Work Text:
She was singing again.
Ever since he’d seen a moving truck outside his building four months prior, at precisely six fifteen every morning, Kaz could hear her voice through the thin walls of their conjoining apartment bathrooms. The hiss of water hitting tile was accompanied by a woman’s voice singing- usually Indian songs, sometimes hymns or theatre tunes or whatever was popular on the radio. Sometimes, like today, it was Disney.
Her. Inej Ghafa, age twenty-four, apartment 4C. Of course he’d hacked her the minute she’d moved in. It had been more difficult than he’d anticipated; she had firewall after firewall encrypting her desktop and phone, and finally he’d had to go through her weaker wi-Fi connection to crack the safe that was her data.
It was surprising to find that such measures had been put into place to hide a relatively innocuous life. Her parents were immigrants from New Delhi, having left when, if he calculated correctly- and he always did- they’d been expecting a child. She had no siblings but many cousins, and he scrolled through their faces on her social media with little interest. She made a modest income teaching gymnastics to children. He’d concluded that his new neighbor was neither a threat, nor of any particular use to him, and he quickly put her out of his mind.
Or at least, he’d tried to. Six in the morning was about the time he returned from his London prowls and got ready for bed- meticulously brushing his teeth and washing his hands, shaving his pale skin smooth. Her singing, after the initial annoyance, had by now been integrated into his daily routine.
“No man is worth the aggravation! Been there, done that…” She was really getting into it this morning, even including the backup of the muses. He strongly suspected she was dancing as she rinsed her hair with the orange-jasmine stuff he sometimes caught whiffs of through the vents.
Like clockwork, the water sounds ceased at 6:35, and with it, the singing. She valued routine as much as he, though their schedules were polar opposites. Next, he presumed, she would dress and leave for work. He had never spoken to her or anyone else at the complex, though he kept tabs on them all.
He hummed the chorus of I Won’t Say I’m In Love under his breath until he slipped into a dreamless sleep.
…
Grateful for the cover of night, Kaz limped, bloody and beaten, back to his apartment. He’d won the fight, but the cost had been great. He hadn’t anticipated on being jumped, and he cursed himself for it. Anticipate the worst, always.
As a thief for hire, being double-crossed by the employer sometimes came with the territory. He was usually good at sussing out the earnest from the false, but this one had been offering so much… he’d been blinded by pound signs, and it had made him stupid.
No matter. He and his little gang of trusted accomplices would get their revenge on Van Eck; London’s underbelly needed a good reminder not to fuck with the Dregs. He firmly kept his eyes off of his own bruise-mottled body as he sank into the hot bathtub, carefully keeping the stitches Nina had sewn into his arm above water. It had been agony letting her touch him- he wore his gloves for a reason- but he’d recognized the necessity.
“God help the outcasts, or nobody will,” sang Inej softly, and Kaz closed his eyes to listen.
…
Success at last. Better than any high. His bruises had barely faded when Kaz made a big score; sixty grand divided evenly among his gang, nicely laundered and scattered in accounts under false names and in multiple countries. Best of all, it had been money taken directly from Van Eck’s accounts, like taking candy from a baby.
There would be more to his revenge- there was always more- but it still left a sweet taste in his mouth and a grin on his lips.
“I’m walking on sunshine!” Inej crooned, and before Kaz could stop himself, he let out a “Whoa-oh!” in response before freezing in place, eyes wide. Shit.
A long, long silence followed his outburst. She’d definitely heard him. How weird must that seem. He was a freak; he didn’t have any business interacting with normal people, interrupting their day. She’d probably complain to the manager, and-
“And don’t it feel good!” Less confident than before, with almost a question in her voice.
Kaz fled from the bathroom, cane clutched tightly in his shaking hand.
…
The next week or so were all Indian songs; melodies he didn’t know, words he couldn’t understand. That was fine with him; they were pleasent to hear, and it was good to know he hadn’t traumatized her out of singing entirely. Nina would have been able to translate them- she was a near-genius with languages- but it had never been Kaz’s forte.
Not that it mattered. What did he care what his weird neighbor sang in the shower?
One morning, though, his attention was caught by her slightly accented English. “You don’t have to keep your distance anymore, because for the first time in forever I finally understand.”
Back to Disney, apparently. And Frozen? That inane, overhyped nonsense he only knew about because Wylan’s baby stepsister had wanted to watch it when she’d been foisted on him- against his will, mind- one morning?
