Now Ameche backs out of the storage room and says, “I don’t know, boss—the kid looks dead to me. It’s messy as fuck in there.”
To see a man of Ameche’s nature grimacing at bloodshed is so bizarre, it’s enough to cause Nomi’s world to tilt on its axis. Ameche knows death; if he says that Brittany is dead, she must be dead.
Simon is still looking at her. “I killed Brittany because I want to get out of here alive. A seven-year-old kid is weight, and I don’t need extra weight. And what does it matter? They were going to kill her anyway.”
“Don’t say that.” Nomi’s head is spinning.
Simon looks at her pityingly, his eyes like twin sapphires, hard and cold. This can’t be happening. Once again, she can’t read him, doesn’tknow him—has she ever really known him? This can’t be real. But what is real? Simon Noone isn’t real. He’s just a cipher, a made-up name, a guy with no memories and a past full of blood ...
“Who the hell is this guy?” Ameche asks Lamonte, gesturing at Simon with the gun. “Could he be with the Westies?”
It’s a name that Nomi knows, a rival gang in Hell’s Kitchen that she dealt with in the Tenth.
“Ask her,” Lamonte says, and he lifts his chin at Nomi.
She looks away. Her body is hurting, her mental landscape is fracturing, and she doesn’t want this man to look at her—just being perceived by him is repugnant.
“Who’s Simon Noone?” Gino Hart says by her shoulder. “Come on, baby, you can tell us.” His voice is surprising, mellow, warm as a foot rub. It’s unbelievable that a mob torturer should have a voice like a late-night radio DJ.
“I have no idea,” Nomi replies, wooden.
Hart shifts position, and now they’re all lined up in front of her at varying distances: Ameche with the gun, Simon in his chair, Lamonte at greater distance, Hart at his workbench. Ray Dinkins startles her as he limps into view, holding his shoulder, his coat blotched carmine as he scrapes his ass up onto a table. This is the worst-case scenario if you’re a cop: falling into the hands of the enemy, like falling into a pit of vipers.
Now they’re arrayed, and she’s being looked at by all of them. Her skin prickles like it’s been electrified. Being under the microscope like this, knowing each man is examining her and wondering what use he can put her to, is a horribleness so extreme she almost cracks. And Simon? His eyes are the worst: amused, cruel, detached. Nomi swallows hard, feels her gut tighten and cramp. Every particle of her being wants to break into tears, beg for mercy, plead for her life.
But she’ll be damned if she’ll give these guys anything. No tears. No pleading. No compliance. Kneeling down is against her religion. They can all go to hell.
“Just tell us,” Lamonte sighs.
“How about I tell you to eat a pile of dicks,” she says.
Her voice is wobbling, but it’s there.You get too attached, sweetie.Irma’s critique.That was always your thing.Irma was right. But there’s something else that was always Nomi’s thing: being a stubborn-assed bitch. It’s gotten her in trouble for years. But now, at last, it’s found a purpose.
Nomi recovers her steel, breathes through her nose.
And when she looks over, Simon gives her a wink.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
October 1987, Saturday
Did Nomi see him wink? Simon’s not sure of anything, having reached the point where colors are starting to coalesce around every person and object in the room.
He had to play it very straight with her to sound convincing in front of Lamonte. Persuading Nomi that he’s killed Brittany was always going to be tricky—he had to lean hard into her natural suspicion. It was tough, though. He kept wanting to break character, to grin or snort or make a joke that would ruin the act. Would’ve done it, too, if his head hadn’t felt like it was being squeezed in a vise.
His brain is too big for his skull and is about to start leaking out the sides. His skin is throbbing. This migraine is about to crash into him like a freight train, and he’s never handled a migraine without medication before. He has no idea what the repercussions will be.
He wonders if Nomi saw his wink, if she understood what it meant. She’s purple again now, though it’s a deep black-purple, like squid ink. Her eyes are still pure carnivore. He hopes she got it—the wink, that is. Maybe he accidentally winked both eyes. Or winked multiple times. God, he can’t hold it together. It’s impossible to know if his acting is cartoonishly obvious or impenetrably subtle.
“If the kid’s dead,” Lamonte says to Ameche, from someplace behind Simon at left, “we’ll have to hold on to the body awhile, maybe stick it someplace cold. We can string the mom along if we send her bits and pieces.”
Ameche scratches his neck with his bandaged hand, a green haze all around him. “We don’t need the Axedale dude past the tenth, is that right?”
“I can check with Galetti,” Lamonte says, but then his tone turns speculative. “I still want to know who this guy is. If he’s not local, he could be with some other family, or even from the West Coast. The last thing I need is the Milano boys or those LA Israeli punks breathing down my neck.”
Simon wonders which guy they’re referring to, then makes the connection: “This guy” is him. They’re talking about him. He’s going to be questioned, and he’d better brace for it.
“Could he be a pig?” Dinkins asks, his face swirled an oily yellow.
