Over the sleek white desk accented with metal details, Guiliana bent forward, her face lowered.
Across the desk paired a large black leather chair, whose size contrasted the small man who took temporary residence upon it in the day and was now pounding her from the back with his stump. She splayed her hands, like a bobcat ready to pounce, her head turning over the shoulder while a crack of lightning cleft down from the sky.
"What took you so long?" she moaned through clenched teeth.
"I'm sorry, sweetheart," Taylan Dinc panted, baring his teeth, his soft hands gripping her hip. "I dreaded every minute with the old hag, believe me."
"Didn't the race finish at four? Where did you go after that?"
He didn't answer but pinched her. "Moan for me, sweetheart."
She threw her head to the front, her eyes rolling while she kept her face down.
"Louder!"
She obliged, and, making the most of her effort, she faked coming.
Which Dinc took as his signal and dumped himself in her. Her face contorted at the warm glue writhing inside but shuffled her face to a simper the second she turned around, getting on her knees as she cleaned him up with her mouth.
Dinc put on his pants. Plopping onto the plush sofa, he beckoned her to lie on his lap.
"I've heard it on the radio that you've donated all the money you won?" she probed, curling up to him, while the small man traced around her haunch with his hand.
He snorted.
"Already?"
"Your point?"
"Is there a reason you can't keep the money?"
The tracery of wrinkles deepened as Dinc narrowed his eyes ridden with suspicion.
Guiliana quickly added, "I was thrilled when I saw you win! We could have spent it together. I was even thinking about a vacation home!"
The suspicion dispersed, merging into a disdainful grin. "Don't I want the same, sweetheart," he groused, throwing back his head. "But you know how it is. Can't be too careful these days, especially with the proletarian revolution in the Commonwealth. It's safe to stay low, safer when the people perceive us harmless, and not much better off."
Guiliana strangled a snort. A government is to make tough calls when push comes to shove, she thought, not to pose like a saint. The Commonwealth is crumpling exactly because all the pygmies have voted in the men who are afraid to offend. And thank all the gods you're only a minister of health! But she didn't come here debasing herself so she could talk about politics. "You're such a wonderful man, Taylan," she said, her voice so easy and genuine that she might have even believed herself. "You should become a party member and run for the highest office."
A gloating laugh rattled in his throat. "Oh yeah?"
"Mustafa seemed pissed when he saw you win," she baited and waited.
His honey-colored eyes turned steely, brewing a bitter hatred, while words tangled on his lips, of all the dirt he was made to swallow. She could feel them as he glanced up at the night sky and the tumbling clouds hanging heavy. Splits of lightning illuminated the balding trees flouncing outside the window, thunder roaring near and far. He tipped his head to his shoulder and let his eyes travel to the next wall lined with custom-built shelving. A mix of decor and awards was displayed on it – credentials he believed he had earned when he was still a surgeon and could spend half a day admiring.
Believed.
Guiliana chewed on her bottom lip.
Eight years ago, one of the best surgeons in the Republic was killed by a patient's deranged husband after the patient died of cancer. It wasn't after his death did Taylan Dinc came under the limelight, claiming the title of the First World's most renowned surgeon, while all the patients he had failed to treat, he swept them under the rug. But the story didn't just end there.
Guiliana glazed her eyes with a hazy, half smile.
Among all the misfortunes the gods had thrown in her way came one lucky coincidence. The deranged husband lived in the same slum she grew up in. Guiliana traced down the daughter who had moved away to the Third World South after her father's death sentence. Having assumed a new name, the woman now ran a curing house for artisan pork.
Someone had paid them handsomely – so handsomely that the father was willing to sacrifice himself – just as they had paid Guiliana's mother to withdraw her father from the treatment. Guiliana dared not wonder how many times the same scenario had been repeated. But she needed to get to the bottom of it. While she kept telling herself she was doing it to avenge her father, deep down, she had always known it was for herself. Had her father not died, she wouldn't have been sold like a piece of meat. She had given up her dignity, the love of her life, and everything she held dear to come this far. It was her hatred and thirst for vengeance that gave her life purpose, and she couldn't let go of it now.
"I bet Mustafa wouldn't give away a dime," she pushed it.
The hand that was grazing her haunch clenched into a fist. "No shit he wouldn't."
"And yet he said all that to the press!" she hissed with a cry, summoning anger to her voice. "I'm sure he'll donate a generous sum to a good cause – What the hell was that? Why should he care what you do with your money? It's not like he gets to benefit from your donation!"
"Enough, Guiliana," Dinc snapped, grabbing her arm as he held her up. "Don't ever talk about Mustafa like that. You never know if the walls have ears."
Little did he know that the quiet and snide scoff that came and went only seconds before his words were telling enough.
Guiliana batted her eyes. Purring a submissive apology, she noted the chance that Mustafa would indeed benefit from the donation, that Dinc won only because Mustafa wanted him to, because being the renowned Minister of Health, it'd only be reasonable for him – if not expected of him – to donate to a health fund.
The Bellerophon National Health Fund.
That should be her cue.
"You know Sommer Abid?" she asked in her usual air of nonchalance, drawing a lazy hand along his hirsute chest.
"Zahid's wife?" Dinc shot her a downward glance, his double chin folding out. "What about her?"
"She fainted the other night she went out with us. Poor thing, she didn't have a sip but just wanted to be around people. I was thinking maybe I should check on her tomorrow after work. We do need the DEA to comply with us from time to time after all." She culled her words catering to the small man's big ego.
Dinc sighed through his nose. The profits he made from and with the pharmaceuticals hinged on how much leeway the DEA was willing to exercise. Guiliana befriended Sommer as their effort on the sideline to stay in Zahid's grace.
"Sure," he snorted. "But I wouldn't take too long."
"Why not?" She made sure to sound indifferent, as if she didn't care about the answer but asked anyway just to keep the conversation going.
"Isn't it obvious?" he snorted, a frown clasping his graying brows. "The wife isn't going to live for long, and we might have to find another way to curry favor from Zahid soon."
"But why are you only telling me this now?" Guiliana made a moue of discontent. "Any idea how many awful hours I've spent on the woman just to win her over?"
Dinc swiped a thumb across her pouted lips. "I'm sorry, sweetheart. I really thought Zahid had a shot –" he cut himself off, as though realizing that he had spilled too much. "If you can think of a bag, a restaurant booking, or shoes, anything, to make up for it," he added, "you let me know."
Guiliana crossed her arms under her breasts, which few men could keep their eyes off whenever she decided to make a show of them. "What do you mean that Zahid had a shot? His wife is having the best treatment at the Bellerophon Hospital. What does Zahid have to do with her getting better?" she pushed, letting her impatience get the better of her. "No bag can make up for the time you had me wasted! I'm in the last stretch of my youth, you know! And what's the point of the restaurant booking? It's not like you can come with me or anything!" She reached for the vape in her bag, her eyes rolling.
"Naughty, naughty," Taylan Dinc snickered. Gripping the curve of her waist, he pulled her toward him. "About the restaurant, I'll make some arrangements."
While he got busy again teething her skin, she contemplated what Zahid did or failed to do that doomed Sommer's treatment. A daring conjecture sprouted in her mind like vines stretching from Mustafa Agca to Zahid Abid.
Her watch vibrated. She peeked. An incoming call from Lord Arslan Qusbecq. She sent an instant reply and switched herself offline.
***