Page 19 of Mine

I nodded.

“If anything, they might go question Adrian if they can make the connection, but he’s careful, right? I mean, if anyone checks, you guys all work at his health club or some bullshit like that, right?”

“Yeah. Right.”

“So,” he shrugged. “Even if there is an investigation, you’ll never know.”

“I guess,” I said, then dropped it.

Talking to Benji’s father was exhausting, and when I finally got to put the nurse on the phone with him, I felt an overwhelming sense of relief. I did not want to be the one to coordinate with the morgue or to figure out how Benji’s body would get back to Atlanta. It couldn’t be me, and I was relieved that it didn’t have to be.

“Kady should pay,” I told Conrad in the car as he drove me to my mother’s work later that day. I had to see her before she left for her trip; I wanted to give her some money. I had planned to stop at the bank, but Gabriel’s gift made that unnecessary. I had all the cash I needed on me. “He shouldn’t get away with torturing Benji.”

“No, he shouldn’t,” Conrad agreed. “But from what you told me, Gabriel was on his way to see Kady already. My guess is that whatever revenge you’re planning, Gabe’s gonna try.”

I looked out the window at the gray sky, the drizzle already beginning. “The doctor said he was stabbed and beaten, that it would have taken hours to inflict that kind of damage.”

“Sure.”

I turned to look at him. “If Gabriel can’t get to Kady, can you?”

It took several minutes for him to answer me. “Yes.”

“Okay.”

He cleared his throat. “Just so you know, it’s a big jump from defending yourself to killing someone. You’re talking about premeditation, right? That’s a whole other thing.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, taking a breath.

He cleared his throat. “Did Kady come on to you?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I ain’t pretty enough for Ellis Kady, or white enough.”

He scoffed.

“What? I’m not,” I said, holding up my arm, pushing the sweater up so he could see my dark-bronze skin. “I’m darker than you, man.”

He grunted because that was a slight exaggeration.

“And you’re prettier than me,” I teased him. “And you’ve got the cool green eyes; mine are just boring-ass brown.”

Deep annoyed sigh, and I smiled just a little.

“I wonder why that is; your eyes, I mean. I bet there’s a white guy back in your family tree somewhere, huh?”

He was ignoring me.

“I should have the green eyes, since in with the Cuban, there’s Spanish and some German and some French too.”

“Are you still talking?”

“You know, if we were coffee, I’d be something with caramel in it and you’d be, like, a cafe mocha or some shit.”

“Please stop talking.”

I chuckled, turning back to my window, the raindrops hitting it hard now, blurring the world outside.

“Tell me the truth. Did Kady come on to you?”