Chapter Two

Kitt

The man who said his name was Riordan Jeffries—and why did he have two last names, anyway—sat back in his chair and stared at me. I’d drunk a lot and needed to pee, but I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of asking if I could go to the bathroom, because fuck him. No matter how good looking he was or how blue his eyes were or how much his big muscles strained against his shirt, I hated him. He was mean.

I was tired from not getting much sleep the night before. I was staying with a friend of a friend, couch surfing, I guess, since my friend Adam’s current boyfriend kicked me out. Adam had been my good friend in school, even after I got kicked out, and he’d graduated and gone home to Albuquerque to live.

When I ran away, he was the first one I thought of going to. I knew he’d give me a place to stay until all that shit in Atlanta blew over. And he did too. Until his boyfriend came home from work one evening, and I was sitting at the kitchen bar, laughing at Adam being goofy as he flipped eggs in a frying pan. The boyfriend got jealous, for literally no reason at all, and I was asked to vacate the premises. Since he was paying half the rent, I really had no choice but to go.

Adam managed to find another friend of his, a guy named Benjie, who was willing to let me crash on his couch, but the guy’s fat cat was determined to sleep on my chest all night. I guess the couch was his, and he resented me taking it. I couldn’t blame the little guy, though, and he was really cute.

I squirmed in my seat, trying to get more comfortable, and Jeffries noticed, like he seemed to notice everything I did.

“Do you have to go to the bathroom, or do you have ants in your pants?”

I glared at him. Ants in my pants? How old did this guy think I was anyway? That was like something my Pop would have said to me years ago. The thought of my Pop brought me a little pain like it always did, right in the center of my chest even after all this time.

“I need to use the bathroom, yeah. If that’s what you’re asking.”

“Then go. Leave your shoes here and leave the door open.”

“What do my shoes have to do with anything?”

“It’s cold out, and I don’t want you to get the idea of making another break for it. You won’t do that with no shoes.”

I stood up, rolling my eyes so hard I almost did myself an injury. I pulled off my shoes and threw them down at the floor one by one. He looked on serenely. I guess he thought he was being clever and that not having shoes would help to keep me from running again. But he was wrong.

“Jacket, too,” the asshole said.

“My jacket? What do you mean?”

“That denim thing you’re wearing over your t-shirt.”

I rolled my eyes again and added a glare. “If I wanted to run, then that wouldn’t stop me.”

“Yeah, whatever. Just leave the jacket.”

“I hate you. I want you to know that.”

“I’ll try to bear up under the strain.”

I ripped my jacket off as dramatically as possible, hurled it at the floor and stomped toward the bathroom barefooted as he gave a loud sigh.

When I got inside, I thought about closing the door anyway, just to see what he’d do, but I knew what he’d do, so I just used the toilet and came back out to stand in the doorway and glare at him.

He was a really handsome guy, and big too. Probably like over six feet something and maybe close to two-thirty or so, but all muscle and not an ounce of fat on him. He had short, dirty-blond hair, and his eyes were intensely blue. He looked like a member of the Aryan brotherhood, and I already knew that he was almost as violent and mean as they were from the way he’d been manhandling me.

Okay, he didn’t really look like that, and I may have exaggerated about the violence…but my point was that he looked like he could be. Kind of. I remembered the way he’d held me when we danced to that jukebox in the bar, and how he’d twirled me around like I was a doll. People shouldn’t be that strong. He’d even picked me up and danced around with me when I couldn’t do that two-step thing. I’d felt like a doll or a kid in his arms, and I didn’t like to think about how that made me feel. But it wasn’t bad. Not at all.

He even had a lot of tattoos on one arm, like I supposed Aryans might have. No swastikas, or anything, though. Actually, I didn’t know fuck all about the Aryan brotherhood, but I just didn’t like this guy and that was the worst thing I could think of. His tattoos were cool though, and I held that against him too.

I had already looked closely for any tattoos that might have been done in prison, but I hadn’t seen any. That I knew of, anyway. He had a kind of cool flag tattoo on his shoulder and a spider web around his elbow that looked a little sus, though.

