The Good Boy (46 page)

And all this time he’s been waiting for a call, too—not from Bo Colton, but about Elgin Poole.

When the transfers are in place, Pete decides to get some air.

On his way out, he finds the girls in the living room, purpose fueling both hope and frustration as Sarah tinkers with the wording on a Missing flyer McKenna designed on her laptop.

Pete thinks about asking if they want anything, mochachinos or bagels or whatever, but he doesn’t want to interrupt. And really, he doesn’t want to say goodbye.

Outside, it’s a beautiful day, so fuck it, he drives the squad over to the Super Spray. He’ll give it a power wash—not because he’s planning any kind of cover-up, but simply because he still feels pride for the job.

He has six minutes’ worth of quarters left on the timer for the foam brush and a spot-free rinse when his phone rings. He has no idea who to expect; he figured Elgin’s story made its way up Indiana’s East Chicago PD ranks and forked into lightning that just struck this city, its department, and the newsrooms all at once, so it could be anybody.

Another guy is vacuuming floor mats on the pavement behind him so Pete steps out of the wash bay and stands and looks at the lot’s fake palm trees while he answers the call. And then Kitty tells him the news, which seems just about as surreal.

“It’s Joel…”

The timer is still running and he hasn’t washed the soap off the squad’s back end when he drives out of the carwash. He cuts over to Western Avenue and drives south, blows a bunch of lights and makes it to 26th and California in a half hour. He thinks about calling Sarah during the drive. He probably should. He doesn’t. He turns off his phone.

He parks in the tow zone in front of the courthouse entrance, locks his gun in the glove box and climbs the steps, breath catching, heart racing, just like it did when he went to see his boy for the first time—and this time, too, he worries whether he’ll have all his fingers and toes.

His badge gets him through the priority security line, no problem, and when he rounds the corner and finds Kitty waiting by the drinking fountain he realizes she’s part of the reason he’s anxious, too. He hasn’t seen her in months—not since he met her out late one night, her neighborhood, and at a back table at a quiet place called the Charleston she told him that she had been thinking, lately, that she wished the rumors were true. When she was through with her whiskey, served neat, he walked her home. Said goodbye.

Now she looks different, but the same, but better. Her smile is courteous at best, but it is still disarming.

“Kitty, you look—” Pete says, and puts his hand out, both awkward beginnings.

“I look fine,” she says, taking his hand and pulling him to her, the half hug perfunctory. “You look like shit. But I guess you’ve got an excuse.” She turns and he follows her to the snack bar where she gets at the end of a decent line.

“What are you—” Pete starts; he doesn’t get the detour. “Where is Joel?”

“He’s in my chambers. I thought I should tell you what’s going on before we go up.”

“You didn’t want to tell me before, on the phone—”

“No I didn’t. Now I do.”

“And you also need a snack? Right now?”

“Don’t judge,” she says. The slick-suited guy waiting in front of them hears her and chuckles; he must know her. Everyone does.

She looks at Pete and asks, “What did you tell Joel about Elgin Poole?”

“What did I—Elgin Poole?” Pete has been waiting to hear the name all morning, but not from Kitty. “I didn’t. What would I tell him?”

“Do you remember when Poole showed up at your house?”

“Yes of course. But that was a long time ago—”

“I know: it feels like ancient history. But kids, their memories? Things like that—big, bad things—they stick. And I’ll tell you, for Joel, Elgin Poole stuck.”

Pete follows Kitty as the line moves up and she peeks over the suit’s shoulder to get a look at the selection. Pete can’t believe it: Joel and him, the same bad guy.

“Joel ran away because of Elgin?”

“Joel didn’t run away. He ran
here.
Seriously, what he lacks in logic, he makes up for in memory. Can you believe, he remembers that dinner we had at your house last fall? Apparently I said I’d get him a fair trial—as if I thought he’d ever need one. He came to me to plead his case. He wants me to clear Butch—”

“Where is Butch?”

“Let me get to that.” The line moves up again, and Kitty gets a couple of bucks out while the man in front of them rolls open the cooler door for an energy drink. Kitty turns the bills around and straightens them out, Washingtons up. “I have to tell you, your son has an incredible memory. But he also has one hell of an imagination. He thinks Poole is the leader of an army he calls the Redbones, and that the Redbones are after you—all of you.”

