“The door guys are the exclusion. They never get seen, ever. Will you watch the guy, now?”
I saw a woman carrying a child walking passed us, about twenty feet away. I smiled at the toddler in her arms. The child smiled back.
“You believe me now?” Fate said from behind me.
“Fine. Hurry up.”
He turned back to the car as I stared through the windows. I could see the corner of the man's sleeve as he sat at the table.
“Got something,” Fate said behind me. “Come on.” He grabbed my arm and tugged me after him toward a Chevy Impala.
“Is there a particular reason you feel the need to pull me around after you?”
“I don't do that,” he said and then looked down and realized that was exactly what he'd been doing. He dropped his hand. “You walk slow.”
“No, you're just bossy.”
“Get in.”
“What? No Porsche?”
“Going for low key.”
I slid into the front passenger seat. “What did you get?”
“He's at a hotel a few blocks from here,” he said as he started the car. “We need to come to an agreement.”
“What kind of agreement?”
“I don't want him killed. Not right away.”
“Tell me why.”
“I'm going to help you, but that's my condition.”
“What does any of this matter to you?”
“He's not a normal human. I want to know who he is.”
“Okay.” I didn't think that was the end of the story. I knew if I were planning to stay on, I'd want to know about people like him. As far as explanations went, I could live with it. “But he goes before my time is over.”
We pulled into the hotel parking lot a few minutes later. Fate killed the engine.
“You stay here and call me when you see him,” he said.
“Why don't you stay here and call me?” I suggested as I got out of the car. “Why do you get all the fun stuff while I'm supposed to be the watch?”
“Because I know what I'm doing.”
“He's a curiosity case to you. He's my murderer. I want to know 100% you don't miss anything.”
“I'm not staying down here.”
“Neither am I.”
We stood in the middle of the lot staring at each other.
“Fine,” he finally said. “Take turns at the window?”
“Agreed.”
We entered through a back door of the building as a guest was exiting.
“You know the room number?”
“Yes.”
“Just checking.”
I followed him up to the third floor.
“This is it,” he said as he stopped in front of room three-fourteen.
“How do we get in?”
“If we were on a job, it would've just opened. But we aren't. Luckily, it's an old fashioned lock or this might've been a problem.” He pulled out a small metal pick from his pocket and held it up to show me.
“Do you normally carry those types of things around?”
“Only when I think the occasion might arise.” I watched as he inserted it into the handle. He made surprisingly quick work of the lock.
The room was classic moderate hotel, from the prints on the wall to the patterned coverlet. The guy was neat; not a thing was left out.
“I'll take the closet, you take the drawers.” I didn't give him much of a choice as I was already standing in front of it. Gray, gray, gray – the guy sure liked his gray suits. Or perhaps he just liked to blend.
It was hard to tell exactly how long he was staying here, since there were four suits. With four, he could've brought a suit for every day or been having them laundered regularly, because he liked to pack light.
I felt in the pockets for any stray receipts but came up with nothing. A small safe was tucked into the corner of the closet – shut. I turned to where Fate was searching through the drawers.
“Got any tricks for safes?”
He turned to answer me just as we both heard a sound in the hallway. His eyes stared at mine. As if of one mind, we were packed into the closet together less than a second later.
Now, if we had just played nice, and one of us had actually taken window duty, this all could have been avoided. But neither of us wanted the shit job, and as penance, were forced up against each other in a goddamn closet.
It was easier and worse for me. Being smaller and shorter, I could stand normally. It was worse because Fate was taller and larger, and in order to fit, he was wrapped around me.
The door closed and any squirming or shimmying either of us wanted to do was frozen. We'd left the closet slightly ajar, as it had been when we got there. It cut back on our room but also let us hear better.
Keys were tossed onto a hard surface, skidding slightly as they landed. A few steps further and a jacket was being shed. The springs of the bed compressed and shoes dropped, one after the other, to the floor. The T.V. was turned on. The only bright side was he must have had bad hearing, because the volume was turned way up.
This had the potential to take a while.
At first, he couldn't seem to settle on one channel. I tried to get as comfortable as I could, with my back to Fate's front. His left arm was around my waist, simply to avoid having it bang into the closet door. This would've been an awkward moment no matter what, but after the kiss in the forest, I was that much more aware of every point of contact we had. The way his forearm grazed the underside of my breast or when he shifted and I caught the graze of his stubbled jaw along my neck.
It still might not have been that bad if the moaning hadn't started. Porn, and from the sound of it, classic eighties stuff. Please tell me this guy was not really going to watch porn right now?
I shook my head and looked up. I only saw the closet shelf but it would have to do.
“This is payback for the forest, isn't it?” I mouthed the words, barely a whisper escaping.
I was pressed up against a guy I barely knew and didn't exactly like. Of course this didn't seem to deter my attraction to him, against my better judgment. At least it was dark, so he couldn't read the unease all over my face.
“Who are you talking to?” His lips were right near my ear as he whispered, causing a funny reaction through my body.
“No one. Shhhh.”
I felt him try and shift his large frame away from me but there was nowhere to go and he ended up closer, if that were possible. This set off my own tight space maneuvering.
“Stop squirming.”
His arm tightened around my waist. Great. More contact. Just what I needed.
“I'm uncomfortable,” I replied. The sound of the moans and accompanying music shielded our own noise.
“Stop.” There was a husky edge to his voice that made me think he was becoming agitated. Like I wasn't?
“I'm claustrophobic. I'm doing the best I can.” It felt like he was actually holding me closer, but it was probably just my heightened awareness of him, which I wouldn't have had if he'd kept his hands to himself the other night. Okay, that was a lie. I was always aware of him, it was just worse now that I had a feeling sex with him would be as good as I suspected.
Fate was like getting a big present with a bow and finding out the gift inside lived up to the packaging. I've received big presents before. They almost never measure up to the hype.
Fate was moving behind me, trying to rearrange again, but every shift seemed to bring him in further contact. His thighs were against mine and I felt his breath along my neck. If I hadn't heard him rejecting me with my own ears, I would've thought he was doing it on purpose.
My breath was getting ragged and the more I tried to calm down, the worse it seemed to get. What was wrong with me? Not dead even a month, with a fiancé and family left behind grieving, and I'm ready to play seven minutes in heaven with the first hot guy I'm near? Maybe this was why Luck always looked well tumbled. Was dying some sort of aphrodisiac or was I just turning into a bit of a harlot?
The T.V. was suddenly muted, alerting us to a change in circumstances in the room and saving me from rubbing myself up against Fate in the next few minutes.
With the new silence, I heard his phone ringing.