Page 67 of Nobody's Fool

“You are a brown kid in a foreign country.”

Henry is still chewing the book when I finish. Molly sits there, digesting it.

“Well, we know now she wasn’t dead,” Molly says.

“Yes.”

“That has to be a relief.”

I nod, not trusting my voice.

“Did you check for a pulse?”

“No.”

“Because when you screamed, this Buzz guy burst right in?”

“Yes.”

“Like he was waiting for you to wake up?”

“Yes,” I say again.

“You must have wondered about that.”

“Over the past twenty-plus years, I’ve considered every possibility. But I don’t think my mind would let me go to what I now know is the truth.”

“Which is?”

“I was scammed. I had a lot of money on me. A phone too. When I rushed out, I never even realized that it was gone. That was their play. Anna and Buzz were con artists. I was their mark. Anna’s job was to get close to the mark. By drugging him and making him think he’d killed her, the mark would just run off. He wouldn’t make a fuss. He wouldn’t go to the police or press charges or any of that. Most of the time, the mark, I imagine, would just do what my father suggested. Run and never look back. And if the mark did report it, well, they cleared out of that room before anyone could find them.”

“Seems like quite an effort,” Molly says. “Couldn’t they have just rolled you the first night?”

I shake my head. “I kept the money in a safe deposit box. That was my first night with it. I was going to move in with her.”

Molly sat there. A tear rolled down her cheek. Watching her, I could feel two hands grab my heart and snap it in two. I don’t think I’ve ever seen my wife look so sad.

“Molly?”

“You never told me.”

“I never told anyone. Only my dad.”

Molly swallows. “Nicole?”

I shake my head again. “Not even Nicole. Not even my mother.”

“This huge part of you,” Molly says, her voice sounding far away. “And you never told me.”

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I buried it.”

She makes a face. “You didn’t bury it.”

“I didn’t want it in our life.”

She doesn’t reply. She just sits there and breaks my heart.

“Molly?”