Page 38 of Bang

"Why?"

"Because she had it coming. And you damn well know it."

Cami sank lower in her seat. "Maybe."

I reached toward her and held out my hand, palm up. "If you want, I'll answer."

She glanced down at my hand. "Oh, stop it. You wouldn’t."

I kept my hand in place. "Wanna bet?"

"Alright, scratch that," she said. "You probably would. And that's not a good thing."

"Why not?"

"Because you'd probably say something totally rude."

"Gotthatright."

Cami shook her head. "You're not getting it."

I returned my hand to the steering wheel. "Hey, don't say I didn't offer."

"I wasn't talking about the phone," she said. "Imeanyou're not getting the gist of what I'm saying."

"Which is…?"

"That Livia and I have been friends for a long time. Yeah, we don't always see eye to eye. And I know she can be a bit…well, difficult, I guess. But there's a lot ofgoodhistory there, too."

NowthisI had to hear. "Like what?"

"Well…in grade school, we were best friends." Cami lifted her hands and made little air quotes. "BFF's and all that."

"Best friends forever, huh? How'dthatwork out?"

"Fine. Mostly. And maybe she didn't stay myverybest friend. But in college, we roomed together my freshman year."

I recalled what I'd seen on the background check. "At Michigan State, right?"

"Right," Cami said. "And she was a good roommate.Anda good friend. Well, most of the time, anyway."

"She couldn’t have beentoogood," I said, "if you only roomed with her the one year."

"Yeah, but that wasn't her fault," Cami said. "I didn't go back after my freshman year." She hesitated. "Well, not until a whole year later."

"Why the gap?" I asked.

"Well…Mom got sick, and I'm one of five kids. Three of them are younger, so I figured I'd take a year off, to help out at home, you know?"

Silently, I considered what she was telling me. I'd met the mom earlier today. She seemed like a nice lady – and perfectly healthy, too. I asked, "How sick was she?"

"At the time, we didn't quite know." Cami bit her lip. "Breast cancer." A note of worry crept into her voice. "Nowthat'sa c-word."

I didn't like to see her worried. More softly, I said, "But she's okay now?"

"Oh yeah," Cami said. "But we didn't know it at the time, so…" She shrugged. "Anyway, it all turned out in the end."

"Good."And I meant it, too.From what I'd gathered, Cami had come from a decent family, the kind where the parents actually gave a rat's ass about their kids.