[Tantalism] 🕶️ Jobs

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 150-153

There’s something in the clothes provided by Miriam that seems appropriate for the concerned young wife of a gangster. I slip it on. Black. Plunging neckline. It’s hot, but classy, as are the heels I find. A little bit of make-up, and a spray of Chanel Coco. I look at myself in the mirror and laugh. I’ve come a long way in the last fifteen minutes! I strut confidently, but with appropriate amounts of concern, up the hallway, into Miriam’s room.	I strut confidently, but with appropriate amounts of concern, up the hallway, into Miriam’s room.
“What’s going on, Miriam?” My voice is sharp. in a way that surprised even me. Miriam gets what’s going on immediately. She introduces me to the police as Mrs Andropov. Goes all quiet and frightened. The temperature in the room drops twenty degrees. “You were fucking my husband again, weren’t you Miriam.” This was not a question. Miriam blushes in an act that would win an Oscar. “Yes Ma’am.” She whispers, looking at the floor. Then at the police, a male and a female sergeant, who clearly wish they were somewhere else. The policeman speaks, indicating I should sit down. The arrogant Mrs Andropov ignores him. “Mr Andropov has had a heart attack, ma’am," says the Sergeant. Soft and caring. "We think the combination of…er…exertion and drugs at his age…” I go all melodramatic and sit with my hand over my heart. “Do we know how serious it is Sergeant?” “We only know that he’s very unwell ma’am.” I lower my head at this. Sigh. I need to be careful not to overdo it so I verbally launch myself at Miriam. “This is your fault Miriam. Slut.” “Ma’am, he forced himself on me…” I have to look at the police. If I don’t, I’ll crack up laughing. “Didn’t sound like that to me,” I mutter to no one in particular. I soften my voice. “Sergeant, I’d be most grateful if I could come with you when you return to the mainland. I need to be with poor Igor.” I hit them both with the killer smile. Miriam coughs. “Of course ma’am. I’ll get a car to meet us at the Trogir dock to take you to the main hospital in Split.”	We arrange to I strut confidently, but with appropriate amounts of concern, up the hallway, into Miriam’s room.meet at the boat. I stalk back to my room. I’m in the process of changing out of the fuck-me dress into something more discrete and appropriate for a boat ride when I hear a little splash, and a voice from the bathroom.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 154-157

“Fucky fucky fucky…”	Snake Eyes. Naked. In my bath. He’s scratched from his dalliance with the roses. He holds up a key. “You want boat?” he says, leering. “We have bath. I wash you. You, me, slippy slippy. Then, you have boat.”
Slippy slippy, fucky fucky, washy washy, boaty boaty. For fuck's sake! I cover myself with a towel. Look at him for a moment. And make a decision.	I already have a boat. And some nice police people. So I scream. I scream the fucking house down. Snake Eyes tries to get out of the bath in a panic. He slips and lands with a gigantic splash. Some more clomping and yelling, and the aforementioned Nice Police People appear at the door. “Sergeant…” I say shaking my head and indicating the intruder. I need say no more. Miriam is behind, smirking silently.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 158-161

The launch cuts across flat black water at full throttle. Through the cockpit window I can see Snake Eyes’ ankles where he’s cuffed to a rail below, crossed at the heel like he’s napping. Miriam will be stripping the room by now. Igor will be on a ventilator somewhere, Warren circling the building like a dog that’s heard a tin opener. The male police officer, Luka, is telling me about a place near the Diocletian Palace that does a lamb peka worth the trip alone. I ask him to write it down. He does.	Split materialises out of the grey just before dawn. Luka walks me to his aunt’s hotel, carries my backpack up three flights without being asked. His aunt appears in a housecoat, kisses him twice, gives me a room key and a look that lands, finally, on my face. She says something to him in Croatian. He glances at me and says nothing back. I pay her cash a week up front. This seems to settle any issues.
Luka sets my backpack inside the door. Tells me the hospital is twelve minutes on foot, offers to draw a map. I tell him I’ll find it. He nods. Smiles. Looks at me once more—not the way Snake Eyes looked, not the way Igor looked, just looks—and goes back down the stairs. I listen to him reach the bottom before I slide the bolt across.	I strip off. The hotel room is small, clean, smelling of lemon polish. But it’s hot, and I turn on the air conditioner and lie on the bed naked face down, and sleep. But sleep doesn’t come immediately. I listen to Split waking up. Scooters. Voices. Someone singing off-key two floors below. The aunt’s hotel is cheap, anonymous, the kind of place where no one asks questions because everyone has something to hide. The kind that makes its money from couples booking a room for a few hours.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 162-165

