I have not let myself think about that either. But I am thinking about it now, with my hands on him in a cabin in the Catskills at two in the morning.
He is almost certainly investigating the family I work for. He had every reason to let the Greeks have me. A dead Moretticonsigliera would have been useful to him in ways a live one cannot be.
He walked through that wall anyway.
Why?
I have an answer. It does not satisfy me operationally. It satisfies something else. I am not going to look at that something else tonight.
"This is going to hurt."
"Most things do."
I look at him.
"That was bleakly philosophical for a man bleeding on my kitchen island."
"Buy me dinner first."
"I already saved your life."
"So we’re moving very fast."
The voice is rougher than it was in the warehouse. Lower. Tired. Entirely unafraid of me.
I sterilize the entry wound. I work the lidocaine into the tissue. I prep the suture kit.
"You’ve been stitched before."
"Once or twice."
"Rangers?”
"You’re guessing."
"I’m not."
A pause. I begin the first suture.
"How do you know?"
"The way you cleared the warehouse. The economy of it. Army, not Marine, the finish is different. And you stopped when the lead was down. You stopped cleanly. That's the police layer underneath."
He is quiet for a moment, watching my hands.
"That's a very thorough guess."
"I told you. I'm not guessing."
I move to the next suture.
"What else do you know?"
The question is not defensive. He is genuinely curious. He wants to know what I see when I look at him. Not to protect himself. To understand what I see.
I have been asked this question by men who were afraid of the answer.
He is not afraid of the answer.
