Saucy Side: Knave of Hearts (Talia Version)

Featuring Talia Parker

AU set in Georgia, 1946

You awake to the rustle of someone climbing in through your bedroom window.

She’s back.

Georgia’s most infamous thief promised that she would return to steal your heart. You laughed at the time—how could you trust the word of anyone, let alone a thief, who called herself “Glitch”? The only other place you’d heard that ridiculous word was on the radio, whenever announcers admitted to an on-air mistake over the static broadcast.

You teased Glitch about her moniker the first time you met her at one of your parents’ galas. She claimed the word came from “glitsh,” the Yiddish word for “slippery place.”

“Because,” she said, brown eyes gleaming with amusement, “slippery places are my business.”

Missing her innuendo, you asked if that meant she worked at an ice rink. She laughed, the rich sound sending a tingle of warmth and awareness all the way down to your toes. Then she asked you to dance, and you said yes, and she slipped off her gloves and slowly removed yours so that your palms burned as your fingers interlocked in a way not required by the waltz. For the first time in your life, everything felt perfect. Glitch twirled you out the doors of your parents’ ballroom and kissed you in a dark corner of the gardens next to a plot of overgrown verbenas. And that kiss, in the dark, to the far-off refrains of the orchestra indoors . . . that kiss was perfect as well.

Then she left, and you discovered that your mother’s sapphire necklace had gone missing.

The next morning, a note was left on your silk pillowcase. Its envelope was filled with purple verbena petals. Inside was a poem, written in looping cursive, that promised Glitch would return.

Fool that you are, you waited. With the War over and Nick discharged from France, you finally dared to dream about escaping from the social expectations that came from being born a Wiseman. You fantasized of disappearing into the night with a dashing thief who had no need to return in order to steal your heart, because she’d already claimed it.

You continued to wait. Parties came and went. You waited, but she never returned. You only knew that she hadn’t left the city because of other thefts; headlines burned with speculation on the mysterious thief who made a fool out of Savannah’s elite by lifting their necklaces straight from their necks and their pocket watches from their pockets.

You spent two months waiting until resolving to give up. Your fall back to earth had been three months ago.

Now, almost half a year after that magical, world-shattering, foolish kiss . . . Glitch is back just as she promised.

After a moment’s deliberation, you open your eyes. “Why are you here?” you ask.

Your mattress dips as she sits on the edge of your bed. “I didn’t mean to arouse you . . .” she pauses playfully “. . . from your sleep. But I promised to return.”

You turn your head towards her without getting up. In her dark suit and demi-mask, Glitch almost disappears into the night. But her wide, teasing smile gleams in the moonlight—the smile of a woman with the soul of The Cheshire Cat.

“That promise was made six months ago,” you say stiffly, praying that she can’t hear the rapid thrum of your heartbeat over the outside cicadas. “You’re late.”

“Do promises have an expiration date?”

“You stole my mother’s necklace.”

“That doesn’t mean I’m feckless.”

“You never wrote.”

“I left a note.”

You sit up abruptly and glare at her. “Are you doing that deliberately?”

Glitch smirks at you, leaning closer until her nose almost touches yours. “Doing what?”

“The rhyming.”

She chuckles softly. “You found it endearing last time.”

“A lot has changed since then. I’ve matured.”

“Have you? I haven’t.” Glitch inches even closer. Her lips brush against the shell of your ear as she whispers: “You still shiver at my voice.”

“I do not—”

Glitch seals your protest with a kiss. Unlike the first time when she kissed you in the garden, this kiss isn’t an instant explosion of want and need. Her lips are as gentle as a benediction, moving against yours in a beseeching prayer for atonement. Then it deepens, her tongue twining with yours, and her hand grasping the back of your neck.

“Lord, how I’ve missed you,” she moans into your mouth. “I’ve missed you so much.”

You swallow her litany of apology, your fingers clenching the fabric of her suit as you pull her closer. But it’s not close enough. It will never be close enough—can never be close enough. This thief owns your heart, and you’re unable to reclaim it no matter the proximity.

Your chests press so closely together that you feel Glitch’s heartbeat pounding, its beat fluttering and accelerating as your hands explore her shoulders and down the dip of her back.

“I’ve missed you too,” you admit.

Her moonlight grin widens. Then she’s pushing you back onto the bed, dexterous fingers undoing the top buttons of your nightshirt as you fall.

“I’ve decided to keep your heart,” she whispers into the crook of your neck.

You gasp as her lips trail downwards. “Only if you pay for it.”

Glitch pulls back, and she stares at you intently. “It’s not my usual method as a thief,” she says, “but for you I’ll make an exception.”

“Good.” Your arms reach around her, bringing her back down. “Because I’m taking your heart as payment.”

Glitch rests her head against where your heart—no, her heart—beats. “Careful. Or you just may make an honest woman out of me yet.”