Crescendo h-2 Read online

  I moistened my lips and decided to get the question over with. “Have you ever heard of the Black Hand?”

  Rixon flinched. He studied me in silence a moment before his face blazed with amusement. “Is this a joke? I haven’t heard that name in a long time. I thought Patch didn’t like to be called it. Did he tell you about it, then?”

  A slow freeze gripped my heart. I’d been on the brink of telling Rixon about the envelope with the iron ring and note claiming the Black Hand killed my father, but found myself grasping for a new response. “The Black Hand is Patch’s nickname?”

  “He hasn’t gone by it in years. Not since I started calling him Patch. He never liked the Black Hand.” He scratched his cheek. “Those were back in the days when we took jobs as mercenaries for the French king. Eighteenth-century black ops. Enjoyable stint. Good money.”

  I might as well have been slapped across the face. The whole moment felt unbalanced, tipped on its side. Rixon’s words ran over me in a blur, as if he was speaking in a foreign language, and I couldn’t keep up. I was immediately bombarded with doubts. Not Patch. He hadn’t killed my dad. Anyone else, but not him.

  Slowly the doubts began to fall by the wayside, replaced by other thoughts. I found myself picking through facts, analyzing for evidence. The night I gave Patch my ring: The moment I’d said my dad had given it to me, he insisted he couldn’t take it, almost adamantly so. And the mere name the Black Hand. It was fitting, almost too fitting. Forcing myself to hang on a few more moments, holding my emotions carefully in check, I selected my next words carefully.

  “You know what I regret most?” I said, my tone as casual as I could make it. “It’s the stupidest thing, and you’ll probably laugh.” To make my story convincing, I pulled a trivial laugh up from someplace deep inside me that I didn’t even know existed. “I left my favorite sweatshirt at his house. It’s from Oxford—my dream school,” I explained. “My dad picked it up for me when he went to England, so it means a lot.”

  “You were at Patch’s place?” He sounded genuinely surprised.

  “Just once. My mom was home, so we drove over to his place to watch a movie. I left my sweatshirt on the sofa.” I knew I was walking a dangerous line—the more details I revealed about Patch’s house, the higher the chance something wouldn’t match up, and my cover would be blown. But along the same lines, if I was too vague, I was scared it would tip Rixon off that I was lying.

  “I’m impressed. He likes to keep his home address off the radar.”

  And why was that? I wondered. What was he hiding? Why was Rixon the only person allowed into Patch’s inner sanctum? What could he share with Rixon, but no one else? Had he never allowed me inside because he knew something I’d see there would unravel the truth—that he was responsible for murdering my dad?

  “Getting the sweatshirt back would mean a lot to me,” I said. I felt somehow removed, as if I was watching myself converse with Rixon from several feet away. Someone stronger, more clever and contained was saying the words rolling from my mouth. I was not that person. I was the girl who felt herself crumbling into pieces as fine as the sand beneath her feet.

  “Head over first thing in the morning. Patch leaves early, but if you’re there by six thirty, you should catch him.”

  “I don’t want to have to do it face-to-face.”

  “Want me to pick up the sweatshirt next time I’m over? I’m sure I’ll be over there tomorrow night. This weekend at the latest.”

  “I’d like to get it sooner rather than later. My mom keeps asking about it. Patch gave me a key, and as long as he hasn’t changed the locks, I could still get in. Trouble is, it was dark when we drove over, and I don’t remember how to get to his place. I didn’t pay attention, because I wasn’t planning on having to drive back and get my sweatshirt, post-breakup.”

  “Swathmore. Near the industrial district.”

  My mind netted this information.

  If his place was near the industrial district, I was betting he lived in one of the brick apartment buildings on the edge of Old Town Coldwater. There wasn’t much else to choose from, unless he’d taken up residence in one of the abandoned factories or vagabond shacks by the river, which seemed doubtful.

  I smiled, hoping I appeared relaxed. “I knew it was over by the river somewhere. Top floor, right?” I said, taking a stab in the dark. It seemed to me Patch wouldn’t want to hear his neighbors stomping around above him.

  “Yeah,” Rixon said. “Number thirty-four.”

