The Red Hunter(44)

His girl. Few things worried him more than Zoey. How do I provide for you? Protect you from the ugliness in this world? Make sure you know how to protect yourself after I’m gone?

“What is it?” asked Paul, squinting with concern. “What’s on your mind?”

“You hungry?”

Paul’s frown deepened. “Sure,” he said. “I never met a burger or a beer that I didn’t like.”

? ? ?

IT WAS NEARLY NINE, SO Burgers and Brew was quiet, just an hour from closing. It was Wednesday, a big game that night at the high school. It would be over now, folks heading back to their houses to finish up homework, get ready for the looming workday. Every good, law-abiding, family-centered person would be where he belonged—in front of the television or helping with homework, cleaning up after dinner. Heather, he knew, would be lying on Zoey’s bed reading while Zoey studied for her algebra exam tomorrow. Or they’d be watching something together on the television in the master bedroom. After a certain hour, only the singles, the cops, and other night-shift workers, and the thugs were still out.

He and Paul took a booth toward the back.

“You’ve been on the job a long time,” he said. “Like me.”

“Sure,” Paul said. “Yeah.”

“Does it ever bother you?”

Peg, the waitress came and took their order—pale ale and a couple of towering, gooey cheeseburgers, fries. He’d have to lie to Heather; his cholesterol was through the roof. Paul didn’t answer to anyone, never married, no kids, a New York City beat cop now for fifteen years. Neither of them ever wanted to be anything else, just like the old man. Well, not just like him.

“Does what bother me?”

“The unfairness of it all,” Chad said. “The inequity.”

“How so?”

He leaned in. “How some people have so much and other people so little. How the good guys struggle to make ends meet, but the thugs are driving Hummers?”

Paul flattened his big palm against the wood of the table, looked down at his hand.

“You sound like your dad.”

“He was right.”

“Okay,” said Paul. “What if he was? Is it news that the world is an unfair place?”

Peg brought their beer. “There you go, boys. Enjoy.”

They clinked glasses, each drank a swallow. It was cold and light, hops tingling and flavorful. The wash of it was a relief; he felt some of the day’s tension washing away.

“I’m just saying,” he said. “What if you had a chance to even the score just a little?”

Paul pinned him in an icy blue stare, took another swallow of his beer. “I don’t know what that means.”

“Well,” he said. “I’m about to tell you.”

No one ever really talked about debt, the weight of it, what it did to you. They never told you how it started small. For them, it was the engagement ring. It was too much, he knew that. She was a teacher and he was a cop. They were never going to be rich. Never. And it was never what they wanted. But the lady in the jewelry shop, she kept showing him ever bigger rings. It’s the purchase of a lifetime. Every time she looks at it, she’ll know how much you love her. One day it will go to the daughter you have together, or maybe your future grandson’s fiancée years from now. What seems like a lot right now won’t seem like much five years from now. We have a convenient financing plan.

He’d never bought on credit before. His father had taught him better. The old man wasn’t up for any best-father awards, but he’d been frugal as hell, managing to pay for both his and Paul’s educations, never borrowing a dime.

Then it was the mortgage, the new car. When Zoey came, the private preschool where Heather taught. They got a discount, but still it was a small fortune every year. Then Heather wanted to stay home with Zoey, wanted to try for another baby, and he wanted that, too. We’ll make it work. We’ll cut way back. The bills mounted slowly. The cruise they really couldn’t afford, that trip to Disney. As a father, he wanted to give his girl the things the other kids had—those certain jeans, that backpack, the computer.

It just took a couple of months of charging and not paying off the balance. It crept up and up and up.

Until one day, when he sat down to add it all up, he realized that they were buried. It wasn’t that much. But in comparison to what he made? It might as well have been a million dollars. Day to day, it didn’t matter very much. But it was as if there were this weight strapped on his back, invisible to everyone else but making everything he did harder.

But that’s not what he wanted to talk to Paul about. It was something else. When he was done, Paul hung his head, folded his hands in front of him.

“What you’re saying,” said Paul. He paused. “What you’re thinking. It’s wrong.”

“Wrong?” Chad said. “But it’s right to deal drugs, make a fortune off of other people’s addiction, misery, and death and then have so much cash that you need to bury it in a field outside of town?”

“How do you even know about this?”

“I have a confidential informant on the inside.”

“A CI? You trust this person?”

“As much as you can trust a meth head, yeah. He’s not lying.”