he does when he’s addressing Naima. There’s a lot less enthusiasm in his voice, when he informs me, “You should also make a list, Amber. Luca will be having dinner with you tonight and every night from now on, and he says he wants you to cook.”

My brow furrows. “He wants to have dinner with me? And he expects me to cook it?”

“Yeah, he does,” Rock replies. Final answer, as if cooking for my kidnapper should’ve totally been on my list of expected outcomes.

I stand there stunned, and Naima snaps out of her super early case of Stockholm Syndrome to say, “There’s no way Amber’s going to cook for that man. He’s holding her prisoner! Yeah, in a crazy nice penthouse, but still, that’s an outrageous ask.”

However, as Naima protests, my mind works, and after a few moments of deliberation, I come to a decision with an evil inner smile.

“Fine, I’ll cook, just show me to the kitchen.”

Luca:

“Sorry, but the video’s in the wind,” Stone tells me on my secure burner of the month a few hours after Joey drops me off at my Ferraro Disaster Management office, which sits right above the largest of our Jersey-side Hudson River warehouses.

I curse softly because having video evidence of my enforcer pulling a social worker out of her home is the last thing I need.

“Has it shown up anywhere online yet?” I ask as I push out of my chair and go to stand at one of the casement windows that line my work space’s outer wall. This warehouse set up ain’t exactly Holt’s corner real estate at the New York Cal-Mart offices. But hey, at least I don’t have to answer to shareholders. Also, I’ve got a pretty nice view of the other side of the Hudson, which helps to calm me down when I get news I don’t like.

Not today though. A container ship with Chinese characters plastered all over it trundles along in the cold grey water. No logos though, so I’m guessing Chinese mafia. Maybe even those Silent Triad motherfucks who’ve been encroaching on more and more of our territories ever since setting up shop in Rhode Island a few years back. Probably just bad timing for staring out the window to calm the fuck down therapy, but the shit feels ominous. Like a sign, especially when the boat crosses right in front of my Tribeca apartment building in the distance.

Not a skyscraper necessarily, but close enough to be called obnoxious by a few of the residential buildings behind us, who got their view ruined when Zahir and I decided to go in on the building project together.

At the time, I’d wanted something to call my own. A bachelor pad to impress the ladies before kicking them out after sex.

But now I’m using that state-of-the-art real estate acquisition to hold my ex-wife prisoner, because…hell, I’m still not sure why I’m doing this.

There’s revenge, yeah. However, I’m also working the proximity formula again with this dinner every night move. And this time my end goal ain’t nearly as clear as when I went after her like a big game hunter in grad school.

All I’m sure of is that I don’t have any intention of letting her go. She’s pregnant. With my baby. And she lied to me about it. Her duplicity cancels out all previous agreements. That means she’s mine now. Whether she likes it or not.

“Not yet,” Stone answers my question about the video. And he sounds just as grim as me as he says, “Lemme get Rock on the three-way.”

The story doesn’t get much better with Rock on the line. Apparently, Stone and a few of the Ferraro soldiers bust into Amber’s office to find…well, nothing but a cold cup of coffee and one stale cronut still in the bag. There was no sign of the assistant we’re pretty sure caught everything Stone said and did to Naima on tape. Stone phoned Rock, who immediately sent a hacker to join Stone at the office—or as Rock calls it, “hack up.” Meanwhile, Rock and Joey went to case Amber’s place.

Rock was able to use Amber’s laptop to announce to her entire mailing list that 1) she was pregnant, 2) I was the father, and 3) she’d decided on doctor’s orders to take a leave of absence from work for the rest of her pregnancy, and 4) move in with me. So my tracks are covered, but neither Rock nor his best hacker contact could pull anything related to the possible assistant off Amber’s laptop or work computer.

“Whoever set her up with those sunglasses wiped her desktop. They might have even done a remote job on Amber’s laptop, too,” Rock tells me, sounding a little impressed. “I’m still thinking it’s an assistant, though, because according to Amber’s bank records, she’s been sending a bi-weekly direct deposit to an offshore account.”

“Did you guys follow the money?” I ask.

