I got another lick in, smashing into sidekick two's hip. Another grunt of pain but a quick recovery. I jabbed the top of the bat in sidekick one's stomach twice, hard. He went back at the same time trying to snatch the bat away from me.

I kept hold then swung, also hard, this time higher. He lifted cocked forearms and one of them deflected the blow but he emitted a grunt of pain and fell slightly back.

My attention turned to sidekick two who I was instinctively shifting from. Sidekick one wasn't the threat, sidekick two's eyes were mean. On swing five, moving fast, sidekick two caught the bat. He twisted, I held on. He twisted harder, angry eyes never leaving me. Taller, stronger, I was no match. He wrenched it out of my hands then tossed it aside.

Not good.

They advanced. I backed up, caught my heel on the curb up to the walkway outside the hotel rooms and fell right to my ass. Hard. And it hurt. No time to feel the pain, they kept coming and I scampered back on hands and feet.

Sidekick two grinned.

Yep. Mean.

I kept scampering and my head and shoulders hit brick.

That hurt too.

I heard the ratchet of a shotgun just as I heard the quick start and stop of a police siren.

My body froze but my eyes flew to the side and I saw a man in a wife beater, a beat up, dark colored, terrycloth robe, a pair of slacks that led into a pair of bedroom slippers and he was holding a shotgun. My eyes then moved to the entrance of the parking lot where a squad car, no flashing lights, was pulling in. Then my eyes moved, peering around the two sidekicks in front of me. I saw Gray had dispatched one guy. He was groaning and kind of rolling but mostly he seemed to be fighting for consciousness. He had Cocky Guy down on his knees in front of him, bent back, his fist was wrapped in Cocky Guy's collar and his other arm was cocked back ready to deliver a blow. He had blood streaming down his face from a cut over his left eye but Cocky Guy appeared to be bleeding profusely from his nose, a cut lip and a gash on his cheekbone.

Jeez, the whole thing lasted maybe five minutes. How could he inflict that much damage in five minutes?

"Buddy, what the hell?" the guy in the wife beater asked loudly. "Christ, by now, don't you know better? How many times does Gray gotta teach you this lesson?"

I found this comment interesting.

The hotel guy got no further and therefore, alas, didn't explain this because the cop had stopped the car and was folding out.

I found this alarming.

I was not a big fan of being in the presence of cops. At first, long ago, health hazard. Now it was an occupational hazard.

The cop rested his arms on the top of his open door, leaned into them and demanded of the parking lot as a whole, "Tell me my eyes are deceiving me."

My two sidekicks moved cautiously back while one of them muttered, "Uncle Lenny."

Uncle Lenny?

Suddenly, the cop straightened like a shot and he did this when the boy-men had moved out of his line of sight and his eyes hit me.

"Oh no," I heard him say softly. "Hell no." Then he moved out of his door, slammed it viciously and advanced on the sidekick I caught on the knee. He advanced fast, aggressive and very angry until that particular sidekick was pressed against the side of a car with his angry, cop uncle leaning over him threateningly.

"Convince me not to rip your dick off," he growled.

Wow.

"Uncle Lenny " the sidekick started, his voice trembling.

"That a girl I see on her ass?" the cop asked.

"We were " the sidekick began again but his uncle leaned even closer and I held my breath.

"Is that...a girl...I see...on her ass?"

"She hustled Bud at pool," the sidekick said quickly.

"I did not!" I snapped at the same time I heard Gray's deep voice state. "That's a fuckin' lie."

I looked to him to see he'd tossed Cocky Guy aside, Cocky Guy was pulling himself up but Gray was walking to me. He got to me, hand extended and I put mine in his. He instantly pulled me up and close, his hand firm in mine and not letting go.

He was also bleeding from that cut over his eye and he was bleeding a lot. It was running down his temple, cheek and dripping off his jaw onto his leather jacket.

Through this, the cop didn't move.

Instead, he spoke and what he said was, "I don't care if she hustled him, mugged him, drugged him or bit his dick off givin' him a blowjob. Bud got fucked in some way, he's a man; he takes it like a man. He's got a legal problem; he takes it to the law. Whatever happens to Bud Sharp, you do not get involved. Especially if he's got a beef with a slip of a girl. And I never drive up in my cruiser seein' you loomin' over a slip of a girl who fucked you, who fucked Bud or who fucked the fuckin' Pope. You get me?"

"I get you, Uncle Lenny," the sidekick whispered.

"Jesus, fuck, it's like nothing grew between your fuckin' ears," the cop muttered, moved away and turned to face the assemblage, his eyes honing in on me. "You makin' a complaint?"

"They leave me and Gray alone, no," I answered instantly and he nodded just as quickly before his eyes cut to the guy in the wife beater. "You makin' a complaint, Manny?"

