Gave Proof Through the Night (Stars, Stripes, and Hockey Night #11)

ERICA

Chapter playlist:

Wild Child — The Black Keys

Bad Reputation — Joan Jett & the Blackhearts

The wallet goes from the man’s back pocket to my fingers to Rue’s hand in under two seconds, and I still think I could’ve shaved another half.

Sloppy. But I’m the only one who knows that.

“Sir?” Rue calls out, already three steps behind him, her voice doing the breathless-concerned thing she does so well. “Excuse me… I think you dropped something?”

The man turns. He’s maybe forty, wearing a Georgetown Law pullover. He pats his back pocket. All the blood drains from his face.

“Oh! Oh wow.” He takes the wallet from her hands like she’s handing back a lost puppy. Opens it. Counts his cards. Closes it. “Thank you so much.”

Rue beams. She should win awards for that beam.

He walks away, wallet safely returned to the exact pocket I lifted it from, none the wiser. I fall into step beside her.

“A little slow on the approach,” I say.

She shoots me a look. “I was wearing wedges.”

“Exactly.”

“What? I hit a lumpy spot.”

“Okay, Rue.”

We’ve been at this for almost an hour in Georgetown Waterfront Park, trading off, switching who lifts and who receives, running the handoff until it’s as effortless as breathing.

I’ve been in DC for three days now, but Rue arrived today, at my request. I like a good practice every now and then, but that’s not really why we’re here.

Still, skills go soft if you don’t use them, so why not?

My dad used to say idle hands in a way that was deeply ironic given the profession.

And, if I’m being completely honest, it’s just really fun.

But I have a rule. Always… always give it back.

You are a deeply unusual person, I tell myself pleasantly.

Rue stretches her arm across her chest and looks out at the river like she’s just a woman enjoying the view.

“So… You’re in?” I ask.

She side-eyes me. “Did you think I wasn’t going to be in?”

“I think it’s polite to ask.”

“Erica.” She turns to face me fully. She has this quality where she looks like an old soul and a party girl at the same time. It is a gift.

“It’s Cinco de Mayo. I came to meet you in this boring city when I should be eating chips and salsa wearing a cheap sombrero in New York. I’m in.”

We circle back into the park. The game continues.

The thing about the waterfront is that everyone is just carelessly flaunting their “goodies” unnecessarily. We’re not actually shopping for a score, but seriously, people! Wallets in back pockets? Walking while distracted on the phone? They’re practically screaming, “Here, take my stuff!”

I lift a watch off a man in a Vineyard Vines quarter-zip so cleanly he doesn’t so much as twitch. Rue gets a phone off a woman who was actively looking at it, which she will be insufferable about for the rest of the afternoon.

“Class is in session,” Rue announces after returning the phone to the lady. She gave her a story about it falling from the woman’s bag and the woman believed her.

“Lucky,” I say.

“Skill.”

“Both,” I allow, because I’m generous when I’m right.

We’re winding down now. Rue has a plane to catch, and I’ve been awake since five and eating vending machine granola bars. Then Rue’s eyes snag on a man nearby, and she gives me the look.

One more.

I tip my chin. She drifts.

The lift is clean. Rue ghosts past him and the wallet is just gone. Easy peasy. She hands it off to me, then I’m on the move.

“Excuse me,” I say, touching the man’s arm lightly. He’s maybe sixty-five, white-haired, with a kind face. “I think this fell out of your pocket.”

He takes the wallet. Opens it. His whole face goes through the inventory, the relief, the almost-laugh because he can’t believe his luck.

“Oh, goodness.” He’s counting. Everything there. Every last bill. He looks up at me like I’m a small miracle. “Sweetheart, you have no idea.” He digs out two twenties. “Please. Take this. For your trouble.”

I stare at the money.

“I’m good,” I say.

“No, no, please.” He’s already pressing it toward me. “You’re such an honest young woman. Take it.”

Oh, this is the funniest thing that has happened to me in a while.

“I really can’t.”

“You just saved me a lot more than forty dollars.” He’s still holding the bills out. “Take it, honey.”

Honey. I love this man. I will not be taking his forty dollars.

“Keep it,” I say. “Have a wonderful Cinco de Mayo.”

