#rootworkin

matt moreau was an obnoxious asshole but when he slapped beau's shoulder with a sharp greeting, beau just let out a lazy grin, and thought about how much money the oaf was going to earn him. the trick to conning people involved with big, powerful crime families is never let them know how you truly feel; and beau was a master of masking how much matt made his skin crawl. matt's bloodshot brown eyes studied his face, and for a moment beau expected him to speak, but then his gaze slipped past him, and he watched the man's face face light up with a cruel smirk as he saw someone else to focus on. beau found himself being turned by a strong shoulder pressing into the small of his back.

" Ah! " matt barked, " You made it. Come over here, darling, I want you to meet my buddy Stevie. " beau yielded to matt's firm touch, and tuned; but the moment he laid eyes on who was being summoned, he froze. she looked flawless, as always, and suddenly the hand on his back was suffocating. pasha. he fought to keep his breathing regular, but his less than gracious host had noticed his stiffness, and let out a sharp laugh, slapping his back again before his hand finally, thankfully, slid away. " She's pretty isn't she? " he didn't respond, and felt warm breath on his neck as matt leaned in to whisper in his ear, " She's a handful though. " then he moved past him to greet pasha, beautiful and glaring. and beau's face fell, his eyes pleading with her - don't say a word.

It’s a lot easier not to think about Pasha when he’s at school,     surrounded by beautiful men and women and overloaded with work to do.     It’s easy to forget about her when he’s too busy trying to prove himself to the rest of the student body.     As a marginalized person,     the first of his family to ever attend college,     he feels that he has that much extra pressure on him.

When he comes back from school,     Polly sends him to New Orleans for Christmas,     because she wants to keep her connections with the Devereauxes and having Tommy working for them for the majority of his young life had apparently not been enough.     Now she wants him to go and mingle and tell them all about his grades and his extracurriculars  ( the legal ones,     anyway )  and pretend that he belongs there when the entirety of his best outfit costs less than one of their lamps. 

He’s standing in the corner with his hands in his pockets,     watching people mingle at the Christmas party when he realizes that Pasha has caught him staring.      Instead of looking away he holds her gaze for a long moment and beckons her over with a nod of his head and a smile that is far too charming to belong on a scrappy young boy from Birmingham. 

“Lemme guess, this is tha part where yer expectin’ me ta ask if ye been followin’ me or not.” Todd says in that messy and disjointed quebecois-parisian accent. Bright blue eyes beam with deviousness. His smile is ever-present, showing off those finely filed canine teeth as he turns to face the women who’s been asking for his attention as he walks home from work. “I already know ya have been so we ain’t gotta do that ol' song an’ dance.” Todd generally just assumed the cops are always on his case. For the most part, he’s been inside a police station more than a bed –– a haunting reality he hasn’t exactly thought about too hard and long on yet. 

“So whatever ya wanna ask me about, copper–– Yeah, I marked ya a mile away––” Todd says, pointedly, leaned up against the brick wall next to the alleyway with his arms crossed over his chest. Around the corner, his use of the word ‘copper’ has triggered some scrambling from the people occupying the alley way next to him. “I’ll just save ya tha trouble. It wasn’t me, I ain’t do shit, and I ain’t a rat, just a fox.” Todd smirks and offers her a wink. The words are rehearsed and devoid of meaning. If Todd wanted to put a good foot forward with the cops, this wasn’t the way to do it. But, then again, cop was a cop, right?

ooc. gOD YES. i literally stalk so many ships. I’m currently stalking:

                      Nyoko & Shuni ( @slwdancing & @cordiibus )                       Aubrey & Oz ( @caerulcum & @cordiibus )

His second mistake is turning his back to the darkened doorway of the restaurant from which he had just emerged with a beautiful woman on his arm.     He’d walked her to her car,     said goodnight,     and left like a gentleman.     They’d spent a pleasant evening catching up over wine and whisky and food that Thomas could barely pronounce.     He’d carried himself well enough,      but he had made his third and final mistake much earlier in the night. 

His third mistake had been that he had not kissed Pasha. 

The flame of the lighter goes out and before he can take his first drag,     there is the sound of the rapid tap-tap-tap of hard-soled shoes on the pavement behind him,     coming closer.     He turns in time to catch the stranger on the side of the head with a closed fist and get a good look at him. 

“ Riviera ? ”

Before he can take a step forward three men take him to the ground and beat him savagely.     He counts the seconds.     173.      And then it’s over. 

There is so much blood that it leaves shining puddles on the black pavement,     the moonlight casting an eerie glow across his broken face.     One of the uninjured men heaves Tommy over his shoulder and carries him to the back of a flatbed truck.      The last thing Tommy hears before he slips into the sweet lull of unconsciousness is the sound of his skull slamming down hard against the sheet of tin that covers the bed of the truck. 

He stirs again when they dump him onto a doorstep and stuff a note into the breast pocket of his suit.     It is still night.     There are fireflies in the air.     The shallow din of crickets and frogs and insects fills his ears.     He knows this place.     Were it not for the smell of copper and iron in his nose he would smell hay and horses and fresh water.     He is on Pasha’s doorstep. 

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