Chapter 4 Tatiana
TATIANA
The tray slips from my fingers at the roulette table and glasses shatter across the floor in a spray of ice and vodka that splashes up onto my ankles and drains into my heels.
Linda appears beside me within seconds, and her mouth's moving, but I can't process the words she's saying over the sound that keeps replaying in my head on an endless loop.
That gunshot is gonna haunt me for the rest of my life. If only I hadn't actually seen what happened, I'd be able to put this out of my head, but I just keep picturing that man's body lying in a puddle of blood and—
"Tatiana, are you even listening to me right now?
" Linda snaps her fingers directly in front of my face, and I force myself to focus on her expression that's shifted from annoyed to concerned.
"What the hell's going on with you tonight?
You've been completely out of it for the past hour, and now you're dropping trays and breaking glasses all over my floor. "
I blink a few times and stare down at my soggy shoes before I respond, but when I speak, it's more of a mumble than clear speech.
"I, uh… I'm not feeling well." I press my empty hand to my belly and wince very unconvincingly.
"Must be food poisoning or something. I should probably go home.
" No way I can finish this shift, anyway. Not with that sound tormenting me.
Linda scowls and glances around the floor before motioning to someone behind me, probably to clean up the glass. She's not a horrible manager, but she isn't very kind about stuff like this most times.
"You look absolutely terrible…" Her words line up with how a boss should speak, but her face is a scowl of frustration.
"I just need to sleep it off and I'll be perfectly fine by tomorrow when my next shift starts." I bend down to start gathering the broken glass, but my hands won't stop trembling. A shard slices into my palm and draws blood immediately.
Linda grabs my wrist firmly and hauls me back up to standing before I can do any more damage to myself or create a bigger mess on her floor.
"Leave the glass… Go clock out right now before you hurt yourself worse.
I'll get someone else to clean up this mess and cover your section for what's left of the night shift. "
I nod without really processing what she's saying and stagger toward the back hallway on wobbly legs.
The employee locker room's completely empty when I push through the door, and I lean my forehead against the cool metal of the lockers while trying desperately to remember my combination through the fog completely filling my brain.
It takes three separate attempts before the lock finally clicks open and I can grab my sweater and purse.
After I clock out, I walk three blocks to the bus stop on autopilot and stand under a streetlight that flickers every few seconds.
My reflection stares back at me from the dark shop window across the street, and even from this distance, I can see how shaken I look. I'm pale and my eyes appear sunken.
"Get it together, Tati," I tell myself.
The wait for the bus is nerve-racking, though I don't even know if those men know I was there watching.
Still, my senses are on high alert and I'm watching over my shoulder.
Then the thirty-minute bus ride feels like one of those haunted roller coasters where you're waiting for someone to jump out at you from behind things.
When I finally straggle through the apartment door, Lena is parked on the couch watching a sitcom and she nearly jumps out of her skin.
"You're home way too early." She reaches for the remote control and mutes the TV while her eyes scan my face.
"What happened? Did something go wrong with a customer?
Did one of those jerks touch you again?" As a coworker, Lena knows exactly how awful it can be to work at the Titan.
But I can't even give her an honest response.
I open my mouth to answer her question, but my throat closes up and suddenly, tears are streaming down my face.
The pressure of having to hold it in for so long releases as I walk farther into the apartment.
Then my legs give out and I drop onto the couch cushion beside her.
Lena's arms wrap around me immediately and pull me tightly against her shoulder.
"Hey, you need to talk to me right now and tell me what's going on because you're absolutely scaring me." Her hand rubs circles on my back between my shoulder blades. "What happened? Tell me! I'll call Linda or—"
"It isn't about work, exactly, or at least not in the way you're thinking right now." My words sound slurred and bungled, but I can't have her going off half-cocked. "Oh, God… It's so much worse."
