by Leigh Tudor
Pretty responsible strategy, as long as they were safe and circumspect.
His eyes scanned the room.
He didn’t see the Russian.
Interesting.
Loren wasn’t in the bar, either.
His jaw ticked. He was annoyed.
He turned back to Gus, who was handing a beer to the guy next to him. “Surprised her sister isn’t here.”
Gus jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Out back with Jimbo.” He wiped his hands on a bar towel. “Guinness?”
“Hold that thought. I’m gonna go check on Jimbo.”
Gus returned a knowing smile, which Alec ignored as he shifted his body back through the crowd and out the front doors.
The noise level decreased significantly as the door latched behind him. He jammed his hands into his front pockets relieved for Jimbo’s sake that they were having a mild winter, but thinking tonight might be the exception.
He followed the path to the back alley, past the large metal trash bins where he found his longtime homeless friend sitting on top of several woolen blankets, eating what looked to be a double-decker hamburger dubbed “The Gus Special.”
Loren was sitting cross-legged on top of a wooden crate, laughing at something Jimbo said. “So, you told the little girl you were a Bedouin?”
Jimbo swallowed and grinned. “What? That’s what I am. A nomad traveling the prairie as opposed to the desert.”
“I guess it’s all about perspective.” She shrugged.
“How ’bout you, Miss Loren? Travel much?”
Alec remained in the shadows just outside of the lamplight next to the back door of the bar. He kept his presence unknown. There was no way he was going to miss an opportunity to learn more about this woman’s elusive past.
He noticed she’d pulled her hair up in one of those messy buns. Platinum-blond wisps framed her face, and his chest warmed at overly large eyes that looked the color of rare whiskey. He watched her head dip as she repeatedly pulled at one of the zippers on her tall suede boots. “Yes and no.”
Jimbo swallowed another bite. “What? You either do, or you don’t.”
She shrugged her shoulder. “I traveled a lot. All three of us did. But our schedules were tight. Not much time to explore or check out museums.”
“I’m assuming that’s because of that overprotective uncle of yours?”
She smirked and then with a sad turn of her head, smiled at Jimbo. “He didn’t like for us to wander too much.”
“What’s the point of traveling if you can’t wander?”
“I guess you could say he had his own agenda, and time to ourselves didn’t serve it.”
“Sounds like he wasn’t very much fun to travel with.”
She readjusted her weight, sitting up a little straighter. “He didn’t travel with us per se; he sent us on trips with hired help. They were to keep an eye on us at all times. But don’t you worry, Mercy and I found ways to fly under the radar and enjoy ourselves.”
“Went into stealth mode, huh?”
“You could say that,” she said with a wry grin. “During a . . . trip to Paris, we took the wrong line on the Metro and came out at Place de Pigalle, known for being one of the seedier parts of the city. Mercy was only seventeen at the time, and the first person we passed was a man dressed as a woman in six-inch metallic heels walking his fuchsia-dyed poodle down the street.”
“What’d Mercy do?” Jimbo asked, sipping on his straw.
“She walked right up to him and politely asked for directions to where we were headed.” She shook her head with a nostalgic half-smile on her lips. “And where she could find those same pair of heels.”
They laughed together, and Alec’s chest tightened at the sound.
And then Loren added, “That’s when I realized that Mercy had been isolated for so long, that she didn’t have any preconceived ideas as to those things that should take her by surprise.”
“You wanted her to be shocked and outraged by Parisian transvestites with great taste in shoes?”
“No, of course not,” she said with a smile that turned somber. “I just never want her to feel insecure because she doesn’t know the first thing about fitting in.”
“She’s a good young lady, Miss Loren. You’ve raised her well, despite your uncle.”
Alec watched her grin sheepishly at Jimbo’s compliment. She said softly, making Alec strain to hear what she said.
