Remy’s feet complained in his hard, Italian leather shoes as he pounded the pavement. His lungs burned with the rush of cold air. He had no time for apologies or to excuse himself as he chased his subject through the crowd. He left behind a trail of fuck-offs and one-fingered salutes. In typical big-city fashion, no one helped him.
She was fast and slippery, something that surprised him. She’d seemed so delicate!
It became life and death to get that camera back.
“Damn it!” he roared. “Get back here wi’ dat! C’mon, now!”
He was gaining on her. Ororo felt a cramp in her side as she stumbled off a curb but regained her footing. A yellow cab nearly missed her and blasted his horn at her retreating back.
“What, ya think yer the only one in the street? Crazy bitch!” The driver watched her flight with more annoyance than concern. “Hey!” He leaned on his horn again as the tall, skinny guy in the expensive black coat followed her across the crosswalk at a dead run.
“Damn,” he muttered. “What’d ya do ta piss him off, darlin’?” His curiosity was cut short; the cars behind him gave him the same treatment, blaring and honking at him until he realized the traffic ahead was moving again. Logan grumbled obscenities under his breath and stubbed out his cigarette. He gladly moved along, but the sight of that chick taking off so fast nagged at him.
She did what Remy hoped and broke away from the tide of people on the pavement.
She chose a back alley between two huge brownstones. Fetid water splashed up on her calves as she ran, chilling her, but she clutched her prize to her chest. She prayed she wouldn’t drop it.
She wagered the camera must at least be worth a couple of hundred dollars. She calculated two, maybe three nights at a tiny dive of a motel down the road from the docks. Or at the very least, some hot food. She’d settle for either one. And a long hot bath.
Remy rounded the corner, pushing himself to keep up with her. He thanked his personal trainer for being so hard on him five days a week. She was a treadmill sadist, draining him of buckets of sweat and leaning on the incline button to make him work.
She knew she could lose him. There was a fence up ahead with a gap just wide enough to wriggle her way through; that would certainly hold him up, if she played her cards right.
“C’mon!” Remy shouted. “Dis is bullshit, petit! Get back here wi’ dat!”
“Not on your life,” she hissed to herself. The camera was her meal ticket, at least for a while. He wouldn’t take it from her. Everyone had something they wanted to take from her.
“Dat ain’t yers!” he cried. His lungs burned and his throat felt raw from shouting at her over several city blocks. She reached the fence and slammed herself at it, wedging herself painfully between the large gap in the links.
Fate wasn’t on her side.
She felt the fence shudder and clink around her in one, two, three shakes before two size eleven feet thudded onto the gravel before her. She felt herself grabbed roughly as he yanked her the rest of the way through the fence.
“Whoullff…OW!” He slammed her back against the side of the brownstone. Her heart hammered in her ears and her throat was raw.
Her captor’s hair was tousled and wild, his slightly long and very metrosexual style ruined from his jaunt. His nostrils flared and his broad chest heaved like a bellows.
“What,” he panted,” d’ya think yer doin’? Huh?” She struggled in his grip, but he didn’t relent.
“Nononooooo!” she wailed as he pried the camera from her cold hands. “Don’t. Please don’t!”
“Bullshit,” he hissed. “Know what happens in this city when ya take sumthin’ that ain’t yers?”
“The cops look the other way, asshole!” she informed him haughtily. Her voice was full of bravado she didn’t feel. Ororo felt the prick of tears in her eyes, but she jutted her chin in defiance. “Let go of me!” Her fists found him repeatedly. A harsh laugh burst from his lips.
“Gimme a break.” They continued to struggle. Remy was too angry to notice how the cold rush of air during their run colored her cheeks and made her spill of white hair even more wanton. Bits of it clung to her lips. “I don’ b’lieve dis,” he said incredulously. “Ya were gonna take off wit’ Remy’s camera dat he bought wit’ his own hard-earned money.”
“You’ve got plenty,” she countered. “Let GO!”
“Yeah, ya’d like dat, wouldn’t ya, petit?”
“You’ve got it back!”
“So I’m s’posed ta just let ya run off, eh? Live ta thieve anudder day, eh?”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about anyway, you sonofabitch!” She struck him again.
He’d had it. Remy jerked her close enough that his hot breath steamed her face.
“Ya picked da wrong man ta rip off! What, were ya gonna sell dis fer some blow? Or crank? D’ya know how much dis camera’s worth?”
“I don’t know,” she muttered.
“Huh?” he pressed, shouting in her ear as she twisted her face away from his. His grip on her wrist hurt. “More money dan yer ever gonna see in yer lifetime, cher!”
