TWO

Night falls.

Violet watches the darkness come rolling down from the long scratch of mountains stacked crooked on the horizon, the sun sinking at her back. She fiddles half-heartedly with the garbage on the dirt floor of the telephone booth, hoping to find a dropped coin or two. Despite this distraction, she cannot keep herself from reflecting on her conversation with Olaf.

Her bargain, she thinks, bitterly ripping the Daily Punctilio in two.

"How do I know you're even worth the gas, Baudelaire?" The memory of his voice is enough to make her grimace, jaw clenched in fear and frustration. Mind spinning with anxiety, Violet wonders if he will even show. She can imagine that he might adore the inherent cruelty in this - might leave her waiting inside the Last Chance until the next day when he rolls up with a nasty hangover, still in his rumpled clothes from the night before. Or, she thinks, he might not even arrive at all. Might simply continue his life, wondering with amusement how long she will wait for him like an abandoned pet.

This fear is what pushes her into anger, makes her desperate for a plan despite her exhaustion. This, and the cold, finally drives her inside.

Still, the Last Chance is empty and silent and dark. Violet feels very small as she weaves between the aisles, blindly grabbing at supplies and backtracking to the front counter to examine each pick under the flickering brown light. Soon, she has a stockpile of goods which she packs very carefully into a hiking backpack.

In the face of Olaf's arrival, she feels no qualms in stealing from the seemingly-deserted general store. She feels only a desire to survive against his neglect in any way she can manage. Violet ponders this as she paces the aisles, making sure she has everything she might need. She returns to her backpack to find that the light through the windows has shifted, illuminating a cabinet beneath the front counter.

She kneels to examine it, squinting to peer inside. The glass parts with a squeak, and Violet reaches inside.

There are two knives that she takes. One is large and serrated, sheathed in a leather holster, which she shoves into her backpack without a second thought. The other is a slim, dark switchblade, the spring new and quick. She tucks this into her bra, grown roomy since her trek down from the mountains, and feels somewhat more prepared. The anxiety lessens. She scrambles atop the counter and unwraps a candy bar, nearly inhaling it. She has three bottles of water in her bag and one beside her, along with two bottles of root beer. She twists the cap off and lets it clatter to the floor, gulps the drink despite the fizz, and nearly empties it.

By the time Olaf arrives, she has eaten four candy bars and two cans of peaches. She has brushed her teeth, swishing her mouth with one of the water bottles, and spitting the suds into the grass outside. Her backpack is organized and well-stocked, and a warm sweater, luxuriously soft, has been slipped over her tattered dress, smelling like the spicy warmth of the general store itself. Violet has just finished reading her second magazine by the time she hears his tires displace the stones outside. Her breath stops in jagged apprehension. The switchblade stills against her ribs.

He parks crooked out front, gravel spraying. Every window is rolled down, and the scrappy car she had seen before has been replaced with one of the same style but sleek, quiet, and so black it bleeds into the night, edges hazy and undefined.

Olaf strides from the car and Violet ducks from the window above the register so he does not catch her eye. She had only managed a quick peek of him, silvery, dressed in a suit the color of smoke with swinging coattails.

He steps cautiously into the darkness of the shop, moonlight at his back. He turns to face her and that white light illuminates the side of his face, hollowing his cheekbones like a corpse. He grins when he spots her sitting hunched as a gargoyle atop the counter, glaring. At the floor, his eyes dart to the mess of wrappers and Violet braces herself for a cutting word, but he simply stalks towards her, swipes the remaining bottle of root beer, and says, "Let's go."

Violet is momentarily stunned. She had expected a speech - something grand, dramatic, taunting. She had expected that he might make her beg. Might want her on her knees, and even imagining this makes her bristle and sink with bitter humiliation, thick as bile on the back of her tongue. Yet it does not come.

He takes two steps away from her, the sound unexpectedly loud on the creaky floor of the empty shop, and lopes outside into the dark.

It throws Violet off, makes her question her knowledge of him and her confidence in his character. She might have preferred the begging, if only to be sure.

