The Unearthed: Book One, The Eddie McCloskey Series (4 page)

Tim watched the table. “Looks like four or four-thirty. That work for you?”

“I’ll have to clear my schedule.”

Stan hadn’t worked a day since winning the lottery a few years ago.

“Kiss my ass.” Tim surveyed the table and decided to play the stripes.

“So what else?” Stan asked.

“Jackie hasn’t experienced as much as the others. He’s a converted skeptic. They’re very worried about their son. He’s talking to someone.”

Tim pocketed a stripe.

“Someone invisible?” Stan asked.

“Yep.”

“How old is the kid?”

“Thirteen.” Tim lined up his next shot. He’d run three balls, but he’d have problems getting all the way to the eight.

“Little old for an imaginary friend,” Stan said.

Tim made his shot but stymied the cue behind a couple solids.

“What else?” Stan asked.

“Jackie says he’s picked up the phone sometimes and heard talking. He can’t make out what’s being said because it’s hushed and it’s a bad connection.”

“Is the call coming from inside the house?” Stan said.

“Funny.”

Bill
y
was doing well, though Jackie could tell by the look on his face that Billy didn’t think so.

“Good. Keep those hands up. Always protect yourself,” Jackie said.

Billy moved his gloves up a few inches.

“And keep moving to your right. Always move away from someone’s strong side, not toward it,” Jackie said.

Billy changed directions.

The two circled each other, sporting headgear and gloves.

Billy was out of breath and had trouble talking. “But what if someone … pretends to be right-handed?”

“Most guys won’t. They’ll set up with their strong side further back.” He threw a few slow jabs to test Billy’s response. Billy checked the first one and stepped away from the subsequent ones.

Good. The kid knew what he was doing. He’d picked up a lot in the short time they’d been sparring. It was time to teach him some new things.

“Try to dodge instead of blocking, son. A guy can still hurt you even if you block,” Jackie said.

Billy frowned. “Is there anything else I’m doing wrong?”

Jackie threw another jab, and this time Billy darted away.

“I’m just trying to help you.”

They continued to circle each other in the center of the room under the overhead bulb.

Jackie felt the sweat on his back. He loved to exercise, just never had the time. He always slept great after a workout and woke up refreshed. But Talia was right. He was no spring chicken anymore.

“Come after me, son,” Jackie said.

“I thought you were teaching me to defend myself.”

“Sometimes you have to defend yourself by attacking,” Jackie said.

“I can’t. Your arms are way longer than mine.”

“You’re faster than me.”

“I’m not.”

“You are. Just try.”

Billy made a half-hearted effort and circled away.

“Come on, Billy.”

“I can’t.”

“Don’t say you can’t.” It pissed him off when Billy was defeatist.

“I can’t.”

“Damnit, son!” Jackie stopped circling and put his arms down. “You can’t be negative about everything. You’ve gotta be positive.”

Billy stopped moving.

Jackie brought his arms back up. “Don’t give up on me. I’m here trying to help you.”

Billy pulled his gloves off and started removing his headgear.

Jackie cursed silently. When he went easy on his son, Billy didn’t take it seriously. When he was hard on him, Billy quit.

“Son, there’s something you need to learn.”

Billy stopped taking his gear off.

“If you keep acting like this, no one’s ever going to respect you. Including yourself. You’re thirteen now.”

Billy did a double-take. He looked surprised suddenly.

“What?” Jackie asked.

“Nothing, Dad. Forget it.”

“What is it?”

Billy pulled his headgear off and threw it onto the floor.

Jackie was tired of the defeatist attitude. He was losing control of himself again but couldn’t stop it.

“Is your friend here?” Jackie asked.

Billy looked miserably at Jackie.

“Answer me.”

“Yeah!” Billy said. “And he thinks you’re an asshole.”

“That’s convenient.” Jackie felt his pulse throbbing in his neck. “Your invisible friend is thinking the same thing you are.”

Billy rolled his eyes. “You don’t even believe me. I don’t know why I tell you anything.”

“Billy—”

“Shut up,” Billy said.

Jackie actually did, for a moment. Billy had never talked like that to him before. “How dare you talk to me like that.”

Billy’s eyes widened in fright. “I wasn’t talking to you.”

“Don’t be a coward. Be a man.”

“But Dad—”

“Don’t give me that. Own up to what you said.” Jackie was losing it. He took a deep breath to calm himself.

Billy held Jackie’s stare for a long minute. Finally, his eyes broke away.

“Say it again or apologize,” Jackie said.

Billy’s face had gone purple. “Fine, Dad. Shut the fuck up.”

Jackie felt the rage explode in his chest. He clenched his fists and took a step toward Billy. His face felt a million degrees.

