Chapter 7 #2
I let out a deep exhale, ready for the uncomfortable conversation ahead of me. As I walked through the pizzeria, I guessed at his first question. Who are you? How did I do that? Or maybe he had already connected the dots. You’re a super? The question became, “Are you a hero or a villain?”
In the back corner, I pulled out a chair and sat down. My fingers gripped my jeans as I prepared for the interrogation. Would he start with the twelve seconds of silence? Or would he take the direct approach? I was fearful of any tactic he pulled out. I’m pretty sure I’d break before—
He slid a sheet of paper across the table.
“It’s not over.”
The grip on my knees eased. I had thought he wanted to discuss what happened at Cypher’s apartment. Instead, he wanted to get to the bottom of the mystery. I could handle this. Work. Good. I shoved the worry to the back of my mind.
“Who do you think made it?” I asked.
He set the menu down. The red of his beard clashed with the tablecloth, almost fitting the grim expression on his face. Shaking his head, he spun the note around.
“Wrong question. This isn’t a warning. It’s an admission.”
“You think somebody is helping us?”
“Synergy would like to say everything is sorted. They’re satisfied.”
“You’re not?”
The slightest smirk. Booker didn’t want the game to end, not yet.
“I was assigned to find the crook… or crooks. Come, Drew, come. The game is afoot.”
Why was I not shocked that he read Sherlock Holmes? “What next? Do we go to Ms. Keyes? Ricardo?”
“We’ll have to schedule a meeting and—”
“Drew!”
I heard the smacking bubblegum before I saw Becky.
She stepped behind the counter, looking as if she fell out of the eighties.
From neon pink and purple leggings to her shirt tied off her hip, she idolized the decade.
Jake’s daughter couldn’t have graduated from high school yet, but that didn’t stop her from joining the family business.
“You’re not ordering takeout?” She asked me but didn’t stop staring at Booker. “Are you going to introduce me to your friend?” She all but added air quotes to the question. “Don’t be rude.”
“Booker, this is Becky. Becky, meet Booker.”
She held out her hand. He gave it a hearty shake. “Nice to meet you.”
“Are we going to be sharing a pizza?”
My focus had been on the disapproving glances from Booker as he asked about Cypher. I had never thought about ordering. I’d leave her an extra tip for some privacy and less insinuating something that wasn’t going on.
“We’ll just have—”
“Whatever Drew normally gets,” Booker said. “Large.”
She chomped that gum as if she held a grudge. “That good with you, Drew?”
Her tip went down by the second. “Sure. I guess? Why not?”
Becky turned around and headed past the partition where her father worked. She made a show of yelling my order. “One large pizza with pepperoni and enough mushrooms to choke a man.”
The controlled expression faltered as Booker snickered.
“Let’s see if it chokes a man.”
For a moment, I could almost feel Cypher’s neck in the crook of my arm.
I couldn’t tell if his statement had an innuendo underneath.
He must have an opinion about last night.
I don’t know if I could bear hearing it.
I reached out, ready to flag Becky down to come back and cancel the order. The anxiety took hold.
“We can just—”
He grabbed my wrist. The pace of my heart slowed, and my shoulders relaxed. He guided my hand back to the table, but didn’t let go. “I promise, it’s okay. ”
“How do you do that?”
Now he withdrew, sitting back in his chair. “What do you mean?”
“Normally, when somebody says it’ll be okay, it makes the anxiety worse.
” I held my wrist, rubbing the spot he had just grabbed.
“When you do it, I believe you.” His eyes dropped to the table as if I had scolded him.
I didn’t mean for it to sound like an accusation.
It hadn’t been the first time, almost as if he had the Midas touch.
“Part of my training.”
I didn’t believe him. Not that he lied, but for the first time, I wondered if Booker had his own secrets. If Jake Owens and I could hide behind personas, did this burly man do the same?
I was about to offer an out when he blurted out, “About the other night…”
Not even his ability to calm my nerves could stop the tightening in my gut.
I leaned back, wiping sweaty palms along my jeans.
I went back to gripping the fabric. Every one of the practiced excuses flashed at once.
I took martial arts classes. He had been concussed.
It shocked even me how easy lying had become, especially when what I really wanted to say was that Cypher got what he deserved.
“Thanks.”
My head cocked to the side. “Thanks?”
“Isn’t that the proper response when somebody saves your life?”
“Yeah.” I didn’t sound confident.
“Oh, you thought I meant the other thing.” He leaned forward, hands folded. “You… uhm… yeah. I felt guilty. I didn’t want to leave you until I knew you were okay.”
“You were guilty?” Oh.
We weren’t talking about what happened at Cypher’s apartment. He skipped ahead to what came after. My palms grew sweatier for a very different reason.
“You saved my life. I shouldn’t have done that.” This wasn’t going at all how I expected.
“You shouldn’t be alone.” I mumbled the words he had said in my doorway.
What came after had been soft, reassuring, even sensual.
Those four words didn’t ask me to shove my emotions to the side.
They didn’t require a mask to be put in place.
Booker had watched my nervous breakdown, one I still didn’t fully understand.
He could have run away, hell, he could have run toward me. Instead, he stayed still.
I couldn’t meet his eyes, not without my breath catching in my throat. “Don’t be.”
He had this uncanny method of backing away from the conversation and giving it a chance to breathe… a chance for me to breathe. The government might have taught him how to wield patience like a weapon, but had they taught him empathy?
“You were right.” It came out like a whisper. Admitting it felt like weakness. I spent my days in the office making deals, and at night I cracked skulls for justice. I’d have chosen a knife fight over the next words. “I didn’t want to be alone.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
I shook my head. “No.” I gave him a slight smile. “Not yet, at least.”
“That’s okay.” A quick glance up, and he had a smirk on his face. “I’m not going anywhere.” He was sincere. “We still have a job to do.”
If I didn’t know better, I’d think Booker had the ability to say the right thing at the right moment.
This man owed me nothing. Thrust together to solve a problem I hardly understood, it had evolved.
Is this how normal friendships came about?
Two people absentmindedly put together to do a job, and somehow they bonded?
Booker liked me, or at least part of me. I just couldn’t figure out why.
“I almost forgot your drinks.” Becky wedged herself past the tension and dropped a soda in front of me and a water in front of Booker. “You strike me as a water guy.”
“Thanks. I think?”
“Don’t mind me,” she said, backing up. She spoke while smacking her gum. “You two get on with your date.”
The heat rushed to my cheeks, and I forced my powers to keep them from glowing red. I wasn’t sure if I should tip her extra or demand that her father fire his daughter. I continued wiping my palms on my jeans. At this rate, I’d have a wet spot.
“It’s okay, pookie.” Booker’s grin turned devious. “He gets flustered about his love life.”
Becky just about squealed. “I get it. Danny’s the same way.”
She went back to where her father shoved a pizza into the oven. My eyes narrowed. As embarrassed as I might be, I’d rather deal with this than delve into my emotional state at Cypher’s apartment. Fine, Becky got a big tip.
“Bring me out for pizza and solving corporate espionage—” He held up the two papers. “You’re such a romantic.”
If I didn’t know better, I think he enjoyed my discomfort. “Pookie?”
“It looks like you’re stuck with me for a little longer.”
“I guess so.”
He pulled the papers away as Jake worked the pizza tray between us. From the kitchen, Becky stared at us as if she were heavily invested in this ‘date night.’ Whatever had been rattling around in my brain vanished as I inhaled the delicious mixture of cheese, pepperoni and—
Booker gasped. “That’s enough mushrooms to choke a man.”
Yes. Yes, it was.