Behind him, the door closes with a clap. A piece of that bullet hole glass clatters to the floor. Violet takes a moment to recover from her shock before she lurches to her feet and hurries after him, backpack riding high between her shoulders.

The temperature has dropped significantly from when she was last outside, a cool wind blustering from the mountains. She crosses the sparse landscape and slides hesitantly into the passenger seat, placing her backpack between her feet. Olaf is reclining at the wheel, moonlight pooling into the wrinkles of his clothes. He watches her settle, face unreadable.

Violet examines him in return, not knowing what to say. In a different situation, with a different savior, she knows she would be nothing but grateful, brimming with humble thanks. But Olaf, sitting in repose beside her slurping his drink, deserves none of this, even if thanks had been just behind her teeth over the phone. His presence alone has soothed some of that sad desperation - and now all Violet is left with is bitter rage.

"You know, I don't usually drink root beer," Olaf says, tilting the bottle towards her, the neck tall like a pointed finger. "Brings back bad memories. But I don't think anything could spoil my mood tonight. Not even bad memories or this fizzy little drink. Cheers, Violet."

He lifts the bottle, drains the rest, and tosses it out his open window. It hits the ground before the Last Chance's front steps, cracks in two. In the moonlight, the glass glitters as if underwater.

Violet scowls at him. "Cheers to what?"

"Oh, to you, of course!" He crows, raising an empty hand. "To Violet Baudelaire! Loser, loser loser!" He cackles wildly, the laughter of someone truly entertained.

Violet looks away, disturbed and ashamed. The shame, at least, is familiar and ragged as her dress, worn with use. She does not know what to say. Olaf convulses with laughter until he stops as abruptly as he started, his eyes hot and piercing on her.

"You've lost your heart, haven't you?"

She is surprised by this observation, cut by it, as if the switchblade at her chest had sprung free and gored her straight through. She isn't quite sure what he means, though she knows it to be true without question. No responses or arguments come to mind. Violet stares to the mountains as he continues to giggle, feeling wretchedly, terribly seen.

"Oh! And cheers to me. Always cheers to me."

To her surprise, he still doesn't start the car. The mountains tower in the distance, snowy caps slightly visible in the gloom. The moon glows behind thin, gauzy clouds. It reminds Violet of the way her last coin had looked in her palm before she had called Olaf - spit-shined, gleaming, so scratched from her teeth it was hardly recognizable.

"Don't you want to get back to your party? I heard them on the phone. They'll toast to you all you like."

Olaf hums at that, a pleased smirk on his face. "They will. We're having parties all year, with each premiere. There will be plenty of time to celebrate."

Violet frowns, wondering what she is missing. "You aren't usually a patient man."

He laughs, stark, startled. Not as cruel as before.

"No," he agrees. "Never. But, you see, Violet - " He says her name like a gift, like a password. "You're wrong. This is not patience. This is revelling. This is a victory all its own and I intend to bask in it however long I please."

Olaf smiles, reaches out to touch her, running a hand over the greasy crown of her head. She sits frozen, endures, though her body relaxes at the gentle touch despite her best efforts. "You need a bath. You're disgusting."

"Just your type then," Violet spits, face glowing hot with embarrassment. There is a snarl of hair at the nape of her neck, too thick to comb out. Her dress is stiff with mud and breezy with holes. Black grime clots beneath her fingernails. She is a picture of dereliction and disastrous hygiene, and the fact that she cannot argue, cannot defend herself, is what makes her bite her tongue against further argument.

"Ah," he growls, hand gliding down to pinch her cheek harshly. His fingers are warm against her cheek. Goosebumps prickle her body, lingering in her joints, her soft spots. "Clever. Somehow I'd forgotten about that wicked little tongue of yours."

Violet smacks his hand away with a fierce glare and rubs her cheek, feeling a welt starting to rise. She crosses her arms, pretending to pout, and slips the switchblade from her clothes. It's easy to do in the dark, easy to palm and hold. Even having it in her hand, hot from her skin, is enough to make her breathe easier.

