She thought back. “As for his wife, I didn’t even know her name until now. Like I said, the man was a closed book.”
“So Dino Vicenza is a retired widower, raising two daughters on his own. He plants himself in a nice quiet central California town.” Amos shook his head. “Definitely one for the books.”
Jenna recalled moments when the nice old man, her friend, revealed shadows of a dark side. The sudden rages, all out of proportion to the situation, or so it seemed to her. At the time, she had simply put it down to Dino having a bad day. But now she could link them together under a new heading. These were remnants of who Dino had once been. A truly bad man. A mobster. A thief.
Just the same, she had grown to like him. Knowing his past didn’t change that. Even if perhaps it should.
Jenna realized they were watching her. “Like I said. I’ve never met anyone who loved secrets more than Dino.”
“No surprise there,” Zia said. “He had a hundred million reasons to keep it that way.”
* * *
Jenna walked the two men back to their respective rides. They stood there in the day’s growing heat, until Amos told his friend, “Go ahead and give her the other half.”
Zia said, “We heard about, you know.”
“He means Noah acting like a total dodo.”
“There’s no law against a man playing stupid,” Zia said. “Else we’d all be behind bars.”
Amos huffed. “Maybe you would.”
Zia snorted. “Oh, and now you’re Mister Perfection.” To Jenna, “Me and some buddies, we’ve been saving for years. Planning to buy us a boat. We’d all like to go in together, buy shares.”
Amos said, “My Aldana says we want to be part of this too.”
Zia said, “This from the man who gets seasick looking at pictures of boats in magazines.”
“Long as I can choose the right days for my trips,” Amos said, “I’ll do fine.”
Jenna fought down the sudden urge to hug them both. Weep. Something. “Guys, I can’t tell you what this means. But Noah owns fifty-one percent.”
“My brother is not selling his share to anybody without your approval,” Amos said. “He just doesn’t know it yet.”
This time, Zia’s grin held a cop’s steely glint. “Me and the boys, we’ll escort Amos’s idiot brother somewhere empty and quiet. Keep him there until the situation is totally elucidated.”
“Illuminated,” Amos said. “I have no earthly idea what you mean by that last comment. And I don’t want to know.”
Jenna reached out. Finding great comfort in gripping them both. “I don’t know what to say.”
They stood there for a long moment, Jenna as close to happy as she’d been in a while. Finally, Amos said to Zia, “Why don’t you take on off, let me and the lady have a word.”
“Whatever you need,” Zia told her. “Whenever. Just let me know.”
“You took the words right out of my mouth,” Jenna replied. “And my heart.”
Amos waited until Zia drove away to say, “I don’t know how you feel about giving my brother another chance. Truth be told, Aldana isn’t sure he deserves anything but a bullet at sunrise.”
She pressed a fist to her stomach. Doing her best to keep her breakfast down. “Tell me.”
“Noah is beyond sorry. He knows he made a terrible mistake.” Amos took his time, staring down the empty road. “Aldana likes to say that good women are born knowing their men will get things totally wrong, fall on their faces, whatever. She brings that up a lot when I deserve worse than she gives me.”
Jenna knew she needed to say something. About how Amos was one of the finest people she had ever known. How much it meant to call him a friend. But just then it was hard to take a simple breath.
Amos went on. “Aldana says the answer to two questions make all the difference. First, will they admit they’re wrong, and be ready to grow beyond their mistakes. And second, will they apologize.”
“That’s three questions, not two.”
