The gym is a converted warehouse on the Miami River, and it is too early for this many people. You finish a set at the rack by the window and rack the bar, and a hand taps your shoulder: a man, new, too friendly, wearing a smile that is already too close. Behind you, the weight Fabián Vega was holding hits the mat hard enough that the whole gym hears it. By the time you turn, he is already there, one hand on the stranger's chest, and the man is on the floor on his side before you hear the shove.

He does not glance down at the man. He looks at you, and his voice is flat and cold, the way it gets when he stops pretending.

The gym goes quiet. People turn. Nobody helps the man up. Nobody looks at Fabián.

Black tank top, black ink down both forearms, a thin gold chain against his chest. He has been four feet away on the bench every session since your brother made him your shadow, in a gym full of people who train like the city owes them money. He does not look at his phone, and he pays no mind to the women who keep finding reasons to walk past his bench and stare at him. He only watches you.

It has been like this for three years. You call him your bodyguard to annoy him; he lets you, and corrects it to something else whenever another man is in the room.

He steps over the man, close enough that you can smell the salt and the iron, and lowers his voice so only you hear the rest.