because I was essentially part of the excuse for his actions, I felt there was something oddly honorable about his story. He’d chosen me and I’d gone a lifetime thinking he’d never done that. It was both comforting and disconcerting.
“So you never contested your sentence because you knew it might bring Keene’s involvement to light?” I said.
He nodded. “First time Darcy came here, took me about two minutes to realize that if I gave her anything, she’d dig it out. She wasn’t going to go through the motions. She actually thought she could overturn the conviction.” He rubbed a hand across his jaw. “Giving her your name was a way to pacify her. I didn’t figure on you getting involved. I just assumed that you wouldn’t want anything to do with me and would send her on her way.”
Remembering Darcy in the ocean that day we met, I knew sending her on her way was exactly what I should have done. She’d still be alive, and I wouldn’t have been sitting in San Quentin with a man who was taking a power saw to my life.
“I swear, I thought Keene would either be dead or you wouldn’t be able to find him. Guy has to have about a million enemies and I thought something or someone would’ve gotten to him by now,” Simington said. “It was a stupid mistake on my part. I’m sorry.”
“Am I right in thinking he killed Darcy?” I asked.
“Yeah. He must’ve gotten wind of her taking on my case. I’m sure he keeps an eye on me, waiting for them to strap me in.”
I was unnerved by the way he talked about his own death with such detachment.
“I’m taking him down, then,” I said.
Simington shook his head. “Not worth it, Noah. She’s gone, and that’s too bad. But it’s my fault because I started this chain reaction. It’s not your problem to solve.” His eyes hardened. “Best thing you can do is to step away from this now. It’s what’s best for you and your mother.”
It may have been what was best for everyone, but I didn’t care. Keene had killed Darcy and dumped her in my apartment. Maybe he hadn’t killed Vasquez and Tenayo, but he’d been a part of it.
“Someone has to fight for Darcy,” I said. “I’m taking him down.”
“There’s only one way to take him down, Noah,” Simington said.
“What’s that?”
Simington leaned closer to the window, the smudges and fingerprints distorting his face. “Kill him.”
THIRTY-SEVEN
I set Simington’s advice aside for the moment. “You need a new lawyer.”
“No,” Simington said, shaking his head. “I don’t. I’m fine.”
“This kind of information could change your sentence,” I said.
“We already went through that. I did what I did, I’m going to take the punishment, and I’m alright with it.”
He spoke as though he were serving a week-long detention rather than being executed. No matter how I felt about him, that didn’t make sense to me.
“Why?” I asked.
“Why what?”
“Why are you so comfortable with dying?”
Chair legs scraped the floor on the other side of the room, echoing off the walls. We stared at each other for a few moments. I wasn’t going to say anything until he answered the question.
“You’re a good guy, aren’t you, Noah?” he finally said.
I shrugged, not knowing how to answer.
“No, you are,” he said, smiling. “I can tell. The fact that you’re here, the fact that you found Keene, and the fact that you want justice for what happened to Darcy all tell me that.”
I adjusted how I was sitting in the chair, the seat back suddenly feeling too hard.
“And I know what Carolina’s like,” he continued. “Your mother, I screwed that up, okay? I had a chance to actually have a decent life with her and I shot it all to hell. She was one of the few good things I ever ran across and like always, I fucked it up. She has her faults, but bottom line, she’s a good person. It’s natural that she would’ve passed that on to you.”
That was difficult to hear. I chose to think that my personality traits evolved in a vacuum instead of having been passed down from people I was embarrassed by.
Simington pointed his index finger at his chest. “I’m not a good person. I’ve never been a good person. My parents were not good people, so it came easily for me.”
I wondered about the grandparents I’d never known. “Are they still alive?”
“No, and the world is better for it,” he said. “My old man died when I was fifteen. Shot in the chest during a burglary. And my mother passed on about ten years ago. Heart attack. All the stress of lying and stealing from people finally caught up to her.” He paused. “You are better off never having met them.”
My genetic hit streak continued.
“I have never wanted to be a good person,” he said. “It never occurred to me. I didn’t mind hurting people if it