“What did you say your first name was?” I asked him, standing back in the doorway, looking at him.

“Riordan. My friends call me Rio.”

“Well, I won’t, because we’re not friends and we never will be.”

“Aw…well, you never know. Friends come and go, just like waves on the ocean… Maybe you’ll stick around. Kind of like an octopus stuck to my face.”

I smirked. “Oh, he has jokes…”

He smiled at me, and a few of my brain cells fainted. God, he really was sinfully handsome. I was pretty sure I hated him, though. Almost positive.

“Anyway, when do we leave for Atlanta?” I asked. “Are we going in your car?”

“We’ll leave in the morning. It’s too late tonight.” He glanced over at me. “Go get a shower and get ready for bed. You look tired.”

“Gee thanks. But I don’t have any clothes or anything to ‘get ready’ with, remember?” I glanced over at the only bed in the room. “And just where am I supposed to sleep anyway?”

“In the bed is the usual place.”

“With you?” I snorted, “Ha! Not hardly.”

“You’ll do as you’re told, Kitt. You offered me a blow job earlier. So, sleeping with me should be a breeze. Besides, it’s a king-sized bed, for God’s sake, and it’s huge.”

“Yeah, well, so are you.”

“Put pillows between us if you’re worried.”

“No, I want my own room.”

“You’re not getting it. In fact, I don’t think you’re really understanding any of this, are you? You’ll be with me until we land in Atlanta and make it to your brother’s house. Then I can officially deliver you into his custody, and we can both breathe a huge sigh of relief and go our own separate ways. In the meantime, suck it up.”

I gave him the meanest look I could muster. “Did you say, ‘land in Atlanta?’ As in you think we’re going to fly there? Oh, hell no, I don’t fly. My brother must have told you.”

“What do you mean, you don’t fly? What are you—Rainman or something?”

I sneered at him. “I know that’s an old movie you’re referencing, but I don’t get it. Didn’t he count cards or something? Did he hate to fly too? How old are you anyway?”

“Never mind. But you’re getting on that fucking plane.”

“Read my lips. I. Do. Not. Fly. Period!”

“Bullshit. You do now.”

“It’s not bullshit. I have a phobia against flying that I’ve had for years. Ever since…well, never mind, but I have one. My brother should have told you. And I’m not getting on an airplane.”

“Stop being a pain in the ass. I’m not driving God knows how many hours back to Atlanta, so you need to just get over yourself.”

I glared at him, trying to have a stare-down contest with him, but he wasn’t playing. He rolled his eyes and turned away, so I changed the subject. For now, anyway.

“What about my things? My bag? I left it all at the last place I crashed. I can go over there and pick it up real quick, though. No problem. Won’t take me but a few minutes.”

“Uh huh. Nice try. But no.”

“Well, what am I supposed to do about my bag?”

He sighed. “I guess we’ll have to go get it, if it’s that important. You say it’s only a few minutes away?”

“Um… That might have been a slight exaggeration.”

“How slight?”

“I don’t know. It’s maybe twenty or thirty minutes, okay? By bus. I rode a bus downtown tonight so it’s hard to say with all the stops.”

“Do you have an address?”

“Yeah, sure.”

He held his hand out to me impatiently, like some mean teacher asking for my phone like they used to do when they caught me with it in high school. I dug the slip of paper out of my wallet and handed it over to him, and he nodded.

“Okay, I have a rental car downstairs. Do you have a key to this place in case your friend isn’t at home?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“You keep saying that, but are you sure?”

I pulled out the key and showed it to him. “Happy now?”

“Just put on your shoes and coat, Kitt, and lead the way. It’s getting late.”

We went down the same elevator as before, and I had to stifle a smile at the memory of those elevator doors closing in his face. Almost immediately though, I could feel my cheeks start burning with humiliation when I also remembered how he’d hauled me right back up in that same elevator, his hand over my mouth to stop me from yelling. He’d spanked my ass too and told those nice old ladies that I was mentally challenged, come to think of it. He’d tapped his forehead like I had some kind of condition, and he said I had sneaked out of my parents’ room. What an asshole.

