He smiled in memory. “But that night she surprised me. I swear she was about to laugh at the awful things Dolores said. Laugh! Then Kathy put her arm around Dolores and walked out of the room with her. I was truly impressed. Now that’s class, I thought.”
He shrugged. “But later, I saw Kathy crying. Not a lot, but just enough that I knew what Dolores said had hurt her feelings. We talked for hours that night and that’s when I began to think maybe we could help each other.”
“And now you want someone else.” It was easy to see that Elise was thinking of her own marriage.
Olivia was sipping her drink and looking at Ray. “My guess is that you’ve found a woman who is more like you. Or what you grew up with.”
“Dr. Jeanne’s going to lose her job,” he said. “You girls mind if I...?” He waved his hand over his bare chest. He didn’t wait for an answer, but got up and went into the kitchen to get his shirt, put it back on, then poured himself a glass of straight Scotch. He took the bottle into the living room.
Olivia said, “You mentioned a man whose death changed your life. Does your big decision have anything to do with him?”
Ray finished his drink and poured himself another one. “Yes. Everything to do with it. That was Carl. Rita—the woman I fell for—is his little sister.”
“Tell us your whole life story,” Elise said. “Take our minds off our own problems.”
Chuckling, Ray leaned back in his chair. “I grew up in a rough neighborhood in Brooklyn. No dad, a saint of a mother who did the best she could at two jobs, but I was alone a lot. From the second grade, Carl Morales and I were best friends. We were taller and bigger than all the other kids.” He sipped his drink. “When you stand a head taller and twenty pounds heavier than the other kids, you can go either of two ways.”
“Be a bully or...?” Olivia asked.
“A savior. A protector. Carl and I saw ourselves as kings and it was our job to watch over our subjects.”
“With that philosophy, how did you get into a gang?” Elise’s voice was disparaging.
“We were big, not smart,” Ray said. “Actually, that’s not true. I’ve always been smart, just not very wise. And I was ambitious. Carl was my follower. Wherever I led, he went with me. By the time I was twelve, my goal in life was to become the ruler of the Scorpions. I thought that was the highest a person could reach. Carl and I quit school at fifteen and joined the gang. Then we spent three years showing them we were the best.”
“By robbing houses,” Olivia said.
“That and a lot of other crimes. Grand Theft Auto, B and E, all of it. We got to be so good that we became careless. When we were barely eighteen, the owner of a house had a gun and...” He stopped for a moment. “Carl threw himself in front of me and he died for it.”
Ray closed his eyes for a moment. “I’d never imagined my life without him. We were rarely apart, had no secrets. We were...” He took a breath. “He left behind a mother and a little sister. At Carl’s funeral his mother told me her son’s death was my fault, that Carl didn’t have the brains to get into trouble on his own. She said, ‘You had a choice. You could have led
him to do something with his life, but you chose to teach him how to be a criminal.’”
Ray put his drink on the coffee table. “She was right. Carl had turned his life over to me and I’d led him the wrong way. The next day I got out. I had to smack a few noses to make my point but I did it. I got a job as a mechanic, earned my GED, college—” He shrugged. “A professor said I was an inch away from being a con man so I should take advantage of my talent and go into sales. I did.”
They were silent for a while, then Olivia said, “And Rita was the little sister.”
Ray grinned. “Yeah. From the day of the funeral, I sent money to Carl’s mother. I sent everything I could afford and the amount increased as I did better. She never thanked me, never even acknowledged me, but the checks were cashed.”
He sighed. “His mom never came close to forgiving me, but Rita grew up and went to a community college. When she got out, you’ll never believe what her mother did.”
“Sent her to you for a job?” Olivia asked.
“Close, but no. She sent Rita to Kathy. I think she knew that I wouldn’t hire the kid. She brought back too many memories and too much guilt. But Kathy didn’t know any of that. She just heard a sad story so she gave Rita the job as my assistant.”
“Your wife hired her?” Elise asked. “I never did anything for Kent’s work.”
Ray shrugged. “Kathy’s a better judge than the employment department. She helped me with a lot of things.”
Both women waited for him to elaborate but he didn’t. “Did she know about you and Carl?” Elise asked.
“No,” Ray said. “I never wanted someone as sweet and innocent as Kathy to know about my sordid past. When she asked me questions about my childhood, I’d play a romantic Bad Boy part. I’d tell her about motorcycles and black leather jackets, that kind of thing. I didn’t tell her about breaking windows and stealing kids’ Xboxes.”
“What happened after Kathy hired Rita?” Olivia asked.
“I hadn’t seen her since she was a child, but I instantly knew who she was. She and Carl had different fathers, but they both had their mother’s eyes, a weird blue-green that could turn to ice. Carl could freeze a person with those eyes.”
“And you fell in love with her,” Olivia said.