I have crazy dreams. I am naked - or nearly naked - and on display. In the one I remember - the one that wakes me up, I’m in the middle of a city crowd being fucked from behind by a young man, while an older passer-by touches my breasts. God, I’ve got a lot of shit to work out.	At ten I give up. There’s a group downstairs in the hotel's Waterfront cafe making a lot of noise. I take a cool shower, dress in something appropriate to my status, and walk to the hospital. The streets are already baking, the stone radiating yesterday’s heat. I find a café, order espresso, watch old men play chess in the square.
The hospital is the kind of building that keeps adding wings and hoping no one notices. I find reception. Ask for Mr. Andropov. The woman behind the desk looks at me the way women behind desks look at you when you’re seriously overdressed for the venue - not unkind, just filing the information away. She blinks and makes a call. Waits. Nods at something. Points me toward ICU.	A doctor catches me. He has the face of someone who has delivered this particular speech before, but not often enough to be comfortable with it. He starts with the “having vigorous sex with another woman” part of the story, watching to see if I buckle. I don’t. He moves on: the heart, the cocaine, the numbers on a chart he turns slightly toward me. Each pause an invitation to weep. I look at the chart. Ask one or two questions. He closes the folder and says he’s very sorry for my loss, then corrects himself—very sorry for what I’m going through.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 166-169

I go to Igor’s room. He looks smaller. Tubes everywhere, machines breathing for him. I stay with him for two hours. Not out of devotion. Because I need to see who comes, who calls, what patterns emerge.	I leave a picture of myself. If he wakes up, I’d like the first person he sees to be one who truly hates him. I want the loathing on my face to trigger his last breath.
I see no one that afternoon apart from medical staff. I leave and go for a walk before heading back to the hotel. The old boys are still playing chess in the square, and I treat myself to an ice cream from a lovely old bloke. He’s so concerned about me spoiling my ‘pretty party dress’, he gives me extra serviettes and wishes me a happy day. I promise I’ll visit again tomorrow.	I walk back to the hotel through streets that narrow and twist like arteries, past shops selling sunglasses, holidays and inflatable dolphins, past markets, past restaurants where waiters in black shirts call out to me in three languages. I ignore them all. My feet know the way now, muscle memory taking over while my mind chews on the morning’s information.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 170-173

The aunt’s hotel is quiet when I arrive and she is nowhere to be seen. I sleep again, deeper this time. But the dreams come back. With a vengeance. This time I’m working in a topless bar. I’m wearing only a short black leather skirt. There’s half a dozen old men behind a counter. They don’t say anything, but I can feel their eyes all over me. When I do see them, they re all the creeps who did bad things to me when I was younger.	A younger guy comes out from nowhere, puts his hands on my shoulders and forces me to my knees. This is a performance. Something we've agreed to do for an audience.
He takes his cock out and I suck it while all the old guys watch.	Then my skirt comes off and they’re all touching me and licking me. An old man finger fucks me and I cum in the dream.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 174-177

And also in real life. It wakes me up. Almost catapults me off the bed.	"Oh fuuuuck!!!!
"Oh...sweet Jesus..."	There’s a bang on the door. “Mrs Andropov. It’s Luka. I need to talk with you.” “I’ll come down and meet you in the Waterfront, Luka,” I grunt hoarsely in response, my voice breaking. “OK.”