He supposed it wasn’t terribly surprising; Inej did work with children, after all. This was probably the stuff that played in her little gym all day. What did surprise him was how she paused, anticipation in her silence. Maybe she’d forgotten the words?
The silence grew until it began to get under his skin. “Go enjoy the sun and open up the gates,” he finally snapped. “You mean well, but leave me be. Yes I’m alone, but I’m alone and free. Just stay away, and you’ll be safe from me.”
He could hear the smile in her voice as she replied in kind, and gradually his anxiety ceased until his deep voice rang off the tiled bathroom walls in perfect harmony to her own.
…
The holiday season made Kaz irritable. Though the other members of the gang attributed it to less jobs coming their way, few knew the truth: he’d lost his only family after being evicted in late November by their landlord Pekka Rollins. Pneumonia had affected him and his brother those nights huddled under the bridge: Kaz had woken in the hospital and had been bounced around the foster system until he’d had enough and ran away. Jordie hadn’t woken up at all.
He knew he was being harsh with his gang, driving them hard. He heard their muttered complaints, saw their rolled eyes, and remained indifferent. He didn’t need them to like him; he needed them to do their jobs.
After a particularly cruel comment towards Wylan, Jesper finally snapped. “What’s your problem, man?!” he demanded, and planted a palm in the center of Kaz’s chest, shoving. “You don’t need to talk to him like that.”
Everyone stared at the two, eyes huge. Nobody pushed Kaz and got away with it, not even Jesper, his right-hand man. He could see it in their eyes: anticipation of broken bones, crushed kneecaps. He/really didn’t want to hurt Jesper, but reputation was reputation.
Jesper licked his lips nervously, then seemed to decide he might as well say his piece, if he was already in for it. “I don’t think it’s gotten through your thick head that we’re on your side, Kaz. We’re a family of fucked-up hell-bound misfits and we love you, so maybe stop treating us like shit once in a while?”
Kaz regarded Jesper for a long while, staring into his gray eyes. Other men would have flinched under his stare, but not Jesper. He’d always reminded Kaz of Jordie, a little, though they looked nothing alike.
“I don’t want you as my family,” he said coldly, still staring hard into Jesper’s eyes. “I don’t recall asking for that. I get the jobs, I work the jobs, you help me, and you get your share. If you want something to cuddle with, adopt a dog.”
He told himself the hurt in Jesper’s eyes was a good thing. It meant the message had finally sunk in. With Jesper, a strike to his overlarge heart was better than any broken finger, and would last far longer. He turned his back and began the long walk home.
“You’re gonna die alone, Brekker,” Jesper told his retreating back. “If you keep pushing everyone away, they’ll stop coming back.”
He was in no mood for Christmas songs when he got home, and growled to himself when he heard the last strains of Candles In the Window filtering softly through the wall, though her voice did have a soothing effect on his nerves.
He was washing up, heart heavy with something he refused to call guilt, when another song followed the first.
“I really can’t stay, I’ve got to go away.”
Out of habit he quietly murmured, “but baby it’s cold outside.”
It was comforting to have this… whatever it was. He knew it wouldn’t last; sooner or later she’d move, or his location would be compromised and he’d have to find somewhere else to dwell. Still, the comfort of routine drove him on, numbed the sting of the earlier exchange. “Baby, it’s bad out there.”
Perhaps he was imagining the playful lilt to her voice. “Say, what’s in this drink?”
He winced. Men who put things into women’s drinks didn’t sit well with him. Still, she had paused again, clearly waiting for him to continue.
“No cabs to be had out there…”
When they reached the conclusion, singing together in harmony, “Baby it’s cold outside!” he felt himself let go, belting the lyrics, experiencing something real with another human through the safe filter of a bathroom wall.
His ears felt hot when he heard a melodic laugh through the vents, and he quickly dried his hands and left the bathroom. It was a nice laugh.
The next day was Christmas. When he stepped outside, long after dark, to collect his mail, he found a giftwrapped box of chocolate biscuits and peppermint tea leaves on his doorstep.
…
An absence was harder to notice than an action, and looking for a needle in a haystack was clearer than searching a needle in a stack of needles.
It wasn’t until Inej had visitors that Kaz realized she never had before.
Once the thought was brought to his attention, it struck him as odd. She had family- tons of family. And he saw no reason she wouldn’t have friends- from the pictures he’d seen on her accounts and the glimpse of her he’d gotten when she moved in, she was pretty enough. She certainly seemed friendly, sharing the intimacy of a shower with a total stranger like him.
