No Brainer ( The Darcy Walker Series #2) (34 page)

Stepping up to his bathroom mirror, I pulled my cosmetics bag out of my purse and slid red lipstick on my lips. Taking a few swipes at my lashes with black mascara, I next patted on a minimal amount of pink blush. Lastly, I pumped body spray in the air, danced into it, then gagged two times ending with a snort. I tried to enhance my best assets, but a good chance existed that I looked like trailer-trash Barbie.

You can plan and think you’ve got your bases covered for all scenarios, but occasionally you run into a plot that blows your plans out of the water. What I did better than anyone was think on my feet. As I made my way back down the hallway, an unexpected someone proceeded to mess with my plan.

Zander groggily stepped into my path.

If only I had some chloroform…

“Whoa,” he whistled, “you look delish. Are you taking me with?” This could go one of two ways. I could tell him the invitation included me only—which it did—or I could tell him I’d planned for him to join me and to hurry and get dressed. Since rebels liked to drag someone down with them, I figured it wouldn’t be a hard sell.

I simply agreed, “Yeah.”

“Really?” he squealed. “Where to?”

“To a party with Kyd and Tricky.” The boy acted slap happy, bouncing all over the walls—especially when I informed him that Dylan didn’t make the invite list—and our blood clause demanded a silent oath he’d carry to the grave. My iniquity engineer side surfaced—just sin, sin, and more sin—but I really didn’t see another recourse.

Zander ducked inside to change and seconds later stepped outside wearing a Cincinnati Reds shirt, baseball cap, matching athletic shorts, and black Adidas sneakers.

Everything that reeked of tourist.

We were screwed.

Winding his fingers in mine, we took off toward the clubhouse armed with a butter knife, bonded by our pure idiocy. Ten minutes later, I concluded heels weren’t appropriate for a walk on pavement. My feet somehow squeezed into a pair of Sydney’s Rock & Republic four-inch size sevens when I wore an eight. One heel wobbled, and the other might’ve given me an ingrown toenail.

Kyd and Tricky leaned up against his silver Toyota Land Cruiser, eyes agape that I had Zander in tow. Seriously, they
should
be agape, but bringing Zander happened to be one way to distance myself from Kyd’s romantically challenged relationship with Mary. One look at him, though, and the bad-girl in me had to wonder. Kyd was meticulously groomed, and no doubt existed in my mind why Mary had fits of jealousy. Wearing dark shorts and a long-sleeved striped oxford, rolled and pushed to his elbows, his expensive tan loafers topped off a male you didn’t see everyday. He seemed almost too perfect, his blond hair waving gently in the breeze. Although attractive, Tricky appeared the exact opposite tonight. Sporting all black athletic gear, his brown hair hid underneath a black ball cap, hiding his face. Tricky looked prepared for “another day at the office.”

“We’re dead,” he mumbled.

“Probably,” Kyd grinned.

“Vamoose,” I giggled.

Once buckled inside, we listened to Zander spout off the mascots for every college and university in the country. Like my Grandfather Winston, Zander held a plethora of meaningless trivia but barely made the C-list like me. Unfortunately, I now couldn’t rid that group of animals and inanimate objects from my mind. I never quite understood the complexities of my brain. Sometimes my obsessions could be blessings; others, an overwhelming distraction.

Twenty-five minutes later, we rolled into the Orlando OBT area … one of the nation’s notorious red light districts. Perhaps that’s why many crimes were easily overlooked; you kind of expected it. Orange Blossom Trail is a section of US 441 that runs north to south through the Orlando area and boasts the fact it’s one of the 25 most violent places to live in the United States. It’s a tourist trap and infamous as the city’s “ghetto.” Figures. And here I was, a minor contributing to another minor’s delinquency.

Ballsy.

Stupid.

Kyd must’ve heard my gulp from the back seat. He looked in the rearview mirror, kept his left hand on the steering wheel, then reached back and tenderly touched my knee. “Say the word, Legs, and we’ll turn around.”

My mouth couldn’t do anything but produce another swallow.

Old hotels lined the streets while red, blinking neon signs alerted you to strip clubs. As we drove further south, we moved directly into the section called Whorelando. On one corner, a prostitute slinked; on the opposite, illegal drug trade transpired. A black Beemer idled as a gray-hooded drug runner handed him a baggie full of pills. People weaved in and out of the crowd like the process was as normal as walking down a nice area in Cincinnati. Apparently, assimilation was easy once conditioned to your surroundings.

