“Time we were getting back.” A woman’s voice, older. Or maybe just more sober.

“Yeah, yeah.” He pulled a face and leveled a finger at me. “Get back where you belong, den rat. You got lucky this time. Don’t try it again. I’ll remember you.”

“Huh. Not the boss of your life after all. Or mine.” The alarms eased, so I could set my jaw and stare at the tip of his finger like I’d any second bite it off. “Who made you the law?”

He snorted. “Law? Ain’t no law. Only Darwin.”

Oh, I was brave, now he’d been cut down to size, ready show some pluck. Rubio had told me about Darwin. “That so? Come on downtown, and I’ll show you who’s fit, and what survival really means.”

He stared at me like he was ready to go right then, like it might be more interesting than anything else he had planned.

“You wouldn’t last a minute.” Now I was pushing that luck.

“You’d be surprised.”

“Julie? Oh, for godsakes!” A curly-haired redhead all in sequins peered around the side of the canopy. “Leave the trash, asshole. Can we go now? Anyone steady enough to drive?”

“Me!” cheered the pudgy drunk.

“Not a chance,” Dark Boy said, still holding my eye.

“Of what?” I murmured. “Driving or downtown?”

His mouth twitched. Almost a smile. “I’ll drive,” he called over his shoulder.

“Got some sense after all. Mama’s boy.”

“She’s not my . . .” The finger jabbed at me again. “Back where you belong, you hear?”

“Julie, come on,” the redhead whined. She swung neatly pointed feet over the gunwale and stood on the dock with her arms folded. Under so much pearly makeup, it was hard to tell her age, but surely younger than she wanted to look.

Dark Boy reached into a pocket, weighed stuff in his hand, dropped some back. “Here. For the lousy fuck we didn’t get.” Metal rattled on the dock.

I spat on the wood beside them. Who used coins anymore?

“Julian. Now.” Movement under the canopy caught my eye—blond hair, blunt-cut, a strong jaw turning toward me into the light, then abruptly away.

Sullen again, Dark Boy folded his leg under him and rose, elbowing his companion to help with the out-cold third.

“Aw, leaf ’im,” muttered the drunk. “He falls in, he’ll wake up fas’ enuff.”

“Don’t . . .” I blurted.

Dark Boy sneered. “What do you care? He’d been awake, you’d be history.”

The girl caught his arm and they all climbed sloppily into the launch, leaving their friend sprawled on the foredeck. Alone on the dock, I craned my neck for another glimpse of the blond woman, but she’d retreated inside. So like the ninja girl, but not.