These visitors arrived in a sleek black car with tinted windows- two men and a woman, and though he couldn’t make out their exact words through the walls of his apartment their tones were aggressive. At the sound of a slap and a muffled cry of pain, then a wall-shaking thud as if someone had been thrown into a door. Kaz slipped out of bed, a frown on his face. What on earth…
It took him less than a minute to pull up her cell phone number on his computer, and then he was dialing it on one of his burner phones before he allowed himself to question whether it was a good idea.
“H-hello?” Inej answered on the third ring, sounding shaky. Her voice had such a tinny quality he knew he was on speakerphone.
“Hey, Ghafa.” His American accent was decent at best; hopefully these newcomers wouldn’t think too much on it. “Just picked up a couple pizzas; wondered if me an’ the guys could stop by and watch the game at your place.”
“Uh…” she sounded politely baffled.
“Aw, come on, baby!” he wheedled. “It’s cold outside.”
He heard a sharp intake of breath and knew she’d figured it out. “Um, sure. Just give me a minute, you can come over.”
She hung up. Not five minutes after, the black car with the woman and two men inside were pulling away from the apartment.
Kaz picked his phone back up and dialed Nina. “I need a favor…”
…
The singing had stopped, and Kaz could guess why. Whatever trouble she was mixed up in was bad enough; the fact that her next door neighbor was spying on her enough to know her phone number and when she was in trouble was probably giving her the creeps. He wouldn’t be surprised at all to see moving trucks arrive at her place any day now, and he couldn’t blame her for it either.
Jesper arrived at his doorstep a week after Kaz’s phone call with Nina, a binder of handwritten notes and old newspaper clippings trapped under his arms. “We figured it out,” he explained. “Nina and Wylan and I.”
Kaz invited him in. Jesper raised an eyebrow at the steaming cup of peppermint tea on Kaz’s table, but made no comment. He hadn’t teased Kaz like he used to since their Christmas Eve argument, and Kaz hated to admit that he was starting to miss it.
“Here we go.” Jesper spread the papers out over the table. “So what we pieced together, though they never used her name in any of the articles because she was a minor- is that this Ghafa girl was kidnapped at age fourteen and sold into human trafficking.”
Kaz felt like he’d been suddenly and mercilessly punched in the gut, but he didn’t let his face show it. “I see.”
“Her parents managed to find and rescue her after a year, but they spent every penny they had hiring detectives and lawyers and went pretty deep into debt,” Jesper continued, showing his work with the articles he produced. “A debt which they still haven’t recovered from. The woman you described fits Heleen Cahoon, who’s been charged for child abduction but hasn’t ever been convicted.”
This was all painting a very ugly picture.
Kaz glanced at Jesper from the corner of his eye. Jesper had his face down, studiously avoiding looking directly at Kaz and instead focusing on the work. Kaz bit down on his inner cheek, struggling internally, then-
“You did very well, Jesper. Thank you.”
Jesper looked up in surprise. “I did?”
“I would have had a difficult time doing this without you,” Kaz admitted. He was never liberal with praise, but now he forced himself to speak the truth. “You’re valuable to my life.”
“Wow, Kaz.” Jesper blinked numbly. “I don’t know what to say.”
Suddenly self conscious, Kaz stood and busied himself with straightening the kitchen. “Say whatever you want,” he snapped. “Is there anything else?”
“Yeah, actually.” The ice had been broken, and Jesper was coming back full force. “I want to know why you’re so hung up on some random girl. What’s your angle- want her to join the Dregs?”
Kaz snorted. “Hardly. I just like to know what my neighbors are up to.”
Jesper’s face was comically skeptical. Kaz sighed.
“I made an acquaintance with her, and don’t take kindly to her being slapped around by child traffickers.”
“An acquaintance. You made an acquaintance with a pretty girl you have no intention for using in the gang.”
“Of a sort. We communicate through showers in coded lyrics.”
Jesper wiggled his eyebrows, helping himself to the remainders of Kaz’s mug of tea. “That’s what floats your boat?”
Kaz responded with his best stony expression. “I’m not sure I follow.”
“Duets with hot, wet, naked chicks?” Jesper, as usual, was one of the few to be immune to The Look. “You ever hear any other noises through the bathroom wall?” He imitated a feminine moan, then choked on the tea when Kaz gave him a shove. He was laughing through the coughs.