“That’s from LaFonda Redding’s car. Mizz Redbone. Elgin was driving it that day last year. Some other Hustlers drive it now. A beater car. Collateral for Elgin’s debt.”

“I’m not sure Joel understands collateral, but he definitely understands revenge. He read the newspaper this morning.”

“What, the lawsuit?”

“For him, Ja’Kobe White’s serves as confirmation.”

“How does he connect Ja’Kobe to this?”

“It is a form of attack, no? Joel says Ja’Kobe is a Redbone, too, which is pretty perceptive, now that I know what the hell he’s talking about. Same with McKenna’s friend Zack, which is where this starts.” The line moves once more and Kitty takes a Snickers off the rack. “Joel wanted to warn McKenna about Zack. So he took Butch there—a party?—and at some point, backup backfired.”

“Butch bit DeWilliam Carter.”

“You know this?”

“I was looking for Joel. I found Carter.”

“Well, Joel heard Carter and his friends talking on the way out. They said some things I’m not sure Joel will ever be able to forget.”

“
Youth
nize.”

“You
do
know this.”

“I was looking for my son.”

“Yeah, well he found me.”

The man in front of them snaps the cap off his energy drink and Kitty puts the Snickers on the counter. When she reaches out to get her change from the cashier, Pete recognizes the single-pearl necklace that dangles in her open white collar. Kitty told him the pearl was all that was left of a strand some German ancestor tried to sneak over in her coiffed hair. She was found out; there were pearls everywhere. Except the one. The one right there.

“You want something?” Kitty asks, and Pete knows she caught him looking since she doesn’t wait for an answer, just drops the Snickers in her pocket and heads across the lobby.

At the elevator bank, Kitty sticks her foot out to stop a closing door. When it reopens, a car full of people stare at them. “We’ll wait for the next one,” she says, pressing the Up button.

When the door closes again, Kitty says, “So, the part you don’t know is that Joel got Butch down here, all the while thinking he was on the run from Elgin Poole and his Redbones, and then he ran into Agapito Garcia. Completely different army.”

The last elevator in the bank arrives. When Pete gets onboard, Kitty stops a young woman from joining them and waits for the doors to close and then she says, “Garcia is not someone Joel could have imagined. He’s a high-ranked Satan Disciple who happens to be
amistoso
with a well-known MLD named Hector Osorio, a guy who did time last year for organized animal abuse. A dogfight up in Humboldt. Since then, he’s secured himself a top spot on Kane County’s shitlist. Runs a tire shop out there, but he’s still a dogger.”

Pete’s heart sinks when the car starts to rise. “How does Joel know any of that?”

“He doesn’t. He remembered Garcia’s address and license plate. I put people on him.”

“Kitty, no—”

“I know,” she says, “you don’t want me to complicate things. But Butch is Joel’s best friend. This isn’t for you. It’s for him.”

When the doors open on six, Kitty gets out and starts across the semibusy corridor a step ahead, like she doesn’t want anybody to put them together. Or maybe she no longer wants anything to do with him. He can’t blame her. They hurt each other, didn’t they?

He follows her to the restricted entrance where a guard waits—and by his smile, he doesn’t mind waiting on Kitty.

As she clears Pete for access, he notices the faint wrinkles around her own smile, deepened ever so slightly. He’ll bet she still enjoys a cigarette after work. He wishes they could still be friends; wishes it were only the rumors that stopped them.

“What?” She catches him watching again.

“Do you want to do me a favor?”

For a moment, she looks like she’ll say yes. But. “No. What I want is for your son to get his dog back.” Then she turns and Pete lets her lead the way to her chambers.

Pete feels a rush as they approach her door—Joel, in there—but he has to stop her before they go in. “Wait.” He takes her hand. “You need to know something.”

Both her hands turn to fists. “No, Pete. I can’t recuse myself from you.”

“This is—it’s for Joel, too. Listen. What I did, when I thought he was gone? I’m probably going to serve jail time for it. But I can’t change it, and I’m not going to run from it, and I wouldn’t have done a single thing differently and that’s because I only wanted to bring Joel and Butch home. That’s still all I want. I want to get them both home, before I go. I just want to keep my family together. You know that. You’ve always known that.”