  “Do you think Patch will be home tonight? I don’t want to bump into him. Especially if he’s there with Marcie. I just want to get the sweatshirt and get out.”

  Rixon coughed into his fist. “Uh, no, you should be good.” He scratched his cheek and cast me a nervous, almost pitying, look. “Vee and I are actually meeting up with Patch and Marcie for a movie tonight.”

  I felt my spine stiffen. The air in my lungs seem to shatter … and then, just when I felt all semblance of my carefully controlled emotions fleeing, I was speaking clearly again. I had to. “Does Vee know?”

  “I’m still trying to figure out how to break the news.”

  “Break the news about what?”

  Rixon and I both swung around as Vee plopped down with a cardboard crate of Cokes.

  “Uh—a surprise,” Rixon said. “I’ve got something planned for tonight.”

  Vee grinned. “A clue, a clue! Pleeeease?”

  Rixon and I shared a quick glance, but I looked away. I didn’t want any part of this. Besides, I’d already tuned out. My thoughts were robotically sifting through this new information: Tonight. Patch and Marcie. A date. Patch’s apartment would be empty.

  I had to get in.

  CHAPTER 16

  THREE HOURS LATER, THE FRONTS OF VEE’S THIGHS were toasted red, the tops of her feet were blistered, and her face was swollen with heat. Rixon had taken off an hour ago, and Vee and I were lugging the umbrella and beach tote up the alley branching off Old Orchard Street.

  “I feel funny,” Vee said. “Like I’m going to pass out. Maybe I should have gone easy on the baby oil.”

  I was lightheaded and uncomfortably warm too, but it didn’t have anything to do with the weather. A headache sliced down the center of my skull. I kept trying to swallow the bad taste in my mouth, but the more I swallowed, the queasier my stomach grew. The name “the Black Hand” skipped around my mind like it was taunting me to give it my full attention, stabbing its nails into my headache every time I tried to ignore it. I couldn’t think about it now, in front of Vee, having enough foresight to know I’d shatter the moment I did. I had to juggle the pain a little longer, tossing it up in the air every time it threatened to crash down. I clung to the safety of numb devastation, pushing the inevitable off as long as I could. Patch. The Black Hand. It couldn’t be.

  Vee came to a halt. “What is that?”

  We were standing in the parking lot at the rear of the bookstore, a few feet from the Neon, and we were staring at the large piece of metal attached to the left rear tire.

  “I think it’s a car boot,” I said.

  “I can see that. What’s it doing on my car?”

  “I guess when they say violators will be towed, they mean it.”

  “Don’t get smart with me. What are we going to do now?”

  “Call Rixon?” I suggested.

  “He’s not going to be very happy about having to drive all the way back out here. What about your mom? Is she back in town?”

  “Not yet. How about your parents?”

  Vee sat on the curb and buried her face in her hands. “It probably costs a fortune to get a car boot removed. This will be the last straw. My mom’s going to ship me off to a monastery.”

  I took a seat beside her, and together we pondered our options.

  “Don’t we have any other friends?” Vee asked. “Someone we could call for a ride without feeling too guilty? I wouldn’t feel guilty about making Marcie drive all the way out here, bu
t I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t do it. Not for us. Especially not for us. You’re friends with Scott. Think he’d come get us? Hold on a minute … isn’t that Patch’s Jeep?”

  I followed Vee’s gaze down the opposite end of the alley. It fed into Imperial Street, and sure enough, parked on the far side of Imperial was a shiny black Jeep Commander. The windows were tinted, a glare of sun reflecting off them.

  My heart accelerated. I couldn’t run into Patch. Not here. Not yet. Not when the only thing keeping me from breaking down sobbing was a carefully constructed dam whose foundation cracked deeper with every passing second.

  “He must be here somewhere,” Vee said. “Text him and tell him we’re stranded. I might not like him, but I’ll use him if it gets me a ride home.”

  “I’d text Marcie before I’d text Patch.” I hoped Vee didn’t detect the strange, dull note of distress and loathing in my voice. The Black Hand … the Black Hand … not Patch … please, not Patch … a mistake, an explanation … The headache seared, as if my own body was warning me to stop this line of thinking for my own safety.