“Sometimes I get so confused as to what’s normal and what’s the exception. It’s exhausting to be constantly on the search for cues and clues. The best I can do is learn from movie scenes, books, and plain old every day observations, so that when the time is right, I can be sure to act accordingly in the right way at the right time. But to be honest, I miss the mark more often than not. And then I worry about what example I’m setting for Mercy and Cara.”
Jimbo also got quiet. “You know what I wish for you and your sisters, Miss Loren?”
“An online discount for stripper footwear?” she panned cheekily.
“No, ma’am,” he said with a tilt of his head and a slight smile. “My wish, for you and your sisters, is that each of you gets so comfortable in your own skin that you no longer need to mimic other people or worry about what other people think.” Jimbo closed the plastic container and set it to the side, giving Loren time to marinate in his words. He smiled and clapped his hands together as if to change the mood. “So, did you and Mercy ever get to where you were going?”
She tilted her head in question.
“In Paris.”
Loren shook her head and with a forced smile, she said, “No, our uncle’s . . . staff found us before we made it to our destination.”
As if the memory turned sour, she picked at a loose piece of wood on the crate and then chucked the sliver at the light. It ricocheted off the building’s brick wall, landing next to Alec’s boot.
Jimbo and Loren’s attention turned his direction, so he felt compelled to move out of the shadows and into the glow of the security light.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Arithmetic is numbers you squeeze from your head to your hand to your pencil to your paper ’til you get the answer.”
—Carl Sandburg
Swedish-American poet, biographer, journalist,
and editor who won three Pulitzer prizes: two for his poetry and one for his biography of
Abraham Lincoln
* * *
“Evening, Jimbo,” Alec said to break the silence.
“Well, hey there, Alec. Come on and join us. Plenty of room.” Jimbo grinned.
Alec nodded, moving closer to the light. His hands moved to his front pockets as he leaned on the brick wall. For whatever reason, nerves started to settle in. “Nice weather we’re having.”
Oh, perfect. Now he sounded like Mercy with her repetitive tagline when greeting people. These days the entire town was greeting one another with, “Nice weather, isn’t it?” in some sort of homage to the Ingalls sisters and the unexpected level of enthusiasm they instilled in everyone they came in contact with.
“Yes, sir.” Jimbo nodded as he took another bite. “Mighty fine weather.”
Alec finally lifted his gaze toward Loren. “Evening, Loren.”
“Hey, Alec,” she greeted, with her hands on her knees. “Are Cara and Ally still at your place writing the soundtrack to next year’s box office hit?”
He smiled and nodded, but not before noticing that her green knit sweater fell to one side exposing a creamy white shoulder, the lamplight making her skin appear translucent.
He cleared his throat as he worked a rogue weed with the toe of his boot. “They’d moved on to a scary movie by the time I left.”
“Nice,” she said, her smile competing with the sexy roll of her whiskey-brown eyes. “Tonight, you get neurotic little sister duty.” She turned toward Jimbo to further explain. “That’s when Ally and Cara squeal at all hours, convinced that every sound they hear is someone coming t
o hack them with a chainsaw.” Loren turned back toward Alec and smiled knowingly. “But they’re happy and safe and that’s what matters.”
Alec nodded. “So true.” He cleared his throat as the conversation started to lag. This was the longest non-confrontational conversation he’d had with his enigmatic neighbor and he didn’t want it to end. “Thanks for letting Ally spend the night while I was out of town last week.”
Lord, he was grasping for straws and Jimbo appeared just as confused, his head bobbing back and forth between them.
“Oh, yeah, not a problem. How did orientation go?”
Alec nodded. “Went well.” Not sure what to add to that as details of his job weren’t to be discussed due to the nature of his profession.
“They teach you the QWERTY keyboard and how to send and receive email?”
Alec nodded with a chuckle. “Something like that.”
More like department protocol for how to remotely infiltrate city-wide video cams and hack into VPN’s set up by targets. As a Raider he was usually the boots and brawn, not the one sitting behind the computer, but what they taught him he could have taught and then some.
