#o: l.stephens

[garrickc]

For: @laurestcphens

Sometimes, he's gotta play dirtier than even his usual degree of filth.

He'd painted on his most devilishly handsome smile, kept the attention of Surya for half a breath. Not to entertain, or tolerate. Garrick just wants to be seen fistbumping the germs, because someone with his temperament breaking bread with those he opposes. Well, ain't that a sight. Francoise and the frog had been a cute entrance, and he's gotten a little soft from Lara and her lady. None of it means he doesn't know how to smile, converse and play the board if he's gotta fucking show face, and sail a rough ocean once or twice. He is feeling more inclined to flash his ass, and suggest they take a picture though.

The thing with ivory towers, is they're fortified to shit. He ain't planning to climb it, or none of that brute force crap. He wants letting in the front door, and after that, he's just gotta play nice with the guards at the steps.

So, Palmgren. Rees. Kanoute. Not all directly, but folks stand out amongst the thousands. And he hates that they're so damn easy to spot; he's either too acclimitised to the gaudy frills, or they're trying their damndest to be known. Huang and Miralles are last; they're harder to get secluded.

No threats. He ain't even asked one to cut a rug, and stain their hands with oil and grease. It's the impression that he's leaving. It's the quiet seduction of a server, and some mortal caught alone that starts off the setting up of the domino track.

Rothschild is minted (both literally and figuratively), Garrick's certain he's seen some Italian ice cream this shade of green. And witnessed sea brides with fewer frills. He still might trip a guy over in front of him yet and see the spillage, but it's too early for a Brooklyn street game. This is a bigger league than the old been and gone gangs; he's playing by their rules, the political neutrality that they'll never catch up to.

Laure knows him too well; if he goes right at it, he's never going to get her interest. Just her irritation that he's made up a crock of shite about Pretorius to the wrong people she'll have to smooth over later. So he makes it simpler, he sends Francoise earlier in the night on a course past the mint-clad woman. Idle, non-direct. She's got a mind that changes course every thirty seconds. She drops her gaze to the first pretty thing that looks at her, but doesn't stop for Rothschild. Frankie doesn't get the details of Garrick's fun, just the white lie that she repeats like a clockwork toy to every passerby, yapping and yapping:

"Ohhh, have you heard the latest? It’s absolutely vile, babe, come closer, you’re gonna die. No, really, it’s juicy, like that froggy I kissed. Surya Bhansali has been literally talking to everyone about this. This, and that silly meeting later, she's been more excited about that than my froggy!"

Planting the first seed of Garrick's conversations of less than thirty seconds. After all, Frank's got some friends in high places too; stuck her name on a building an' all as well as a hotshot for a mother. Flirting with Lomidze's apparently. Ain't as bad as that time she did it with a roscoe though. He really loathed that. But he's missed a fuckin' lot. And he doesn't know this city all that good yet.

Rothschild looks the part, but can she remember how to play it?

Last meeting they were at together, she nearly tore the head off some goof for falling for a phone scam. History says she's been a wily one. Not always so queenly, either.

He doesn't need to lie or deceive for this part. It's true.

"I ain't know there could be a kitten with something more dead up their arse than there is in yours." a beat, to chuckle because Laure ain't all bad if he scraped out all her shit bits that were carefully narrowed down to her entire being, "But I found one in tha' Pembroke lass. Bashin' ears with every shiny big wig in 'ere." He scoffs, stealing a drink from a server. He even lifts one to give to Laure, offers it towards her, before staring at her ensemble. "Though, nowt ain't getting to any of your holes with that haberdashery stall wrapped around you, is there?"

She better take the drink, before he does spill it on her.

[nsilocastillon]

For: @laurestcphens

Castillon has indulged in more than the usual vices, dabbled in her fair share of dances — admired the entertainment and gorged in risque habits that tamed a hunger by which the glasses of crimson don't match up. Even lit a fire at the feet of a friend, just to see how they'd squirm; all in good spirit, of course.

They're the types that eat it up.

As the night drags on, Nsilo notices the ease in recognition; masks lifted, sitting on unkempt hair, some missing entirely. A more lax attire, sleeves rolled up to elbows, unruffled collars. She isn't the only one a slave to the baser impulses, she supposes.

Laure's half-skull; medusa-esque mask is everything she can be encompassed in a statement piece as eyes flash her way. Nsilo loves it; the glamour falling, and the Pretorius rep has been in more mentions of conversations than Castillon has ever cared to hear. Yet, she's not heard a peep from the woman herself.

So why not do what everyone's so afraid of doing.

Roll the dice. "I hear your name in a lot of mouths, but I've heard little from you," Nsilo murmurs, sidling up beside her. Casual like, it's not judgemental — it's perhaps even dismissive. Laure can't surely be unaware, her ears are just as in tune, she's sure of it. Eyes follow those walking by them, curious eyes diverted at the first sign of being caught. Castillon swills the liquid in her glass, "Markus is flapping his feathers and you've still taken half his limelight." That's teasing, before she adds to the jibe. There's a few lingering, pieces of earlier mentions puzzle-piecing together. "And that's before they're even talking about your entourage, cute."

[garrickc]

For: @laurestcphens

New city reaps new opportunities and just because he's in Port Leiry, doesn't mean a man gets to free pass himself out of clan business. They're damn everywhere. Garrick has tried to call technicality, on account of his fleeting visits in cities worldwise. Turns out, it doesn't work like that (rules and nonsense), and he has people who he can better support with the knowledge that he's got people.

They're just not his people.

Pretorious are a formality that goes against everything he stands for; self-indulgent, self-preservating and lording themselves above all else. Some ivory towers, involve being on the inside. It's how he's looked at it, for centuries now. A slow timebomb that he knows is slowly being flagged for not following the nice-knit rules. He's not around in one place long enough for them to ever come to chide him, but he's making it his problem to swing by and see young miss courtside who's repping them out here.

Laure's a thing older than he is. And by hell and highwater, he wonders how she feels he's making his pit stop out here in the boonies. Garrick can hear it now: 'he's three sheets to the wind, who invited him?' And he'd slap an arm around her, whilst she bristled and swatted him off like the dirty, scurvy-adjacent creature he had been.

Some things don't change, even throughout the ages. A sailor wants to know if anyone else in the room can remember those days; Laure in her courting age, meandering between places as much as he had. And a gangster wants to know where her fire's gone. He might've had a drink or two, before, during and now.

"You're a sight for sore eyes, doll." Brows wagging, Garrick slumps himself against the wall beside her. Juts a thumb towards the room they'd just exited; they're on a break — adjournment, recess, whatever she'd correct a man about. "Yer about as interested in there as I am." Poke. "What, better places to be?" Poke. "Better legs to be between?" Jab. Jab. Jab. Laure's not well put together like she wants those old farts to believe.

He plucks the cigarette from behind his ear, nasty habit, but one to keep busy hands. "Let me guess..." A fake hand to a mouth, to "Filthy man. Filthy mouth, but he noticed your face when they got talking. You ain't all into it, Laure."

That changes the game.