Assuming Names: a con artist's masquerade (Criminal Mischief Book 1) by Tanya Thompson

me?”
    I stared at him, baffled.
    He glanced at the amount of grounds already in the basket. “You try hurt me? Maybe you think I no …” he punched his chest.
    My furrowed brow meant I was clueless as to what he meant. I studied both him and the coffee maker for meaning.
    “This how you make coffee?” he demanded.
    I set the can down. “I thought so, but I’ve never made it before.”
    His head dropped forward to consider me with disbelief. Raising his brows, he stared at me, waiting for me to change my story or give something more, and when I did neither, he pulled back with a deep breath to ask gravely, “You laughing at me?”
    I looked myself over and then, rather perplexed it wasn’t obvious, answered, “No.”
    He exhaled confusion. At a loss to understand, he put both his hands on my shoulders and stepped me to the side to stand before the coffee maker himself.
    Palms open to encompass the mess I had made, he shook his head muttering, “Madonna mia.”
    Pulling the basket out of the machine and dumping the grounds in the trash, he spoke aloud as though he were explaining it to us both, “So, you no laughing whole time.” Rinsing the basket, stating as fact, “You think Kalashnikov is sport.” Showing me the filters and then daintily taking one to press into the basket, he held it for me to inspect. “You know how to cook?”
    I looked around the kitchen as though it were a hospital operating theater.
    He asked himself sardonically, “Why she know how to cook when she make coffee like this?” He swept his hand over the counter, pushing a pile of grounds to one side. “How many years you have?” He was filling the jug with water, waiting for my answer, but I was confused. He searched for the phrase he’d been taught, “How old are you?”
    “Twenty-three.”
    He laughed. Pointing at the two and then just below the four cup measuring lines, he asked, “Two three?”
    “Yes.”
    “No.” Pouring the water into the coffee maker, “Why you say this, Constanzia?” But I remained silent while he scooped an appropriate amount of grounds into the filter. Once the machine was started, he watched it like he were in a daze, then huffing out a breath, he turned to look me over and declare, “Maybe you one nine. Maybe. ”
    I smiled an expression of whatever-makes-you-happy, making Sergiu frown and say, “You pretty girl but,” his hand waved from the left of me to the right, “something no good with you.” Then, after a moment’s consideration, “I like this.”

Cambodian Mob
     
    Sitting on Tricia’s front porch, we were looking over the park. Tricia was worried. She didn’t want to sound paranoid, but she wondered if maybe someone were watching the house.
    I shielded my eyes to squint into the setting sun. In the farthest distance, golfers were striking balls across the green, but no one else seemed to be around.
    “Perhaps I’ll ask your detective what he thinks when he gets here.”
    We were waiting for Rick to arrive. He’d called from the sheriff’s office while I was working. I’d been with Tricia for a month and he’d been meaning to check up on me, so he offered, “We’ll make a night of it, and I’ll take you to dinner.”
    But first Tricia wanted to tell me something. She’d been edgy the past week. We would go to see the Europeans and she’d keep her attention out the window, looking, watching. Sergiu would press wine on her, but she was too agitated to drink it.
    He had asked me, “What is problem with Tricia?”
    But I didn’t know. I hadn’t asked. She always seemed relatively calm in his living room with Daniel. It was with the Cambodians she was really troubled.
    And tonight it seemed like we were at the Asian apartment complex instead of her porch. She was jumpy, looking nearly manic while throwing back wine to drown her nerves. Her asking Rick if someone was watching the house sounded positively demented, and I was embarrassed for us both just imagining it.