Except, as I scanned for exits and threats, the former was limited to the back stairs, which we’d come down.The stairs to the main bar upstairs were closed off.Only people who knew about the back door to this place could enter the basement tonight.
And Ellie knew each face.The numerous hugs that followed were harmless.And whoever outfitted her with a tiara and a feather boa wasn’t threatening either.
I recognized Tall Bob and Casey.After delivering my drink, Kat flitted behind the bar occasionally to serve others.I swirled the alcohol in my glass, and settled near the cluster of small couches and overstuffed chairs that created conversation centers and a place to park her coat.Ellie took center stage on a leather bar stool and bounced between talking and toasts.
“Hey, Ellie, who’s your next victim over there?”
I wasnota victim.
“That’s Ringo, you know… like the guy in that western.He’s an educated man.”
I knew that movie at least.It was one of my mother’s favorites and one of the few memorable things we had in common.
Kat joined the group and stood in the space next to me.“That movie’s a classic.”
Someone from her group asked, “Hey Ringo, can you spin a gun around like that?”
The devil on my shoulder tapped once and took over.“Naw, but I can spin a knife.”With that declaration, I flicked out the blade hidden under my cuff and showed off…just a small amount.
When I tucked the knife back into its spring-loaded sheath, I laughed.Her friends laughed, too.Except for Casey.He stared at me like I’d just proven myself to be a threat.The knowledge in his eyes reached back decades.I extracted myself from a lame conversation to approach.
“Ringo Devlin.”He spat my name like a warning shot.
“Did you look me up?”I’d done a thorough background on him.He was ex-cop with a black mark on his record—one bold enough to make his benefits disappear with a pen stroke.The sale of the bar to Ellie and Kat eliminated his debts.Since that time, he’d been unremarkable.
He leaned in.“Scuttle is, you ain’t Irish.”
“My mother would slap you for saying that.”That was no joke.She wouldn’t care if he was an ex-cop or a real one.Neither did I, if the truth needed to be told.But if the streets were whispering already, that meant someone in the families talked.“Who whispered that in your ear?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
Fucker.Since he was Ellie’s former boss and a good friend, I couldn’t kill him.Yet.
13
Ellie
“You’re fooling yourself,” Kat whispered in my ear.
I paused, mid sip of the virgin cosmo I asked her to make for me.“What?”
“Don’t make me repeat myself.That man.”Her head tilted toward Ringo.
She didn’t have to say the rest.My brain was already screaming it.Or maybe it was my pussy, or my stupid, stupid heart.I was putting up a good fight, and that’s about all I had going right now.“I’m tired of fighting it.”
Her eyes went a little wide.“It?”
“You know…”
The glance she shot to the chair where Ringo sat by the door was obvious.Her voice lowered.“It?”
“Yes,it.I had sex with him in Italy and it was good.No.Not good.Cosmically altering.”
Her jaw canted a little to the side as she absorbed my words.“For six months you strung the baby-faced guy with the barely legal mustache along and never once mentioned anything cosmically related.You were a veritable saint—which I know you ain’t—and then you know Mr.Dangerously Sexy over there what, one day…two?”
She was fishing.
“One day was on the plane.We sat together.”
