Scott’s eyes narrowed and he squinted at me through the light, which still seemed to hurt his eyes. “What are you talking about?” His tone was wary, hostile, muddled.
“You think this act is funny? I know you gave me the ring.”
“The—ring?”
“The ring that made that mark on your chest!” He shook his head once, hard, as if to shake off his stupor.
Then his arm lashed out, shoving me up against the wall. “How do you know about the ring?”
“You’re hurting me,” I said with venom, but I was shivering with fear. I realized that Scott wasn’t pretending. Unless he was a much better actor than I imagined, he genuinely didn’t know about the envelope. But he did know about the ring.
“What did he look like?” He fisted my camisole and shook me. “The guy who gave you the ring—what did he look like?”
“Get your hands off me,” I ordered, pushing back. But Scott weighed a lot more than me, and his feet stayed planted, his body trapping me against the wall. “I didn’t see him. He had it delivered.”
“Does he know where I am? Does he know I’m in Coldwater?”
“He?” I snapped back. “Who is he? What’s going on?”
“Why did he give you the ring?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know anything about him! Why don’t you tell me?”
He shuddered hard against the raging panic that seemed to grip him. “What do you know?”
I kept my eyes nailed to Scott’s, but my throat was clenched so hard it hurt to breathe. “The ring was in the envelope with a note that said the Black Hand killed my dad. And that the ring belonged to him.” I licked my lips. “Are you the Black Hand?” Scott’s expression still held deep distrust; his eyes darted back and forth, judging whether or not he believed me. “Forget we had this conversation, if you know what’s good for you.” I tried to yank my arm free, but he was still holding on.
“Get out,” he said. “And stay away from me.” This time he let go, giving me a shove in the direction of the door.
I stopped at the door. I wiped my sweaty palms on my pants.
“Not until you tell me about the Black Hand.” I thought Scott might throw an even more violent rage, but he merely nailed me with a look he might give a dog if he caught it squatting on his lawn. He scooped up his T-shirt and made like he was going to stretch it back over his frame, then his mouth curled into a threatening smile. He threw the shirt on the bed.
He loosened his belt, yanked down his zipper, and stepped out of his shorts, leaving him standing in nothing but fitted cotton boxers. He was going for the shock factor, clearly trying to intimidate me into leaving. He’d done a pretty good job of convincing me, but I wasn’t going to let him get rid of me that easily.
I said, “You have the Black Hand’s ring branded on your skin.
Don’t expect me to believe you know nothing about it, including how it got there.”
He didn’t answer.
“The minute I walk out of here, I’m calling the police. If you won’t talk to me, maybe you’d like to talk to them. Maybe they’ve seen the branding before. I can tell just by looking at it that it isn’t good.” My voice was calm, but my underarms were damp. What a stupid and risky thing to say. What if Scott didn’t allow me to leave? I obviously knew enough about the Black Hand to upset him. Did he think I knew too much? What if he killed me, then threw my body in a Dumpster? My mom didn’t know where I was, and everyone who’d seen me enter Scott’s apartment was wasted. Would anyone remember having seen me tomorrow?
I was so busy panicking, I hadn’t noticed Scott had taken a seat on his bed. His face was bent into his hands. His back was quivering, and I realized he was crying silently, great, convulsive sobs. At first I thought he was faking, that this was some kind of trap, but the choked sounds low in his chest were real. He was drunk, emotionally unhinged, and I didn’t know how stable that made him. I held still, afraid one slight movement might cause him to snap.
“I racked up a lot of gambling debt in Portland,” he said, his voice scratchy with desperation and exhaustion. “The manager at the pool hall was breathing down my neck, demanding the money, and I had to watch my back anytime I left the house. I was living in fear, knowing one day he’d find me, and I’d be lucky to get off with broken kneecaps.
“One night on my way home from work, I was jumped from behind, dragged into a warehouse, and tied to a folding table. It was too dark to see the guy, but I figured the manager had sent him. I told him I’d pay him whatever he wanted if he’d let me go, but he laughed and said he wasn’t after my money—in fact, he’d already settled my debts. Before I could figure out if it was his idea of a joke, he said he was the Black Hand, and the last thing he needed was more money.
“He had a Zippo, and he held the flame against the ring on his left hand, heating it. I was sweating bullets. I told him I’d do whatever he wanted—just get me off the table. He ripped open my shirt and ground the ring into my chest. My skin was on fire, and I was yelling at the top of my lungs. He snapped my finger, broke the bone, and told me if I didn’t shut up, he’d move down the line until he broke all ten. He told me he’d given me his mark.” Scott’s voice had dropped to a rasp. “I wet my pants.
Right there on the table. He scared the hell out of me. I’ll do whatever it takes to never see him again. That’s why we moved back to Coldwater. I’d stopped going to school and was hiding out at the gym all day, bulking up in case he came looking for me. If he found me, this time I was going to be ready.” Cutting off there, he wiped his nose with the back of his hand.
I didn’t know if I could trust him. Patch had made it clear he didn’t, but Scott was shaking. His complexion was pasty, misted with sweat, and he plowed his hands through his hair, letting go of a long, wavering breath. Could he make up a story like that? All the details meshed with everything I already knew about Scott. He had a gambling addiction. He’d worked nights in Portland at a convenience store. He’d moved back to Coldwater to escape his past. He had the branding mark on his chest, proof someone had put it there. Could he sit two feet away and lie to me about what he’d gone through?
“What did he look like?” I asked. “The Black Hand.” He shook his head. “It was dark. He was tall, that’s all I remember.”