VII

Wind whipped at the exposed skin of Hector's cheeks as he sped down the strip of highway which skirted along the westernmost side of Odette. The morning was cold for the region, but the air temperature still hovered far above the blistering weather his hometown was experiencing. Even in February, winter's deepest chill was hundreds of miles away.

Opening the throttle and pressing the bike and his skills to their limits, the asphalt roared beneath him. The scant few lumbering vehicles on the road with him became blurs of color and blaring horns as he sped past, and more than one jerked his direction as if they might like to run him off the road. He avoided them all, darting from one lane to the other, heedless of the danger to life and limb.

Too late he recognized the emblems painted on the final car he passed and lights flared red and blue in his mirrors. A warbling chirp of a siren cut through the dismal morning air and he cursed his luck, slowing to a stop on the soft shoulder. Slicking a section of dark curls away from his face, the back of his left hand itched in anticipation.

"Welllll, Mister Torres," a voice hailed from behind him, drowning out the crunching of gravel and glass beneath his heels.

"Sheriff Cutter," he said, hands gripping tighter to his handlebars. Of all the luck.

The man took his time moseying up to Hector, one hand on his belt and the other scratching at the stubble on his cheek. Cutter was a beast of a man, solid and stubborn as a cinderblock wall, and he wore his uniform like he’d been poured into it when he'd taken his oath and never taken it off. His jet black hair was silvering at the temples, cropped into the military-style cut he’d likely worn since adolescence. A class ring took the place of a wedding band on his left hand, but Hector never cared enough to learn whether he was married or just liked having the extra weight on his fist. For any woman’s sake, he hoped the man was a bachelor.

"Now, you know the courthouse is in the other direction, don't you?"

"Yes, sheriff," he said, face impassive as he stared at some point in the distance. Not for the first time he wondered what Cutter would do if he just took off.

"So explain to me what all had you speeding down my road this morning?"

The hairs on the back of Hector's neck raised and he turned a furrowed brow on the man. "Was I speeding, sheriff?"

"Miss me with that shit," he scoffed. "And where's your helmet?" he asked, his fingers jabbing forward into the side of Hector's head for emphasis.

Bait. Hector wasn't biting. "At home, sheriff."

Cutter shook his head, clucking to himself. "That's a mighty poor place to keep it," he said. "And here I figured lawyers to be smart."

Hector said nothing and kept the simmer in his chest off his face. He'd considered selling his bike when he'd moved to Odette, but his first traffic stop with Cutter had led him to keep it out of misguided spite for the man. It was a move that was costing him dearly, but Hector was nothing if not stubborn.

"You know I could haul your sorry ass in for reckless driving, the rate you were going?"

He could say he'd take Hector's license and chew it up into pieces for all the follow-through the threat would have. The man was an ass and had him dead to rights, but Hector was friendly enough with the legal side of the city that it wasn't worth the effort. Arresting Hector was an Ace up his sleeve he could only pull out once, and he was waiting for the opportune moment to use it.

Still, Cutter sized him up for another tense few minutes before spitting out a gobbet of something foul onto the pavement between them. Saliva splashed Hector's boot, daring him to speak, but when even that failed to get a rise, Cutter leaned away, bored of the interaction. "Well you sit tight," he said, sauntering back to his cruiser. He took with him neither license nor registration, having memorized both ages before.

Dawn creeped in from the horizon before Hector in a slow, agonizing way; the first real rays of the sun throwing a pale light over the warm, light brown skin of his now-scowling face. The light was barely enough to burn off the cold fog of the night as it spread, coaxing the woodland on either side into life. New York had been far from perfect, but it was the mornings he missed the most, when a city that had never fully slept was spurred to rise for another day. The rumbling of trucks and the shifting gears of bike couriers outside his cramped street level apartment had been his life for so long that he'd only noticed them when he'd left it all behind.

Despite the sunlight now pouring on it, his left hand was chilled to the bone and ached in a way he could never explain.

In his own time, Cutter returned to Hector's side with a metal clipboard and two bundles of paper. "Sign," he said, passing them over.

Hector's dark eyes flashed up at him once before scanning the tickets. One was the speeding citation he'd expected, but the other made him choke back a flurry of protest. Failure to produce proof of insurance. The state didn't have a mandatory helmet law, instead requiring additional health insurance for those who rode without. They both knew he carried it, but Cutter had never asked for it.

