Cadillac Payback: Rising Tide by AJ Elmore (the false prince .TXT) 📕

Maria

Frederick is already at the garage when I get there. When I pull the Caddy into the bay, Spanky’s face goes bright red, and he starts fidgeting. If I speak to him, he’ll stutter when he answers.

The first time it happened, I had asked Freddy if he’s always like that. Apparently, it’s just when I’m here. I had asked why. His answer was a look of flat disbelief. I guess Spanky isn’t much of a Romeo.

I cut the engine and climb out. The garage smell makes me think of my brother, but I shove those thoughts away immediately. This situation is already emotional enough.

“Hey, Spanky, how are you?” I say with a little wave.

“I-I-I’m fine, M-Maria. How’r’you’doin?” he says.

He will only look me in the eye for a few seconds at a time.

“I’m ok,” I say, glancing at Frederick.

Usually he looks vaguely amused when Spanky starts floundering. Not today. He looks tired and there’s a crease across his forehead. I’ve seen him pissed, and I’ve seen him worn out. This is something else, something similar to when he returned from doing recon for our plan to blow up Gram’s operation. He’s stressed.

“She’s all yers, Freddeh,” Spanky says, vaguely waving a hand at the garage.

I notice he’s holding a greasy bag in the other hand, which he takes inside with him.

I lean back against the Caddy’s trunk, and wait to see if Freddy will speak first. It takes him a while to meet my eyes, so I scan the rest of him in the meantime. Black-framed glasses, pristine white t-shirt, stained jeans, black boots. Even in a plain t-shirt, he’s goddamned sexy.

My appraisal takes too long, because he’s watching me give him the once-over by the time I make it back to his face. Just for a flash, there’s hunger in his eyes, but he buries it. With a strong pang, I realize he’s something I’ll never have again. It wouldn’t be right to push those buttons.

He looks away, to the car, and says, “Any strange noises I should know about?”

I shake my head. There’s a painful knot forming in my throat, and it’s becoming clear that I don’t know how to say goodbye to him. I don’t want to, and I remind myself again that it’s not fair to expect him to stay. If he’s willing to face my grandmother’s assassins rather than stay in her ranks, he really has reached his breaking point.

He turns toward the hood, but he stops. He’s staring through the back window, and I remember the blood stains I couldn’t get all the way out of the seats.

“I have to get them redone again,” I say quietly.

I instantly regret saying again. The same thing happened to the passenger seat when Josh pulled him out of that other garage.

“You should at least cover it with a towel or something,” he says.

Always practical. He’s right, of course. Yet another reminder that I’ll be lost without him.

He opens the driver side door and pops the hood. As he starts looking around, I post up on top of a three-drawer tool chest and sit Indian style. I never paid attention when Charlie used to explain what was going on with the car. I always presumed there would be someone to do it for me. Another regret on the growing pile of them.

My eyes follow the rifle tattooed on his forearm, which reminds me of the skull and crossbones on his pec. The skull with the crooked crown and the knife in its mouth. What a fitting image for him.

“I met Izzy’s ex-fiancée,” he says without looking away from the car’s innards.

The words snap me out of my inner rambling, and I frown. Frederick isn’t the type for small talk, but at least he’s talking to me. Surely he can feel my tension. He always could.

“What’s she like?” I say.

It’s hard to imagine Izzy with a fiancée at all, but I guess there must be a reason he was always so emotionally closed off.

“Top notch cunt,” he says, which surprises a laugh out of me.

“Seriously,” he says. “Perfect hair, perfect make up, nails, all that shit. Probably spends more on her wardrobe then it costs to feed us for a year. She looks at everyone like they’re her servants. She has him dressed up like her personal Ken doll.”

My eyes go wide and the laugh dies.

“That doesn’t sound like Isaiah at all,” I say.

He shakes his head and stands straight. His eyes skip to the tool chest, then to me. His shoulders rise and fall, and I realize he’s hesitating. Then he comes over and opens the top drawer. He’s close enough that I can smell his bath products, and I find I’m squashing the same desire that stirred in me earlier.

He doesn’t look at me when he says, “Doesn’t sound like the Izzy we knew, but he had a whole life before us that nobody knew. Apparently that life was filled with really expensive shit and Florida beaches.”

He grabs whatever tool he’s after, and retreats. I breathe silent relief. His proximity is a little too heady.

Again, he’s right. To my knowledge, not even Charlie knew much about Isaiah’s past.

“Anyway, you’d hate her,” he says and ducks back into whatever he’s doing.

“How is he, though?” I say.

Freddy’s hands stop moving, and he looks over at me.

“He’s miserable.”

Right. Of course. Freddy has already told me as much.

There’s a part of me that wants to see Isaiah, just to know he was well before this. But then I think of the disgust in his eyes when he showed up to save my ass. He wouldn’t want to see me. At least, for once, it’s not my fault that he’s miserable.

I draw my knees up against my chest, wrap my arms around them, and rest my chin on my knees. Freddy’s attention is back on the car, but I see him glance over at the movement.

He says, “Izzy has changed. He’s bolder, more attitude. I almost