I waited, knowing there was more.
Satch pulled out his cell phone and a slide show began. “Some nights Rico stays in their neighborhood so he can catch their expressions when they discover what he’s done.”
I tried to block the fear rising inside me, but the foreboding came, stronger than ever. “They’re going to catch him,” I said. “There’s no way they won’t. We’ve got to stop him.”
“I talked to him,” Satch said, hiding his emotions, which I knew had to be volatile; he and Rico were closer than most brothers were. “He says it’s the only way he has to calm the anger inside him.”
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
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14
When the school day ended, I broke through the mob of students and headed across the field where band members had gathered for practice. Tubas, flutes, and clarinets piped out scales while drummers tapped a fast pace on their donated snare drums.
I pressed my cell phone against one ear and plugged my finger into the other, trying to hear Ariel. “Say it again and louder.”
“I wish I could have come to school today,” Ariel said. “What was it like?”
“Everyone treated me like royalty, but school’s not fun without you. When are you coming back?”
“As soon as the headaches—”
My phone went dead. I had drained the battery with my attempts to reach Melissa. No one knew where she’d gone, and she hadn’t answered my calls. That worried me. Maybe I’d find her at Trek’s. I had to go there anyway, to feed the dogs. But first, I needed to pick up their food at Tulley’s, which carried some staples along with the liquor.
I hiked down the alley as the beat of drums cracked the cool air and the band began to play. Four blocks later, near Tulley’s, I could still hear the music, which almost drowned out the heavy steps of Satch and Rico trampling the gravel behind me.
“You should have waited for us,” Rico scolded when they caught up to me. Black paint stained his fingers.
“Tulley’s is too close to the Borderlands for you to come here alone,” Satch added.
“Why do I suddenly need an escort?” I asked.
Their worried looks boomeranged from one to the other.
“A bunch of dopers were on your porch last night,” Rico said.
“What’s new with that?” I asked. “You’ve seen dopers in my yard before.”
The homeless from the Borderlands came out every night and prowled around our neighborhood, scavenging for things they could sell to get money for drugs.
Rico opened the screen door, which had duct-tape patches over the holes. “Just be careful,” he warned.
“I always am.” I stepped inside and breathed in the scent of apples that were stacked in a crate next to the empty captain’s chair where Mr. Tulley rested when he didn’t have customers.
At the moment, he stood by the cash register in front of the cage that held cigarettes. When he saw me, he took his false teeth off the counter, placed them in his mouth, and worked his lips to settle the dentures onto his gums.
“You don’t have to put your teeth in for us,” Satch said.
“I’m not trying to look handsome for you, Satch,” Mr. Tulley said. “I’m wearing my teeth for Blaise.” He tapped his bandaged fingers on the cans of dog food that were stacked next to a bag of kibble.
“Filet mignon.” Satch read a label. “Pixie and Bonnie eat better than we do.”
“Pit bulls should not be called Pixie and Bonnie,” a voice came from behind us. “I got love for you, Blaise, but those names are a humiliation.”
I spun around.
Danny stood stock-still, not looking the least bit afraid, a liter of Coke in one hand and a bag of pizza-flavored chips in the other. I gaped at the Egyptian cross that swung from a chain around his neck. Had Ariel given him her silver ankh necklace?
Grinning, Satch edged closer to the captain’s chair and blocked the exit aisle, his fingers clenching, while Rico inched forward, his breath slow and deep, the sharp scent of adrenaline coming off him.
Danny’s smile turned Cheshire and, the moment Satch and Rico lunged for him, he hurdled over the captain’s chair and apple crate and landed in a graceful run. His body hit the screen door and he tore outside, dropping the Coke and chips on the porch.
Satch and Rico raced after him, their feet battering the warped floor. The wooden boards creaked and rocked, the motion shaking the shelves until the bottles rattled against each other.
I grabbed the sack of dog food, leaving the change for Mr. Tulley, and dashed outside in time to see Satch throw himself into a dive, his hands grasping for Danny’s ankles.
