“Careful, Sweets,” I said, “or your coffee gets poured into a to-go cup and you are to-gone.”

“Truth, ma’am?” Sweets said with a slight laugh. “He was a cocky young smartass who thought he walked hand in hand with truth, justice and the American way. He was also fair, generous and respectful. Had him a kind of, you know, insight—a wisdom—about folk. Real folk.”

“I take it there’s more,” a very astute Tatina said, “but you’re being cautious around me. Which you needn’t be. Right, August?”

This appeared to be a deceptively simple final-exam question for the recent lesson Tatina had given me on honesty. She was smiling at me, but her unblinking brown eyes told me I was under cross-examination.

“Right,” I said.

“Dang, girl,” Sweets said with a laugh. “Where that sexy accent from? Virginia?”

“Norway via Somalia and Germany,” she said.

“Daaaang!” Sweets said. Looking at me, Sweets said under his breath, “You drivin’ imports now?”

“So, what’s going on?” Tatina said. “Really going on.”

After a moment, I nodded to Sweets, indicating he had the go-ahead for full disclosure. Frankly, I don’t know how anyone, least of all me, could resist even the slightest interrogation from Tatina.

After five minutes and a coffee refresh, Sweets had clued Tatina in to the fact that men had recently arrived in town with the mission to kill me. After another ten minutes, and I had filled in the background: an increase in drug pushers in Mexicantown, who were using former criminal Duke Ducane as a “false flag” for the drug supplier; a mystery-cloaked real estate broker named “Mr. Sloane” and his interest in buying the city-block-long Authentico Foods; Mr. Ochoa’s suspicious death; and how everything seemed to circle back to Sloane.

“Sorry, Miss Tatina,” Sweets said. “Looks like your boy here got himself a talent for gummin’ up the works when it comes to mothafu—unsavory types.”

“There’s an old German saying,” Tatina said, rising from her seat at the kitchen island. “A hero is just a dumbass who doesn’t know when to quit.” Then she leaned over the kitchen island and gave me a quick kiss on the lips. “You’re my hero.”

“Gee, thanks,” I said.

She made her way back upstairs like a slow-motion dream of a conquering warrior goddess.

“Boy, I ain’t lyin’,” Sweets said, shaking his head. “I’d crawl a mile over broken glass—”

“Do not finish that sentence.”