IS IT MY SCARS?

Chapter One

There was a man in a clown mask on the sidewalk, and so Ray stopped in her tracks.

The street was quite deserted except for huge halogen lights, one model in a black sweeping evening gown, and a harried production team. Work was underway for an upcoming fashion week cover-shot, and the overly temperamental designer was starting to look unfashionably flustered.

'Why did you stop, Ray? You're supposed to pause and do the three-second pose over there, not there! Alright, let's do it again, people. More shadow this time! Yes, hold it like that, Carlos, now Ray…..are you listening to me? Ray? Ray!"

The model turned her head to him abruptly. 'Quiet!'

Swaim's mouth fell open inelegantly. 'What?'

She turned her head back, watching the man on the corner. The otherwise empty street hummed busily, and only the two of them stood still, each looking at the other mutely. Any second now, he would turn away, go away, but she knew he was there, she just didn't know why…….

Swaim flapped his hand in front of her face. She jerked her head back, twitching her brows at him, and as she glanced back, she saw the clown had gone. Suppressing the knot of unease in her stomach, she turned and gave Swaim a cool smile.

'I'm sorry, darling; I was distracted for a minute there. You were saying about the pose?'

Swaim went into another explanation of the entire sequence. She listened carefully this time, blanking out everything else except the lights, the empty street, and the feel of thousands of dollars worth of silk swishing down her body. Smoothly she strode to the end of the street, paused, jerked a superbly arrogant shoulder at the sideways camera, and turned with a flurry of skirts. Her cherry-red lips gleamed dully in the lights, giving off the precise shade that Swaim loved so much this year, and the shoot was done. Another few thousand bucks in the bank for my game, she thought, and almost smiled.

Swinging around the corner in her steel Lamborghini half an hour later, she narrowed her eyes at the dark roads and thought carefully about what she had seen. The block had been closed off for the shoot, and the designer had publicized the entire process well from beforehand, so anyone still on the streets at that time was hardly a random sightseer. The man looking at her had been looking for her. Without being narcissistic, she was aware of her own exotic looks, enhanced by layers of makeup for any and every shoot, but only a very stubborn admirer – and she wasn't aware of any such – would go to such lengths to see her. And while a clown mask might be freely worn in any part of the world at any time, in Gotham City there was a special significance involved, especially after recent events. Only a henchman of the evil madman, the Joker, would wear such a thing – anyone else would be too disgusted or afraid to risk it. Which meant that not only was he aware of her – well – extracurricular activities, so to speak – he had actually sent his people to –

The realization made her swerve violently. 'Oh, fuck.'

About an hour later, she was on the other side of town, fiddling with a pen in her fingers and staring at the table top while a gray haired man in a check suit droned on about crate-sizes to an audience of about fifteen other people.

'The crates are coming in, but too late. Dock regulations say they gotta be smaller so the boys can carry 'em, else we need winches. But we've never needed winches for these before, and now we gotta pay off the dock inspectors on all three shifts. We could shift the whole operation downriver, but that's Mr. Hughes' territory. With all due respect to Mr. Hughes, maybe we can come to an agreement that works for both of-'

'Or maybe,' said Ray, 'You could just get smaller crates.'

A subdued guffaw swept through the room. Marone curled his lip and looked expectantly at the man in the check suit.

'Could we do that, Esa?'

Esa was sweating around the collar. It was clear that this solution hadn't occurred to him. He said nothing.

Ray took pity on him and drawled out slowly but distinctly, 'Don't worry about it, Esa; you're not the first person here who tried to rescue a cat from a tree by burning down the entire goddamned forest. All you gotta do, you gotta order smaller crates that the men can lift on their own, and henceforth not only are you obeying dock regulations without the winches, no trouble to Mr. Hughes here, but you're clear with the inspectors too. You'll be their golden boy, Esa, so clear that you'll be practically legitimate. Would you like that, Esa?'

