Page 40 of Ransom
I stared at the flowers long enough that a petal came loose and landed on my doorstep.
"You gonna shoot me or let me in?" he asked.
I stepped aside.
He came through the door, and the casita shrank by half. Winston was a big man, and I kept forgetting that because he carried himself loose, easy, like the space he took up was borrowed and he'd give it right back. In the casita there was nowhere to give it back to. He stood in the center of the room with the flowers in one hand and his hat in the other and turned a slow circle, taking in the bed, the chair, the stove, the photo on the nightstand.
His eyes stayed on the photo a beat too long.
"You want a drink?" I asked.
"Sure."
I opened the cabinet above the stove. One tin plate, a fork, a hunting knife, and the flask. I pulled it down and unscrewed the cap, and held it out. He took it, his fingers brushing mine on the metal, and drank. He swallowed, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and passed it back.
I drank. The whiskey was cheap and burned all the way down. I welcomed it because it gave me something to focus on besides the fact that Winston Valverde was standing in my bedroom holding stolen flowers and I was barefoot with my jeans undone.
"You can sit," I said. "Chair's the only option."
He picked my shirt up from the chair, folded it once, set it on the bed beside the cat, and sat down. The cat opened one eye, assessed him, and closed it again.
Winston set his hat on his knee and held out the flowers. "These are for you," he said.
"I see that."
"Sierra had them on the table. Seemed like the thing to do." He turned them in his hand. "I don't actually know if you're the kind of man who wants flowers. Seemed like a gamble worth taking."
"I'm not."
"Too late." He held them out.
I didn't take them.
"You stole flowers off Sierra's kitchen table."
"I borrowed them with the intent to deliver."
"You stole them."
"He had a whole pot. He won't miss six." Winston paused. "Five. One didn't make it."
"Jesus Christ."
"You want them or not?"
I took them because he was sitting in my only chair, looking at me like he'd rehearsed this part on the walk over, and it still wasn't going the way he'd planned. The stems were damp. A few petals had come loose and stuck to his palm.
I turned and set them on the nightstand next to Chance's photo. They looked wrong there, bright and alive next to my brother's frozen grin.
"You said to come find you," Winston said behind me. "When I was ready to tell the truth."
I turned around and leaned against the nightstand with my arms crossed over my bare chest. "That's what I said."
"Well." He rubbed his palms on his thighs. "I'm here."
I waited. Waiting was the one thing I was better at than him.
"Rex Rawlins isn't his real name," Winston said.
