AllFreeNovel
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It takes forever to get to TriBeCa. The closer we get, the more Lily is on edge.
“Who is this guy, anyway?” she asks as I double-check the address in a public lot.
“A council member who likes to pretend he’s working-class while he lives in a luxury townhouse and takes bribes from business owners to vote against policies that make it easier for people who don’t have a billion dollars in their bank accounts to live in the city.”
Lily frowns at me. “If you already have his address, what more do you need to know?”
“I’m interested in the parking situation. Let’s do this.”
I hop out of the SUV, and she jogs around to meet me. “We’re already in a lot. What do you mean, parking situation?”
“I want to know where he keepshiscar.”
“So you can…do some crime on it?”
“No comment.”
“I take that as ayes.”
“Unfair. You can’t take myno commentsas anything but a lack of comment.”
“I could make out with you,” she says, just loud enough for me to hear. “Then we could find out how much you care about this so-called parking situation.”
It’s late enough that traffic isn’t congested, but there’s still traffic. Headlights bounce off Lily’s face and reflect in her hair. A couple of drivers go past in a hurry.
“Couple of blocks up ahead,” I tell her. “We’re just walking by, which is a totally legal act, just so you—”
Brakes scream off to the right, followed immediately by a muffledthump, and a pissed-off somebody lays on the horn.
“Oh, fuck.”
There’s a shape in the road, its soft outline hazy in the headlights, and I just go.
Lily shoutsJameson,but I’m already across the first lane of traffic by then. Another set of brakes screeches. The car that stopped—the car that hit the shape in the road—lurches forward, and thenthatasshole’s honking, too.
“Wait a fucking second,” I shout at the windshield. I can’t see the driver through the reflection.
It’s a cat. A little black cat, and it’s still breathing.
I scoop it up off the ground and take it back across the traffic, then sit down on the curb. The cat is shivering, and it’s still trying to look around, and its tiny chest moves up and down too fast.
“It’s okay,” I tell it. “Just let me—”
I get my shirt over my head with one hand and wrap the cat in it, then hold it like—
Like a baby. I don’t know how else to do it.
The cat shudders in my shirt.
“No, I know. It’s okay.” I don’t know anything, and it’s not okay, but an image comes to mind. A green field with trees in the distance. Tiny daisies dotting the grass. A river running through. A path? “You follow the stone path to the trees.” I don’t know what I’m talking about, but the cat watches me, and it’s not shivering as hard. “You’ll know when you’re there, because it’s warm, and there’s—” Another image—a pair of big hands that seem familiar, but I don’t know why, and in those palms is a toy meant to look like a ball of yarn in a deep red color with orange-gold tendrils. “There’s somebody there. With a ball you can play with. And no cars. There aren’t any cars.”
One last rise of its lungs, one last exhale, and the light in the cat’s eyes goes out.
“Just look for the path.” I swear to fuck, I can feel it looking. Leaving. “You’ll see it any second.”
The cars in the road speed up again. Brakes screech and release. Lily touches my shoulder.
“We should go,” she says. “We should take—”
