“George,” she said, her voice flat and cold. “What do you want?”
Bruiser George grinned at her. It wasn’t a pleasant smile. “Is that any way to greet an old friend, girlie?”
They weren’t friends. Wiry and weaselly, with a mouth that was always twisted into a leer and hands that liked to hurt people, he didn’t have any friends as far as Vivian could tell.
She didn’t reply, just waited. His eyes narrowed, and he held out his hand. “Let’s go for a spin, all nice and normal-like, and I’ll tell you why the boss lady sent me.”
“Not damned likely,” Vivian said softly. She didn’t want to attract any more attention by starting an argument in the middle of the dance floor. But she was even more certain that she didn’t want to let him touch her. “I’ll buy you a drink, and you’re lucky to get that much here.”
George scowled but followed her to the bar without argument.
Vivian led him to the side where Danny wasn’t working. She wanted to find out what George was there to say and send him on his way, not risk someone starting a fight. When George ordered his drink and said with breezy confidence that she would be paying for it, she received a worried look from the bartender. He knew trouble when he saw it, even if he was too new to recognize it by name.
“I’m good for it,” she said, giving him a nod. “And he won’t be staying long.” Up onstage, Bea was belting out “Everybody Loves My Baby,” sweet and fast, with the trumpet playing counterpoint.
“What does Mrs. Wilson want?” Vivian asked quietly as George took a long, satisfied drink. Hattie Wilson was the only “boss lady” in Bruiser George’s life. “It had better not be anything to do with this place or anyone in it.”
George smirked. “No need to show your claws, little cat. I’m not here for anything too messy or nasty. Just a little favor is all. You’ll be making a delivery tomorrow to a Mrs. Morris. Boss lady wants you to retrieve a letter of Mr. Morris’s. It’ll be somewhere in his bedroom—they keep separate ones, right next to each other with a sitting room in between—and not in his study or office. You’ll know it because the stationery saysSwan’s Point.”
Vivian didn’t ask how he knew about another couple’s bedrooms; it wasn’t hard to picture Hattie gathering details about the lives and homes of the city’s wealthy families. But at the rest of George’s statement, Vivian felt the same sort of cold that she’d felt after Eddie drove straight to her front door. “And how does Mrs. Wilson know where I’ll be making deliveries? Usually I don’t even know that until I get to work.”
George just laughed. “You think you’re the only one who owes the boss a little favor?”
“That’s not a little favor,” Vivian said sharply. “I could get arrested for prowling around someone’s house stealing their things. Not interested, thanks. Tell her to come up with something else.”
She would have turned away, but Bruiser George caught her wrist. He was smaller than his buddy Eddie, but still bigger than Vivian. “Don’t be stupid, girlie, or the boss’ll get angry,” he said, soft and menacing. “You owe her. Just do what you’re told, nice and quiet and no one the wiser, and you won’t need to worry about anything.”
Vivian stared into George’s eyes, hating every inch of him. “Fine,” she said, deliberately even, and just as deliberately not pulling her hand away. She wouldn’t let him see how scared he made her. “Swan’s Point, you said?”
“There’s a good girl,” he said, smiling. “She’ll be in touch once you’ve got—”
“Vivian.”
The voice cut through their conversation, raised just enough above the music for them to hear it. Vivian whipped her head up to see Leo pushing his way across the dance floor, his eyes dark with fury and locked on where George’s fingers still gripped her wrist.
George sighed, but he didn’t stop smiling as he dropped her arm at last. “See you around, girlie.” He nodded to her with exaggerated politeness and headed toward the back door.
Leo reached her only moments later. “Are you okay?” he demanded, catching her upper arms as he looked her over, head to toe. “Wasn’t that one of Mrs. Wilson’s boys?”
“I’m fine, and yes, but don’t make a scene, okay? There’s nothing too—”
She hissed as one of Leo’s hands met her wrist. There were angry red marks where George had held her. Vivian grimaced, but it wasn’t bad enough to leave bruises. She would have happily ignored it. But then a finger caught her under the chin, lifting her gaze until she was looking at Leo. He leaned forward and brushed a gentle kiss across her lips, one so at odds with the murderous look in his eyes that it made her feel cold all over.
“I’m going to kill him,” Leo whispered, and turned to head for the back door.
“No.”Vivian lurched after him, catching his arm and leaning all her weight back to bring him to a stop.
“I’ll send him back to his boss in goddamnpieces—”
“Please,Leo, just let him go, okay?”
Leo’s head whipped around, the glare he gave her as fierce as the one he had directed at George’s retreating back. It almost startled her into letting go of his arm—she’d seen Leo angry before, even seen him in a fight. But he’d rarely turned a look like that on her. “Like hell, Viv, you can’t let a fella like him get away with—”
“No,” she snapped, still barely above a whisper. “I know just as much about dealing witha fella like himas you do, thanks. And right now, what I know is that I’ve only got a few days to outrun a charge for murder, and his boss knows it. So what do you think she’s going to do if I make her angry? If you send one of her boys backin pieces?”
“He hurt you,” Leo said.
The anger in his expression hadn’t disappeared, and his voice was hard as jagged glass. All around them, the dancers dipped and swayed their way across the floor while Bea crooned a love song from the bandstand. A group of men and women jostled past them to get to the bar, none of them giving Leo or Vivian a second glance. At the door, Bruiser George had stopped to look back through the crowd, and he smiled when he saw Vivian holding Leo back from following him.
