"Is this your place?" Patrick asked.
Catriona nodded shyly, her eyes narrowed in embarrassment. He shrugged, putting a smile on his face.
"It's charming," he said, "but it seems you've outgrown it."
He gave her a warm smile, patting her coupled hands on her lap. Her shoulders relaxed as they slipped out of the car.
"I hope your sister isn't attached to this place," he said as they went up the stairs. "You'll both be much more comfortable in Chicago. I promise you that. My estate isn't as luxurious as Nathaniel's, but there will be more than enough space for all of us."
Catriona smiled at this, hoping Patrick couldn't see how empty it was.
Catriona's heartbeat strangled her more with each step up the stairs, towards her sister who hadn't returned a single letter or even tried to contact her in the time she was at Griffin Estates. How would Sarah even react to her showing up? And was she even there?
Patrick followed Catriona to the door, her palms sweating as she lifted her hand to knock. It felt strange to knock on her own door, and even stranger to have to wait for someone to open it.
"I told you!" Sarah's voice bellowed from the other side. "You'll get your blood money as soon I speak to --"
The door flew open with a gasp. Sarah looked at Catriona, mouth agape, and with a smile and a cry threw her hands around her sister's neck and cheered with relief.
"Oh, Catriona!" she cried, her hug tightening, "it's you! How I've been waiting for you to come back home! You came just in time, too. The landlord, he's been making such a fuss about --"
She stopped, her eyes meeting Patrick's.
"Catriona?" Sara's tone suddenly becoming sweet. "Who might this be?"
Patrick smiled, his teeth glistening as he held out his hand to greet her. "The name is Patrick, my dear. You must be Catriona's sister. Your beauty is undoubtedly similar as sisters, yet completely unique."
Patrick gave Sara's hand a quick peck and then dropped it, stepping back to Catriona's side. Catriona shifted her weight as her sister blushed and grinned.
"Well, well, well," Sarah chattered. "You brought home a real gentleman, Catriona. Bring him inside and let me offer him a drink."
Patrick stepped in after her, and Catriona puffed out some air before walking in behind them. As she walked in, she noticed that the apartment was even more empty than before, the shelves bare, the walls uncovered, and the linens gone. There was a small corner of boxes.
Sarah stepped over and grabbed a wine bottle, corking it and pouring a dusty glass for the three of them. Catriona could only stare at the wine, unable to not compare the pale color of the cheap wine to the deep color of wine at Griffin's estate.
"I hate for you to come home to bad news, Catriona," Sarah said, sipping her wine. "But it seems we've been evicted."
Catriona said nothing, only surprised that Sara hadn't been kicked out before that.
"Evicted!" Patrick said with concern. "Whatever for?"
"Oh, the landlord is an absolute brute!" Sarah replied. "He's no better than a tyrant. I worked double shifts to make enough money to make ends meet, but he had no interest in my profession or my money. I think he hates us simply because we're immigrants, I do. That's the kind of discrimination I can't tolerate, you know."
"But when I paid the rent, he said nothing at all," Catriona pointed out.
Sara swallowed her wine and continued to speak to Patrick as if Catriona had said nothing at all.
"Do you happen to know of any safe place for us, Mr Patrick?" she asked. "I can't imagine a gentleman such as yourself would be settled to allow two women to live on the streets."
"In that, you would be perfectly correct," Patrick responded. "In fact, I was just taking Catriona back to Chicago with me, under the condition that I take you with us."
Sara's hands fluttered to her chest. "Chicago! Are you telling the truth? What a wonderful place to live! Why, I've always wanted to make it to Chicago. Really, Catriona, how could you hide such a gem of a man? What a gentleman to come and sweep us away like a charming prince."
Sara linked her arm in Patrick's, and he nodded with his usual charming smile. His mouth lifted until it showed a wisp of his canine tooth, a strange detail that Catriona had never noticed before.
Patrick offered his other arm to her. Still processing the last ten minutes, Catriona lifted her hands to take his arm, slowly slipping her hands between his elbow. Something felt unbalanced as her sister held close on the other side, and all Catriona could think about was how Patrick smiled.
*****
Patrick had sent for a car to pick up Catriona and Sarah's things, and invited them to dinner at a French restaurant on the wealthy side of town. Sarah was enchanted by everything around her to Patrick's delight, while Catriona sat silently listening to them talk.
"I can't believe you're the cousin of the Beast himself," Sarah said, "you're nothing at all alike."
Catriona looked down at her plate, silently agreeing.
"How are we so different?" Patrick asked. "We're both businessmen. Cut from the same cloth. Really, the only difference is I enjoy what I earn while he doesn't. It's a shame really. He used to be such a fun person."
"You're lucky you ran into such a gentleman, Catriona," Sarah said, petting the silk of his jacket. "A regular prince charming, ready to rescue you. That's what fairy tales are made of, isn't it?"
Catriona's fingers fumbled with her napkin. Fairy tales also included beasts who were under spells, trapped in castles, and the thought of the beast she knew with a spell still unbroken made her heart tighten in her chest.
"Yes, I'm glad you think so, Sara," Patrick said, raising a glass. "Catriona is a gem of a woman. I thought so from the very moment I met her. And to see that her sister is just as charming has put my heart at ease."
He bit into a piece of orange as he looked at Sara, the edge of his eyes lingering for a bit too long on her neck.
