I’m sitting in my corner office, working on land purchase documents for the South Shore Development. People think that being a lawyer is all about arguing, but in fact you only spend a tiny percentage of your
time in court or in settlement negotiations. The vast majority of my hours pass by right here in this room, writing, reading, or editing.
I don’t mind being alone in here. It’s my sanctuary. I have control over everything inside these doors. I have my desk set up just the way I like it, facing the two-sided view of the Marina City Towers, Michigan Ave, and the Chicago River spread out below me.
Everything in my office is pewter, brass, cream, and blue—shades I find soothing.
I’ve got three watercolors by Shutian Xue on the walls, and a sculpture by Jean Fourier in the corner. It’s his piece called Building Blocks, which is supposed to represent the interior of an atom. To me, it looks more like a model of a solar system.
I watch most everyone else finish their work and leave for the night. A couple of my colleagues poked their heads in my door on the way out to give me a message—some work-related, and some just nonsense. My paralegal Lucy lets me know she’ll finish the stack of lease agreements I gave her as soon as she gets back in the morning. And Josh Hale tells me I came in second in last week’s Pick‘em league, which means I won a whopping twenty dollars.
“I didn’t think you even liked football,” he says with a condescending smile.
“I don’t,” I say sweetly. “I just like winning your money.”
Josh and I are not friends. In fact, we’re direct rivals. The eldest of the firm partners is about to retire. When Victor Weiss leaves, either Josh is, or I am is the most likely choice to replace him. And we both know it.
Even if we weren’t in competition for the partnership position, I’d still detest him. I’ve never liked the kind of person who pretends to be friendly, while scavenging for information they can use to hurt you. I’d respect him more if he were an honest asshole, instead of a fake nice guy.
Everything about him annoys me, from his too-tight suits to his aggressive cologne. He reminds me of a TV show host. In looks, maybe a Ryan Seacrest. In personality, more like a Tucker Carlson—always thinking he’s twice as smart as he actually is.
Taking the opportunity to snoop, I see him scanning my office, trying to read the headings on the documents spread out on my desk. He’s relentless.
“Okay, bye,” I say to him, pointedly. Telling him to leave.
“‘Don’t work too hard,” he replies, shooting a little finger gun in my direction.
After he leaves, his cologne lingers twenty minutes longer. Ugh.
The last to depart is Uncle Oran. He’s the managing partner of the firm and my father’s half-brother. He’s always been my favorite relative. In fact, he’s the reason I became a lawyer in the first place.
At family parties I’d corner him and demand to hear another story of odd and interesting legal cases, like the man who sued Pepsi for refusing to provide him with a $23 million dollar fighter jet in exchange for Pepsi Points, or the time that Proctor & Gamble tried to argue in a court of law that their own Pringles were not, in fact, potato chips.
Uncle Oran is an excellent storyteller, well able to milk drama out of even the most convoluted cases. He’d explain to me precedent and statutes, and
how important even the tiniest of details could be . . . how even a comma in the wrong place could invalidate an entire contract.
I found Uncle Oran fascinating not only because he’s funny and charming, but because he’s so similar and yet so different from my father.
They both dress well, in fitted suits, but Uncle Oran’s look like something a Trinity professor would wear—always tweed or wool, with wooden buttons and elbow patches—while my father looks like an American businessman. They’re both tall with the same thick graying hair, and long, lean faces, but Uncle Oran has the coloring they call “Black Irish”—dark eyes, and an olive tone to his skin. My father’s eyes are cornflower blue.
Oran’s accent fascinated me the most. He’d lost some of it, living in America for years. But you can still hear it gilding the edges of his words. And he loves a good Irish saying:
“Forgetting a debt doesn’t mean it’s paid.” Or, “There’s no such thing as bad publicity, except your own obituary.”
He’s a version of my father who grew up in Ireland—an alternate reality, if we’d all been raised there instead of Chicago.
Tonight he knocks on my doorframe, saying, “You know we don’t pay you by the hour, Riona. You can go home once in a while and still have plenty of money for those fancy shoes.”
