Chapter 10: The Selection
The dawn over Santa Monica was a watercolor smear, pink and gray over a sluggish ocean. Inside Susan’s penthouse, the only light came from a massive laptop screen, painting everything a cold, surgical blue.
Jim watched her work.
She was naked, cross-legged on a vast white linen sofa, her back to the floor-to-ceiling windows. A leather-bound portfolio was open beside her, stuffed with glossy headshots and printed dossiers. But her focus was on the small, unassuming kit on the glass coffee table: a tourniquet, an alcohol wipe, a spoon, a lighter, a syringe.
“Hold this,” she said, not looking up, her voice husky from the night’s cigarettes. She handed him the laptop.
He took it, his eyes on her hands. They were steady, expert. She cinched the rubber tube around her thigh, just above the knee, tapping the skin until a vein rose to the surface. She swabbed it, her movements economical. In the spoon, a half-melted blue pill fizzed under the flame of the lighter. She drew the liquid into the syringe, a tiny, toxic bullet.
“You’re going to ruin the upholstery,” Jim said, his tone conversational.
“It’s vintage. Stains give it character.” She found the vein, slid the needle in, and depressed the plunger.
Her head fell back against the sofa cushion. A long, shuddering sigh escaped her, part pain, part profound relief. The tremble that had been in her fingers vanished, replaced by a liquid bonelessness. The Oxy hit her system like a warm tide, smoothing the sharp edges of the hangover, of everything. She opened her eyes, the green of them glassy and content. “Okay,” she breathed. “Now I’m ready to shop.”
Jim placed the laptop back on her knees. The screen showed a grid of headshots, all women, all beautiful in a carefully non-threatening way. He scrolled. A yoga instructor from Topanga. A former gallery assistant from Silver Lake. A grad student in clinical psychology.
“The psych student is a hard no,” Susan murmured, her finger tracing the screen. “Too analytical. She’ll be diagnosing you instead of obeying you.” She clicked the file closed. “The yoga instructor… maybe. Flexible. Used to taking direction. But that whole zen vibe might be annoying.”
“You’re the consultant,” Jim said, taking a pull from his flask. The bourbon was cheap here, not his usual. It burned a familiar, comforting path.
“Damn right I am.” She clicked open another file. A woman in her late forties, blonde, with a keen, intelligent face. “Financial advisor. Divorced. Client list is mostly bored wives. She’s discreet.”
“She looks like she’d try to manage my portfolio mid-session.”
Susan laughed, a throaty, genuine sound. “Probably. But look at the subtext.” She pointed to the woman’s notes, which Susan had annotated in red digital ink. Seeks structure after chaotic marriage. Responds to firm authority. Financial dominance a possible trigger.
“You write these like novel summaries,” Jim said, a note of admiration in his voice.
“It’s all storytelling, Jimmy. We’re just casting for a very specific role.” She leaned back, the laptop’s glow on her skin. The drug had softened her, made her playful. “You know, for a guy who wants total control, you’re surprisingly picky. What’s wrong with the ones from the club? The pros?”
“They’re transactions,” he said, his voice losing its lightness. “I’m not interested in transactions anymore. I’m interested in… acquisition. Integration.”
“Like Caron.”
The name hung in the salt-tinged air. Susan said it without malice, a simple data point.
“Caron is a separate equation,” Jim said, a finality in his tone that discouraged further discussion.
Susan held up a hand in placation. “Okay, okay. Touchy.” She scrolled again, then stopped. “Oh. Here.”
The photo showed a woman named Elena. Late twenties, dark hair pulled into a severe bun, dark eyes that held the camera without smiling. She was a classical cellist, according to the bio. Currently playing with a regional orchestra, teaching privately.
“Quiet,” Susan mused. “Used to long, repetitive practice. Used to interpreting a master’s work—the composer’s. Probably has a masochistic streak a mile wide. All that discipline has to go somewhere.” She turned her head to look at Jim.