him to pass the salt. “I’ll be done in a second.”
AC/DC’s breath pistoned her ear, and she felt the suggestive grind of his hips against her.
“In your dreams, asshole,” she said, and simply let her knees go, dragging him over. When his center of gravity was higher than hers she flowed forward, then quickly reversed, whipping his own momentum against him into a shoulder roll. He grabbed a handful of her hair on the way over, and she ended up on his back. He flailed and bucked, trying to throw her off, but she had her arm around his neck and she applied pressure, cutting off blood flow until his body went slack.
And then she kept on holding the pressure, fury mounting. Stop it, you’ll kill him, something told her, but it was a small voice, and she wasn’t really in the mood to listen anyway.
She kept choking him until a baseball bat slammed splinters out of the wood floor right next to her.
She looked up to see the bartender/owner—Sol himself?—his face purple with fury, pull back for a straight-for-the-bleachers swing at her head. She let go and held up her hands. He didn’t lower the bat as she got to her feet.
“Cops are on the way,” he said, which was the longest speech she’d heard from him yet. “Take your boyfriend and get the hell out. Don’t come back.”
Jazz fought off an adrenaline-hot wave of dizziness and went to where Borden sat crumpled against the wall. He was probing his bleeding mouth and looking dazed. She grabbed a leather-clad elbow and dragged him to his feet.
“Let’s go,” she said, and guided him toward the door. He yanked free after a couple of steps and staggered back for something.
The red envelope, lying on the floor.
He tucked it into his jacket and followed her out, stumbling over the two prone bodies.
Outside, the night was cool and quiet, stars shining in a cloudless sky. A blurry bass beat thumped from a dance club down the street, and the sidewalk was thick with teenagers trying to look sullen while they waited their turn at the red velvet rope. Jazz turned left, heading uptown. Borden caught up with her in a couple of long-legged, stumbling steps. He was wiping blood from his face with a clean white handkerchief.
“Are you okay?” he asked her.
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Your lip…”
“It’s nothing,” Jazz said, and tasted blood. She dabbed at the cut on her lip and couldn’t remember when she’d picked it up. “How about you? No broken bones?”
“Bruised ego. Among other things.”
“You know, the tough-guy act? Really not all that convincing.” She stepped out to wave down a cab, but it sped up and passed her by. Maybe the problem was the ad for Armor All lurking next to her. He really did look like he’d been whomped pretty good. She muttered a curse and took the handkerchief away from his face to inspect him with merciless authority. “You’ll live. You’ll have a nice shiner, though. And you should see a dentist, he popped you in the mouth pretty good. What about the ribs?”
He winced when she probed them, but they didn’t feel broken. Just bruised, probably. She pulled up his shirt to see bruises forming across smooth, trembling lines of muscle. His skin felt flushed and velvet soft.
“Hey!” He smacked her hands away. “I’m all right.”
“You were lucky,” she said, unapologetic. “If you’ve got a perforated lung, fine, go aspirate blood in peace. And don’t bother me anymore. Thanks for ruining my night. I was starting to like that bar.”
She hailed another cab, but it passed her by. Probably a bad block. She decided to keep walking, put some more distance between herself and Sol’s. Any cop with half a brain would be able to pick Borden out of a crowd from a description, wearing that stupid Harley ensemble.
Speaking of which, Borden wasn’t going away. As she started walking again, he fell in behind her, her own personal black-leather shadow.
“Stop following me.”
“I can’t.”
“Trust me, you can. Just quit putting one foot in front of the other.”
He kept following. She walked faster. That wasn’t an issue for him, considering the length of his legs. She rounded on him after another half a block, fists clenched, knuckles wincing at the pressure. “Are you deaf? Get lost, idiot! I know you speak English!”
His nose was still bleeding, but only a trickle. He wiped it absently and held out the envelope. “Take it.”
“Oh, Jesus!” she yelled, out of patience, then grabbed it and waved him off. “Fine, whatever.”
He didn’t move.
“Oh, for God’s sake—look, you’ve done your duty, I’ve got it, whatever the hell it is, now would you please just—”
“Open it,” he said again, and this time he sounded like he meant it. “I’m not going anywhere until you do.”
She eyed him for a few seconds. His gel-spiked hair really was stupid, but the leather might have looked halfway decent on somebody it suited; he’d probably bought it because he’d been spooked at the prospect of coming to the bad side of town and trolling tough streets. Leather had probably seemed like a smart choice. And hell, it had probably kept his ribs from breaking, so maybe he’d been right after all.
“Lose the jacket,” she said, and turned and walked away. She heard the sound of metal zippers and jingling chains, and glanced over her shoulder to see that he’d taken off the jacket and had it draped over one shoulder. A black stretch shirt, black leather pants…yeah, that was all right. Maybe the leather pants were little more than just all right, not that she’d ever admit it.
“I mean it,” she said. “Lose the jacket. Dump it, unless you want us both to get picked up for assault.”
She pointed at an alley, where a homeless guy lay rolled up in newspaper.
Borden stared at her. “You’re not serious.”
“You want to talk to me, get rid of the thing. The cops will be all over us if you drag it around.”
“Do you know how much this thing cost?”
“Don’t care.” She resorted to flattery. “You look better without it.”
He hesitated, then walked over and handed it to the homeless guy, who clutched it in utter shock and hurried off into the shadows, probably intent on selling it, because he knew he’d never be able to hang on to it on the streets. Jazz wished him the best deal, a warm bed and the rest of the Irish whiskey she knew she wouldn’t get to drink, at least tonight.
She wished Borden would move closer so that she could lose herself in that smell again, warm and cinnamon-soft. The tide of adrenaline was dropping, and it left her feeling weak and shaky.
The paper felt stiff and warm in her hand.
Borden silently trailed her as she took a right turn at the corner, up Commerce, and headed for a Starbucks half a block up. He’d look all right in a Starbucks, she wouldn’t look wrong, and nobody looked for fugitives among the latte-and-mocha set.
The place was packed, full of chatting couples and groups of friends and a few dedicated, lonely laptop users looking pale and focused in the glow of their screens. She pointed Borden to a side table, near the corner, and ordered two plain coffees from the barista. He’d probably prefer a soy half-caff mocha-something, but that wasn’t her problem, and she wasn’t that committed to the conversation. Even the regular coffee cost an arm and a leg, and she hardly had a lot of money to burn, considering her state of unemployment didn’t look likely to end soon.
Besides, since she couldn’t go back to Sol’s, she’d have to save her booze allowance for a more expensive bar.