"There's nothing so romantic as a contrite lover," I said. "And he's apologized for caring about her so many times. It's a hard face to look into and not be suckered."
"That's why they stay?"
"That's what the domestic violence folks say," I said, but my eyes were focused out the window, across the street.
"I'm not sure I like your vast knowledge on this subject, Freeman," she said, but I was no longer paying attention.
"You know these two guys across the street? The one in blue and his buddy leaning against the light pole?"
She checked them for a full minute. They were older than the rest of the crowd, both thick in the shoulders and waist. One was taller, the other more nervous. I could see the silver in the hair of the bigger one.
"No. Don't think so."
"They've been there since we came in. Beer bottles in hand, but neither one has taken a drink."
"Did they get dropped off by a white van?" she said, and even though it bugged me, she was right about my paranoia.
"How about you watch to see if they pull out their guns and come running across the street while I eat," I said.
"How about we both eat?" she said, this time with that smile of hers.
"Deal," I said, and put my hand flat on her thigh under the table. I kept my eyes off the street through dinner.
"Get your hands up on the table where's I can see them!" announced Rosa when she brought the bill, her big, dark face full of mischief. "Now don't be bringin' no more young ladies in here, Mr. Max," she said as we got up to leave. I looked to see Richards's reaction.
"Oh, she OK, baby. Just no others, hear?"
"Good night, Rosa," I said, leaving her a twenty-dollar tip.
When we stepped out onto the sidewalk Richards said, "They're gone." I looked across the street.
"I hadn't noticed," I said.
"Liar."
She made coffee when we got to her house and spiked it with a creme rum that turned it sweet and light brown. I didn't object. She climbed into the big hammock with me and her movement set it lightly swinging.
"You comfortable, Freeman?"
"Very," I said. She had turned out the porch lights, so the only light was the soft iridescent blue from the pool.
"What am I going to do about my friend, Max?"
I knew what was eating at her. I knew how it could.
"Listen to her," I said. "Suggest some counseling. You know the PBA has programs for this. Maybe she can get him to go before it gets too far. If it hasn't already."
She was quiet. Thinking quiet. Running the scene through her internal eye as a good investigator does.
"I'm not sure she'd go for that," she said. "And I doubt seriously that he would."
We both sipped our coffee and watched a breeze ripple the pool water and set its light flickering.
"And if she admits he's been hitting her? What do you do?"
"You gather the evidence and arrest his ass. It's a crime," I said, though it came out harsher than I expected.
She sat her coffee cup on the deck and stretched out next to me, her head on my chest. The smell of her hair was in my nose, and I was afraid she was listening to the elevated race of my heartbeat.
"Will you tell me about your father someday, Max?"
I ran the scene through my own internal eye.
"Yes," I said.
Later, when she was asleep, I lay staring up into the trees. I would use my left hand on occasion to push off the near railing and set the hammock swinging, because I did not want to close my eyes and did not want to dream.
I could never hear my mother's voice, no words of anger or fear or even begging to make him stop. I would lie in bed, the covers up to my neck and-forgive me, God-I would listen. The rough slam of the front door woke me. I counted the heavy steps past the staircase and down the hall to the kitchen. Eighteen. I heard the soft suction of the refrigerator opening, the clinking sound of glass against glass. A plate on the wooden table, a scrape of a chair being pulled back. Maybe he would stay down there tonight. Maybe he would fall asleep in front of the television and his hard snoring would be welcome music. But not this night. Not in this dream.
I heard each step up the stairs, the creak of old wood when he stopped and grabbed the smooth oak ball at the top of the banister to steady himself. I could feel him looking at my door, and then he went the other way, to their bedroom, and it would start. I tried, in the head of a thirteen-year-old boy, to make it another man's voice, the harsh, spitting curses. He was clapping his own hands together to make a point, I would lie to myself at the sound of skin slapping skin. A thump against the wall vibrated through the house. The sound of something porcelain from my mother's bureau shattering on the floor. And then, quiet. No sobbing. No gentle, conciliatory words. Just a long and empty silence.
In the morning I stayed upstairs as long as I could, listening for him to leave. I brushed my teeth, twice. I packed and repacked my football cleats and jersey. But the time forced me down and he was sitting at the kitchen table, his dark hair slicked back with Brylcreem, his shoes polished and shining, his blue policeman's uniform pressed and starched by my mother's hand.
"Running late again, Maxey?" he said, grinning, his eyes only slightly bloodshot from drink.
"Yeah, gotta run," I said, snatching something from the fridge, standing up close to my mother, who stood clearing the stovetop and no longer said anything to me about skipping breakfast.
I kissed her on the cheek and she turned halfway to accept it. "Have a great day at school, Maxey," she said. "And here, take your lunch." Then a car horn sounded out front.
"You got a game tonight?" my father asked.
"Yes, sir. Rafferty."
"OK, I'll be there, son," he would lie. "Good luck. And tell your uncle I'll be out in a minute."
Out on the street a black-and-white police cruiser was double- parked on Mifflin in front of the house. When I came down the steps, my uncle Keith called out from inside.
"Yo, Maxey."
"Hey," I answered, stopping to greet him through the open passenger's window. He too was in uniform. He and my father had the coveted day shift.
"How you doin', kid?"
"OK."
"St. Rafferty's tonight, eh?"
"Yeah."
"Go get 'em, kid. An' give that pussy quarterback of theirs a shot for me, eh?"
"OK, see ya," I said, and walked away, refusing to look back, even at the sound of my front door opening.
The ringing telephone woke her, and Richards's movement pulled me out of my own fitful sleep.
"You want to let it go?" I said.
"I would," she groaned, getting up, "if it had stopped on the ninth damn ring."
She went inside. I blinked the haze out of my eyes and tried to judge the hour by the lightening sky to the east that swayed back and forth above me with the rock of the hammock. Twenty seconds later Richards returned with her portable in hand and an unpleasant look in her face.
"It's for you, and the asshole won't I.D. himself or leave a message," she said, then pressed her palm over the mouthpiece. "And I don't think I appreciate you giving out this number as a place to reach you, either."
She pushed the phone at me, spun, and walked back inside.
"Who is this?" I said into the phone, Richards's anger quickly transferring into me. The line was silent, but open.
"Hello!"
"Stay out of this Noren issue, Mr. Freeman," a man's voice said. "It's ancient history, and believe me, you're better off without it."
I tried to process the words, tried to come up with something to keep the guy talking. But before I could, the line went dead.
CHAPTER
8
"I've been bribed before. Asked to st-stay away from a case for p-1 political reasons. Hell, every criminal case c-comes down to a plea bargain offer at s-some point." Billy did not resort to swearing easily, so I knew he was pissed, or frustrated, or both.
When I got to his office at eight he was already working the phone. Allie served me my big mug of coffee at her desk in the reception room before showing me in. Billy had actually sounded congenial until I told him about the phone call to Richards's home two hours earlier. The information seemed to click things into focus for him. He started pacing the carpet in front of his windows, ignoring the view outside.