Page 11 of Taken Off Camera
Outside, the afternoon sun temporarily blinds me. I keep my head down, hoodie still up, and merge into the flow of pedestrians. Three blocks north, I drop the prepaid card into a storm drain. Five blocks east, I remove my hoodie and surgical mask, stuffingthem into my backpack. By the time I board the bus heading toward Ashford Heights, I’m just another commuter on his phone.
But my hand stays curled around the flash drive in my pocket, fingers tight with purpose. I have a name now. I have proof. And Saint will know what to do with it.
The Blue Note Lounge exists in that perfect sweet spot between forgotten and discovered. The kind of place where the bartender remembers regular faces, the lighting stays dim enough to hide the stains on the booth cushions, and the jazz playing through ancient speakers is always twenty years out of date.
Saint sits in our usual corner, back to the wall, both exits in his line of sight. His posture appears relaxed to anyone who doesn’t know him well enough to notice the constant readiness in his shoulders.
I slide into the booth across from him, and he pushes a glass toward me without asking what I want. The amber liquid catches what little light filters through the frosted windows.
“You’re late,” Saint says without accusation.
“Had to take three different buses.” I lift the glass,the scent of good whiskey filling my nose. “Paranoia tax.”
Saint raises his own glass in a silent toast before taking a sip. “Find anything?”
“Everything.” I slide the thumb drive across the table. “Meet our underwear enthusiast.”
Saint slips it into his pocket. “Tell me about him.”
The whiskey burns pleasantly down my throat. “He works in the mail processing facility for my PO Box.”
“What?” Saint leans forward. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
I wave away his concern. “Don’t worry. I already switched locations.”
“What else?” Saint demands.
“I’ve got him connected to at least three other accounts harassing Omegas online. He’s been collecting screenshots of me for months.”
Saint’s fingers tap a slow rhythm on the table’s scarred surface. “He knows what you look like.”
“Not hard when I don’t wear a mask online,” I say, regretting that decision now.
“Think he’s hung around, waiting for you to pick up mail and followed you back to The Solace?”
I shrug. “If he has, he hasn’t made it up to my floor. I checked all the cameras.”
“You doing another show tonight?” Saint asks.
“Just a short one, followed by a private session with a regular.”
Saint arches a brow at me. “Justa regular? Ortheregular?”
A flush rises to my cheeks, and I swirl the whiskey in my glass, watching it catch the light. “Leave it alone. It’s nice to pretend.”
Saint grunts. He’s already made his opinion on GentlemanX known, and we’ve agreed to disagree.
The music shifts, heavier bass thrumming through the wooden booth. Saint and I let it fill the silence between us, the kind that comes easy after years of leaning on each other.
I catch him watching me and note the faint crease at the corner of his mouth. He doesn’t have to say anything for the memories of the night we met to surface.
I was sixteen, terrified, and feverish with my Heat, locked in my room at Omega House. This was before the Omega Outreach Program got traction, back when the government just shoved us into any city-run facilities.
The House Manager, an Alpha with dead eyes and alcohol on his breath, had used his master key to let himself inside. The memory of his silhouette blockingthe light from the hallway still features in my nightmares.
I can still feel the closet’s splintered wood biting into my back, the jagged chair leg clutched in white-knuckled hands, and the certainty that no one would come. And then Saint, still gangly armed and fueled by rage, swinging a bat. Bones broke. Blood spilled. And suddenly, I wasn’t alone anymore.
He’d paid for saving me with six months in juvie and a new tattoo, but when he stepped out, I was waiting with a secondhand duffel and a studio apartment that I scraped the money together to rent after leaving the group home. The only furniture it had was a battered couch that sagged in the middle.