“What, does that make you feel big? You feel important, shoving me around and rubbing my nose in it? You have money. That must be nice.”
“Yeah. It is.” Guilt pulled at him as he continued to take in her pitiful appearance. She shivered from the cold as the endorphins from running faded away. Her full, ripe mouth looked uncomfortably chapped, her lower lip slightly cracked. It looked like it hurt. “It’s called havin’ a job and gettin’ yer shit together. C’mon!’
“No! I’m got going with you!”
“Why, ya got somewhere else ya’ve gotta be?” Remy said with a shrug. “Huh?”
“You can’t-“
“Oh, yeah, I can. You’ve got a date with Westchester PD.” He dragged her behind him, back through the fence. She cursed and struggled, trying to twist away from him.
Ororo was so tired. Her face was so defeated.
“Don’ hafta worry ‘bout money anymore in lockup.”
“You…bastard.” Her voice was choked. He was just getting warmed up as he pulled her through the alley.
“Ain’t like yer missin’ out on anything, goin’ ta jail. It’s warm. Ya get ta eat fer free, at taxpayers’ expense. Three squares an’ a roof.”
“I hate you,” she hissed, sparking back to life. She had no gloves on and her nails were half-broken and overgrown.
She dug them into the back of his neck. Remy roared in pain.
“I’m doin’ ya a favor!”
“Keep telling yourself that!’
“What were ya even gonna do with my camera! It ain’t a toy! Dis is how I make my livin’!”
“What, taking pictures of pigeons?” Remy suppressed a snort. She dove for him again with her clawlike nails. He slapped her hands away; he was that close to slapping her pointe blank.
“Pigeons,” he spat. “Keep them hands t’yerself, petit.”
“Quit calling me that!”
“Fine. Howsabout Inmate Thirteen, Cell Block E?”
This time he was caught off-guard. As he shuffled them down the alley, she managed to go limp, forcing him to stop.
“What-“
CLANG
He never saw the trash can lid coming. Ororo grunted with the effort of swinging it as hard as she could.
Home run. Pain exploded across his cheekbone. Remy’s ears rang.
She wrenched her wrist from his grasp and rushed off, debating whether to try to grab the camera first.
Remy shared the same indecision as he finally shoved his camera back into his case. Face throbbing, he took off after her, knapsack slapping his back the entire way.
His chase was short. Ororo stumbled into a pothole of cold slush. She pitched forward and landed face first in the grit.
Damn it damn it damn it damn it… Her breath choked out in a sob. She heard footfalls stopping short just above her.
Great. Now he’d have her arrested for theft AND assault…
For the first time in her young life, despite the thanklessness of her existence, the trial to just keep going, and the futility in hanging on to hope:
Ororo wished she were dead. Never more before than today.
“Think yer clever, huh?” Her breathing was ragged. She closed her eyes and didn’t try to get back up.
That gave him pause. “Gonna make me drag ya again?”
She shook her head, refusing to look up at him.
She was just so tired.
“Ya wouldn’t have gotten anything close ta what it was worth anyway, cher. Not at the local pawn shops. Wasted effort, anyway.”
“You think?” she rasped. “I’m good at those.” She began to push herself up, wincing at the pain in the heels of her hands. She’d scraped them raw trying to catch herself.
“Huh?”
“It’s a waste, everything’s a waste,” she insisted raggedly as she sat up. He reached for her arm. She slapped his hand away.
“Ain’t my problem. Tell it to a judge.”
“You think sending me to jail will make things so much better? Get a thief off the streets?”
“How’d ya end up on the streets, anyway?”
“It’s none of your business.” She tried to stand.
His firm hand on her shoulder stopped her. “Let go of me!”
“Where d’ya think yer going? Ya didn’t answer my question.”
“No, really, genius?”
“Damn.” It was a waste.
She was beautiful, more striking than half the women who graced the glossy covers at the newsstand. But she was a non-entity, no resources, not even a home address.
Guilt nagged him again. Her blue eyes shone with anger and the threat of tears.
His earlier musings at the dock came back to him. He could have fed her, maybe plied her with a cup of hot coffee or given her his gloves. Something. Anything, for a chance to get more shots.
Yet here he was, threatening to press charges against her.
“Pigeons,” he muttered, shaking his head.
“What?”
“You thought I was taking pictures of pigeons.”
“I don’t care.”
“Course ya don’t.
“Why should I?” But her jaw wasn’t as firmly set. Her blue eyes flitted to his knapsack, then away again.
“G’wan. Get up a sec.”
“I’m not making it easy for you.”
“Think yer bad? Little mama, I could toss yer bony ass over my shoulder before ya even blink. When’s the last time ya ate?”
“What’s it to you?”
