And, man, how she glowed tonight. Smiled and laughed in a way that he had feared lost forever…
He thought of the man in the suit and his bodyguard. Of wet lips and white teeth and a big black gun. Of the call already placed to the detective, the message he couldn’t take back. He had to tell the truth. He had to. Even though it would kill her.
“What do you think?” Her face traced in candlelight, a hint of cheekbone, the delicate hollow of her throat. He remembered one time kissing that hollow, telling her he wanted to pitch a tent and spend the rest of his life there, and her laughing, laughing against him.
“Tom?” Her lips slightly parted, as if she were preparing to smile, or to cry.
“I think it’s great,” he said, and squeezed her hand.
12
THE LADDER WAS THIN and wobbly and impossibly tall, and he was at the top. The whole thing swayed with every breath, then swayed further when he tried to compensate. He smelled dust. Put his hands up to brace against the ceiling, but the motion only made the ladder lean further. A long, creaking shudder. The wood groaned. Everything started to topple. He scrabbled for purchase, fingers tracing slickness, straining to hold, but the weight was too much, and the ladder tipped, falling toward the surrounding dark.
And as it went, as he lost all hope, as his calves and the inside of his pelvis shivered with the electric anticipation of falling, and even as his body tumbled free, deep inside and delineated by fear, Tom Reed felt something like relief.
His eyes snapped open. The pillowcase was wet, and Anna was beside him, her breath faintly sour with sleep. He took a breath, flipped the pillow, and turned on his side.
Doesn’t take a genius to figure that one out.
After dinner, they’d grabbed a cab. Anna had taken his hand and held it the whole ride, smiling to herself. He’d opened the window, and the rush of air and blur of lights and pressure of her hand had combined to allow him to forget everything but sensation. A moment outside of time, and for the brief ride home, he let himself soak in it.
But after they trudged up the steps and opened the door, the alarm had given its quick succession of beeps, and every fear had tumbled back into his head. They brushed their teeth and fell into bed, too tired and buzzed to talk or make love, and she had drifted off almost immediately.
For him, sleep didn’t come so easy. He lay staring at the ceiling, trying to think of a way out. A way to keep the money and lose the bad guys and have the life they wanted, simple and happy and complete. He replayed the conversation with the man in the suit a hundred times. Each time, he almost woke Anna to tell her everything; each time, he decided against it. It wasn’t about deception. Tom just wanted to make everything right first. Between the pregnancy attempts, and the break-in, and now her job, she had enough on her mind. He’d tell her when he’d figured out what to do.
He stared and thought and wished he still smoked. His mind seemed to be working in circles, slow orbits around wet lips and white teeth and a big black gun. Around a threat, and a promise, and a hope. Around a voice-mail message. Around a tomorrow approaching too quickly.
Sometime after three, it had come to him. A possible way out. So simple he’d overlooked it; the truth, of all things. More or less. He’d slipped into a shallow sleep broken by dreams of falling.
It took most of the day to get hold of Detective Halden. They traded voice mails until nearly three o’clock. When they did finally connect, Halden suggested that Tom come by the station. They could have a cup of the world’s worst coffee, he said, and talk in one of the interview rooms.
“I’m in for the coffee,” Tom said, “but could we meet halfway? There’s a Starbucks on the corner of North and Wells. I need to talk as soon as possible.” A partial truth; he did want to talk soon, but he also didn’t want to do it in a police station, on the cop’s home court.
The coffee shop had that standardized coziness, the same anywhere in the country. Tom supposed that was one of the comforts of chains, but it was one of the horrors too. Soon there’d be no point going anywhere. He ordered a coffee, no whipped cream, no flavored syrup, no caramel, just coffee, in a large cup – did anybody actually feel more international by saying “venti” instead of “large”? – and took a seat at a corner table by the window.
Halden arrived a few minutes later. He nodded at Tom, then got a coffee of his own, sweeping back his jacket to reveal his silver star. The girl at the register smiled, and Tom noticed she didn’t charge him.
“Mr. Reed.”
“Detective. Thanks for coming.”
The cop sat down, crossed his legs ankle-on-knee, and sipped at his cup. He didn’t start firing questions, just leaned back and let Tom take his time.
Remember, you’re scared and confused and have nothing to hide. It wasn’t a hard role to play. Two of the three were dead accurate. “I’ll get right to it. Someone is threatening my wife and me.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. I was having lunch yesterday, and this guy I’ve never seen before sat down, started talking. He knew my name, and my wife’s. And he asked me if I loved her.”
Halden ran his tongue around the inside of his cheek. “Your names were in the paper.”
“It gets worse.” Tom paused. “He was part of the Shooting Star robbery.”
The cop leaned forward. “How do you know that?”
“He bragged about it.” Tom gave it a minute, let the lie – not lie, exaggeration – sink in. “He said that some men had cost him face. He said that Will Tuttle was one of them. He said that because I had sheltered his enemy, I was now an enemy myself.”
“ ‘Sheltered his enemy’? He say it that way?”
“Yeah. He had a story that led up to it, about Genghis Khan. I think he was trying to scare me.” Tom took a sip of coffee, went back to that moment, the man saying Anna’s name, that she was lovely. “It worked. I’m scared shitless. He had a guy with him that looked like a gangster, big guy with a gun.”
“He drew a gun?”
“No. Just let me see it in his holster.”
The detective nodded slowly, his face giving nothing away. “What then?”
“He said that I had to pick a side. That the men who had done the robbery had taken some of his merchandise. He didn’t say what, I assume drugs. That’s what the papers have been saying. Anyway, he said it was in my house, and that if I didn’t give it to him, he would kill us both.” Another helpful exaggeration, the more-or-less version of the truth.
“This was yesterday?”
“Yes.”
“At lunch, you said.”
“Right.”
“So why did you wait to call me?”
Tom sighed, shrugged. Looked at his fingers tracing shapes on the table. “I thought maybe if I found what he was looking for, he’d just leave us alone. I went home and tore the place apart.”
“And?”
“If it was there in the first place, then whoever broke in earlier this week took it. The other bad guys.” He shook his head, put on his best victim expression. This was the moment he had to sell through. “Detective, I don’t know what to do. We’re normal people. All of a sudden we have drug dealers and murderers coming after us. My wife is terrified. So am I. We need help.”
Yesterday, when Tom had left the first message for Halden, his plan had been to come clean. Give up the money and beg for help. It had seemed the only way. But as he’d lain in bed last night, he’d remembered that the drug dealer didn’t know about the money, or didn’t know that Tom and Anna had it, at least. All he wanted from Tom was his drugs back – and that was an opportunity.