Sensing the tackle, Danny loped to the right, into the stubby weeds. Satch landed flat on his stomach, his fingers skimming over the backs of Danny’s tennis shoes, as Danny bounded onto the Oldsmobile parked at the curb, his weight setting off the bleeps of the theft alarm. He crossed the hood, jumped into the street, and ran toward a bicycle that leaned against a tree.
“Stay down!” Rico shouted when Satch started to get up.
Rico leaped over Satch, onto the Olds. The metal popped and twanged as he darted over the car roof and flung himself onto the street, hitting the pavement close to Danny, who jerked his shoulders and flinched away.
With a burst of speed, Danny dashed forward, his feet slamming the ground faster than I’d ever seen anyone run. He grabbed the handlebars on the bike, swung his leg over the seat, and peddled away, pulling a wheelie.
Rico walked back to us, frowning, his chest heaving, as Satch stood and brushed off his clothes, looking sullen.
From the corner of my eye, I saw movement behind Tulley’s screen door and turned quickly enough to catch a hazy image of Ariel, who stared back at me before she edged deeper into the store. An uneasy feeling crawled into my stomach and settled in for a long stay. What would Satch and Rico have done if they had caught her with Danny? What would I have been forced to do?
By the time we’d reached Trek’s house, I had stopped chewing on the inside of my mouth and, though Rico and Satch had been talking, I wouldn’t have been able to repeat a word they’d said, because my thoughts had been so focused on Ariel. How could she put herself in such danger for a guy?
Omar greeted us, alone on the porch, and blocked our way. His hands skidded down Satch, then Rico, checking for guns, before he frisked me. Satisfied we were clean, he opened the door and let us inside. The moment I stepped into the living room, my body stiffened. The atmosphere was heavy with tension.
I glanced at Dante, who looked away, intentionally avoiding my gaze.
Trek sat in one of the chrome-armed chairs and stared at me, not smiling the way he usually did when I came over to feed the dogs. Though he was probably furious with me for humiliating Dante, in my opinion, he should have been thanking me.
Satch spread out on the couch while Rico leaned against the wall.
“Is Melissa here?” I asked as Bonnie and Pixie raced out of the kitchen, their hind ends wagging.
“She’s shopping,” Trek said, curtly.
I didn’t need to see his look to know he wanted me to leave the room. I herded the puppies, who’d outgrown their box, back to the kitchen, set my purse and the sack of food near the sink, and listened as I bent down and petted the dogs, who mewled against me, hungry.
“I hope you two are here to tell me you got Danny,” Trek said.
“We missed him again,” Satch replied. “We’ll get him eventually, but if you want your money back, we’re cool with that.”
“Did I say I wanted my money back?” Trek asked. “What I want is Danny with a busted head.”
“And you’ll get it,” Rico said emphatically.
“When you go on a mission,” Trek countered, “if you don’t make the nightly news, then you didn’t do the job that you were sent out to do.”
“Are you sayin
g we didn’t try hard enough?” Rico asked defensively.
“Why would you think that?” Trek asked with a curious calmness in his voice. “You know you’re my favorites. You’d never let me down, would you, Rico?”
I peeled the lid off a can, scooped the dog food into a bowl, and set it on the floor, the meaty-garlic smell saturating the air, as the voices in the living room became hushed.
When the whispers stopped, I figured they had reached an impasse.
Finally, Trek’s voice broke the silence. “Dante, give them a gun.”
Air left my lungs in a rush of fear. I knew they didn’t want to shoot Danny, but my worry flipped to Ariel. Would she be standing next to him when they fired?
After a pause, Satch spoke. “We can shoot Danny, but getting shot is too random in this neighborhood. No one will see it as a warning. Some other hustler will slide in where Danny left off. It’s like you said in the beginning; Danny with a broken nose is a walking billboard, warning others not to move in on your territory.”
