Coffee & Criminals

22. She's Your What?!

We kept walking.

I swallowed embarrassingly loud. It felt like there was something stuck on my throat. I wanted to tell Wolfe something, I just didn't know what. The words were right on the tip of my tongue but my mind hadn't gone far enough to know what they were just yet. Wasn't that silly?

"I have to ask you something and I need you to tell me the truth." His voice was hoarse, almost cracking on the last word. Truth. Like I said, Wolfe wasn't a liar. He just withheld information. Saying exactly enough to be considered that word, the truth, but not enough that he could be held to his words if a change occurred. I liked to think myself as an honest person. I just lied when it was necessary. Did that make it right? Absolutely not. Did I care? Absolutely not. Would I ever give up Twizzlers? Absolutely not.

I chewed my bottom lip nervously. "Depends on what the question is."

"Florence."

I rolled my eyes. "Yes, I'll tell the truth."

"Do you trust me?" Wolfe asked.

I was confused. "So, is that the question or just, like, an inquiry before you ask the question-"

"Florence."

"Stop saying my name." I scowled. Trust. A special word, meant so much more to some people than others. I trusted three people with everything: My parents and Clancy. Ade, not any more. Not after what he did. As for Wolfe...he wanted a truthful answer. I was going to give him one, I swear. I just didn't know how to...say it, exactly because I didn't even know the answer myself.

"Well?" He raised his eyebrow.

"I don't know." There. That was the truth. I really didn't know. Had that question been asked to me a week ago, my answer would have been a surefire no. But now, I wasn't so sure. Wolfe seemed to be expecting more so I unstuck my tongue and continued. "I suppose, to a certain extent, yes I do. With some things. I mean, I wouldn't trust you with my life or anything. You did just leave me alone for three minutes. You had many chances, and reasons, to kill me and you didn't take it. I dumped coffee over you, I pushed you, I made fun of you. But you also drove me home when I was lost and I would almost consider you a nice person if it wasn't for the one thousand pounds of meth in the cellar. Trust is a really interesting word but I wouldn't use it to describe the relationship we have."

"Then what word would you use?"

"Harmful. Unhealthy." I said bluntly. "Wrong. Damaging. One-sided. And every other synonym there is for the word 'bad.' What was the question you had to ask me?"

"Oh, right." Wolfe said. He was quiet for a few seconds. "What's the wifi password for the coffee shop?"

"I don't know." Lies, I totally did. It was CatBurglar48.

"Seriously. We need it." Wolfe urged. "Elliot needs to access to the Internet keep track of the shipments that come in. Our entire security system, cameras and such, are monitored on a concealed Internet domain. We can't break through the firewall, for whatever reason and Elliot can't access anything without the password."

"I told you. I don't know." There was no way I was going to tell Wolfe the wifi password. We were already in deep waters by merely associating with the Crowns. The drug shipments that were currently sitting in the cellar was proof of affiliation, in any eyes of the law. Using our property, or rather, my parent's property, for a criminal hideaway was breaking all the rules. The last thing we needed was for the bust to happen from being traced back to the signal coming from the coffee shop. It was practically leaving a breadcrumb trail for the cops. Evidence was a lot harder to erase from online networks.