Olaf scoffs, a fresh thought in his voice."Though, that's no surprise. Reminds me of what you said during our chat earlier, when you were begging me to come save you. You know you've always wanted me. Let me assure you, Violet, that even bruised, broken, snarling, lifeless, dead - I will want you. You, and that nasty mouth of yours. Even reeking and half-starved and full of so much sweet hatred. You are always - what was it? - my type."

Violet winces, disgusted, terrified. Her heart slams against her ribs, worse than if he had threatened her outright. She knows that actors must be good liars. She also knows that, when it comes to his twisted, filthy affection for her, he is saintly in his honesty.

Olaf starts the car, which comes to life silently, headlights bright on the dirt road. The radio bursts with crooning noise, old love songs that feel slow and mocking.

"Don't try to touch me again," Violet tells him, though over the music and the wind rushing like water through the open windows, she is not sure if he hears her.

She does not speak up. Does not try again. There's a girlish flicker in her chest, thrilled, impressed, and revulsed by his vicious possession of her.

Please do not hurt me, she remembers thinking. Please let me stay.

"Why was a theatre named after you?" She bites out eventually, over the wind and the noise. Olaf allows the distraction. He twists a dial on the dash, and the voice on the radio cuts to silence.

"Are you saying you don't believe it was awarded to me based on talent alone?" He snorts. "I deserve it. But you can get anything you want if you threaten the right people. The fans, though - the party, the crowd, the audience. That's real. That's genuine. They're mine. Just like you."

She doesn't like that answer. It feels too direct, too straightforward. An easy trap to fall into, to let him talk about himself for as long as he can. Violet gathers her thoughts as the car gathers speed. Tries again as they rattle over the bumpy road.

"Don't you want to know what happened to my siblings?"

Olaf shrugs. "I don't care. Go ahead and tell me then, since you're obviously itching for it."

Earlier, when she had contemplated getting this far, Violet had planned to lie. To create an excuse or two on the spot. Yet Olaf sits preening with victory, picking his teeth with his pinkie nail and watching her calmly out of the corner of his eye, and she realizes with sick defeat that she does not feel the need. There is no trick to her abduction, no scheme. Olaf gets what he always wanted, and there is no need to lie, no need to stay one step ahead.

Beneath her failing anger, she is too exhausted, too defeated to lie.

"We were in the Mortmain Mountains," she begins, expecting to be interrupted with questions that do not come. "Snow gnats forced us into a cave for the night. We made a fire and fell asleep. When I woke up, they were both gone. I've been wandering around the mountains for weeks, I think, looking for them. I ran out of food and ruined my coat and - and - never found them. They're gone."

"Poor orphan," Olaf coos mockingly. "You've been abandoned yet again. You were all alone. But not anymore. You've put yourself in my hands, Violet, and I can assure you - " He reaches out slowly, and Violet braces herself, thumb on the trigger of her weapon. He brushes a reverent finger over the pursed line of her mouth. "That I will never let you go."

With a splintering glimmer of moonlight on metal, she flips the switchblade into action. Quick and firm, she presses it against the tender pulsepoint inside his wrist. It is a threat, a warning, a challenge she does not need to speak.

Olaf gasps in delight, a wicked, happy smile splitting his face like a gash, and then that nasty laughter returns. Despite the blade pressed to his wrist, he keeps moving. He dips his thumb into the damp pit of her mouth, hot as an open wound, dragging her cheek up into a painful grimace, a parody of a smile, a fish on a hook.

"Say it," he demands, flint in his voice through the amusement.

She does not have to ask to know what he means.

"I need you," Violet reminds him carefully, quietly. Gentle press of tongue and teeth against his skin.

"Oh, Violet," Olaf breathes, grinning with unbridled joy. Their eyes meet in the darkness, holding. His grip on the wheel is unwavering as the engine purrs, races. They're speeding away from the mountains, dust flying, neither looking at the road, and Violet realizes, beneath the violent wave of anger, that her fear has finally, blissfully vanished. "We are going to have so much fun together."