  “Who else can we call?” Vee said.

  We both knew who we could call. Absolutely no one. We were lame, friendless people. No one owed us a favor. The only person who would drop everything to come to my rescue was sitting beside me. And vice versa.

  I directed my attention back to the Jeep. For no reason whatsoever, I stood. “I’m driving the Jeep home.” I wasn’t sure what kind of statement I intended to send to Patch. An eye for an eye? You hurt me, I’ll hurt you? Or maybe, This is only the start, if you had anything to do with my dad’s death …

  “Is Patch going to be mad when he figures out you stole his Jeep?” Vee said.

  “I don’t care. I’m not going to sit here all evening.”

  “I have a bad feeling about this,” Vee said. “I don’t like Patch on a normal day, never mind when he’s got his temper on.”

  “What happened to your sense of adventure?” A fierce desire had taken control of me, and I wanted nothing more than to take the Jeep and send Patch a message. I envisioned bumping the Jeep into a tree. Not hard enough to deploy the air bags, just hard enough to leave a dent. A little memento from me. A warning.

  “My sense of adventure stops short of a kamikaze suicide mission,” said Vee. “It’s not going to be pretty when he figures out it was you.”

  The logical voice in my head might have instructed me to back away for a moment, but all logic had left me. If he’d hurt my family, if he’d destroyed my family, if he’d lied to me—

  “Do you even know how to boost a car?” Vee asked.

  “Patch taught me.”

  She didn’t look convinced. “You mean you saw Patch steal a car, and now you think you’ll give it a try?”

  I strode down the alley toward Imperial Street, with Vee jogging close behind. I checked for traffic, then crossed to the Jeep. I tried the door latch. Locked.

  “Nobody’s home,” Vee said, cupping her hands around her eyes to peer inside. “I think we should walk away. Come on, Nora. Back away from the Jeep.”

  “We need a ride. We’re stranded.”

  “We still have two legs, leftie and rightie. Mine are in the mood for exercise. They feel like a nice long walk—Are you crazy?” she shrieked.

  I was standing with the tip of the beach umbrella aimed at the driver’s-side window. “What?” I said. “We have to get in.”

  “Put the umbrella down! You’re going to draw a lot of negative attention if you smash out the window. What’s gotten into you?” she said, watching me, wild-eyed.

  A vision flashed across my mind. I saw Patch standing over my dad, gun in hand. The sound of a shot ripped the silence.

  I braced my hands on my knees and leaned over, feeling tears sting behind my eyes. The ground lurched into a nauseating spin. Sweat curved trails down the sides of my face. I was being smothered, as if all oxygen had suddenly evaporated from the air. The more I tried to draw air, the more paralyzed my lungs became. Vee was shouting at me, but it came from far away, an underwater sound.

  All of a sudden the ground halted. I took three sharp breaths. Vee was ordering me to sit, yelling something about heat exhaustion. I pulled free from her grip.

  “I’m okay,” I said, holding up a hand when she came for me again. “I’m okay.”

  To show her I was fine, I bent to pick up my tote, which I must have dropped, and it was then that I saw the spare key to the Jeep gleaming gold in the bottom. The one I’d stolen from Marcie’s bedroom the night of her party.

  “I have a key to the Jeep,” I said, the words surprising even me.

  A frown mark stretched across Vee’s forehead. “Patch never asked for it back?”

  “He never gave it to me. I found it in Marcie’s room Tuesday night.”

  “Whoa.”

  I shoved the key in the lock, climbed in, and sat in the driver’s seat. Then I adjusted the seat forward, cranked the ignition, and gripped the steering wheel with both hands. Despite the heat, my hands were cold and jittery.

  “You’re not thinking about doing more damage than just driving this thing home, are you?” Vee asked, buckling herself into shotgun. “Because the vein in your temple is throbbing, and the last time I saw it do that was right before you clipped Marcie in the jaw at the Devil’s Handbag.”

  I licked my lips, which felt sandpapery and rubbery at the same time. “He gave Marcie a spare to the Jeep—I should park this thing in the ocean, twenty feet under.”

