I nodded again.
We advanced to where Luke, Shirleen and the other man were standing.
When I got within a few feet of her, Shirleen crowded in, pulled me away from Hector and Daisy and gave me a fierce hug.
“Child,” she said softly into my hair.
Then she let me go.
That was it. But that was all there needed to be. Shirleen Jackson gave good hugs.
“Sadie, this is Luke Stark and Jack Tatum,” Hector said when Shirleen moved away. “They work for Lee and they’re here to give their statements. They were there the night you drove into the garage.”
At that, my body froze solid.
Bex told me a lot of people blocked out what happened to them. Not me, no, I remembered every last second. Including scrambling in the stairwell in nothing but a nightgown.
I instantly decided I couldn’t do this.
Right before I could turn on my heel and run, Jack spoke. “I’m just gonna say, I like Hector’s plan for takin’ Ricky down a lot better than this shit. I don’t like the idea of him gettin’ a cushy jail cell for the next fifteen years. No man makes a woman end her night slippin’ in her own blood on some stairs –”
“Jack,” Luke growled (yes, he growled).
I felt rather than saw Hector’s body grow tight and that dangerous current was snapping all around the lobby.
“Thank you,” I said quickly in an effort to fight back the current.
Jack stared at me. Then he said, “What?”
I pushed back the panic, tamped down the fear and sallied forth so Hector didn’t come to blows with his colleague because he’d been an eensy bit too honest at an inappropriate moment.
I explained, “You got to me first. You were nice. Thank you.”
Jack stared at me again. Then he muttered, “Jesus.”
I decided to take that as a muscle-bound man’s way of saying “you’re welcome”.
I took a deep breath, straightened my spine, looked up to Hector and asked quietly, “Can we go and do this now?”
His arm slid along my shoulders, he pulled me into his side and looked down at me.
“Yeah, mamita, we can go do this now.”
* * * * *
We walked into a big room that was full of people, phones ringing and lots of desks.
It didn’t go silent when we walked in but the noise definitely muted.
My eyes caught Eddie who was standing at a desk in the middle of the room. Beside him was a middle-aged man, shorter than Eddie by several inches, definitely rounder and he had dark, thinning hair.
Eddie and the man’s eyes came to us immediately upon entering the room. I saw Eddie look at his brother before his eyes moved to me. Then he smiled.
His smile was nearly as nice as Hector’s.
“Willie, Brian, Tony, Jorge, she’s here. Round ‘em up,” the man beside Eddie said, pointing to some uniform officers that were standing several feet away and then he twirled his finger and pointed to the door.
The officers didn’t waste time, they took off.
Eddie and the man walked to us.
The man stopped, Eddie didn’t. His arm went around my waist; he leaned in and kissed the side of my head then, while I as recovering from that, he stepped back.
“This is Detective Jimmy Marker. He’s gonna take care of you. Bex Cusack called and said she’d be here in twenty minutes. We’ll start after she arrives,” Eddie told me.
I nodded.
“They weren’t jokin’, you do look like a fairy princess,” Detective Marker remarked.
I nodded again, now completely unfazed by this remark then I sighed. “I get that a lot.”
Detective Marker stared at me for a second then he spoke again. “Willie, Brian, Jorge and Tony just went out to pick up Ricky and Harvey. We already called the hospital and made appointments to get statements from the staff who took care of you. Got officers jumpin’ at the chance to nail those two jackasses so Luke, Jack, you’re up now. Luke, you’re with Melvin. Jack, you’re with Danny. Hector, I wanna talk to you.”
Without delay, Luke and Jack moved into the room, separated and went to different desks.
I didn’t even have a chance to take this in before Detective Marker kept talking. “Lee sent the photos of your apartment over this morning. I woulda liked to have had a chance to send the lab boys over after the incident but if someone will let us in now, we’ll comb the place, see if we can find anything that places Ricky there.”
“I can let you in,” Buddy volunteered.
Detective Marker looked over his shoulder and called, “Adam, we got access to Sadie’s apartment. Call the boys.”
