AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Winter >> Will be late. Drama.
I will say one thing about the New York City police: they were efficient as anything and had no time for this shit. They shooed away the bystanders, got traffic moving again, and within twenty minutes the spare guard, Angus, had arrived with a new car, and my trip to the promised land of pizza resumed.
I tapped my nails against my phone, trying to calm myself, but I couldn’t stop shaking.
Hamid straightened his tie like he wasn’t splattered with blood, snot, spit, and glints of glass. He told Angus, “Home.”
“No.” I was not going to just crawl back to my flat and howl about it. “I’ve got an appointment to keep.”
Hamid smelled pissed.
[Sterling] >> Where are you? Are you hurt?
I rubbed my head.
Winter [Sterling] >> I’m fine. I’m going to meet Mint and then fitting.
[Sterling] >> Fuck the fitting.
Winter [Sterling] >> Not possible. I’ll be home in time for the thing tonight.
[Sterling] >> Did you hit your head?
Winter [Sterling] >> No.
The place Mint had chosen for lunch was a hole in the wall, crowded with people clamoring for slices of greasy pizza. The smells coming out of it were amazing, thick with basil and oregano and rosemary.
Mint stood up from the table he was camping as soon as I walked in. “Winter,” he said, “What happened?”
“Do I look it?” I didn’t feel it. I didn’t feel much of anything.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” He held the little chair for me. “What do you want?”
I wasn’t hungry. Mint had two grease-soaked paper plates in front of him. “Did you already eat?”
“Had to to hold the table.” He smiled. “What do you want? I will grab it.”
“Whatever is best here,” I said. “Or trashiest.”
He disappeared to the counter where loud men in white aprons hurled around discs of pizza, slicing them off and slapping them onto paper plates at huge speed. Mint ordered over the din, and handed over a few bills, returning with plates of pepperoni pizza and a wad of napkins.
I stared at mine, confused for a moment, and vaguely aware that my whole body was starting to ache.
“So what happened? Can you not talk about it?” Mint asked me.
“I just dodged an abduction attempt.” My mind trembled on the what if if I hadn’t been in the company of an extremely expensive and competent bodyguard.
They would have had me. Right now I’d have been in the back of that van with BrainCells groping me, or worse.
“What?” Mint paused, slice of pepperoni dangling from his fingers.
“Guy runs out in front of the car, throws himself onto the hood, van behind us slams into us.”
“Winter.” Mint reached across the table with his non-pizza hand.
I shied away from his hand and picked up the pizza instead. I bit into it without thinking. At first the food was disgusting, and the knot of stress that was my body protested, until my good senses took over.
Mint waited until I was a few bites in and asked, “Do you want to skip the fitting?”
