Laying face down on top of a garbage pile that smelled of rotting food, feces and urine was not the way most young men planned to spend the better part of their day off work. Nate had finally gone numb to the stench and was just waiting for the chance to get the hell out of the alley way before someone threw something into the dumpster on top of him. That would just add to his wonderfully crappy week thus far. Nathaniel hadn’t had the balls to call Grace and talk about what had happened, and she hadn’t really tried to contact him either, although they weren’t actually avoiding each other. It was just that they were conveniently always with other people and not alone with each other. Although with Nate helping Tom and his mother Maya spy on a blackmailer, he really didn’t have all that much free time to be running around with his best friend anyways.
Focus. You already missed this chance once because your head is lodged firmly up your...there he is. Nate talked to himself silently. The blackmailer was some douche bag who had the incredibly bad taste to have filmed himself having sex with some rich girl and was threatening to give the film to the internet. Nate and Tom had followed the blackmailer, thus dubbed el douche and had discovered something rather interesting. El douche was still seeing the girl he had filmed. As in they were meeting up right now and Nate was just waiting to get a picture of them together to give to Maya. The girl’s parents had some mighty suspicious natures and had asked Maya to figure out the game of the black mailer. It turns out the daughter was in on it and they were trying to collect money from the parents for some nefarious reason or another. Nate didn’t really care; he just found the whole thing despicable.
Even as Nate was taking pictured of El Douche and wonderslut as Tom called her, his mind was on other things. Actually on two very specific things. One, what he was going to do to salvage his friendship with Grace now that he went too far. Two, how he could help Ophelia now that she was getting the worst kind of news. Neither one was a whole lot of fun to tackle on its own; both together were giving Nate some nightmares. Still, he would do his best to not make things worse for either woman, though that seemed to be his speciality lately.
Because the blackmailer had figured out that Tom was following him, he knew to be a bit cautious and finding the love bird’s point of meet up was difficult. The advantage though, since they figured they’d ditched their tail, was that now that they were ‘safe’ they weren’t being discreet. Nate caught enough photographic proof of their duplicity to appease Maya and her clients, the girl’s parents and now he just had to wait for them to stop making out in the street so he could sneak out of here and go shower.
Being stuck inside a garbage dumpster was giving him too much time alone with his thoughts and that was dangerous territory lately. The duo finally stopped dry humping in the streets and wandered inside their rendez-vous and Nate heaved a sigh of relief. Before he could hop out of the dumpster though, the inevitable happened. Someone opened the lid and chucked in slops on top of him. Cold, wet, smelly and slimey stuff coated him and slithered through the layers of Nate’s clothing, already chilling in the cool October air.
That is…. Thank you god. Clearly I have done a great many things to offend you lately. Nate gave the sky a sour look as he climbed out of the dumpster, ignoring the astonished look of the gentleman who had just dumped pureed muck all over him. There’s something in my shoe… he whined to himself, trying his best to ignore the unpleasant squelching in his shoe every time he stepped forward. He fought with the wet, sodden jeans to get his crud encrusted hand into the pocket to grab his cell. Luckily he’d stuffed it in a Ziploc, just in case his bad luck held true. Now that it had, his phone still worked even though he reeked to high heaven.
“Tom, come pick me up. Bring a bucket of water too. I smell like you.” Nate called his friend, having to leave a message because the man just never directly answered his phone. That would be too easy. Tom knew where Nate had holed up and thus knew where to come get him, but Nate still had to stay out of sight of the apartment that the black mailers had gone into. No need to give the game away now that it was almost done. If he didn’t stick out so much covered in slop, Nate might even have just walked it the hour or so back to his end of town. But no taxi would take him like this, no public bus would either and he had no desire to be stared at in the more populated parts of town.
Around twenty minutes after calling Tom, Nate had to duck into the alleyway and hide back in his favourite dumpster because the blackmailing couple were coming back outside. It seems their amorous romp upstairs was over with and it was time to go back to being low lives. With my luck Tom will show up now and they’ll see him and split… Nate predicted with cynical sarcasm.
Thankfully Tom either spotted the smooching duo and stayed out of sight until they went they’re separate ways, or Nate’s luck was starting to turn up because Tom didn’t show until it was safe to be there. The crap Nate had been coated with had mostly dried to a disgusting, tacky mess and he had gotten used to the smell after a while, but the horrified and disgusted look Tom shot him was more than enough evidence to warn Nate that he looked like Hell’s leftovers warmed up.
“Did you bring a bucket?” Nate asked, voice heavily sarcastic.
“No. Mind riding in the trunk so I don’t have to be seen with you like that?” Tom shot back, unlocking the door despite his words.
Nate opened the passenger door and got in without a word, not even saying anything when Tom opened all the windows to let the breeze help eliminate some of the stench. Nate tried to bury the building funk his mood had been in lately as Tom drove him back to his house. Since Carlitos was often wheelchair bound, having great difficulty and pain using his walker, Tom didn’t often bring people back to his family house. Nate was one of the lucky few and since he was doing a job to help Maya, they were kind of expecting him. Still even they stared at him as he walked into their home covered in filth.
“Got your picture proof. Stick a fork in me, I’m done.” Nate said, handing the surveillance camera to Maya.
“More like stick you in the shower, you smell.” She replied with a smile, taking the camera and pinching her nose. “You know where it is, leave the clothes on the floor outside the door; I’ll wash them for you.”
Nate nodded and shuffled his way down the hall, peeling the clothes off to drop them on the floor in a pile. He’d long ago gotten over being body shy so he didn’t care that he was standing bare assed in the hallway.
“Tom tells me that you’re in a lazzo with Lobo’s little girl.” Carlitos said in Spanish, not seeming to care that Nate was naked and in desperate need of a shower.
Nate replied in Spanish, as comfortable in his father’s native tongue as he was in English. “You mind if we have this discussion until after I’m not shrinking in the breeze?” he tried to deflect.
“You’re already vulnerable, naked just makes you uncomfortable.” Carlitos countered, not giving him an inch. “You’re Malcolm’s boy so I will give you this piece of advice. Life is too brutal and too short to waste your time. I lost one person I love due to fear and hesitation. I almost lost my wife to it too. Don’t make my mistakes. You love her or else you wouldn’t hurt so bad. She loves you or else she wouldn’t wait for you to act. Be a man.”
Nate gaped at Carlitos in plain faced surprise. “I’m fairly certain that Westley would skin me alive if I touched her.” He felt obligated to point out.
“A good woman is worth pain.The Wolf is going to guard his only cub fiercely so you better be damn sure this is the right thing to do. Do not mess around and do not waste your one chance, none of us will let you have another if you hurt her.” Carlitos replied. “Now go shower, you’re making an old man feel uncomfortable just standing around naked like that.” He wheeled away before Nathaniel could respond.
“I never plan to hurt her.” Nate mumbled to himself and finally went into the bathroom to claim his shower. Carlitos’ words chased after him. Yes he needed to be a man. Grace was worth some pain and he wanted to be a good man for her. But was she really waiting for him?
YOU ARE READING
Aces Wild (House of Cards Series 4)
Teen Fiction(Sequel to Queen of Spades/King of Hearts stories) Nathaniel Vega grew up in a less than conventional family. His mother and father had once been student and teacher, his best friend was also his adoptive sister and his family seemed to include peop...