“Not gonna budge an inch, huh? Big and bad. Strong, silent type.”
“Fuck you.” The corner of his mouth quirked.
If he wasn’t being such an asshole, she just might be inclined to notice how broad his mouth was, how sharp the notch was in his upper lip. His jaw held a hint of five o’clock shadow. He eyed her, catching how she checked him out. She glanced away.
She turned back to watch him as he removed the camera from his pack.
It was digital. Ororo instantly, guiltily revised her estimate of its worth.
Thousands. He’d had to have paid three, maybe four gees for it, let alone what he laid out for the hard, black leather case. The digital display flashed “Nikon” as he powered it on.
She felt slightly sick. She understood why he’d been willing to chase her ass through traffic, slightly over a mile in the dark cold. Shit.
He panned through the menu, clicking on the option he wanted. “There’s yer pigeons,” he told her. “G’wan ahead, look, petit.”
Her eyes swung reluctantly toward the tiny viewing screen. He toggled the view, zooming in on the first frame.
It was her.
She’d been right before; she looked like hell. Her hair was a jacked-up mess.
Her eyes looked haunted, her cheeks more gaunt than she realized, literally seeing them through someone else’s eyes.
“Yer a good subject,” he admitted. “Memorable.”
“Big deal. All you want is my mug shot.”
“Yer own business if ya want ta be on a wanted poster, petit.”
“I told you to quit calling me that.” She sat in numb awe on an old crate as he continued to pan through the frames.
He’d taken three dozen. Her eyes widened at the number of files in the display.
How long had the sonofabitch been watching her?
“What were you doing, stalking me?”
“Naw. Just people-watchin’. Told ya, dis is how Remy makes his livin’.”
“Who?”
“Remy.”
“That’s…you?”
“Dat’s me.”
“You talk weird.”
“An’ ya’ve got a real mouth on ya, cher. Yer mama nevah wash yer mouth out wit’ soap for usin’ hard words like dat?”
“No,” she whispered bitterly.
The photos burned her.
The photos were well-shot, that much she wouldn’t argue. But the subject…she couldn’t swallow the sight of herself in her pitiful clothes and tangled hair.
In some of the photos, it looked like he caught her enjoying a personal joke; in others, she appeared to have lost her best friend. Pensive. Irritated. Bored. Sad. Tired. Desperate. He’d caught her entire range of emotions in pixels.
“Get rid of them.”
“Uh-uh.”
“You heard me. I said throw them out.”
“I never throw anything away.”
“You can’t do anything with those,” she argued.
“Says who?”
“Me. Maybe…maybe I don’t want some strange guy to have pictures of me laying around!”
“Don’t matter. Yer goin’ ta jail.”
“Not if I cry rape first.” She didn’t know how the words jumped out of her mouth. She ran with it. “The cops will think you’re some sicko. You have pictures of me. You grabbed me.”
“Cher, Remy has one helluva headache, not only from tryin’ ta get my camera back, but from yer wicked left. Cops ain’t gonna think ya can’t defend yerself. Might book ya fer assault.” He stood and began to walk away. She stared openmouthed.
“What? Wait! Get back here. You can’t take those.”
“Sure can.” He had the gall to begin whistling a tune. His strides were long and swift.
Remy had already made up his mind. On the one hand, jail would almost be a kindness. She was cold, no doubt hungry, and had nowhere to go.
He felt an odd sense of relief and amusement when she began to follow him. “Wait. Don’t.”
“Got what I came for. Ain’t gonna press charges,” he shrugged.
“You…ass!”
“You’re welcome.”
“You can’t do this.” She dogged his feet onto the open street. He continued to whistle. Passerby looked amused at the sight of the statuesque woman chasing the aloof-looking, handsome man down the pavement.
“S’a free country.”
“Well, those pictures aren’t free! You didn’t ask me for my permission. I have rights!” she shouted after him.
“Why, ya suddenly have ownership of yer likeness? A copyright? That’s cute, petit.” Anger boiled beneath her skin, making Ororo’s scalp feel tight. “Gonna arrest me next for lookin’ at ya?”
“Ooo!”
“Don’ know ‘bout you, but Remy’s starving. Ain’t gonna keep me out here arguin’ wit’ ya all night ‘bout whether I can take photos of whatever I want. Maybe ya were just the background, petit. Remember, ya said I was just shooting pigeons.”
“Bastard.” She kept following him as he resumed his pace after the walk light flashed at the intersection.
“Ya gonna chase me all night?”
He turned abruptly around the corner into a crowded diner. She stopped just as sharply. Remy turned when her presence behind him disappeared. He watched her through the glass-paned door. The words “Ruby’s” separated them, painted in red script.