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 178-181

	Despite the recent explosion in my loins, I’m so fucking horny after that dream I’d do pretty well anything with anything right now. But I have to grow up and be good. Luka is a pretty policeman, no doubt about it. But he’s still a policeman. And in my social circles, a woman from the Spinetti clan cuckolding an Andropov with a cop will go down like a bucket of cold sick. I take a deep breath. Tell myself to calm down. I spray a quick blast of deodorant, throw on shorts, singlet and jacket. My natural habitat when it’s hot. Sometimes even when it’s not.
	Luka’s off duty and enjoying a beer. I do the same. “Mrs Andropov…” he begins, but I gently interrupt. “Call me Gabriella, please Luka. Or Ella. Anything but Mrs Andropov.” I smile and he blushes. In the corner, Auntie watches over her beloved nephew like a meerkat on amphetamines. “Gabriella. You need to know that despite our best efforts, Franjo made bail this morning.” “Franjo?” “The man we found in your bath.” Snake Eyes. I begin to feel nauseous. “He has alerted us to…well…” “Spit it out Luka,” I say, patting his arm. As I do, Auntie walks into an umbrella. “Isla De La Palma have issued an extradition warrant for you. Two counts of murder.” He sets his beer down carefully. “When they came for you last night, they took the wrong woman. Mila Loncar. She’s in a cell here while they work out what happened.” Something moves through my chest. I keep my face still. “Is she OK?” “Shaken. She’ll be okay.” He pauses. “She told us what he did to her. And what he did to you.” I lift my beer. Take a long pull. Across the terrace, Auntie stops rubbing her forehead. “Mila shouldn’t be in there, Luka.” “No.” He turns his glass on the table. “But she’s safe, warm and comfortable. Probably better than in a shelter.” I nod, remembering that Andropov had picked her up off the streets. “Someone called Khalid Aliyev from Azerbaijan has been in contact. Sent photographs of that night. He asked us to look out for you.” “Khalid.” I exhale something that isn’t quite a laugh.
	“Someone called Khalid Aliyev has been in contact. Sent photographs of that night. He asked us to look out for you.” “Khalid.” I exhale something that isn’t quite a laugh. “And somebody else sent us some pictures that’ll probably get you off the hook in Isla De La Palma.” “My god, who?” I ask. He doesn’t answer, but pulls out a tablet. Puts it in front of me, swiping through snaps.

The first set is grainy. Night vision green.
Two figures dragging something heavy through scrub. Then the something heavy becomes two somethings. Bodies. Legs trailing. Arms bound. They drop them into a hole that's already been dug, then shovel dirt on top with a kind of methodical, unhurried rhythm that makes my stomach turn over. The time stamp in the corner reads 02:47. The date is the twenty-third.
The morning after the night I landed on Andropov's island as his brand new wife.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 182-184b

I keep my face neutral. Swipe.
The second set is different. Colour. Daylight. Two men standing on a balcony I recognise—the honeymoon villa, the east terrace. One of them is my father. The other is a face I don't know. Stocky. Grey beard. They're looking at something in a box and laughing. The time stamp puts this at the previous morning, hours before the night vision shots. I hand the tablet back. My fingers are steady.
"Who sent these?"
"Warren Andropov." He smiles, watching for my reaction. I flop back in my seat. Whistle. I should be angry. I think I am angry. I shake my head.

