Mr. Close?”
“Yeah, sure,” Danny said.
Henry opened his mouth to no doubt say something smart-ass, but snapped it shut again at the half defiant, half pleading look Cory shot him. “Whatever.” Then, as if to make up for what he clearly interpreted as a momentary weakness, he gave Poppy a slow up-and-down. “You’re hot.”
“Yes, I know. It’s my burden to bear. So shall we get started?” She nodded at the assortment of painting supplies on the sidewalk to her right and held out her hand, palm up. “You each owe me thirty-seven fifty.”
Danny dug through his wallet and forked over the required amount, but both Cory and Henry looked stricken, although they struggled to hide the fact. Cory said sulkily, “I’ve only got ten-fifty.”
“And I only got twenty,” Henry admitted.
“Then we’ll put you on the payment plan,” she said easily and accepted the money they did have, making a note of it in her little notebook. “You’ll contribute each time we meet until your debt is paid off. If you don’t have a way to make money on your own, a couple of the merchants whose buildings you defaced agreed to give you some chores, which they’ll pay you minimum wage to perform.”
“Pretty damn generous of them if you ask me,” Jase muttered.
She turned to face him. “The no-cursing rule extends to you and me, Detective de Sanges,” she said levelly. “I will thank you to show us the same respect we’re requiring of Misters Gardo and Close and Ms. Capelli.”
“Yeah, Detective,” Henry said. “Show us some damn respect.”
De Sanges’s dark brows inched toward each other for a moment, and he leveled a look on Henry until the kid shifted on his huge, laces-dangling sneakers. But he merely said to Poppy, “Yes, ma’am,” and looked beyond her to the kids once more. “My apologies,” he said flatly.
When it became clear none of the teens was going to reply, she turned her attention back to the two with balances left on their accounts. “Do you both understand my conditions?”
Cory gave a clipped nod.
Henry said, “Yeah, big deal. I’ll wait until the old man climbs back in his bottle and see what the wallet yields.”
Her heart felt bruised at the picture that comment revealed, but she knew better than to display anything that Henry could construe as pity. “Let’s get started then.”
Jase stood back and watched as she handed out old lab coats for the kids to use to protect their clothing and got them organized. He eyed the girl in particular as she took off her oversize leather jacket and carefully folded it before setting it out of harm’s way. Calloway had the right of it: the kid was a surprise. He hadn’t been involved when they’d been busted, but everything he’d heard had been about three boys. Cory was tall for her age and happily not one of those starved-looking girls that so many of today’s young females strove to be. But the nape of her neck looked soft-as-a-baby’s vulnerable.
My ass. He scowled. He didn’t know where the hell that had come from, but he wasn’t cutting her any slack just because she was a girl. Do the crime, you do the time; that was his motto. Her freaking nape most likely wasn’t on display anyway when she was in the dark, dressed like a boy, roaming the city streets.
But a jittery feeling attacked the pit of his stomach on the heels of that visual…and just served to make him tenser still. Pulling his attention away from the girl, he focused it on the author of this charade.
And felt an edginess of a different sort. He shoved it aside, but ruminated over the fact that she was a bit of a revelation herself. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected to see in her interaction with these kids, but something a little more Lady Bountiful, he supposed.
But she was good with them. Calm but strict, which surprised him. He’d assumed she’d want to be their friend too much to be anything but ineffectual. But she hadn’t let a damn thing slide, whether it was about the money they owed or that respecting-each-other rule…which he had to admit was first-rate. She managed to do it, too, in a way that didn’t put their backs up, and God knew that was a talent not to be sneezed at.
And that little shit Henry was right about one thing: she was hot. Amazingly so, considering she didn’t try real hard. As far as he could tell she wasn’t wearing a lick of makeup except for maybe some mascara and a lip balm he’d seen her smear over naturally pink lips with a pronounced bow that pulled his gaze like magnets did metal. She had all that blond hair pulled away from her face in a high ponytail, three skinny black headbands keeping the unruly curls from escaping, the first just back from her hairline, the second an inch or so behind that and the third an equal distance behind the second.
She wore well-worn jeans, a slim red fleece top and a puffy navy down vest, over which she was currently pulling on a voluminous black smock that was paint-splotched with a good dozen colors. All those layers should have made her look like the Kraft Jet-Puffed Girl, and for about one minute it did. But then she bent down to pry the lid off a can of paint and the smock rode up and her jeans stretched tight over a world-class butt.
“Dude, why you lickin’ your chops?”
Jerking his attention away, wondering what had become of his trademark ability to stay on track no matter what distractions were going on around him, he glanced at Henry and said the first thing that popped to mind. “I was thinking about marshmallows and hot, gooey centers.”
“I love marshmallows!” Cory looked at him over her shoulder and for a moment her screw-you armor dropped and she was just a wistful-looking little girl in too much makeup. “My daddy used to make us a fire in the fireplace and we’d toast them on a stick over it.”
Henry studied him a moment, then shook his head. “You mighta been thinking of hot, gooey centers, dude, but I’m thinking it weren’t in no marshmallows.”
Jesus. Jase was disgusted with himself. What the hell’s happened to your cop face, when you can’t even fool a thirteen-year-old?
Luckily Henry didn’t have time to pursue his advantage because Poppy chose that moment to hand him a roller. The boy grimaced in distaste.
Jase shot him an evil smile. “Shut up and paint, kid.”
“That’s Mr. Close to you, dickhead.”
“Remember Ms. Calloway’s rules,” Cory said. “It’s Detective Dickhead.”
Danny G. laughed.
“That’s enough out of all of you,” Blondie said and shot him a look that said, Aren’t you supposed to be the grown-up here, Detective Dickhead? “I want to see a little less dissing and a lot more painting.”
She kept the teens on task, making them, over their vociferous protests, apply two coats of paint on the side of the shop. Not until nearly three and a half hours had passed did she step back and survey their work. “Not bad,” she said.
“It’s better than not bad,” Danny G. protested. “It’s damn—dang—good. ‘Specially considering only a small portion of it was even tagged in the first place.”
“Yes, I haven’t heard that more than a dozen times from each of you today,”