He stood calmly beside me on the way back down and took my elbow again as the doors opened to the lobby. It wasn’t too late, so people were still buzzing around downstairs, and I felt like all of them were looking at us and the way he was hanging onto me so tight.

Nobody was, of course, but it was still embarrassing to be treated like a criminal in the custody of my jailer.

We went out to find car he’d parked on the street near the bar. It was cold as hell out now, and I was shivering in my denim jacket, but it was all I had brought with me. I hadn’t realized it got cold in Albuquerque in December. Within a few minutes, he found the rental—a big, black SUV—and we were on our way, following the onboard GPS. He turned the heat up full blast, and I held my hands out to get them warm. The place I’d been crashing was a little farther out than I’d remembered, but we found it way too soon, and I went up to pack my bag—with him right behind me every step of the way, of course.

Adam’s friend Benjie wasn’t home, and since I’d only been there for a little over a day and a night, it was easy enough to pack everything up. I did that, while he stood and watched me from the doorway, letting the traitorous, fat cat rub all over his pants legs and not even shooing it away like I thought he would. He actually bent over to pet it.

Then he grabbed my bag and held onto it while I wrote Adam’s friend a quick note and left him the key.

He took my arm again, like I was going to make a run for it if he didn’t—which I might have at that—and we went back down to his car. Instead of going directly back to town, he stopped at a motel not far from where I’d been staying. He pulled up outside a room and came around to my side of the car, pulling open the door.

“Get out,” he said. “I have to go get my stuff too.”

“Your stuff? You’ve been staying here? Have you been watching me?”

“What do you think?”

I huffed at his rudeness and got out to follow him inside. It was neat and almost spartan inside, and not the way a motel room I stayed in ever looked. He packed quickly and we were on our way outside again.

“I could have stayed in the car,” I griped as we got in.

“Sure, you could,” he said, sarcasm dripping off the words. “And you’d have waited for me right here, huh?”

“Of course.”

Naturally I was lying, but I really did have to do something soon. I was running out of time—fast—and if he got me back up to that other hotel room, I was done for. I had to do something. I thought about it all the way back to the downtown hotel and got my chance when we pulled up to the front to valet park.

The valet came out and I noticed that Rio left the keys in the ignition while he talked to him. The valet gave him a ticket and Rio began to come around to my side of the vehicle, leaving his door open. I got out on my side before he ever reached me, but when he came up beside me to take my arm, I dropped to the ground, unable to think of anything else to do on the spur of the moment. The sudden move took Rio by surprise, and he reached for me. At the same time, I slammed my fist at his knee, and he overbalanced and came crashing down on top of me, throwing out his free hand and flattening me. He had been unable to catch himself before landing on top of me. And did I mention he was a big guy? I managed to roll slightly to the side as he fell, or otherwise he’d have knocked the breath clean out of me, and as it was, I was gasping. It was when he was trying to get back off me, and I was moaning and rolling around and pretending to be much worse off than I really was, that he somehow managed to connect his elbow solidly to my jaw.

I saw stars, just like in the cartoons.

“Damn it!” Rio yelled, lying on top of me, almost nose-to-nose. “Are you all right? I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to hit you.”

The blow to my jaw had rocked my head back, and to add insult to injury and all that, the rebound made me hit the back of my head on the pavement. For a couple of seconds there, I was reeling.

He got to his knees beside me and was peering down with a look of alarm on his face. As for me, I played dead, even letting my eyes roll up a little as if I were unconscious.

“Kitt, are you okay? Can you hear me?” His voice sounded panicky, almost like he really gave a shit.

Good, let him worry. I waited until he bent close to my face to check my breathing before making my move, slamming my forehead into his nose as hard as I could again, like I’d seen people do on those cop shows on TV. I had no idea how much that shit would hurt though. It was the second time that night, and I thought I might have broken his nose this time.