	"Look at this one. Really interesting." He swipes a few more shots before stopping at one of me skipping naked through the rainforest waving at the drone. Something between a laugh and a grimace comes out of me. "Yeah, very funny…" "No, I'm serious. Look here." He zooms in past me. There's a figure in the trees. Distant. A little pixelated, but definitely female. My stomach does something complicated.
	"The same woman who's here," he says calmly. It's a shot taken the night I was destroyed by my new husband and his friends. She's dressed in leather and latex, holding a small riding crop. I stare at it longer than I need to. Miriam. I feel the beer in my hand go cold. The terrace tilts slightly. Not enough for anyone else to notice. Just enough for me. "Are you sure?" Luka nods. "We have her on three different cameras from that night. She was on Isla De La Palma two days before you left. She organised the men to dig the hole. Then she got changed and played flight attendant for your trip back. Then, only a week ago, got the paperwork happening for an extradition.”
	I feel the beer in my hand go cold. The terrace tilts slightly. Not enough for anyone else to notice. Just enough for me. "Are you sure?" Luka nods. "We have her on three different cameras from that night. She was on Isla De La Palma before you arrived. She organised the men to dig the hole. Then she got changed and played flight attendant for your trip back. Then, only a week ago, got the paperwork happening for an extradition.” I set the beer down. Push it away. My mind is doing that thing where it tries to process too much at once and ends up processing nothing. Miriam. Who massaged me, who got me drunk, who sat across from me at breakfast. Who helped me pack. Who smirked when Snake Eyes hit the bath tile. Who seduced me and told me, with those careful brown eyes, that she loved me.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 185-188

"She's been in contact with you on your burner phone since you arrived in Split," Luka says. "Two calls. One text." I don't move. The terrace keeps tilting. "Can I see the text? Have you got it?" He hesitates. Then pulls his phone out, finds it, turns the screen toward me. *Room 303 safe. Don't use the balcony. —M* I read it twice. The words don't rearrange themselves into anything kinder. I hand the phone back. My hand is steady. I'm proud of that hand. "Where is she now?" "No idea. Probably in her room waiting for you.” I stare at him. Think about the gun I handed her. “I…I can’t trust her can I?” He pauses to consider my question. “I’m not sure you can trust anyone Gabriella. Apart from me.” He smiles. “And, strangely enough, Warren.” I look at him, perplexed. “He heard about the murder charge and volunteered the photos because he knew you couldn’t have done it.”	I meet Miriam in the corridor outside her room. She opens the door before I knock. Like she's been standing behind it. Waiting. "Ella." Her face does that soft, melting thing. She steps forward and wraps both arms around me, pulls me into her. Her hand goes to the back of my head. Her lips find my temple. "God, I've been so worried about you." I stand there. Let her hold me. My arms hang at my sides for a beat, then I lift them and put them around her waist because not doing so would look wrong, and right now wrong is dangerous. She squeezes tighter. Makes a small sound against my hair. The sound of someone who's missed someone. And I wanted this. I wanted it so badly an hour ago. We pull back. She’s wanting something more, but I put my hand up. "Tall tales and true over breakfast. We have so much to talk about." She nods sadly, as I’m already halfway to my door. I linger outside, watching it close.
My room is quiet in a way that has weight to it. I sit on the edge of the bed and look at my hands. They're shaking. Not a little—they're shaking. I press them flat against the bed and stare at the wall and try to locate, somewhere in my chest, the part of me that knows what to do next. It isn't there.	Next morning before breakfast, I head to the hospital. The doctor, a different one, older, calls me into a small room with a laminated table and a window overlooking a car park. He has a folder. He doesn't open it. "Mrs. Andropov,” he says. He scrutinises me. Assesses. "Doctor." "Your husband has suffered an additional ischaemic event. A second stroke, this one in the brain stem." He pauses. Looks at me. I say nothing. "The damage is extensive. He is breathing with assistance. He is not in pain. But he will not regain motor function. He will not speak. He will not eat without a tube. He will not walk." "Will he know I'm here. Will he know anything?" Another pause. Longer this time. "We believe he can hear. Possibly see, though the extent to which he can comprehend is unclear. There are EEG patterns consistent with awareness. He is, in the clinical sense, conscious. But he cannot respond." "So he's trapped." The word hangs between us. "Yes. That is one way to describe it." I let the silence do the work. The doctor shifts in his chair. Opens the folder finally, closes it again. “Realistically, he's only alive because of the machines, and that's not going to change," he eventually says. I nod. "As his wife, any decision about how long we keep him in this limbo is yours. His son has signed away the responsibility." "I understand.” Warren’s leaving it to me. I pause for a moment, translating this information into something that make sense for me. “I’d like to see him, if that’s ok." "Of course."

