Re: AHS: Sam A & Cris M
He knew plenty of girls married off, even more who ran away, taking to the streets and disappearing, lured in by some pimp or another, but, yeah, no, none of them were pretty little white girls with Spanish like that. But he knew—just because he hadn't seen it, didn't mean it didn't happen. Yeah, he'd learned that lesson the first time he was on the beat. He relearned it with every case that came across his desk and each one that walked in asking to speak with someone from Special Victims, that splinter of fear in their eyes that no one was going to believe them. Did he feel sorry for the girls whose only value was in their being passed off as a wife? Yes. Did he pity them? No. Sometimes it was the only way out of something worse.
Yeah, yeah, his number. His grin cracked, evidence itself that she was right. He'd liked it as much as his sisters had, and it was fun so long as they had everything back before Padre came home.
What that smile said wasn't that she was corrupt as she was innocent. It was that she was corrupt, the blackened soles of her bare feet and all that color on her lips. Led again by the hand, Sam laughing like she had it all figured out, and Cris followed the upkick of her unshod feet, the tide of her long skirt washing up to his shins.
The bar was all round, rich wood, sleek with imagined modernity, the stools with thin backs. Cris took a hold of one and tugged it out for Sam before sliding onto the one next to hers.
"Havana cooler for me," he asked of the bartender, hand going to his tie and holding it against his chest to keep it from flopping on the bar. He gestured toward Sam to let her order, and once she had, he leaned back some in that thin chair, hands folded low on his stomach. "Guess they don't have a no shirt, no shoes, no service policy here."
He smiled at her, shifting to rest an elbow on the lip of the bar as he turned toward her some.
"How long you been coming to this place, eh, mami? You must drag a lot of poor saps here. Don't think I didn't see the sympathy in Santa Barbara's eyes," he said about the doorman. There was nothing accusatory or shaming in his tone. It was that same black-sky humor born in a city where green could be rare.