He looks mildly devastated. I walk away.

Rue is waiting for me under a tree, biting her lip so hard she’s going to do damage.

The second I reach her, she loses it.

“An honest young woman,” she wheezes.

“Stop.”

“Have a great Cinco de Mayo.”

“I said stop.”

She doesn’t stop. We stand there another minute. I can tell Rue is hardly keeping it in. I’d say she doesn’t get out much, but that would be a lie. I let her amusement ride out because what else can I do? Besides. It was actually kind of funny.

And then I see… him.

A man standing near the waterfront, slightly apart from the tourist cluster by the dock, looking at his phone.

Tall. Dark hair. Broad-shouldered. This man either has very good genetics or a very expensive gym membership (possibly both).

He’s wearing a pretentious polo and tan chinos, and on his left wrist there’s a gold watch that’s calling my name.

“That mark’s mine,” I say.

Rue follows my eyeline. Pauses. “Because of the watch? Or because he’s kinda cute?”

“Obviously because of the watch.”

He is cute. Maybe. Marginally. But that is entirely beside the point.

“Mm-hm.”

“I’m going to do him a favor,” I tell her. “He’s clearly distracted. Someone less ethical than me could take advantage of that.”

“Someone exactly as ethical as you is about to take advantage of that.”

“Just get into position for the handoff.”

She steps left. I step right. And I go to work drifting back into the crowd toward the mark. Nothing to see here. I’m someone who just happens to be walking past.

He’s within arm’s reach now. I time the brush. Three seconds… I’ve got two fingers poised to liberate the clasp of his watch when his right hand closes around my wrist.

I freeze.

He’s looking down at me. Brown eyes, warm and thoroughly amused.

“Tsk, tsk.” His voice is low. “Sticky fingers.”

I look down at it. I look up at him.

“Hi,” I say.

“Hi.” The corner of his mouth moves.

“Did you need something?”

“I was going to ask you the same thing.”

“I was just walking,” I say, the picture of serenity.

“You were just walking.”

“Through the park.” I gesture broadly at the park, as if he may not have noticed it. “It’s a nice day.”

He hums. He has not let go of my wrist. He does not appear to be planning to. “Yes, it is a nice day.”

“Cinco de Mayo.”

“Mm.”

“You’re still holding my wrist.”

“I am,” he agrees, unhurried, like we have all the time in the world, and he personally owns most of it.

I look at him. He looks at me. My heart does something embarrassing in my chest.

He is not going to look away first.

“You know,” he says. “Where I’m from, being faster than a pickpocket is a skill you learn… very, very young.” He tilts his head, easy as anything, eyes raking down to my shoes.

Every nerve ending I own relocates to the point where his fingers are still circled around my wrist. The skin-to-skin contact is hot and zingy and I am acutely aware that I am not usually this interested in being caught.

“And where might that be?”

“Mexico City.”

“You don’t have an accent.”

He smiles. Just barely. “Nope.”

I snort, making a show of scanning his outfit: The Ralph Lauren polo. The peg-leg chinos fitting almost too snugly. “And the New England frat boy situation you’ve got going on?”

“I went to college in Michigan, not that it’s any of your business.”

“Sure you did.” I tilt my head, trying to figure him out.

Hmmm, this is interesting.

I get it now: the speed of that catch. The easy stance. The fact that his hand was already moving before I made contact.

He saw me coming.

I study him with new eyes and realize I might have just tried to pick the pocket… of a pickpocket.

He’s still holding my wrist.

I’m still not pulling away.

He takes one small step closer, and without raising his voice at all, tilts his head so that his mouth is level with my ear and says, just above a whisper: “Crime doesn’t pay.”

The warmth of his breath skims the shell of my ear and travels straight down to my knees, which make a completely unilateral decision to stop cooperating with the rest of my body.

I lock them in place through sheer stubbornness.

My skin prickles everywhere he isn’t touching, which is most of me, and my brain offers exactly one unuseful thought:

Ay, caramba.

I swallow, and my voice comes out a little too shaky. “Maybe I just wanted your number,” I say.

He pulls back. Looks at me. Something in his expression shifts. Still amused, but a different frequency entirely.