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 189-192

Igor's room smells of antiseptic and something sweet underneath. Flowers. Miriam's work, probably, though she only arrived yesterday, summoned to keep up appearances. The robot on the front desk tells me that no else has visited. I can’t help thinking that no one wants to keep sucking up to a vegetable. The machines hiss and click. His chest rises and falls with mechanical precision. His eyes are open. Not staring at the ceiling—slightly to the left, fixed on the window where the light is brightest. I pull a chair close. Sit. Cross my legs. Uncross them. Put myself in his field of vision. Then I talk to him.

GABRIELLA'S REVENGE 1

PLEASE WATCH THIS VIDEO WITH AUDIO (190.rar)​

Video's Context:
Gabriella visits her abusive gangster husband in hospital. He is in a vegetative state after a heart attack and a stroke, brought about by having crazy sex with his secretary when he was high on cocaine.
Medical advise suggests he can hear her and comprehend what's going on around him.
After suffering appalling sexual abuse from him and his friends, she decides it's time to get her own back.
She now has the power.

Having reminded Igor that his life is now, ironically, in my hands, I leave. Miriam meets me at a café in Trogir. I take a taxi from Split to the market and walk the rest, through narrow, secretive historic alleys. Miriam’s on her feet before I reach her. We collide more than embrace. Her arms go around me hard and I grip the back of her jacket.	“Tell me it worked,” she says breathlessly. “Yeah! Luka thinks you personally supervised the excavation. Backhoe and all.” She pulls back, laughing despite herself. “What’s a backhoe?” “Ask Luka.” She laughs again. Orders without showing me the menu. Food arrives. I eat it. The sun is doing something reassuring to the back of my neck and I turn my face toward it like a plant.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 193-196

"Get the waiter to take our photo."	“I love you Ella.” Her words slap me. I realise she wants something I can never give her, give anyone. I reach out and touch her beautiful face. Smile.
“Slim, before I can commit even to eating breakfast with you, I need to know whether you had anything to do with the murder of those two beautiful young men. You’ve been playing both sides since before I even knew there were sides. But I need to know that’s over.”	She doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t reach for her coffee or look away. The sun catches the edge of her jaw, the small scar I hadn’t noticed before near her ear. “I didn’t kill them,” she says. “I didn’t know they were going to die.” “And the extradition? Setting me up for murder?” She reaches for my hand. I don’t pull away, but I don’t reciprocate either. “After you humiliated Andropov at lunch, he went straight for Mila. Remember, we heard her screaming for what felt like hours?”

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 197-200

“I remember. I can still hear her.” I tell Miriam that Mila is in a local jail while they figure out what to do with her. “ And you appeared at my door with wine for the first time.” I hazard a little smile.	“Ella, your bravery at lunch and then Andropov’s treatment of Mila, made me see a line that I had long ago crossed. So I turned up with wine to at least try and make up for some of the things I’d done to you.”
“Like pussy-whipping me.” She flinches, nods, tears building in her eyes. She continued. “When Mila eventually lost consciousness, he made a call—to a butcher in Kinshasa who collects blondes like trophies. Andropov wasn’t just angry; he was going to package you up and ship you off in exchange for a crate of assault rifles or a fresh girl to break.” My blood didn’t just run cold—it froze solid in my veins. “In The Congo?” “Yes. In two hours he had three potential buyers for you, all warlords in different parts of Africa, outbidding each other. These were men who specifically wanted—you know what they wanted.” I do. I know exactly what they wanted. I feel it in my spine, in the place between my legs that still wakes me up screaming.	We get more coffee. Water. “It was me that suggested the extradition to get you away from him. I knew we could prove you hadn’t been anywhere near the place so it wouldn’t be for long. I just didn’t expect the goons to arrive for you so quickly.”

