“Didn't she say he killed someone? Does Officer Kinney know he's here?”
“Yeah. He said he'd keep an eye on him, but we should probably watch out for the kids. Just in case.”
I wasn't an inconspicuous guy by any means. At six foot seven, it was hard for me to blend in, and I sure as hell wasn't going to win any games of hide-and-seek anytime soon. The height and size had their advantages sometimes—I could always reach the highest shelf, and nobody had dared to fuck with me at Wayward—but now, I felt like I stood out like a giant, throbbing sore thumb.
Harry patted my back reassuringly. “Hey, don't worry about it. They'll learn.”
“It's fine,” I muttered, pushing the door open and walking into the store.
“They just don't know you yet.”
“I get it.”
And I did. Once upon a time, if I'd heard that some guy moved into town who'd been locked up for ending someone's life, I'd have jumped right on that rumor train with everyone else. But that didn't mean being on the other side of the rumors didn't suck. In fact, it hurt. It hurt a lot. But what was I going to do about it, other than to be patient and hope they gave me a chance?
“Hey there!” Howard called, wearing an apron and a pin-striped shirt.
He looked like he belonged in an old-timey painting of a general store, and so did The Fisch Market with its wooden fruit displays, two mechanical cash registers, and antique gumball machine. He ran over to us and shook each of our hands before leading us to a room toward the back of the store.
“All right, Soldier,” he said, then chuckled. “I'm sorry. It's just hard to get used to calling a man Soldier who isn't … well, a soldier.”
I shrugged, sweeping my gaze around the small frozen food section. “I probably would've been better off if I were, to be honest with you. The military would’ve done me some good before I had the chance to really screw things up.”
Howard twisted his face with immediate discomfort. “I think you should keep talk about your past to a minimum, if you catch my drift.”
Before I had the chance to reply, he cleared his throat as he opened the door to reveal a closet full of cleaning supplies. He began to point them out, but I stopped him to say I’d spent most of my life cleaning and that I knew my way around a broom closet.
He nodded with approval before saying, “Now, I don’t expect you to wear much of a uniform. All I ask is that you make sure to cover your tattoos with long-sleeved shirts and wear one of the store aprons.”
I swallowed and made a mental note to buy some more clothes as soon as I was able.
And as if he were reading my mind, Howard said, “If you don’t have any long-sleeved shirts—”
“I think I might have a couple,” I said, cutting him off. “I’ll just have to wash them often. It’s all good.”
He nodded with satisfaction. “All right. So, when do you want to start?”
I looked between him and Harry and said, “Uh, today?”
Howard clapped Harry on the back. “I think we’re going to get along just fine.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
11:11
So, I began my life in River Canyon.
And like many things worth having, it didn’t come easily at first.
My first day of work was going well enough. There was nothing difficult about pushing a broom and making sure the toilet flushed properly. But if anything got under my skin, it was the whispers.
Not even the curious and accusing looks could compete with the whispers.
“What happened to his face?”
“How many people do you think he killed?”
“What the hell was Mayor Fischer thinking?”
I thought what got to me the most was, I knew my name was public knowledge, and so was my record. I was sure every one of them had a phone they could use to look me up and find out exactly what had happened and what I’d done. But no. People preferred to speculate; they preferred to talk. All because it was more interesting than the truth.
I got through it though, and because I hadn’t expected to work that day, Harry had left me without a ride back home.
Home.
1111 Daffodil Lane.
So, I walked the short ten minutes it took to get from The Fisch Market to my run-down trailer, where I made a can of soup I’d bought at the store and went to sleep on the air mattress Harry was letting me borrow until I got my hands on a bed.
And that was more or less how things went the first week or so with only work on my little house to break up the monotony. One day, I came home and went to town, scrubbing the bathroom until it was suitable to shower in. Another day, I came home and pulled up the matted, stained carpets in the living room and bedrooms. Little by little, it was looking cleaner, at the very least, and I was starting to see the potential underneath the grime.
But the whispers hadn’t stopped.
It was the start of my second week when I walked into McKenna’s Delicatessen to grab some lunch. The only cop I ever saw wandering around town watched me with a blend of curiosity and suspicion as I walked up to the counter and asked the woman at the register—the same woman who’d shielded her kids from me that first day—for a chicken salad sandwich.
“Of course,” she replied and set to work, risking a cautious glance in my direction. “So, um … you work at The Fisch Market, don’t you?”
She knew I did. She’d seen me there several times, just as I’d seen her. But she was making friendly small talk, or so it seemed, while that cop observed the exchange from the row of refrigerators behind me.
“Yeah,” I replied, nodding. “I just started last week.”
“How are you liking it so far?” She laid out the bread and pulled out the container of chicken salad.
I shrugged and stuffed my hands into my pockets. “It’s okay. Honestly, I’m just grateful to have the job. I owe Howard and Connie a lot for setting me up like this.”
The cop took a step closer. “They’re good people,” he said, and I turned to look at him.
“They are,” I agreed.
“Everyone here is.” He met my eye with what I perceived as a warning of sorts. As if to say, This is my flock, and if you fuck with them, I will fuck with you.
But he wasn’t going to intimidate me that easily. His job was to protect—I got that. But my job was to move on and make something of myself, and I had no intention of fucking with anyone.
“I’m sure they are.”
The woman behind the counter turned with my sandwich wrapped up and smiled as she rang me up. I paid, accepted my change, wished her a good day, and turned to leave without another look at that cop.
He followed.
“Hey, wait,” he called, and I stopped to glance over my shoulder. “I think we’re gettin’ off on the wrong foot,” he said, then offered his hand to shake. “Officer Patrick Kinney.”
I eyed his palm for a moment before accepting the gesture. “Soldier Mason.”
“Ya have to forgive us, Soldier,” Officer Kinney said with an apologetic glint in his blue eyes. “We live in a quiet small town, and just the thought of someone comin’ in and upsettin’ the balance shakes us up.”
I allowed the tension in my spine to loosen a bit as I nodded understandingly. “I don’t blame anyone for being suspicious.”