“Thanks for the info, Jes!” Kaz said pointedly. “The bus is leaving soon- better get on it!”
“Alright, alright!” Jesper was still laughing as he let himself out. “Hey, at least you know she’s clean-”
Kaz shut the door firmly in his face.
…
The phone call on the burner phone he’d used once to contact her came late at night. Kaz stared at it from across the room, knowing. It could have been someone else- an employer, maybe even a Crow, but he knew it wasn’t. He let it go to voicemail.
It was another day before he worked up the nerve to look at the phone again. One missed call. One voice message. He chastised himself for being foolish, and forced his fingers to enter the pin and play the recording.
“Hi. Um. The apartment manager said your name was Jordan Rietvald? I’m- I know we’ve never talked. Um. I’m Inej. Inej Ghafa. Um. I wanted you to know, I’m moving soon. I’m not sure how soon- I need to get things sorted with my job. Listen- I don’t know how you knew how to help me out that night, but. Um. Thank you.”
He replayed the message four times, then took the microchip out of the phone and put it in the microwave for twenty minutes.
This was good. It was what he’d wanted. Hacking into her parents’ bank account had been a bit of a challenge, but once he was in it was easy to hook them up to Van Eck’s stock market. They’d be recieving five percent of everything he earned for the next twelve years- small enough to go unnoticed, yet large enough to erase their debt within a matter of months.
He was still working on part B of his plan- but he’d achieve it sooner than later. Either Heleen would end up behind bars… or she’d end up at the bottom of river Thames, never to be seen again.
It was for the best that Inej leave. He promised himself he’d never try to learn where she went, to let her go in peace. Their worlds need not collide again.
…
“Wise men say, only fools rush in…”
It had been so long since he’d heard her sing; his heart nearly leapt from his chest at the sound of it, and his feet carried him to the bathroom before he could stop them. What had happened to him?!
“Oh shall I stay, would it be a sin?”
Kaz had both his gloved hands pressed flat to the wall of his bathroom, his head tilted so he could hear her better. He’d never heard her sounding so sad before. It was doing something to his insides; they were twisting, his mouth was searching for words to express himself but none came, so he borrowed another’s.
“Darling, so it goes; some things are meant to be...” he hadn’t meant to jump in, he hadn’t, but he had anyway, and she took it in stride.
“Take my hand, take my whole life, too.”
His voice was soft as he concluded, “for I can’t help falling in love with you.”
The water falling was the loudest sound in the world for many long seconds; six thirty-five came and went, and still the shower ran until she spoke again.
“What’s your real name?” she asked.
“Kaz,” he replied, for the first time in his life unable to lie. He was grateful for the walls separating them. This was a lot. This was too much. He didn’t understand anything. He wanted to run. He wanted to stay there forever.
“Kaz. The police received a folder of evidence on Tante Heleen’s involvement in… things. Evidence they’d never seen before. It looks irrefutable. The likelihood that she makes it out of this is slim to none.”
Kaz said nothing. The knowledge hung between them, heavy until she spoke again.
“I’m leaving tomorrow night.”
His mouth suddenly felt very dry, his heart sinking low in his stomach. “I know.”
“You could come with me.”
…
Kaz was doing the right thing. His door was shut and locked, and inside he would stay. He would not watch the moving vans. He would not watch the dark-haired girl leave forever. It was better this way.
Jesper was right. He was a cold, ruthless bastard. He lived alone, and he would die alone, and he would not be mourned. He’d made a lifestyle of alienating others and isolating himself, and he liked it that way, didn’t he?
He shouldn’t care. This was so ridiculously stupid.
His feet carried him to his front door, and then stopped. He looked around anxiously, and picked at a thread on the hem of his glove, then walked back to the kitchen. He wished he smoked, just for something to do.
His feet carried him back to the door.
“This is ridiculous,” he said out loud.
Never before had his apartment, a small haven against the world with its blackout curtains, state of the art computer, and tastefully neutral bedcovers seemed so empty.
He felt the doorknob in his hand and turned it, letting in golden sunlight from the setting sun.
I shouldn’t, he thought anxiously, his heart beating rabbit-fast in his chest.
You’ll regret it forever if you don’t, a voice that somehow sounded like Jordie, Jesper, and Nina combined told him.
Kaz Brekker walked to apartment 4C- eight steps that felt like a mile- and knocked on the door.