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 201-204

“So,” I responded “you took me to your room that night hoping they’d think Mila was me.” “It was a long shot. And if we’d been sprung we’d both be on our way to The Congo.” I’m holding her hand firmly now. I kiss it, and she kisses mine.

“I believe you,” I say. And she bursts into tears. Around us, a kid drops an ice cream, a busker between gigs wanders past. I continue. “Our rooms are both bugged and fit with cameras. Our friend Luka has a deal going with his aunt. That, and his take on your activities, was why I was so cold with you last night.” She nods. Squeezes my hand. I get to my feet. Pay. “Slim, I need to see Igor again. Part of my ‘loving wife’ act. And then I think we need to find different accommodation we don’t tell anyone about.”

GABRIELLA'S REVENGE 2

PLEASE WATCH THIS VIDEO WITH AUDIO (203.rar)​

Video's Context:
Gabriella visits her abusive gangster husband in hospital. He is in a vegetative state after a heart attack and a stroke, brought about by having crazy sex with his secretary when he was high on cocaine.
Medical advise suggests he can hear her and comprehend what's going on around him.
After suffering appalling sexual abuse from him and his friends, she decides it's time to get her own back.
She now has the power.

I leave the hospital, feeling completely evil at the games I’m playing with Igor and the lies I’m spouting. It’s the final night in Luka’s aunt’s hotel. I climb the stairs to my room, strip down to my underwear, and keep going up to the roof. I desperately need to feel cool night air on my skin.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 205-208

There’s a terrace up here, a view of terracotta tiles and satellite dishes and, beyond everything, the beautiful vivid blue sea. It’s night and I can’t see it. But I know it’s there. I’m as horny as hell. I’d give anything for some buff young man - or men - to ravish my naked body with calloused hands and fuck the bejesus out of me right now up here.	I consider a quick nudie display on the balcony, but quickly reconsider when an older gentleman and his wife appear. He’s happy to hang around with a scantily clad twenty-something blonde on the roof. His wife less so, huffing and puffing after a stair climb. He appraises me, makes small talk in German. Says goodnight and they go downstairs.
	I drop into a chair, the rusty metal frame creaking under my sudden weight. The crack of a rifle splits the air a half-second later. Experience of my misspent youth tells me it’s a large calibre. A spray of concrete dust stings my cheek as a bullet screams off the wall right where my skull had been, leaving a raw, white scar in the brick. Fuck! There’s a commotion below. I drop to the ground, crawl to the stairs and bolt down to my room.
	I hear the German babbling about a girl in her underwear, then heavy footsteps up the stairs onto the roof. Miriam emerges. By now am ready to speak to someone. After about ten minutes, that someone is Luka, and he gets short shrift. I tell him everything I know. Not a lot. I was on the roof getting fresh air and, by sheer fluke, dodged a bullet. “No one knows I’m in this hotel, apart from you and your aunt,” I report acidly. “And whoever is watching the surveillance cameras you planted.” “And Miriam,” he says, not even bothering to look surprised I’ve found his spy equipment. I shake my head. Step inside my room and shut the door in his face. “Maybe try and not be so conspicuous, Gabriella!” he calls through the door. The cleanup is quick, and peace soon takes over again. The last thing Miriam and I see is a very fat man being bundled, handcuffed, into a police car. Closely followed by a handcuffed young woman. A rifle, broken for safety in a big plastic bag, is placed carefully in the boot. There's a couple of cops and a dog searching in the bushes, but everyone else has gone.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 209-212

