Poisonfeather (Gibson Vaughn #2)(36)

Gibson handed him a spare set of keys.

“There’s a grocery store a couple blocks north if you’re hungry. I’ll be back in a couple hours.”

“Where you going?”

“See my kid. That okay with you?”

“Yeah, it’s cool. Wait . . .” Swonger was looking around with mounting panic. “You don’t have no TV.”

“You want a book?”

“You killing me, man.”

“Well, if you get bored, you can follow me around some.”

“Nah, I’ll give you the night off. Good faith, right?”

Right.




Gibson picked Ellie up from her after-school program and took her to a movie. A revival house in Ashburn was showing Finding Nemo. It was Ellie’s all-time number-one movie. A bold statement for a seven-year-old, but she’d watched it until she’d worn a hole in the DVD. She was too young to have seen it on the big screen, and Gibson figured it was a safe bet after the baseball-game fiasco. Dory was her favorite character—a fitting role model for his easily distracted daughter. “I shall call him Squishy and he shall be mine, and he shall be my Squishy!” she screamed happily at the screen. Ellie was still mastering the concept that you had to sit quietly at the movies. Fortunately, it was a quote-along, so audience participation was encouraged. Pretty soon Gibson was laughing and calling out lines right along with her.

After the movie, he drove them to the Nighthawk, where they split a deluxe banana split—one scoop each of chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry; banana; whipped cream; chocolate syrup; nuts; pineapple; strawberries; and three cherries. Toby Kalpar delivered the towering pièce de résistance personally. Ellie was going to be in a sugar coma for a week. Gibson gestured for Toby to sit and watched his friend fold his tall, thin frame into the booth beside Ellie. Toby and Sana treated Ellie as if she were their own grandchild, and she was starting to think she owned the place. Ellie bounced up and down in her seat in anticipation.

“Where’s Ellie?” Toby asked, looking back and forth blankly. “I brought ice cream.”

Ellie giggled and made an exasperated face. “I’m right here!”

“It’s too bad. I guess we’ll have to eat it ourselves.” Toby pulled the banana split toward him and aimed a marauding spoon at it.

“Guess so,” Gibson agreed, reaching for the other spoon.

Ellie shrieked.

Toby clutched his chest in shock. “Where did you come from?”

“I was right here!” she said. “Dad! Tell him.”

Toby smiled and presented Ellie with a spoon, which she snatched like she’d just negotiated the end of a hunger strike. No one was ever going to mistake his daughter for shy.

“What do you say, El?” Gibson said.

Ellie managed a muffled “Thank you” a millisecond before she wedged a fist-size spoonful of ice cream into her mouth, tipping her head back to keep it from running down her chin.

“El . . . No Bruce the Shark, okay? Regular bites.”

“Yeash, Dahbd,” she managed.

After a few bites, Ellie stopped and offered Toby her spoon.

He smiled and tousled her hair. “I’ve already had mine today.”

“You are so lucky,” she told him. “I want a diner like this one when I grow up.”

Toby beamed at that. “Doesn’t fall far from the tree, this one.”

Diners had been hallowed ground to Gibson’s father, and they had in turn become hallowed to Gibson. As he got older, he was realizing that he hadn’t fallen far from the tree himself. Those things that his father had cherished, he found growing in significance in his own life. Being able to make peace with his father’s death had only accelerated the process. Did he even love diners at all, or did he just like the way they made him feel because they reminded him of his dad? Could he even separate the two at this point? He wondered what he would pass on to Ellie that she would one day mistake for her own. Would he give himself the chance to find out?

While Ellie inhaled the rest of the banana split, Gibson caught up with Toby, whose daughter, Maissa, a graphic designer living in Palo Alto, had been laid off in a wave of corporate restructuring. Toby was worried about her. Sana was more circumspect about it, which made Toby worry all the more. There was no new news. Maissa was job hunting, and Toby wasn’t sleeping. Sana was about ready to banish him to the couch because he was keeping her up too. Gibson had seen Maissa’s work; it was very good. He couldn’t imagine she would stay unemployed for long, but telling that to Mr. Anxiety was a lost cause.

Gibson worked up the nerve to say what needed saying. He wanted to test saying it out loud to Toby. See how his friend reacted. He lifted his cap off his head and ran his fingers through his hair. “I took a job.”

Toby, busy making faces at Ellie, began to congratulate him, but something in Gibson’s tone stopped him. Toby stared levelly at him. Although his friend wore glasses, there was nothing wrong with Toby’s vision.

“What kind of job? Like before?” Toby didn’t know the half of what Gibson had done to find Suzanne Lombard, but he knew enough to be wary.

“No, different. I’m just looking into something for someone,” Gibson said, trying to keep the note of apology out of his voice.

“Oh, something for someone. Foolish of me not to have guessed. When will you start to do something for yourself?” Toby’s eyes narrowed. “Is it the same people?”