The Familiar Dark(46)
“Maybe,” I said. “Or maybe somebody helped him along.”
Jimmy Ray looked at me again. I could feel his dark eyes burning into the side of my face. “Why? What’s the benefit in Matt being dead?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he knew something about what happened to Junie and Izzy. Maybe someone didn’t want him talking.”
Jimmy Ray flicked my leg with one hand. “Hate to break it to you, sweetheart, but Matt wasn’t never gonna talk to you. And I seriously doubt he had any information about the murders anyway. That guy barely knew his ass from a hole in the ground.”
My head thunked back against the wall. “I have no idea then. About anything.” I paused, closed my eyes. “I keep trying to make sense of it. Why they died. What happened. What the point of it was.”
“Waste of your time, Eve. Like pissing into the wind. Trying to answer that question, the why of a thing like that’ll drive you round the bend. The why don’t matter.”
“Then what does?”
“The who. The person who held the knife. That’s the only thing that really matters.”
It didn’t escape me, how weird this conversation was. Jimmy Ray and I sitting here nursing our wounds and shooting the shit like we were old friends. Hell, maybe that’s what he thought we were. It reminded me, in the worst kind of way, of me and my mama. No matter how often I thought I was finally rid of her, somehow we always seemed to end up sitting across from each other again. Both she and Jimmy Ray had some kind of staying power, I’d give them that. “I still feel like you know more than you’re telling me,” I said, gathering my wet hair into a knot on top of my head.
“Nah,” Jimmy Ray said, stood up and held out his hand. He hauled me to my feet. “I know as much as you do.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” I ducked my head to try and catch his eyes, his face averted from mine. Jimmy Ray who used eye contact as a kind of weapon, for seduction, for intimidation. He was a man who knew the power of his gaze. I knew it meant something that he wouldn’t look at me now.
He turned away from me, limping a little from the knee to the groin earlier. Which, I admit, gave me a twinge of satisfaction. “You know what I always liked best about you?”
I thought back to the compliments he’d given me over the years. “My legs?”
He did look at me then, over his shoulder, eyes sliding from my hips to my bare ankles. “Always did love your legs. They still look damn good.” He smirked. “They’d look even better wrapped around my waist.”
I was suddenly aware of my nakedness, how one quick yank would send my towel flying. A surge of excitement followed the thought, chased immediately by a flush of shame. What was wrong with me that a man like Jimmy Ray made my body react so easily, heat in my belly and wetness between my legs with only a few words? Especially when that same body knew the pain he could inflict? I took a step backward, away from him.
“If not my legs, then what?” I tried to keep my voice brisk and businesslike, but I heard the huskiness in my tone. Jimmy Ray heard it, too, if the way his smirk had turned into a full-on grin was any indication.
He threw me a wink to let me know I wasn’t getting away with anything, and then his expression turned serious. “I liked how smart you are. All the other girls I’ve dated”—he tapped his temple—“not much in the way of candlepower.”
“I thought you liked it that way,” I said. “Less chance they’ll argue with you.”
Jimmy Ray’s hand swiped through the air, swatting away my words. “Pay attention to what I’m saying. You’re smart, Eve. You’ve got stuff going on upstairs. It made you a pain in the ass to deal with a lot of the time, but you were never boring. I’ll give you that.”
I thought Jimmy Ray’s attempt at a compliment was probably bullshit, had more than a sneaking suspicion that he’d called me a dumb-ass cunt a hundred times behind my back. I tightened my hands on the top of my towel. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because it’s all right there.” He poked his temple again. “You can figure this out.”
“What if I’m not as smart as you think?”
“You are,” Jimmy Ray said. “But maybe you’re focusing on the wrong things.”
“You mean Matt?”
“I mean there’s only a few reasons people kill each other.” He ticked them off on his fingers. “Sex, money, or pure rage.”
I was getting frustrated now, unsure whether he actually knew anything or if he was screwing with me. “Which one was it, if you know so much?”
“I’m not saying I know anything,” Jimmy Ray said. “I’m saying you may be going down the wrong path, is all.” Which sounded at least partly self-serving to me. Jimmy Ray wanted me out of his business and away from his compound. Matt was out of the picture, and now I needed to follow his lead.
“Maybe you blew up Matt yourself to keep me from talking to him.”
Jimmy Ray laughed. “Girl, you’ve been watching too many movies. I’m gonna go to all the trouble of setting up an explosion when I can walk up to the man and shoot him? A gun’s a lot quieter and doesn’t bring a bunch of cops down on my head.” He opened my front door. “Besides, what do I give a shit if Matt talks to you? I already told you I had nothing to do with your girl dying.” He paused in the half-open doorway. “From what I hear, there wasn’t any sex involved in the killings. And it doesn’t sound like rage, either. Not the way they were laid out all nice and neat. What’s that leave?” He looked at me over his shoulder as he closed the door, the pity in his eyes so completely foreign I wondered if even he knew it was there. “Follow the money, Eve. Follow the money.”