Page 9 of Wicked Nightmare

"Now, now, don't be rude. She went to great efforts to cook your dinner." It was true. Lakey couldn't cook worth shit. The last time she cooked dinner, she made mac and cheese with boiled steak strips and onions, and it was basically soup. For some reason she was averse to using measuring cups. 'It's all in the eye, Cam.' She'd said while pouring at least two cups of milk in and then stirring.

"Hooooookaaaayyyyy." He huffed, packing up his laptop and stepping down from the bar, not even touching his beer.

"You might wanna grab that muffin."

"Right, yes. Okay."

I stuffed down a laugh as his short, fat legs struggled to keep up with me as we walked out of the bar. "It's a short walk, don't worry, Skeets."

True to my word, we were at the apartment in less than five minutes, but in Skeeter time, it was probably five hours the way he was puffing.

"You good, buddy? Not gonna have a heart attack, are ya?" I clapped him on the back and opened the lobby door before helping him to the elevator. Lakey could kill him later, but I did need him alive long enough for the rest of the addresses. Everything else that came after didn't matter.

"Why'd you have to bring me here, man? We coulda just stayed at the bar."

He'd never even met Lakey, and he was afraid of her. Interesting.

"Good question, Skeeter. I'm so glad you asked me that." The elevator dinged and I stepped forward as he shrunk backward. Using force to push him out, he stumbled, but I gripped his shirt to stop him from falling. "Lakey is... well she's particular. We grew up together. So, a long, long, LONG time ago, we made a pact that we wouldn't hide our... acquaintances from each other."

"Ya'll don't have secrets?" He looked astonished.

I smiled and motioned to our apartment. "Not even one. Well, except this one. This work that you're doing for me will be a secret until her birthday, because some secrets are actually surprises. But no, Skeeter, we don't hide things from each other."

He looked sideways at me and shook his head, stepping into the apartment when I opened the door, trying to shrink into the smallest possible shape as I moved past him. Hard to do when you're the size of a small rhino, so I was impressed. "Ya'll are fucking weird."

"Hellooooooo!"

"Hi, baby!" Locking the door, I pushed our guest into the living room before grabbing Lakey and kissing her. "This is Skeeter, our guest. He is doing some computer work for me, so we will be on the balcony. Dinner smells divine, what are you making?"

She grinned. "Oh, that's just onion and garlic. I haven't even started cooking yet. I pulled up a Gordon Ramsay recipe. Beef Wellington. Says that it is his best." Waving a knife towards where a butchered piece of beef sat, she continued, "I just need to roll these in that pastry and cook it in the oven and then we can eat."

Narrowing my eyes at the thick cuts, I ventured a question. "Did the recipe say how long it takes to cook?"

"Ummmm..." She pulled up her phone. "Oh fuck."

"What?"

"Well from scratch it takes three hours." She looked around in a panic. "I fucked up, didn't I? Oh, Cam. I'm sorry. Damnit."

I grabbed her and pulled her in for a hug. "Hey, no sweat. Skeets, how long on that info I needed?"

"Uh, a while. So uh, yeah, three hours sounds good." He was sweating again, eyeing Lakey up and down.

Moving to block his view of her just as she zeroed in on him and that maniacal look started to cloud her vision, I tugged on her long hair. "See? Don't sweat it. Have a beer and put on your favorite songs. We will just be over on the balcony, doing some shit. Love you, lil psycho."

She huffed. "Love you, too."

And with that, I dragged a reluctant Skeeter onto the balcony of our high-rise apartment, closing the balcony door behind us.

"Welcome to the office. Now. You better get to work, fuckhead. Don't look at my girl like that. I won't even need to carve your eyes out of your head because she will do it for me, then she'll scoop your nuts out of your sack and put them in your eye sockets."

"What the fuck is wrong with you people?"

"Many things." Grabbing him by the back of the neck, I shoved his nose onto his keyboard. "Work. Now."

As he worked, I rummaged around in the beer fridge we kept on the deck. Handing one to Skeeter, I cracked mine and leaned over the railing, watching the addicts do their dance on the street below looking for their next fix. That was one thing I always prided myself on. Never stooping so low. I'd always kept my nose clean and my blood cleaner. I had to. Lakey's life depended on me keeping my head clear.

This balcony was where I did my thinking. Fourteen stories up, facing east, the kind of view you get when you live in a building that's one code violation away from condemnation. Spider had covered the first month's rent when I got out of juvie. Nine years in this apartment and it was still ours. The kitchen was where Lakey destroyed food. The bedroom was where we put each other back together. The bathroom had a stacked washer and dryer that rattled so hard during the spin cycle that the mirror fell off the wall twice before I bolted it in. At least the landlord had fixed the shower that never got hot and screamed when you turned it on. The hallway had a dent in the drywall from a fight in year two that neither of us had bothered to patch because we both liked looking at it. It was proof that we could break each other and still stay.