Free The Winter Girl by Matt Marinovich Page B

two.
    “The Hub…blood…Dick’s house…V-Rex…Merry Christmas to you too.”
    As soon as she hung up, I pushed open the swinging door and confronted her.
    “Nice of him to call,” I said. “I don’t know what we’d do without him.”
    “Not now,” Elise said, pulling open the oven and shoving her hand inside a pale blue oven mitt.
    “It’s really too bad he can’t join us out here. Share a little of the turkey this year.”
    “He’s an inmate in Ohio,” Elise said, dumping the foil-covered roasting pan on the counter. “I don’t think he’s going to make it.”
    When I get angry, my saliva feels like it’s turning to acid. I could feel it stinging my throat as I tried to swallow.
    “I didn’t hear the voice asking you to accept the call,” I said. “He’s out of jail. He’s not an inmate anymore.”
    Elise shook off the kitchen mitt and lifted the foil to take a peek at a singed turkey wing, lightly touching it with her fingers.
    “He’s at a halfway house in Urbana, Ohio,” she said, staring at me as if I’d accosted her. “He shares a room with a sex offender and a nineteen-year-old arsonist. He’s wearing an ankle bracelet. I don’t think you have to worry about him, Scott. But it being Christmas, some compassion would be nice.”
    “Elise, I was listening,” I said, moving toward her. I tried to hug her, but she ducked away. Our positions were reversed now. I was standing by the stupid turkey and she was standing by the door. “Did Ryder send those guys?”
    Elise looked like she wanted to kill me. And that pissed me off. Blood isn’t thicker than water. It was as simple as that.
    “I’m your husband,” I reminded her. “That still counts for something, right?”
    “Yeah, it counts for something,” she said tersely. “My brother isn’t some kingpin. He’s been kicked around since he was born.”
    Even without laying eyes on the guy, I could tell how much Elise loved him. And that pissed me off even more. If she could make that big-sister face for some loser with an ankle bracelet, where did I fit into the equation? For starters, there were going to be no more secrets. I wanted to know every petty crime the guy had committed. How they’d grown so close. Had she ever given him money? Lied for him?
    “This brother thing,” I said. “It’s a blind spot for me. We’re going to have to start from the beginning.”
    “There’s no beginning to start from,” she said. “I’m the only one he trusts. He didn’t send anyone. He owes people favors. He has a big mouth and they know he’s got a rich father. He sent them to the wrong house on purpose to
protect
 us.”
    “Well, that’s great,” I said. “Because it’s just a matter of time before they find out Victor lives eighty feet away.”
    “They’re stupid. They didn’t find anything. Believe me, they’re done.”
    I briefly found myself picturing the guy who had nearly kicked the living shit out of me and Elise just humbly moving on to the next act of violence or extortion, wherever that might take them.
    “Thank you for letting it go tonight,” she said before I could say another word. “It’s not exactly a world-champion family.”
    “V-Rex, though,” I said, finally able to mention her nickname for Victor. “That’s pretty apt.”
    I laughed a little, but she didn’t join in. She waited for my mouth to straighten up again. Her refusal to let me share in this private language made me even more envious. Because how close can a couple be if they can’t create their own private language?
Fuck Ryder,
I thought.
    “We came up with stuff,” she said, looking out the windows at the balcony, the floodlight overhead catching the cold mist coming off the water. “That’s the way we coped.”
    With that, she turned her back on me and walked into the dining room. I stood there for a moment, and then I picked up the casserole, cursing the hot Pyrex, and brought it into the dining room.
    For the rest of the