“’Course,” Stone answers.

“But the account’s been closed as of this morning,” Rock finishes with an apologetic tone. “It was probably a bounce-around job anyways.”

“Bounce-around,” I repeat. “You mean her assistant made the account untraceable by running it through a few other accounts?”

“Yep. Total ghost,” Stone answers, his voice more annoyed than impressed.

“For all we know, this assistant of hers is some 12-year-old boy in Singapore,” Rock admits.

“That’s why I hate these dark web assholes,” Stone says. “Nothing to grab and choke to death.”

I almost laugh. Almost.

“But the good news is, whoever was behind the recording doesn’t seem to walk on the same entirely legal side of the street as your special guest,” Rock says. “That means she might not be a threat.”

Stone just harrumphs, and though he doesn’t say it, I can tell he’s thinking his twin’s “on that Pollyanna shit,” again.

“And in other good news,” Rock continues on, as if he can’t hear his brother, “I got hold of Naima’s laptop, too, and fed them a story about her having to go back to Hispaniola to help her parents with an emergency. Her boss agreed to a leave of absence, no questions asked. It was a nice conversation actually. Just goes to show you not all social workers are jaded and burned out. Naima works with good people who appreciate her. And I brought a bunch of things back with me from her house, so she’ll really feel at home.”

“Are you serious with this shit?” Stone asks. “She’s not our fucking guest. You know that, right? She’s a prisoner. Leverage.”

“Maybe. But we don’t have to make her feel like that,” Rock answers.

“There’s no ‘maybe’ about it—” Stone starts to say.

But Rock railroads through his brother’s contradiction to tell me, “Also, Amber’s agreed to cook dinner for you, no problem.”

I squint, and now it’s my turn to question the veracity of Rock’s cheery announcement. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Rock confirms, and I can hear the grin in his voice. “She just made a list and gave it to me. I’m about to go shopping now and take it back to her.”

What the hell? That doesn’t even sound like Amber. I’d expected much more of a fight from her. But before I can question Rock any further, my official phone vibrates once on top of my desk.

With a bad feeling, I saunter back over to my desk to check the iPhone I use for all my legitimate business.

After the Face ID sees me, the “Attachment: 1 Movie” message disappears, and a thumbnail with a play triangle appears on the right side of the notification box.

Fuck… “I’ll call you guys back,” I say, suspecting the worse as I end the call with one hand and open the text to click on the video link with the other one.

My suspicion turns out to be right. A black screen with words “Let her go” appears followed by an edited video of Stone threatening the hell out of Naima.

“Who is this?” I type when the video finishes.

“Give her back, or I send this to the police.”

“Good luck with your fake tape, but I doubt any of my friends will believe it’s real. And I’ve got friends in every borough.” I answer. Not incriminating myself over text but coming as close as I can to saying outright that any police officer she sent that tape to is either on my payroll or knows he will be if he does right by me.

There’s a couple of dots, then…no answer.

But I’ve got the feeling Amber’s ghost assistant isn’t backing down, just not answering. For now, at least. And I’m still not sure if this new issue is a pesky fly or an incoming bomb.

For that reason and more, I’m not exactly trusting Rock’s assurances that Amber easily agreed to my dinner order. But when I walk into the apartment later that night, there’s loud Latin music playing, and I find Amber exactly where Rock said she’d be. In my apartment’s white and ceramic luxury kitchen with Naima and Rock. Rock’s sitting at the counter, but Naima and Amber are shaking their hips to the music as they move pots, pans, and dishes around, rearranging them inside the kitchen’s ivory cabinets.

A renowned design team crafted this particular space to be what our marketing team called “a home cook’s dream” in the brochure. It has chef caliber appliances and a special teppanyaki cooktop, which in most cases means you can cook like a pro while looking out on the Manhattan skyline.

But despite not being able to enjoy the view, Amber seems right at home in the kitchen I only ever use to Ninja Bullet protein shakes in the morning. Or at least she’s in the process of making the kitchen her home. I know that’s what she’s doing because I still remember how she reconfigured the kitchen at both my old Upper East Side place and our apartment in Queens. First things first, even before she unpacked her clothes.

