Page 9 of The Lie Maker

“But I want to get an early start tomorrow on what I’m going to do next,” I said. Not that I had a plan, but I had to do something.

“Maybe your dad would have some leads?” she suggested.

“Earl’s not exactly my go-to guy when I have a problem.”

Lana believed parents were referred to as “Mom” and “Dad,” but she was used to my use of “Earl.”

“Funny you should mention him, though,” I said. “He called me a couple of days ago. Wants to see me. Set it up for tomorrow. Told him it would have to be quick. Couldn’t exactly take a long break from work my second day on the job. Don’t have to worry about that now.”

“You almost never talk about him. Or your mom.”

I shrugged. “Not much to talk about. She passed away a long time ago. Earl and I kind of drifted apart after that. See him maybe once a year. If he didn’t live around here I probably never would. He’s probably got some pyramid scheme he wants me to invest in.”

Lana slipped her arms around me, came in close, and offered her lips to mine.

“You’re sure about not staying over?” She smiled slyly. “How about... five more minutes?”

“I’d like to think I’d take just a little longer than that.”

I was back on the street fifteen minutes later. As I walked away from her building to where I had left my car on the street, a couple of blocks from Quincy Market, I could hear sirens. Hardly surprising in the heart of the city.

Moments later, a fire truck went screaming past me, heading the same direction I was going. As I turned a corner to walk down the street where I’d left my aging Nissan, I saw that this was the fire truck’s destination. Something was ablaze near where I had parked.

I’d only run about twenty yards when I realized that it wasn’t that my car was close to the fire’s location. My car was the fire’s location.

The firefighters were already training their hoses on it, dousing the vehicle with water. Steam and black smoke billowed into the night air. They were working quickly to keep the blaze from spreading to other vehicles or nearby buildings. For now, the Nissan was the only thing in flames.

“That’s my car!” I shouted, running toward one of the firefighters stationed by the truck.

The firefighter turned my way and shrugged.

“Lucky you weren’t in it,” he said.

Yeah, I was having a real run of good luck lately.

Five

“Sit down, sit down, I need to talk to you.”

“What is it, Dad? Am I in trouble?”

“Of course not. Don’t be silly. I guess you’ve probably heard your mother and me talking.”

“I might have heard... something. About you being in trouble.”

“Yeah, that’s right. I’m going to have to go away.”

“Where?”

“Don’t know exactly. That’s still being sorted out.”

“Is Mom going with you? Are you guys leaving me all by myself?”

“No, no, nothing like that. It’s going to be just me going.”

“For how long?”

“Okay, so, this is the hard part.”