Zero at the Bone (19 page)

Who’s helping you?”

“No one, and that’s just how I like it. Now, are we okay? We understand each other?”

“What’s happened to you? You were such a babe in the woods when I put you in Vegas.”

“Well, you grow up fast when hired killers come after you.”
And when you live with
one for a week
.

“I didn’t want this for you, Jack.”

“I know. I’ll be in touch.” He hung up before Churchill could get another word out.

Jack stood and looked out across the backyard for a moment, going back over the conversation he’d just had. He didn’t like lying to Churchill, but he didn’t have much choice. He turned and went back into the house. D was still at the kitchen table, staring at a bowl of soggy cereal.

“Well, it’s done,” he said.

D looked up, his gaze guarded. “What’d he say?”

“About what you expected. Didn’t like it, didn’t have a choice, thought I was getting help. He seemed to buy it, though.”

“Good.” D turned back to his cereal, twirling his spoon in the sodden mess.

Jack nodded, tapping the phone against his leg. “That’s all you have to say?

‘Good?’ I just lied to a government official, D. That’s got to be some kind of violation of something. Witsec has promised to help me and I just told them a bald-faced lie to help protect the man who came to kill me.”

D stood up slowly and turned to face him. “Wasn’t on my behalf ya done that, doc.

Was on yer own. You ain’t protectin’ me none.”

Jack shook his head and tossed the phone to the sofa. “I can’t believe any of this is real. Fuck me. What the hell am I thinking? I ought to tell Churchill exactly where I am and ask him how fast he can get here!”

“If that’s what ya want I won’t stop ya.”

“You’d just let me tell him everything? You’d stand there and do nothing while I gave him the whole damned story?”

“Nope. I’d be gone. You can tell him whatever ya want, but I sure as hell cain’t stick around ta meet him. So I guess all ya gotta decide is whether ya think yer better off with me or Witsec. I’m jus’ tryin’ ta protect you, Jack. I think I can do it better’n they can. You don’t agree, then go ta them with my blessins and best wishes for yer safety.”

“You’d let me turn myself over to them? Just like that?”

“Jus’ like that.” D narrowed his eyes and peered at him. “Sounds like that troubles ya some. Ya think I’d wanna fight ta keep ya, is that it? That I’d feel some remorse or regret on seein’ the back a you? You ain’t wrong. This is a hard business, Jack, with no room fer friends or fond feelins. Ya gotta do what’s practical, and what’s immediate, and 82 | Jane Seville

what’ll keep ya from getting killed or arrested or both. Havin’ a friend’s the quickest way to a knife in the back.”

Jack looked at D’s face, his hardened and weathered face, and wondered just how much he was speaking from personal experience. “That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard,” he said.

D shrugged. “It’s a hard fuckin’ fact a life. It is what it is.” He got up again and went to the window, keeping his eyes averted. “Well…

whether there’s room for it or not… I’m your friend, D.” He heard D sigh. “I wish I could say I was yours, Jack.” He heard footsteps, and then the back door opening and closing again.

D SAT on what he’d started to consider “his” bench for hours. The sun climbed overhead, then started its slow descent across the sky. He stared at ants trundling by on the patio, wondering what he was waiting for. Was he hoping Jack would come outside and make him talk about it? Ask him to come back in? Was he waiting to see how long it would take?

The cell phone, the one Jack had used to call Churchill, was in his pocket. He’d swiped it off the couch while Jack’s back was turned, and it felt heavy with expectations.

The call he was putting off making would get no easier with time. Finally, he got up and walked a short distance into the trees, and redialed the last outgoing number.

It only rang once before it was picked up. “Witsec, Churchill.”

“This is D.”

He heard the other man settle in, clear his throat, take a breath. “Been expecting your call.”

“We understand each other?”

“Give me one good reason I shouldn’t come find you and put you down like a dog.”

“I’ll give ya two. Ya cain’t, and ya shouldn’t.”

“You accepted a contract on Jack Francisco’s life.”

“A contract I didn’t carry out.”

“I’m supposed to trust you because you had some last-minute attack of conscience?”

D counted to five before answering, his voice tight and controlled. “The Bureau talk ta you?”

“Yeah.”

“Then ya know just how long my attack a conscience’s been goin’ on.”

“I don’t give a shit what you’ve done for the Bureau. My concern is Francisco.”

