Loose Ends

by Tara Janzen

  Then he’d really short-circuited her brain, looking down at her after he’d handed her off, still grinning. She’d been struck straight through the heart. Their eyes had met, his smile had faded, and she’d never been the same, not ever, not even now. He’d changed her, even though a guy like him wouldn’t have looked twice at a street rat like her, not back when she’d been picking pockets. Unless, she’d found out weeks later, if a night got so wild that even the good guys started crossing the lines.

  He’d crossed the line with her.

  Much to her everlasting mortification, she did know that much about him. But the most important thing she knew about J. T. Chronopolous, the hard thing, the worst thing, was that he’d died. They’d buried him six years ago on a summer afternoon in a cemetery in Denver. She’d been one of the hangers-on that day, just a street kid in the background, not really part of the mourning that had gone on. But she’d felt the grief, hard and heavy and aching, right along with his friends.

  God, she’d cried for him, for things that had never had a chance in hell of really beginning, let alone lasting.

  She stopped at the corner and looked back, but he was gone—J.T., John Thomas Chronopolous, Kid Chaos’s older brother, the best of them all.

  He’d told her once how much he’d loved being a Marine, but he’d loved his friends more, and when they’d asked him to come home, he’d left Recon behind. He’d told her a lot of things during the long, hot summer of their unexpected friendship. The city had been scorching that year, the temperatures soaring close to a hundred for days on end, the nights little better. So she’d taken to the rooftops, and one night, so had he …

  What a score!

  Jane ran down the street for another half block, legs pumping, before turning into an alley off Wazee, a plastic bag full of Chinese takeout swinging from her fist. The food was still hot and had barely been paid for when some hapless old dude with a limp had set it down to unlock his car.

  Fool. She’d slid by him and scored an amazing dinner. She could still hear him back there yelling for the cops, but she was long gone—and so was his meal.

  She slowed to an easy alley-eating lope, and her mouth curved into a wide grin.

  Gourmet Chinese, from the coolest new restaurant in LoDo, a place called the Lucky Moon. If she’d had a cellphone, she would have called her friend Sandman to come and share.

  Partway down the alley, she took a right turn into the parking lot of Sprechts Apartments, one of lower downtown’s pricier addresses. Every apartment had a balcony, and the people who lived at Sprechts were the kind who grew gardens on them and had lots of plants, even trees. Sometimes the Sprechts people would sit around on their balconies and drink wine. More than once, she’d scored a half-empty bottle in the wee hours when the city was asleep. But the nicest thing about Sprechts was the roof—specifically, its location.

  She came to the fire escape and started up, moving quickly and silently, her steps as light as her fingers were fast. It was five floors to the roof, but she would have climbed twice as high to get the view she wanted—the alley at 738 Steele Street and the undying long-shot hope that the hot guy who’d busted her boost two weeks ago would show up tonight.

  It was a little silly, and fun, and kind of comforting to have such a crazy crush on a guy. In this one way, at least, she was like all the other teenage girls in the city, the normal ones. None of them could have cruised the dark alleys of Denver or stolen their dinner off the street, and she doubted if very many of them had ever been on the rooftops. But they had crushes on hot guys, and so did she—the hottest guy ever.

  Her smile returned.

  At the top of the fire escape, she made a small leap onto a balcony rail and quick-stepped across, balancing herself with her arms outstretched, her small backpack in one hand, the Chinese food in the other. When she reached the end of the balcony, she threw her backpack up on the roof, gripped the plastic bag of food in her teeth, and swung herself up. She had her place all picked out and settled in with her dinner for the long haul, sitting in the prime place for watching the alley backing 738 Steele Street. A lot of buff guys went in and out of the building, but she was only interested in one—her crush.

