This is part 2 of a story about an affair between Otto and Nina, a man with money and a young mistress with a great capacity for cruelty. Read part 1 here.
Before Otto, Nina had an old banker. She had gotten into the car with him a few times, was gifted a gorgeous apricot-colored fox shawl that was softer than a cloud, then fought her way out of his old hands when she decided that there actually was a line to be drawn about what was appropriately worth the life of luxury she was after. Not long after, when she had felt the reluctancy to sell her fox for cash, she reached back out by calling his office, only to be informed by a timid secretary that he’s dead (bathtub, heart attack). She sold the fox.
She had met Otto at the diner where she worked, serving coffees and pancakes to working men who didn’t care about the taste of their coffees and pancakes. Otto had seen her through the window a few times and immediately rerouted his commute home so he could catch glimpses of her—everyday for a whole week before striking up the courage and tearing down his conscience to approach her.
Nina had also picked up the pattern. She would pour him dark, liquid glances every time he passed by the window, where she busied herself with some made-up task.
On their first meeting, Otto purposely dined in around the last hour of Nina’s shift so that she could join him afterwards. That wait was the longest he had ever taken to finish one cup of coffee. With the intuition of a first-time murderer distributing stones in a body bag, he rehearsed (in his head) a few possible ways the conversation would go and how he would get her to agree to seeing him more. When he saw her shuffling his way, he urgently reached his left hand into his coat pocket and pushed his ring off with the thumb before pulling his hand back out, discreetly examining if the red indent it had left was too obvious before clasping both hands down to his lap below the table just as Nina slid into the side of the booth across from him.