I parked at the curb in front of his apartment building and was surprised to see him sitting on the stairs. He was bare chested, wearing only a pair of basketball shorts and sneakers. I gritted my teeth together to distract myself from noticing. If there were ever a pointless thing for me to notice, Chris Martinez’s bare chest would be it.

He saw me coming and opened the door, pushing with the same half scrunch to one side, as if it still hurt. It probably did. That was the side that had met the impact of the Monte Carlo dead on. It had been pretty demolished. He would likely feel phantom pains there for a long time, if not forever.

“Where’s the fire?” he asked, and at first I stopped short, thinking he was trying—and failing horribly—to be funny. But the look on his face reminded me that he hadn’t seen the letters. He knew nothing about what had happened over the past two hours of my life.

“I found letters,” I said. “Bad letters.” I shocked myself at how easily and quickly the truth came out of me.

“Let’s go for a walk,” he said. “I’m kind of stiff from all that time in the car. I need some exercise.” Indeed, a trace of his limp had come back.

I had to force myself not to churn up the sidewalk, to slow down and wait for him. I was angry, not in a race.

“So you found letters,” he said. He stopped, stooped to pick up a fallen twig, and kept walking, rolling it between his fingers. “I have no idea what that means. What kind of letters?”

“They were letters to my mom from Brandi Carter. And a letter to my dad from Bill Hollis. My dad started the fire that burned down the set at Angry Elephant, Chris. And he refused to pay.”

His eyes widened slightly, but he still kept them firmly planted on the twig as we walked. We rounded a corner, headed toward a church.

“Okay?” he said. “And?”

I planted myself in the center of the sidewalk. He nearly plowed into me. “And? Are you serious? My mother is dead, Chris. What is it you don’t understand about that? She is dead. She’s never coming back. Nobody cares about it but me. Nobody ever has.”

“I care.”

“You do not.” I started walking again. He was a few steps behind me.

“I do care, Nikki. But I have other things to think about, too. Your mom is dead, yes. But someone tried to kill me a few months ago. Today’s bad guy takes precedence over the bad guy from ten years ago.”