Hector seethed, wondering if the assault charge and disbarment would be worth it. "Yes, sheriff," he said at last, raking the pen across the second citation hard enough to dig a hole through to the carbon copy below.

With the biggest shit-eating grin, Cutter handed him his copies of the tickets. "Now you make sure to pay those off. Wouldn't want you to lose that pretty little bike of yours."

A distortion to his words like microphone feedback hit Hector's ears. You'd love that, you fucking sack of shit. You'd bust your ass trying to ride it around the impound lot you — "Of course, sheriff," he said, folding the tickets into a zippered pocket on his jacket.

Cutter lingered for a beat longer, as if he could sense Hector's inner monologue and was straining his ears to pick out the words. When he at last was satisfied with whatever power trip he was riding that morning, he turned. "You be careful on these roads," he said. "Mighty easy to wipe out if you aren't careful."

Hector gave no response, no indication he'd even heard the veiled threat as he kicked his bike into gear and drove off. It was only when he'd exited the highway, miles between himself and Cutter did he throw his head back. "FUCK," he screamed, slamming a fist into his thigh.

Working himself into a full-on mood, he parked the bike in the first open spot he could find and jerked his glasses case out of his pocket; how Cutter hadn’t cited him for not wearing corrective lenses was a miracle unto itself. Maybe he was saving that one for a future interaction.

Fuming, he clacked his molars together. The traffic stop had been the last straw in an exhausting and ultimately fruitless night that had seen him from one end of Odette to the other chasing a rumor that hadn't panned out. His source had been a drunk brought in on disorderly conduct who had been raving to anyone who would hear about him and his buddy who had been jumped. There had been no demands, no threats, nothing but a flash of violence that had left one man bleeding out in an alley and the other desperate for anyone to believe it had happened.

As was typical, the parish's finest had written him off as a crank, leaving only Hector to take on the cause. He'd fully believed the man, but had found no evidence of their attacker nor any other witnesses willing or able to point him in the right direction.

Hector mulled it over as he stalked the street towards Misty, the only cafe in the city which opened at a decent hour. There were limits to his information gathering in Odette; four months in the city hadn't been enough to forge any meaningful connections. It was a delicate balancing act that he'd mastered back home, to find allies where he could without tipping his hand too far and giving the game away. It was a lonely kind of life, moving between two worlds and never being able to plant both feet in one.

The bell above the door announced his arrival with a jangle, the mouthwatering scent of sugar and coffee smothering some of the anger in his head. The cashier greeted him, her purple undercut and stellar smile further lighting up his morning. "Morning," he returned halfheartedly.

"Red eye and a ham croissant?"

"Yeah. Uh, yes, please," he said.

Something about her smile turned conspiratorial and she waved away his hand when he reached for his wallet. "It's been paid for." She leaned over the register to add in a sotto voice, "By the gentleman sitting outside."

Hector blinked and turned with all the grace of a freight train. The window on the far end of the cafe was covered by a set of blinds, closed off against the morning sun. "Gentleman?" he repeated.

The cashier turned back to the counter with his order. "Guy. Y'know. Maybe a friend of yours?" she said.

With a distracted word of thanks, Hector took the food and tore into it as he moved closer to the window. He could slip back out the front door and not be seen; it would be rude as fuck, but he didn't know if he could handle a delicate rejection after the last 24 hours he'd had.

But the man had bought him breakfast, and that was a gesture of kindness he didn't feel right about leaving unanswered. He would still have to let the poor guy down — Sorry, I'm flattered, but I'm not looking for anyone right now — but getting to know at least one friendly face would do wonders for his mood.

And who knew? Just because he'd bought him breakfast didn't mean the man wouldn't be disinterested in a casual fling. He'd have to navigate the uncharted waters of disclosure in the deep south at some point if he didn't want to shrivel up and die.

In a move that would betray him if his suitor was paying even a whit's attention to the cafe, Hector slipped his fingers between the slats of the blinds and spread them apart. He froze at the sight of the red-headed figure sitting at the only occupied table on the patio. All reservations forgotten, Hector let the blinds close with a snap and worked his jaw back and forth in silent debate before striding out the side door to meet him.