“I do, and I also know those hands do not have to be yours, Bax.”
“If not me, then who?”
“I’m not so sure of the answer to that question just yet. You and Race need to keep your heads down, keep the girl out of Benny’s hands until we can come up with a plan that gets everyone out alive. You think you can sit on it for a few days?”
I didn’t want to, but in the harsh light of day, there was no denying he was right.
“Novak knew Race had the tape, he knows about the setup. The only reason Novak hasn’t done anything is because Race’s dad is laundering his dirty cash, and Race doesn’t want his mom dragged into the gutter with the old man, who, by the way, tried to hire Novak to kill Dovie.”
Titus’s eyes flared with a blue fire, and I saw his hands curl into fists on the top of the table between us.
“Who are these people? How did we end up in a place where people’s lives are nothing more than moves on a chessboard?”
I lifted a broad shoulder and let it fall. It made my battered ribs scream at me in protest. “It’s the Point. That’s how it’s always been. You were lucky to make it out before it poisoned you like it did the rest of us.”
He blinked at me and opened and closed his mouth. Then he just gaped at me. “You really believe that, don’t you?”
I tilted my head to the side. “Believe what?”
“That I got out. That I went and lived up on the Hill and nothing from the Point ever touched me. Like my mom wasn’t still a drunk, my brother a thief, and my old man doing life for drugs and murder? You think moving to a place with a different zip code made everything else just go away and turned me into a different person? You’re wrong, Bax. Being a poor kid with a messed up home life in the Point just makes you one sadder story out of a million. Being the poor kid and the charity case on the Hill makes you a freak show and a target. I knew every day I didn’t belong, knew I was never going to be anything more than some schmuck from the ghetto that everyone looked down on and pitied.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. For the longest time I thought Titus had left me, left us, to fend for ourselves. I never thought about his side of things. Like the rest of us, he had done what he needed to do in order to survive. Just like Dovie had so eloquently tried to point out to me. Thinking about her made my stomach drop and that open place in the center of my chest twist up and release like a car accelerating at full speed. She hadn’t even been out of my life for a full day, and I could already feel the loss, which made sending her off with Race the right thing. If I had to do time again, there was no way I would make it with Dovie Pryce living under my skin. The absence of her while I was on the inside would make me go crazy.
“And yet you managed to come out of it a verified good guy with a shiny badge and everything.” I didn’t bother to keep the sarcasm out of my tone.
“What else was I supposed to do? You were always in trouble with the cops, my dad is a goddamn drug kingpin and killer . . . the only way to separate myself from all of that was to become a cop. There aren’t enough of us out there who can walk on both sides of the street. I can. I know people from the Hill are just as crooked, just as twisted, as people from the Point, and a broken law is a broken law, I don’t care who is breaking it. I put criminals in jail, Bax. You know that better than anyone.”
“Is that how you see me, Titus? I’m just one more criminal in a city overrun with them?”
He sighed and pushed his empty plate to the side. “No. You’re my little brother, but you’re also an ass**le who has a penchant for getting into the worst kind of trouble. I wish you weren’t so good with cars, especially the ones that don’t belong to you, but I have never blamed you for doing what you had to do back then.”
“I wanted out, you know?” I fiddled with the edge of my fork. “That’s why Novak was trying to set me up for the murder of the old guy who owned the Aston Martin. It was getting old being yanked around. Sure, the money was nice and the cars were enough to leave me with a hard-on for days, but I knew it was going to go bad. I wanted out before I took Race down with me.”
“Why couldn’t you have wanted out before you went down? Bax, come on, you gotta start thinking about the big picture.”
“What does that mean?” I knew I sounded defensive, but I couldn’t help it. This was probably the longest conversation I had ever had with my brother and I didn’t need a lecture.
He waved a hand in the general direction of my face. “Just look at you. What do you think comes next for a guy with a f**king tattoo on his face? Where does that kind of choice end you up, Bax? What comes next for you? More car theft, more fighting, something else that’s going to put you in a body bag? You need to start looking at what comes after.”
The star was so much a part of me that I couldn’t imagine looking in the mirror each day and not seeing it, but he had a point. It wasn’t like I thought about what putting ink on my face was going to mean for me as an adult or what kind of opportunities it would limit me to, which were just what he said, being a thief and a thug from here on out. I scowled and tossed the fork down on the table.
“What exactly do you think comes after, Titus?” I put my palms flat on the table and leaned closer, so we were staring intently at each other. For the first time, I saw the same core of steel that ran through me reflected back in my brother’s bright blue eyes. “This is my life. This is the Point. Even if we figure out a way to get a handle on Novak, some other piece of shit is going to rise up and take his place. You think I’m going to wake up one day and decide I want to be a banker or a stockbroker? I don’t know what fairy tale you’ve been reading, but that isn’t mine. I’m a criminal, it’s what I know how to do.”
We stared at each other for a long moment until he swore and dug in his pants for his wallet. He tossed some money on the table between us and climbed to his feet. He looked worn out and sad.
“I was hoping the redhead mattered enough that maybe your opinion on that would’ve changed. I saw the way you looked at her. A man doesn’t willingly walk away from a woman who puts that look in his eyes. Give me until the weekend. Let me see what I can come up with regarding the tape. Keep your head low and try not to antagonize Benny or Novak.”
I sucked in a breath between my teeth. “A week is all you’re gonna get. If I have to handle this bloody and messy, I will.”