A man across the room immediately picked up a phone.
I blinked.
Boy, these guys didn’t mess around.
Detective Marker’s eyes were on me again and he caught the blink. “We’re police. We don’t like crime,” he informed me.
“I don’t like it either,” I assured him, just in case he was wondering.
“I wasn’t finished,” Detective Marker said.
“Oh,” I murmured.
“I got a wife, three daughters. Rape’s on the top of the list of crimes I don’t like,” Detective Marker declared.
I swallowed then I moved closer to Hector. When my hand found his and his strong fingers closed around mine, I nodded.
“I know who you are,” Detective Marker said and I held my breath. “So I suppose, the way you grew up, you don’t get this so I’ll explain it to you now. You’re standin’ there holdin’ Hector Chavez’s hand. Hector’s Eddie’s brother, Eddie’s one of us. We don’t like crime but we really don’t like crime when it happens to one of us. You’re one of us now. Ricky Balducci is goin’ down, I don’t care how it happens but me and every man in this room is gonna do whatever the fuck we gotta do to make it happen. You with me?”
“I’m with you,” I whispered.
“All right then,” he nodded. Then he smiled (which made him a lot less scary) and he reached out and squeezed my arm. “Badass Cop Speech is over, let’s get this done.”
Without anything else to say, I said, “Okay.”
* * * * *
“V… I… fuckin’… P!” Tex boomed the minute Shirleen, Daisy, Hector and I walked into Fortnum’s Used Bookstore (Buddy was at my apartment with the “lab boys”).
We stopped several feet in front of the door and I took in the scene.
There was a large open space at the front of the store, a counter in front of rows of bookshelves, an espresso counter against the back side wall, tons of comfortable-looking chairs, couches, armchairs and tables littered the middle. It smelled musty, dusty but looked really cool in a lived-in, sit-back, stay-awhile kind of way.
Even though it was well beyond coffee hour, there were people everywhere. Most of the seats were taken, there were three customers waiting in line to order, two standing at the end of the espresso counter waiting for their coffees.
Indy and a big, gray-bearded, long-gray-hair-in-a-ponytailed man wearing a black T-shirt that demanded you “Ride the Range” and a black leather vest with a rolled red bandana on his forehead were standing behind the counter. Tex and Jet were behind the espresso counter. Ally was clearing coffee mugs from the seating area.
“You!” Tex boomed, pointing at the people innocently sitting on the couch in front of the big, glass window at the front of the store. “That’s VIP seating. Up! Move!”
Without a word, as if this had happened before and they had loads of practice, the people grabbed their mugs and laptops and scurried to the corner table.
“You!” Tex pointed to me. “Sit!”
“You better sit,” Shirleen whispered sideways to me. “Indy’s face is gettin’ red. She hates it when Tex bosses around the customers. She looks like she’s gonna blow.”
I didn’t want Indy to blow so I nodded to Shirleen and hurried to the couch.
“I’m makin’ you a special,” Tex shouted to me.
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“Okay, Tex,” I thought it best to shout back. Then I sat down.
“You’re gonna hafta wait, that’s Sadie. She’s a VIP,” Tex informed the next person in line like they didn’t already know this fact really, really well.
Daisy sat down on one side of me, Shirleen on the other side. They sat close, like sentries.
I looked helplessly up at Hector. He was doing that fighting-a-grin thing again.
I narrowed my eyes at him. The grin grew into a glamorous, white smile.
My eyes un-narrowed and I stared at him. He shook his head and went to the counter where Indy was.
Ally bustled up, precariously balancing used coffee mugs.
“You okay?” she asked.
I nodded. “It wasn’t that bad. Detective Marker is nice,” I told her.
She smiled and her eyes danced in a mischievous Veronica Mars type of way. “I wasn’t talking about that. I was talking about Hector taking you to Blanca’s for dinner last night. What is it with the Chavez men taking their women home to meet their Mama? They know better. Blanca’s a nut. First time Eddie took Jet home, Blanca had the whole family over plus half the neighborhood.”
