If she gets hurt, he has only himself to blame.
8
Karma
I’m exhausted and I smell funky, like a day old Italian hoagie after spending most of the day cleaning out another foreclosure in the Norristown area. Unlike the last clean out Ruby and I did, there are no Whole Food groceries in the fridge or expensive sheets in the linen closet. This one is in a house that’s seen better days because the owners probably fell on hard times.
This is the kind of project that makes me hate myself for what I do, because it’s my job to bag up this family’s personal possessions and place them on the side of the curb for scavengers and the garbage man.
All I want to do is take a hot shower and curl into the lumpy, twin-sized trundle bed that Ruby and Kim allow me to sleep on in their spare room, but I know that’s not in the cards for me. Not yet. Bronx Masterson texted that he was on his way thirty minutes ago, so I’m hoping he has information for me. There’s no way I can go to bed until I hear whatever it is he has to report. Has he found Lev? I turn off my phone and slip it back into my tote bag, praying he has good news.
Bronx’s silver Mercedes truck looks slick and formidable as it rolls down the street towards us, and people who are out and about in the neighborhood notice it immediately. It’s probably not the kind of car you see a lot in a neighborhood like this. In fact, it’s kind of obnoxious but totally him with its large boxy shape and shiny chrome accents.
I’m not sure why, and maybe it’s because I’m totally wiped out, but I’m annoyed by what I see when Bronx pulls up in front of me. He’s dressed super casual, wearing a very worn, blue University of Delaware t-shirt with gold letters and dark jeans, but obviously that’s not what irks me.
It’s his hair.
His mane of freshly washed black hair looks like it’s been recently mussed by someone’s fingers.
A woman’s fingers.
And I’m figuring it’s the handiwork of the woman sitting next to him.
There is a buxom woman my age in the passenger seat wearing a tightly cropped pink tee and pink metallic leggings to match. Her face is seriously beat with a full face of make-up, including dramatic face contouring and the longest false eyelashes I’ve ever seen.
She looks exactly like the kind of woman I would imagine an edgy guy like Bronx would be with: beautiful, trendy, worldly, and very sexual. She is basically the complete opposite of everything that I am, not that I’m comparing myself. It doesn’t matter much to me who he chooses to spend his time with, and it’s certainly none of my business. I just don’t understand why he’d bring her to meet with me today unless she has some information about Lev.
“You had a hard day, eh?” the jerk asks before even a hello, his throat sounding much better today than it did yesterday.
The woman next to him doesn’t greet me but instead performs a complete inventory of my appearance with her eyes. I know exactly what she’s thinking without her having to say a word. I must look a wreck, I lament to myself, especially because it feels like my eye is never going to return to its normal color. I’ve always been a slow healer.
Suddenly, Ruby walks up behind me and replies to him instead, “Yeah, the two of us worked hard today.” She runs her hand alongside the side of his truck. I’m not exactly sure what point she’s trying to make. I don’t speak fluent Ruby. “Whoa, this is a nice ride for a bounty hunter.”
Oh, that’s her point.
Bronx’s mood completely shifts, and I can feel the chill of his stare all the way over to where I’m standing. I don’t think he particularly cares for Ruby and whatever she’s insinuating, but he’s got to understand that we’re all just trying to feel each other out.
“I don’t talk about work in public,” he says, exchanging a heedful look between the two of us.
I don’t know Bronx, and he doesn’t know me. Immediate trust is not a luxury that I can afford to give to anyone. A fact that Ruby probably understands better than most. That’s why she feels the need to question him in her own misguided way.
“Get in,” he says to only me, in an obvious attempt to ignore Ruby.
I’m about to take a step forward but then hesitate. He wants me to get in the car with him and miss pink-all-over? And then what?
“Do you have any information about my brother?” I ask first.
“That’s why I’m telling you to get in,” he replies impatiently. “We’ll talk over dinner.”
The woman in the car and I both have the same look on our faces after he says that. The three of us are going to have dinner together? That doesn’t sound like it will be a productive dinner meeting at all.
“I don’t do ménage,” she says to Bronx and I almost choke on my spit. This woman doesn’t mince any words.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” Ruby doesn’t wait for my answer and simply pulls me to the side, the motherly judgement rolling off of her in waves. “You know I usually mind my business, right? But I have to ask, what in the hell are you doing with this dude?”
I have to laugh to myself because while Ruby’s claim is that she ‘usually minds her own business’, it’s pretty clear she ends up doing the very opposite, at least when it comes to me.
“He’s helping me find Lev.”