The shoes in question are a pair of oxblood Nomasei pumps, set neatly to the side under my desk. I take them off when I know I’ll be sitting a while, so they don’t get creases across the toes.
I smile up at Uncle Oran. “I knew you’d notice those,” I say.
“I notice everything,” he says. “Like the fact that you’ve got all the South Shore land purchase agreements in front of you. I told you Josh was going to handle those.”
“I had already started them,” I say, shrugging. “I figured I might as well finish.”
Oran shakes his head. “You work too hard, Riona,” he says seriously. “You’re young. You should be out with friends and boyfriends. Once in a while, at least.”
“I have a boyfriend,” I say. “Yeah? Where is he?”
“About five miles that way.” I nod my head toward the window. “At Mercy Hospital.”
“Oh, the surgeon?” Oran sniffs. “He’s still around?” “Yes,” I laugh. “What’s wrong with Dean?”
“Well . . . ” Oran sighs. “I wasn’t going to say anything. But I saw he sent you roses the other day. Red roses.”
“So?”
“Not very imaginative, is he?”
I shrug. “Some people like the classics.” “Some people are intellectually lazy.”
“What’s the right flowers to send a woman?”
Oran grins. “I always send whiskey. You send a woman a bottle of Bunnahabhain Forty-Year Single Malt . . . then she knows you’re serious.”
“Well, we’re not,” I tell him. “Not serious.”
Oran strides into my office and scoops up the stack of folders off my desk. “Hey!” I protest.
“This is for your own good,” he says. “Go home. Put on a nice dress. Go get your man from the hospital. Enjoy a night out. Josh will find these on his desk tomorrow morning, the lazy shite.”
“Fine,” I say, just to placate him.
I let Oran carry the folders away, and then I watch him head over to the elevators, leather satchel slung over his shoulder in place of a briefcase. But I have no intention of actually leaving. I’ve got a million other projects to work on, with or without the purchase agreements.
And this is my favorite time to do it—after everyone else had left and the lights have automatically dimmed across the floor. In total silence, the rest of the office dark, and only the city lights sparkling below me. No interruptions.
Well—almost none.
My cell phone buzzes on the desk next to me, where it lays face-down. I flip it over, seeing Dean’s name.
You still at it? Want to come meet me for a drink at Rosie’s?
I consider. Rosie’s is only a couple of blocks away. I could easily stop for a drink on my way home.
But I’m tired. My shoulders are stiff. And I haven’t had a chance to exercise yet today. I think about a glass of wine in the trendy, noisy bar, compared to a glass of wine drunk in my own bathtub, listening to a podcast instead of a recap of Dean’s day.
I know which one sounds more appealing to me.
Sorry, I text back. Going to be working late. Then I’ll just head home. Alright, Dean replies. Dinner tomorrow?
I hesitate.
Sure, I say. 6:30 tomorrow.
Dean and I have been dating for three months. He’s a thoracic surgeon— intelligent, successful, handsome. Competent in bed (I would guess all surgeons are—they understand the human body and they’re in full control of their hands).
I should want to go to dinner tomorrow. I should be excited about it. But I’m just . . . indifferent.
It’s nothing to do with Dean. It’s a problem I seem to have again and again. I get to know someone, and I start picking away at all their flaws. I notice inconsistencies in their statements. Holes in logic in their arguments. I wish I could turn off that part of my brain, but I can’t.
My father would say that I expect too much from people. “No one’s perfect, Riona. Least of all yourself.”
I know that.
I notice my own flaws more than anyone’s—I can be cold and unwelcoming. Obsessive. Quick to get angry and slow to forgive.
Worst of all, I’m easily annoyed. Like when a man becomes repetitive.
It’s only been a few months, and already Dean’s told me three times about how he thinks the anesthesiologists in his department are conspiring against him, after he refused to hire one of their friends.
“It’s these South Africans,” he complained, last time we went to lunch. “You hire one, and then they want you to hire their cousin or their brother- in-law, and all of a sudden the surgical unit is overrun with them.”
Plus, he seems to think that now, at the three-month mark, he’s owed a greater portion of my time. Instead of asking if I’m free Friday or Saturday night, he assumes it. He makes plans for us, and I have to tell him I’m busy with work or a family dinner.
