“I hope you’re not talking about me.” The deep rumble of a male voice behind me had dread sinking to the pit of my stomach.
I squeezed the girl’s shoulders. “Waylay, go find Liza J and go outside,” I said as quietly as I could.
“But—”
“Go. Now,” I said, and then I turned around and pasted a flirtatious smile on my face.
Cereal Aisle Guy was dressed in track pants and a long-sleeve T-shirt. His cart was once again full of healthy produce and lean proteins. The only thing missing was the candy.
“So we meet again,” I said coyly. “I was just telling my short friend how I met a cute guy in the cereal aisle.”
“Were you? Because it sounded to me like you figured out something you shouldn’t have.”
Well, shit. So it was going to go down this way? Okay.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go disappoint a twelve-year-old’s dentist,” I said.
A large, meaty hand closed around my bicep. “The dentist will have to wait, Lina Solavita.”
My heart wasn’t just cartwheeling, it was trying to climb out of my throat.
“I’m not a fan of nonconsensual touching,” I warned.
“And my friend isn’t a fan of you following his boys around and getting one of them arrested.”
“Hey, I wasn’t the one who decided it was a good idea to bang my brother’s wife. Maybe you should be having this conversation with him.”
“I would, but he’s in jail because you called the cops on him.”
“In my defense, the whole naked thing really threw me.”
“Let’s go,” he growled.
His grip was cutting off my circulation.
“I’m going to give you one chance to take your bear paws off me and leave. One chance for a head start before I kick your ass and then my boyfriend, the chief of police, shows up to finish the job. You’re legit. At least partially. If you drag me out of this store, there goes that life. You’ll be a full-time criminal.”
“Only if I get caught. You caused too many problems and now it’s time to face the consequences. Nothin’ personal. It’s just business.”
“Leave her alone, you gigantic shithead!” Waylay appeared at the mouth of the aisle and savagely hurled a can of kidney beans at my captor.
It caught him in the forehead with a satisfying thunk. I used the surprise canned good beaning to my advantage and kneed him in the groin. He released my arm to grasp his balls with one hand and his forehead with the other.
“Fuck!” he wheezed.
“Run, Way!” I didn’t watch to make sure she listened. Instead, I landed a jab to the man’s jaw. My knuckles screamed in agony. “Damn it! Is your face made out of concrete?”
“You’re gonna pay for that one, sweetheart.”
He was still off-balance, so I planted both hands on his chest and shoved as hard as I could. He stumbled backward into the endcap display of Diet Coke, sending cans of soda everywhere. A shopper holding a box of cereal in each hand screamed, threw both boxes in her cart, and then ran away.
Liza J appeared out of nowhere on one of the store scooters. She rammed him from behind at full speed. It knocked him close enough to me that I could make my next move. I brought my heel down on his thigh with an axe kick, making sure to lead with the stiletto.
He howled in pain.
“Take that, you son of a bitch!” Liza J crowed.
The store manager, Big Nicky, himself appeared, holding a mop like it was a jousting lance. “Leave the lady alone, sir.”
“For fuck’s sake,” the bad guy muttered. He reached into the waistband of his track pants and produced a gun.
I put my hands up. “Easy there, big guy. Let’s talk this out.”
Apparently, he was done talking. Because he aimed at the ceiling and fired two shots.
The store went dead silent for a second and then the screaming started. It was followed by the sound of stampeding feet and the incessant beep of the automatic door opening.
“Let’s go,” Cereal Aisle Guy said stonily. He picked up the bag of Fruit Gems and grabbed me by the arm.
“Umm.” The manager was still standing there wielding his mop, though he looked significantly less confident now that firearms were involved.
“It’s okay. I’ll be all right. Go make sure everyone else got out,” I assured him.
Cereal Aisle Guy dragged me toward the front entrance, both of us limping, him from the injury I’d inflicted with my boot and me because his hard-ass thigh broke the heel right off.
I took a mental inventory of the situation. Getting taken to a second location was almost always a very bad thing. But in this case, I was finally going to see Duncan Hugo’s hideout. I had my phone in my jeans and Lucian’s ridiculous condom tracker in my jacket pocket. I’d left a voicemail for Nash, and I’d missed a call from my mother during the rehearsal dinner.
Help would be on the way soon.
We stepped outside into the dark parking lot, and he held the gun to my neck. “That’s a really small gun,” I noted.
“Too hard to carry concealed. The bigger barrels stick halfway down my ass crack. It’s uncomfortable.”
“Bad guy problems, am I right?” I quipped.
FORTY-SEVEN
PANTSLESS AND ASS UP
Nash
Dear Nash, This feels awkward. Writing you a letter. But I guess most things have been awkward between us for a good portion. Why stop now?
Things here are pretty good. Three squares a day, which means I’m putting on weight. I have my own room for the first time in two decades.
The group therapist looks like he’s twelve years old, but he’s assured us he graduated from medical school.
Anyway, he was the one who suggested we write letters to our families or the people we’ve let down the most. Looks like you and your brother are both. Lucky you. This is an exercise in apologizing and taking responsibility. You know, getting the words out and putting them down on paper. We don’t have to send it. I probably won’t send it.
And since I’m not gonna send it, I might as well be fucking honest for once.
I don’t know if I can kick this habit or addiction or disease. I don’t know if I can survive in the world without something to numb the pain of existence. Even after all these years, I still don’t know how to “be” in this world without your mom.
But I am still here. And so are you. And I think I owe it to the both of us to give it a real shot. Maybe there’s something else on the other side of all that pain. Maybe I can find it. Whether I do or don’t, I want you to know my brokenness was never yours to fix. Just like it wasn’t your mom’s job to hold me together while she was here.
We’re each responsible for our own damn mess. And we’re each responsible for doing what it takes to be better. I’m starting to understand that maybe life isn’t something to get through with the least amount of discomfort possible. Maybe it’s about experiencing it all. The good, the bad, and everything in between.
Hope you’re well. Not that it should mean anything to you, not that it’s my place to say it. I’m damn proud of the man you’ve become. I’ve worried over the years that you and your brother would follow the piss-poor example I set. Hiding from the light. But that’s not who you are. You stand up for what’s right every damn day and people respect you for it. I respect you for it.