He lets go of my wrist. “Maybe you should have led with that.”

And then he slides his hands into his pockets and turns back to the waterfront, and I’m standing there holding absolutely nothing, my wrist still warm where his fingers were, blinking at the back of his head.

The nerve of him.

I walk back toward Rue with my dignity just a tiny bit smooshed.

She has abandoned the tree entirely and materialized from behind a park bench about fifteen feet away, watching me with an expression I can only describe as forensic.

“Don’t,” I say.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re thinking very loudly.”

She falls into step beside me and we walk in silence for a full ten seconds, which for Rue is something close to a spiritual achievement.

I glance back, just once, because I’m a human being with eyeballs, thank you. Watchy El Hottie is by the waterfront again, phone in hand, utterly unbothered. Like the whole thing was a mildly pleasant way to pass three minutes and nothing more.

Unbothered. HA! The absolute nerve.

It’s fine. I’ll never see that man again in my life. I have a job to think about. A crew to assemble. Several weeks of logistics and reconnaissance and very important things that are not brown eyes and warm hands.

We find a bench near the fountain, and I lay out the basics.

“July first,” I say. “We meet back here. I’ll have the full team confirmed by then.”

Rue nods. “And until then?”

“I’ll go see Sal. He might have some names for me. Zoe and I will be back here late June. We’ll set up the workspace, run the first walkthrough, that sort of thing.”

I look out at the park. There are families, joggers… a woman whose golden retriever has very strong feelings about a squirrel. Such normal, pedestrian stuff. I wouldn’t mind that life.

We sit in silence, letting it all sink in. “You’re clear for the summer?”

“I’ll make it clear,” Rue says. In other words, she’s there for me no matter what.

“Good.” I sit back, letting the moment breathe. “This is the one that matters, Rue. My last one.”

Rue looks at me and raises a brow.

“I know, I know.” I wave a hand. “Don’t judge me.”

“Why would I judge? One last job. That’s what we all say.”

She gets up and checks her phone, already glowing in that Rue way. She does a little shimmy as she reads her notifications.

“Good news?” I ask.

“I’m going to a rooftop party in Tribeca.” She looks up, already delighted with herself. “Cinco de Mayo, baby. Margaritas all night.”

“Ooh Tribeca. Fancy.”

“Come with me.”

“I have things to do.”

“The things will wait.”

“The things will absolutely not wait.”

She deploys the eyes. Rue has very, very good eyes for this. Wide and hopeful and cleverly persuasive. “Margaritas, Erica. Good ones.”

“Go.” I wave her off. “Go drink margaritas on a rooftop. Send me a picture of the view.”

She grins, bright and quick, and pulls me into a hug.

“July first,” she says over her shoulder as she turns for the station.

“July first,” I confirm.

I watch her disappear down the path toward the Metro. A fifteen-minute walk in wedges, which honestly serves her right. I don’t know why she doesn’t just take an Uber to the airport.

Then I’m alone, the park breezy and humming around me and the afternoon tipping over into early evening.

Cinco de Mayo.

I stand near the fountain and let myself stop moving for just a second. The light off the river is doing something magical. Somewhere nearby someone has started playing music, probably getting the festivities started early. I close my eyes and just breathe it in.

Watch guy. Watchy… El Hottie.

I wonder how he’s celebrating tonight. Whether he’s still in the park or whether he’s on his way to a rooftop party right now with good margaritas and a skyline. I wonder if that same warm expression will be aimed at someone else.

“Excuse me?”

I open my eyes.

It’s the white-haired man. Still beaming. Holding a bunch of yellow tulips. They’re slightly lopsided, like he just bought them from someone on the corner. Both his hands are extended toward me like an offering.

“I felt bad you wouldn’t take the cash,” he says cheerfully, pressing them closer. “Please. For an honest young woman.”

I look at the tulips. I look at him. I look at the tulips again.

“Thank you,” I say, and take them.

He walks away entirely satisfied, and I stand in Georgetown Waterfront Park on Cinco de Mayo holding a bouquet of yellow tulips, thinking about a man from Mexico City with fast reflexes and very warm hands.

I tuck the flowers under my arm and head for the warehouse. I’ve got a crew to assemble.