Her eyes welled up again. She stared at him like she was trying to find the floor beneath her, her lips trembling. Slowly, she nodded.
They finished the meal in silence. Ash flagged down the waiter, paid in crumpled twenties, and stood. At the counter, he spotted someone’s jacket draped over a stool and picked it up in one fluid motion. It fell easily over Nora’s narrow shoulders. She met his eyes, half grateful, half afraid. He just nodded toward the door.
They slipped into the night without another word.
(10:00 p.m.)
The bus station stank of diesel, damp concrete, and despair. Harsh fluorescents flickered in time with the buzz of vending machines, casting a sickly pallor over the cracked floor. Gum wads clung to the undersides of benches where a few haggard travelers slumped in half-sleep, arms looped protectively around their bags. A bored clerk stared blankly from behind scratched bulletproof glass, chewing something like it offended her.
Ash bought a one-way ticket to Wilmington from the kiosk and folded it into Nora’s hand without ceremony. He pressed therest of his cash—sweaty, crumpled twenties and tens—into her palm.
Her fingers tightened around the money with hesitant disbelief. “Why are you doing this?”
He didn’t answer. Just glanced away, jaw working.
She studied him. “You’re a weird guy, you know that?”
A corner of his mouth lifted. “Yeah.”
They waited near the boarding gate. The hiss of hydraulic brakes and the low murmur of tired voices filled the space around them. A janitor dragged a mop across the floor like it weighed more than he did. Nora stood close—not touching, but near enough that he could feel her body heat, smell her shampoo, the clove-sweet trace of her tea. She kept sneaking glances at him, thinking he wouldn’t notice. But Ash noticed everything.
“I still don’t know your name,” she said, voice softer now. “Or should I just call you Bruce Lee?”
“Ash,” he said, eyes sweeping the terminal for any sign of danger. There was nothing—no sneaking shadow at the edge of the platform, no echo of footsteps behind them. Maybe he made a clean break. Though, somehow, he doubted it.
She repeated it, savoring the syllable like she wanted to keep it. “Thank you, Ash,” she added. “For… everything. You saved my life back there.”
He met her gaze at last. Her eyes were clearer now, no longer glazed by panic or shock. Simply tired. And grateful. And open in a way that made him uneasy.
For fuck’s sake.
“You want to thank me?” His words came out low and edged. “Clean yourself up, get your shit together, and start over. Think of it as a second chance. You won’t get another.”
She flinched slightly at his tone, but nodded. “I will. I promise.”
The bus pulled in, belching steam and diesel into the terminal. Ash walked her to the step. They let the other passengers board first, dragging their bags and busted lives behind them. When her turn came, she spun to face him, one foot on the first rung, hands buried in the sleeves of her too-big, stolen jacket. She didn’t speak. Only gave him a small nod.
He nodded back. The kind that says go. The kind that closes doors.
She climbed aboard and went to the rear, searching for an empty seat.
Ash stood there as the bus wheezed into motion, its taillights smearing red across the wet asphalt. He watched it vanish into the city’s bones, swallowed whole by the dark and the rain. Finally, he turned away, lit a cigarette, and walked back toward his bike.
The thunderstorm followed him like a curse as he roared down the slick, glittering streets of Little Italy and into Silver Cove. He needed to shower, change his soaked clothes, and get ready for work. He’d promised a performance tonight, his first since the pokey, and he was looking forward to it. The Eclipse’s plush embrace, the maze of hungry eyes, the slow jazz seeping through his chest like a second heartbeat.
But Jimmy’s face kept rising in his mind. Mangled. Discarded. Unavenged. Nora had given him nothing. No trail. No lead. Just dead ends and cold rain. The weight of a promise he’d made to himself, and no clear way to keep it.
He didn’t know what came next. Didn’t know where to look, who to push, what thread to pull. For now, all he had was the stage. The lights. The temporary escape of being someone else. Maybe clarity would come later. Or maybe he was chasing phantoms. He twisted the throttle and let the storm drown out his thoughts.
Either way, he wasn’t stopping.
Chapter Twenty-Two
(10:57 p.m.)
The Eclipse shimmered like an open wound in the night.
Rick stood across the street where he’d parked his car, beneath the dripping mouth of a broken neon pharmacy sign, staring at the club’s blazing marquee. The last time he’d seen it, the place had looked shut down, almost modest, a faded lion dozing in the sun. Now it roared. Rows of electric bulbs traced its arch in blazing gold, turning the street into a stage and the slick pavement into black glass. Above the entrance, blocky black letters spelled out its promise in radiant snare.