“Satch, you think too much,” Rico complained. “Trek’s got the right idea. We’re never going to catch Danny. Let’s just shoot him. It’s easier.”
“Wait,” Trek warned.
“Give me the gun. I’ll do it.” Rico’s eagerness was a bluff to plant doubt in Trek’s mind, because he hated what Lobos called locura, the craziness that made some homies too quick to react. Trek liked to strategize, plan, and wait. For him, the game was more exciting than the victory.
Trek said, “No gun. We’ll go back to my original plan.”
Dante finally spoke. “How are they going to catch him?”
“We need a lure,” Trek said. “A girl who can distract Danny and make him careless.”
“Melissa can do it,” Dante suggested.
“Any fool knows she can’t be the lure,” Trek said, annoyed. “How is she going to lure anyone when everyone knows she’s with me?”
“I’m just saying, she could if—”
“She’s not a possibility.” Trek cut him off, and then to Satch and Rico, he said, “I’ll find someone and get back to you.”
Satch and Rico left in silence through the front door, while in the living room Trek spoke to Dante in a low grumble that told me he was upset with him.
Good, I thought. I hoped he kicked Dante out on the street for what he’d done to Melissa.
I spread clean newspapers over the floor, anxious to catch up to Satch and Rico and, as I started to stand, I glanced at the floorboard. Several scratches nicked the wood. Had they been there before?
Quickly, I refilled the water bowl and set it down, then crouched beside the dogs. While they lapped the water, my gaze drifted back to the scratches, which looked new. Had someone broken into Trek’s stash? My thoughts settled on Rico. He wouldn’t, surely he wouldn’t—but my heart dropped because I knew he would.
Fighting the urge to look behind the wall and see if the drugs were still there, I jumped up and collided into Trek, who had been standing over me.
“Sorry,” I said, stepping back. “I didn’t hear you come into the kitchen.”
“That’s because I didn’t want you to hear me.” He touched the side of my neck, his fingers resting on my pulsing vein. “Your heart’s racing. Have I made you nervous about something?”
“No, of course not.” My voice sounded labored.
He stared at me, his eyes unreadable. I lifted my chin in defiance. Did he think I was stealing from him?
“I have a job for you,” he said at last. “I want you to be my lure.”
“Me?” I laughed in disbelief. “A lure has to be sexy, like Melissa.” Like my mother. “Guys on the street don’t even give me a second look.”
“That’s because you never give them anything to look at. You hide yourself with baggy clothes.”
“I can’t lure anyone. I don’t have that special power,” I said, reasoning that if I had my mother’s magic, guys would be flocking around me. “No one is going to get careless looking at me.”
“Dante did. The 3Ts bragged about the way you handled him this morning. Tara said you’re a natural.”
“Did anyone tell you why I attacked him?” I asked, the memory curdling my stomach.
“Melissa did. She laughed about it.”
“She laughed?” I blinked against the confusion and doubt that were rising inside me.
“She was teasing Dante and having fun. Some girls like to play.”
“That doesn’t sound like Melissa,” I argued. “She—” I’d almost said hates Dante but held back. I could hear him prowling in the next room and I didn’t want him to give her more trouble.
“Melissa isn’t upset about this, so why are you?” Trek asked, frowning.
“I didn’t like what I saw. It looked wrong.”
“Maybe you saw wrong,” Trek suggested.
I took deep breaths, trying to stay calm. Had Melissa been playing with Dante and his crew, only ashamed when I caught her? I stifled the cry in my throat. My mother had liked to play.
“You don’t need to protect Melissa. I’ll take care of her.” Trek rubbed my arm, soothing me, before he took my hand. “Come on. I’m going to prove to you that you’re beautiful.”
He led me into the laundry room. When I saw the full-length mirror, I ducked around him and tried to escape. His hands caught my hips, forcing me to turn and face my reflection.
I stared at the floor, unable to look, sweat erupting under my arms, prickling with the intensity of my nervousness.
“Why do you act like beauty’s a crime?” he asked from behind me.