Kyd pulled onto a side street and turned off the Land Cruiser. We’d parked in front of an old metal warehouse that had a newer, red side-unit attached to its side. Appearances suggested the building had been built for functionality and not for aesthetics, but here in OBT the idea of beauty wasn’t thought of in terms of architecture. It mostly walked on two legs, was up your nose, or in your arm. The building stood three stories high and threw off the vibe that only idiots would venture inside. It appeared barren, other than a dimly lit section on the middle floor.

Suddenly, I felt grossly overdressed, completely out of place, and an overwhelming guilt for bringing a 12-year-old boy along. I suppose I had no regard for my life. Perhaps I never thought anything presented a big deal because I’d already lived through every child’s darkest fears … abandonment. Something like that aged you on the spot and killed the instinct that told you when you needed an adult’s help. I somberly exited the car, and Zander crawled afterwards like a nervous spider while I absently picked a few stray hairs from my sweater.

“You’re scared,” Kyd said, tracing a finger down my jaw.

“I’m not scared,” I clarified, “I’m trying to figure out what to do.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “You have no plan?” I never had a plan.

“It’s a work in progress,” I shrugged.

Lining the right side of the street were a navy Mercedes CLS-Class, a BMW 3 Series silver convertible, an army green H2 Humvee, a green BMW Roadster convertible, and a red Porsche Turbo. On the opposite were a white Cadillac Escalade, a beige Ford Bronco, two black Chevy Suburbans, a black Aston Martin, a silver Bentley, a taupe Toyota Celica, and an old blue Honda Accord whose rims looked more expensive than the car. Next to the Accord sat a vehicle that resembled the Pinto rattletrap that Elmer Herschel climbed into with the gothic girlfriend. But why would a lummox like Elmer Herschel rub shoulders with close to a million dollars of foreign and domestic automobiles? All the license plates were the normal seven-figured letters and numbers combo except one vanity plate labeled with a single X
on the Red Porsche Turbo.

I said the numbers over and over along with the makes and models of the cars, trying to burn them into my memory. Tricky mouthed them out loud two times then acted as if he was bored. Tricky, by reputation, had a photographic memory. I suppose I did, too, except I could never settle down long enough for that information to gel into something useful.

Kyd put his hand out like a stop sign as Zander and I attempted to make our way toward the back entrance of the building. “Hold on, Darcy,” he demanded. “I feel like it’s my duty as your brother to say something.”

Zander immediately groaned, rolling his eyes. “You sound like Dylan.”

Kyd shrugged with a frown. “Perhaps we’re alike.” Doubtful.

Reaching out to touch his hand for reassurance, I found it flexed and rigid … just like the rest of him. “I’m simply piecing some things together,” I told him. “There’s no need to worry.”

Kyd grabbed me by the arm, dragging me to his side. “Give us some privacy,” he said to Tricky and Zander. Both stepped about six feet over. “I don’t want you hurt, Legs,” he murmured. “Lola Medina’s nothing but trouble. She always
has
been, and here I am dropping you off in a seedy area as your brain runs amuck. I need more information, and for the life of me, I can’t determine how you conned me into doing this. I’m having second thoughts, and as strange as it sounds, I honestly feel a bond with you.”

Introducing Kyd, Romeo extraordinaire.

His eyes burned a light, drowning green. Almost tearful, like my pain filled him up so much that one step inside would pull us both under. Why was it that the guys who were players, always knew how to talk to girls?

I gave him a lot of teeth, trying my best to look like a flirt. “It’s the brotherhood,” I grinned.

“
Stop it
,” he warned. Heck, maybe he
was
like Dylan. “I care, and I have this drowning feeling you don’t care enough about yourself to even think about your safety. What happened to you, Legs, that makes you not consider whether you’ll live or die?”

How in the world should I respond to that? I exhaled six years worth of disappointment and frustration but realized all that did was give me a headache. “To answer your question,” I said tightly, “life happened. Sometimes, life doesn’t give you a choice or ask permission. All you can attempt to control is how you respond to what it throws at you. What’s going to happen is going to happen, Kyd. I appreciate the concern, but Zander and I will be fine.”

Mother blankety-blank-blank
, I cursed in my mind. I needed to take up cursing or find an outlet to release the guilt-slash-stress people inflicted upon me.

Zander jumped up three times in anticipation as I gave him a high-five. Dang it, I didn’t know what we were doing but had a pretty good feeling I’d figure it out once we’d made it inside.