I gasped, sorry for Jet but also thankful that I didn’t have to deal with half the neighborhood last night. What I had was enough!
All of a sudden, Jet was there. “It’s true,” she told me. “I got snockered on margaritas.”
“And Eddie threw your cell across the yard and shattered a margarita pitcher,” a newly arrived Indy shared.
“I still wish I hadn’t missed that,” Daisy muttered.
“Boy’s got good aim,” Shirleen put in. “Damn waste of margaritas though.”
“Why’d he throw your cell phone?” I asked Jet.
“Well, I kind of had some bad men after me. One called me. Eddie took the phone away from me and heard what he had to say. It made him a little…” She hesitated. “Miffed.”
“Miffed! Eddie Chavez miffed! I love it,” Ally hooted.
“He wasn’t miffed, the man was pissed!” Indy put in, a huge smile on her face.
Boy, he would have to be beyond miffed to throw a cell phone.
I looked at Hector who was talking to the guy with the bandana.
“I just bought a new cell phone. I like it,” I told them.
“Keep it away from Hector,” Ally advised then burst out laughing.
So did everyone else. I looked around at them, not sure what was funny.
I mean, I did like my cell phone. It was fancy and you could even get e-mail on it.
Tex shouldered in and handed me a big mug. “Butterscotch sandie latte. That’s butterscotch and pecan syrup. If that don’t trip your trigger, woman, nothin’ will,” he announced then he shouldered back through and returned to the espresso counter.
I turned to Daisy. “I don’t mean to be mean or anything but, isn’t he a bit… odd?”
Daisy started giggling and it sounded like Christmas bells. I couldn’t help but giggle with her.
She put her arm around me and gave me a squeeze. “Sugar, that ain’t the half of it.”
I took a sip of my latte. My eyes bugged out.
Trigger tripped.
* * * * *
Hector and I spent about an hour at Fortnum’s. Hector spent most of his time talking on his phone. I spent my time talking to the girls, Duke (the guy with the bandana who had a very deep, gravelly voice and was somewhat intense in a scary but not overly scary way) and Tex.
Tex made me go behind the counter so he could teach me how to make espresso. Since I had an espresso maker and so did Ralphie and Buddy, I showed him my stuff.
He was impressed.
Then I told Hector I had to get back to the gallery. We had an opening next week and Ralphie was having to do all the work. Even if I was pressing charges against one brother for rape and another brother for assault and attempted kidnapping which, for normal people, would mean they could probably take the day off, I couldn’t sit back and let Ralphie do all the work.
I said good-bye to the girls, Tex and Duke, Hector walked me out to his Bronco, helped me in and we took off.
* * * * *
Hector double-parked in LoDo (what they call lower downtown in Denver) right outside Art.
Like this was perfectly legal and he had all the right in the world to double-park, he casually flipped on his hazards and walked me into the store.
We walked in, Ralphie looked up and called, “Hey Double H, Buddy called. Said he’s making his famous seared tuna in citrus and flash-fried noodles tonight. You missed the brioche. You cannot miss the tuna. That would be a crime against gastronomy.”
I stared at Ralphie.
Someone please tell me that Ralphie didn’t just invite Hector over to dinner.
Someone else please tell me that Ralphie hadn’t given Hector the nickname “Double H”.
“What time?” Hector asked.
“Six-ish,” Ralphie replied.
“I’ll be there,” Hector said.
Yes, Ralphie just invited Hector over to dinner. And Hector accepted.
I took stock of my life and asked myself if it was in my control.
In a nanosecond, I came to the conclusion it wasn’t in my control.
Before I could speak to either of them to tell them I needed to get my head together, to deal with the day, to cope with my decisions, to understand my feelings, to figure out what I was going to do next, Hector’s arm came around my shoulders and he curled me into his heat.
All thoughts of mind-organization and future-planning swept out of my brain and I looked up at him.
“See you at six,” he said.
I nodded.
His other hand came up and his fingers sifted into the hair at the side of my head.