  Cripes, she’d had a day. Taking her jacket out of the backpack, she spread it out in front of her on the roof and unloaded her take: five wallets; a small clutch purse; four DVDs she’d copped out of the drugstore, all new releases; a couple of candy bars; a silk shirt with the tags still on it; and a Batman action figure. She thought Batman was pretty cool, but the action figure was for one of the new kids on the crew, a squirrelly little towhead named Jeffy. She should have gotten him a Batman shirt. His looked like it had been handed down about forty times. But she’d snagged the action figure instead so the kid could have some fun.

  Not bad, she thought, looking the stash over and reaching into the bag of food. The first thing she pulled out was a box of wontons, and after taking a big bite out of one, she started her nightly sort. Cash went in one pile, credit cards in another, identification cards in another. Sometimes, if a wallet had a lot of good stuff, she’d keep the whole thing intact for an ID sale, squeeze a few extra bucks out of it to feed her crew.

  A few minutes later, she’d counted up two hundred and seventy-seven dollars in cash, eight credit cards, four driver’s licenses, and one learner’s permit, whatever that was worth. She didn’t have a clue, but it never failed to amaze her what some people wanted to buy.

  Reaching back into the bag, she took another wonton and decided that what she needed was a DVD player, and every now and then, maybe she’d keep a movie. The kids would love it.

  During the sort, she’d kept her eye out for people coming and going in the alley below, but so far, the night had been a bust.

  Disappointed but still hopeful, she scooped up the day’s cash and cards and stowed them into her pack before settling in to wait, and watch, and eat. She was into her fourth wonton when her luck changed.

  “Chinese?” a deep voice asked.

  Cripes. Her heart took a jump, and she jerked her head around but didn’t see anybody.

  “You’re going through those wontons pretty fast.” The guy spoke again, and she quickly turned her head in the opposite direction.

  There, in the deep shadows cast by the moon, he was standing with his back against the air-conditioning unit.

  “Go find your own roof,” she said around a mouthful of wonton, the rest of the bag clutched close to her chest. “This one’s already taken.”

  “I’ll leave as soon as I find the thief who stole my boss’s dinner. He ordered takeout from the Lucky Moon, that new restaurant up on Blake. Have you heard about it?” the guy asked, and oh, so help her, she suddenly recognized him.

  The wonton turned to instant sawdust in her mouth.

  Oh, God. Nobody’s luck could run this bad.

  “General Grant, my boss,” he continued, “picked up his food about half an hour ago, but before he could get it home, the bag got snatched by someone he described as a coltish brunette.”

  Coltish? That didn’t sound good.

  Her eyes narrowed. “What did he mean by coltish?”

  “Long legs, a little on the skinny side, and fast as hell.”

  That was her, all right.

  “He probably left the bag lying on the street,” she said, while simultaneously determining the quickest escape route, and all the while hating that her wonderful summer crush was over. It was darn hard to stay infatuated with someone who thought you were a thief, even if you were. “Anybody could have come along and picked it up.”

  “No,” he said. “Not anyone. General Grant isn’t a patsy. It took someone good to get his dinner away from him.”

  A backhanded compliment, but beggars—and thieves—couldn’t be picky.

  “That’s a great story,” she said, casually slipping her arm through the handles on the plastic bag and then wrapping her hand around the strap on her pack. “But these are my wontons.” D
eny. Deny. Deny. Those were the first three rules of stealing on the street.

  “Maybe.” The guy seemed to be giving her the benefit of the doubt. “But he sent me to track down the thief, and here I am, and there you are with a bag of Chinese food.”

  Impossible, and she told him so.

  “Nobody can track me on the streets.” Hell, she’d been chased by the cops dozens of times, and she’d never been caught. Never.

  A small laugh escaped him, and she could see him shaking his head. “Oh, yeah, babe. I can track you, and I did.”

  He sounded damned sure of himself, but she wasn’t buying it, even with that sweet little “babe” business. “No,” she said, shaking her own head. “Nobody’s that good.”

  “Actually, Ms. Linden, I’m better than that,” he said, his voice coolly serious. “Way better.”

  He knew her name, her real name.

