Shimmy Bang Sparkle(11)

But she was so easy to talk to, I found myself damn close to blurting out that I was fresh out of jail for moving stolen diamonds for an art dealer on Canyon Road in Santa Fe. The more we talked, the more she laughed, and the happier I felt, the more I wanted to spill it. All of it.

It was weird. And it was also really . . .

Nice?

Nice. Yeah. Really nice. Part of me wanted to ask her about the ring, sure. But a much bigger part of me . . . I watched her close her eyes with pleasure as she took a big bite of a steaming papadam . . . didn’t. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. It would’ve complicated everything. Too fucking much, and too fucking soon. Having a common interest in jewel theft wasn’t like sharing a passion for mountain biking or curry or some shit. If she ever told me, it’d take time. And trust.

“What do you do, besides zooming around on your motorcycle?” she asked. She had a little glop of one of the chutneys on her lip, and I pointed to the same spot on my mouth, trying not to be too obvious about it. She grabbed her napkin and wiped off the wrong side.

“Other left,” I said. All this smiling was making my goddamned cheeks burn.

Finally, she got it and straightened out her napkin on her lap. Her dark hair was in a long, gorgeous tangle over her shoulder. A thin line from a bikini top made a tantalizing stripe over her collarbone.

She cocked her head and smiled, and I remembered she’d asked me a question. What the hell was the question? Christ almighty. An evening with her and I couldn’t even think in straight lines.

“So . . . what do you do?” she said, as if she hadn’t pretty much said that same damn thing two seconds ago. She ended with a big smile and pinned her tongue between her teeth.

I was on it this time, and I ran through what I wanted to say. I couldn’t tell her everything, for Chrissake. I didn’t want to spook her. But I didn’t want to flat-out bullshit her, either. So I decided to cherry-pick the truth. Give her the highlights and leave the lowlights for some other day. Or maybe never.

“I used to be a mechanic,” at a chop shop in the South Valley, where I also learned to fence just about everything, from used stereos to weed to weapons, which I fucking hated. “I decided to go into business up in Santa Fe,” where I began specializing in fencing jewels, “until I made a bad investment,” and got caught red-handed by an undercover cop at an exchange just outside a town called—wait for it—Truth or Consequences. “Actually, I just moved back to Albuquerque,” after seven months in the can. And now I’m trying hard not to screw up again, and that’s why, “I’m bartending at a place downtown.”

And now how the fuck was I going to explain that career change? At least it’s legal. It keeps me out of trouble. And it’s 100 percent parole officer–approved.

Most eligible bachelor in Albuquerque right here.

But she spared me from my impending epic overshare, swooping in with, “Bartending is harrrrrrd. I was a waitress for exactly eleven days. I’ve never worked so hard in my life or been so bad at anything. I had to”—here she lifted her fingers in air quotes—“resign . . . before I got fired! Like Nixon! But bartenders!” She looked up at the ceiling. “There’s a special place in heaven for bartenders . . .”

She was sexy, had expert moves, helped out old guys in need, and hadn’t said some condescending BS when she heard the word bartending. There was no way she was actually this great.

“. . . where people remember how to calculate twenty percent and never ask what beers are on tap when they’re standing in front of the taps!”

Or maybe she was.

When the tikka masala came, she tore off a big triangle of naan from the piece in the basket between us, scooped up some chicken and sauce, and jammed it in her mouth. She was chatty without being awkward, interested without being nosy. She also always managed to end up talking with her mouth full, which was pretty fucking cute. She told me about her friends, who she worked with, and about Mr. Bozeman, who she looked after whenever she could. And for about one second, listening to her talk and watching her chase down a piece of chicken in her tikka masala—for the first second in ages—I felt like a normal dude, on a normal date. Didn’t matter what I’d seen before; this felt good. This felt right. And I didn’t want this to end. Not yet. Just as she scooped up some more tikka, I asked, “What are you doing after this?”

A little bit of the red sauce splatted down onto her plate, and she froze with her naan between her fingers. “I . . . Actually, I was . . .” she stammered.

Aww fuck. It was too much too soon. Probably for the best, anyway. The new me probably shouldn’t be spending the whole night with a woman who just stole $10K worth of diamonds, no matter how fucking bad I wanted to. “Nah, never mind. I’ve got shit to do myself.” Like drinking OJ straight from the carton while I sit around in my boxers. Getting straight was a lot of things, including boring as shit.

“No, no!” she said, reaching out and touching my forearm. “Actually, it’s pretty silly. I was going to go have a movie night in my pajamas, if you really want to know,” she said, smiling so hard her nose wrinkled up. “Going out with you sounds much more exciting.”

Her eyes brought me back to that Mexican lagoon again. Diving from the cliffs there was risky as hell but too tempting to resist—exactly the same feeling I got from being near Stella. I shouldn’t, but I will. Being the new me could wait; for tonight, I was going to dive right the fuck in with her. So I watched her for a few beats, letting her feel my eyes on her. Letting her know that I wanted my hands on her so bad, but I was also going to be a gentleman about it. There was a time and a place for hot and heavy, and a booth at the Crown Prince of India wasn’t it. “There’s an outdoor theater down the street. Movie starts at sundown.”