“Charley—”
“Owen—,” I covered my face with the one hand I could lift and bit down hard to keep from crying. “—just please tell me.”
He exhaled slowly. “You took my pants.”
I lowered my hand just enough to see him over my fingertips. “What?”
“About a month before I tried to run your ass down until you died a prolonged and painful death, I’d spilled orange juice all over my pants. When I went to the restroom, I took them off to rinse them in the sink, and one of the guys grabbed them from me, joking around. He ran out and threw them into the girl’s restroom. And you took them.”
“I don’t even … Wait, that’s right. Larry Vigil opened the bathroom door and threw in a pair of guy’s pants. So—” I leveled an apologetic gaze on him. “—I took them. I just thought they were from the locker room. And the next day,” I added, hating to say it aloud, “I wore them. As a joke. Owen, I had no idea they were yours. I figured they’d taken them out of someone’s locker and whoever they’d belonged to had sweats or something else to wear.”
“They weren’t and I didn’t. They left me there, and later when you wore them, I thought you knew they were mine.” He glanced down, embarrassed. “You looked right at me and laughed the next day as you walked past.”
I ran a hand through my hair and winced when my fingers brushed over stitches. “Owen, I wasn’t laughing at you. I was just, I don’t know, laughing. Probably at something Jessica said.” Jessica had been my best friend growing up before I made the mistake of telling her too much about me.
“Well, I know that now,” he said. He stood and stalked to the window that overlooked the college campus.
“But there’s more to that story, isn’t there?”
He nodded and turned away. “I couldn’t leave the restroom. It was the end of the day and everyone went home, and I was just there, stuck in the restroom with no pants. So, I waited for all the buses to run, tied my jacket around my waist, and started walking home.”
I cringed. The embarrassment he must have felt. “Oh, my god,” I said, as the memory of that time rushed back, “you were the kid. The South Nines beat you up.”
After a long moment, he nodded. “They caught me in an alley and basically kicked my ass for not wearing pants.”
“But you were at school the next day.”
He shrugged. “I didn’t tell anyone. I told my mom I crashed my bike. If the Nines had kept their mouths shut, no one would ever have known. Then when I saw you wearing my pants the next day and everyone laughing…”
My hand covered my eyes, trying to block the memory. “Talk about adding insult to injury.”
“I just couldn’t forgive you. The Nines never left me alone after that. I had to face them every day.”
“Owen, I’m so sorry. That’s why you withdrew. Neil Gossett said you just kind of drifted away from them.”
“Being harassed on a daily basis has that effect. Still doesn’t change the fact that you’re a bitch.”
“That’s true.”
He turned back to me. “But you just take this shit and take it and keep coming back for more. The guys in my division can’t figure out if you’re really good or really stupid.”
I peeked out from between my fingers. “It’s a fine line.”
He lowered his gaze. “I wanted you dead.”
“Yeah, I got that when you came after me in your dad’s SUV.”
“I wanted to drag your lifeless body down the street, dropping limbs along the way.”
“Okay, but you’re over that, right?”
“Not really. But you’re all fucked up, so I can’t give you a hard time. We can pick this back up when you’re better.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
* * *
The next day, I woke in the late afternoon, a soft sun filtering through the window. Uncle Bob was there as well as Cookie, her eyes rimmed with a redness that hadn’t been there before.
“Are you getting enough sleep?” I asked her.
“You’re one to talk,” she said with a sad grin. “Everyone’s been here. And it’s all over the news. About the man who’d been in prison for a murder he didn’t commit. I think Reyes is going to be famous.”
“So he doesn’t have to go back to prison?”
“I talked to your friend Neil Gossett,” Uncle Bob said. “They’re going to keep him in minimum security until all the paperwork goes through.”
“But why don’t they just let him out now?” I asked, alarmed. “The man he went to prison for killing isn’t even dead.”
“For one thing, they have to prove that really is Earl Walker. Then papers have to be filed and a judge has to review the case. It’s not like in the movies, hon.”
“So how is he?” I asked.
“Farrow is fine,” Ubie said. “He’d called the police before he ever got to your place and was there when we got there. He surrendered with no complications. And that is really the man he went to prison for killing?” he asked at the last.
I knew he would take it hard. Sending a man to prison for a murder he didn’t commit would wreak havoc on the heightened moral codes of a good cop. “There was no way for you to know, Uncle Bob. Wait.” My brows slid together. “What do you mean he surrendered? He didn’t really have much of a choice, did he?”
“Actually, the first officers on the scene were a little busy. They had no idea who he was. He identified himself and told them the guy lying in a heap of broken limbs was Earl Walker.”
“He told them? With the gunshot wounds?”
Ubie and Cookie exchanged glances. “He wasn’t shot, sweetheart,” Cookie said.
“Oh, my gosh, he’s faster than I thought. I could have sworn he was shot. I mean, I saw Walker pull the trigger. I saw the bullets head straight for his heart.”
Again with the glances. Cookie took my hand. “Hon, that wasn’t Reyes.” She bit her lower lip, then said, “That was Garrett Swopes.”
I blinked in confusion, closed my eyes, and replayed the memory. A tall man came bursting through the door, and Reyes had been on his way. I’d just assumed.