Kitty looks at him a long time, her hands going soft. And then she reaches into her pocket and hands him the Snickers bar and pushes open the door.

Inside, a good-looking guy in a trim-fit jacket and jeans is sitting on Kitty’s desk while Joel sits below him in an armchair, small and slouched, back turned.

“As promised,” Kitty says, as she enters.

Joel turns, and Pete sees his face, and the five steps between them seem as long as a mile.

“May we have a few minutes, Detective?” Kitty asks.

“Sure thing,” the guy says, sliding off the desk and letting himself out.

“Dad,” Joel says, but he doesn’t get up.

Pete tries to go to him, but he can’t. He sees more behind the boy’s eyes, now: a depth there.

“Dad,” he says again, carefully. He stands up. His clothes are filthy. His face is scratched. He says, “I’m sorry. I couldn’t go home. Not without Butchie.”

And then Pete is on his knees and Joel is there and they wrap their arms around each other and Pete can’t let go. He hears the boy in his ear: this is his fault, he only wanted to do the right thing. Pete smells his hair, like the outside and sweat and vomit and also, somehow, exactly like eleven years ago. Pete holds him there until he’s sure he won’t cry anymore, and then a little while longer.

When he finally says something, he says, “Your mom misses you so much.” He fumbles for his phone, calls home.

Joel says, “Dad, I know who took Butchie.” Then he takes the phone, says, “Mom?”

And then Kitty comes around the desk and hands Pete a Post-it note, an address scrawled. “Hector Osorio’s place is out in Carpentersville. I’ll tell the sheriff to wait.”

When Joel hangs up, Kitty says, “You two had better get going.”

Pete hands Joel the Snickers.

*   *   *

Pete takes the Eisenhower and threads his way through midday traffic at a good eighty miles per hour, Joel in the passenger seat, a schoolbook in his lap. If this is all the time Pete’s got left, the homecoming has to wait.

Pete doesn’t say anything and Joel doesn’t, either, this whole thing hanging on not asking questions, just going.

A bottleneck slows things down at the I-90 off-ramp, and as they edge around the cloverleaf, Pete notices Butch’s dog tags tied around Joel’s neck. And then he has no doubts. Joel is right: they can’t go home without the dog.

When Joel sees him looking, he takes the tags up in his fingers, and then to his mouth, and Pete realizes the silence must seem like punishment.

So: “What are you reading?”

“It’s called
White Fang.
”

“About a wolf, isn’t it?”

“A wolf who is captured and domesticated and made to fight.” Joel looks down at the tags. “And to hate.”

Captured. Domesticated.
The words so big. The boy, grasping them.
And to hate
.

“Is it a good book?”

“I think so. The hero just showed up.” Joel looks out the window.

When they reach I-90 the lanes open up and they shoot out to Carpentersville, windows down, and what Pete thinks Joel kind of sings, his voice off-key, is a song he knows: “Yeah, we’re runnin’ down a dream.”

*   *   *

Fifteen minutes and as many blown stoplights later they pass Bolz Road and, according to Kitty’s directions, find
SCREAMERZ AUTO
on the right. The building sits on an otherwise undeveloped property, the sign’s letters painted to look like graffiti. Pete turns into the gravel lot and crunches up the drive to where it’s shadow business as usual, a slow Monday, a single mechanic working in the only open bay.

“Butchie is here?” Joel asks, nervous and also excited, like he’s waiting to board a roller coaster.

Pete rolls slow past the parked cars. “Do you see Agapito Garcia’s car here?”

“No.” Strike nervous; he’s terrified.

“That’s good,” Pete says. “That means you don’t have to worry, because nobody here knows you. We’re just two guys wondering about a dog.”

Joel nods, but he doesn’t look at all convinced.

Pete parks in front of the open bay, where the mechanic is installing a muffler. He cuts the engine, says, “Wait here a minute.” He reaches over, about to open the glove box—

“Where are you going?”

Pete thinks twice about his gun. “I’m just going to talk to that guy.”

“I don’t want to wait here.” Joel goes for his seat belt.

“Listen: I need you to be my backup. You know, like Butch and me: I’ll go sniff it out, you stay back, be my eyes and ears.”

“What do I do?”

“If you see anybody or anything suspicious, just honk the horn.” He turns the steering wheel. “It’ll be your alert, like a tug on the leash.”