Billy darted upstairs and slammed the basement door.

* * * *

Tim felt a hand on his shoulder. Then he realized it’d been there for a few moments. Everything was on a two-second delay, courtesy of the beer.

“Hey, pool shark,” Michelle said.

The bar had quieted down. Stan stood in the corner with Moira and Eddie, all three smoking.

“You come here alone?” He winked at her.

“Yeah. You ready to get out of here?”

Tim shook his head.

“Are you okay, baby?” Her hand moved from his shoulder to his back.

“I’m good.”

She smiled up at him. “You’re lucky I’m shallow.”

“Am I?”

“You bet you are. If you weren’t cute, I’d be long gone,” she said, still smiling.

Tim didn’t think he was good-looking. Eddie had gotten all the looks. But he wasn’t going to argue the point with Michelle.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Feeling?”

“Feeling.”

“You really want to know?”

“I do,” she said.

Tim inhaled sharply, then stuck out his lips. He peered over at Eddie. “I’ll tell you later.”

“Why?”

He watched Eddie come up to them and put his arm around Michelle’s shoulders. She involuntarily recoiled, but Eddie didn’t seem to notice. His brother was right. Michelle didn’t like him too much. Murphy’s Law: Tim was ready to pop the question, so of course she and his brother didn’t get along.

“You ready for me?” Eddie nodded at the pool table.

“You ready for me?” Tim said.

“You’ve got no eye when you’re sober.”

“And you don’t know how to think more than one shot ahead.”

“But I always make the one I’m looking at.” Eddie smiled. “Beer?”

“If you think you can handle another.”

Michelle rolled her eyes at the male posturing.

Eddie teetered off to the bar to order another round. Stan and Moira came over.

“So lay the plan on us,” Stan said.

Tim waited for Eddie to come back. Eddie spilled about two fingers’ worth of both beers as he put them on the table before swaggering his way to the pool table to rack.

“You know everything I do,” Tim began. His stomach jumped on him. The next beer would have to be taken down slowly. “Stan, you’re coming out tomorrow when we’re onsite for setup. Check out the Caller ID, too. That sounds like an electrical malfunction to me. There are so many variables on this thing, I want to rule everything out we can.”

Tim looked at Moira. “M, this house has a lot of history. I need to know everything you can find. When it was built. Previous owners. Same goes for the Moriarty Massacre. We probably know less than we think we do. Good thing is, it’s local. We have people we can talk to in town. Mrs. Dilworth. Charlie Waite over at the police department. The more we dig up, the better.”

Moira smiled. “You know how much I love a good tragedy.”

Eddie had finished racking and was making his way back to his drink. The guy had a higher tolerance than Dean Martin.

Tim said, “Aside from that, it’s the usual. Me and Eddie lead onsite. I’m thinking a half-day tomorrow for the interviews, most of the day and night Saturday, then maybe a wrap on Sunday morning. After that, we get to the data scrubbing.”

“You’re going to have to explain all this to me, you know,” Michelle said.

Tim gave her a wink. “This is huge for us. Nobody else has been there, and there’ll be a local buzz. Let’s do this clean, let’s do this right.”

“A rousing speech. Did you steal that from Cicero?
O mores
!
O tempora
!” Eddie said.

Classic Eddie. The guy had barely gotten out of high school but you wouldn’t know it talking to him. He was a voracious reader and could surprise you with an erudite line.

Tali
a
lay down on top of the bedspread. She let her bathrobe fall open so Jackie would get a good view of the twin peaks when he came out of the bathroom.

She said, “So what happened down there?”

“Christ, I don’t even know. Maybe I push him too hard, maybe I don’t. It’s just frustrating when he gets so down on himself, because you can’t even talk to him.”

Talia loved their bedroom. It was so much bigger than their last place and she had a walk-in closet.

“What did you say to him?”

“I told him to stop hiding behind his invisible friend and say what he wanted to say.” Jackie came out of the bathroom in a t-shirt and shorts.

“Did he say something after that?” She’d known better than to ask right after the argument, better to let them cool off.

Jackie did a double-take when his eyes caught the bare skin between her breasts. “Nice real estate there.”

She giggled.

Jackie said, “Where were we?”

“I was asking—”

“I’m just kidding. Your son actually told me to shut the fuck up.”

“No!” Talia shouted then lowered her voice. “He didn’t.”

“He did.” Jackie laid down next to her.

Talia tried but she couldn’t stop the giggles. Soon she was laughing hysterically.

“I’m so-sorry.” She could barely get any words out.

“I’ll give you something to laugh about.” He pinched her side, and she completely lost it.

“Stop-stop-stop … stop … okay, okay … stop.”

He stopped.

She could barely catch her breath. “Okay, promise now. No more.”

