I didn’t have to ask twice. Alex grabbed me by the shoulders and kissed me, long and deep. At first, I continued to keep my arms folded across my chest, but it didn’t take long before I was pulling his shirt over his head and he was tugging mine off too. We let our hands and our mouths roam freely and quickly consummated our relationship on the kitchen floor. This was the first time I’d ever come at exactly the same moment as the person I was with. It was explosive; the sense of relief exquisite.
Then we moved into my bedroom and took our time. After two more orgasms, I was spent.
“Can I ask you something?” I said as we laid side by side in my bed. Alex’s chest was covered in a fine layer of perspiration, some of which had rubbed off onto me.
“Sure,” he said.
“Why are you doing this?”
That was the first time I’d heard him give a genuine belly laugh. “Are you kidding? I’ve wanted to do this since the day I met you.”
“Not this,” I said. “I meant why are you helping me? I know you didn’t want to. Agent Diaz told me he’d tried for years to get you to testify against the Russians and you refused. So why now? What did he promise you?”
“The same thing the FBI promises everyone who agrees to testify in a case like this. Witness Protection.”
“But you could’ve gotten that anytime. What changed?”
He shrugged. “Seemed like the right time, I guess.” Then he rolled over onto his side so his back was facing me. He yawned loudly then went silent, and I assumed he’d fallen asleep. I was starting to drift off too, when he suddenly said, “I was a lot like MJ when I was a kid. I got good grades, played sports, all the parents liked me.”
I was afraid to speak. Afraid I might say the wrong thing and he’d clam up again. But I was equally afraid if I didn’t speak, he might think I was sleeping, or worse, that I didn’t care. “So what happened to change your trajectory?”
Alex let out a laugh and rolled over onto his back. “I love the way you talk.”
“How do I talk?”
“With a lot of fancy words. And you make everything sound like a big project or some problem for you to fix.”
From someone else I might’ve taken that as a compliment, but not the way Alex said it. “Sorry.”
Alex turned to face me. “Don’t apologize. I like your fancy words. And you’re good at fixing things. I’m really grateful for what you’ve done for the kids.”
“Anyone would’ve done the same.”
“That’s not true,” he said, suddenly angry. “No one did anything for those kids. Not one person. Only you. And what you’re doing now…I can’t imagine anyone else taking on Igor. I think you’re amazing.”
I laughed. “No need to flatter me. You already got me into bed.”
Alex rolled on top of me. “What if I said you could never leave, that I want this to last forever?”
“I would say I have to go to work in the morning and so do you, but there’s a good chance of this happening again. Just not tonight. I’m a little sore.”
“Sorry,” he said and rolled off me.
“I’m not complaining.” We may not have been compatible outside the bedroom, but we were definitely compatible inside it.
“Good,” he said, clearly proud of himself.
I didn’t want to have sex again, but I did want him to keep talking. “So you were telling me…what happened to change your trajectory?”
Alex chuckled and shook his head, then his smile disappeared. “My dad died when I was thirteen.”
“I’m so sorry, Alex. That must’ve been horrible for you.”
“For all of us. But I was with him. I watched him die.”
“Oh my god.”
Alex turned away from me and stared up at the ceiling. “We were driving home from my baseball game. My dad came to all my games. I was good. Really good. My parents were hoping I’d get a scholarship because there was no money for college. We were stopped at a red light when two cars came up on either side of us. My dad realized what was happening before I did. He pushed me down. Saved my life. The bullet smashed my window and hit him in the head.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“He didn’t do nothing wrong. Didn’t even know the guys. Just a bunch of gangbangers having a turf war.”
“I’m so sorry, Alex. That is truly horrible.”
“What’s it called? Irony? He never even got a traffic ticket. Worked construction. That ain’t easy money. My mom cleaned for rich people. But she couldn’t pay the mortgage on that. We thought we were gonna lose the house.”
“But you didn’t,” I said. “You still own it.”
“Yes. And someday it’ll belong to MJ and Sofia.”
“What happened? How did your mom get the money?”
“She didn’t. I did.”
I stayed quiet and eventually Alex continued.
“At first, I was just a lookout. I’d let the guys know if the cops were around. But as I got older, Lucky gave me more responsibility.”
“Lucky?”
“Carlos Lucky Lopez, your friendly neighborhood drug dealer. He got the nickname because a lot of guys around him got taken out, either by a bullet or by the cops, but somehow Lucky always managed to survive. Until he didn’t. I was his number two when one of the Bloods finally got him. I took over when he was gone.”
“So, you sort of fell into the drug business?”
“You could say that.”
“But you stayed.”
“Yeah, Grace, I stayed. I’m a high school dropout. What else was I supposed to do? Go work at McDonald’s for minimum wage? Break my back in construction like my old man until somebody blows my brains out for no reason?”
I didn’t respond because I didn’t know what to say.
“If you want to know why I’m doing this,” he continued, his voice still tinged with anger, “it’s because I don’t want MJ to end up like me. I want him to end up like you.”
“I’d help MJ anyway. Sofia too. This isn’t a quid pro quo.”
“I know, but you wouldn’t back off this thing with Igor. When Roberto came to me and told me he was thinking of letting you do this I told him he was nuts, that you both were. But he took a lot of heat when your husband died and he had to shut down his investigation. He wasn’t gonna pass up a second chance. He wants to get Igor almost as much as you do.”
“So you’re doing this to help both of us?”
“No. I told you, I’m doing this for MJ and Sofia. So they can keep living with you. That’s not gonna happen if you do something stupid and get yourself killed. Did you think Roberto was kidding when he said my job was to keep you alive?”
After a long pause, I said, “The kids may not get to stay with me anyway. Your sister’s made no secret of wanting them back.”
He sighed. “Yeah, I know.”
“Janelle says it’s going to happen. If Maria stays clean, the court will grant her custody again. There’s nothing I can do to stop it.”
Alex rolled over so his back was facing me. “It’s late. Let’s get some sleep.”
The next morning, Igor and Sergey walked into the gallery ten minutes after I did. It made me wonder if they weren’t watching the security cameras waiting for me to arrive. Only Igor joined me in the office. I knew Sergey was nearby, but as long as I didn’t have to be alone with him, I was okay with that.
Igor took his usual spot on the couch, and I swallowed my anger and pasted a smile on my face.
“How’s your aunt?” he asked.
“Getting better,” I said, focusing on a spot on the wall behind his head so I didn’t have to look at his face. “Thank you for the flowers, by the way.”
He waved away my thanks. “You’re behind on your invoices.”
“I know. I’ll get them out today.”
“I need you to increase the retainers by ten percent each.”
“Okay. Any particular reason?” I tried not to stare at the pencil cup. I knew the recording pen was in there, but I had a hard time recognizing it since it looked exactly the same as the rest of the pens. I only knew which one held the recording device because it was heavier than the others. I hoped the battery hadn’t died. I’d been at my aunt’s house for the last two weeks so I hadn’t been able to change it out.
“Because I told you to,” Igor said and stood up. “I’ll be back later with more files. Send out the invoices by the end of the day.”
I didn’t ask or else what? But I wondered.