  The shock froze her in place for all of a nanosecond before she bolted.

  But damn, he was fast—faster than her, and when she would have cleared the southernmost corner of the building and made her jump for the balcony, he was two steps ahead of her.

  She skidded to a stop, and before she could change directions, he reached out and took her pack and the bag of food, just snatched them right out of her hands.

  The loss stopped her cold.

  Dammit. She couldn’t go home without her backpack. She wouldn’t go home without it. Delivering the goods was how she kept her standing with her crew. It wasn’t just her livelihood at risk here tonight. It was how she kept the whole sorry pack of them safe—by being better, by never getting caught, by having the cash to feed them.

  “I need that,” she said, using her firmest voice, letting him know he’d gone too far. “You can have the Chinese food. I’ll even pay you for the wontons, but I need the pack.”

  He stood there in front of her, bigger than life, so calm and sure of himself, still the most beautiful guy she’d ever seen. Five minutes ago, he’d been everything she’d wanted. Now she just wanted away—one more dream down the tubes.

  “Ten minutes,” he said with a lift of his eyebrows. “Stay and talk with me for ten minutes, and I’ll give you your pack back. I promise.”

  She thought his offer over for all of two seconds.

  “With everything in it?”

  “Everything,” he promised.

  Ten minutes of talk to claim two hundred seventy-seven dollars and eight credit cards? That would be the best deal she’d made all day.

  And she believed him, for whatever reason, believed that if she talked to him for ten minutes, he would return her pack, and she’d be on her way—wiser and sadder and wondering what, if anything, would come into her life to replace the thrill of hoping to see him.

  But that was over now. It really was, no matter how good he looked standing there.

  “How do you know my name?” she asked. She hadn’t given her name to his friend or to the doc who’d looked her over two weeks ago, not her street name, Robin Rulz, and sure as heck not her real name, Jane Linden. She never gave anyone her real name.

  “When I was younger, I used to own these streets. So I asked around to see if anybody knew a green-eyed girl picking pockets in LoDo who had long dark hair and a face … yeah, well, an unusual face.”

  Unusual face? Coltish?

  Well, this was damned embarrassing, but she needed that damn backpack back.

  “You’re beautiful,” he said straight out of the blue, then glanced down and let out a soft laugh. “You probably hear that all the time.”

  No, she didn’t, and standing there in a pair of cast-off tennis shoes with holes in her jeans and an old Rocket Girl T-shirt, she wondered if he was talking to somebody else.

  A quick glance around killed that idea. There was just the two of them up there on the Sprechts roof.

  “Stunning, really.” He looked back to her, meeting her gaze with a half smile teasing his mouth. “I’ve never seen anyone like you, not ever, and I’ve been from one side of this planet to the other.”

  Okay, well, ten minutes of this wasn’t going to be so hard to take, even with a blush warming her cheeks.

  “I’ve never seen anybody like you, either,” she admitted. “But I’ve mostly just been from one side of Denver to the other.”

  He laughed at that and dragged his hand back through his hair, and looked like he was feeling a little shy.

  Geez. She must be having a darn good hair day.

  “So what’s your name?” she asked.

  “J. T. Chronopolous,” he said. “Ask around, you’ll hear about me and my friends, Christian Hawkins and Creed, maybe a few of the others. We used to run a pretty tight crew around here.”

  Good. Great. It never hurt to have a few names to throw around.

  “Does your friend Creed have a last name?”

  He laughed again, a rich, deep sound that warmed her heart. “Just Creed. Come on, have a seat. We can finish the general’s takeout. I’m sure the guys have gotten him a whole new dinner by now.”

  Chinese food, her backpack, and ten minutes of conversation with J. T. Chronopolous, her ex–hot crush. She’d sure had worse offers and, truthfully, seldom, if ever, had a better one.

  She sat where she stood, a few feet away from him, and he grinned but didn’t press the point, sitting down where he’d been standing and leaning over to hand her the small white carton with the rest of the wontons.

