His own cousin was a bit too sappy over that kid of his. Great kid, straight A’s, a real credit to Johnny, but please. The guy would collapse flat if anybody threatened her. Probably get a bit dangerous over it, but still, a weakness.
He wasn’t all that worried about these flashy guys. They’d run and hidden. Most of them were smart enough to hide their families, but dumb enough to tip their hands that they cared. Any of them who were smart sons of bitches would have cut the dead weight. Women were cheap. Besides, this method inherently targeted the stupid ones who hadn’t even done a decent job of cutting out.
It had never occurred to Bobby that he wasn’t particularly bright, either.
Kerrie Maise added another hole to her belt with Joey’s pocket knife, wrinkling her nose at the baggy slacks and the salt cellars at her collar. She absently rubbed at the scars on her right knuckles. She had not intended to lose weight again. It was just that even after three years of treatment for bulimia, if she didn’t consciously plan six small meals a day, her weight tended to slip again. All the turmoil from that mess with Keith had been so upsetting that she had frequently been too nauseated to keep anything down. Ginger snaps were high on her list for the supermarket run. No nutrition to speak of, but they were calories she could trust to stay down pretty good. It wasn’t like she could find herself a new shrink — not as hot as the whole family was right now. It was going to be one hell of a lonely New Year’s Eve.
“No, Pinky, we cannot get a dog. Not right now, and no, I don’t know when.” She sighed. His plaintive reply was unintelligible, but she could guess the gist of it. “I don’t know means I don’t know. Now quit whining at me before the Darhel come to eat you.” That shut him up.
Pinky’s chubby face and huge brown eyes, not unlike a puppy himself under the silky black curls, stared up at her, his forehead crinkling slightly in worry. “How about I go play now?” he asked seriously. Sometimes the boy was scarily smart.
Kerrie closed the knife and flipped on the safety catch. “Give this back to Joey on your way,” she said. She didn’t think twice of handing the little boy the knife. Not only was he biddable, but Bane Sidhe children started weapons’ safety training at age two. He wasn’t opening that knife short of an instruction from an adult or a bona fide emergency.
Pinky carefully did not look excited as Mommy handed him the knife. It was Joey’s pride and joy; Pinky had often asked for a chance to look at it, but Joey was stingy and wouldn’t share. As soon as he got out of his mother’s sight, he ran down the hall as quietly and quickly as his legs would carry him. There was one place he could count on privacy to examine the treasure before he had to hand it off to Joey.
The basement stairs always creaked, just like the ones back home. Mommy’s room was far enough away that she wouldn’t hear, but he didn’t know exactly where Joey was. He followed his customary sneaky route, which consisted of stepping to the very edge of the wall, right on top of the nails. Only the third stair from the bottom creaked if you just stepped on the nails. Pinky knew it was the third one because he was a very smart boy. Everybody said so, because he could already count all the way to ten, and knew his numbers, too. He had another little secret, though. Pinky liked secrets, because it was practice for when he grew up. He was going to be a spy. The grown ups thought he didn’t know, but he suspected Uncle Neddie was a spy, because of the way he talked secrets sometimes with Daddy. That didn’t make him a very good spy, but it did make him cool.
He figured if he showed he could keep lots of good secrets, then when he grew up, maybe Uncle Neddie would help him get a spy job, too. One of Pinky’s most precious secrets was that he couldn’t just count to ten. He could count all the way to a hundred. He had more reasons than one to keep this ability to himself. One was that Joey tended to punch him when Mommy or some other adult wasn’t looking, for “showing off.” The biggest reason was because he had discovered that secrets built upon secrets and secrets. The second secret was that Uncle Caspar, whose house they were staying at while Daddy was away with the other soldiers, had this really neat, huge trunk in the basement. It was only partway full with old clothes and papers and stuff, but the empty part was big enough for a very small boy to fold up and hide real comfortable. He had a flashlight, crayons, and paper hidden under the other stuff. When he wanted a little very special privacy to examine some treasure he shouldn’t have, or when he was tired of Joey bossing him around, he could sneak down to the big trunk and hide inside, for as long as he wanted.
One reason nobody would look for him there was the trunk had a combination lock on it. Joey had once, very snottily, Pinky thought, told him about combination locks and all about how he knew how they worked while he tried and tried to get it open. There was nothing Pinky liked better than to secretly do what Joey couldn’t do. Joey thought he was so smart just because he was six. Pinky laughed inside about this a lot. He knew six-year-olds who weren’t as smart as he was. Why, Pinky had been smart enough to stand behind Uncle Caspar, three times, while the man worked the lock’s spinny dial. He had made sure to ask a lot of questions about everything he could see in the basement while he watched that lock. Grown ups pretty soon quit noticing anything you did if you were asking them enough dumb questions. All he had to do is imagine he was Joey and think of what questions Joey would be asking.
Pinky was good enough at the combination lock by now that he could even think about other things while he worked it. He hadn’t realized he could do that before he noticed the lock opening in his small hands.
He had lots and lots of tricks. Tricks were fun. Secrets built on secrets. It had taken him a long time to bend the coat hanger just right, so he could leave it through the crack in the opening of the trunk. With a lot of practice, now he could hold the lock on the end, and close the lid so the latch came down. The first couple of times were scary, because he’d had to work hard to get the lock back out so he could get back out. He was an unusually patient boy, if only when a secret was involved. By now, he could lift the combination lock so its curvy part went right back through the little loop thingy, and move it around so it almost looked closed.
He’d played spy a lot. The calm game came quick and easy, the combination lock sliding right into place, the side pulling smoothly even so it almost looked closed. He scrabbled around for his flashlight, but decided not to turn it on. If it was Jenny Sorenson from next door, they’d be trying to find him to make him play with her. Some girls were okay, but Jenny was yucky. His mother kept telling him he was too young to think girls were yucky yet. Easy for her to say. She didn’t have to play with Jenny.
Sure enough, it wasn’t long before Jenny came clomping down the stairs, calling his name. It was almost smart of her to guess he’d be in the basement. Almost. Maybe the worst thing about Jenny was she had black curly hair and brown eyes, too, and everybody was always saying how cute they looked together, like twins. Yuck.
The doorbell rang again and Pinky felt a lift of hope. Maybe Jenny wasn’t supposed to go out and her mother had come to make her go home. Please, oh please, he prayed silently. Very silently.
The firecracker popping noises upstairs told him immediately that whoever was at the door, it wasn’t Jenny’s mom. Pinky had been to the range with Mommy and Daddy lots of times. He knew what those firecracker sounds were, and he suddenly knew several things. Daddy wasn’t on an ordinary mission, they wouldn’t be going back home, and Mommy was upstairs dying. Mommy didn’t carry her gun, and she was a lousy shot. He hoped Joey was out playing, but the awful high-pitched shriek told him he was wrong. Some small voice in the back of his head told him he ought to do something to save Jenny, but for some reason he couldn’t move. He was scared, and realized he’d peed his pants like a baby.