Chapter 6 - The Price of His Protection

The week that followed taught me how expensive being right could become.

My shifts were back on the schedule, but customers had started coming in to look at me. Some wanted photographs. Others wanted me to repeat what happened, preferably with a better ending. One man asked how much I'd charge to kiss him too.

I told him to leave me alone.

He complained to the manager on duty.

For once, the manager asked him to go.

I should have felt relieved. Instead, I stood in the service corridor trying not to cry into a rack of clean napkins.

Being publicly humiliated was exhausting even when somebody believed you.

That Friday, Jonah's physical therapy appeal was still pending. We had enough for rent only because Mrs. Keller had paid the shifts Grant wrongly withheld. It didn't leave much for groceries. My brother noticed me calculating totals in the kitchen and quietly moved two items back into the cupboard.

"You need to eat," I told him.

"So do you."

"I'm twenty-eight. I can skip a snack."

"And I'm seventeen. I can see you doing math with a loaf of bread."

I hated that he had learned to look at money the way I did.

On Saturday morning, Naomi called. Somebody had submitted a complaint to the city's hotel development review office claiming Adrian's security had threatened me to keep me silent. The complaint attached the edited video and quoted a statement I had never made.

Apparently, according to the document, I had been offered payment to conceal the incident.

"I haven't taken a dollar from him," I said.

"I know. I've prepared a response. The review office has agreed to accept evidence from us directly, and the police have the threatening messages."

"Do you think they can put words in my mouth forever?"

"Only if no one insists on the difference between a claim and proof."

That afternoon, Adrian asked to speak to me again. This time I chose the bar before opening. Ben would be working, and Naomi said she could attend by video if I wanted. I told her I'd call if we discussed anything legal.

Adrian arrived alone except for a driver who waited outside.

He looked at the familiar booth and then at me.

"I never liked this place," he said.

"I do. At least I used to."

He sat at a table in the middle of the room, where anyone walking past could see us.

"I heard about the licensing complaint," he said.

"Then you know somebody's speaking for me again."

"Nadia says your attorney is handling it. I won't interfere."

He looked at my hands. I had a bandage over a small cut from the dishwasher.

"Did someone hurt you?"

"A broken glass did. Not every bad thing in my life belongs to your enemies."

He almost smiled. Then he seemed to decide I deserved a more serious answer.

"Fair enough."

I asked him why he had come.

"My head of security reviewed what happened. The guard who reached for his jacket will be removed from public assignments while we retrain the team."

"Was he carrying a weapon?"

"He was. It remained concealed. I should never have let that reaction become possible over a stranger walking up to me."

I looked at him for a long moment.

"My coworkers thought they were going to die."

"I know."

"You can't fix that by being polite to me afterward."

"No," he said. "I can change what my people are allowed to do. And I can admit publicly that they frightened the room."

That answer mattered. It didn't erase the fear.

I told him what I'd learned about the tenant families he'd helped push out years before. Naomi had found reports while checking his company's history. Some people had received settlements. Others had moved away before any lawyer tracked them down.

"You did that and still expect me to believe you'll protect someone like me?"

His face hardened, not with anger at me but with the effort of listening.

"I don't expect you to believe anything," he said. "You should watch what I do."

Then, almost reluctantly, he added, "And decide for yourself."

I thought about the kiss. How easily I'd mistaken courage for ignoring somebody else's choice. How easy it would be now to mistake his attention for proof that he was kind.

We had both crossed lines in different ways.

Neither of us got to claim the other person's forgiveness because we felt badly afterward.

When Adrian stood to leave, I stopped him.

"Why did you ask Ben to call me?"

"I saw Rusk recording before you approached," he said. "My driver recognized him. Then I saw your coworkers watching you like they'd sent you onstage. I knew you'd been used."

"Why not say it to me at the booth?"

"I didn't know how much you knew. I was also angry about being kissed without permission. I needed to leave before I said something I would regret."

It was the first explanation that had made complete sense.

"Thank you for telling me."

He nodded and left.

I watched through the window as he spoke briefly to his driver. There was no grand gesture. No expensive gift. No offer to solve all my problems.

That was better.

But by the time my shift began, another message had arrived from an unfamiliar number.

This one contained a photograph of Jonah leaving his physical therapy clinic on crutches.

Below it were six words.

People you love can be followed.

May you like

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I didn't scream. I forwarded the message to Naomi and called the police officer who had taken my first report. Then I went straight to Jonah's school and waited in the office until he was released to me.

For the first time, fear had followed me somewhere Adrian Moretti had never been.