Chapter 23
DIEGO
First morning prep shift at the donut shop, done. I grabbed leftover Boston creams on the way out and packed a bag of things to keep her occupied. Trying to keep this clinical. Detached. Business.
It's not working.
I drop everything at the storage unit and drive straight to Ernie's to fix the panels. Raul lets me in and immediately starts shaking his head before I've cleared the doorway.
"Shut up." I shove the hardware bag at him.
"Not about the panels. The girl. What the fuck, Diego?"
"I don't know."
"A hit is one thing. That's business. But you kidnapped a civilian. A whole woman. What are we supposed to do with her now? We can't let her go."
"I know."
"What were you thinking?"
"I couldn't let anything happen to her." The words come out before I've decided to say them, which is its own kind of problem.
"WHY?" He steps into my space.
"I. Don't. Know." I shove him back a step and hold his gaze and mean it. I genuinely don't know. That's the part that's keeping me up.
He drags a hand down his face. "Did she see you? Your face?"
A beat. "Yeah. She recognized me."
"Fuck." He looks at the ceiling. "You need to talk to her. Find out what she actually knows before you decide anything."
"I tried this morning. She was in no state. I'll go back tonight."
"And until then?"
"She stays put."
He nods once. We don't talk about it again.
Three hours of hammering panels into place, the rhythm of it filling the silence, and I'm grateful for every minute of it. No questions. No judgment. Just nails and wood and something that needs fixing that I actually know how to fix.
I pick Ma up and drop her at work for her night shift, watch her shuffle through the doors until I can't see her anymore, and then I drive to the warehouse.
Nerves settle into my stomach as I punch in the code. Unfamiliar. I don't get nervous. I don't let myself.
I ease the door open. I left the light on for her, and she's found the couch, curled up with one arm tucked under her cheek, asleep. Her hair's loose around her face.
I set up the TV and DVD player I'd scavenged earlier, positioning it where she can reach it without straining the chain, and she stirs at the noise. Comes awake fast, eyes flying open, landing on me.
I go still.
"What the fuck!" Her voice is wrecked from screaming, rough at the edges, and she scrambles upright. "What the fuck!"
"Good morning, Goldilocks."
"I didn't break in, fucker. You locked me in here." She blinks. "Goldilocks. Like Goldilocks and the Three Bears?"
"Didn't even think about that."
"Fantastic." A pause, something shifting in her expression. "My name is Harvee," she says, quieter. "Not sure that matters to you."
"I know your name."
"Oh." Another pause. "What's yours?"
"Friends call me DJ."
She studies me for a moment. "What's your story, DJ?" Her tone lands somewhere between sarcasm and genuine, and I can't fully read which one she means. Maybe she can't either.
"Wrong question. You have no idea who I am."
She looks at me with this soft, searching expression that twists something in my gut immediately and not in a good way.
That look. The sympathetic one. I've worn the receiving end of it my whole life — poor DJ, the mama's boy, the one with the sick mother and the complicated history. My fists pull tight at my sides.
I'm done with this conversation.
I pace instead. The concrete amplifies every step, restless energy with nowhere to go.
She shifts on the couch, trying to find a comfortable position against the chain. The metal clinks softly, and I make myself look somewhere else.
"Grabbing lunch," I say, stopping near the door. "Allergies? Anything you don't eat?"
"No." She looks up. "DJ."
"Yeah."
"Why are you doing this?" She nods toward the chains, voice dropping. "These hurt."
She lifts her wrists. Red welts where the metal has been.
I need to leave before I say something or do something I haven't thought through yet. "It's for your own good."
"How is any of this—"
The door shuts behind me. Her frustrated shriek follows it, muffled but very much audible through the metal.
I laugh under my breath on the other side.
That accent. That fire underneath the fear. The way she goes from terrified to furious and back again without losing either one. It does something to my spine that I'm not going to examine right now.
I shouldn't enjoy riling her up.
I'm going to have a very hard time not doing it anyway.
An hour later I come back with a grilled chicken sandwich, fries still hot, a tall water with a straw, and a bottle of ibuprofen. I set it on the table just outside her reach and watch her eyes move from the food to my face and back, calculating.
"Brought lunch. Ibuprofen for your wrists. Eat."
"I'm not hungry."
"You are." I shake two pills into my palm and swallow them dry so she can watch, then slide the bottle toward her. "Take them. You'll feel better."
She doesn't reach for the food. She reaches for the ankle chain instead, testing the slack, fingers working the links with a stubborn methodical patience that I respect more than I'm going to tell her.
"Let me go," she says quietly. "Please. I won't say anything. I promise."
I crouch down to her level. Close enough that I catch the citrus in her hair even in a place that smells like concrete and age. "Not yet. Eat first."
She holds out for another few seconds, then reaches for the water with trembling fingers. Small careful sips. No pills yet. Still testing the chain when she thinks I'm not watching.
Stubborn.
Good.