  “Maybe he had a really good reason,” Vee said nervously.

  I gave a high slight laugh. “I won’t do anything to it until after I drop you off.” I cranked the wheel to the left and peeled onto the street.

  “You swear to add that disclaimer when you try explaining to Patch why you stole his Jeep?”

  “I’m not stealing it. We’re stranded. This is called borrowing.”

  “This is called you’re crazy.” I could feel Vee’s bewilderment at my anger. I could see irrational in the way she stared at me. Maybe I was irrational. Maybe I’d pushed things over the edge. Two people can have the same nickname, I thought, trying to convince myself. They could. They could, they could, they could. I hoped the more I said it, the more I’d come to believe it, but the place that I reserved in my heart for trust felt hollow.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Vee said, using a wary, frightened voice she never used with me. “We have lemonade at my place. After that we could watch TV. Maybe take a nap. Don’t you have to work tonight?”

  I was about to tell her that Roberta hadn’t scheduled me tonight, when I tapped the brake. “What’s that?”

  Vee followed my gaze. She bent forward, pulling a scrap of pink fabric off the dash. She dangled the French bikini top between us.

  We looked at each other, and we were both thinking the same thing.

  Marcie.

  No doubt about it, she was here with Patch. Right now. On the beach. Lying on the sand. Doing who knows what else.

  A violent, traitorous surge of hate spiked through me. I hated him. And I hated myself for adding my name to the list of girls he’d seduced, then betrayed. A raw desire to rectify my ignorance gripped me. I wasn’t going to be just another girl. He couldn’t make me disappear. If he was the Black Hand, I would find out. And if he’d had anything to do with my dad’s death, I would make him pay.

  “He can find his own ride home,” I said through a quivering jaw. I punched the gas, laying down a stretch of rubber on the street.

  Hours later, I stood in front of the fridge, door open, surveying the contents, looking for something that could pass as dinner. When nothing popped out at me, I moved to the narrow pantry kitty-corner to the fridge and did the same thing. I settled on a box of bow-tie pasta and a jar of sausage spaghetti sauce.

  When the stove timer beeped, I drained the pasta, poured myself a bowl, and stuck the sauce in the microwave. We were out of Parmesan, so I grated cheddar and called
it good. The microwave chimed, and I spooned layers of sauce and cheese on top of the pasta. As I turned to carry everything to the table, I found Patch leaning against it. The bowl of pasta nearly slipped through my fingers.

  “How did you get in?” I asked.

  “Might want to keep the door locked. Especially when you’re home alone.”

  His stance was relaxed, but his eyes were not. The color of black marble, they cut right through me. I had no doubt he knew I’d stolen the Jeep. Hard not to, since it was parked in the driveway. There were only so many places to hide a Jeep at a house surrounded by open fields on one side, and impenetrable woodlands on the other. I hadn’t been thinking about hiding when I’d pulled the Jeep into the driveway; I’d been consumed by sickening abhorrence and shock. Everything had come into sharp focus: his smooth words, his black, glinting eyes, his broad experience with lies, seduction, women. I’d fallen in love with the devil.

  “You took the Jeep,” Patch said. Calm but not happy.

  “Vee parked in an illegal zone and they put a boot on her car. We had to get home, and that’s when we saw the Jeep across the street.” My palms touched with sweat, but I didn’t dare wipe them dry. Not in front of Patch. He looked different tonight. More severe, hardened. The wan glow of the kitchen lights traced the cut of his cheekbones, and his black hair, tousled from a day at the beach, hung low across his forehead, nearly touching his obscenely long eyelashes. His mouth, which I’d always thought of as sensual, was turned up cynically on one side. It wasn’t a warm smile.

  “You couldn’t call and give me a heads-up?” he asked.

  “I didn’t have my phone.”

  “And Vee?”

  “She doesn’t have your number on her phone. And I couldn’t remember your new number anyway. We didn’t have a way to reach you.”

  “You don’t have a key to the Jeep. How’d you get in?”

  It was all I could do not to give him a traitorous look. “Your spare.”