Page 22

CHAPTER 22

IT WAS MIDNIGHT BEFORE Baby walked back up the rickety stairs of Arthur’s house. She’d waited until Rhonda had gone to her bedroom with the trophy box and the contents of Jarrod Maloof’s backpack before she’d slipped out of her bedroom window and called an Uber. She was tempted to stay home, where it was familiar and safe. But she was trying to prove something to herself, to Rhonda, and to Arthur. She could and would survive outside the nest.

Baby knocked on the front door of the old house on Waterway Street, then tried the doorknob and was surprised to find it unlocked. “Hello?” she said, and Arthur called out that he was in the kitchen.

She had to stop for a moment in the near darkness of the corridor when she saw him sitting there, hand on the side of a coffee cup — he reminded her so much of her father, it made her heart ache. Earl Bird was someone who’d charged around the world like a raging bull, chasing loan sharks, skewering bond-skippers, cornering fence men and thieves. But through her childhood, there’d been rare moments of stillness like this, when Baby would walk into the mansion on the beach to find the huge man waiting quietly for her. When Arthur turned at the sound of the floorboards creaking under her feet, she half expected him to smile at her and say, “Hey, li’l Baby,” just like her father.

But Arthur said nothing. She slid into the chair across from him and let her bag slump to the floor under the table.

“Hell of an hour to be walkin’ in,” the old man said.

“Better get used to it.”

“Uh-huh.”

“All right, spill,” Baby said. “Who’s got it in for you, old man?”

Arthur tapped the cup. His wedding ring clinked on the porcelain. “It can’t be as bad as that,” he said finally.

“You know it is,” Baby said. “That’s why you wanted a big scary man to help you out. Because you know it’s that bad.”

“But they wouldn’t kill me. That’s ridiculous. That kind of stuff only happens in movies.”

“Who are we talking about?”

Arthur glanced out the window at his side yard and the fenced houses beyond. “Almost every house around here has been bought by a company called Enorme,” he said.

“Enorme?” Baby said. “Who are they?”

“Some megacorporation.” He shrugged. “You know the type. All the executives have their own yachts.”

“But what do they do?”

Arthur shrugged again. Baby took out her phone and googled, saw all that she needed to see. Sprawling tech communities. Cinematic aerial shots of factories the size of football fields. Glossy investor videos with beautiful happy people in suits.

“They own pretty much the whole block,” Arthur said. “That’s why those other houses are fenced off and boarded up. They’re prepped for demolition. Enorme’s gonna put one of their factories here. Or a skyscraper or ... I don’t know. I didn’t read the paperwork.”

“But they don’t own your place?”

“No.”

“You’re the last holdout.” Baby sat back in her chair, felt a flower of dread blossom in her chest. “They’re heavying you to sell.”

“They’re heavying me.” Arthur nodded and put his hands on the table with his withered palms up. “But it’s like I told my wife, Carol: When you got a bully after you, you just hunker down and carry on and wait for them to get bored.”

“Or,” Baby said, “you fight back.”

“I’m too old to fight back.”

“These Enorme people — did they throw money at you?”

“Sure.”

“Why didn’t you take it?”

“What am I gonna do with the money?” Arthur looked around. “Everything I want is right here. Except Carol. And money can’t bring her back.”

“How did Carol die?”

“Heart attack,” Arthur said. “Start of the year. It happened in the kitchen.”

Baby stiffened. The old man flapped an impatient hand.

“I know what you’re thinking.” He sighed. “But you’re wrong. She didn’t get shocked by anything. She was sitting right where you’re sitting now, at the table. I saw it. She grabbed her arm suddenly and fell on the floor. Didn’t say a word. She had diabetes. And heart problems.”

“She did?”

“Yeah,” he said. “She must have forgotten to take her heart medicine or ... ” He trailed off.

Baby raised an eyebrow. “Did she tend to forget things like that? Was she a forgetful person?”

Arthur didn’t answer.

“So you called 911, right?” Baby said.

“Yeah. Of course. Immediately.”

“And what happened?”

“Carol was eighty, okay?” Arthur’s hands were shaking. He tried to disguise it, but Baby could see the tremors. “They didn’t do an autopsy. And the EMTs, they took all her medications with them. So if there’s something hinky about all this, like you’re trying to suggest ... ”

He paused, held on. Baby gave him a moment.

“I can’t face that.” Arthur stared at his hands. “If they did something that killed her ... if they ... I don’t know if I could face something like that.”

They sat in silence together, the night outside absurdly quiet.

“I could,” Baby said. “I could do it for you.”

Again, the silence. Baby was used to that, to loaded male silence. It didn’t dissuade her.

“Arthur,” she said. “I want to help you. If these Enorme fuckers have been messing with you, then I want to catch them and wipe the floor with them. But you’re not safe here.”

“Well, I ain’t leaving.”

“I knew you’d say that.”

“So what do we do? You got any ideas, whiz kid?” Arthur asked.

Baby grabbed her bag and plopped it on the table, making the coffee in Arthur’s cup ripple. She unzipped it, and some of the equipment she’d brought from home tumbled out.

“Of course I do,” she said.