Don't Look for Me(80)

The water will make more vomit. If he’s on his back, maybe he’ll choke on the vomit. Maybe that will be what kills him.

“But he didn’t have the muffin! He didn’t eat it!” she cries out, and I can see that part of her was relieved when he didn’t eat it. She is ambivalent about my plan. She is ambivalent about him.

Which is why I didn’t waste the seeds on the muffin. I couldn’t trust Alice to give it to him.

“I know, sweetheart,” I say. “But he drank his coffee, didn’t he? All of it.”

Her eyes get big now as she remembers how I had her bring me the coffee tin, and then the white filters, and then made her go back to the kitchen for a measuring spoon, the little yellow one that scoops out the coffee.

When she was gone, I put the apple seed mash beneath the filter, coating the plastic basin, then sprinkled some coffee into the filter and placed it on top. When she returned, we measured more coffee from the little yellow scoop.

She cries harder. Terror Face. I give it a name now because I am no longer reacting to it. To him, and his suffering.

“Alice,” I tell her. “Do as I say now. It’s very important. But then go and get that key.”

She moves her head back and forth, no.

I reach through the bars and grab both of her arms.

“You will get the key and bring it to me. Do you know why?”

She shakes her head with Terror Face. No, no, no.

“Because,” I tell her. “He knows you helped me make the coffee.”





46


Day seventeen





Nic did not go home. She drove right into the heart of the storm, this new storm that was brewing in Hastings.

She got to the intersection of Route 7 and Hastings Pass, to the Gas n’ Go. Kurt’s car was in the parking lot. She drove across from it and parked. He’d been working the night shift here, then was probably heading to the bar to open for lunch. That was what he’d told her before, about his schedule.

Now was better. Here was better. Customers would be coming in and out. They wouldn’t be alone for long.

Kurt was behind the counter, sitting on a stool, reading a magazine. He was surprised to see her, but he smiled warmly. Covering up his guilt.

Nic did not waste time with small talk. She took out her phone and pulled up the photo of him with Edith Moore.

“So what was your endgame with Edith Bickman?”

“Shit…” Kurt mumbled, hanging his head. “Not here—they have cameras.”

Nic followed him to the back of the store, behind a row of shelves.

“This is the only spot they don’t cover,” he told her.

“Who is they?” Nic asked.

“The people who own this place. Some corporation. I don’t know. I just know where the cameras are because they have monitors up front.”

“So tell me now, away from the cameras.”

Nic waited as he thought about what to say. She could see him struggling for words.

“Okay. Look—it’s not what you think.”

“What do I think?” Nic asked.

“I didn’t know what she was doing, okay? When you came in here and told me about this witness and then told me her name—I mean, how many Ediths are there who could be connected to Hastings?”

“But she worked with you. At the bar.”

Kurt nodded. “She did. I knew her. I knew where she’d gone. So I went to find her, to ask her what the hell was going on. I didn’t want to get her in trouble. It’s not like she’s a criminal. And you were convinced she’d seen your mother. I wanted to find out why she was lying about her name and why she was here that night.”

Nic was frustrated now, all of the threads tangled together, and her mind too exhausted to sort them out.

“Just tell me everything. Please. You can start with your arrest for gun possession if you want.”

He looked back to the front of the store, then out the window to the gas pumps.

“I’m scared, okay? I didn’t want to go up against Reyes. I can’t go back to prison, and I can’t leave this town. I have two jobs and about fifty bucks in the bank. I’m an ex-con. Are you starting to get it?”

“Why would you have to leave town?”

“You don’t see it? You still don’t see what he is?”

“Who?”

“Reyes. Officer Jared Reyes.”

Now a rush to her head. A wave of nausea.

“He’s the criminal, Nic. A con man.” Kurt let this sink in for a moment, but not a long one. Not long enough.

“Three years ago, he pulled me over for supposedly running a light. It was bullshit. Next thing I know, I’m out of the car and he’s holding a handgun, saying he saw it in plain sight in the back seat of my car. He didn’t even pretend to look back there. He didn’t even bother to go through the motions of the setup.”

Nic stared at him now, her perception of Reyes taking a new turn.

Kurt continued. “Then he said it could all go away for ten grand—like I would have ten thousand dollars. He said I could borrow it from my family. He gave me until the end of the day. I thought, fuck him, you know? I was young. I believed in justice and the people in this town who’d known me my whole life. I believed in the chief and his bullshit about helping kids…”