My battle is hindered by the detachment she's been using as a shield. I've dragged myself through days of short, impersonal interactions and purposefully diverted glances. I'm still not sure what she's trying to get at by shoving me out of her bed with hardly a sheet to cover my wounds. I can't understand that, and all after she broke down the years I've spent denying that I wanted her to be more than a friend and partner. Maybe it's all my fault. Maybe if I had just kept my mouth shut in the car this wouldn't hurt so much.
“You need to figure out what you want from me,” I hear myself say.
I'm already getting hard against my khaki shorts, so I make an attempt to kill the buzz. I can't remember making the decision to go at this like a man, but the words release themselves from me anyway. They fill the space between us until the seams of our world threaten to unravel.
Her eyes catch such an intense blaze that, for a breath, I believe she's going to jump me right here on the stool for everyone to see. Then she takes one step back. Smoky air buffers her retreat, softens the edge the gesture draws in me. Her expression chills more than I am ready to handle.
“You're right,” she answers softly, a sad light dancing in her eyes. “But that's impossible right now.”
The bar lulls into a strange, collective moment of silence, like one of those times that all noise dies and you're left screaming something embarrassing. I feel like the whole city has turned to observe this awkward, painful moment.
Then the band kicks into a dirty punk rendition of “When the Saints Go Marching In,” worthy of a Second Line funeral parade straight through the Quarter. The crowd erupts into cheers and dancing and singing, and attention scatters.
The song strings unexpected grief along my ribcage. The tequila won't relinquish its hold on me now. The punk has melted her brown eyes into muddied pools. I reach toward her like a possessed man. I see myself moving, but I can't remember deciding to do it.
She folds into my grasp, giving in to her sobs against my chest. This embrace is not about sex. My fingers tighten in her hair as I garner my own defenses. She's right. I'm asking too much from her just now. This is Charlie's night, after all.
I lean my lips close to her ear and say, “Whatever you decide, I won't leave your side unless you tell me to go.”
I don't even know if she can hear me.
Part Two
Chapter 12 Cadillac Crown
Frederick
I've always been the kind of guy to instigate action. Call me a catalyst, but if you want to do something, don't fuck around about it. I'm also the kind of guy who gets the same half-cocked response from a sleek and functional weapon as I do from a hot bitch. That's why I always work guard duty.
It's why I'm sitting in the cool of the first hours of morning, feet propped on the railing of Noah's balcony, my .50 cal Desert Eagle resting in my lap with its silencer lodged comfortably against my thigh. It's why I'm up here sitting in the open, darkened doorway instead of downstairs, behind drawn shades with a bunch of really dangerous assholes who I'd rather fight than talk to.
“Lighten up,” Noah says beside me, setting his lips in a grim line. He makes a dramatic pause, waits for the scathing look that is my reaction. Then he laughs.
I hold the serious expression just long enough to make his smile fade. Then, just as everyone always does, I fall victim to his charm. I grant a dry laugh at his questioning gaze. If it were anybody else, he'd be knocked out already or defending himself, depending on his reaction time. But it's Noah, so I sneer into the early morning.
“I'm high as a damn kite,” I scoff, watching him produce a cigarette from a pack of Camel Turkish Royals. “Doesn't get much lighter than that.”
He, too, has been fettered to this guard post. We are strange company, my temperament too salty for negotiations, his far too lighthearted. Noah is the type who'd just as well stay out of that shit. Generally, so am I, if for different reasons. This time, though, I'm pissed that she didn't take me.
“Don't you have faith in our girl?” he asks, pushing back the brim of a black, tweed Trilby hat with the barrel of his Glock 9 mm as he closes his lips around a smoke.
“Faith doesn't stop itchy trigger fingers.” I wave away the pack he pushes in my direction, his arm like a muscled art exhibition. He knows I don't smoke.
I look to my own tattoo, a red-banded daisho on my left forearm, the handle of the katana starting at the elbow and its sheath running to my wrist. I'm supposed to be her guard, but she ordered me here, where I can't do a damn thing. I won't say that shit to Noah, though.
The cigarettes linger in the space between offering and rebuke, and his features crunch in suspicion. I'm used to it, nobody ever really believes me when I say I don't smoke. The weight of the street life that keeps our heads above water also drags life to a sluggish halt in moments like this. Then he sighs and the haze of
