“Serious money here,” Nick mumbled under his breath.
They moved softly in the heavy silence of the giant house, working their way to the right-toward the doorway of a small yet fabulously decorated room. Two lush, forest-green leather chairs framed a gorgeous fireplace, across from which sat a silk-upholstered sofa. Jake assumed this was what one would call a parlor.
“Hey!” a voice boomed from behind.
Jake led with his gun as he whirled to find Thorne walking briskly through the front door, dragging the body bag with one hand and carrying a cellular phone in the other. “Jesus, Thorne,” Jake spat, breaking his aim. “You scared the shit out of me.”
Thorne paused at the sight of the weapon and regarded Jake with disgust. “Put that thing away,” he commanded. “I told you, the estate is clean. We’re safe here.” He dragged the orange bag across the foyer and thrust out the phone. “Here,” he said. “Mr. Sinclair wants to talk to you.”
Mr. Sinclair can kiss my ass, Jake didn’t say. He reached for the phone.
Thorne turned to Nick. “The rest of your shit’s in the kitchen. That’s where I’ll put this.”
Nick nodded and followed the other man down the hallway, to disappear behind the dramatic, sweeping stairway.
Jake brought the phone to his ear. “Yeah, Harry, this is Jake.”
“Where’s Sunshine?” the old man demanded, his words like daggers.
Instantly, Jake’s hatred for this bully tycoon bubbled to the surface, just as pure and as bitter as it had always been. “Carolyn’s not here,” he said. The tone that he’d hoped would sound defiant sounded soft instead, like that of a child confessing to a parent. This was, after all, the man to whom he’d sold his soul in return for an easy way out. “I had to leave her behind.” He took a minute to tell the story.
“So you just ran away,” Harry charged. “You just left her to those pigs.”
“There was no choice, Harry.”
“There’s always a choice.”
Jake said nothing, merely sat down heavily on the elaborate sofa. Of course there were choices, but what else-
“It’s that goddamn kid of yours!” Harry roared. “I told you no kids! And you deliberately ignored me! Why didn’t you listen?”
Jake was stunned, struck dumb. Whereas just seconds before, he’d felt his self-worth swirling down the toilet, now he was ready for a fight. Goddamn kid? How dare he! For a long time, he stared at the phone, his mouth agape.
“I asked you a question, Jake,” Harry’s voice buzzed from the earpiece.
“We did listen to you,” Jake seethed. He found himself concentrating on his words, controlling his voice. “We did every goddamn thing you told us to do, and look where we are today.”
“You didn’t listen!” Harry yelled.
To hell with self-control. “We did listen!” Jake shouted back. “You said to run. We ran. You said to change our names and appearances. We did that, too. For fourteen years, Harry, we’ve done every goddamn thing you told us to do! And yes, we had a son…”
Suddenly, the words caught in Jake’s throat, and he paused, as if choking. And the horror of it all became clear. “I had a son,” he repeated, and now his voice was barely a whisper. He’d just used the past tense.
Oh, God…
“He’s the only thing we ever did right, Harry, and I think I killed him.” He looked at the phone curiously for a moment, bringing it down to waist level, where he folded it shut and let it drop to the floor. The last person he owed an explanation to was Harry Sinclair.
With his elbows wedged into his knees, he leaned forward and ran his fingers deeply into his hairline. The hopelessness of it all took his breath away.
What kind of animal am I? he wondered. Killing my own son, and sacrificing my wife, just to save my own skin?
“Oh, my God,” he whispered. “Oh, sweet Jesus, I’m so sorry.”
And he came apart. He pressed his fists against his eyes to keep the sadness from spilling out, but it wouldn’t be stopped. It gushed out of him in breathless, choking sobs, and suddenly, in his mind, he wasn’t in Arkansas anymore. He was with his little boy, holding him steady as he pedaled his bicycle for the first time. Then he saw the pained expression that invaded Travis’s face every time they told him that it was time to move to another town. The tenements they’d lived in, the roach-infested trailer parks. The bruises when Travis yet again refused to back down from the local kids who wanted to see what the new guy was made of.
God, Jake had tried so hard to be a good father, but in his zeal to keep his son in line, he’d never truly gotten to know the boy as a friend. The thought of it brought genuine pain. Suddenly, it was hard for him to take a breath.
And in his most heroic moment-when he was hoping to save our lives-all I could do was yell. And strip him of his dignity.
Jake wanted his family back. He wanted a group hug from the old days-a sandwich hug, where he and Carolyn were the bread and Travis was the jelly. The thought of never touching them again was more than he could bear. His mind played out a horror show, in which his only child lay trapped forever inside an airtight box, covered over by a ton of dirt, while his mother prayed for the moment when she could join him, every day suffering the torture of prison rapes and beatings.
Such a pillar of virtue, that Jake Donovan. Always willing to let women and children suffer in his place. There were words for people like him in our society: coward-the most exclusive group of villains; people who throughout history have willingly stepped aside to let others die in their place. Deserters and draft-dodgers came to mind. Or ship’s captains who take the last lifeboat while their passengers drown.
Like falling down a well, Jake found himself tumbling deeper and deeper into the blackest misery he’d ever known. And the well of misery had no bottom; just more blackness. Everything he’d ever loved was gone now, and it was all his fault. How could a man live with knowledge such as this? Knowing that he’d killed his own blood, how could he ever face a mirror again? How could he face another dawn?
“Jake!”
The harshness of the voice startled him. It was Nick, and he seemed agitated. “What?”
“Are you coming or not?”
Jake felt disoriented, mentally numbed; as if a chunk of time had passed without his notice. He checked his watch and was shocked to see that a full half hour of his life had somehow evaporated.
“Coming where?” As he spoke, his throat felt thick.
“To the kitchen,” Nick said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. His face turned grave. “Are you okay?”
Jake stood uneasily, unsure whether to trust his balance. “Yeah, I’m okay. Just zoned out.” A few seconds passed, and then his head cleared. He followed Nick into the foyer, then stopped. “What’s in the kitchen?”
Nick clearly felt uneasy. “I wanted to take a look at these remains before we ship them off to Chicago. The best place I can think of to do it is in the kitchen.” He responded to Jake’s curious glare with an offhanded shrug. “Don’t worry about it. Just something I noticed in the magazine. Probably nothing, but I thought we should check it out.”
“What is it?” Jake pressed as he followed down the hall.
Nick remained evasive. “I’ll tell you after we take a look. Like I said, probably nothing at all.”
Body language alone told Jake that it was useless to press further.
The kitchen was huge; like something that belonged in the back of an elegant downtown restaurant. Stainless-steel appliances shined like mirrors. Copper pots and pans hung from the ceiling, suspended in midair, it seemed, over a gleaming six-burner stove. The black and white tile floor was so clean that Jake found himself stepping carefully, lest he find that it was still wet.
The orange body bag lay in a heap in the right-hand rear corner, placed there with all the care and respect that one would show to a throw pillow.