“What the fuck! You fucking pig!” Caro shouted. The officer held her against the hood and attempted to put cuffs on her to detain her, “Get your mother fucking hands off me!”
“Ma’am, you cannot hit an officer,” he said, as the other officer continued to detain her. She resisted.
“Dani, do something!” Caro yelled.
“I suggest you disregard her for a moment,” the officer said to me.
I tried, but listening to Caro struggle in discomfort captivated my mind. I knew the position she was in triggered her. I attempted to awaken my shadow, which oddly laid dormant at a favorable opportunity. I called out to it in my mind, I played reels of angering memories to awaken it, but it was nowhere to be seen.
An officer stepped forward and whispered, “They work for Franklin.”
The words were barely audible, but I knew what this officer was implying.
“And?” said the officer that was doing the questioning, “They may, but I sure as hell don’t. Not like every other asshole in this department,” he said and turned to face me, “Now, let’s go over this again.”
I heard the officer lift Caro off the hood and slam her back down into it. I lunged toward him and shoved him hard.
“Hey, chill the fuck out!” I shouted. He lost his footing and stumbled to the ground. Immediately I was placed in the same position as Caro with four cops restraining us.
Needless to say, we were read our rights and arrested. They attempted to question us once more after we were detained. Neither one of us had anything to say at that point. On the way to the station, Caro was practically silent. She said only one thing to me.
“Why wasn’t your shadow able to stop them, Dani?”
As I thought on the question, the answer began to crawl up from my past and manifest in my mind:
Mortal Nights.
Chapter Four
Lawless
We spent a mere six hours in the clink before we received notice that bail had been posted on our behalf. We trudged out of the holding cell, not anticipating a warm welcome from Franklin. He would, undoubtedly, be furious that one, we got arrested; two, our target could ID us; and three, it happened in his establishment. We collected our belongings and headed through the doors to freedom. Franklin was nowhere to be found, to our relief. Punishment delayed. However, when we exited the building and headed down a small flight of stairs towards the road, a man stood at the end of them.
He was an exceptionally tall and muscular black man. He was also extremely handsome and dressed like a model straight out of GQ magazine. I had no interest in men, but he certainly caught my attention. He wore sunglasses as he leaned against the rail with his hands crossed in front of him. Caro must have noticed him as well because she began heading in his direction. She walked up to him and crossed her arms as she gazed at him.
“What are you doing here?” she asked. He mimicked her posture and crossed his arms as well.
“I heard you were in a bit of trouble,” he said.
“You heard wrong,” she replied matter-of-factly. He glanced at the jail entrance, then back to Caro.
“You sure about that, Carolina? I’ve heard you’re getting mixed up with the wrong people.”
“Like I told you before, I can take care of myself. Besides, I’m not getting mixed up with the wrong kind of people, I am the wrong kind of people. I’m just finding the people more like me.”
“That’s not who you are, Caro. You know you’re better than that.”
I observed this unusual interaction from the sidelines. It was like watching a dramatic scene out of a movie.
“Just stay out of my way,” she replied.
“You know I intend to take Franklin down, Carolina, and I will.”
“Not my problem,” she retorted. He sighed and reached in his pocket, pulling out a pill bottle.
“I heard Danielle needed more medication,” he said.
“Hey,” I said, reaching for the pills, before Caro snatched them out of the man’s hand.
“Anything else?” she said, shoving them into her purse.
“No, nothing else,” he said, with a small shake of his head.
“Good,” she said, grabbing my arm, “Let’s go.”
“There’s a better way, Danielle,” the man called from behind me, as Caro led us away.
“Ignore him,” Caro whispered to me.
When we were out of range of the man, I grabbed Caro’s arm, needing all the details of what I had missed in our encounter.
“Was that an ex-boyfriend? That guy was. . . well, like an embodied bad ass,” I replied, not attempting to mask my admiration, “He was just so cool and, like, smooth and stoic and — I don’t know, but I want to be him.”
“Wow, Dani, calm down. I would almost think you had a boy crush.”
“Crush? No, I literally want to be him.”
“Well, actually, that’s probably the last person you want to be.”
“Why is that?”
“Why? Because that was Law you just met,” she said. Words suddenly escaped me.
“Wha, uh —”
“Yeahhhh, exactly,” she said with a nod.
“What was Law doing here, why did he bail us out? More importantly, how does he know you? You dated him, didn’t you?”
“No, Dani. . . I used to work for him,” she said and began to walk away, “I’m hungry. Let’s go get some breakfast.”
We sat in a booth in a local diner, coffee steaming next to each of us. Caro seemed to pretend to be engrossed in her menu, avoiding eye contact. I drummed my fingers on the table and sipped from my coffee. I tried to be patient, waiting for Caro to elaborate on her half-ass explanation of Law.
“Figure out what you want to eat, Dani,” Caro said, glancing over the menu.
“I’m not hungry.”
“You are hungry,” she said, looking up sternly, “Figure out what you want to eat.”
“Good morning!” said a young, flamboyant waiter as he strode up, pouring more
