“I’m thinking that man needed help. I just left him in there. He could bleed to death.”
“He was going out the other door,” Janice pointed out. “It wouldn’t have done him any good if you had gotten shot as well.”
“Did you see who shot him?” Sally asked. “Was it one of the four clowns?”
“I didn’t see anyone,” Rory admitted. “The door banged open and someone started firing, but they were hidden from me.” She looked at Cindy. “Did you have a better angle? Was it one of the four men we suspect are up to no good? Jarrod? Harvey? Dustin? Ret?”
“I couldn’t see anything. I thought maybe one of them was shot,” Cindy said. She looked at the others. “Did any of you see anything?”
Sirens were growing louder. The other women shook their heads. Janice answered for all of them. “We ran. As soon as I could, I called 911. I didn’t know what was going on, but I wasn’t sticking around to find out.”
“It sounded like hundreds of bullets were fired,” Sally added. “I’ve never been so scared. I just wanted out of there.”
It seemed to Rory that the next hours were endless. She needed to get ready for work, but the police needed statements from them. She didn’t mind giving them a statement, but she really didn’t have much to say. Unfortunately, the stranger, whom she had never seen before, had collapsed and died just outside the apartment building.
The police insisted on using a gunshot residue kit to check each of their hands to ensure that none of the women had fired a weapon.Rory couldn’t blame them for being so thorough when she learned that the victim was named Peter Ramsey, and he was a detective in the police department.
Rory was careful not to speculate or tell the police officer questioning her that she was certain there were four men doing something very illegal in the neighborhood, because she had no idea what they were doing or any proof other than her suspicion. If they were selling drugs, that was a far cry from killing a detective. The other women must have felt the same, because no one else mentioned them either.
She was already running late by the time the police allowed her to rush upstairs and change. She’d texted her boss that she’d be driving rather than doing her customary walking, so no one could take her designated parking spot. Parking was always at a premium, and most of the time, she allowed others working at the bar to use her spot. She didn’t take the time to give herself a breathing treatment but used her inhaler. She even used the elevator rather than the stairs.
“We have to get our mail,” Lydia stated very loudly to someone Rory couldn’t see.
Rory had forgotten they were sorting mail. She did have two bills that had come in. Paper bills rather than online. Then there was the junk mail in her bag. She went to stand by Lydia.
“My bills are in the lounge as well,” she added, and pointed to her tote and the two envelopes on the end table. “Maybe you could just grab our mail for us?”
The officer nodded. “The lounge will be released soon. Forensics is still processing and will be for a while. But I can ask them if I can get the mail for you.”
He returned with their envelopes and bags. Rory shouldered hers, hugged Lydia, waved at the cop and hurried out to her car. After tossing the bag of junk mail into the trunk, she made her wayto the bar, sending up a silent prayer she wouldn’t forget to bring in the two bills she’d placed on the passenger seat when she came home that night.
The moment she entered the bar, Lani, one of the female bartenders who had covered her station, began whispering to her about two customers who were extremely hot. One had come in several times, always sitting at one of the tables in the shadows, never at the bar. Always in Rory’s section. Now, apparently, he was back with a friend.
“Dana’s waitressing, and she’s been flirting outrageously,” Lani said, ending her report.
Dana rarely went home alone, and she garnered more tips than any other waitress. Rory snuck a quick look at the two men at the table facing the bar. Her breath left her lungs in a rush. The newcomer was the most attractive man she’d ever seen in her life. She spent most of her time as a bartender, so she saw a lot of men, and this man was mesmerizing and charismatic, and she hadn’t even heard him speak.
Fortunately, it was extremely busy, requiring her to work fast and hard. She went on automatic pilot, although she remained aware of him in the room. She couldn’t help being aware each time Dana approached the table and asked if the two men needed a refill. She thought the waitress did so a little more often than necessary.
Rory couldn’t look directly at the man sitting at a table facing her station. He never came up to the bar to get drinks. She heard the gorgeous man call his companion Javier. Javier called her fantasy man Gideon. It wasn’t as if Gideon was handsome in the accepted sense of the word—he was all rough edges. He had hawklike features. Sharp and angular andintense. Sadly, he was ripped. That meant he was physically fit and wouldn’t do for her. Not at all. She couldn’t afford to fall for someone and have them destroy her when they walked away.
Dana went running every single day. She probably made sure that Gideon and Javier saw her very toned abs and rock-hard glutes. And thighs. Rory sighed. She had to face it. She was never going to have Dana’s perfect body no matter how hard she worked out in the gym. Worse, Dana was actually nice. Really nice. She shared her tips. She offered to babysit for Trudi, the only single mom working at the bar. She took crap shifts for others if they needed help. It wasn’t like you could hate on her because she was good-looking and had a killer body. If Rory expressed interest in Gideon, not only would she quit flirting with him, but she’d also try to get information about him for Rory. That was how nice Dana was.
Dana and Lani were two of the biggest reasons Rory loved working at the bar. Trudi was the third. The bar itself and her boss also factored into her reasons for deciding to stay in San Francisco for a longer time than she usually stayed anywhere. Between work and the friendships she was building at the apartments, she felt she had a good situation for the first time since she’d begun her life as a nomad, and she wasn’t going to allow it to be ruined by what happened at the apartments.
“I’m not getting the GhostWalker vibe off her,” Gideon said, his eyes on the woman talking to one of her many male customers.
It didn’t matter that her hair was piled on her head in a sloppy knot that was falling out tendril by wayward tendril; it was obvious she had masses of hair, and it was dark cherry red. The real deal. Cherry red. He’d never seen that color of hair on anyone before. Every time she moved under a light, it blazed into vibrant life. It was difficult to keep his eyes off her.
She had those eyes. A deep green. Emerald? Jade? No, emerald for certain. Her eyes sparkled when she talked to her customers.She looked directly at them even when she was mixing drinks, her rhythm never faltering. Sometimes she would laugh softly, the sound musical, turning heads no matter how low it was in the noise of the crowded bar.
“You’ve been here several times over the last couple of weeks, Javier.” Gideon made it a statement. It would be difficult to get anything past Javier.
Gideon had held out as long as he could. The doctor hadn’t given him permission to come see Rory in person, but he couldn’t resist the compulsion any longer. Javier wasn’t happy about it, but he’d come along to ensure that Gideon didn’t tear open any wounds. In other words, Gideon thought a little ironically, babysitting.
“I’ve watched her closely,” Javier admitted. “I can’t see any indication that she’s a GhostWalker, other than she has extraordinary reflexes. Her bartending skills are amazing. She’s fast and can handle multiple orders. She doesn’t seem to forget faces or names. On the other hand, I’ve followed her home every night, and she doesn’t run or exhibit any kind of behaviors or skills a GhostWalker might under cover of darkness. She walks, Gideon. Even if there’s a threat to her, which, on more than one occasion, I shut down.”
Gideon didn’t like that. The bartender everyone called Rory was a very attractive woman, although she didn’t seem to notice that she was. She didn’t flirt with her customers so much as genuinely try to connect in a friendly, positive way. If a man asked her out, she gave him a grin but refused gently.
