It showed, I thought. Rich leathers. Real art.
Sara lit a candle, and sipped her wine. “Will you kiss me?” she asked.
“Are you sure?”
“Just for a little while. Just until.”
It felt strange, the way she asked, but I knew nothing of grown women, and that made everything strange: the tasteful furniture, her readiness when I sat beside her. She took the glass from my hand, then pressed me down and spread across me like a blanket. At first, she clung tightly, but then she kissed me, and the touch of her lips was as gentle as rain. Her fingers, too, were light on my skin. They brushed my face, my chest. In time, she rose, and our shirts came off, and still the moment was hers. The eagerness remained, but she’d coiled it someplace deep: a vibration at the small of her back, a catch in her breathing. We kissed until the coil loosened, and when it did, I felt it in her breath. It came faster and hotter, and the heat was in her skin, too: her hands on my face, the press of her legs. Under shadowed eyes she pushed me down, and I knew she wanted an excuse, a reason to move and do and forget. I was a tool for her, but didn’t care. The heat was mine, too, the same catch in my breath. I closed my eyes and saw a wash of red as if the heat we shared had rolled into the room itself. Bloodred, it brightened and pulsed, and Sara’s skin was slick beneath my hands. She said, “Oh…” And I thought, Yes.
But that’s not what she meant.
“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit…”
My eyes opened as she rolled away.
The red light was real.
Cops were in the drive.
Sara ran to the window, and for those seconds looked like something from a world I’d never really known: the giant shadows, the red light on her skin. It felt like a scene from a movie, set in a great city and starring someone larger than myself. I felt nothing but awkward. Pulling on my shirt. Looking for hers. I found it beneath a pillow, and carried it to her.
“Here, put this on.”
The curtains were diaphanous. She held a bit between two fingers. “Why are they here?”
“Come on. Get dressed.”
Outside, men crossed in front of the car lights. I got the shirt over Sara’s head; helped her with the straps that passed for sleeves.
“It’s Tyra. It has to be.”
“We don’t know anything yet.” But I actually did. The cops were named Martinez and Smith. They were murder cops. They worked with my dad.
“Don’t leave me, okay?”
My arm went around her shoulders. She was scared. We both were. “Come on,” I said. “Let’s see what they want.”
At the door, Martinez and Smith were already on the top step. Their shock at seeing me would have been comical in other circumstances.
“Gibby? Jesus.” Smith spoke first, his gaze moving to Sara’s face and mine, then to my arm on her shoulder. He was a small cop with soft eyes and narrow hands.
Martinez, beside him, looked harder and crueler and cynical. “What are you doing here?”
“Nothing.”
It was a kid’s response, but Martinez was like my father at his worst: the cop eyes and distrust. He glanced at Smith, and cleared his throat. “Why don’t we speak separately? Gibby, will you come with me?”
“Is this about Tyra?” I asked.
“What do you know about Tyra?”
“Only that she’s missing.”
“You know her, then? Personally?”
“Yeah. Course.”
“How do you know her?”
Smith said, “Martinez…”
But Martinez ignored the note of warning in his partner’s voice. “I said, how do you know her?”
“Come on, man. It’s Bill’s son.”
“Don’t tell me to come on! You saw her, same as me.”
I didn’t know what he meant, but thought, Tyra, first, and then that it was bad. Martinez was so hot and bothered I looked for smoke in his ears. “We have questions,” he said. “Cop questions, important ones. And I expect you to answer them right here and right now, same as your little friend.”
He stabbed a finger at Sara’s face, and I saw blood on the cuff of his shirt. He followed my gaze, and saw the same thing. “Son of a bitch…”
He tried to wipe it off, and Smith took the lead, his voice softer. “You’re confused. I understand. Worried, too, I’m sure. But we need to ask the questions first. You know how this works.”
I did. I didn’t care. “Tell me about Tyra.”
“I can’t do that…”
“Gibby, what’s happening?”
I pulled Sara closer, squeezing her shoulders. “We’ll wait for my father,” I said.
“Your daddy’s not coming,” Martinez said. “Even if he did, it wouldn’t make a difference. This is happening like I said. Right here. Right now.”
Smith showed his palms. “It would be helpful…”
“You’re damn right,” Martinez said.
“Not until I know what happened to Tyra.”
“Goddamn it, kid. You don’t ask questions, and you don’t get to see your daddy.”
But a car was racing down the street, red light on the roof, the engine running hot. It was my father’s car; I knew it. So did Martinez. He stepped back, and I heard the words under his breath: Motherfucker, son of a goddamn bitch …
The car braked hard, and the doors flew wide. “Not a word, son, not a single word.”
“What are you doing here, Bill?”
“Not now, Martinez. I need to speak with my son.”
“So do we.”
“And I’m saying, not now!”
“He knows our victim.” Martinez stepped into my father’s personal space, crowding him. “Personally.” Martinez stressed the word. “He knows her personally.”
“We can talk about that later. Gibby, get in the car.”
“But Sara…”
“I said get in the car.”
“What happened to Tyra?” I made it a demand. No one cared.
“Not now,” my father said.
“Then when?”
“Son, get in the fucking car.”
His eyes blazed, but the profanity frightened me more than anything else. Burklow was gentler. “Go ahead, son. You can see your friend tomorrow. She’s not in any trouble.”
Keeping his eyes on Martinez, my father said, “Ken, if you would.”
Burklow took my arm, and pulled me down the steps.
Martinez said, “We still want to talk to your son.”
“I know you do, but it’s not happening tonight. Ken, please.”
The big cop dragged me all the way to the car, and stuffed me in the back seat, locking me inside. I looked for Sara, on the stoop.
Her face was in her hands.
She was crying.
13
At Lanesworth, X was frustrated and restless. He stretched out on the bed, got up, stretched out again. When Reece appeared, at last, a glance at his face told X it was done. “It went well, then?”
“So well I am disinclined to charge you. The young woman was … delightful.”
X mirrored the man’s thin smile. “It’s no crime for a man to enjoy his work. Expect the usual fee in the usual manner.”