Someone spoke briefly, and Dane answered. “At the Northside Grill, why?”
My gut clenched in a way that usually signaled lactose intolerance or an attack of the flu. I didn’t like any association between Dane Quimby and Cypher Security Systems, much less one that placed me in Dane’s proximity.
I stood up to pull a twenty out of my back pocket, and Dane’s eyes widened as they followed me up and up and up. He scowled, and covered the phone again. “Where are you going?”
I nodded toward the phone in his hand. “You’re busy, and I have to prep for a colonoscopy tomorrow.”
He made a face and spoke into the phone again. “Hang on,” he snarled. Then he covered the mouthpiece again. “When can I see you?”
I brightened. “Why don’t I find you on Tinder and we can look for men to share.”
He frowned. “To share? But I’m not gay.”
I put on my saddest face. “You’re not? Oh, that’s too bad, because I am.”
Before he could untangle that ridiculous parting shot, I handed Tiffani the twenty as I headed for the door. “Thanks Tiffani,” I said brightly. “Keep the change.”
“What happened to your leg?” she asked. “You okay?”
She must have seen my limp, and she looked sweetly concerned. Dane was still on his phone, and I could hear his voice rising angrily in the background. “What do you mean, you’ll be right here? Why?”
“Oh yeah, it’s nothing. Just a shark bite,” I said with a quick glance back at Dane before I stepped outside.
I’d taken about five steps down the sidewalk when a big black SUV barreled around the corner and drove past me to screech to a stop in front of the restaurant. The passenger shot out of his seat and stalked into the building so fast I barely caught a glimpse of a good suit, dark sunglasses, and neck tattoos. The driver was still in his seat, and I could see his eyes on me in the side view mirror.
Something in those eyes locked my knees in place and forbade my legs to move.
Then the driver opened the car door, and was out on the sidewalk facing me before I could exhale.
I hadn’t even registered the driver’s appearance and I was already cataloguing my options. Bond? Bond Girl? Or Bond Villain? I knew I looked good tonight, and I could charm my way out of most situations, so Bond Girl was on the table. I’d worn a special knife holster on the titanium shaft of my prosthetic leg, invisible inside my boot, which gave me Bond powers of attack and defense. But I’d just emptied Dane’s private cootchie fund of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and transferred it to his wife as payment for fifteen years of services rendered. So maybe I was actually a Bond villain instead.
But then I took a breath and actually looked at the man on the sidewalk in front of me.
He wasn’t much taller or older than me, which made him about six two or three, and put him in his early thirties. He wore a sharp black suit tailored to make his shoulder-to-hip ratio look like an inverted triangle, and made me think quarterback instead of linebacker. He stood like a cop and dressed like a CEO, which made me think private security – and that made me think that somehow, Cypher Security was on to me.
An aura of power radiated from the Man in Black like wavy heat above a desert road. It didn’t help my temperature that the guy’s Idris Elba smolder threatened to set my skin and various articles of clothing on fire. For one insanity-filled moment I imagined casually walking over and introducing myself.
I must have flinched, because his hand twitched toward a holster he wasn’t actually wearing. Then reality intruded on the fantasy. I was a Caucasian female alone in a predominantly Puerto Rican neighborhood in Logan Square, having just committed something akin to a felony, albeit justly deserved, standing in front of a guy who probably used to be in some form of law enforcement.
And perhaps because I must have truly gone insane, I smiled at him. It was pure reflex, like the sigh at a spectacular sunset, or the grin at a child’s laughter, and was as if the pale green eyes, dark skin, and powerful build of the man in front of me composed my picture of male perfection, and my smile was the acknowledgement of having beheld it in person. He very nearly took a step toward me, then seemed to come to his senses and halted in place. It was at this point that I compounded my idiocy by accidentally waving to him as I turned to hurry away down the street.
Who waves at the guy who could probably bust her ass ten ways from Tuesday?
Finally, cold logic, survival skills, and James Bond took over control of my hands. I powered down my phone, took out the battery, and tucked both into my back pockets as I walked. I also ducked down an alley and circled back on myself twice. I never carried a purse if I could help it – my phone, keys, a credit card, my L card, lip balm, and two twenties were all I ever had on me, and even squeezing my not-insubstantial hips into skinny jeans had left room enough for those.
I half expected squealing tires and slamming doors to find me before I got to the L, but remarkably, I made it to my train unimpeded. My heart still pounded uncomfortably in my chest as I dropped into a seat, and it annoyed me that I had reacted so strongly. Was it because the Cheater McCheaterson I’d just relieved of a quarter mil had connections to Cypher Security, or was it the Man in Black who had made my stomach clench in a way that was decidedly not like lactose intolerance or the flu? I was almost grateful for the two young hoods who sat down across from me and leered suggestively.
Seriously boys? That’s all you’ve got? I front-loaded disdain into my pointed glare until they got up and slid down the train, leaving me alone with my slamming heart.
I’d just hijacked Dane Quimby’s phone and moved half his money into his wife’s account.
How long until someone connected the dots between my “date” with Dane and the missing money?
I absently rubbed the skin above my leg socket and let my head fall back against the window of the train. I might have even tapped my head against the glass a couple of times to drown out the whooshing sound of impending doom that filled my ears.
Two
Gabriel
“You have to be smarter than them, talk softer, smile bigger, and let all the words roll off your back. It’ll be hard, son, but someday you’ll find someone who wants to see your light, and when you do, you’re going to shine.”
– Felicity Eke
Who the hell was that?
I took another step forward, but she was already walking away – fast, like she had a place to be. She had a slight hitch in her step and I almost got back in the car to offer her a ride, but that was madness from an overactive protective gene I seemed to have inherited along with a penchant for self-destructive behavior. It didn’t matter how nice the suit was, a black man in an SUV did not offer a ride to a beautiful white girl he didn’t know, not even when the man in question had a British accent and an Oxford education. At a minimum, she’d call the police, and I did not need to explain my misguided chivalrous instincts to Chicago’s finest tonight.
“You alright, man? Why’d you stay outside?” O’Malley asked, as he stepped out of the restaurant. Dan O’Malley had the Boston accent and tattoos of a thug, and the generosity of a gentleman. He’d been showing me the ropes at Cypher since I came onboard, and he was one of those people who made the new bloke feel welcome without doing anything particular to show it.
His voice broke the spell I was under and I tore my eyes away from the excellent view disappearing around the corner. “I’m fine. Thought I’d give you first impressions. What’s your opinion of Quimby?”