“That smell is cat.”
“Cat?”
“I did the best I could. There wasn’t much to choose from.”
“And yet you chose this one.”
“Well, if you don’t like it, you can always wait here and catch a ride in a nice and clean police cruiser. The price for that clean ride is that they’ll book you for insurance fraud. Take your pick, Saint Tiffany.”
She closes her full lips and screws up her face in a cute ‘shut the fuck up’ look. “Fine. Let’s go.”
I slip an arm around her shoulders and help her around to the passenger side of the car. Then I open the door and help her lower herself into the front seat. She wrinkles her face again as soon as she makes contact with the seat.
“It’s moist. And it really smells like cat. Or cats. Plural,” she says as I settle in to the driver’s seat. “Where did you find this thing?”
“Borrowed it. If you don’t like the smell, just roll down the window.”
She cranks the window down as I turn the key in the ignition and pull us away from the curb.
“Where to first?” I say.
Her nose is still wrinkled, disgust all over her face.
“My house, first. I need to get some of my things. Then your mom’s house, so we can look at her situation, her records, all the pertinent information, and figure out an action plan to get her back on track. I will not lie to you, Blaze, this could be a complicated situation. And we might not be able to do it alone.”
I look over at her. She has her eyes out the window. Or maybe she’s just trying to keep her face as close as possible to the fresh air. This car really fucking smells.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, the responsible thing to do is to be prepared to hire a lawyer.”
I lean to the side. Away from her. And put my face out the window. This car really fucking stinks.
“A lawyer? What the fuck for?”
“Well, what if there isn’t a simple, financially oriented solution for your mother’s problem? What if we need to guide her through bankruptcy, or loan arbitration, or some other legal process? How much experience do you have with the law?”
I smirk at her.
“A fair bit.”
“OK, but other than being arrested?”
“None.”
“Which means we will need someone experienced to guide us through that process. If it comes down to it. See my point?”
“Yes, you’re right.”
“I should make a list, because there are a lot of things I will need to pick up from my place and, with that warrant you’ve got on you from the bank robbery, we shouldn’t be making any more trips out than necessary. Do you have something I could write with? Never mind, I got it.”
Before I can stop her, she opens the glove box and reaches inside, rummaging for paper and a pen. Out into her lap falls a pencil, the remains of a mouse’s nest, and the vehicle registration. Frowning, she wipes the bits of nest off her lap and picks up the registration slip.
“Who is Bert Carlisle?”
I look out the window at the passing suburbs of Torreon while my brain hunts frantically for an answer.
Either I take too long or she reads the truth on my face.
“Blaze, tell me the truth: did you steal this car?”
“You try finding a car on short notice in the middle of the fucking desert.”
“You made me a promise.”
“Did you not hear me? This was the only fucking option. Especially considering the fact that you told me to hurry because you committed fucking insurance fraud just to get back at your bitch of a boss.”
We roll to a stop at an intersection, and her face is as red as the traffic light. She glares at me in between the moments she pops her head out the window for fresh air.
“You swore: no more crime while we were figuring out your mother’s situation. And what is the first thing you do once you hang up the phone on me? You go out and steal a car. And to make things worse, you steal a car that stinks so bad that I’ll be smelling like cat for the next week. Do you think I’m stupid? That I wouldn’t figure this out? Do you respect me so little? You need my help — you’ve said that you can’t figure this mess out without me — and yet you so blatantly disrespect me?”
For a moment, I’m stunned into silence by her indignant rage while we sit idling at the traffic light. I want to answer her, to hit her with some kind of comeback that’ll silence her smart ass.
But she’s through talking.
The passenger door opens, she slides her ass out on crutches, and slams the door behind her with all the force and fury a crippled nerdy young woman can manage.
And then she sprint-hobbles away.
Chapter Seven
Tiffany
This isn’t the first time I’ve been on crutches; I’m a runner, have been for years, and that means I’ve experienced my fair share of ankle turns, knee strains, muscle pulls, and a whole litany of other injuries that’ve lead me to accumulate a considerable amount of experience bracing myself on glorified sticks.
I can be fast. Even with a foot wound. Even on crutches.
And, as soon as I slip myself out of Blaze’s stinky stolen car when we hit that intersection, I prop the crutches under my armpits and I make a mad dash down the sidewalk. I don’t know where I’m going — don’t care — I just want to get far away from