“You know, you could invite me to dinner with your family,” he said in a sulky tone.
“It’s not a social dinner,” I told him. “We’re going over plans for phase two of the South Shore Development.”
Most dinners with my family are working dinners, one way or another. Our business and our personal ties are so deeply intertwined that I would hardly know my father, mother, or siblings outside of “work.”
The fate of our business is the fate of our family. That’s how it works in the Irish mafia.
Dean has some idea about the Griffins’ criminal ties—it would be impossible not to. We’ve been one of the largest Irish mafia families in Chicago for two hundred years.
But he doesn’t get it. Not really. He thinks of it like an interesting backstory, like people who say they’re descended from Henry the Eighth. He has no idea how current and ongoing organized crime is in Chicago.
It’s always a dilemma in my dating life. Do I want a boyfriend who’s ignorant of the dark underside of this city? Who could never really understand my entrenchment in my family? Or do I want one of the “made men” who work for my father, cracking heads and burying bodies, with blood under his fingernails and a gun perpetually concealed on his person?
Neither, really.
And not just for those reasons. I don’t believe in love.
I’m not denying it exists—I’ve seen it happen for other people. I just don’t believe it will ever happen for me.
My love for my family is like the roots of an oak tree. A part of the tree, necessary for life. It’s always been there, and it always will be.
But romantic love . . . I’ve never experienced it. Maybe I’m just too selfish. I can’t imagine loving somebody more than I love my own comfort and having my own way.
The idea of being controlled by someone else, doing things for their convenience instead of mine . . . no thanks. I barely tolerate that for my family. Why would I want to center my life around a man?
I pack up my briefcase. Before I leave, I sneak into Josh’s filthy, cluttered office and steal back the purchase agreements off his desk. I started them, and I plan to finish them, regardless of what Uncle Oran says. He won’t notice—I’ll be done with them before Josh would even have looked at them. With my briefcase satisfyingly heavy, I head out of the office tower on East Wacker Drive. I walk home, because my condo is only four blocks away from work.
I bought the condo just this summer. It’s in a brand-new building with a gorgeous fitness center and swimming pool. There’s a doorman, and a fantastic view from my living room up on the twenty-eighth floor.
It was past time. I’d been living in my parents’ mansion on the Gold Coast. Their house is so huge that there was plenty of space for everyone—no real reason to leave. Plus it was convenient to all be in the same house together, whenever we needed to go over business-related material.
But then Cal got married, and he and Aida found their own place. And Nessa left too, to be with Mikolaj. Then it was just me alone with my parents, with the distasteful sensation of having been left behind by my siblings.
I have no interest in getting married like they did, but I could certainly move out.
So that’s what I did. I got the condo. And I love it. I love the quiet and the space. The feeling of being on my own for the first time in my life.
I wave to Ronald, the doorman, and take the elevator up to my apartment. I change out of my blazer, blouse, and slacks, putting on a one-piece swimsuit instead. Then I grab my waterproof headphones and head up to the pool.
The pool is on the roof of our building.
In the summer, they open up the atrium overhead, so you can swim under the stars. In the winter, it’s enclosed from the elements, though you can still see the sky through the glass.
I love to lay on my back and swim back and forth, looking up.
I’m usually the only person in the pool when I come this late. Sure enough, tonight the space is dim and quiet, the only noise the water lapping against the rim of the pool.
It smells of chlorine, and fabric softener from the fresh stacks of towels laid out on the lounge chairs. After turning on my swimming playlist, I set my phone down on one of the chairs.
I’m about to jump in the pool when I realize I forgot to fix my hair. I usually braid it and put it under a swim cap, so the chlorine doesn’t dry it out. Red hair is fragile.
It’s still in a chignon from work, twisted up with one of those two-pronged hairpins.
I don’t really want to go all the way back down to my apartment. This will be fine, for one single time.
I put my hands over my head and dive into the water with one, clean jump. I stroke back and forth across the pool, listening to “California Dreamin’ ” on my headphones.