“Promise.”

“You swear?”

“I swear.” But he was smiling.

“Seriously. I mean it.”

“Get over here, you.”

“Okay, but you better not, I swear to God.”

Warily, she nestled her back up to him.

She hadn’t forgotten about their problems with the house but they didn’t seem to matter so much. Her man had his arm around her and they’d shared laughter. All seemed right with the world.

“Let me ask you a serious question, hon.”

“Nice segue.” Her stomach hurt from laughing so hard.

“Be honest.”

“Okay,”

“Are you seeing someone?”

“Seeing?” She sat up. “Are you being serious?”

He looked away, embarrassed. “Yeah.”

“Where is this coming from?”

But it wasn’t a fair question. She knew she was a big flirt sometimes.

He just looked at her, said nothing.

“No, I’m not. What made you think that?”

“Forget it.”

“No, let’s talk.”

“The phone ringing like that. I started to think it was a code of some sort.”

“A code?”

“It’s dumb. Forget it.”

She wouldn’t. She knew he wouldn’t. “Jackie, I love you more than anything, except that boy in the other room. You got it?”

“I got it.”

“Now do I have to show you?”

He smiled. “It would help.”

* * * *

Eddie had made his play, but things weren’t going well.

Moira said, “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“I was just flirting with those two girls earlier, nothing serious.” He’d talked up a couple co-eds, managed to listen to their ridiculous sob stories about how difficult college was. Attending classes for three hours a day, maybe doing a couple hours of homework each night … Eddie felt like telling them to get ready for real life.

“It’s not that,” Moira said.

“It was just talk.” Which wasn’t exactly true. He would have taken either one home for a night of fun if they’d been interested. The thing was, he wanted something real with Moira.

She was quiet.

He said, “I never got over you. We had something special.”

“You’re a good guy, Ed. You’ll find somebody.”

Eddie looked into her dark eyes and thought of kissing her. Maybe that would resonate. There was something still there at her end. He could tell by how deliberate she was, like she was acting against her natural inclination.

“Eddie …”

She didn’t finish her sentence. She started to turn away.

“How’s work going?”

Moira kept her eyes away from him. “I finished up my last grant project a month ago. I have another proposal out there to do more archiving and restoration.”

“When’s it come through?”

“Eddie, do we have to do this?”

“It’s called talking. It doesn’t hurt.”

She sighed. “I’ll hear in a month or so. Fingers crossed.”

“That’s cool.”

“You know me. Books are my life.”

“Mine too,” Eddie said, not lying.

“Damn, are you talking about books again?” Stan asked, suddenly joining the conversation. He watched Stan put his arm around Moira’s shoulders. It looked funny, with Moira a few inches taller than Stan. But she didn’t mind. In fact, she moved in a little closer.

Eddie felt an unhealthy bitterness rise up in him.

Moira looked at Stan. “You seem like you’re feeling good.”

“Got my arm around you. Of course I am.”

Eddie tried not to roll his eyes. Stan’s lines came with extra cheese. But they always worked for him. If Eddie tried something like that he’d be laughed out of the bar.

“Why didn’t we ever date?” Stan asked, and the two of them had completely forgotten about Eddie.

“You guys staying?” Tim suddenly appeared at his side. He swayed like he was on the deck of a trawler, Michelle doing her best to keep him vertical.

“No, I’d better get going.” Stan smiled. “You know, I’ve gotta get up for work tomorrow … oh wait a minute.”

Everybody
fuck you-ed
Stan.

“If only we could all win the lottery,” Moira said. “I’ll leave with you guys.”

Score one for Eddie, he thought.

Moira said, “Can I catch a ride? I’m a bit tipsy. And you know the cops around here.”

“Eddie knows the cops real well,” Tim said.

Everybody laughed. Eddie flipped a collective bird.

“No problem,” Michelle said. “I’m good to drive.”

Stan spotted someone he knew at the bar and said good night to them.

They made their way to the parking lot. Never one to miss an opportunity, Eddie took up the rear to get a good view of Moira’s caboose. They’d had sex a lot while they’d, and it had been good, the best he’d ever had. He’d joked with her about how all librarians were maniacs in the sack. She’d told him it was probably true. And then had proven it in her own case.

“Here’re my keys.” Tim almost missed Michelle’s hand.

“No way. I’m not driving that pedophile van of yours. Let’s take my car,” Michelle said.

Eddie couldn’t walk a straight line. He zigzagged as if he were trying to avoid being sniped. He estimated a twenty-five percent chance of puking during the car ride.

He’d driven with worse odds.

“Shotgun,” Eddie said. Shotgun was better than the back when you were sick.

“How old are you?” Moira asked.

“He just got his wisdom teeth,” Tim said.