Page 47 of The Reluctant Hero

“Never mind,” he squeaks when he comes face to face with the blue haired woman with her boyfriend. “Not safer.”

“Don’t be a wuss, Manny!” I hurry to the fridge, forcing Matthias and co to slide out of my way and grab a soda to start shaking it up. The door groans in protest when I try to close it. I ignore the random mess on the floor and rush to open the window in the bedroom section of the tiny one-room apartment.

“What are you doing?” She follows me, watching as if I’m the most fascinating thing she’s ever seen.

“Just watch,” I grin at her and wait. I can see Loser’s fancy car in the lot. Actually, there’s a lot of them. I bet Matthias’ car is down there. I should have grabbed two cans.

She patiently waits while I shift from foot to foot. After a second, Loser comes stomping out of the building. He’s so pissed, and I’m loving every second of it.

“Bombs away,” I sing out with glee and rear back to throw the can out the window.

“Jeff,no!” Manny barks out, but it’s too late.

The woman and I hurry to the window to watch it fly in an arc and land on the red Porsche. There’s the satisfying sound of breaking glass. The whoosh of the can as it explodes in a fury of sticky bubbles. Then the shrill car alarm blaring as if it’s screaming for help.

I gasp in delight and rear back before Loser can turn around.

“Score!” I squeal in excitement. “I actually hit what I aimed at!”

When blue hair doesn’t follow, I grab her arm and yank her away from the window. She feels so fragile. How the hell did she stop Loser from hitting me?

“Are you crazy? He’ll see you!”

“He won’t,” she assures me flatly, and my eyes narrow.

“Ok, Captain Invisible. But in reality? He would have said you did it, and I’m not into feeling guilty about anything. Do me a solid and learn how to duck and cover if we hang out in the future.”

“Guilt is a useless emotion.” Her voice is so odd and emotionless. It isn’t just her expression.

“Most of them are,” I shrug and take in the room. My brows go down in a scowl as I notice all the things I ignored during my quest for petty vengeance.

“What the fuck happened in here?”

The mattress looks like it was shoved at some point. It’s crammed halfway into the closet. There are papers with names and pictures all over the floor because someone broke thedrawer off its hinges. One of the cabinets has a crack in it, and the fridge is tilted. There’s a dent in the door, too. No wonder it was groaning a second ago.

“Who messed up my fridge?” I glare at the four guys that were left in here unsupervised. Only Manny looks guilty. I know damn well he didn’t do any of this.

“I left you guys alone for five minutes, tops! Clean this up, assholes!”

“I’m out,” Manny throws his hands up in surrender. “He’s calling the cops, and I’m not sticking around for it.”

I nod but don’t take my glare off of the three jackasses left. “Good call. I’ll see you later.”

“The cops won’t do anything,” the blue-haired woman’s voice is still flat as Manny rushes off.

“True. They don’t come out this far very often. But it would be my luck if they showed up and arrested me.” I stomp over to the mattress and try to figure out how I can get the heavy piece unstuck.

“One of you get your ass in here and help me with this.”

Matthias gives me a cold look of indifference. Scruffy’s jaw is clenched as he stares at me intently. The muscled guard is the one that steps forward.

“Thankyou,” I tell him pointedly. “It must be difficult dealing with them all the time. They did this, didn’t they? You’re innocent.”

He gives me a smirk and single-handedly hauls it out to put it back into place. He even straightens the sheet and replaces the blanket.

“I’m calling you if I ever manage to move out of here,” I mutter with wide eyes. “What’s your name?”

Scruffy starts moving the fridge back, and Matthias picks up the pages on the floor. He looks disgusted at every picture he touches. I don’t blame him. The guard doesn’t answer me, so Ishrug it off. It’s probably best if I never see him or his buddies again anyway. I don’t know why his dismissal stings as much as it does.

---