“I’m sorry, boss, but I’m not following ya.”
“You know what I think?” the agent says.
Donnie drains his glass, waits for him to continue.
“I think that Judge Wood did something when he was younger and, given the bones, I can only surmise it was something terrible, and someone knew and was blackmailing him. Maybe others were involved with whatever happened to that skeleton.” He gives Donnie a pointed look.
“Interesting theory.”
“And maybe Judge Wood tried to figure out who was blackmailing him and found something new.
Does Boo Radley mean anything to you?”
“No, why?” Donnie lies.
“No reason,” the agent lies back at him. Obviously, the law clerk told the agent the same thing she told Donnie about Benny’s message.
“You have any idea who was blackmailing him?” Donnie asks.
The agent hesitates, like he’s considering how much to share. “Let’s just say we think we identified a case Judge Wood might have fixed—a highly unusual dismissal of a racketeering charge against a member of the O’Leary family out of the Nicetown neighborhood in Philly. You know anyone from Nicetown?”
Donnie shakes his head.
“And the photo of the bones, well, it was sent from a computer in West Virginia. The URL’s from a computer owned by a TV network.”
Donnie still isn’t following.
Then it hits him hard, like a semitruck barreling down the highway.
Nico.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
NICO
“Where are we going?” Nico asks Jenna as she hides the motorcycle in the tall weeds on a vacant lot a block from Savior House.
“To Mr. Get off My Lawn’s place,” Jenna says.
Nico smiles, remembering all the crazy names they had for the characters in their Chestertown neighborhood. There was Meth Head Ted, who was in dire need of dentistry, Ned Flanders, the guy who was helping Arty with his computer projects, Urkel, the Black guy with thick glasses who worked at the bodega. They had more nicknames for folks than coal miners. Mr. Get off My Lawn was the neighbor across the street from Savior House. A crank who sat on his porch with a perpetual scowl, complained about the group home ruining the neighborhood, threatened them if they so much as stepped a foot on his grass.
They push through a rusted chain-link gate to the backyard, which, like the rest of the neighborhood, is unkempt and half-dead.
Jenna pulls open the screen door, which hangs on only one hinge, then kicks the doorknob, causing the lock to splinter and the door to burst open.
There’s the clicking sound of tiny feet, and Nico shudders as he thinks back to those rats in the mine. The past three days truly have been a surreal disaster.
Jenna sweeps the house for any unwanted tenants, both of the two-and four-legged variety. Then she pries open a board covering the front window, giving them a clear view of Savior House.
“What now?” Nico asks, glancing at his phone. The meeting with Derek Brood isn’t for three hours.
Jenna looks at him like it’s a dumb question: “We wait.”
An hour passes and Nico glances up from his phone and notices Jenna staring at him. He’s already made several bets on DraftKings.
Jenna says, “I have a teenager and she spends less time glued to her phone than you.”
“Um, am I supposed to be doing something else? Forgive me, I don’t know stakeout etiquette.”
Jenna frowns, continues contemplating him. “Can I ask you something?”
Nico shrugs.
“I don’t remember … why were you at Savior House? I mean, what happened to your parents?”
Nico doesn’t know why she’s asking. It’s an odd question all things considered. What does it matter?
“My old man, he was, for lack of a better word, a fiend.”
“He abused you?”
Nico isn’t much for therapy hour, but there’s nothing else to do. “Not so much me. Mostly my mom. She took it for years, but finally she had to escape.”
He remembers the day at the beach. He thumbs the Saint Christopher necklace that matches the one she wore.
“Did you ever reconnect with them?”
Nico releases a cynical laugh. “My dad disappeared, an occupational hazard when you work for the O’Learys. And my mom, no, I never saw her again.”
For years, Nico was so angry at her. He once did some internet sleuthing and found out she was alive. She was not on social media, but there was a local newspaper story about Gloria Adakai organizing a bake sale with funds going to a domestic abuse shelter in Los Angeles. She’d always dreamed of living on the West Coast. He considered reaching out, but she’s an old woman now. If she wanted to locate him, Nico isn’t hard to find.
“Your parents?” Nico asks.
Jenna shakes her head. “Car crash. What I wouldn’t give to see them again…”
Nico decides to change the subject: “I’ve googled ‘Fagin Jones’ and ‘Robot LLC’ and come up with nothing. Assuming it was Ben who wrote the note, what’s with all the cryptic messages? I mean, why not spell it out?”
Jenna shrugs. “He was a judge, didn’t want anyone to know, I suppose. And the note from the library was just a note to himself, he knew what it meant. Anyway, we’ll see what my husband finds.”
Nico feels a wave of guilt. Maybe if he hadn’t been so shameless, so greedy, Ben would still be here. Maybe if he wouldn’t have gotten in so deep with Shane O’Leary.
Maybe if he’d admit that the reason he never reached out to his mom is that he knows the hard reality: that she has no interest in seeing her cowardly son—the one who didn’t protect her.
Nico examines Jenna as she peers out the window. What would the oddsmakers give the chances of Derek Brood backing down, taking Arty’s money? And what happens if he refuses? What odds would they give on Nico coming out on the other side of this, particularly with that FBI agent seeming to know that he blackmailed Ben?
Nico loves the thrill of beating the odds. But this is a long shot not even he would take.
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
THE TWINS
Outside the dive bar, Haley waves to Casey, who’s driving the semitruck. Casey’s face is tomato red and she’s wearing a trucker hat. That driver picked the wrong girl.…
Casey pulls the rig to the side of the road. The vehicle is too big for the area and risks grabbing a cop’s attention, so they need to be fast. They’re losing daylight and Casey’s sideshow with the truck driver cost them time.
While Casey was with the trucker, Haley tracked the FBI agent. He’s going to notice her tailing him sooner or later, so it’s now or never.
The agent has been inside the bar for about an hour. Haley risked peeking inside and she saw him talking to the guy from the cruise ship. Haley smiles, remembering him plummeting into the Atlantic.
Who would’ve thought the geezer could survive? Good on him.
Across the street, Casey is opening the back of the rig, lowering the ramp. They’d better hope no cops come by. She feels a stab of worry that Casey hasn’t gotten rid of the trucker’s body.
Finally, the agent emerges from the bar. His jaw is set, like he’s having a day, and he takes no notice of the rig.
Haley walks across the street, making sure he can’t miss her. He’s been on their trail and she’s counting on him noticing. Halfway across the street, she can virtually feel his eyes snag on her.