"They leave my customers alone and I don't got fights in my parkin' lot for, say, the rest of all eternity, no."

I thought Manny was kind of funny.

I thought this but I sure as heck didn't laugh.

The cop's eyes sliced through Cocky Guy and his sidekicks. "This girl, Gray or Manny got any problems with you boys?"

"No sir," his nephew said immediately.

"No," sidekick two answered at the same time.

The third shook his head. He was the one who'd been fighting for consciousness. He was up now and swaying a bit so I wasn't sure he had words in him.

Cocky Guy was glaring at Gray.

"Bud?" the cop called and Cocky Guy tore his eyes from Gray and looked at the cop. When he did, the cop went on in a quiet voice filled with warning. "Don't mess with me, son. You know you don't mess with me. You're smart, you'll go home, clean up the cuts Gray's opened up on you and think on those. My count, this is the third time Gray's drawn your blood. Learn and don't let there be a fourth."

It seemed to me that Gray and Cocky Guy had a long history.

"She hustled me out of five hundred dollars," Cocky Guy spat to the cop.

"Len, I was there and that's not fuckin' true," Gray said low, clearly pissed and the cop looked to him.

Then he looked to me. Then his eyes moved up and down me.

I could read people, I had to. Survival.

Cops could read people too. I knew he sized me up the second he looked at me.

Not good.

Gray spoke again.

"She's the shit at a table. He and his boys watched her wipe it clean, he knew she had talent. The whole bar did. He offered the bet, she declined. He pushed the bet. She took it. He lost. What he says is bullshit. Ask Janie."

The cop held my eyes and I held his. His dropped to my hand which Gray still held firm in his. Then he looked to Gray only briefly. Then he turned back to Cocky Guy.

"Do you not think I see what this is?" the cop asked Cocky Guy softly and I didn't get that but I did see in the parking lot lights Cocky Guy's face go pale even as it went hard. "Go home, Buddy," he finished on a near to whisper.

His sidekicks immediately shuffled to exit the scene. With no other choice, Cocky Guy aimed a laser sharp scowl at Gray and me then cleared his throat and hocked a loogie in our direction.

"Got shitloads of money, not an ounce of class," Gray muttered, his eyes locked on Cocky Guy as he followed his boys.

Manny, the cop, Gray and I watched him go.

Then Manny turned to the cop. "Thanks for bein' quick, Len."

"My job, Man," he muttered and Manny looked at me.

"You okay, miss?"

I nodded then said softly, "Thanks."

He nodded back then looked to Gray.

"Would say good to see you, son, but be better seein' you without blood on your face."

"Right," Gray replied and he sounded amused.

"Catch ya at The Rambler for a drink sometime," Manny went on.

"You got it, Man," Gray muttered.

Then Manny turned and walked toward the office.

The cop looked at Gray and me and when he did, his eyes again dropped to our hands, mine still held in Gray's.

Then he looked to Gray and grinned. "Bud would probably stop bein' such a jackass if you didn't scoop up all the pretty ones."

I liked that and I didn't. I liked it because it was a compliment. I didn't because that meant Gray had a lot of girlfriends and even though this was by no means a surprise and it made no never mind to me, I didn't like knowing it.

"Wrong way around, Len. He wasn't such a jackass, he might get a shot," Gray returned.

This was true.

Len agreed with me and I knew this because he kept grinning and also nodding. Then his eyes flicked up to Gray's forehead before going back to his.

"I got any shot you'll go to the clinic and get that stitched?"

"I'll be all right," Gray answered.

That meant no.

Len looked back down at our hands then to me then to Gray, all quickly.

Then his grin turned to a smile but he did this right before he looked to his boots and said, "'Spect so." He looked back to me. "You sure you'll be all right, miss?"

I nodded. "I'm just fine. Thank you for intervening."

"Like I said. My job," he replied, jerked up his chin then moved toward his cruiser.

Gray's hand around mine squeezed and I looked to him to see him looking down at me.

"No lie, you all right?" he asked.

And right then, without me even trying to stop it, I did something stupid. Something unsafe. Something I'd never done and something I never expected I'd do.

I answered, "I will be, you let me see to that cut."

And that was when I got it, probably what I was looking for, definitely what I wanted.

He smiled at me and I saw his dimple.

Chapter Six.

Feels Good Though "You think, you're cleanin' blood off my face and all, you might give me your name?"

That was Gray, sitting on the end of my bed in the hotel room as I stood over him doing exactly what he said, cleaning blood off his face.

Blood he shed for me.

Hells bells.

My eyes went from the short but deep and gaping cut to his.

He was close, really close. I'd turned on most the lights in the room so I could see what I was doing and I saw that his eyelashes weren't russet. They were dark brown.

The tips were russet.