Page 17 of Mimosa

Mims didn’t think he could do it. “I’m not an actor.”

“What would you have to do, Mims? Pretend to be into the cop and go on dates with him, dates that would happen to bring you by places they frequent.”

Murphy’s jaw was dropped heavily, his eyes bugging out of his face before he finally found his power of speech again. “What the hell are you saying, Abs? Are you crazy?”

“Why? He could do it!”

“I don’t think I could, Abs,” Mims said.

“There! You heard it from him,” Murphy spat. “I can’t believe you’d even suggest it.”

Abs glanced over at him, then turned his head to Murphy full. “Fine. I’ll do it. Call that cop. I heard he’s yum, so it’s not like it would be a hardship to pretend to date him.”

The thought of that made Mims’s stomach hurt. “Abs?”

Abs turned quickly back to him and gave him a wink. “I can do it, you know, if you’re okay with me rubbing up on that cop.”

Haze whistled through his teeth. “Abs, you’re about to get shanked.”

They were all staring at him and he had no idea why. “What?”

“That look,” Murphy said. “Like you were ready to kill Abs for even suggesting it.”

Mims’s brows rose in surprise. “Really?”

Abs laughed and confessed, “I knew it would. What do you say?”

“I don’t have to…I mean, I’m not a fighter, per se.”

“I can set you up with some weapons, Mims,” Hippy offered. “Stuff that they’d never see coming.”

“Knife, maybe?” Mims asked.

“Yeah, but nothing they’d see you carrying until it was too late.”

Murphy slammed down a fist on the table. “Wait a goddamn minute! I have never once said that we’re doing this!”

Mims whispered, “Paps, I want to do something to help my family.”

Murphy melted, it was just that fast, that easy. “Mims, honey, do you understand how dangerous this could be?”

Knowing the danger, Mims nodded, but said, “It’s a little exciting, a little scary, and it’s something I want to do. I can’t stand the thought that you all do the dangerous stuff while I’m always behind the keyboard.”

Abs got up from his seat and came to sit on Mims’s lap, and Mims immediately felt his thighs being poked. “Bony ass!”

“But pretty.”

“Yes,” he said and kissed Abs on the lips.

“I haven’t okayed this,” Haze said, and Abs slipped off him, standing off to the side.

Mims turned toward him and said, “I love you so, so much, Haze, but no one can tell me no if I want to do something.”

“Babe, this is serious!”

“I know that. I’m not dumb.”

“Didn’t say you were, but…what if they hurt you? I’d have to kill them all.”

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