Nico Rosso - Renegade Protector

“Are you all right?” Concern etched the black woman’s face. She clutched a hastily thrown-on sweater across her chest and didn’t hesitate to step into the puddles on the sidewalk in her untied sneakers.

“I’m fine.” Mariana hadn’t meant it when she’d told Ty after the attack. She tried to put as much truth in it now to reassure her friend.

“I heard the sirens and jumped on the community loop. They had the address from the scanners.” Sydney slowed her progress once she reached the broken glass on the ground.

Mariana separated further from the police and firefighter activity, opened the door of her shop and stepped into the embrace of her friend. A long breath racked her, releasing some tension. “It was them.”

Sydney squeezed harder around her. “The developers?”

“It had to be.” Mariana stepped from the hug and looked Sydney in the face. “They attacked me...in the parking lot.”

Worry mixed with fury in Sydney’s eyes. “I’m going to take a wrench to every one of their heads.”

Mariana whispered, “Someone helped me.”

“Who?” Sydney shot a suspicious glance at Pete. She’d had less choice things to say about him and the police department when Mariana’s concerns had been dismissed because of lack of actionable evidence.

“I don’t know.” And what details she did have weren’t quite adding up yet. “I mean, I have a name, but not much else.”

“Not local?” Sydney looked about, as if they were being watched.

“Definitely not.” Mariana would’ve remembered if she’d ever seen him before he walked into her shop that day.

“He didn’t stick around, though.” Sydney couldn’t hide her skepticism.

“He’s kind of...shady.” When Sydney shook her head and took a breath to voice her concerns, Mariana took her friend’s hand and continued, “But he was there all the way. And he rushed into the fire to save things from my shop.”

Sydney squeezed her hand tighter, looking at the broken-out facade of Mariana’s store. “I’m so sorry about what they did.” Her friend swung her gaze across the street, to her own shop that sold candles and honey and other by-products of Sydney’s beekeeping. Mariana understood. Anyone could’ve been targeted by these attacks. But it was only her. And it was for her land.

Jones approached respectfully. “We’re wrapped up here for now. Can you come down to the station to put all the details down?”

Mariana nodded and let go of Sydney’s hand. “I can do that.”

Sydney stepped to her side. “I’ll go with you.”

“You showed up here,” Mariana reassured. “And that’s exactly what I needed. You can go home now. I’m good.”

Miguel was the last out of the shop and closed the door behind him. “Moretti Construction has a twenty-four-hour number for boarding windows. I’ll give them a call.”

“Gracias, Miguel.” Mariana shook his hand. “Thanks for everything.”

He held her hand an extra beat. “I’m really sorry about what happened.”

“We’ll find them.” Jones stood straight, but Mariana couldn’t draw from his confidence. The crooks had been too slick to leave a solid trail before. What could the police do now?

Miguel dropped her hand and headed to his fire truck. Mariana patted Sydney’s shoulder. “Seriously. I’m good.”

Sydney’s concern didn’t diminish. She waved her cell phone. “Call me for anything.”

“You know I will.” Mariana smiled a goodbye, but wasn’t sure how convincing it was. Sydney kept watch as Mariana moved up the sidewalk with Jones and Pete. Rounding the corner at the end of the building brought relief from the flashing lights of the fire trucks. But a new anxiety arose when Mariana stepped into the dark parking lot.

The attack still shook her, cold fear knotting between her shoulder blades. “Maybe now we can convince the city to fix the light back here.” Her voice rang tight. If she could just see Ty and know if he was still around, it might unwind the tension. She thought she felt him watching her, standing by to spring into action again, but it might’ve just been a fantasy. Maybe she’d just imagined him in the first place and this whole thing was a delusion created by her assault.

Pete offered up only “Yeah.”

Jones opened the door to the police cruiser. “We’ll follow you there.” He turned on the headlights, illuminating her truck and half the parking lot. If Ty had been lurking in the shadows, there would’ve been nowhere to hide now. She tried to search as casually as possible for him. No sign.

She’d already seen his skills in a fight. There was no question he could stay hidden if he wanted. But she didn’t know how to sort her disappointment at not seeing him. It could’ve been just a matter of safety. He’d been the one to save her this night. There was something more, though. A curious yearning to find out more of who this mysterious man was.

The automatic motion of taking her keys from her purse brought her back to the moment. This was where her night had changed. She unlocked the truck, then walked to where the rescued items from her store were still scattered on the ground. Everything stacked easily, with the photos on top. Serious and determined, the people in the old picture watched her walk back to the truck and load them in the passenger seat.

She was back behind the wheel of her truck but couldn’t erase what had happened. The engine turned over, and pop music sprang out of the radio, way too cheerful. She killed the radio and pulled away, leaving her burned-out and soaked store. The police car followed her out of the parking lot, but she didn’t see any other cars join the caravan, even from a distance. Ty talked a good game about being with her every step of the way, but his absence left her starkly cold.

Seven blocks later, she parked in front of the police station and went inside with Pete and Jones. Her skin had been so chilled from the wet clothes she didn’t even feel it anymore under the heavy blanket. Hot coffee didn’t help, nor did the hard plastic seat next to Jones’s desk in the large room past the front desk of the station. The lights were so bright she couldn’t tell if it was night or day. Jones typed on a computer and Pete sat close. Together they sent questions to her as she recounted the night. Now that she was off her feet, exhaustion dragged her bones heavy.

“I don’t know who he was. He didn’t say.” Most of the questions swirled when she mentioned the man who’d helped her. “It was too dark to really see him in the parking lot.” She left out the detail that Ty had been in her shop, and that his deep gaze had inspired an unexpected blush on her chest and cheeks.

“And in the fire?” Pete asked pointedly.

She shot back, “I was a little preoccupied.”

Jones looked over his screen. “So we have a black man, over six feet tall, and that’s it.”

“But I know that the guy who attacked me in the parking lot was white, shaved head, in his twenties, no facial hair.” Pete tilted his head and smoothed the back of his blond hair, a move she recognized as frustration. Before he asked, she answered, “The headlights of the car that tried to run me over lit that guy up pretty good, but not the man who helped me.”

Pete seemed unconvinced. Jones stepped in. “I think we’ve got everything you remember.” He took a business card from the desk and handed it to her. “Anything else comes back to you, call anyone here. We’re all working on this, Mariana.”

“Thanks, Jones.” Her legs felt like rusted steel as she stood. She shook his hand and nodded to Pete. He tipped his head in return.

Jones stepped with her toward the front door. “You want us to escort you home, check out the place?”