Spin (Songs of Corruption #1)(36)

On the way out, I saw a man with a comb-over I would have sworn I recognized. He wasn’t wearing a mechanic’s jumpsuit, but a zipper jacket. His left eye was badly bruised, almost swelled shut, and a bandage held a cut together at his brow. It was Vito, and when he saw me, he turned and walked in the other direction.

After some discussion, some signed papers, a few minutes spent waiting for something I couldn’t remember because I was distracted by Antonio’s presence in his office and the distance between us, I let Paulie Patalano drive me home. Apparently, my house was on his way.

twenty-one.

ou ever been in a Ferrari?” Paulie asked.

“You’re joking,” I said as I got into the flashy yellow car.

“Gotta ask.” He slid into the driver’s side and shifted his shoulder a little, touching something behind him before he got his seatbelt on.

I’d dated a detective in college, and he made the same exact move when he got into a car. When he’d caught me watching, I got a lecture about how he had to wear his gun even when off-duty and how he didn’t want to take it off for a short drive. We had a long drive ahead of us, and poor Paulie was going to be very uncomfortable. He put the top down, and we got onto the freeway.

“Thanks for driving,” I said once we hit traffic and the wind didn’t whip as much.

“I was heading out this way.” He drove with the seat pushed all the way back and his wrist on the top of the wheel.

I had my bag in my lap and my knees pressed together. “I’m glad you found me at the bottom of that hill.”

“Yeah.”

“You work at the car shop?”

He smiled. Changed lanes. Adjusted the hunk of metal at his back. “I own it with Spin.”

“Oh, partners?”

“In everything. He’s like my brother. Pisses off my real brothers, but they’re douchebags. A cop and a lawyer.”

“And you?”

“Businessman.”

I put on my most political comportment because it was obvious what kind of business he did from the back of a body shop, with loose hours, carrying a firearm. I’d never seen one on Antonio though, which seemed strange.

I didn’t care. No, I shouldn’t care. It should all be meaningless small talk in a yellow Ferrari going twenty miles per hour on the 10 freeway.

“You weren’t really heading west, were you?” I said more as a statement than a question.

“Zo is the only other guy I’d trust to not speed, and he’d bore the paint off the car.” He glanced at me. “We just fixed it. He’d return it with primer, shrugging like, ‘dunno what happened, boss, I was just talking.’”

I laughed. “Sure.”

“And, you know, I want to get to know you. See what your deal is.”

Did he think I was working for the DA as well? I couldn’t easily ask. “My deal?”

“Spin likes you. Ain’t no secret.”

The road opened up for absolutely no reason, and the wind whipped my hair like cotton candy.

“I’m sure he likes plenty of girls.” I pulled out my bun and let my hair fly.

“Not like this,” Paulie said.

“Like what?”

He shook his head and put his eyes on the road.

“No, really,” I said. “I’m not asking you to tell stories about your friend.”

“Oh no? You women, you’re all alike.”

“Like what?”

“Like you don’t want a guy to like you. You have to know how much. How high. How deep. Never simple. So before you ask again, he’s never looked at a woman who’s not from home.”

“Pretty small dating pool.”

“He don’t date. You ain’t getting another word outta me.” He raised his index finger and put it to his lips. “Just know I’ll protect him with my life.”

“He’s a lucky guy.”

“Right about that.”

Nothing he said should have hurt me, because my thing with Antonio was done, but as I watched the city blow by me, it did.

***

Katrina was on set when I got home. The loft had never seemed so big, so modern, so clean. Everything had a place, and everything was in it. The surfaces were wiped sterile, and dust bunnies were eradicated.

I threw my bag on the couch. It didn’t belong there, but I left it.

I missed something. I felt a longing and a regret for something I’d lost. I couldn’t pin it down. In a way, it was Daniel. I missed his constant talking on the phone, the hum of his ambition, the steady foursquare geometry of his dependence. I missed his presence spreading over me even when he traveled, covering me in a way Katrina’s couldn’t.

“Fuck you, Daniel,” I whispered. I threw my jacket over a chair and left it.

Dad had always said all we’d ever need was our family, and I’d never doubted him. But he was wrong. Dead wrong. I couldn’t mold my life into any of my sisters’. I couldn’t take joy in breathing their air, or feel the electricity of physical connection. I couldn’t look at my house and see them coexisting with me as anything but an imposition.

The refrigerator. Vegetables in the crisper. Proteins on the bottom shelf. Leftovers above that, and on the top, condiments. I pulled out a tub of hummus. Crackers on the bottom shelf two over from the sink. I stood at the island, dipping, eating, dipping, eating. Double-dipping, even.