Page 44 of Married With Lies

This sounds harmless. Maybe it really is. But with Richie, I always have my doubts. If he still has ideas about sweet talking Luca into a life inside the Amato criminal empire then this visit is far more sinister.

Yet I need to choose my words carefully. Luca was only a toddler when we lost our folks. He has almost no memories of them. They’re just nostalgic stories. Photos in a frame. For the most part, he was raised by his Uncle Richie and Aunt Donna. With Luca’s law school days rapidly coming to an end, Richie intends to remind his nephew of those family ties. I hate the idea of Richie being alone with my brother, messing with his head.

“Know what?” I drum my fingers on the steering wheel. “Maybe I can clear the schedule for a few days to join you down there.”

“Sure. Will you be bringing Sadie this time?”

I wince over his question. Lying to Richie is one thing. Lying to my only brother always feels like shit.

“We’ll see,” I say. “She has trouble getting away from the ranch.”

Luca’s reply comes slowly. “Right.”

Luca’s no fool. He knows me well enough to suspect something isn’t right. I wish I could tell him the truth. Lies shouldn’t exist between brothers.

Though my eyes see only the road ahead, my mind strays back to the first time I ever saw Luca. After nine years as an only child, I wasn’t too excited about the addition of a screaming baby. That all changed the second I walked into a hospital room where my mother, looking tired but radiant, held a dark-haired little bundle. My brother’s tiny hand waved from the folds of the blanket. When I reached out, he instantly gripped my finger and wouldn’t let go. In that moment I knew I’d do anything to protect him.

“I’m still planning to pay you back for the condo,” Luca says.

That’s funny. It’ll be a snowy day in Miami before I take any money from my kid brother. “Keep the condo. Or sell it and buy something else. We’ll count it as a graduation gift.”

“I’ll be paying you back whether you like it or not. Just might take me a while. Uncle Richie sounded disappointed when I said I was interviewing for local jobs. After all, New York offers would be far more lucrative. And I sure miss Aunt Donna’s Sunday dinners with the family. What do you think?”

What I think is that Richie already has me under his thumb. He doesn’t get to have Luca too.

“You’ve got a good setup in Miami. You’ll have your pick of jobs. And you always brag about how you get to surf in January. Can’t do that in New York.”

“Very true.”

We go back and forth for a few more minutes. Then Luca says he needs to get some more studying done before test time. He was always like that. Driven and focused. A great kid who follows all the rules and never causes trouble. Though we look very much like the brothers we are, that’s where the resemblance ends. Luca will be a decent man. And if he someday learns enough about me to feel ashamed to call himself my brother then so be it.

After saying goodbye to Luca, the silence in the car feels unsettling. I’m starting to regret the decision to drive through the night. On impulse I check to see how far my current location is from Bright Hearts Ranch. Nearly three hundred driving miles. That’s a hell of a detour. I can’t explain my vague sense of disappointment. It’s not as if my so-called wife would be thrilled to see me if I suddenly rolled into her driveway for a surprise visit. I don’t know why it even crossed my mind.

What I really need is a snack and a gallon of coffee to keep me from dozing off. And I still need to buy gas. The tank just ticked lower than the quarter mark. I’m somewhere between Flagstaff and Winslow but a sign shows there’s a rest stop up ahead. Good timing.

The gas station is farther away than it seemed from the freeway. After the exit I cruise along a crunchy parallel road and follow the arrows until I reach rows of gas pumps bathed in sickly yellow lighting. I spend a few seconds getting the lay of the land before stepping out. The other pumps are empty. The only thing special about the adjoining convenience store is that it looks like it’s part of an old movie set. The sign is broken, the lottery posters on the window are yellowed and peeling, and there’s a general vibe of dust and neglect. Only two crappy vehicles – a Chevy sedan that should be in a junk yard and an old orange pickup – are parked at opposite ends of the parking strip in front of the store.

The pump itself flickers a few times before processing my card. I always travel with a stack of prepaid debit cards. They can’t be tracked, at least not easily. And I’m not a fan of using cash. The digital numbers at the pump flicker in and out, rolling by with maddening slowness. There’s no noise, except from the sporadic hiss of cars careening down the unseen highway. I flinch when a shadowy creature that’s either a cat or a very well fed rat darts from one sage bush to another.

Sixty dollars later, I shove the pump handle back into place and twist the gas cap back on. No other cars have come this way and no one has entered or exited the store. I cannot explain the chill tickling base of my spine. I’ve been in legitimately dangerous situations countless times and this isn’t one of them. I haven’t been followed from Vegas. And there’s no way anyone anticipated my stop at a grubby gas station in the middle of nowhere. It’s only out of habit that I check the loaded pistol under my blazer before crossing the ten yards to the store entrance.

A two note bell sounds when I open the glass door. At the moment there’s no clerk minding the register. The door whispers shut at my back while Johnny Cash sings about Folsom Prison Blues.

On the opposite side of the wall, there’s a rather anemic coffee station with barely enough left in the pot to fill a paper cup. After collecting a Red Bull, a Twix bar and a bag of Fritos, I drop everything on the dingy laminate counter.

There’s no self-checkout option and still no sign of any employees. A rusted metal call bell sits on the right and I slap my hand on the button.

The tinny sound is extra loud in the stillness, even with Johnny Cash still crooning away. Maybe the clerk is on the shitter. I’m about to throw a hundred dollar bill on the counter and let whoever finds it figure out how to keep the change.

Then I see the blood.

It’s a lone splattered drop trailing down a glass display containing souvenir keychains. If I’d been less familiar with the sight of blood I could have easily overlooked it. Or just assumed it was paint.

My gun is already in my hand. With the hammer cocked, I take a big step backwards toward the coffee station and glance down the aisle. Nothing to see but shelves of refrigerated beer. I swivel to the left and crane my neck, trying to get a better view of what’s behind the counter.

What is see is two feet inside dusty black sneakers attached to denim-clad legs, one stretched straight and the other bent at the knee. There’s a lot more blood, puddled on the tile floor. I can’t see the top of the body but the size of those sneakers indicates they belong to a man. Or at least they did. Judging by the volume of blood, he’s probably no longer alive.

I hear the shot before I feel it. The upper glass pane on the entrance door shatters and I dive to the floor.

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