As Jim walked around the back of the Iron Mask, he was not cool with what was doing on so many levels. And his outlook did not improve as Devina slipped her arm through his and pressed herself close to him.

"It's chilly again," she said in a low voice.

Yeah, it was, but he wasn't going to warm her up like he had last night. "Let me help you put your coat on, then."

"No..." She stroked the fur that was over her arm. "I don't want to wear this right now." Which, gee, wow, probably meant Vin had bought it for her. This was really not a good turn of events.

Jim got her over to the BMW, and the moment she killed the security alarm with the electronic key, he opened the driver's-side door.

"I'm not good at stick shifts," she said, staring into the interior of the M6. "I really can't drive them." She waited like she expected him to say something. "Jim - "

"Let's get you into that car."

She glanced over at his truck, which was parked two spaces down. Although she didn't come out and say it, given the way she angled her head, she was asking him a question. "I can't." Jim took a step back. "I'm sorry."

Devina hugged that white mink closer to her chest. "Didn't you like last night?"

"Of course I did. But I know him now, and no matter what you say in this moment, you will regret it later."

There was a long, tight moment; then Devina nodded and slowly sank into the bucket seat. Instead of closing the door or pulling the belt across herself, though, she just stared out over the steering wheel, the lights of the dash illuminating her gorgeous face.

"I'm sorry, Jim. I don't know why I asked...It's not fair to you or him or me. I'm just so empty that I'm making bad choices and not acting right."

Shit, he knew exactly what that was like. "It's okay. People do that."

He crouched down so he could look into her eyes, and as he did, he got pissed with Vin. Didn't the guy know what he had? For fuck's sake, no one was perfect, and the spat they'd just had in the club proved that on both sides. But come on.

"Look, Devina, have you talked to him? Tried to explain..." Goddamn it, Jim couldn't believe the f-word was about to come out of his mouth. "Have you tried to explain how you're feeling?"

"He's always so busy." Her eyes were dark and deep as she looked over. "But maybe you would speak to him for me? Tell him that I love him and I want to be with him - "

"Wait...whoa..." Okay, that was almost as bad an idea as their having sex again. "I'm not the kind of guy - "

"Please. Jim, please. It's clear he likes you, and believe me, that doesn't happen all that often. You could just tell him that you and I talked out here and that I miss him even though he's in my life. I mean, I'm not a fool. I know what kind of man he is. Making money is always going to be important to him, and there are benefits to being with someone like that. But there has to be more." Her eyes seemed to flash. "Don't you think there has to be more to life, Jim?"

As he felt that ensaring pull reach out and grab onto him, he got to his feet. "Yeah, but you need to be saying those things yourself."

For a moment he thought he saw something hard flash in her eyes, but then she nodded again and stretched the seat belt across her breasts.

"Vin is not who I thought he was." Devina started the engine and put the M6 in gear. "I've been waiting for him to warm up and trust me and love me, but it hasn't happened, and I'm losing the strength to hang on, Jim, I really am."

"He's bought you a ring."

As her head whipped around, Jim was totally aware he'd not just overstepped his bounds, but bombed the shit out of them. Keeping her in Vin's life was the important thing, though. "He has?" she breathed.

"Just hold on a little longer." Christ, maybe he could talk to Vin tonight. God knew Jim was a good liar, and in this case, for once his motivations were good: He could try and argue that marriage is something worth believing in. "Look, let me sit down with him, okay?"

"Oh, thank you." She reached out and squeezed his hands. "Thank you so much. I really do want this to work."

She blew him a kiss and shut the door. Stepping to the side, he watched her ease out of the parking lot and accelerate down Trade Street, the engine going through its gears slick as shit through a goose.

Jim frowned and thought that if that was what she classed as not knowing how to work a stick shift, he wanted to know exactly what proficient would be.

Man, he needed a cigarette.

With a rattle and a whir, a car pulled up to the brick wall of the club and parked under one of the staff-only signs. Two barely dressed women with Playboy breasts and legs as thick as toothpicks got out and stopped when they saw him.

"Hey," the blonde said with a sexy smile. "You coming into the club?"

Her friend had an Amy Winehouse beehive and a necklace that spelled out slut in diamonds. "Yeah, how'd you like to come with us through the back door?"

The innuendo was way too obvious for Jim's taste, and that dangler around her neck meant he was far more interesting in going if she were involved - but if it saved him a trip all the way around the club in the cold night? Fine and dandy, thank you, ma'am.

Jim walked over as a bouncer opened the door for the ladies.

"He's with us," Blondie said to the guy. "He's my cousin."

"'Sup, man." The bouncer put out his knuckles and Jim gave them a pound. "Good to meet you."

After they were inside, the guy relocked the door and talked into the Bluetooth clipped on his ear. "Up front? Okay. Coming. Shit, girls, we got a rumble in general population. You're gonna wanna harig here till it's over."

"Oh, we'll find something to do," the blonde quipped.

"Or somebody," the beehive cut in, taking Jim's arm and rubbing up on him.

He disengaged himself. "I got a friend waiting for me."

"Male or female?" the blonde asked.

"Male."

"Perfect for a double date. Club's that way - see you in a bit."

The one with the beehive leaned up to his ear. "You think I look good now, wait'll you see my work clothes."

They hustled off through a door marked ladies locker room, leaving him in the dark hall thinking that if they were changing into something smaller than what they had on, the pair were going to come out dressed in postage stamps.

As he started down for the club proper, a dark-haired working woman turned the corner up ahead and came toward him. He recognized her instantly as the one Vin had actually been staring at when Devina's latex nemesis had been begging him for attention, and Jim was not happy to see who was on her tail: That pair of big, young guys were way too close, and they had looks on their faces like they'd chased her into this dim, secluded hallway because they wanted something she clearly wasn't interested in giving them.