He saw her vulnerability in the way she stood. He understood immediately.
She doesn’t think she belongs in here. They stared at each other for several long moments. The traffic rumbled in her ears while another cold blast of wind sent her hair flying around her. Customers buffeted each of them as they worked their way inside, wanting the two strangers to get out of the way.
He crossed the threshold first and reached for her hand. Hesitantly she took it and let him guide her inside. She looked numb and confused.
Her face was wreathed in relief at the first wave of warm air as they entered the dark lobby. The light over the cashier’s desk was dim, throwing a yellow glow over the skill crane game’s homely stuffed prizes and two gumball machines. The enticing smell of fried potatoes and hamburgers made Ororo’s stomach twist and growl at the same time.
“How many?” barked the hostess as she grabbed two menus.
“Two.”
“Counter, table or booth?”
“Whatever ya’ve got.”
“You tell me,” she snapped, nodding to the dining room.
“Booth.” The look of exhaustion on Ororo’s face made up his mind.
“Fine. C’mon.”
They followed her brisk gait to a booth by the window. Remy waited for Ororo to sit first. The hostess tossed their menus onto the table.
“Your server’s on her way with your water.”
“Thanks,” Ororo mumbled. She shivered and rubbed her hands, blowing on her stiff fingers.
“Ya need gloves,” Remy said.
“No, really? Let me run right out and take care of that.”
Remy sighed as he took off his coat. He unwound his long muffler and shucked his leather gloves, tucking them into his pocket. His skin tingled from being back where it was warm. Ororo leaned back in her seat and looked…rapturous. Remy guessed it was due to the warmth, too.
“It smells good. Too good.”
“Order whatever ya want.”
“You buying?”
“Well, duh, petit.”
“If I tell you my name, will you quit calling me that?’
“Maybe.”
“No. Please. That’s the only way I’ll tell you, if you promise.”
“Scout’s honor, den, cher.”
“Sheesh. You weren’t a Scout, I bet.”
“Were you?” He had her there.
“It’s Ororo,” she said flatly.
He grunted in surprise. It was different and unfamiliar. Yet it suited her. She just wasn’t a Tiffany, Heather or Crystal.
Her hair was indeed a blazing white under the bright dining room lamps, and her eyes were definitely that blue. Two or three different shades, he mused to himself; deep violet flecks and sapphire mingled with cornflower. She watched him, irritated.
“Do you always stare at people like that?”
“Part of my job.”
“Sure it is.” She toyed with the packets of sugar and nervously peeled the wrapper from her straw, tearing it to bits.
“I ain’t gonna do anything with the pictures. Not yet. Sometimes I take some pictures just for pleasure. I have print work that I sell as commercial stock, though.”
“Stock?”
“Just nice pictures that people use for stuff like newsletters and graphics and print ads.”
“Oh.” Then she frowned. “No one would want the ones you took of me. I look like shit.”
Remy chuckled. “Might not end up in a Victoria’s Secret catalog, but sometimes, photographers like art-quality photos of interesting subjects.”
“I’m interesting,” she said flatly.
“Memorable,” Remy shrugged, holding out his hands. Their server thunked down two waters.
“Coffee?”
“Definitely,” Remy said. Ororo looked torn.
“Um, do you…have hot cocoa?” She eyed Remy for permission. He nodded.
“G’head, cher. Get her what she wants.”
“One cocoa. Coffee comes with a refill. Lemme know when you know what you wanna eat.” Their server attended the same finishing school as their hostess.
The words in the menu swam before Ororo’s eyes. She mentally devoured every picture of fat-laden entrees on each page.
“Whaddya feel like eatin’?”
“I…I don’t know.”
“Tell ya what. Pick two that ya think ya want. Ya can’t make up yer mind, I’ll order one of yer choices, and ya get the other.”
Remy sat in amusement twenty minutes later, tearing apart a chicken strip. He wasn’t even hungry for the appetizer platter that was her second choice, but it had a little of everything, the perfect dish for the girl who couldn’t make up her mind.
In the meantime, Ororo diligently inhaled a cheeseburger dripping with sauce. She caught a crumb of bacon before it could fall back to the plate and crammed it into her mouth.
“Good?”
“Mmmph-hmmm. Mmm.”
“Right. Don’t interrupt a woman while she’s eatin’.”
“Want that cheese stick?”
“Nope. Never touch ‘em.” His trainer would kill him if he tried.
It was the cheapest model’s fee he’d ever paid for some of the most striking shots.
[Reviews - 56]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story |
Has been viewed 14746 times
- Text Size +
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story | - Text Size +
You must login () to review.
