He laughed, a deep belly laugh. Then winced in pain as he held his hands against his ribs.
She looked at the dried blood matted into his hair. “What happened to you?”
“Your boyfriend again.”
She glared at him and stabbed her finger toward the door. “If you’re going talk to me like that, get out of my apartment.”
Shane gave her a crooked smile. “ Your apartment. I remember when it used to be our apartment.”
She dropped her hand but kept her eyes locked on his. “Now it’s just my apartment. It was your choice, Ray.”
He nodded once, an almost imperceptible movement, but it was there.
Jenny’s anger started to slip. There was something in his eyes she hadn’t expected to see-defeat. Like he had been beaten, not just physically, but emotionally. Ray had never looked that way before, not even when he was on his way to prison. Maybe everything that had happened to him had finally taken its toll, had finally worn him down. They had both fallen so far from where they had been that there was probably no going back.
She watched as he probed at his torn scalp with his fingertips. “I’ve got nowhere to go, Jen,” he said.
“Tell me what happened.” She pointed a finger at him. “But I’m warning you, you say something like that again, I don’t care if you’ve got to sleep in the street, I’m kicking you out.”
Even though she realized it was a mistake, that it would stir up old feelings, Jenny fished under the kitchen sink for a first-aid kit while Ray told her what had happened at his apartment.
She spread the kit out on the table. When she touched the cut over his eye, he winced. “What did he want?” Jenny asked.
“To kill me.”
“Why?”
“He thinks I somehow stole that money.”
“What money?”
“From the robbery.”
“Why would he think that?” She wiped a cotton ball soaked with rubbing alcohol over his split eyebrow.
Ray’s head jerked back. “Ouch!”
“Quit your whining. You want this cleaned or not?” He nodded and she kept wiping. “Why does he think it was you?”
“I guess he figures there had to be somebody on the inside.”
“Was there?”
He nodded.
There was no way to bandage his scalp without shaving it, so Jenny just cleaned the cut as best she could with a Q-tip. The split over his eye had started bleeding again, so she made him press a towel against it until it stopped, then covered it with a gauze bandage.
“This one needs stitches,” she said, pressing the last piece of tape into place along the edge of the bandage.
“I can’t go to a hospital. Too many questions.”
Jenny set her gauze and tape down on the table. “Suit yourself, but if you don’t get it sewn up, you’re going to have a hell of a scar.”
“You afraid it’s going to ruin my good looks?”
“Don’t be an asshole.”
He whistled. “You picked up some rough language working at that place.”
She retook her seat across the table from him and looked into his eyes. “Did you do it, Ray?”
He looked surprised. “How the hell can you ask me that?”
Not letting go of his eyes, she asked again, more demanding this time, “Did you do it?”
Ray sighed, but he kept his eyes on hers. “No, I didn’t.”
Living with him had taught her how to tell when he was lying, and she knew he was telling her the truth. “Then who was it?”
He shrugged. “Hector was probably involved, but he wasn’t smart enough to pull it off by himself.”
“Tony?”
He looked away. “I don’t know.”
“You’re holding something back, Ray. What is it?”
“Just some things I heard…”
“About what?”
“About Vinnie.”
Not at all what she was expecting. “What about him?”
“He might have had a motive.”
“His son was murdered.”
Ray rested his elbows on the table. “Somebody got carried away.”
“Carried away?” she said. “They blew off his head.”
“And whoever did it has got to make damn sure they cover it up.”
“You really think it was Vinnie?”
A shrug. “It’s possible.”
“Why?” she said. “What’s the motive you’re talking about?”
“Same reason people do everything.” He rubbed his thumb and index finger together. “Money.”
She shook her head, thinking he was way off about this. “You’re projecting. Not everyone thinks like you.”
“What do you mean?”
Jenny took a deep breath. “Your problem is you’re greedy.”
He eyed her like she was crazy. “What the hell are you talking about? I’m trying to tell you the reason Vinnie might have robbed his own place, and you want to turn it around and tell me I’m greedy?”
“I’ve known you a long time.”
“So?”
Jenny could tell he was getting pissed, but that was too bad. This was something he needed to hear. “Why did you go to prison, Ray?”
“Because somebody ratted on us.”
She shook her head. That was the answer she expected. “No, Ray, I’m asking you why you went to prison.”
“The feds tried to make a deal with me. I could have gotten off with probation, but I told them no, that I don’t snitch on my partners.”
Was he just being hardheaded or did he really not get it? Knowing Ray the way she did, Jenny believed it was the first option. He was hardheaded. As long as she had known Ray, she could never remember him admitting he had made a mistake. He bulled his way through everything, always convinced he was right.
“Listen to me, goddamn it!” she almost shouted. “I’m talking about why you went to prison, what you did that sent you there.”
He stared at her, his face set so hard it looked like stone, but that very look is what gave him away. Because in that look she saw that he knew exactly what she was talking about. He just refused to admit it, just like always.
Jenny rubbed her fingertips together just like he had. “Greed is why you went to prison, Ray. Not because somebody ratted on you, not because you sacrificed yourself for your partners, but because you wanted money. You saw morons like Tony living like kings. You had a cop’s salary but wanted to be one of the kings, and for a while you were, but then you got caught.”
Ray’s face turned red. “You think you got me figured out? You think you know what makes me tick? You think every problem can be fixed with some pop-psychology bullshit from an episode of Oprah?”
Some wounds never heal. Jenny felt her throat tighten, felt the tears forming at the corners of her eyes. “Maybe some things can’t ever be fixed, Ray, but I know one thing.”
“What’s that?” His voice was ice-cold.
“People can change.”
He stared at her, his bright blue eyes boring into her for so long she felt like looking away, but she didn’t. He wasn’t playing stare-down, he was thinking, probably about what she had said. She hoped he had really listened to what she had said. When he finally spoke, his voice was thick. “You think that’s true, about people changing?”
His hands were spread out on the table, palms turned down. Gently, she laid a hand on top of one of his. “Yeah, I-”
Someone pounded on the door.
Jenny spun around in her chair. She glanced at her watch, 5:30 AM . Who the hell could be at the door at this time of morning? Gordo. It had to be. As she looked back at Ray she put a finger to her lips.
He nodded.
Then she got up and stepped to the door. She looked through the peephole but couldn’t see anything. There was no light coming through. Whoever was outside probably had his finger on it. “Who is it?” she shouted.
From the other side a man said, “It’s me. Open the fucking door.”
Tony Zello.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Tony Zello was at Jenny’s door.
She glanced at Ray. He was on his feet. He had recognized Tony’s voice.
She turned back to the door. “I said, who is it?”
The voice was angry. “You know who this is, now open the fucking door.”