Alec had asked for a low-key position as compared to his career with the Marines. He had a sister to raise, and until she graduated, he needed a job that would keep him home most nights. He could do that by pulling intel to track targets as opposed to securing them. He agreed to fieldwork only when his particular expertise was required and didn’t require weeks of travel.
When and if that project came about and he was called out, he would ask if she could stay with the Ingalls. Which reminded him, he was to have his last debriefing next week and needed to ask if Ally could hang with them after school and maybe stay the night. When it came down to it, despite holes in their stories, the Ingalls’ home base was as safe as a fortress of Amazonian warriors.
And one Russian.
Fucking Russian.
More conversation lag.
“So,” Loren piped up, as if she too was working to revive a dying conversation, “the girls seem to be doing much better at school. Even made friends with Amarilla Simmons.”
“Yeah, I’ve been checking in on Amarilla and her grandpa lately. Cara and Ally tag along. Soon as we get there, they run into Amarilla’s room, giggle at high decibels and then I have to drag them out with wet nails and repetitive girl hugs.”
“Like they won’t all see each other the next day at school.”
“Right.” He nodded, kicked a brick embedded in dirt.
Again with the crickets.
Jesus Christ.
Okay, now he was pissed. Why was the conversation so easy and fluid between her and Jimbo, but shooting the shit with him seemed like a chore? Despite the not-so-distant past, when he preferred superficial convos with his lady friends, this wasn’t going to cut it. Not even close. Maybe if he could talk to her alone, without Jimbo staring at them like they were alien transplants that just showed up out of nowhere and landed on his side of the sidewalk.
He sighed and rubbed his bottom lip with his thumb. He glanced up at Jimbo. “I came back to check on my friend here. You need anything, Jimbo?”
“Nah,” his old friend replied, patting the lid of the Styrofoam container. “Loren here took care of me tonight. Gave me plenty of blankets and a hot meal. Can’t ask for more than that. That’d just be greedy.”
Jimbo was anything but. He appreciated all the kindness people gave him and ignored them when they acted otherwise.
“Well,” Loren said, stretching her legs out in front of her. “I guess I better go check on Mercy. Make sure she’s having fun but not so much that she’ll regret it in the morning. ’Night, Jim.” She popped off the crate, dusting off her pants.
“Night, Half-Pint. Thanks again.”
She grinned at the nickname and threw her hand up as if it was nothing as she walked toward Alec and away from the light. Before she could get past him, he touched her arm. “I’ll walk you back.”
“That’s okay,” she said, pointing toward her chest, “no fear of chainsaws here.”
His eyes remained glued to hers, but it was a Herculean effort to keep them from following the path of her finger. “Wanted to talk, if you have a minute.”
“Okay,” she said with a shrug as she moved past him. God, she smelled so fucking good, an exotic mixture of vanilla and honeysuckle.
Jesus, now he was sniffing her hair. And he, of all people, hated it when he read a book and they said shit like that. Like a woman could actually smell like a flower.
Alec gave Jimbo a quick wave before following Loren through the alley, catching the older man’s cheeky grin.
She stopped before reaching the parking area and turned toward him with her arms crossed over her chest. He watched her defenses shoot up like a spring-loaded rifle target.
It was his experience that when women were nervous they got tongue-tied, but not Loren. No sir, Loren would erupt with words.
She didn’t disappoint.
“So, what did you want to talk about? Let me guess, the NASDAQ? Identity politics? The plight of baby seals in certain remote Asian countries?”
She was so damned beautiful. He wanted nothing more than to touch the curve of her collarbone and then maybe kiss some of her nervous sass away.
His eyes snagged onto her creamy shoulder and he recalled how sweet that particular part of her body tasted.
“I’m wearing a bra.”
His eyes shot up at the unexpected comment.
And deadpan delivery.
“Come again?”