I almost couldn’t believe it when it actually worked. Taken off guard, he yelled out, clapped a hand over his nose and fell backward, blood spurting through his fingers. Though my forehead was throbbing, I managed to stumble to my feet and hobble around the car. I jumped inside, locking the door with only seconds to spare, right in front of the gaping valet parking guy, who’d been standing by, watching the show.

Rio, meanwhile, was right behind me all the way, yelling and calling me names and banging on the door, slinging drops of blood all over the side of the SUV. I had to admit I was kind of horrified, but I started the engine, threw the car in reverse and backed out of there. Rio was halfway hanging onto the door, and when I realized it, I panicked and slammed on the brakes. That knocked him off, and he went flying off and rolling across the pavement. Really scared now, I waited to make sure he wasn’t dead and then when I saw him stumble back up to his feet, I threw the car in gear and took off, peeling out of the parking lot and making the tires squeal.

As I raced out onto the street, I saw him shaking his fist at me in the rear-view mirror and yelling something I couldn’t hear over the tires squealing. I thought that was probably a good thing. My head ached, and tears streamed out of my eyes because it was all a little overwhelming, and I really hoped I hadn’t hurt him. I had never done anything like that in my life before, and I knew it was outrageous and over the top. Maybe I’d really gone too far this time. I knew he was going to be furious, and if he ever caught up with me, he might really kill me, like he was shouting he would when he was holding onto the door handle of the car.

I raced the SUV down the street, dodging traffic and glancing into the rear-view mirror, halfway expecting to see Rio catching up to me, blood still streaming down his face, like in a horror movie. I was headed for the interstate, though I had no clear idea of where the hell that was. This was my first time to actually drive in the city. This was a big SUV and had more power than anything I’d ever driven before, too, so I slowed down and tried my best to calm myself and stop speeding. The last thing I needed was to get pulled over by the cops. There was no way I could explain this car being in Rio Jeffries name. Plus, I thought the Atlanta PD might have put out some kind of lookout on me by now. Come to think of it, Riordan Jeffries would probably call and report this to the New Mexico police too. I was a wanted man in two states!

I’d really screwed up in Atlanta, and I still wasn’t sure how I was going to get out of this mess. Or even if I could.

The whole thing had started with a friend of mine I knew from my college days, Jeremy Kline. I saw him around town often at some of the clubs I liked. I’d go to the clubs most weekends to dance and have a few drinks. Jeremy was gay, like me, so we had a lot in common, though there was never any attraction in that way, as we both considered ourselves to be dedicated and enthusiastic bottoms. If anything, we competed in a way for some of the same guys. Like I said, I’d known him a while, and he was fun to hang out with.

Jeremy’s cousin, Cherry, worked at a local nightclub downtown called the Golden Pony, and she was one of the exotic dancers there. It was located in Five Points, in downtown Atlanta, not too far from Underground. They called it Five Points because that was where five streets met—Marietta Street, Edgewood Avenue, Decatur Street, and two legs of Peachtree Street.It was also where the MARTA Five Points Station was located, which was the largest and busiest station on the whole MARTA train system.

So needless to say, there was always a lot going on down there. When I saw Jeremy at the club that fateful Friday night, he was worried because she’d called him sounding a bit nervous and scared, and asked him to come and pick her up at the club. She said something about there was going a big fight brewing in the club, but she didn’t want to give any specific details. She just told him to come around to the side and she’d come out. She asked him to hurry.

Which he totally would have, I’m sure, if not for the fact that he was wearing his new club clothes and looked totally fabulous in them. Plus, the man he’d been after for weeks had just agreed to go home with him that very night. Well, what was he to do?

He was definitely in a quandary. He didn’t want to leave his cousin Cherry stranded—but some things were just thicker than blood. Things like the fact that he’d put a lot of work into this man, and it had finally all come to fruition. Now Jeremy’s ass had seen more action than the front seat of an Enterprise rental car, but he was sure this man was “the one.” That’s what he told me anyway as he begged me to help him out and asked me to go pick his cousin up. He made lavish promises about how he’d repay me if I just did him this one favor, this one time, and I finally told him I’d go pick her up.