“I don’t,” I sputtered. Images of my mother streaked through my mind.
“Watch.” His hands lifted my chin, then smoothed down my neck to my shoulders, his fingers collecting the collar of my gray cardigan, which he pulled off my arms.
I shivered, my skin clammy, and glanced down, confused for a moment, as he undid my skirt button.
“What are you . . . ?” I was trembling.
“I’m showing you what you hide.” He slid the zipper down.
I caught his hand, his fingers warm in my icy, sweating palm.
“Don’t you trust me?” he asked. “You’ve come over to my house every day, alone, and nothing’s happened.”
“I trust you. It’s that . . .”
“You act like you’re afraid to let me see your beauty,” he said softly.
“Beauty,” I sniffed, not glancing at my reflection. “All you’re going to see is my ratty underwear.”
“All right, then,” he said, his voice suddenly impatient. He took his hand away and my skirt slipped below my hipbones, the torn elastic on my panties sliding into view.
Heat rose to my face. “I told you,” I whispered.
“You need to see yourself as I see you,” he scolded. He lifted my chin again, and this time I relented and looked in the mirror, my breath coming in swatches.
Still standing behind me, he unbuttoned my blouse and let it fall open, my breasts bulging against the tight-fitting, secondhand bra. “Why do you hide yourself?”
“Because.” I glanced at the mirror. I saw my mother in my reflection, the perfect body and huge round eyes under arched brows, though mine had never been plucked. I licked the lips that looked like hers, full and deep in color even without lipstick. Tears clung to my black lashes. Everyone had said that she could have been a model if she hadn’t gotten pregnant with me at fifteen.
“One glance at you and any guy will fall,” Trek said against my ear.
“Blaise!” Satch’s voice startled me. “What’s taking so long?”
My heart raced. When had he come inside? He burst into the laundry room and saw my reflection, his mouth opening, confusion on his face. Satch had never even seen me in a bathing suit, and never this way with a guy . . . with Trek, who was smiling broadly.
“Blaise is going to be the lure,” Trek said, arrogantly assuming I would do it. He grabbed my limp arms, my skirt falling to m
y ankles as he turned me until I faced Satch, who tensed his jaw.
“She can’t,” Satch said, his knuckles punching the doorjamb. “She’s just a kid.”
Trek stepped in front of me, his eyes scanning my body. Heat rose to my face and the room swayed. He grabbed my arm to steady me. “She doesn’t look like a kid to me.”
I stared at the floor, then back at Satch, who argued, “Trek, you know damn well what I mean. Get a girl who knows something about guys.”
“Blaise is the one I chose,” Trek said abruptly.
Satch’s gaze held mine, a vein pulsing in his temple. He probably thought I’d never be able to lure a guy. He frowned and looked away, no doubt trying to figure out a way to tell Trek he’d made a mistake in choosing me. Blaise is a fighter, I imagined him saying. She doesn’t know how to charm a guy. She thinks she is one.
Staring into the kitchen, Satch swallowed hard. “Rico and I’ll be waiting for you on the corner.”
His steps quickened, pounding into thunder. Then the back door slammed, shaking the house and setting off the wind chimes in a cacophony of clatter and jangles and clanks.
Nearly tripping over my skirt, which hobbled my feet, I faced Trek and shoved him hard. “I can’t do it,” I said. “How can I lure someone in my school uniform? That’s the best I own. I wear the hand-me-downs that the churchwomen give my grandmother.”
I looked at Trek and energy passed between us, a sadness of understanding, as if he had known deep poverty and had once felt its shame. The moment passed so quickly, I thought it had to be my imagination, until he spoke. “I don’t want you to ever feel like you’re second best.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a roll of bills that he pressed into my palm. “Tell those churchwomen to find another charity. You buy your own clothes from now on, pretty things to match your face. No more hiding in secondhand clothes.”
I stared down at the money, knowing I should give it back, but I couldn’t, because it felt too good in my hand.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE