Fight for Her #4: MMA New Adult Contemporary Romantic Suspense Read Online Free PDF Page B

ambulance comes, no telling.”
    “Can I come by next Tuesday, see if he comes?” I ask.
    “Sure. ’Round about five, I’d say. Before dark.”
    “Thank you,” I tell him. “We’re hoping to find him before Thanksgiving.”
    “That’s comin’ fast,” he says. “Maybe he’ll be here Tuesday, just in time.” But he looks doubtful.
    The man goes back inside. I turn around. I’m not sure which way to take this. Go to the cemetery? Or call the hospitals?
    A man bundled in a blanket shuffles toward the table. I watch him sit painfully in the chair. Damn. So much suffering in the world. I figure I might as well talk to him before I head out. I sit opposite him. “You know Tony Greco?” I ask.
    “Who’s asking?” he says, his voice a growl.
    Funny they all ask the same thing. I wonder what bullshit they have to go through day to day with people hassling them.
    “My wife is his daughter,” I say. “She wants to find him for Thanksgiving.”
    “Huh.” The guy huddles down in his blanket. “I think he’s probably dead.”
    My throat gets tight. “You know what happened?”
    “Just heard about it. He keeled over in front of Luceros.”
    “The bakery?”
    “Yeah. They would give him bread. They give us all bread.”
    “Did they call an ambulance?”
    “Lucero himself drove him somewhere.”
    I jump from the chair. “Thank you.” I’m about to run off, then I remember who I’m talking to. I pull out another twenty and lay it on the table. “Take care of yourself.”
    A hand snakes out from the blanket. His arm is bare. Shit, he doesn’t even have a coat. I strip mine off. “Here,” I say. “I got others.”
    He lets the blanket fall and takes the coat. He’s just got a T-shirt on beneath.
    I walk away, not even feeling the cold. Damn this shit world. Not a thing I could really do about it. Not enough shelters could be built to help everybody. Guys like that probably don’t trust shelters anyway. Sounds like Tony doesn’t.
    I take off in a light jog toward Luceros. It might already be locked up by now. I feel close to finding out what happened, and I hope for Maddie’s sake that Tony hasn’t died on the streets.
    The glass doors look modern on the crumbling yellow facade of the pasteleria. As I approach, a woman comes outside and locks the door. I run toward her full-out, hoping to catch her before she gets in a car.
    But she doesn’t. She heads toward a bus stop, a giant bag under her arm. She stops in front of anyone she sees sitting on a curb or a bench and hands them a loaf of bread.
    I reach her and touch her arm.
    She turns away from the man who is tucking the bread under his jacket. She is very tiny, about fifty years old, her black hair twisted in a tight knot. Her eyes are kind.
    “It’s cold to be out without a coat,” she says. She reaches in her bag for a loaf of bread.
    She thinks I’m homeless. I hold up my hands. “I gave my coat to someone a few blocks back,” I say. “I need to know about the man who collapsed in front of the bakery. A homeless man.”
    She pauses. “Tony? He loves my rosemary bread.”
    “Is he okay?”
    “My husband took him to White Memorial Hospital.” She motions up the street. “It’s about a mile or so that way. He was okay last I heard. I think David saw him yesterday. This has been a busy week with Thanksgiving coming.”
    I rush out a long breath of relief. “Thank you. I’m looking for him. He’s my wife’s father.”
    She reaches out a hand and squeezes my forearm. “I think he will still be there. It was something with his lungs, but nothing too terrible.”
    “Thank you, thank you,” I say and start another low-intensity jog. A mile is nothing. And running it will keep me warm.

Chapter 8: Maddie

    I lied about my phone. Parker has been so good about waiting for Lily to call him on Thursdays that I unblocked his number.
    I should probably go back to my old phone plan and not the one Parker pays for, but right now it seems