if only i could let go [edie/riley]

[ollie]

❝ what do you do when you're stuck, because the one that you love, has pushed you away, and you can't deal with the pain, and now you're trying to fix me, mend what he did ❞

another mark. there was never really anything different about it, of course—a target, a crime icon that had to do with the inner workings of the speakeasies and the frequenters of the speakeasies. she was dressed beautifully to the t; the expensive material of her dress, the fur shawl draped around her shoulders, slipping off to show a pair of pale, fragile shoulders. her hair was pinned up, to feign short hair in a twisted bun, a loose strand falling along her temple. she rolls her ankle thoughtfully, waiting for whoever has come to tell her who she’s after, the considerable heel of her pump—considerable for the time—catching a few eyes. she sips on her moonshine, watching the people, searching for the most likely to be here to tell her. she watches as the young man walks over to her, taking a seat next to her at the bar. she smiles at him, and his conniving smile makes her certain that this is her boy.

“do you see the poker table, over there?” he says quietly to her, inclining his head towards her. he has the nicest shade of green eyes, she notes, before looking to the poker table she noticed earlier. men that remind her of darin and rian sit around it, sucking moonshine, with various women crowded ‘round them. only a few didn’t have flappers hanging over them, though they all seemed considerably average. plain old rum runners; nothing special. “there’s a man named riley that has a company of talented thieves, murderers, and rum runners. he’s a hard catch—we’ve attempted to take him down with, ah, common assassins. he’s charmed, eluded, and handled each of them.” he says, his voice cold by the last sentence. she glances back at the lad before back at the table. there was no telling which was riley—all could be talented pick pockets, none looking like a bonafide leader.

“he’s the one with the tallest chair. not a single woman on him. be the woman on him… and bring his head to the company’s capital by morning.” he hisses before standing and leaving lore there, considering her choices, and her target. never easier. she sipped on her moonshine a while longer, watching her target. there were plenty of women watching him, most, if not all, unnoticed. she wet her lips, finishing her glass of moonshine, before standing and beginning to walk to the poker table. she didn’t even glance at the men that barked out calls towards her, avoiding a hand seamlessly as it reached for her. stepping around to the back of riley’s chair, she took a seat on the arm of the rather lush chair, crossing her almost bare legs. the man to riley’s—and now her—right whistled at the garter of her thigh-highs, which peaked out from the slight slit in her skirt. her lip curled slightly, and she upturned the chair with a tug on one of the chair legs. he went down with a yelp, and she smiled almost sweetly, righting the chair with an equally simple tug, this time without the pig that had whistled.

lore leaned towards riley, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. “i hear you are one hell of poker player, darling,” she said, putting on a think russian accent that sounded like it was used daily. her foot, under the table, ran along his shin, and she silently considered the material. expensive—this was certainly her mark. “i am dariya dimitrieva. my father told me about you, mr riley. you have no mrs riley, no?” she knew that answer, of course she did, but she had thrown in mention of her father, and her last name, for good measure. the dimitriev family was still a well-known name; her employers had made it seem that her father had only gone into hiding, as his wife had, despite the fact that she had seen their bloodied corpses and watched him get shot to death. if she hadn’t been tied down, she would have certainly started her murder business at that very moment, starting with those bastards. she didn’t let it show, though, and reached in towards the table, picking one of the bottles of moonshine and taking a swig.

“thank you, dear,” she smiled at the man she’d taken it from, who glowered at her but said nothing. everyone feared that russian name—it was a safe haven for her, especially if she referred to her father. it wasn’t hard to consider, due to her family traits. the dirty blond hair, the eyes, the seductive smile that matched her mother’s. it hurt, sometimes, recognizing herself in the mirror. she found it almost impossible that darin hadn’t even realized she was the dimitriev heir yet—but, of course, it meant that he hardly noticed anything about her. it wasn’t hard to consider. glancing up and catching the eyes of a flapper, she raised an eyebrow. “vhat the hell are you looking at, whore?” she spat, which made the girl recoil.

“i ain’t the one draped all over him like that and drinking everyone’s moonshine. who do you think you are, queen of england?” she snapped, putting her hand on her hip, which was just barely covered by her cheap dress. something homemade, probably. badly made, too. “you’re just another whore.”

she smiled, relaxing. “you must be young, then. the dimitrievs don’t breed whores. they breed vomen.” she smiled, the expression a mixture between a sneer and a genuine grin. “so i vouldn’t be related to you, vould i, dear?”

“vhy don’t you learn the native language?” the flapper mocked, rolling her eyes. her friends glared at lore in unison, but she didn’t flinch twice.

“because vhere vould the fun in being like you be?” she asked, tilting her head, before looking away from her and leaning towards riley again. “can ve go somevhere away from these people, riley?” she purred, watching him closely. he was an interesting study—someone different, for once. too bad she had to have him dead and headless by daybreak.