"What do you mean, it's worse than work?" Lena pulls back just enough to look directly at my face. She looks confused and maybe a little afraid. "Tatiana, you really need to tell me what happened because you look like you've seen a ghost."
"I saw someone get murdered behind the casino in the alley where I always go for my smoke breaks every shift." Just saying the words aloud feels scary, like somehow, telling someone will make those men appear in my apartment ready to kill me. "My God, what if they saw me?"
"Oh, God," she says softly, and she goes rigid. She's still holding me, but her hand stops moving in that comforting rhythm.
"Two men were dragging another man between them and they shoved him against the wall…" My voice cracks, and I'm shaking just trying to get this out. "One of them pulled out a gun from inside his jacket and… and then he just pulled the trigger and…"
I can't finish because I'm sobbing too hard now, and Lena's squeezing me so tightly, I can barely breathe. She mutters something under her breath that I can't make out and when I finally pull back, her face has gone completely white.
"Did they see you? Please tell me they didn't see you standing there."
"I don't know. I was behind the dumpster and I didn't move until they left, but…" I wipe my face with the back of my hand. "What if they knew? What if they come after me?"
Lena stands up and starts pacing. "The casino has cameras everywhere. If the police investigate, they'll check the footage and see you went outside right when it happened. Everyone will know you were there."
Her comment makes me want to vomit. "I didn't even think about that."
"We need to go to the police right now." She's already grabbing her keys from the counter. "You have to report this before those guys figure out there was a witness." Lena slides her shoes on, but I don’t move. I'm shaking too badly to stand up right now.
"I don't want to go anywhere. I just want to sleep and wake up and have this not be real."
"Tatiana, you can't pretend this didn't happen." She crouches in front of me and takes my hands. "Please. We have to do this now before they clean up the scene."
She's right, and I hate it. Someone was killed and I witnessed it. That person might’ve had a family who will want to know what happened, and I may be the only person who can give him justice. So I let her pull me up and we head down to her car.
"It'll be okay," Lena says, but she doesn't sound sure, and I don't question her as she drives. My head is a jumble of terrifying thoughts and emotions. I feel like I'm on autopilot, unable to focus on anything.
The police station sits on a corner downtown and looks exactly like every depressing government building I've ever seen. Concrete steps lead up to glass doors that have been smudged by a thousand hands. Fluorescent lights buzz inside and make everything look washed out and sickly.
Lena parks in a visitor spot and we walk up together, though my legs feel shaky and I have to grip the metal railing to keep myself steady.
When we push through the doors, a desk sergeant sits behind thick bulletproof glass typing on a computer, but he doesn't look up when we approach.
Lena clears her throat and says, "Excuse me?"
The sergeant holds up one finger without looking at us. We stand there while he finishes typing horribly with his two index fingers while he scowls at his screen. Finally, he looks up and the frustration on his face softens to curiosity.
"Can I help you?" His voice comes through a speaker mounted in the wall and sounds tinny and distorted.
"I need to report a murder." My voice shakes, but at least the words come out clearly. "I witnessed it tonight behind the casino where I work."
That gets his attention. His eyes sharpen and he actually looks at me now instead of through me. "You witnessed a homicide?" I watch his shoulders square and his chest puff out ever so slightly.
"Yes. Two men shot another man in an alley and I saw the whole thing happen."
He reaches under his desk and a loud buzzer sounds that makes me jump. A heavy door to our left clicks open with a mechanical whine, and he barks, "Come on through and go down the hall, second door on the right. Wait there, and someone will be with you."
I glance at Lena, who lets me cling to her arm like a scared child as she leads me through the door.
The hallway is even brighter than the main entryway, and none of the large metal doors have windows, though I've never been in a police station like this before.
This is probably just par for the course, maybe why criminals are so grumpy.
The room he directed us to is small and windowless. There's a metal table bolted to the floor and three metal chairs with no cushions. The walls are bare except for a clock, and Lena and I sit down while she squeezes my hand.
"It's gonna be okay," she whispers.