Jim glanced up and back. The corridor was a good forty feet long and about ten feet wide, and aside from a door marked office, which was way far down by the exit, the locker room was the only shot she had at losing them.

And the bouncers were already busy with some kind of disturbance.

Jim planted his feet and got ready to intervene...when from out of nowhere, Vin appeared in the archway at the club end of things, looking like he'd come to the same this-ain't-right conclusion. Striding down, Vin closed the distance fast, but the drama reached Jim first. "I said no," the woman snapped over her shoulder.

"Your kind of female doesn't get to say no."

Okay, so the wrong thing to say, right there. Jim stepped into the path of the guys and spoke to the woman over his shoulder. "You all right?"

As she turned to him, it was clear by her hard face and her terrified eyes that she was keeping it together by force of will only. "Yup. Just taking a break."

"Why? Is your mouth tired already?"

Jim faced off at the guy who'd spoken. "Why don't you back the fuck off."

"Who are you? Another one of her pimps?" The SOB reached around and grabbed her wrist. "Why don't you let her do - "

Vin diPietro, who had closed the distance, moved like the street was still in his blood. Before Jim took action, he was on the unwelcome contact, catching the biceps of that arm and breaking the guy's hold on the woman by snapping the kid around. He didn't say a thing. Didn't have to. He was ready to pop the motherfucker, gray eyes no longer cool, but volcanic.

"Let go of my goddamn arm!" the punk yelled.

"Make. Me."

Jim glanced at the woman. "My buddy and I are gonna handle this. Why don't you grab a cup of coffee and tell those other two girls to hang with you. I'll give you a shout when the attitude adjustment is finished."

Her eyes drifted over to Vin. It was clear she didn't like accepting the help, but she wasn't stupid. Given the buzz in the college kids' eyes, there wasn't just booze fueling them, but some coke or meth, too. Which meant the chances of things going downhill fast were high.

"I'll call for a bouncer," she muttered as she opened the locker room door.

"Do me a favor," Vin said, still vapor-locked on his boy. "Don't call anyone."

She shook her head a little and ducked out of the hall.

And that was when the knife appeared in the quiet kid's hand.

Leaving Vin to deal with the chatty Cathy of the pair, Jim stepped forward and anticipated which direction the lunge with the blade was going to come from. Ah, yes, fidiot with the sharpie was going to cruise in from the right because he was right handed, so it was just a case of waiting -

Jim grabbed the guy in midcharge, snagging his wrist, whipping him around, and applying pressure to the joint until the weapon dropped to the floor. And just as he introduced the bastard's face to the wall, Vin broke into a fistfight, ducking a wide punch, then coming up with his bare knuckles like a boxer. His impact was a cracking stunner...but the trouble with illicit stimulants was that they carried, in addition to the possibility of felony and addiction, the certainty of anesthetic properties.

So the kid with the ugly, and now bloody, mouth didn't seem to feel a thing. He slammed a return hook into Vin's face and it was on. The pair of them went hog wild, turning the hallway into an MMA octagon - and check that shit out: Vin was both the aggressor and the punisher of the pair.

To give him plenty of room for the beat-down he was delivering, Jim dragged his deadweight out of the way, prepared to keep things civil as long as his load of crap kept the trouble and the opinions to a minimum.

Fucker had to open his mouth, though. Just had to: "Why do you give a shit what some whore does? She's just a heartbeat and a hole, for fuck's sake."

Jim's vision flickered on and off, but he got a hold of himself and glanced up at the ceiling. Sure enough there were pods at regular intervals - which meant this was all being recorded. Then again...he and Vin had been smart enough to let their opponents throw the first punch and take out the weapon, so legally they could argue self-defense.

But more to the point, two college-aged fuck-twits who'd been doing illegal drugs weren't going to want to report shit to the police.

So no reason not to finish this.

Jim tightened his hold on that wrist, secured another grabber on the upper arm, and yanked the kid back so he could whisper in his ear. "I want you to take a deep breath. Come on, now...concentrate. Calm down and take a deep breath for me. That's it..."

Jim squeezed and squeezed some more until pain cut off any struggle. And when there was plenty of compliance with the even breathing, he dislocated that arm right from its shoulder socket with a quick twist. The resulting scream was loud, but the music from the dance floor drowned out the echo. Which was why, all things considered, clubs were not a bad place for throw-downs.

As the kid sagged onto the floor, Jim knelt in front of him. "I hate hospitals. Just out of one myself. You know what they're going to do to someone with your kind of injury? They're going to put the arm back where it belongs. Here, let me show you."

Jim took the flopping limb and didn't bother telling the guy to breathe deep. He just applied the appropriate pressure so that the bone popped back into its home. No screaming this time - the SOB just passed out cold.

In the wake of his stab at being an ortho doc, Jim glanced up to see how things were going with the other half of the altercations - and got an eyeball full of Vin working his opponent's liver like it was bread dough. College Boy was wilting badly and looking royally licked, his hands up not to throw punches, but to ward them off...and his knees knocking together like his balance was going fast.

Which would have been great except for the fact they had trouble.

At the end of the hall, they were attracting attention, a clubgoer peering down the corridor. The lights were dim, but not that dim. They had to clear the fuck out. "Vin, we got to go," Jim hissed.

The newsflash didn't register, and that wasn't a surprise, given the brutal focus Vin was bringing to his fight. Shit, screw the peanut gallery; if he was allowed to keep this up, he was going to kill the guy. Or at least turn the fool into a linebacker-size vegetable.

Jim stood up, prepared to intervene with more than words.

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