[Mimi]

ooc; DARIN CAMEO!

Darin pulled to a graceful stop before the building, muttering something under his breath that sounded something like "ritzy hotels" and rolling his eyes in accompaniment. She didn't know he'd be here, and actually, he wasn't originally supposed to. He was supposed to be halfway across Arkansas by now, totting boxes of homemade moonshine to the dry states like the knight in shining liquor he was. Sure, he smirked a bit at the irony before stepping out of the car and throwing the keys to the waiting valet.

"Don't touch anything."

Hopefully, Lore wouldn't be too shocked by his unannounced appearance; he wouldn't want her to fuck up and get herself killed, but... He ran a hand agitatedly through his short-cropped hair and frowned. He couldn't help it; he couldn't help but be worried for her each and every time she stepped out of the door, and he knew she was on the hunt again. Who knew, maybe today would be the day the hunter became the hunted, and the thought only worsened the stirring sensation in the pit of his stomach. God! He couldn't believe he'd grown so attached to -- to just a damn pretty nobody! But -- no, she wasn't just a nobody, not to him anyways, and not just the "Black Widow" that was quickly becoming a mainstay of urban legend. She was... Lore to him, and there wasn't any other way to express it.

Running across a couple of doe-eyed flappers on his way in, he very obviously ran his eyes along their gams, making known his interest and dishing out a couple of suggestive winks here and there. He didn't linger for the conversation and giggles though but hurried on his way because there wasn't much time for dilly-dallying. Darin glanced at the face of his watch; he was late. It seemed there wouldn't be time beforehand to assure her that he'd be nearby if anything happened. She'd just have to figure that out for herself when he entered the room, he supposed.

The air held the scent of old money, and everything around him was a testament to the lavishness of the good life. Darin touched at the rim of his fedora and quickened his pace. If he remembered correctly... she was on the floor above this one. His hand ran along the marble banister, but he quickly removed it and looked at the fixture accusingly. Was it just him or was the marble hot rather than cool to the touch as it should have been?

Darin glanced again at his wrist. Ah, he'd arrived and with two minutes to the hour to spare. A dame sauntered slowly by from the corner of his eyes, blonde-hair, blue eyes, and held his own eyes with a sultry fervor for the briefest moment before, at the next, she'd passed by. Damn. He hoped she appreciated what he was giving up. Fixing his tie and tilting his hat ever so slightly over his eye as he was wont to wear it, Darin discreetly pulled open the doors and slipped in.

He immediately discerned Lore from the crowd; she was too obvious to spot, and he made a mental note to tell her later to stop being so conspicuous. It made him nervous.

She was talking to someone. Was he this evening's target...? No, he must have been the informant. Leaning against the wall near the bar on the side opposite her, he was content, at least for the moment, to watch.

He smirked to himself, many of the men were watching her. How typical of Lore even if some part of him, whenever he accompanied her on these little missions, wanted to swoop in and take her out of this gator's pit. But, he wasn't any kind of knight in shining armor, and he knew, so he never mentioned a word of his concerns to her. She could do whatever she wanted; wasn't that the spirit of the decade anyhow?

Something was happening. In the minute or two he'd taken his eyes off her to look around the room, she'd already walked over to whom Darin could only assume was the job. He couldn't quite make out the man's face, seeing as he was facing the other way, but his attention was piqued, and he straightened off the wall. He strained his ears to the squabble between her and another flapper, but with the ruckus of saxophones and pianos in the background, that was obviously all but impossible.

It seemed it was his cue.

Fully removing himself from the wall now, Darin lithely strode over to the table beside the one at which Lore was currently occupied and wrapped an arm across the waist of the Jane she'd been exchanging poison with.

"Hey darlin'" he purred, feigning ignorance at Lore's true identity, and pressed the girl into his person.

She gasped, taken aback by the sudden approach but not entirely turned off by it. It would've been a pain in the ass if she was and had slapped him, but Darin often made his way through life on luck.

His eyes made the briefest contact with Lore before they moved to the delicate patch of skin just at the nape of the unnamed girl's neck, just slightly brushed over with strands of her auburn hair, and whispered some things he was sure would scandalize her little group of friends. He pressed a hand against the small of her back -- the material of her dress was cheap, he noted; she must have been low on the food chain, and he almost growled which only came out as a low, provocative rumble. He really hoped she knew what he had to lower himself to just so he could make sure she was safe at the end of the night.

Said flapper blushed when he pulled away, but before she could protest, he was already leading her from the table. As he did so, however, and without Darin noticing, the girl turned back towards Lore with an arrogant sneer as if to say, "ha, and what were you saying?"

Women could be so cruel to each other.

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