Mendez offered his hand. “No hard feelings, right?”

The funny thing was I almost felt I deserved it. My heart was so fractured that I was willing to hurt anybody to make myself feel better. Worse yet, as all this transpired I almost felt bad for Mendez. Between the unveiling of his crude portrait of Jodi, which made me fight laughter, and his strange canine roar, I felt like we were almost friends.

Now this.

“Brilliant plan, dumbass. If we don’t get arrested,” I said, grabbing his hand, and rising on unsure feet.

“Listen, nobody was ever in danger!” Mendez roared. “Not with a blade that dull.”

“I got knocked out!”

“You’re such a nancy-boy. Besides, the two of you deserved a beat-down for messing with my business. And they wouldn’t have known it was us if you didn’t take off your mask and scream my name.”

I felt sick.

“Then again, Tom just called. Said she didn’t even know we were there. How does it feel to be invisible?”

“Let’s get one thing straight. Are you in on the plan or not?”