“Like the rain.”
She smoked more, and studied him with a contemplative air. French thought something was happening, but couldn’t think clearly. The way he’d behaved, that blind rage. The girl was still watching him, her eyes either gray or dark blue. “How old are you?” he asked.
“Eighteen.”
“And your parents know you work in a place like this?”
“So what?” She frowned around the cigarette. “Now you’re the good cop?”
“I’ve pulled bodies from this place. Before your time, but more than once.”
She shrugged, quietly amused. “I think I’m safe enough.”
“You can’t know that.”
“My father is pulling a dime for the club. Central Prison.”
“So this place?”
“It’s easy money, and it’s like I said, no one touches me unless they want every Hells Angel in the state gunning for them.”
“This is a club bar?”
“Yes and no. A couple nights a week.”
“And the bartender?”
“A wannabe.”
French was feeling better now: slower thoughts, some kind of order. “It’s Janelle, right?”
“It is.”
“What can I do for you, Janelle?”
She looked away, and small teeth appeared as she caught her bottom lip. “That boy is really your son?”
“He was here, then. Did you see what happened?”
“I’m no rat. I noticed him, is all.”
“And…?”
“And he was my age and cute and kind of sweet-looking.”
“He almost died, right up there in the ditch, dumped like trash with his head kicked in.” She shook her head, then showed the same twilight eyes. “It’s just us, Janelle. All alone, no one around.” She hesitated, but French was close. “What would your father do if it were you, half-dead in a ditch? What would you want him to do? My son is only eighteen. He’s your age…”
“Okay, all right. Enough. Jesus.” She lit another cigarette. “Look, it’s like I said. I was working, and I saw him, and I paid attention. Good-looking. Kind of earnest. I couldn’t hear everything he said, but I know he was asking about Tyra Norris…”
“Tyra Norris. You’re certain about that name?”
“Hey, I’m no rat, but I’m not stupid, either. He was asking about Tyra Norris—I heard it plain as day—and before someone killed that bitch dead, she was the original slut-whore from hell. Bikers. Truckers. Even a few cops.” She pointed with the cigarette, one eye half-closed. “Maybe that’s what got your boy beat.”
* * *
In the driveway an hour later, French saw a light in Gibby’s room. He wanted desperately to see his son, to know he was okay, but also to push hard about Tyra Norris and the Carriage Room. But time, he decided, was a friend. Let the resentments settle, the angers fade. Going to his office instead, French poured a drink, and squared Jason’s military records on the desk, staring at the envelope until the drink was gone.
Three in the morning.
Lots of dark left.
Taking a breath to steady his resolve, he broke the seal and started reading. It was all there in photographs and plain print: the lost years and the war, the life of his middle son. It took an hour to skim the file, and two more to read it again more slowly. Turning off the light, French tried to understand the things he’d learned of his son and the darkness of this particular war. It was not easy. There was no clear path. He was exhausted and hurting, but when the sun rose, he was still at the desk, still dumbfounded, thunderstruck, blown the absolute fuck away.
24
Jason woke on a hard bunk, and knew, even without windows, that it was not yet sunrise. That was the rhythm of war and prison. Too many bloody dawns and dead friends. In the dark, he did push-ups and stretched, then trained for forty minutes, not just the close-quarter combat techniques taught to every marine in Force Recon—the combination of Okinawan karate, judo, tae kwon do, and jujitsu perfected by Bill Miller in 1956—but also a devastating blend of Van An Phai and Vovinam, learned across two years from a colonel in the South Vietnamese army. The movements were fluid, fast, precise. He worked until the sweat poured and the guards came to take him back to death row. One, he knew. Kudravetz. The other was new to X’s detail. They shackled him in silence, and no one spoke on the long walk. No one needed to. At death row, they removed the restraints and sent him down to X.
“Good morning, Jason.”
Jason took the final step down, and met X where he stood beneath the stone arch. “It’s a little early.”
“And yet you’re not my first visitor.”
Jason frowned because X did nothing without reason; said nothing without reason. He wanted Jason to ask about the visitor, so Jason did not.
Eventually, X shrugged. “You remember Reece, I’m sure. A blunt instrument, admittedly, but predictable when such things matter.”
Jason was still trying to gauge the moment. A smile. A frown. In the subbasement, they rarely meant the normal things. “How about you tell me why I’m here.”
“You’re here because I found yesterday unsatisfactory. Because I went to bed unhappy, and woke thinking we should try again.” X turned for the cells, and Jason followed with the same wariness. At the second cell, X gestured at a table set for breakfast. “Bacon and eggs, grapefruit and pastry. This is honey from the warden’s wife. She’s begun to keep bees, apparently.”
He offered a chair, and Jason sat stiffly, watching X do the same. He was clean-shaven and finely dressed, but his face was bruised and taped, his knuckles scraped raw. X noticed the studied glance, and shrugged a second time. “One of the Pagans, late last night. I think his name was Patterson.”
“Was Patterson?”
“Was. Is.”
“Why a Pagan?”
“I may spend my days below ground, but I do hear things, rumbles of displeasure from some of the Pagans. They seem to believe you stole from the club and put a few bullets in one of their shot callers. I made it known that you are under my protection.”
“Is that why I’m here? So I can thank you?”
“For now, it’s about breakfast. For later…” X made an expansive gesture. “Discourse. Debate. A few well-fought contests in the days which remain.”
“Discourse and debate.”
“Honest discourse. Vigorous debate.”
“You had Tyra killed for the sake of a conversation?”
“In part, yes.” X frowned for the first time, shaking his head. “But also because she was cruel, selfish, and vain, an utter waste of life.”
“And what of my life?”
“You’ll lose a few days of it. A small price.”
“No, X. Not a few days. I’ll be here long after they kill you. The lights will flicker, and I’ll be here to see it happen. Ten years later, I’ll still be here. You’ve assured as much: the photographs, the murder weapon.”
“Yes, well…” X poured coffee for them both. “You’ve known for some time that I am not a nice man.”