Maybe you should get matching outfits, she suggested. Or a Mason’s #1 Fan foam hand.
Like two days earlier when they’d been on the third floor of the former Petite Trianon Theater, checking out a gilded frieze that ran along the balcony. Mason had said, “So this is really your hobby? I’m not sure your job can be your hobby.”
Ford had shrugged off Mason’s comment, cantilevering himself off the side with a rope secured to the balcony railing. “I like finding things that have been lost and rescuing them.”
Mason handed him a pink tab to mark the part of the frieze they wanted to take. “Sounds like you have a guilty conscience.”
How could Mason know that? Sadie wondered uneasily. Miranda had said the same thing, and she’d been right, but Miranda was… Miranda.
For a moment Ford’s hearing got muffled and the sound of his breathing was louder in her ears. Then everything was back to normal, and Ford said, “Why would you say that?”
“It’s been my experience that people who feel the need to rescue others generally have some guilt they’re working through.”
Bright splashes of yellow, blue, and brown made a blurry image of James and Ford and Cali grinning at a motel pool. The dots became smaller, the image more distinct, and Sadie caught the sticky feeling of humiliation, saw a bed with a pair of red and blue flowered swim trunks on the end of it. Cali, tangled in its blue comforter and obviously naked, turning to look at the door and saying in a voice a little too loud, “Ford, I thought you’d left?” Ford backing out of their motel room, not even realizing he’d dropped the milkshake he was bringing her—strawberry, her favorite—until it was dried and tacky on his hand, still staring at it when James came bounding out in his red and blue floral swim trunks and did a cannonball into the pool, the three of them laughing together like nothing ever happened.
Abruptly the image vanished into blankness and Ford was saying to Mason, “My brother wanted to rescue everyone, be a hero, and he never felt guilty about anything in his life.”
Sadie was thunderstruck. James had slept with Cali, and Ford had known about it. Knew about it.
But not consciously. He’d repressed it, using mental alchemy to sublimate it into a single sensation: the sweet-tacky feeling of dried milkshake on his hand. The memory acted as the source text for the emotion, the sensation persisting even though—or maybe precisely because—Ford refused to acknowledge the event that caused it.
It was a thrilling discovery about how his mind worked, but also puzzling. Why won’t you admit that James wasn’t always the great guy everyone says? she wanted to ask him. He’s dead. Who are you protecting from the truth?
Mason looked apologetic. “I could be wrong. Would it take some of the sting out if I said I have a lot of experience with guilt myself? Nothing like being the only survivor of a car crash on the first day of your family’s vacation to give you a pretty good dose of the GCs.”
“Guilty consciences.” Ford nodded. “That must have been—”
“Yeah.” Mason cut him off.
Ford steered back to safer topics. “Does that mean you think you’re rescuing me?” It was designed to change the subject, but it wasn’t an idle question. He tried to lighten it by adding, “Because you’re not really what I picture in my rescue fantasies.”
What do you picture? Sadie asked, genuinely curious. After all the time she’d spent in his mind, she actually didn’t know the answer.
“Let’s make a deal,” Mason suggested. “I won’t try to rescue you, you don’t try to rescue me.”
“Sure,” Ford said, shaking on it. “Deal.”
Mason handed Ford another pink marking tab. “You used the past tense about your brother.”
“He’s dead. Murdered. A little more than four months ago.” Ford hoisted himself back over the railing. The blankness that followed the memory of Cali and James spread in his mind, taking on mass, becoming milky.
“That’s tough. Grieving is hard, and four months is recent. Was he a good brother?”
Without thinking, Ford said, “Everyone loved James.” Through the milky whiteness Sadie saw dots forming the image of a rope, taut now, held in a black-gloved hand. “He was perfect.” He picked up one of the toolboxes and started for the stairs.
Mason grabbed the other toolbox. “Perfect. Wow.” He said it with admiration, not contempt. “What was that like?”
The image in Ford’s mind evolved. The fingers of the black-gloved hand opened and the rope slipped away, swallowed up by the whiteness. “Great,” Ford answered. The whiteness vanished, his mind cleared, and his gaze raked the interior of the theater. “It was great.”
Sadie felt Mason’s eyes on him, but all he said was “Looks like we’ve tagged the whole building to take with us. I should probably just buy the place.”
Show-off, Sadie thought.
“Right,” Ford snickered, stopping when he saw Mason had his phone out. “Are you serious? You can buy a building on your phone?”
Mason laughed. “No, but I can find out who owns it, what else they have, get a feeling for what they’d take for it.”
Sadie could tell Ford was impressed. He was thinking about it, about what it would be like to have that kind of money, when Mason loped toward him, holding out his phone. “Place is owned by MRP. Know anything about them?”
Mr. P, Ford said to himself, rephrasing it slightly, and Sadie felt his pulse pick up. “I might know something. Do they own anything else?”
You’re jumping to conclusions, Sadie cautioned him. MRP could be someone’s initials. A development company. A real estate trust.
“They own about twenty buildings, all in City Center,” Mason reported. “Mostly derelict theaters and factories. I’m surprised I’ve never heard of MRP with holdings like that. They must keep a very low profile. I’ll forward you the list.”
The phrase “very low profile” echoed from Ford’s mind to Sadie’s. Or MRP could be the Pharmacist, she admitted. But why would an invisible criminal mastermind want a bunch of abandoned buildings?
The Old Turkish Baths were number fourteen on the list. Willy’s party was in full swing now, and several hundred people filled the main floor. Sadie heard Ford wondering if the Pharmacist might be one of them, when his eyes stopped on a beige cowboy hat in the middle of the dance floor.
Bucky? their minds asked in unison.
Sadie felt Ford’s heart rate pick up as he navigated across the dance floor toward the hat. The crowd got denser as he got closer, and when the DJ started a new song everyone threw their hands in the air, blocking his view.
His eyes flicked back and forth over the heads of the dancers, and out of his peripheral vision Sadie caught sight of the hat alongside them. To the left, she shouted, and Ford turned and spotted it, almost as though he’d heard. He dove through the crowd, grabbing for it.
“Hey, what do you think—” The frosted blonde who was wearing it swung toward Ford, indignant. Her outraged expression softened when she saw who it was. “Mr. Ice!” Kansas squealed, leaning close to give him a kiss on the lips that turned a little sloppy.
You’re getting lipstick on you, Sadie warned him. Kind of a lot, and not really your color.
When he finally pulled himself free he said, “Hi, Kansas. Nice hat.”
“Thanks.” She giggled. “Willy gave it to me. It’s a little big, but that just means I have to make my hair bigger.”