“Don’t do it,” the guy snarled, turning his arrow toward her.
She halted before she could smack me with it.
Great, now I owed the muscular Cupid.
Glass shattered from somewhere behind us.
She jumped. “You don’t have to break everything,” she yelled.
As an answer, something heavy crashed to the floor.
She shook her head. “Why are you here? Rumor has it you steal stuff and then give it away to poor people. I am a poor person. I could almost be a charity, dude.”
I couldn’t see anything behind the mask, but I swore he smiled. His body was cut, and his black jeans were form-fitting. I’d estimate the size of his boots at maybe a thirteen or fourteen, which fit with his extraordinary height. I couldn’t tell his age, but something felt young to me. Maybe it was just the mask and crazy hair.
“Are you about done?” he called out.
“Still on it,” another tinny voice called back as what sounded like a heavy piece of furniture was turned over. They were destroying the place.
A migraine tried to poke through my left eye. “Are you following me?”
“Nope. You seem to be in the right place at the right time,” he said.
The story of my life. Could I lunge at him and take him down? He had the arrow nocked and aimed in our direction. He could certainly get off a shot before I reached him.
“What’s your deal anyway?” I asked.
“Just a good Samaritan,” he returned, seeming pretty much at ease while committing armed robbery.
“You’re not a good Samaritan. You keep a quarter of the loot,” I said.
“Hey, I’m working my ass off here,” he returned.
How unoriginal. “Are you going to take that from him?” I asked Lisa. “He’s stealing from you.”
The woman seemed seriously unhinged. Maybe she’d charge him so I could leap behind her and grab the weapon.
“He’s got an arrow pointed at us, a steel-tipped one,” she snapped.
So she did have a sense of right and wrong, or at least for self-preservation.
The other two Cupids returned.
“We got everything of value,” the widest guy said. “Even some good hunting knives from the back.” I doubt these guys knew decent stemware because they still hadn’t taken several good glass pieces. But they’d no doubt stolen some valuables.
“Take the Depression glass and the Belleek china from Ireland,” the head Cupid said, pointing toward the side booth.
“The what?” the widest guy asked.
The guy in the black shirt sighed. “The pink shit and the white ceramic with the green clovers.”
“Oh.” The other Cupid lumbered toward the china. He stepped onto the spilled marbles and yelled, throwing his bag up in the air and falling hard. He kicked out one foot and nailed me in the ankle. Pain clashed through my foot, and I yelped, crashing down on top of him. My hand landed on his mask, and I slid it to the side before shoving it back into place. The voice distorter was thick but I didn’t see it.
What the hell? ItwasLenny. I’d just positively identified one of the Cupids.
I covered the action as much as I could and scrambled away from him, falling onto the marbles and sliding back on my bruised butt, sending them spinning. Wincing, I stood and wiped marbles off my coat, already covered in ink, paint, glittery water, and perfume, which made the spices stick to me all over. I was sure they were in my hair and on my face, too.
Lenny stood, fetched his bag, and hurried over to get the pink glasses, kicking marbles out of his way.
