The Law and the Codas

Chapter Thirty-Seven

"I knew you'd make my sister cry."

Behind Mara, Sam charges in like a boar sniffing out its next victim.

"Jo-jo," Mara says, slapping her cheeks lightly to stop herself from crying. Sam, noticing her red eyes, bares his teeth. "It wasn't Ten's fault." She runs a hand across her eyes and blinks.

Sam stops inches from her, doing a good job ignoring me despite my proximity to his sister. Instead, he leans over, swats Mara's hand away from her face, and examines her. Surprisingly, now that he was in front of me, he didn't radiate as much hate as I thought he would. Sam's not the volcano-shoved-into-a-pair-of-trousers I thought he'd be. He projects an almost soft aura as he brushes aside a few strands of Mara's hair, the corners of his lips raising into a smile.

All the bite from that morning's session seems to have dissipated, though that might just be because he's looking at someone he loves, standing in a place he adores and isn't thinking about me or my presence muddying up everything. Tugging on his sleeve, he runs it along Mara's cheeks in gentle arcs. "I know," he says, his voice low and tender. "You always make yourself cry."

Mara bats his hand away and harrumphs.

Then, Sam turns to face me and it's like he's switched a flip. He locks eyes with me, all that perceived softness melting and reforming into a cold, steely veneer. We stay this way for a few seconds, neither speaking, as Mara shoots off cursory glances our way.

Finally, Sam exhales and shoves a fisted hand toward my stomach. I brace and close my eyes, fully expecting to feel a fist slam into my gut considering what had transpired between us earlier, but when I peel my eyes open, I find Sam's hand, palm out, holding a small white dot.

He shifts on his feet and kicks at a nearby rock. "You didn't really think I'd hit you?" Jutting his chin, he gives his head a little shake causing a few hairs to fall in front of his eyes.

"Well," he says, giving me a sideways glance. "Take it." Mara chuckles. Obviously, I hadn't been clued in to whatever this was. "It won't bite," Sam says, scowling.

Beside me, Mara gives my back a gentle push, goading me to take the dot. It's enough to stem my skepticism for now, so I pluck up the dot, careful not to graze Sam's palm.

I hold the compact white dot between fingers, turning it so that the light hits it at different angles. "What's on it?"

Sam shakes his head. "I told you, Ri-ri. She wouldn't get it." Still shaking his head, he reaches for the dot.

I bat his hand away, my finger grazing the small piece of plastic. At my touch, it lights up, and projects a single black cockroach into the air. "What's this?"

"A cockroach," Sam mumbles, casting his gaze downward.

I'm about to ask why a holographic cockroach is spinning in mid-air when underneath the image, a single sentence pops into existence. "Cockroaches until the end," I say, reading each electric green word. "Lukkas." I knit my eyebrows together. "Lukkas..." When my gaze meets Mara's she nods at Sam.

Lukkas. More than the holographic cockroach, Sam had gifted me with his real name. Clasping the dot, I bring it to my chest. "I love it," I say.

Sam shakes his head while he slams his hands into his trouser pockets. "It's no big deal." He shrugs. "Bought it with some extra money. Wanted to thank you and stuff." His face flashes red. "Though you've been pretty lame lately, but..." His foot finds another rock and he kicks it into a group of daisies.

There'd been plenty of times over the past months where I felt like I was marching to my death, and given Della's no-shits-given attitude, I felt justified thinking that way. Most of her missions had culminated in kidnappings, near-death experiences, or actual deaths.