lie to me → s.d.

.08 | foreign venom

          If there was anyone in the Rossi Estate that felt uncomfortable or out of place or like they didn't belong, Theodora trumped them in every way. She was used to wearing tennis shoes at her waitressing job and boots on the rare occasion someone did hire her for personal protection, so she was completely at a loss when it came to the contraptions on her feet. Of course she had worn heels before, but wearing them descending a grand marble staircase? It proved a far more daunting task than scaling a vertical cliffside at sunset.

          Then again, she did have to admit in the moment she felt like something more than a simple waitress or a wanted thief. She had seen movies growing up, and what girl who hadn't didn't dream about floating down a flight of stairs like this, in a place like this, with a dress sweeping the ground behind her ankles and some kind of prince charming waiting for her at the bottom? She tried to imagine him near the landing, gazing up at her with both awe and a deep adoration - but when she realized she didn't want to choose who 'he' was, she thought it better that she was here on the staircase by herself.

          Theodora felt as if she were a wolf in sheep's clothing, what with the dress' sleeves covering her tattoos and the blinding fake wedding ring to distract from the compass inked on the back of her hand. The phony rock was big enough that it looked as through it had put at least a few jewelry stores on the map. The blue faux silk of her dress moved like curtains on an open window in the low light of the atrium, where hundreds of attendants were waiting for the auction to begin. Tucking her purse under her arm, she allowed her deft glaze to slip to the stage, and her step faltered.

          The Saint Dismas cross was displayed on a pedestal near the front of the stage, beside a set of priceless earrings and a piece of some rare earth stone found deep in the wilds of Belize. They had changed the order; it was being presented third, instead of fifteenth, as the list they'd acquired had said. She found herself stilled, eyes fixated hungrily on the cross like a predator having spotted her prey. It wasn't a crucifix, no, since the idol's hands were not nailed to the arms of the wood, but rather wrapped around it. Saint Dismas, more commonly known as the Good Thief, was one of the two unnamed penitent thieves suspended beside Jesus during the crucifixion in Luke's account of the ordeal. Her hands practically twitched; she could feel the hot blood of her old self, the her that used to rob ancient temples and live like - well, a thief - coursing through her veins like lava.

"Theodora!" called a male voice, and she turned, searching the faces surrounding her for one she knew. She found it, and the magma beneath her skin turned to watered-down ice.

Sam and Nathan had not been alone in their Panama search for the cross; they were competing with a rich, snobby, daddy's boy after the same treasure by the name of Rafe Adler - he had escaped in the shootout that Sam should have, as well. And now he was standing in front of her, with a dark-skinned woman wearing heels that matched the ones she had seen in the bathroom upstairs. Her clutch on her purse tightened and she nearly took an imitated step backwards. The universe just couldn't give her a break this week, now, could it?

"Theodora, how have you been?" Rafe said. His white tuxedo allowed him to stand out in the crowd like a sore thumb, and his red bow tie allowed him to look like the complete idiot he was. He had a thin, slim face and a body to match, and his hair was adorned with so much gel slicking it back over his skull it seemed as though he had taken a dive just before arriving at the auction. "Oh, my goodness, you'll have to forgive me. Theodora, this is my new partner. Nadine Ross, this is an..." His eyebrow gave a nearly-there quirk. "An old associate."

Theodora brought a smile to her lips and shook both their hands, attempting to hide the pale-knuckled grip she had on the purse. "I hardly expected to see you here, Rafe," she said, some kind of foreign venom dripping from between her teeth. "I thought you had gone back to living in your parents' place in Scotland after the escape of a lifetime."