Page 42 of Aftertaste

“Oh!Hey.It’s… Konstantin, right? What are the odds?”

Kostya looked up, saw her, and thought to himself,Figures.

Madame Everleigh—Maura—looked far less psychic without the striped tent and tarot deck of the Seyoncé party, and far more beautiful, even, than he remembered. Her hair was longer now, strands of silver fading to periwinkle, then plum. She wore boots and jeans and a slouchy black sweater. A grey scarf covered in little skulls. Also, a frown.

“Um”—she waved a hand in front of his face—“you okay?”

Kostya swallowed.

He wanted to say something venomous to her, to pay her back for all those months ago, the way she’d shat all over his gift, everything he’d gone on to do since she’d tried to talk him out of it. But he found, face-to-face now—andoh, what a face!—that he couldn’t.

It wasn’t just that she was gorgeous, or that he’d thought about her an inordinate amount. It wasn’t that, of anyone he’d ever met, he thought she might know something—like,reallyknow—about his aftertastes. It was simpler than that, just something in his gut—a strange intuition, a funnyfeeling—like this couldn’t be coincidence, meeting her again. After all, whatwerethe odds that on the same day Kostya got the sleeve Frankie was supposed to get, by the artist Frankie had handpicked, he’d suddenly see her again, the girl Frankie had nudged him toward?

It was almost like someone was sending him a sign.

Yes, Kostya thought suddenly.YES.

Maybe this was the contact he’d been waiting for, Frankie giving him a fist pump from the other side! It seemed exactly like the kind of thing he’d do—play wingman, shoot Kostya a second chance, force him to face his fears, prove to his biggest critic that she’d been wrong about him.

Kostya wouldn’t let him down.

“Uh, sorry. Yeah. Konstantin. Hey. Hi.Ouch!” Cal had poked something on his arm that felt like the flesh was melting off. “You’re… Maura, right?” he added, wincing, trying to sound nonchalant about it, as though he’d nearly forgotten (as if he could ever).

“Good memory.” She smiled, genuinely surprised. “You were at Seyoncé, right?”

“Uh-huh. Yeah. I didn’t think you’d—yow!”

Maura glanced at Cal, who was gingerly probing Konstantin’s ballooning skin. “What’s with his arm?”

“Allergy to the ink, I think.” Cal shrugged. “Nothing my house special won’t cure.”

She turned back to Kostya, one eyebrow arched. “A whole sleeve, huh? Can’t say I pegged you for a tat guy.”

“Some psychic,” he shot back, and she laughed.

“Let me see.”

Maura leaned across him for a better look. She smelled incredible, like oranges and eucalyptus and cedar, and Kostya tried not to look like he was inhaling her.

“That looks nasty. Does it hurt?”

Cal poked him again, and Kostya gave a little shriek.

“Nope,” Kostya said, his voice like helium. “Feels awesome.”

The pain was really spectacular now, his whole arm dancing with it. It felt like he was blistering from within, like thousands of tiny water balloons were bursting through his skin.

“This might sting a little,” Cal warned him, unscrewing the lid of some foul-smelling mystery goop, the stench from the jar like something had drowned in it.

“More than it’s stinging now? I’m gonna pass out.”

“Hey.” Maura bent down to Kostya’s level, her eyes locked on his. “Here. Focus on me.” (No arguments here.) She took his unswollen hand, turned it over, traced her fingers over the lines of his palm. “I’ll distract you.” (You sure will.) “I’ll read your fortune.”

“Here we go,” Cal said, and Kostya braced, tunneling his focus into Maura’s wide brown eyes.

“What do you see?” he gasped.

“Okay, interesting! Your love line—it’s really pronounced. But short. You love deeply, but it doesn’t last.”

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