The Tarantella

The Tarantella
MICKEY

From my spot in the shadows, I watch her collect her groceries and fill the basket on the back of her bicycle, smiling to myself when I see her get frustrated with the ribbons that tie the lid. For the last month I have kept myself hidden, content to remain watching from a distance. Admiring her from afar the way I once did not so long ago.
When I first found her, it was by accident. I had been tearing the earth apart looking for her for months. Scouring tropical islands, hiring PI's in every state and country on the map. I even checked the places that no one in their right mind would have taken her to. Places like Afghanistan and Russia, Sudan and Yemen - I actually eliminated the worst ones first just on the strength of my concern for her safety alone.
On the mark of the second month is when I garnered my first clue. Damien and Tiny ripping apart the Spanish Countryside in search of her. In search of my doll. At first, I contemplated blowing their brains out just due to the fact that they'd lost her in a foreign country. But then... I found out that they hadn't lost her at all. She had lost them.
Ruiz.
That fucker.
I'd hate him, in fact I do hate him, but he managed to do the one thing I hadn't and that I never will - he installed her in her own place of residence on an island that relies primarily on only manual transportation, set her up with an account and a new identity, and then... simply left her alone. Just... how do you walk away from someone that goddamned lovely, that fucking perfect, and that fucking - let's just call it like it is - horny, without at least one dip into heaven? I'll never know, but he did. I know he did, because he hasn't been back even one goddamned time and there is no one on this earth that can withstand the temptation that is my doll once they've had themselves a taste. She's that goddamned addicting.
So, underneath all of my hate for him, is appreciation and respect. Because I am grateful to him. Not only did he manage to get her away from two outrageous fuck-ups that are currently locked in my dungeon in the Maldives, but he slipped her out from under Ruby's taloned thumb.
From what I've learned, Tiny and Damien, acting on Ruby's (HA! Someone tell me when she became a boss, eh?) command, had Romany under lock and key with no hopes of release any time in the near future. They were charged with keeping her away from everyone. Me included. And they succeeded for two entire months before Romany was able to seduce them into a stupor and make contact with Ruiz who then swooped in and transported her back to the States. Leaving those two, incompetent fools to chase their dicks around somebody else's country. Santos' country.
Why did she call Ruiz and not me? I don't know. I haven't asked her yet, but I will. Because, today is the day I will make my presence known. Today is the day I will finally step out of the dark alley and into her path. Well, not exactly her path. More like her comfort zone.
Because this morning after she left to begin her morning ritual of a two mile jog toward the marketplace, I broke into her tidy little cottage on the beach and left her a few things to remind her of me. One of them being a little heart shaped velvet box with a million dollar rock inside. I plan to be watching her reaction to my gifts on the big screen via the wireless camera that I set up this morning, from a short distance of about a hundred fifty feet, in the apartment that I rented two months ago that sits across the very same pebbled road her little two bedroom casita is on.
It's the moment of truth that I need. The moment that will shape the rest of my days. She'll either know it was me and call out my name, or she won't. Either way, I'll be greeting my doll tonight for the first time in almost half a year.
As she rides on past me, I smile and dial Bruno on my phone while I begin my tedious little stroll back to the apartment.
"Bruno," he answers on the first ring and I have to smile when I hear the Tarantella playing in the background.
"Well," I grumble, "Is it done?"
"It's done," he replies. "But he's not fucking happy about it and it's beginning to look like the Dons are gonna execute his ass."
I release a dark chuckle, watching as my doll disappears around the corner. "He's that drunk, is he?"
Bruno hisses, "He's more than just drunk. He's barely standing. The only thing about him that seeems to be in working order is his mouth. He hasn't stopped talking shit about his bride since his vows. It was a real shitshow, that wedding. You won't believe what he said to her right there in front of the whole damned world."
"This is Alex we're talking about, Bruno. Of course I would believe."
"My favorite line was when he vowed to rub, cherish, and starve her until her dying breath and then he asked her to carry him out of the church."
Fuck. Poor Ana. She really deserves better, but... it was either him or me.
He was never planning to marry my doll anyway, and she also deserves better.
"Well," I say with a sigh, "from what I remember of Ana, she's not as timid as she appears. You never know... she may end up surprising him."
"For sure," Bruno chortles. "She definitely surprised me. I thought for sure she was gonna cry or something, but her smile never faltered once... her eyes though... I could tell she wasn't unaffected."
"Maybe she'll do us all a favor and let him drown in his whiskey," I say, only half-joking. Stopping at a vendor to buy a single red rose, my tone turns serious, "Now that the deed is done, I need you to get him and his new wife on a plane to the Maldives. Tell him I left his wedding present waiting for him at my villa."
"What if he refuses?"
I smile. "Tell him that his gift awaits in the dungeon and he won't."