“Yeah… I know what you mean.” Taking pity on me, he took my elbow and guided me into a chair. “Well… at the hospital they said nothing else is wrong with him, so we don’t need to worry about that.”
“Oh… that’s a relief.”
He nodded. “Yeah… I’m sorry I didn’t answer the phone when you called, but I was on the road and couldn’t pick up. After I got on the elevator, I listened to your message. You sounded a little frantic, and I felt bad you went through that.”
I huffed. “Me? frantic? Why would I be frantic?”
He grinned, then raised his brow. “Want a soda?”
“You know it.” I followed him down the hall to his apartment, stopping to let Ricky know that it was just a flesh wound and not to worry. I mentioned the knife and the earthquake and caught a hint of surprise from him, which was soon followed by a grin.
As Ramos handed me a glass of ice and a diet soda, I let out a chuckle. “It is kind of funny, you know? Joey “The Knife” Manetto stabbed himself. I’d laugh more if it hadn’t scared me so much, and I’ve had enough of being scared today.”
“Why? What happened?”
He grabbed a drink, and I followed him into the living room. We both slouched on his white couch and enjoyed the view of the city below. Since Ramos knew all about my other secret, that I could hear dead people, I told him the whole story.
He already knew about my brush with Dex from his encounter last night. But he relished hearing that the ghost had kicked his ass, even if it was hard to believe. “He confessed?”
“Yup.”
“So the earthquake… you think that was the ghost too?”
“Nah.” I shook my head. “It couldn’t be… right?” I took the last swallow of my drink and set the glass on the coffee table. “Oh… and we caught Xavier… the kid who killed Slasher? There might be a problem.”
I filled him in on the health-and-nutrition store, and he promptly called Vinny, telling him to put the word out that the cops were onto the store and to stay away from it. He also called to warn the store manager in case the police showed up.
Finished, he turned his gaze my way. “There’s nothing there for the cops to find, so that should take care of it.”
“There’s one more thing. Grizzo might check you out. Do I need to worry?”
He shrugged. “He can try, but I’ve got it under control.” He was thinking that he had his own connections and he’d be fine, but it pleased him to know I had his back. He raised his brow. “Want to go for a ride?”
My heart soared. “I thought you’d never ask.”
CHAPTER 15
Nothing beat a motorcycle ride with Ramos to make me feel better. It ended sooner than I liked, but I’d take what I could get. Still, even after the ride with Ramos, I drove into my garage feeling totally drained. How was that possible? Of course, I’d had more than one scare for the day, so that probably accounted for it.
Since we’d already had pizza this week, I’d stopped at a sandwich shop on the way home for our dinner. My kids weren’t nearly as happy to see me as Coco, but it was nice to catch up and relax. With the earthquake the major focus, it surprised me that my kids had hardly felt it. I checked the Internet and found that it had been a minor magnitude quake of about 3.5 on the Richter scale.
To find that the epicenter of the quake was just a few yards east of the police station made a lot of sense. Most of the downtown buildings felt the quake, but the only damage at the station was an ornamental vase that had broken in half.
Then there was Uncle Joey. He’d had his moment with the quake that hadn’t turned out so well, but at least it wasn’t life-threatening. I still couldn’t believe he’d gone to the emergency room, and that it had scared me to death. Sure, I didn’t want him to die, but I also wasn’t ready to be his successor. I wished there was a way out of it, but I didn’t see how it was possible. He was counting on me. How could I let him down?
That left the earthquake. I couldn’t decide if there was a connection between the quake and Brock’s dying wish. It seemed crazy that it was just a coincidence, but I didn’t want to think about that too hard. I was just grateful that Dex had confessed and was going away for a long time.
Chris was grateful too, especially after he found out what had happened to me last night at the hotel bar. He didn’t like hearing about my drink getting spiked, or that I’d put myself in danger without Dimples to back me up. But he held it all in and didn’t criticize me once. In fact, he only interrupted me when I brought up Ramos.
“Wait… so… you called Ramos?” That was the part he liked the least.
“Uh… yeah. My cell phone was missing, but luckily, I had the burner phone with his number already programmed in. It was a good thing you called Uncle Joey and talked him into getting one for me, otherwise, I don’t know what would have happened.”
“Yeah.” He reluctantly agreed, especially since looking at it that way didn’t leave him much room to complain. “You’re right.”
“But it all turned out okay. And you should have seen Dex. Ramos punched him a couple of times, and I think he even broke his nose. At least he got what he deserved. Then Dimples took over and covered for Ramos, even