“That’s my concern too.”

“But it’s not your only concern.”

D sighed. “No. I got somethin’ of a situation myself. Someone blackmailed me inta takin’ that hit on him, and now they’re in a state. Dodged a couple of ’em on the road ta Stockton. Figure they found us by piggybackin’ on yer very own tracker, so don’t ya go getting on yer high horse when yer little lodestone almost got the both of us killed.”

“That gas station that went up?”

“Yeah. What’d you find there?”

“Nothing. Car rented under a false name, two bodies without ID, you know the drill.”

Zero at the Bone | 83

“Well enough ta sing along.”

“So these persons unknown are on your trail.”

“That’s in addition to the brothers, who are still gonna be looking fer Jack even if they don’t know nothin’ ’bout what’s happening with me. You hear who they got in fer help on this?”

“Petros, I heard.”

“Yeah. Look, I know ya mean well, but I am tellin’ ya that you cain’t protect Jack like I can.”

“I can’t leave one of my witnesses in the hands of a mercenary.”

“You call me whatcha want, but I know these people and you don’t.” Churchill sighed. “Look, D… whatever your name really is… Jack Francisco is a good man. He’s a rarity in my business: a truly innocent bystander. Most of our witnesses are insiders turned state’s evidence, so I end up protecting the lives of people who have a long list of crimes of their own to atone for. Francisco is different.”

“You don’t gotta tell me about Jack.”
I probly know him a helluva lot better’n you
do, you Witsec son of a bitch
. “I know what kinda man he is, and what he saw and what he’s gonna do about it. So you better believe me when I tell ya that anyone comin’ fer him is gonna hafta go through me, and if they get him ya better know that it means I’m lyin’ dead in front a him, you hear me? Sittin’ in yer nice safe office wherever ya are and tryin’ ta call the shots? I am here in the shit with him with a three-point-five-million-dollar price on my head fer my trouble and listenin’ ta you bitch ’n’ moan about how yer sposed ta trust me. I don’t give a fuck. You jus’ gotta give me the room I need ta do what I gotta do ta keep him ’n’ me breathin’ long enough fer him ta get ta that witness stand.

After that, you can take over and make him inta someone new ’n’ my job be over. You got that?”

There was a long silence. “Yeah, I got it. I just have one favor to ask.”

“What?”

“Jack’s going to check in with me twice a week. You do the same.” D sighed. “Yeah, I can do that.”

“And you keep him safe, you hear me?”

“Ya got my word on that.” D hung up, and returned to his bench. He sat down and watched the lake as the sun angled across its surface in ever-deepening shadow.

JACK had spent the day on D’s laptop, watching pointless videos on YouTube and reading three weeks’ worth of back posts on one of his favorite music forums. He certainly wasn’t waiting for D to come back inside, or wondering what the hell he was doing out there, or asking himself what had happened to the ease they’d established between themselves. Somehow it seemed that now all they were doing was walking circles around each other and getting snappish.

You know why, genius. You feel it, and he feels it too.

He sighed and clicked over to CNN, but he’d reached critical mass for self-delusion and denial and he abruptly shoved the laptop away with a frustrated sigh. He let his head fall into his hands and stared at the tabletop, giving in to all the thoughts that had been crowding against his mental barriers for days.

It was difficult to admit that he was attracted to D. That hadn’t been part of the plan, if there’d ever been a plan apart from not getting killed. It had taken Jack a long time, 84 | Jane Seville

most of his adult life, in fact, to admit to himself that he felt far stronger attractions to men than to women. He had buried this fact during his marriage, although at times he wondered just how successfully he had hidden it from Caroline, who was sharp as a tack, but that wasn’t important now. He was not a stranger to the bodies of other men, but his experiences had never ventured into the emotional realms. He had slept with men, but he had never… did he even dare think it now? Was it even true? He didn’t know if he had any actual experience of that four-letter word he wasn’t letting too close to himself, no means of comparison to the bubbling cauldron he’d been steeping in for days.

It was all moot, anyway. D was about as accessible as Mount Everest. Jack’s mind stubbornly went back to that moment on the couch when they’d held hands, that tiny glimmer of possibility, but that had been nothing but Demerol-induced passivity. When Jack had tried to re-create the moment the next day, D had politely but firmly ended it.