“You did good today,” he said quietly.
“Thank you,” I replied.
“I’ll call if I hear they picked up Ricky or Harvey before I come over tonight.”
“That would be nice.”
“Sadie?”
“What?”
“You with me?”
I blinked in confusion and said, “Yes.” And I was, wasn’t I? I was standing in his arms for goodness sake.
“This is Sadie?” Hector went on.
I blinked again. “Yes.”
“My Sadie?” he kept at it.
This time I blinked for a different reason.
His Sadie? Was there a Hector’s Sadie? Was I Hector’s Sadie? Did Hector think I was his Sadie?
Oh… my… God.
Before I could process what he said or get close to processing what that meant, I watched him smile then he bent his head and kissed my lips.
“Yeah,” he said, his face an inch away. “It’s my Sadie.”
“What are you talking about?” I breathed.
“I thought she slipped away. You were acting like Stepford Sadie.”
“Stepford Sadie?”
He kept smiling. “Yeah.”
My back went straight and my confused stare turned into an annoyed stare.
I mean, really! Stepford Sadie?
“I’m not Stepford Sadie. I’m Ice Princess Sadie,” I informed him because, well, he should get it right!
“Whatever. Just as long as she’s gone,” he muttered, touched his mouth to mine again then he was gone.
I stared at the door as it swished closed behind him.
In a flash, Ralphie was by my side. “He… is… lush,” Ralphie breathed. “I wanna take a bite outta him. Dee-licious.”
I decided immediately I didn’t want to talk about Hector being lush and I definitely didn’t want to talk about taking a bite out of him.
“My life is out-of-control,” I told the door.
Without hesitation Ralphie did the same move Hector had that morning, except different, less possessive and protective, just as sweet. His arm went around my shoulders and he pulled me into his side and partially to his front.
“Sweets? My advice?”
he asked.
I put my head to his shoulder, my arms around his waist and I nodded.
“What I can see with that man, the safety bar is locked tight, put your hands straight up and enjoy the ride.”
Oh my.
Chapter Nine
You Sleep Here Don’t You?
Sadie
“Aaahhooow,” Ralphie yawned with an exaggerated stretch. “I’m tuckered out. Time for beddie bye. Buddy, baby, you comin’ with me?”
I looked from Hector’s shoulder (where my head was resting) to the end of the couch (where Ralphie was stretching) to the armchair (where Buddy was sitting).
Then I rolled my eyes and went back to staring at the credits rolling on the TV.
Seriously, how obvious could you be?
* * * * *
Dinner went okay if you didn’t count one minor incident.
* * * * *
Buddy hadn’t just made his famous tuna and noodles. He’d set the dining room table and even lit candles. He also served his spinach salad with pumpkin oil balsamic vinaigrette before the tuna and chocolate almond torte with vanilla-essence whipped cream for dessert.
I changed out of my Queen Ice outfit and, in the two seconds between our arrival home at six-oh-five and Hector’s arrival at the house at six-oh-five-and-two-seconds, I stared at the contents of my closet trying to find a casual-dinner-at-home-with-Hector-and-my-two-gay-roommates outfit.
Impossible!
In a dither, I opted for a pair of jeans and a black camisole over which I wore a gray cardigan (well, it wasn’t just a gray cardigan, it was a gray cardigan from Anthropologie, it had a hood and wide sleeves with tiny black lace ruffles at the sleeves and around the hem). I decided, since the cardigan said more than “casual-dinner-at-home-with-Hector”, I’d go barefoot.
Barefoot was as casual as you could get.
I put my hair in a big ponytail and headed down.
Since Ralphie talked a mile a minute and Buddy wanted the lowdown on The Search for Harvey and Ricky (the lowdown was that Harvey had been snagged, Ricky was still “at large” and I kind of wished it was the other way around), I didn’t have to say much.
This continued at dinner, mostly Ralphie talking enough for everyone and, when he could get a word in edgewise, Buddy demanding details from Hector on how things would go once Ricky and Harvey were both caught.