There comes a crunching of boots across hay. A big man steps from the shadows, a dense beard crowding his ruddy face. He holds a hooked knife. He doesn’t smile so much as bare his teeth.
“Hello, son,” he says. “I’m here to teach you about pain.”
A full-body buzz of fear rolls through Evan. That wicked blade sways in the man’s bulky fist, catching the light seeping around the cracks of the door.
Jack’s square face points down at Evan, and he says, gruffly, “The First Commandment: Assume nothing.”
The bearded man spins the blade expertly and offers it, handle out, to Evan. He says something, but Evan cannot make out the words over the thudding of his heartbeat.
The voice comes again. “Take the knife, son.”
Evan does, his fingers trembling. Then he looks at Jack. What now?
The bearded man says, “Stab yourself in the palm.”
Evan looks from the man to the hooked blade and back to the man.
“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” the man says, seizing the blade from Evan. His thick fist encircles Evan’s wrist, and then the steel tip pokes down, popping the tender skin of Evan’s palm.
Evan gives a little cry.
“That hurt?” the man asks.
“Yeah, it—”
The man slaps Evan across the face, hard. Evan reels back, the nerves of his cheek on fire.
“Doesn’t hurt now, does it? Your hand.”
Evan stares at him dumbly, his ears ringing.
“Does your hand hurt?” Each word drops deliberately, one stone after another.
“No. My face hurts.”
The man shows his teeth again, that slash of a grin. “Pain is relative. Subjective. A hangnail hurts until someone kicks ya in the nuts. I’m gonna teach you the difference between physiological pain and felt pain.”
He grabs Evan’s other wrist and raises the knife, and Evan flinches, ducks his head, the sting in his lowered palm flaring to life again. The knife does not descend. The bearded man’s eyes stay locked on Evan’s.
“Anticipation of pain leads to fear, and fear amplifies pain,” he says. “Expectation of relief from pain increases the opioids in the brain, makes the hurting stop. How your mind reacts to pain determines how much pain you actually feel.”
Jack’s voice floats over from somewhere beside Evan. “‘Pain is inevitable,’” he says. “‘Suffering is optional.’”
Evan yanks his hand free. Blood drips from his other fist. He senses Jack at his side, doing nothing, and a feeling of betrayal spreads fire-hot beneath his skin.
But Jack is not doing nothing. Jack is watching. And Evan realizes that this is a test like the ones that have come before. He understands that how he reacts now will determine everything, that this is in fact the biggest test so far.
Before Evan can say anything, the bearded man says, “You need to learn to rein in the brain centers that fire when your body detects pain. Control your insular cortex, get distance from the sensation by focusing on your breathing. I’m gonna teach you to attend to pain, put it in a box, put the box on a shelf, and go about your fucking day.”
Evan’s throat clicks as he swallows. “How are you gonna do that?”
The man’s beard bristles again around his grin. “Practice makes perfect.”
Evan looks up at Jack directly now for the first time and thinks he sees Jack give him a flicker of a wink, a tiny vote of confidence. Or maybe Evan has imagined it altogether.
The stink of damp hay thickens the air. Evan holds a breath in his lungs until it burns. Then he exhales. Turning back to the bearded man, he extends his arm, opens his other hand, exposing the pristine palm.
“Then what are you waiting for?” he says.
Morena’s on-call cell phone chimed in the darkness, interrupting Evan from his thoughts, and he lifted it from his thigh.
A text message: IM OUT FRONT. U HAVE HER WAITING?
Breathing the reek of the birdcage, Evan thumbed an answer: BEDROOM.
A moment later Detective Chambers’s reply came in: GOOD. U CLEAR OUT NOW. I WANT HER ALONE.
Beyond the lavender curtains, a car approached, a heavy American model by the sound of it. It idled a moment, the engine deep-throated and growly, then went silent. The neighborhood sounds drifted back in — someone laughing in a backyard, a rapid-fire Spanish commercial on a blaring radio, a jet arcing overhead. And then the crunch of footsteps approaching the house.
Evan wondered how often Morena heard those footsteps as she waited here in this room.
The parrot grew restless. “Please don’t! Please, please don’t!”
The footsteps led to the metal-on-metal purr of a key entering the front door, and then the hinges squealed. The floorboards creaked. Closer, closer.
The bedroom door handle jiggled up and down. Locked.
A gruff voice came through the thin door. “I’m sure you’re scared, Carmen, but I’ll be gentle.” The rasp of a palm against wood. “Your first time doesn’t have to hurt. I know how to do this right.” The handle rattled again. “I know how to take care of you.”
Evan set Morena’s on-call phone down and lifted the pistol from his other thigh.
Out of the memory mist sailed another Jack-ism: Big problem, big bullet, big hole.
“Come on, now. I brought you flowers. Open up and let me show you.”
The door handle rattled a bit more roughly this time. The parrot squawked and squawked some more. Evan’s hand tightened around the string.
“I’m getting tired of playing games, little girl. Open the door. You open this fucking door right—”
Gently, Evan tugged the string. It tightened, causing the door handle to dip, the lock releasing with a pop.
Chambers’s voice, once again calm: “There you go. Good girl.”
The door creaked inward, propelled by a strong slab of a hand. A muscular forearm came into view, bulging beneath a cuffed-back sleeve. Chambers’s face resolved in the darkness as he squinted into the dark room. Blotchy clean-shaven skin, cropped hair, hard eyes.
Chambers stepped forward, his shoes rustling over plastic sheeting. His face changed. “Who the hell are you?”
He looked down, only now noticing the drop tarp unfurled beneath his feet. When he looked back up, his eyes were different.
“Oh,” he said. “Oh, no.”
7
Who’s Who in the Zoo
“Wanna hear the testicle smasher of the year?” Tommy Stojack asked, ambling around his workbench and sucking the last bit of burn from a Camel Wide. “Pretty soon I’ll be able to just print your ass a gun. Type some shit into a program and it spits out a mold. Love to see the baby-kissers in D.C. regulate that.” He plucked the cigarette from beneath his biker mustache and ran the butt under a sink tap before depositing it among a dozen others floating in a red keg cup filled with water. One stray ember could turn the workshop into a meteor crater. “But hey, let’s not panic the sheeple, right?”
Evan followed him across the dim space, which, given the slumbering machines, sharp-edged blades, and weapon crates, felt more like a medieval lair. The Las Vegas sun had baked straight through the walls, and the air smelled of spent powder and gun grease. The heat made the knife cut on Evan’s forearm itch, the skin tingling as it healed, shedding dried bits of superglue.