  “A general,” she said, taking a bite without taking her eyes off him. “So are you with the Army or something?”

  “Something like the Army,” he said, opening another of the cartons and bringing it to his nose. “Sesame chicken, mmmm.”

  She loved sesame chicken, and when he cracked open a pair of chopsticks and offered her the carton, she didn’t hesitate.

  “So how old are you?” he asked.

  “Twenty-two,” she said without hesitation. Twenty-one always sounded like you’d made it up, but twenty-two was solid.

  “Twenty-two?” he repeated, sounding damned doubtful.

  She gave a quick nod and kept eating, sticking with her story. That was always best—to keep it simple and to keep it straight.

  “How did you get the scar on your cheek?”

  “The same way I got the one on my nose.” Her gaze down, she kept eating.

  “Which was how?” he persisted.

  “You’re damn nosy.” She snagged another piece of chicken and popped it in her mouth.

  “I’m interested in you,” he said. “And because of my work, I don’t always have a lot of time, so if I want to know something, I ask.”

  “Your Army work.” She liked that he was a soldier. It fit him perfectly and had a solidness to it.

  “Yeah, my Army work.”

  She ate another two full bites of sesame chicken, watching him the whole time, before deciding to answer his question. In her work, being able to size up people and risk was second nature, and anyone who couldn’t do it in a split second wouldn’t last a day on the streets, let alone a night.

  J. T. Chronopolous checked out.

  “Before I went independent, I used to work for this guy, and he was always knocking us around. Not just me, but the whole crew, and we were so damn little, we just kind of took it. Then Sandman and I went out on our own—so there’s been no more knocking around.”

  “Does this guy have a name?” The question came out immediately, not like he had to think about it, which she found interesting. Cops were like that, quick with the right questions.

  “He used to,” she said. “Now he’s got a number down at the prison in Cañon City.”

  He definitely thought that bit of news over.

  “I checked with the cops, asked them about you, too,” he finally said, and she almost choked on her chicken. “They told me you and Sandman are headed for a fall. That you’ve had a good run, and they like that you’re trying to take care of all those homeless kids, but that you’d be better off shifting the
whole kit and caboodle over to Social Services and giving yourself a break, before they give it to you, and they’re talking jail time, Jane. They want you off their streets. No more Robin Rulz.”

  “You talked to the cops about me?” Unbelievable. And he knew about Sandman and the kids? Good God, he was no crush. He was a disaster. “Why in the hell would you do that?”

  “You’re in a tough spot. I’ve been there. We’ve all been there. I thought if I knew what was going on with you, I could help. I just didn’t think I’d be getting the chance to talk with you about it tonight.”

  Damn him. Mr. Superhero talking to the cops.

  “I don’t need your charity.” She dropped the chopsticks and reached for her pack. Before she could take it, he put his hand on top of hers.

  “It’s not charity.”

  “Then what is it?”

  His answer, when it finally came, proved even more unnerving than him talking to the cops. “I don’t know. Probably the same thing that’s been bringing you up to this rooftop almost every night for the last two weeks.”

  He’d known she was watching for him?

  Now she was really embarrassed.

  “Right.” To hell with the backpack. She’d make it up tomorrow.

  She started to her feet, but he grabbed her wrist.

  “Please,” he said, and carefully, slowly released her. “Don’t go, not yet.”

  “It’s late,” she said—and she felt like a fool.

  “Can I buy you breakfast, lunch, dinner tomorrow?”

  He wanted to see her again?

  “Which one?” she asked, skeptical as hell. Maybe he was working for the cops on the side. She knew the Denver Police wanted to clean out her crew. This one cop, Lieutenant Loretta, really had it out for her and Sandman. Social Services was that woman’s answer for everything.

  “All three,” he said. “I’m headed out of town at the end of the week, the Army thing, and I don’t know exactly how long I might be gone. I’d like to spend some time with you.”