Cocky Secrets (Cocker Brothers #29)

82. Meg

EIGHTY-TWO

Meg

“ W hy don’t you stay at my place tonight?” I murmur against his lips.

“Done and done. Let’s get out of here.” He gives me a smirk loaded with sexual promises.

We set our empty cups on the table. He drops a five on them and I raise my eyebrows. “You’re very generous.”

“They need the money. I don’t.”

His tone wasn’t boastful. It was simply frank and without apology. Of course it inspires new questions in my mind. There are so many things I want to learn. Their life sounds so exciting and different from my own. I like it here, but I have thought about leaving. I know everything about this town. Nothing is new, and the world is so big. I feel I’ve played life too safe. I have a routine that is nothing if not boring and stagnant, but I didn’t know that until now. He’s got me buzzing with a desire for more.

As he shoves those muscles back into the confines of his leather jacket, I gently ask, “How do you get money?”

“People donate as a thanks. We also take it from the fucks who didn’t deserve it, who got it by illegal means.” Off of my questioning expression, he explains, “Drug dealers have shitloads of cash lying around. When we put them in line, they don’t get to keep it. We use it to fund our efforts. And we spread it around, like you see me doing.”

“You left the waiter at Cirino’s a huge tip, more than our bill. Do you do that a lot?”

He nods and rests his hand on the small of my back, guiding me out of Café Mekka. The icy air shocks my skin as we step into the night, sounds of the festival replacing those from inside.

Lizzy was right.

Everyone is out tonight.

This is the busiest night we’ve had yet this year. I’m sure people from Truckee, Chicago Park, Colfax, Auburn, Grass Valley, Lake of the Pines, and even tiny Weimar, have all come to join the celebration. He and I are forced to move slowly and when I feel him stop I glance to his face to discover an odd look on it.

“What is it?” I search to see what has him so enthralled. There’s a boy no more than eleven playing a violin, its case open upon the snow-covered sidewalk at his small feet. He plays as if he’s hiding behind it, the shyness apparent in how he won’t look at any passersby. My fingers lose blood from how hard Antonio is squeezing them.

“He’s so talented, isn’t he?” I ask with a smile.

Antonio didn’t seem to hear me. He has the most enigmatic look on his face until he mumbles something that moves me deeply. “He looks like a boy I knew as a kid. My best friend at one of the homes. He was their son. I was their project. He protected me.”

As I watch him listen to the child playing as though he’s back in time, and seeing a hero he didn’t know he missed, a lump grows in my throat. “Are you still friends? Did you keep in touch?”

“Nah,” he mutters. “His father was a mean son of a bitch. I was his punching bag. Luke never got touched, and he knew it so he’d jump in the way to stop the beatings. His dad never touched him. Sick fuck.”

Up ahead a woman shouts, “Stop him! He stole my purse!” and Antonio comes to life, the memories washed away in an instant. “Stay here!” he growls, releasing my hand and taking off, weaving through people like someone trained to do it. I break into a run and follow him, muttering countless apologies as I bump into people.

There’s a woman in her late sixties, panting and staring off, so I go to her. “Are you the woman who cried out?”

She nods, shaken up. “Yes! That man went after him! Two bikers!”

I don’t understand…two bikers?

She points ahead but I can’t see Antonio anymore. She and I start walking fast, and then I leave her behind as I burst into a sprint, shouting, “Excuse me! Excuse me!!!”

At the end of the street near the Christmas tree is a gang of nine dangerous men all wearing leather jackets with patches that read, “Lucifer’s Army.” One of them is waving a purse as horrified locals and tourists slowly gather to watch the gang circle Antonio.

They all take turns taunting him.

“Look at what we caught! A real honest-to-God Cipher !”

Another sneers, “Took the bait like a good little pussy.”

“Fuckin’ Ciphers. Giving the rest of us all a bad name.”

“You make me sick!”

“When we heard you were in town, and alone? Oh, man, we couldn’t believe our ears, man.”

“Christmas miracles do exist, huh, Bubba?”

The woman joins me and grabs my arm. “That’s my purse!”

I nod, glued to the scene before me, every muscle in my body tense with fear.

“Bubba?” Antonio snarls with an amused gleam. “That’s the best nickname you could come up with?”

“What’s yours? Pansy?”

Bending at the knees, Antonio growls, “Honey Badger.” He lunges and lands a punch on one of the bikers that knocks the guy out cold. The crowd gasps. As another rushes him from behind, Antonio kicks backward like some Karate master and sends the guy reeling. Two come at him and he dips out of the way and shoves them into each other. But there are too many of them and soon he is over powered. It gets worse and worse, them kicking and punching him, laughing the whole time.

I start screaming, “Help him!”

The woman shouts with me, “Help him! He tried to rescue my purse! Help him!!! ”

I see my Aunt Lizzy in the stunned audience, and shout her name. She snaps out of her trance and shouts around her, “Bob! Harry! Lewis! That’s Margaret’s man! He needs your help!”

The waiter, off from his shift and all bundled up in a heavy coat and scarf, yells, “That guy gave me a hundred dollar tip! Come on! Help him!” He leaps into the chaos.

That was the breaking point.

Their fear is replaced by courage and rage.

“Nobody bullies in our town!” Their shouts blend with their roars — men who’ve never fought in their whole lives. Fathers and sons all jump in and take down Lucifer’s Army until the intruders are all unconscious.

I rush to Antonio. He’s out, too, a bloody mess. I touch his neck to see if he has a pulse and give a strangled cry, “Call an ambulance!” I lean down and stroke his head as I keep whispering, “I’m here. I’m here. I’m here.”

A cacophony of voices is all around me. New people want to know what happened. Others are shouting to call the cops while more answer that it’s done, and they’re coming. The ambulance, too.

The woman walks to me, hands shaking as she holds her recovered purse. “Is he going to be alright?”

I start to cry and tell her, “He has to be. He just has to be!”