“Fuck. That’s foul.” Oliver takes a big step back. For a football player, he seems remarkably fastidious. Maybe I’ve spent too much time in the trenches. A little urine is nothing when you’re on a mission.
I tuck the gun into my harness. I’m not going to need it for the incontinent clown.
“You always wear that?” He gestures at my holster.
“Always.” Turning to the clown, I give him a little tap on the face to get his attention. “Why don’t you start talking?”
“I’m just doing my job,” he whimpers. “I was told to deliver a message. That’s all. The chick took five days to answer the door and when she saw me, she freaked out. She’s fucked up, man!”
Oliver sucks in a breath at the insult toward Natalie and I move between them. I don’t need Oliver hitting the clown before he babbles out his answers. The elevator dings and a small man with a shiny suit and even shinier black hair steps out. He moves purposefully toward us and stops behind Oliver. Oliver looks over his shoulder and gives a tiny head nod of recognition. I peg him as an accountant or financial advisor. Maybe agent.
Interrogating people in front of an audience isn’t my preferred method of operation, but I want to eke out what I can here and now. I don’t want to have to chase him down, plus later he’d have an opportunity to change his story. I want it fresh.
“What’s the message?”
The span between me shoving my gun in his face and him catching his breath has given him a false sense of security. He lashes out. “What’s your badge number? I’m reporting you for police brutality!”
“I’m not the police, dumb shit. Now tell me what the message is.”
“I think you should leave, Oliver,” the small man suggests quietly and tugs on Oliver’s T-shirt.
The clown’s eyes shift away from me as if noticing all over for the first time we aren’t alone. “Wait, holy shit. Are you Oliver Graham? Jesus fucking Christ. My brother is going to shit his pants when he hears this.” His eyes dart to the open foyer door and then back again, narrowing in an opportunistic gleam. “Aren’t you dating Fannie Carter? Is this your side piece? I can be quiet, you know. You got any signed jerseys?”
My gut tightens at the reference to Natalie belonging to another man. A reaction that I try to ignore. Meanwhile, Oliver sizes up the clown, probably debating how to respond. Given that Natalie and Oliver’s connection has been secret for years, he’s going to deflect, and for some reason I just don’t want to hear it. I think it would hurt Natalie, and the last thing I want is for her to be caused any more pain.
It’s damn irrational, I know, so I push that aside with all the other little things that I don’t want to examine at this point.
“Listen up. Who’s your employer?”
“I’m an indie.” He lifts his chin proudly.
“How do you take jobs?”
“People fill out a form online and pay via PayPal.”
“Great. Pull it up.”
“Pull what up?”
“Your PayPal account.”
He shakes his head. “I’m not pulling up my PayPal account for you!”
I move before he has time to react. I reach inside his coat pocket, pull out his phone, and then spin him around so his cheek is kissing the wall again.
“You can’t do that. It’s an invasion of my privacy. Oliver, are you watching this?”
Oliver backs away. “I don’t know who you are or what you’re doing. I heard someone scream and came down to help.”
“I’ll testify to that.” The suited man raises his hand. “I’m his agent and we do not know anyone here.”
“Wait,” the clown calls out to Oliver’s retreating back. “What about the signed jersey?”
He barely notices that I’ve pressed the phone against his finger to bypass the screen lock. I pull up the mail app and find the PayPal receipt. I pull out my phone and take a picture. I scroll through his contacts, swiftly snapping his favorites and his last ten emails. I look as his photo roll. Big mistake. He’s got a bunch of porn saved. I cut the zip ties and jerk him to me.
“Don’t come back here,” I warn and then give him a hard push down the hall. He steps in his urine, slips, and falls. From the elevator bank, I can see Oliver smirking at the insta-karma. I enter Natalie’s apartment and close the door firmly.
The phone rings before I can get two steps inside the apartment.
“Call Terrance,” Oliver barks as greeting.
“That her therapist?”
Oliver grunts. “Yeah. They have a love/hate relationship, but he’s the professional. She’ll need to be medicated.”
I don’t know Natalie as well as I’d like, but I’m not calling some guy she loathes. “Let’s have her sleep it off. When she wakes up, she’ll remember what happened and it won’t be an issue. We don’t need to make it an issue,” I clarify.
“Did I miss your PhD certificate in your office? Call fucking Terrance.”
I decide to hang up on Oliver.
Natalie has her issues. She’s scared of new people. She’s scared of going outside. Guys with extreme PTSD lock themselves up because they’re worried that they’ll fall apart in public. She’s scared of being scared. I get it. I’ve had my own mild case of it and so I don’t stay, knowing when she wakes up, she needs things to be comfortable and familiar. I’m neither of those things . . . yet.
If anyone is calling her therapist, it won’t be me.
I invade her office and grab a piece of paper out of the printer.
“You still owe me dinner. Call me.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
JAKE
“Are you going out?” Sabrina asks. “Because you’re kind of in a shitty mood for going out.”
I haven’t heard from Natalie, which is why I’m in this shitty mood, but I try to summon a smile for my sister. She’s back to talking to me . . . barely.
When she follows me into my bedroom, I put her to good use. “Yes. I’m meeting Ian and Victoria at Club 69. Pick out something suitably clubbish.”
I wait for her to beg to come with me. Club 69 is one of Kaga’s newest ventures. It seems like he is opening a new club every other month.
She avoids the subject and instead points to my closet. “What look are you going for? Trendy? Urban? Bridge and Tunnel?”
“What’s Bridge and Tunnel?” I ask, rubbing my chin. I’ve got quite the scruff going, but I’m too lazy to shave. In a couple more weeks, I’ll be headed into full hipster beard mode. I told Natalie that I preferred to shave and now I wonder what she likes. Clean shaven? A little scruff? A full beard?
Her skin felt petal-soft as I carried her into her bedroom. I tried not to stare at her legs or how the big shirt she wore clung to the curves of her ample chest and hugged her waist. Perving on a woman who had passed out from fear is probably one of the lower points in my life.
“Bridge and Tunnel is in from New Jersey to pick up chicks who don’t know better. Axe body spray or Drakkar, open collar, lots of chest hair showing.” Her head is stuck inside my closet, making the words sound like they are coming down some tunnel—although maybe not all the way from Jersey.
“I’ll pass on that. Isn’t there anything that looks like ‘I’m here because my friends think I’m a stick-in-the-mud’?”
“Only everything in your wardrobe.” She makes a face as she holds up a pair of camo pants from my army days. “Seriously, why do you still have these?”