SISTER DEATH
Acid Vanilla Book 4
Matthew Hattersley
Boom Boom Press
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For Suzanne and Alba
One
The girl’s eyes were the colour of dark chocolate. So dark, one had to get up close to see where the pupil ended and the iris began. Of course, Danny Flynn had already known this before sliding onto the bar stool next to hers. Her eyes (big, oval, beautiful) were the same colour as almost every other olive-complexioned girl’s here in the Spanish taberna. But pinpointing the shade, the tone, the precise hue of that brown, that was another matter altogether. And one that made all the difference.
“They’re so striking,” he purred, not blinking, not taking his own eyes from hers. “So rich. Like cocoa… umm, el cacao, sí? A deep chocolate brown.”
The game was simple and arose from Danny’s long-held belief that, for a ladies’ man such as he, a lover of women, the eyes were not only the gateway to the soul but also to the heart, the mind, the bed. Staring into someone’s eyes like this, trying to work out the exact shade, created strong, lasting eye contact, which in turn reinforced trust and likeability. He’d also read how this act of intense perusal conjured up a deep connection between two people. So the person whose eyes you were gazing into – the girl in this case (always a girl in Danny’s case, and there’d been plenty) – would likely become attracted to you.
It also helped if your own eyes were the most beautiful shade of azure blue most girls had ever seen. Or so they told him, at least. Whether or not they meant it didn’t matter to Danny. By that point in the proceedings, everything else was usually a foregone conclusion.
“They are just brown. I think,” the girl said, with a shy titter. “Like most girls from Donasti. You are silly.”
“No way,” Danny went on, “they’re beautiful. I’d say looking at them now, in this light, they’re actually more walnut. Or chestnut. Or raw umber.” He took his time with each description, giving the words as much sexual energy as possible.
“I do not know these things.”
The girl looked away. Damn. He was losing her. Donasti, she’d said. Donastia. The Basque name for San Sebastian. So her family was old-school. Figured.
“Your English is great,” Danny told her. “Better than my Spanish, anyway. Hell, better than my English too.”
Smokey topaz? Would that have done it?
Russet?
He sometimes offered up beaver as a shade, test the waters that way. But with non-English speakers, the nuances of that were risky.
“Whereabouts in England are you from?” the girl asked, gazing up at him through her eyelashes.
He was wrong. Game on.
“I’m not actually from England,” Danny chimed, with a grin to match the twinkle in his baby-blues. “I’m from Ireland. Dublin. You heard of it?”
The girl nodded. “Yes, of course. But I have not visited. I have never left my country. Never left my city.”
“No way,” Danny purred, as his stomach did a somersault. “I’ll have to take you some time. Once we’re married, of course.” He held eye contact, upped the grin, delighting as the girl’s light brown (caramel?) cheeks flushed a dusky pink.
“You are very funny,” the girl told him. “What is your name?”
“Oh shite, where’s me manners? I’m Danny. Danny Flynn.” He held out his hand. “And you are?”
“My name is Lola.” She took his hand coyly. “Pleased to meet you, Danny Flynn.”
The way she said it made him think she knew his game. Knew it, but was maybe onboard all the same. These baby-blues.
“Lola, hey? Not a showgirl, are you, Lola? Or a fella?” He laughed but got nothing back, adding quickly, “Ignore me. Being daft, so I am. Can I buy you another drink?”
The girl, Lola, shifted in her seat as a nun shuffled past them and sat at a table in the corner of the small taberna. Danny watched her for a moment, stifling a sneer. A devout Catholic in his youth, he had no truck these days for any members of the cloth, man or woman. Not that he’d had any dodgy run-ins with the local priest or anything like that. But losing your dad at such a young age does have a tendency to test your faith somewhat. It seemed the good Lord didn’t have his back the way he’d been told he would.
He watched on as the nun eased herself down onto a hard wooden seat. With her face hidden by the folds of the wimple and veil it was hard to tell her age, but by the way she was stooped over, Danny would have said the old dear was pushing eighty. What the blinking hell was she doing here anyway, in a bar? Trying to cockblock him?
But maybe it was a sign. God looking out for him after all. He knew he was pushing it being out in public right now. Luis Delgado knew a lot of people in San Sebastian, and he’d be looking for him. Looking to take back what was his. Still, the way Danny saw it, if he was going to have to lie low for a few days, he may as well have some decent company
He turned his attention back to Lola, narrowing his eyes a little, enough that they creased at the sides, giving her that ‘hint of a squint’ that made him look so confident and sexy, and which he’d often practice in front of the mirror.
“So, a drink?” he asked.
“I am sorry, I do not think I should,” she replied, flustered now. “I have to get home. I only stopped for one drink after work.”
“Oh, where do you work?” Danny asked, trying to dampen any desperation in
