Page 10 of Ricochet

“How you been?” As I took a seat across from her in our usual booth, Blue sat as still as a statue on the floor beside Lauren.

“Good.” Her cheeks caved with a smile and my sensors flared on high alert. “Seeing someone new.”

“Who?”

“Her name’s Jade.”

Jade. Something about the name. Reminded me of jaded, being depressed and taking drugs. Three things I didn’t want Lauren to experience, after she’d already lost everything and everyone around her. We both shared a bond in that respect—the night I lost my family, she lost her mom and older brother in the same sweep.

Somehow, she’d bounced back from it better than I had, had worked harder than most kids her age to make a better life for herself, and planned to go to college.

“What’s her story?” The nice thing about Lauren’s gay preference was that I didn’t have to think about some misogynistic asshole pushing her around, though some of the chicks she dated could be ruthless in their own way. The last had left her crushed, starving herself for three straight days, before I finally had to whip her ass out of bed and convince her to keep going.

Me. I could hardly whip my own ass out of bed, yet there I was, dragging her across her apartment, shoveling food down her throat.

Hannah, the short, busty waitress who’d worked at Esteam’s for years, set a new cup in front of me and poured in coffee before petting Blue. “How ya been, Nick?”

I buried my groan in the cup of coffee, taking a sip, and before I’d set it down, Hannah had already left. Nothing personal. She’d asked me out two Wednesdays ago, and I just didn’t do the dating shit. Not even the fucking shit she’d offered in the same breath.

“Why you gotta be all … mean?” Lauren said. “Not like she asked you for a kidney.”

“I’d have given her a kidney to not ask me on a date.” I ushered her to continue. “So, Jade?”

“She’s cool.” A wily grin stretched her lips. “Different. Fun. She makes me laugh.”

The kicker. Find someone who makes you laugh, I’d once said to her, like I had any fucking business giving relationship advice to a teenage girl.

“Using my words as weapons, now, huh?”

Laughter spilled from her mouth, and I couldn’t help but smile back. The next five minutes were about to kill me as much as I knew they’d kill her, so I took a moment to enjoy the sound.

“Hey ….” Goddamn the queasy feeling in my stomach. “Lauren …”

“Uh-oh. That’s not good.” She leaned back into the booth, kicking up a knee between her and the table. “Any time you start with Lauren”—she attempted to mock my deep voice, lightening my somber thoughts—“I know it’s bad.”

“Something came up.” My jaw shifted, making it hard to form the words I’d practiced in my head so many times before. “I’m not gonna be around.”

Her face twisted to a frown, muscles twitching like she couldn’t formulate the right words either. We had a code, Lauren and me. Not a lot of questions. No ties.

“Already?” Like her eyes had gone into spasm, she couldn’t seem to stop blinking.

I couldn’t look at her, so instead I stared down at my traitorous face in the reflection of the coffee. I’d promised to take care of her, to protect her, and what I couldn’t tell her was that cutting off ties with her was the only way I could ensure she’d be safe. “I’ve got some stuff to take care of.”

“So … when you say you’re not going to be around, what exactly do you mean? Not around, like out of the country? Out of Detroit? Dead? How far away are we talking?”

She’d already broken the first rule, and I couldn’t blame her. We’d made the pact early on, when neither one of us had much invested in the other. Three years later, she was like a kid sister to me, one I tended to treat more like a daughter. A daughter I’d grown to love, assuming I was still capable of loving anything.

“You know the rules, Ren. I’ll continue to look out for you. But it’s safer if you don’t come around.”

Tears formed in her eyes, but before they could steal her pride, she shot her gaze toward Blue. “What about him? Who’s gonna take care of Blue?”

“Blue’s along for the ride.”

She triple, quadruple-blinked, kicking her head back toward the ceiling. “Well, your timing’s shit, as usual, Nick. I tell you I’m happy, you tear it down.”

“Hey, c’mon. Don’t say that.” I leaned to the side, trying to catch her attention. “Remember? We had a deal.”

“Fuck the deal. Whatever you’ve got going, I want in on it. I want to be a part of it.”