California Dreamin’—The Mamas and the Papas (Spotify) California Dreamin’—The Mamas and the Papas (Apple)
I’m wearing goggles, so I can look down into the bright blue water, illuminated with pot lights from below. I see a dark shape down in the corner of the pool, and I wonder if somebody dropped something down there—a gym bag or maybe a canvas bag of towels.
Turning over, I lay on my back and look up at the glass ceiling. It reminds me of a Victorian greenhouse—the glass bisected by a latticework of metal. Beyond the glass I see the black sky, and the pale, shimmering disc of a nearly-full moon.
As I’m looking up, something locks around my throat and drags me down under the water.
It pulls me down, down, all the way down to the bottom of the pool, heavy as an anchor.
The shock of something grabbing me from below made me let out a shriek, and now there’s almost no air in my lungs. I kick and struggle against this thing that’s caught hold of me. I claw at the thing wrapped around my throat, feeling spongy “skin” with hard flesh beneath.
My lungs are screaming for air. They feel flat and deflated, the pressure of the pool pressing against my eardrums and my chest. I twist around just a
little and see black flippers kicking by my feet, and two arms in a wetsuit wrapped tightly around me.
I hear the exhale of a respirator next to my right ear. It’s a scuba diver—a man in a scuba suit is trying to drown me.
I try to kick and hit him, but he’s got me pinned with both his arms constricting me like an anaconda. The water slows the force of any blow I aim at him.
Black sparks burst in front of my eyes. I’m running out of air. My lungs scream at me to take in a breath, but I know if I do, only chlorinated water will pour into my throat.
I reach behind me and grab what I hope is his respirator. I yank it as hard as I can, pulling it out of his mouth. A stream of silvery bubbles pours up next to me. I hoped that would force him to let go, but he doesn’t even try to replace it. He knows he’s got more air in his lungs than I do. He can hold out while I drown.
I feel my chest heaving, as my body tries to take a breath with or without my consent.
In one last, desperate motion, I yank the hairpin out of my bun. I twist around and stab it into the man’s neck, right where the neck meets the shoulder.
I see his dark, furious eyes through his scuba mask.
And I feel his grip relax around me, just for a split-second, as he flinches with shock and pain.
I pull my knees up to my chest and kick at his body, as hard as I can. I shove myself away from him, rocketing upward to the surface.
My face breaks the surface and I take a huge, desperate gasp of air. I’ve never tasted anything more delicious. It’s almost painful how much air I drag into my lungs.
I swim for the edge of the pool, stroking with all my might, praying that I won’t feel his hand closing around my ankle as he drags me back down
again.
I grab the rim of the pool and shove myself out. Not stopping to grab my phone, not even sparing a glance behind me, I sprint across the slippery tiles to the exit.
There’s two ways down from the roof—the elevator or the stairs. I take the latter, not wanting to risk a black-clad hand shoving itself between the elevator doors right as they’re about to close. Instead, I run down two flights of stairs and then I dash back out into the carpeted hallway, hammering on apartment doors until somebody opens up.
I shove my way into the stranger’s apartment, slamming his door behind me and locking it.
“Hey, what the hell?!” he cries.
He’s a man of about sixty, overweight and bespectacled, still wearing office clothes, but with a fluffy pair of slippers on his feet instead of shoes.
He goggles at my swimsuit and the water I’m dripping on his carpet, too confused to form words.
When I look over at the living room couch, I see a woman of about the same age midway through eating a bowl of ice cream, with her spoon paused at the entrance of her mouth. On the television screen, a blonde girl sobs over her chances of getting a rose or being sent home that night.
“What—what’s happening?” the man stammers, not angry now that he’s realized something is wrong. “Should I call the police?”
“No,” I say automatically.
The Griffins don’t call the police when we have a problem. In fact, we’ll do anything we can to avoid contact with the cops.
I’m waiting, heart pounding, too scared to even look out the peephole in case the diver has followed me, and he’s waiting outside the door. Waiting for my eye to cross the lens so he can fire a bullet right through it.
“If I can use your phone, I’ll call my brother,” I say.
