Confessions on the 7:45(58)

But Bridget? Anne had sensed that she was not the typical mark—she had an edge, there was a distant coldness. She wasn’t as enamored of Anne as the others had been. Anne said something to Pop about it, but he wasn’t hearing it. She was a big fish, lots of money. But when he tried to reel it in, Bridget didn’t wire the cash. First, she offered to fly in to help. Then she offered to send a lawyer. She called and called Pop’s burner phone. Finally, she sent an email threatening to call the police. Pop had to shut everything down fast—the online profile, the email account, the Skype ID, the phone. Even though there was no way Bridget could know where they physically lived, they left the Phoenix house.

They were miles away, nearly to El Paso, when Pop finally spoke.

“How did you know?”

They were on a dark desert highway, city lights blinking off in the distance, sky rattling with stars. She watched them through the moon roof. They gave her a kind of comfort, reminding her that nothing mattered very much. There was stardust in her bones. Not so long ago, she hadn’t been here at all. One day she’d be gone for good. And she was okay with that.

“I just didn’t get the warm fuzzies. She didn’t have smiley eyes when she looked at me. I think she had trust issues.”

“I didn’t see it,” he said, gripping the wheel.

She’d noticed that his knuckles were raw, that he had a slight bruise on his cheekbone. She knew better than to ask him about it. Sometimes he went out at night, drank too much. He didn’t always remember what happened.

“You can’t win them all,” she said.

It was something Stella used to say. She should know. Anne remembered random things about her mother—the smell of her perfume—Chanel No. 5—the sandpaper of her laughter, how cold her feet and hands always were—how she’d bury her toes under Pearl as they lay on the couch together. Sometimes details like that came back, and she almost felt something then. A tugging at her heart.

“Maybe I’m losing my touch,” said Pop. “They say it happens. Your instincts dull.”

“Maybe you should retire.” It was kind of a dig. She was mad. She’d liked the Phoenix house; she’d made a friend, a boy in the neighborhood.

She thought he’d go dark again. She almost wanted him to; that way she could be mad in quiet.

“Not just yet,” he said. “I’m not ready to retire yet.”

“Can she find us?”

“No,” he said quickly. “No way. We’re ghosts.”

But he didn’t sound entirely sure. And it would turn out that he was wrong.



TWENTY-THREE

Hunter

Hunter Ross entered the diner, the little bell jingling to announce his arrival. Not that anyone would hear it over the din. The waitress at the counter waved to him, then nodded with a knowing smile over toward the rowdy group of older men in the back. Hunter issued a sigh and made his way toward them.

Retirement didn’t appeal to Hunter Ross. In fact, he had actively started to dread his Tuesday morning breakfast group, a bunch of old guys out to pasture from various gritty professions. On any given Tuesday, there might be a cop, a lawyer, a firefighter, an EMT, and an FBI agent. Men who had strongly identified with their work, and who now used all that pent-up energy to complain about the state of the nation and the world.

They were out of shape. They watched too much television. And, frankly, the way they ate—giant chili cheese omelets and piles of hash browns, sides of bacon, thick sausage links, pints of juice, gallons of coffee—made Hunter nervous.

Some Tuesday soon, one of these old guys was just going to stroke out right in front of him. Not if. When.

They called him “son.” Because Hunter was in his late fifties, and they were all pushing seventy. He wasn’t technically retired, because since leaving the job, he’d hung out a shingle and investigated cold cases for families, understaffed police departments, whoever had a case that had run short of leads, time, money, energy. Sometimes he did it for free.

The group chided him for working when he could just be taking it easy. But they were jealous, too, he could tell. When you did the kind of jobs these guys did, it was never easy to just let it go. There was always a fire, a crime, a victim, the need for a first responder. Other, younger people were running to the rescue now.

Hunter had three cases going right now—a missing teenager who was probably a runaway, a couple—doomsday preppers, who had gone off the grid and not been heard from since—and something that was personal, a case he hadn’t been able to solve that was nearing its ten-year anniversary. Because of that milestone, the old case had been on his mind lately, making him cranky. Maybe if he got some closure on that, he could think about that European riverboat trip his wife was pushing for.

He took his seat at the table.

“You’re late, son,” said Phil, retired beat cop, tall and skinny-fat—a naturally lean guy who never met a vegetable he could stand, who would only run if chased, who hydrated primarily with bourbon. His belly hung over his belt, tenuously kept in place by his golf shirt. “We ordered for you.”

“Great,” Hunter said, settling in next to Andrew. “Because my cholesterol isn’t high enough.”

“He’s busy, can’t always get here, you know,” said Ray the firefighter, expansive with sarcasm. He had a heart attack last year but bounced back; now he had egg whites—smothered in cheese, with a side of bacon. “This one still thinks he’s going to save the world. One cold case at a time.”