Couldn’t deny it. “There a reason he’s hitting the edibles?”
“Trying to stay off the smokes. Also, he ain’t good at doing nothing. Think he was more riled up than I was while you were gone.”
“Pacing a hole in the floor?”
“Metaphorically.”
I opened the pizza box without paying attention to what was inside, grabbed a slice, and folded it in half to shovel quickly into my mouth. “What about you? Did it trigger you to see him laid up again?”
“Don’t psychoanalyse me, father. Not when I’m fat and drunk.”
He didn’t seem that drunk to me, but I let it go all the same, my head too full of other things to absorb much of anyone else’s.
I ate my pizza and listened to Cam and Nash talk shop, all the while stealing glances at Mateo while he stole glances at me.
We both failed. Rubi caught every single one.
He knows.
Maybe.
Did I care?
No.
I got up to clear the mess from the table for no other reason than I wanted to brush past Mateo. But he wasn’t there. In the split second I’d looked away, he’d disappeared.
“He went for a smoke,” Rubi supplied.
“Didn’t ask, brother.”
“Don’t ask the stars to shine either, but there’s some shit you can’t control, ain’t there?”
“Cute.”
“Profound. Off you fuck.”
Rubi’s grin expanded to Cheshire-cat territory. I flipped him off with both hands and ducked out of the open back door.
I smelt weed smoke the second my boot hit concrete, but I forced myself to trek to the bins before I followed the trail to Mateo.
Then it was like I had a magnet in my chest and Mateo was made of steel. I ducked through the shadows until I saw his silhouette beneath the security light by the gates.
Folk was on duty, but for once he’d escaped Mateo’s nuclear glare and was going about his business without a target on his back.
“You got the memo then?”
At the sound of my voice, Mateo turned and his lips turned up in a gentle smile. “What memo?”
“About him.” I tipped my head at Folk. “He passed Alexei’s test.”
“Lucky him.”
“Still unconvinced?”
“Ask me tomorrow. I’m not thinking about Crow rejects right now.”
“What are you thinking about?”
