After Death(78)

“Are we always going to be on the run?”

“No. We’ll be okay. I don’t know how or when. But Michael will know.”

Just then he enters the kitchen with a trash bag full of money, which he puts on the island. “Know what?”

“What’s next,” John says.

Nina says, “That’s your spoon there. Your bowl is on a shelf in the nearer fridge, so it wouldn’t melt too fast.”

Michael takes his serving from the Sub-Zero, stands with bowl in hand, attends to the treat for a few spoonfuls, and then says, “From here, day after tomorrow, we should get out of state. Get lost in a city, maybe Phoenix, for ten days or two weeks, until we can acquire new ID for you and use some of this money to buy legitimate wheels.”

“Can you make us invisible?” John asks.

“To an extent, yeah, but not like in the movies.”

“Are they going to find us?”

“The next week is tricky. After that, once we settle you in a new life, you’ll be safe.”

“Will you stay with us? In our new life?”

With the tone of her voice, Nina advises the boy that his question is inappropriate. “Enough, John.”

Glancing at Nina, Michael says, “I’ll always be on call for you. Always. No less than that. Whether we go one way or our own ways . . . that’s something we eventually have to work out together.”

“Let’s work it out right now,” the boy says.

“In time,” Nina says.

“Why not now?” John persists.

“At the moment, Mr. Mace has a lot on his mind.”

“We all do.”

“That’s for sure,” Michael agrees.

“If we work this out now,” John says, “it’s one less thing on our minds.”

That observation inspires a smile from Michael and a sigh of embarrassment from Nina. She almost tells John the issue doesn’t involve him; it’s between her and Michael. In one sense that is true, but it’s not the whole truth. In fact, whatever she and Michael decide they are—or could be—to each other, whether just friends or something more, will have an enormous, incalculable impact on the boy’s life.

Into Nina’s hesitation, Michael says, “I want whatever your mother wants, John. But you need to listen now and understand me. Given time, people as special as your mom always make the right decision. Guys like you and me, not so much. The best thing we can do, the only smart thing, is shut our traps and be patient. You keep pestering her about this, she might make a decision too quick, one she’ll regret. We don’t want her to live with regret. We want her to know she’s taken the right path, don’t we?”

“I guess so.”

“You guess so? Want to clean that up?”

“Yeah. I mean, I want her to be happy.”

“There you go.”

Michael smiles almost shyly at Nina. She could adore him. But he’s correct when he says she needs time. She feels as if she is on a tightrope, inching toward something so right and so precious that it’s almost surely beyond her reach, given the missteps in her past. If she hurries, she will lose her balance.

Pushing the trash bag across the island to John, Michael says, “You finished your ice cream. I still have some of mine. Start the count, see how much we’ve got. Then we need to pack it in something that looks unimportant.”

John gets off the stool and opens the bag. Across the granite countertop spill thick packets of cash, each individually secured with taped Saran Wrap or its equivalent.

“Looks like a double century in each packet,” Michael says. “Twenty thousand per.”

“More money than a bank,” John says. “We’re set for life.”

Michael shakes his head. “Maybe. But the day’s coming when they’ll try to outlaw cash, force us into a digital dollar without blockchain privacy, total government control of everyone’s accounts and finances. If that can’t be stopped, it’s important for us to scare up all the cash we can while it’s still spendable and use it to insulate ourselves as much as possible.”

Gripped by a cold disquiet, Nina says, “You know that for true? When you’ve been . . . swimming through the internet or whatever it is you do, you’ve seen proof they’re scheming to do that?”

His deadpan expression isn’t reassuring. “That and more. The worst people live for power. They work at it as industriously as bees in a hive. I’ve discovered so much in the past five days, I’m amazed my hair hasn’t turned as white as snow.”

Piling the parcels of cash five high—one hundred thousand dollars per stack—John pauses with a thicker bundle in hand. “Something’s wrong with this one. It’s twenties.”

“It’s still money,” Nina says.

“Yeah, and there’s been two others with twenties. Thicker like this. But this one is kinda funny. Loose. The plastic can’t keep it straight.”

“Let me see,” Michael says.

Frowning, he takes the packet from John. The stack of bills is sufficiently unstable that the tape has peeled up. The plastic isn’t as snug as it should be. He strips the tape off and folds back the Saran Wrap and lifts up a half-inch-thick quantity of whole bills, revealing that the center of the three-inch-high bundle has been hollowed out. Within lies an object Nina can’t identify, nestled between two triple-A batteries.