THIRTY-SEVEN
It was easy to think of God while watching the sun rise over the Hudson River.
As Sola sat on the empty terrace of Assail’s glass house, she stared across the cold, sluggish water. Little flashes of peach and yellow skimmed over the icy expanse as, across the way, that great orange orb crested over the skyscrapers of downtown.
She had made it out of that prison, she thought for the hundredth time. And whatever scars might have formed on the inside of her, her body was intact, her mind functional, and her safety, at least in the short term, assured.
Thinking back to all those prayers, she couldn’t believe they’d been granted. Desperation had made her utter the words, but she hadn’t really expected anyone to be listening.
The question now was … did she keep her side of the bargain?
Man, it would have been so much easier if an angel with wings had come down and freed her, magically depositing her here. Instead, she’d done the dirty work herself, Assail had been on cleanup, and one of those fierce cousins of his had been a chauffeur for the five-hour trip back to sanity. Oh, and then there had been all those people in that facility.
Mere mortals touched by the hand of God? Or a series of random events that just happened to roll out as they did? Was the fact that her life had been saved a case of divine intervention … or of no more significance than one bingo ball getting picked over another?
A shallow fishing boat puttered into view, its sole passenger steering the outboard motor from the back, controlling speed and direction.
Pulling the heavy duvet even closer around her body, she thought about all the things she’d done, starting when she was just nine or ten. She’d begun picking pockets, trained by her father, and moved up to more complex theft with his help. Then, after he’d gone to prison and she and her grandmother had moved here to the States, she’d gotten a cashier’s job at a restaurant and tried to support them both. When that had proved too difficult, she’d put her experience to good use and survived.
Her grandmother had never asked any questions, but that had always been the way—her mother had been the same, except when it came to Sola’s involvement in the life. Unfortunately, the woman hadn’t lived long enough to make much of an impact, and after she was gone, the husband and daughter she had left behind had become thick as thieves.
Natch.
Sooner or later, she’d been bound to get caught. Hell, her father had been even better at it than she was, and he’d died in prison.
Picturing him the last time she’d seen him, she remembered him at his trial, dressed in prison garb, handcuffed. He had barely looked at her, and not because he was ashamed or worried about getting emotional.
She’d been no longer useful to him at that point.
Rubbing her eyes, she thought it was asinine to still be hurt by that. But after spending all her time trying to make him proud, get some approval, find any kind of connection, she had realized that to him, she was just another tool in his black-market workplace.
She had left the courtroom before knowing whether he was found guilty or not—and she had gone directly to his apartment. Breaking in, she’d found the stash of cash he kept in a crawl space cut into the wall behind the shower in the bathroom—and used that shit to get her and her grandmother free of his legacy.
The papers to enter into the U.S. had been falsified. The news they’d received about three weeks later from relations had been real: Her father had gotten life.
And then he’d been murdered behind bars.
With her grandmother not just a widower, but childless, Sola had stepped into the role of provider the only way she knew how, the only way that worked.
And now she was here, sitting on the deck of a drug lord’s house, faced with the kind of moral dilemma she had never expected to come up against …
Watching some random fisherman cut his engine and throw a line in.
Even though the guy had turned off the motor, he wasn’t still. The river’s current carried him along, his boat drifting across the view, a humble craft dwarfed by the distant buildings.
“You want the breakfast?”
Sola twisted around. “Good morning.”
Her grandmother had her hair done in tight curls around her face, her apron tied on her waist, and a flash of lipstick on her mouth. Her simple cotton dress had been handmade—by her, of course—and her sturdy brown shoes were somehow fitting.
“Yes, please.”
When she went to get up, her grandmother motioned downward with both gnarled hands. “Sit in the sun. You need the sun, too pale you are. You living like a vampire.”
Ordinarily, she would have pushed back a little, but not this morning. She was too grateful to be alive to do anything other than comply.
Returning to the view, she found that the fisherman was disappearing on the right, going out of sight.
If she hadn’t prayed, she would have gotten out of that place anyway. She was a survivor, always had been—and she had done what she had on a strange kind of autopilot, sucking in her emotions and physical sensations and doing what was necessary.
So if she looked at her future, at the currents in her life that were going to carry her out of view, so to speak … going legit was the smartest thing to do.
Regardless of any “agreement” she’d had with God.
She was going to end up in jail or dead—and she’d just dipped her foot in the icy cold of the dead scenario. Not where she wanted to end up.
Blinking in the gathering light, she gave up on the vision thing and closed her eyes, letting her head fall back. The warmth on her face made her think of Assail.
Being with him had been like touching the sun and not getting incinerated. And her body wanted more—hell, just the passing thought of him was enough to take her back to those moments in that bed, the night so quiet, the gasps so loud.
As her br**sts tightened, she felt a welling between her thighs—
“Sola, you are ready,” her grandmother said from behind her.
Getting to her feet, she leaned out over the glass balcony, trying to find her fisherman. She couldn’t. He was gone.
Brr, it was cold out here—
“Sola?” came a gentle prodding.
Strange. Ordinarily, her grandmother’s voice was like the woman’s hands—never soft. In fact, she spoke like she cooked: out front, forthright, no holds barred.
But now the tone was as close to gentle as Sola had ever heard it.
“Sola, you come eat now.”
Sola took one last stab at seeing her fisherman. Then she turned around and faced her grandmother.