"I'll return in a moment," Catriona said, suddenly needing air.
"Is everything alright, my dear?" Patrick asked.
"Of course, of course," Catriona lied.
She took herself to the ladies' room, washing her hands as if the cold water would wash away her thoughts. Even with a man as Patrick in front of her, she could only think of the pain she saw in Griffin's eyes as he spoke to her the night before she left. The twisted sound of his voice before he had kissed her. It was a kiss she felt in her dreams, even though she could barely sleep at all. And though Griffin was a flawed man, he was not a deceiving man. He could not help but be honest about everything he saw, and he saw everything a light that needed to be seen.
Catriona didn't have that gift. She blocked out the light, allowing darkness to take over and enslave her.
She understood that now. That's what he hated to see in her. And if she was honest, she hated it in herself as well. She knew that he was right. That her innocence was really feigned naivety and a hope for a world that did not exist.
All of that was proven when she came to Sara's door, and Sara had asked nothing of her debt. She said nothing of the time Catriona had spent at the estate in her place. There was no concern for her well-being.
And with Patrick's odd smiles and long glances, she knew that whatever reality she had created for him would fall apart eventually too.
This must have been the pain that Griffin suffered. To see things as they truly were.
Her thoughts swirled with the water as it went down the drain, and she wiped her hands before leaving the restroom to return to a table she no longer felt comfortable at.
"Where is the estate?" a man asked in the hallway. "The one with the green bars, isn't it?"
Catriona stopped. Griffin's estate had green iron bars.
She stepped back into the restroom out of sight. She leaned her head out to see two men that were vaguely familiar, standing in the hall.
"Let the men know to meet us there just past sundown," the man continued, his voice extremely familiar. "Don't be seen. We'll let him know what it's like to reject a perfectly good business deal."
With a hearty laugh, the men walked down the hall together, disappearing around the corner.
Catriona slipped from the bathroom, rushing back to the table.
"Patrick, something's just happened --" Catriona said as she reached the table, not bothering to sit down.
"What is my dear?"
Catriona told Patrick about the men she saw and the conversation she heard.
"Do you think they might have been from the party? Your friends that Griffin insulted?"
Patrick took a sip of his drink. "Not a clue. I didn't see anyone familiar when we came in."
"Are you sure you're not hearing things?" Sara asked. "There are plenty of estates with green gates on the outskirts of town. I can name at least five."
Catriona shook her head. "I have a feeling it's the one estate I know."
"Sit and have some wine," Patrick said. "You're just dealing with some nerves, I'm sure..."
"It's not nerves!" Catrina replied. "Those were bad men, Patrick, and you know it. Won't you do something? He's your cousin, after all."
Patrick put his wine down reluctantly. "Okay, okay. Give me one moment. I will make a phone call."
He left the table, but Catriona still didn't have the heart to sit. It felt like there were needles in her legs. Sara took a sip of her wine, shrugging.
"I don't know why you'd want to help the man," she said curtly. "He's nothing but a selfish, arrogant --"
"On what grounds do you say that?" Catriona interrupted. "You didn't even meet the man. He showed mercy on both of us after what you did."
"There isn't a single soul who is fond of him."
"The people who know him respect him."
"Because they're just as twisted."
"And why suddenly do you know the difference between a saint and a sinner?"
Sara put her wine down, eyes wide. "What is this tone, Catriona? You've never talked like this to me before."
"I should have. You might have turned out to be a better person."
Patrick came back to the table, sitting beside Sarah once more.
"Well?" Catriona asked. "Did you warn him?"
"No one picked up the phone," Patrick replied. "I will try again in a little while."
"It might be too late by then, Patrick. We need to go back."
"Go back? I've been thrown out, Catriona. And you've run away. It hardly seems useful to go back. Also, if this conspiracy were to be true, it would put us both in a lot of danger."
"Then it's alright to put your cousin in danger?"
Patrick's eyes became sharper than usual, but his face stayed soft. "I didn't say that. But Nathaniel is a grown man, I'm sure he can handle it."
"If you ask me," Sara interrupted, "he might as well have his estate taken from him. He didn't do anything to earn it."
Without a thorough thought, Catriona picked up the glass of wine in front of her and threw it in her sister's face.
With a squeal, Sara jumped from her seat and flung the wine off her dress as if it were a string of ants.
"You dare to say what a man deserves when you've never brought home a penny?" Catriona said, her blood coming to her face. "Mr. Griffin works with his own hands in those fields with more care than you give to your own family."
Sara stared back with agitation, still trying to dab the wine out of her dress. Catriona reached for her bag, turning to walk away from the table. Patrick stood and grabbed her arm, his eyes a mix of confusion and possession.
"Where are you going?' he asked.
"To help Nathaniel."
He pulled her back. "Are you insane? They'll hurt you too, Catriona. Don't you understand that?"
"It hurts me more to stand by and do nothing."
"Then what should I do about this, hmm? I've made you an offer, Catriona. What do you want me to do with it?"
She noticed the way his hand was gripped in her arm, and the shade of gray in his eyes that she hadn't noticed before. She pried his fingers off her and straightened her shirt.
"Do whatever you want, Patrick," she said. "You always do."
With that, she left them behind in the restaurant, running as fast as her shoes could take her.