It didn’t matter. He had to put it out of his mind, and fast. He’d be spending a lot of time with D in the coming weeks, maybe months, and he had to nip it in the bud before it made him miserable.

He got up from the table and went to the cabinet over the fridge, where he knew there was a mostly full bottle of Wild Turkey. He trudged to the sofa and sat down heavily, uncapped the bottle and took a swig, wincing over the bite of the whisky.

He’d drunk another four swallows before D finally came back inside, the setting sun silhouetting him in the doorway. “Gettin’ drunk, Francisco?” he grumbled.

“What’s it to you?” Jack said, feeling his tongue slow and stupid already.
Jesus,
you’re a lightweight, Francisco. Couple of pulls and you’re already half in the bag.

D came over and took the bottle, but instead of putting it away he upended it and drank two long swallows. He sat down at the other end of the sofa and passed the bottle back. “Jus’ don’t wanna listen ta you bitch about bein’ hungover in the mornin’.”

“Why, we got something to do?”

“Gotta be leavin’ soon. Once ya give my arm the seal of approval.” He flexed it in Jack’s direction. He’d stopped wearing the sling the day before.

“No rush,” Jack said, taking another drink and handing the bottle to D, who did likewise.

“Nope, no rush.”

They sat silently passing the bottle back and forth for a good half hour, staring into the flames of the gas fireplace. Jack began to feel weighty and relaxed. Words were rising unchecked to his tongue and it was only with effort that he barred their way.

Some escaped, though. “How long since you got laid, D?” he asked.

D made an indistinct grunting noise. “Why?”

Jack shrugged. “Dunno. Middle of a bit of a dry spell myself. Betcha it isn’t hard for you, though. Mysterious black-clad specter of death; bet the babes can’t get enough.” D shook his head. “You drunk already?”

“That isn’t an answer.”

“I don’t do that, all right?”

“Do what? Fuck?”

D’s jaw was grinding. Jack watched his profile. “I don’t… I’m not….” D sighed and reached for the bottle, taking another swig. “I jus’ cain’t,” he said, quietly.

Jack’s brow furrowed. “Whaddya mean, you can’t?”

“Don’t feel nothin’. Ain’t no kinda human bein’.”

“Well… but….” Jack hesitated. “You don’t feel nothing?”

“Jus’ shut up about it.”

Zero at the Bone | 85

“What, you can’t get it up?”

D turned to face him, his eyes glittering in the dimness. “You watch yer mouth, Francisco. Ain’t too late ta kill ya, ya know.”

“Oooh, I’m so fucking scared. You’re not kidding, are you?” Jack hitched one knee up and turned to face D. “You’re telling me that you’ve dug yourself into a cave so deep you don’t even have a libido anymore?” D’s silence was confirmation enough. Jack shook his head. “That is hard core, D.”

There was a long silence, and more passing of the quickly dwindling bottle. Finally, D spoke again, his voice low and sibilant, almost as if he were talking to himself. “I do things,” he said. “Too many ta count or measure. Gotta cut it off ta bear it. Cut it all off.” His chin set in a hard line of determination. “You tryin’ ta sew it back on and it’s too goddamned late.” He stood up abruptly and went into his room, shutting the door behind him.

Jack faced forward again and drained the rest of the bottle. He slumped into the corner of the couch and gazed numbly into the fire until his eyes closed themselves.

WHEN the crash woke him, Jack was dreaming about shooting a gun. He was in the backyard with D’s Glock in his hands, firing away, trying to aim, but the bullets kept coming back toward him and he had to duck time and again.

He sat straight up, disoriented and still a little bit drunk. It was deep night, he couldn’t read the clock above the stove, and his head felt muzzy and thick. What the fuck was that? It had sounded like something heavy falling.

He heard something else. Another thump, not as loud, and an incoherent half-muffled cry.
Shit, it’s D. He’s having another nightmare.

Previously, Jack had let him alone during his nightmares. Best to let him sleep through them. But now, sitting right outside D’s door, still half-asleep… he stumbled to his feet and over to the bedroom. He pounded on it with one fist. “D? Wake up!” Another thump and a strangled yell, no words.

Jack opened the door. D’s head was thrashing from side to side on his pillow, his hands clutching at the bedsheets. He’d knocked his lamp off the side table, which had probably made the crash that had woken Jack.