“You’ve expressed your concern about my underclothing in the past.” She cleared her throat. “Or, lack thereof.” She tightened her arms in front of her chest and his resolve weakened as his disloyal eyes moved toward the B cups in question. “I didn’t want you to think that I would walk around in public braless. Not that I haven’t. I have . . . gone braless, I mean. And in public. But I know I need to be more circumspect around Cara and her friends.”
The more she rambled, the more a blush of embarrassment slowly progressed up her neck, landing on her cheeks.
His eyes narrowed, remembering the way she reacted to his five o’clock shadow on her soft skin. And then he blinked slowly and became momentarily dizzy at the thought of his beard on those tender peaks, and then biting them.
He scratched his jaw to forcibly pull his thoughts and eyes from their less-than-honorable pursuits.
He needed to ask a favor as it pertained to Ally, not ruminate on the after-effects of stubble on rock-hard nipples that he could see regardless of her aforementioned support garment.
His voice came out hoarse and gravelly, “Wanna get dinner sometime?”
Ah. Fuck. Where in the hell did that come from?
She appeared equally shocked as she ducked her chin as if doing a sound check on what she’d heard. And then glanced up, blinking with slow exaggeration. “Um . . . what?”
He planned on asking her about Ally staying with them while he went through more training and babbled something else entirely. He looked to the ground, searching for his fucking balls. He shoved his hands back in his front pockets and honed in on the front door to Lucky’s. “Forget I asked.”
“No,” she blurted out, grabbing his arm. “No way are you taking that back. You asked me out. You actually asked me out. On. A. Date.”
“Okay, let’s not make a big deal out of it.” He fidgeted, his arm feeling singed by her touch. He yanked his hands out of his pockets and placed them on his hips. Feeling awkward as hell, he rubbed an eyebrow with the pad of his thumb and then to the back of his neck.
He bristled as she stared up at him, slack-jawed. “Is that a yes, or just your irritating way of stretching this moment out only to say no?”
“Yes!” she said with a raised voice. “I mean . . . .” She subtly shook her head with an eye roll. “It depends. I have a pretty busy schedule.”
“Do you now?”
“I do.”
“Okay.” He shrugged.
Fuck this shit. This was too hard. He started to make his way back to the bar.
“No . . . wait,” she said, stumbling after him and grabbing his bicep.
He paused and took a deep breath, trying not to cave to that goddamned flowery smell. Honeysuckle.
“I might be able to work something in.”
“Yeah?”
“I mean, I’ve got classes. And of course, I’ll have to color my roots and polish my fingernails.” She looked at them as if offended.
Not breaking eye contact, he lifted her hand to inspect the evidence. His eyes shifted to her delicate hand and then back to those whiskey eyes that intoxicated him. “You polish these nails?” he asked, raising the hand toward the light. “These chewed-up nails?”
“I can’t help it,” she replied with drawn brows. “When there’s polish on them they remind me of Skittles, and I can’t keep them out of my mouth.”
Closing his eyes, he momentarily blanked at the thought of the things he could put there. Things that were long and hard and raging below his belt.
“And then, I have to polish them all over again. It’s a rather vicious cycle.”
Subconsciously, he rubbed her manicure-less fingers between his.
“What plans are reserved for Friday night?”
“I’m watching A Star is Born with Mercy, Cara, and Becky. And Becky’s teaching me how to make pancakes.”
“Which one?”
“Blueberry.”
“No, which version of A Star is Born? I think Ally told me there were three.”
“I have no idea. But now my vote will be for a three-movie marathon.”
“While eating blueberry pancakes.”
“Yeah, the homemade kind. Not the kind you stick in a toaster.”
Alec nodded with narrowed eyes. “You are busy.”
She lifted an eyebrow and shrugged the opposite shoulder.
“What are you doing tomorrow night?”
“I have a self-defense class and then I’m helping Cara study for a math test.”
