Women? Sure. I wasn’t under the delusion that women were any more innocent than their male counterparts.
Look at my mother. She made Satan look like a saint.
As far as I was concerned, both men and women had equal potential for evil, but Ididhave a line.
And it was the age of majority.
Ryker had tried to put me on a job with a kid once, and I had lost myfuckingshit. I told him that I didn’t care what he did, but if I found out he was taking jobs with kids as the marks, we were done.
At that point, I was valuable and dangerous enough that he couldn’t really argue with me. He just gave me one of his more considering looks and conceded.
“No kids.”He agreed, and since then, instead of spending my weeks between jobs at raves losing my mind on molly, I’ve been hunting down monsters like my mother… and Naomi has been helping.
You see, someone like me can’t really sit at a child’s play park and watch kids all day. The moms got understandably…antsy.
But Naomi could. She sits on a bench and makes small talk with the moms, all the while keeping an eye out specifically for kids who are showing signs of abuse.
Then, she comes back to my car, points out the kid… and then the real fun begins.
“That’s him,” she said, pointing out her tinted window to a small boy who had broken away from the crowded park. He was sullenly kicking an empty can down the sidewalk with his hands in his pockets on what I assumed was his way home.
“Put your seatbelt on,” I demanded, though I couldn’t look away from the child. He was holding his elbows close to him as if moving them too much hurt.
I narrowed my eyes, and Naomi rolled hers.
“Such a mother hen.” She smirked, pulling her belt across her waist and clipping it into place.
I shot her an affectionate grin and tapped her on the nose.
“Hey. Someone needs to look out for the Gnome,” I chirped, and she scowled.
“God. If our mother wasn’t already dead, I would kill her just for calling me Naomi. Gnome has to be the worst nickname in the history of nicknames,” she grumbled.
I laughed.
“Such a rough life you lead, little gnome.” I smirked, throwing the car into drive.
“Now, let’s find out what kind of monster is hurting this little kid so I can show them what a real monster looks like.”
Naomi gave me a smile that somehow crossed the line from innocent to sinister, and my heart swelled.
“Have I ever told you I’m so proud to call you my big brother?” she asked softly, and I glanced at her from behind my Ray-Bans, my tattooed fingers tightening on the supple leather of the steering wheel.
“I could stand to hear it more often.” I winked at her, and she laughed.
“You’re such a ham.” She giggled, and I cranked up the volume.
“Whatever. You love it. Now listen to Taylor. If you’re going to insist on blasting this shit in my car, you better fucking pay attention.”
Present Day
(Age twenty-seven)
Alexa, Play: Rescue Me - Unions
The first time I spoke to a dead person, I was eight years old. I didn’t know she was dead at the time. I just thought she was a nice old lady who wanted to read me a bedtime story.
Her name was Mrs. Williams, and she just sort of…appearedat the end of my bed. She read me one of my favorite Berenstain Bears books until I fell asleep.