Marone glanced quickly at her. She hadn't taken her eyes off her pen now for the last ten minutes. He waved a hand at his men at the doors, and slowly the people around the table started getting to their feet and moving out with firm handshakes and low murmurs. Ray got up without making eye-contact with anyone, swept up her idle laptop, and zipped it up into the bag. Flexing her fingers, she was about to stride out the door herself when Marone caught her eye. She sank back down in her chair with a mental shrug.

He sat back across from her, very much at ease here in his centre of operations. She held his gaze steadily, wondering what she'd missed.

He was the one to break the silence. 'What is it?' he asked, languidly.

Her gaze didn't flicker from his. 'What should it be?'

His mouth tightened. Never answer a question with a question, she remembered belatedly, and shrugged in apology.

'I was thinking about something I saw earlier,' she said, and was rewarded with a lift of the eyebrow.

'There was a man at a photo-shoot today. He was wearing a clown mask. I was just wondering if-'

Marone's brows furrowed. 'He's supposed to have been put away. In Arkham-'

'And if he's out?'

Marone shifted slightly in his chair. 'If he's out, then there's nothing I can do.'

'Should I be worried?' she asked.

'You're a model who plays stocks and shares on the side,' he shrugged. 'On the face of it, he has very little respect for either looks or money. Scars one and burns the other, so you should be fine.'

'I meant should I be worried that someone who knows me told his people I – ah – work two jobs? Because only yourpeople know that, .'

He smiled at her. 'You don't trust me?' It was tantamount to a challenge and she knew better than to push it. Instead she moved on to matters of more importance.

'The Scanlon shares are dipping further. I want to wait a few days before I buy in, but before that I need to finish with that furniture company you wanted to sell. I thought you might want to keep the warehouses so I haven't inked the deal yet, but if you want to clear it all out the Broxton guys have a package figure for you. I can call it up if you-'

He stopped her as she would have pulled out her laptop again. 'I trust you to get me a fair deal on this. Keep the storage space, but for rent. Call Joseph Gray in New York, tell him I'm willing to buy his stock, and make arrangements for shipping. Leave the cargo deal to Esa, let him talk to Hughes' people about this thing, and if you talk to that guy from Wayne Enterprises again, see what you can find out about their labtech programmes. I trust you on this,' he said again, and she wondered what the hell that was about.

'I have to go to work tomorrow. I'll call about Gray later, and Fox is supposed to see me in a few days. I'm buying Wayne shares myself, by the way. They're going to go up soon. Should I cut you in?'

Marone grimaced irritably. 'Ten percent commission if you do. Handle it on the shipping books, make sure it's clean. No paper.' He reached for a drink.

She got to her feet, waving down his offer of Scotch with a polite negative, and was out of the door before he thought of anything new. Make arrangements for shipping, Christ, do I look like a concierge? Down the thirty something floors on a swift elevator, stroll to the car, rev up to sixty in three and finally she had time to think about what Marone had said to her as she turned to leave.

'If the mad dog breaks free, do you want me to put him on a leash for you?'

Everything was so confusing today. What did he mean by putting the mad dog – presumably the Joker – on a leash? She'd thought the Joker was outside anyone's control, acting as a fiery catalyst to violence and destruction all on his insane self, but then why did Marone not think so? Maybe they had a deal, some kind of understanding? And if that was true, then Marone was even more dangerous than she'd thought before, and she'd be all the better skipping right out of town. Also, he'd said 'on a leash for you' and Ray wasn't sure whether that was an implied threat or not. She was aware that Marone had men watching her, he didn't trust her or her expertise with money, he probably kept tabs on her just to prove he really did own Gotham, but could he really send the Joker after her if she did him wrong? She wasn't part of the almighty Family yet, was trying very hard to stay on the fringes, but sooner or later she knew there would be a test of her loyalty. Put one foot wrong and she would be floating downstream with a weight tied to her ankles in no time. At best. What was the exchange offer on keeping the Joker away from her, then? What was she supposed to do to appease Salvatore Marone, head of the Falcone crime family and kingpin of the Gotham Mafia?

Breaking into a cold sweat just thinking about it, she stepped down on the accelerator and zoomed down the highway to her apartment on the West Bank.