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“I can’t tell you what to do here, Lark,” he told me. “But if this was me, or my sister, or my girl, I would say to give me a few days.”
“You think you can scare them worse than the cops?”
“Here’s the thing. The cops really only have a few options to help you with this. A restraining order. Which tends to make bad guys escalate. And they can offer a cop to drive past your place every hour. At best, they will let someone sit on your house and work. But this is Miami, babe. They don’t have the cops to spare. Too much other shit going on.”
“Well, that’s disheartening. You know, to all the other people who find themselves in a bad spot and don’t happen to know a cool biker guy with lots of connections.”
“I thought I was a hot biker guy,” Remy said, smirking.
“Well, that too,” I agreed. “So, can I ask what you plan to do about the situation, then?”
“Well, right now, I am planning on waiting for Arty to give me some files. He will have a shitton of information which will help me decide how I’m going to handle it. What?” he asked, making me realize my reaction must have been all over my face.
“It’s just… the way you just said ‘handle it’ kind of reminded me of mafia guys on TV shows. You know… like in a final sort of way.”
“And you are morally opposed to that?” he asked, choosing his words carefully.
“I, well, huh. That’s actually a lot harder to answer than I would have thought. I guess I don’t think everyone should be allowed to live, you know? Pedophiles are a prime example. Hell, even rapists, honestly. I kind of think I would personally be capable of killing someone if I found myself with a gun and happen upon a person hurting an animal. So, I guess, sometimes it is warranted. If they are bad guys.”
“We are about to determine just how bad of guys they are. As soon as Arty is done.”
“Then we better get him his tacos, so he can keep going,” I said, cleaning up my platter.
“I’ll go order,” Remy said, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
Until someone dropped down across from me.
Anne.
The owner.
“Okay. Girl to girl, Remy is a good guy. In case you were having reservations, and that is why you are just ‘working together’ instead of together-together.
“You see, he didn’t really have a chance to be on the up-and-up. That’s why Rod, my husband, gave him a job when he was a kid. We’d seen him hanging around. You know, on the street. We had our own teens. And it was our mission to keep them off the street, you know?
“But Remy didn’t have parents like that. So we tried to take him in. He was a good kid, but he wasn’t meant for this line of work. Even after he stopped working here, he came in almost every night with his friends. We are well aware that he… went down the path we wanted so badly for him to avoid.
“Even so, though, he has grown into a great man. I wanted to tell you that in case you were questioning it. As a woman, I understand that, knowing what you know, what we know, that you might not want to be involved in that in any way. But if you are okay with his job, but questioning his morals as a person, I’m here to assure you he’s one of the good ones.”
With that, Anne hopped up and moved off before Remy got back to the table.
“What was that all about?” he asked, waving the to-go bag of tacos at me.
“Oh, just… girl talk,” I told him, going for our trays, but he beat me to it, bussing them himself, then leading me out the door.
And while we were halfway out, he oh-so-subtly touched my hip, shifting me toward the inside of the sidewalk, so he was closest to the road.
For a “street kid” with what seemed like not great parents, that was surprisingly great manners. I wasn’t sure I’d ever met a guy who made sure I didn’t walk on the road side of the sidewalk.
My heart actually did a little squeezy thing in my chest.
I made a mental note to text Myles about it when I got back to the safe house.
Which was exactly what I did, as Remy ran out to grab the supplies I’d asked for in my car since we couldn’t bring them on the bike.
When I didn’t get an immediate response, I tried again.
Then again.