Zander hovered my every move. I moved an inch; he moved two toward me.

“First of all,” Kyd grunted, “we’re going to have a conversation about what ‘life’ did to you. That statement is too morose and fatalistic for my liking, Legs. And secondly, Zander has to stay with me. It’ll never fly with him going inside.”

“
What?!
” Zander yelled.

I scrunched my forehead together, frustrated that he had a point. In retrospect, it possibly was for the best. Plus, if I conceded this point, then perhaps he’d lighten up on the demand to psychoanalyze me. I blew out a sigh, touching Zander on the shoulder. “It’s okay, Hot Stuff,” I smiled. “I’ll tell you everything.” Zander grumbled that he should’ve stayed in bed where he could’ve at least dreamt of naked girls.

Not shocking, the boy’s first word was boob.

After a few moments of explicit instructions, checking to see if cell phones were charged, and what resembled a Come-to-Jesus Meeting from Kyd, he placed his hand at the base of my neck and drew me close. “I’m going with you,” he murmured.

Kyd was a master at the serenade. When he parted his lips just a hair, my mind went blank and got stuck in a lightheaded swoon. “You feel it, don’t you?” he grinned.

Bracing my hands against his chest, I deliberately pushed off. I’m not sure what I felt, but it included sweat and a film I’d watched in Human Sexuality class. Kyd didn’t need to go there … no, no, no. “Lola will
rr-recognize
you,” I stammered.

“She’s right,” Tricky agreed. “
I’ll
go.”

Kyd’s frame suddenly riddled with anxiety. He acted as though he knew this part of the conversation was coming, and possibly that’s what they’d planned anyway. “If anything happens to her,” he threatened Tricky, “you’ll answer to me, Neptune.”

Tricky stifled a laugh. Without saying it, he implied he could take Kyd with one arm tied behind his back and blindfolded. “I’ve got it covered,” Tricky said.

Kyd grumbled, “Thirty minutes and I’m following.” Kyd tipped my chin upward, kissing the end of my nose. Before he could expand on his goodbye, I grabbed Tricky’s hand and pivoted toward the back of the warehouse.

“Hey!” Kyd shouted. Tricky and I simultaneously turned on our heels. “Lola goes by the name Lynx. I love you…” Kyd might’ve finished the phrase with “both”—after all, Tricky held the title of his best friend—but whatever the case, I had a momentary pang of guilt. My body stopped doing everything. No breathing, no heartbeat, no brain waves, no nothing but a 15-year-old girl stuck in the middle of the biggest guilt trip imaginable. My behavior blatantly screwed my best friend code of ethics—don’t take advantage of your friend’s unwavering faith in you—but I ran on OCD adrenaline and very rarely did I make my way back from that.

The thought stung.

Tricky towed me across the gravel lot, ushering me into the darkened building. The metal door cracked open on the first push.
Odd
, I thought. They’d either expected someone, or everyone knew it would be stupid to go inside, so why bother with a deadbolt. We hooked a left around a forklift and swung a right back toward the far end of the building.

The first floor consisted of cardboard boxes piled four-high. Rat poison surfaced in the aroma of the damp, musty smell. A set of stairs lay in the back left corner, with a double-door freight elevator in the right.

I took off toward the elevator when Tricky clutched my wrist. “No,” he refuted, firmly shaking his head. “I prefer the stairs. That way I have a full view, and I’m never backed into a corner.”

Made sense, I guess.

Tricky’s arm circled my neck, pulling me to him when I got that oh-crap look. “My job is to keep us safe,” he winked. Tricky had some sort of potent virility thing going on. His silky, brown eyes looked even more furious with his black as night clothing. Currently, my heels placed me a good inch or so taller, but I had a feeling tall women weren’t on his personal list of intimidations.

“M-maybe we should be brothers,” I sputtered as we hit the second floor. Tricky dropped his arm, walking over to a window to canvass our surroundings. I followed as he palmed away grime, peering down into a flat-bottomed truck with a red cab that had two old mattresses piled on top.

“You’re scared of me,” he murmured. “I don’t bite … unless you want me to,” he added in a laugh. I
was
afraid … a little. What he happened to be capable of, I wasn’t sure, but my gut said it included the fine art of the shamma lamma, ding-dong. Before he could decline, I performed the brotherhood ceremony when I discovered a pink Band-Aid on his index finger. Every once in a while I threw in real blood, and apparently Tricky had a four-year-old little sister who liked all things pink.