The thought ‘he who asks first, gets’ curdles in my stomach. He falls into step beside me. “I’ve been watching you,” he says, his voice low, too close. The words should repulse me, but a traitorous part of me thrills at the attention, at being seen in this raw, electric state. “Have you now,” I manage, my own voice thin. “I think there are laws against that.”	“Have you now,” I manage, my own voice thin. “I think there are laws against that.” His laugh is a soft, dismissive puff of air. “Not for someone like you.” His leer is unabashed. Unashamed. My body is a war: one half wants to bolt, the other wants to see what happens. I try to quicken my pace, to find the safety of a crowd, but my steps feel heavy, reluctant.
	His hand closes around my wrist, not harsh, but absolute. A shiver runs through me—fear or anticipation, I can’t tell. “Please,” I whisper, and it sounds like a lie even to me. “You’re scaring me.” His thumb presses into my pulse point, feeling it race. “Good scared or bad scared?” “Bad scared. Let go, or I’ll scream the house down.”

He doesn’t, so I do.

Not loud. Loud enough. That single note cuts through the warm night air like a blade and the street answers it. Heads turn. A couple stops walking. A man outside a bar sets down his beer and stands. Two women in heels slow, then stop, watching. Within seconds there's a loose ring of bodies around us, phones up, that particular modern reflex.

He lets go.

Steps back. His hands drop to his sides. He looks at me the way you look at something you've decided to destroy later, at your leisure, when no one is watching.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 216-219

	"You have no idea," he says quietly, "what you just walked away from." It isn't a threat exactly. It's worse. “Yes I do.” He turns and moves through the crowd without touching anyone, unhurried, the way men like that always move—like the world parts for them because it knows better. And it does. He's gone before anyone thinks to film him.
	The cluster of onlookers dissolves almost as fast as it formed. The couple walks on. I'm left standing on the pavement, pulse hammering, wrist still warm where his thumb had been. I don't go to the strip club.
	The man with the beer comes over and asks if I’m ok. Genuine. Buys me a drink. I sit and chat with him until the adrenaline downshifts into something colder and more useful. He’s nice, friendly, unthreatening. The adrenaline is mostly gone now. What's left is something quieter and considerably more embarrassing. I'm sitting at a bar in Split in my underwear and a pair of shorts that wouldn't pass a school dress code, next to a perfectly decent thirty-something man who is asking me sensible questions about where I'm from and whether I like Croatia, and I feel like an absolute idiot. His name is Tomislav. He sells industrial irrigation equipment across the Adriatic. He has kind eyes and seems to have absolutely no interest in anything other than making sure I've stopped shaking. I have stopped shaking. I tug the hem of my shorts down out of habit. It doesn't help. "You live here?" he asks. "Passing through." He nods. Doesn't push. Orders another round without asking which I appreciate, and when the drinks arrive he turns back to face the street rather than me, which I appreciate more. We sit like that for a while. Comfortable. Easy. The kind of quiet you don't have to earn. I think about the man who grabbed my wrist. ‘You have no idea what you just walked away from.’ The words keep surfacing, cold and specific. Not a drunk's bluster. Something measured. Informed. "You're thinking very hard," Tomislav says. "Occupational hazard." "What's your occupation?" I smile at my glass. "Passing through." He laughs. A real one. It makes the street feel safer

He walks me to my hotel. I take his arm. Thank him with words and a kiss. He waits until I'm inside the lobby before he raises a hand and walks back the way we came. Gentleman.

Miriam is at the small bar off the lobby. Alone. A glass of something amber in front of her, untouched, both hands wrapped around it like it's the only warm thing left in the world. Her shoulders carry the full weight of the night. She looks like a woman rehearsing bad news.