He gushed all over me and texted the girl, telling her I was on the way and told her what kind of car I drove, so she’d know what to look for. I pulled to the back of the Golden Pony about thirty minutes later, but there was no sign of Cherry or anybody else standing outside and no place to park except in the street, and that just wasn’t much of an option. I decided to go around the block again, and this time I got stopped by a long redlight.

I was sitting in my car waiting for the light to change, when I heard loud rap music playing beside me as a car pulled up next to me at the light. I glanced over, as you do, and saw a car full of young guys, just vibing to the music and waiting for the light to change. Just then, another car pulled up on its other side. I was in the far-right lane, the guys with the music were in the middle, and the newcomers were in the far left. I reached in my pocket for a cigarette and lit it up. Just as I leaned over to get the lighter out of the dash, all hell broke loose. Two guys literally jumped out of the car next to me and were met by two from the car on the far-left. They began slugging each other, yelling and cursing with furious faces, waving their hands in the air, obviously embroiled in a heated fight. It seemed to have spilled out of the cars and onto the street. They weren’t more than a few feet away from where I sat, but nobody even so much as glanced my way, so I didn’t think they noticed I was even there. As it was, I had a ring side seat for whatever was about to happen, and it didn’t take long to go down.

Suddenly shots rang out right next to me. In fact, bullets started flying everywhere and people were screaming.

I dived down to the floorboard and stayed there as the shots continued to zing through the air. It seemed to go on for a long time and when it finally stopped, I peeked my head up to take a look.

The light changed then, at about the same time as the ones in the car farthest away from me, noticed me watching them. They started yelling at me and coming toward me. I didn’t know what to do, but I did the only thing I could think of. I started flashing my headlights on and off at oncoming traffic and leaned down on the horn.

I just wanted it to stop, and it stopped all right—as they all came running at me. I totally panicked. I threw the car in Drive and got the hell out of there. By the time I managed to pull out onto the next street, they were already banging on the trunk and the top of my car.

I drove as fast as I could to the nearest gas station outside the downtown area, where I pulled in and sat under the lights with my doors locked to call 911. I told them I had just seen some guys get shot on the street near the Golden Pony and to send everybody as fast as they could. Then I hung up and drove the hell home. I figured Cherry must have made her own way home, or she could take a fucking Uber, because no way was I going back.

Of course, that wasn’t the end of it. Emergency Services had my number, and the CCTV cameras gave them everything else they must have needed. I got a call from the detectives the next day, and they brought me in for questioning. It turned out that the murdered guy and a few of his friends were well known to the cops. So was the guy they suspected of killing him from the other car. They had shown me mug shots of him and his known associates, and I was able to pick out the killer right away. The detective told me the men were both drug dealers and all-around bad guys you just didn’t want to mess with. By the time the cops had arrived, the other guys were gone, and no one claimed to have seen a thing. I was their only witness. Even the film from the cameras that had identified me just fine had now been “conveniently” misplaced.

I told them I would testify, but that wasn’t good enough for them. They said the murderer was very “connected,” and would be coming after me to shut me up, because without my testimony, he would walk. They kept at me for hours, but I just kept telling them I intended to testify, but I was not going into protective custody. No way. Forget it. With the court system the way it was, the trial might be delayed for weeks or even months while the guy appealed and stalled. And all that time, I had to put my life on hold? No fucking way.

They wouldn’t let it go though, and came to my house to talk to my brother about it. He told them he was my legal guardian, and when they found out why, they talked him into involuntary protective custody as the way to go—on account of me being “mentally incompetent.”

I was raging on the inside when they told me that, though I acted meek and tame on the outside. I asked if I could get a few things, and they’d let me go upstairs. Big mistake on their part, because I ducked down the back stairs and made a run for it, winding up a few blocks away. I went to an ATM and drew out all the money I could and decided to take a bus to go visit my friend, who lived in Albuquerque.

I knew the cops would be after me, but I never would have dreamed Jazz would privately hire someone to track me down too. I was in worse trouble than I’d been in to start with, and I literally had no idea how I was ever getting out of this mess.