The memory hits me with a pang, see-sawing my icy heart. Because watching her like this. Like she used to be before we fell apart, makes my chest ache with an emotion that’s definitely not in the “make that bitch pay for what she tried to do to you” territory.

I don’t know how to feel about that, or the fact she and Naima seem to be having a ball. Singing along and wiggling their hips to some guy who sounds like a smooth, Spanish version of Justin Bieber. Rock’s into it, too. His head’s bopping right along to the beat, and his appreciative gaze follows the swing of Naima’s wide hips as she restocks all the plates in the cabinet across from the stove.

They definitely don’t look like prisoners, and he ain’t acting anything like their warden.

“Luca!”

The grand old time comes to an abrupt end when Naima sees me standing there on the edge of the open kitchen.

She cuts off dancing, and with the pause of her hips, Rock calls, “Alexa, stop!” to the Amazon Echo device, hanging out on the kitchen’s inner counter, right next to the Ninja Bullet.

Amber turns in my direction just as the music stops playing, one hand jerking up to her belly as if an out of control gorilla has suddenly entered the room, and she’s got to protect it.

And just like that icy rage settles right back in, blasting the memories from our marriage year to pieces.

“Dinner’s not ready yet,” she tells me, her voice carefully level. “Rock and Naima said they weren’t starving, so I’ll start it when we’re done putting away the last of these dishes.”

I don’t answer, just look at Rock.

And he says, “Hey Naima, let’s get out of here. I know a great steak place, just a few blocks walk.”

“No, I can’t. I have to help Amber with…”

“It’s not an invitation, Nai,” Amber informs her.

Naima’s eyes widen, and she looks between Amber and me, before coming back with a quiet, “Oh.”

“I promise I’ll be good company to you,” Rock says, scooting away from the counter and getting out of his seat. “Good food, good jokes. You won’t suffer at all.”

Naima smiles at Rock’s promise, but she eyes Amber worriedly.

As if sensing her hesitation, Amber says, “Go on with him, Nai. I’ll be fine. Seriously.” Her voice is gentle, caring. The way it gets with the select few people she lets in—the way it used to get with me.

“You know you’re the only man other than my father, who I ever loved.” She told me that once. Out of the blue. No special occasion. She just thought I should know. It’s another memory trying to pierce a hole in my ice-covered chest.

“And Luca, tonight’s meal is super simple. Lo mein noodles. You can wait for me at the dining room table, maybe enjoy a glass of wine while I put it together.” The offer is courteous enough, and her face stays composed, bordering on serene. But I can’t tell if she’s serious, or just putting on a front for Naima.

Either way, it works. “Oh, then…okay, I guess,” Naima says, giving in with a smile.

Stone confiscated Naima’s purse, so she just has to grab a coat, and the two of them are gone. Soon after, I take a seat at the dining room table, ignoring Amber’s invitation to pair my wait with some wine.

Usually, I have a glass or two with dinner. But not tonight.

Yeah, I’ve set it up so that Amber has no choice but to stay here with me, and I know there’s nothing she can do about it. But I don’t like how easily she’s submitting to me. I take my seat at the dining table, tense and brittle as an iceberg, sitting underneath and unexpectedly hot sun.

My wariness proves correct when Amber comes out.

A fresh cold front of fury blasts through me when I see the platter in her hands. Lo mein noodles, covered in a spaghetti sauce with a couple of huge meatballs on top.

The same meal she chose as my very last when I was her father’s teenage prisoner.

I don’t like Italian food. To be clear, I used to, just like every other Italian kid who grew up in Jersey with early Sunday dinners after Catholic church. But now I can’t touch the stuff, because it reminds me of that week in the woods. Of Amber’s father beating the shit out of me, then sending in his beautiful daughter with a plate of delicious Italian food, even better than my mom’s and Aunt Peg’s.

Amber knows that. She’s the only person on Earth, other than my twin cousins and parents who know why I don’t touch the stuff.

Fuck you.

That’s what this dinner is. One big plate of fuck you served with an insincere smile.

“Mangiamo!” Amber says, taking a seat across from me.