Then she sees me.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 220-223

Then she sees me. It happens fast—the shift. Her whole face opens up. Not a smile exactly. More like a held breath finally released. I slide onto the stool beside her and steal her drink. She lets me. Outside, through the lobby's glass frontage, I can see the blue pulse of police lights still painting the rooftop terrace wall in cold stutters. Two officers with torches are working through the scrubby oleander below the building's eastern face, methodical, crouching, parting branches with gloved hands. Looking for a shell casing. A position. Evidence that someone knelt in the dark and drew a bead on me. They won't find much. Men like that clean up. "Where did you go?" Miriam asks. Her voice is careful. "For a walk, Slim." Her jaw tightens fractionally. She knows what that means. She doesn't push it.	"Franjo," I say. "Was he working for Andropov?" "Franjo works for whoever is paying that week." She flags the barman, orders two more. "But Andropov has been paying longest." "And Mila?" She's quiet for a moment. “Mila is complicated." "Uncomplicate her for me, Slim." She tightens her grip around the cold glass. “Word is, her brother borrowed from people who don’t send reminders. Andropov bought the debt, which effectively gave him a claim on her. She’s been scrambling ever since, trying to become indispensable enough to stay alive.” She shrugs. “It’s a razor’s edge.” “Was she pointing Franjo at me or at you?” “You. Definitely.” She sighs. “Go on…” She hesitates. “I’m not proud of this, Ella.” Her chin goes down. Her fingers start to shake around the glass and she has to set it on the bar before she spills it. I take her hand in both of mine. It’s cold as a corpse. “I’ve already told you I knew about the extradition. It was my idea.” She has to stop, swallow, start again. “Because after you lectured him at lunch that day, he really was going to kill you. He said it out loud, in front of three people. The only reason he didn’t do it immediately was that he wanted to torture you first. Kill you slowly.” Her voice breaks on the last word and she presses her knuckles against her mouth like she might be sick. I hold her hand tighter and say the things you’re supposed to say. Something I’m not normally good at.
	“He had a room picked out, Ella. A room. With a drain in the floor. He practiced on Mila.” I shuddered at the thought. “He did all…these things to her. Let the guards…you know…” My nod is a stiff, mechanical thing. She draws a sharp breath, then flags the barman and orders a martini in a voice that doesn’t quite sound like hers. I tap the bar twice to indicate I’ll have the same. “Anyhow,” she continues, the word heavy with everything she’s leaving out, “after Mila, the…novelty of that idea wore off for him.” She won’t look at me.

“He moved on to selling you. There were offers. Hideous old men in compounds who collect difficult young women to play with. I convinced him that reporting you to the authorities on Isla De La Palma was cleaner. Less messy attention. They issued the warrant, all the extradition paperwork. He agreed because he’d already lost one wife in circumstances people still whisper about.”

I nod again, my throat tight. The cold weight of what she’s describing—being bartered between a torturer and a bureaucracy—settles in my stomach. This small mercy feels like being grateful for the shallow end of a grave.

“I could have just run away,” I said.

“Oh Ella, you’ll soon find out that getting off the island is probably harder than getting onto it. Also my love…” she tears up again. “If you’d just escaped, he’d have found you and killed you. With the extradition, he’d forget about you and move on.”

​

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 224-226a

	___
	The martinis arrive, brought by the cocky Kenyan barman I’ve flirted with a couple of times over the last few days. “These are on me, babes,” he says smiling broadly. Miriam thanks him sincerely but tells him we’re in a relationship. He looks at both of us in disbelief. “That’s not what I hear,” he cheekily replies as he walks away. My eyes follow him. “Ella!” “Sorry Slim.” “The night I seduced you was because…” “I’m hot,” I quip, the alcohol beginning to work. She smiles and kisses me. “I love it when you’re silly,” she says laughing. “Yes, you’re hot. Oh God!”
	She lowers her voice conspiratorially. “But it was also because I had to get you out of that room, remember?” She let that hang in the air between us before going on.

“So to answer you: Mila blames you for every cut, every bruise, every night she has to spread her legs under some stranger’s stare just to stay breathing. She doesn’t give a single shit about you. She just needs cash to keep from being disappeared into some shipping container. It mightn’t be fair or rational, but her whole world is totally unfair.”

“I didn’t think of that,” I said, the admission bitter in my mouth.

“Of course you didn’t. You think with your cunt, not your head.” The words aren’t cruel, just exhausted. True. She looks me up and down in my dumb little outfit.

 

[tanuno]

[Tantalism] Gangster Girl Gabriella's Story 226b/226c