The Drop (19 page)

Authors: Dennis Lehane

BOOK: The Drop

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Bob said, “You know how many people were in that bar Super Bowl Sunday?”

Torres said, “Last place he was ever seen. Then? Poof. Just like Richie Whelan. Ironic, since Deeds supposedly killed Whelan. Bodies getting clipped or vanishing all over the place, but you don’t see anything.”

Bob said, “He could turn up.”

Torres said, “If he does, it’ll probably be in a psych ward. Which is where he was the night Whelan disappeared.”

Bob looked over at him.

Torres nodded several times. “True. His partner told me Deeds always took credit for the Whelan hit because nobody else wanted to and he thought it helped his street cred. But he didn’t kill Whelan.”

Bob said, “Will he be missed, though?”

Torres couldn’t believe this guy. He smiled. “Will he be what?”

Bob said, “Missed.”

Torres said, “No. Maybe Whelan wasn’t, either.”

Bob said, “That’s not true. I knew Glory Days. He wasn’t a bad guy. Not at all.”

For a time, neither of them said anything. Then Torres leaned in. “No one ever sees you coming, do they?”

Bob kept his face as clear and open as Walden Pond. He held out his hand and Torres shook it. “You take care, Detective.”

“You too.”

Bob left him there, staring at a building, helpless to change anything that went on in there.

NADIA CAME TO HIM
a few days later. They walked the dog. When it was time to go home, they walked to hers, not his.

“I’ve gotta believe,” Nadia said when they were inside, “that there’s a purpose. And even if it’s that you kill me as soon as I close my eyes—”

“Me? What? No,” Bob said. “Oh, no.”

“—then that’s okay. Because I just can’t go through any more of this alone. Not another day.”

“Me too,” he said, his eyes closed tight. “Me too.”

They didn’t speak for a long time. And then:

“He needs a walk.”

“Huh?”

“Rocco. He hasn’t been out in a while.”

He opened his eyes, looked at the ceiling of her bedroom. She’d pasted star decals there when she was a kid and they were still there.

“I’ll get the leash.”

IN THE PARK
,
THE
February sky hung just above them. The ice had broken on the river but small chunks of it clung to the dark banks.

He didn’t know what he believed. Rocco walked ahead of them, pulling on the leash a bit, so proud, so pleased, unrecognizable from the quivering hunk of fur Bob had pulled from a barrel just two months ago.

Two months! Wow. Things sure could change in a hurry. You rolled over one morning, and it was a whole new world. It turned itself toward the sun, stretched and yawned. It turned itself toward the night. A few more hours, and it turned itself toward the sun again. A new world, every day.

When they reached the center of the park, he unhooked the leash from Rocco’s collar and reached into his coat for a tennis ball. Rocco reared his head. He snorted loud. He pawed the earth. Bob threw the ball and Rocco took off after it. Bob envisioned the ball taking a bad bounce into the road. The screech of tires, the thump of metal against dog. Or what would happen if Rocco, suddenly free, just kept running.

But what could you do?

You couldn’t control things.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PHOTO BY GABY GERSTER / DIOGENEN, ZURICH

DENNIS LEHANE
is the author of ten previous novels—including the
New York Times
bestsellers
Live by Night; Moonlight Mile; Gone, Baby, Gone; Mystic River; Shutter Island;
and
The Given Day
—as well as
Coronado
, a collection of short stories and a play. He and his wife, Angie, currently live in California with their children.

www.dennislehane.com

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www.AuthorTracker.com
for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

ALSO BY DENNIS LEHANE

A Drink Before the War

Darkness, Take My Hand

CREDITS

COPYRIGHT

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Originally published in a different form, as “Animal Rescue,” in the anthology
Boston Noir,
published in 2009 by Akashic Books.

THE DROP
. Copyright © 2014 by Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Lehane, Dennis

The drop / Dennis Lehane.—First edition.

pages cm

“Originally published in a slightly different form in
Boston Noir
in 2009 by Akashic Books”—Title page verso.

ISBN 978-0-06-236544-6 (paperback)

ISBN 978-0-06-236557-6 (hardcover)

EPub Edition July 2014 ISBN 9780062365484

1. Criminals—Fiction. 2. Couples—Fiction. 3. Film novelizations.

[1. Rescue dogs—Fiction.] I. Title.

PS3562.E426D76 2014