by Alan Lee
Daisy Hathaway entered and made a face that nudged Jennings, indicated he should’ve informed her that Murray and Lewis would be there too.
She took the computer chair. Murray lowered onto the carpet. Jennings and Lewis sat in the two kitchen chairs. The blinds were closed.
A council of war.
Jennings felt like they were meeting in a deep coal mine where the air was combustible with firedamp and consequence.
Murray cracked another beer, sucking at the foam. Said, “I hope they catch me drinking. Lynch already said I’m gone. What else they gone do? Fire me twice?”
“You’re not truly fired, are you?” said Hathaway.
“Not yet. I know for damn sure I’ll hear from Gordon Monday about how disappointed the titans are. But he won’t mean the titans, he’ll mean Lynch and the other old white guys Lynch bullies around. Good chance my contract won’t be renewed next year.”
“That’s outrageous,” she said,
“Disappointed is such a white-guy emotion.”
“But you reached the state finals.”
“It ain’t about winning right now. It’s all about one man.”
Lewis had poured wine into a coffee mug and his legs were crossed. “That one man has dirt on the other titans, I hear. He can sway them.”
Jennings leaned forward and rubbed his hands together. “Let’s get to it. We’re here to talk about Peter Lynch and the threat he poses. You texted me tonight about him and we each bring something to the table. Murray, you know he beats his boys and he’s going to fire you. Hathaway, err, Daisy, he is making increasingly inappropriate advances on you and you got to witness his rage. Craig, he humiliated you in public and you know he’s well connected and you’re fed up with doing nothing.”
“I am.”
“Let me tell you what I know,” said Jennings.
He did. Like a dark mystery playing out, the ending not written yet. His conversation with Kelly Carson. The sealed evidence of abuse. Kabir Patel and the compromised local press. Modern Monsters and rumors of missing girls in California. The note from Lynch attached to the squirrel. The cops beating him up and their threat to kill him. Lynch’s sexual advances on Hathaway. The private detective who couldn’t find enough proof.
Jennings concluded, “I found out yesterday, you know police chief Buck Gibbs? He raised the Lynch boys. He’s their adopted father, though it isn’t legal.”
Hathaway sucked oxygen in a gasp and Lewis said, “Oh my dear Lord.”
“Gibbs was a young cop and he took them out of a neglectful home and kept them. Peter Lynch is his son.”
“Oh! The note. He erased Peter’s fingerprints!” Daisy’s hands shook. “It makes sense! That note we took to the chief, Gibbs wiped it off before fingerprinting it.”
Jennings nodded. “I think so too.”
“Maybe getting fired’s a good thing. I should get the hell out of here,” said Murray.
“Some fine investigative work you’ve done, Mr. Jennings.”
“Thanks, Craig, but it’s meaningless if I don’t act.”
“If we don’t act,” said Hathaway.
Murray drained his beer and tossed the empty can toward the trash, missing. “The hell can we do? Lynch’s brother controls the legal system. His old man has the cops. He buys his own press. He literally owns the school. We got nothing.”
“We have the state police and federal government,” said Jennings.
“And tell them what? Can’t prove a damn thing.”
“Not yet. We need proof.”
“Not ever. We’re done. This is like a sundown town and we got to get our asses out.”
Craig Lewis set down his mug. He stood.
They tilted their heads up to look at him.
“Daniel. Do you remember? What I said?”
The exact memory Lewis meant flashed into Jennings’ mind. Their conversation at the restaurant.
“You asked me about evil,” said Jennings.
“That’s correct. I did. And?”
“You asked me if evil existed. More specifically, if a person could be evil.”
“Keep going.” Lewis smiled like a teacher pleased with his class. The smile was sad, however.
“You wondered if I would see Lynch as a broken man instead of an evil one. But you said not to worry about it yet because that turns young men into old men.”
“I’ve been thinking a lot about what I said, Daniel. It’s true but I wish I’d worded it differently. It’s not that worrying has aged me. It’s that, every time I turned a blind eye, I died a little. My pathetic inaction. You three are still young but you’re already faced with it. If you keep teaching, you’ll have students commit suicide. Or they’ll kill someone else. They’ll come to class high or bring weapons. They’ll arrive with bruises and scars and hollow eyes. And you’ll tell yourself you can’t save them all. And you truly can’t but that realization, if you allow it, builds callouses. You become numb. And when you go numb, you atrophy. And once you’re atrophying you’re dying, like me.” He walked to the far side of the little room and he breathed deeply. Voice wobbled. “Evil is real. It’s around us and inside us. When we ignore it, the evil takes root. And then you have what you see before you.” He indicated himself. “An exhausted and lonely man who played it safe his whole life and wishes he could do it over again.”
“What would you do differently?” Hathaway, spellbound, felt like she was speaking to her future self.
“I’d fight. I’d push against the evil. Maybe I’d look even older now, but I wouldn’t be haunted by my cowardice. The final straw was little Ronald Bell. Thirty years ago. His father had visitation rights on the weekends and Ronald would return with black eyes and busted lips. His teachers, we stepped in and involved social services. His father lost his rights, so he kidnapped little Ronald, drove to Georgia and set them both on fire. I haven’t fought since. I haven’t believed in God since. But I replaced him with something worse. Me. And it turns out I’m not worthy.”
“You getting too deep for a football coach to follow, Lewis,” said Murray.
Lewis wiped his eyes and shot a smile.
“Here’s what I’m saying. Evil’s real. Don’t back down from it. Don’t ignore it. You are significant…but your significance is diminished when you do. If you hide your face and pretend there’s no transcendence then you consign yourself to be mere bones and dust.”
“I feel that.” Hathaway pushed her hair back and lowered her face. “I feel that in every part of me, the callouses and the growing atrophy. I’m…I’m settling.”
Jennings said, “Life is harder than we were promised.”
“I’m mad. I’m so mad.” Hathaway spoke into her knees.
“At Lynch?” said Murray.
“At Lynch. At myself. At life. At God.”
“I don’t believe in God.” Another sad smile from Lewis. “But I miss him.”
“Don’t believe in God?” Murray shook his head. “No wonder you’re depressed.”
“Who are you quoting, Craig?” said Jennings.
“I don’t remember. But it sums up my life quite well. Clearly, somewhere deep down, I must believe in good and evil and God and transcendence, and my stubborn pride has brought only ruin. So now, as we face Lynch and the enormous obstacles before us, both inside and out, it’s important to remember our fight isn’t just a physical one. It’s a fight against Lynch, but also a fight for ourselves.”
“I have a plan.” Hathaway raised up. Glanced at herself in the mirror to check her mascara wasn’t running.
Jennings had been waiting to hear the plan.
“A plan to do what?” said Murray.
“Two nights ago I was crying in bed and planning to run away. Abandon my job, my relationships, abandon it all. That was before I knew how powerful Lynch was, so now running away sounds even more appealing. I can’t, though, because that would be settling and compromising again. So I came up with something else, and I want to tell you about i
t. We can catch Lynch.”
“Catch him how?” said Jennings.
“I’ll go on a date with him.”
“No.”
“Hell no,” said Murray.
“He and I will go out to dinner and I’ll get him to confess. My phone will record it.”
“Absolutely not,” said Jennings.
“I won’t go alone. You boys will be waiting outside. You can follow us. If all else fails, he might try something in the car afterward and we can charge him with sexual assault. Maybe he can buy the others off, but not me.”
“You can’t get raped to catch Lynch, Daisy.” Jennings had the disorienting sensation that he’d swapped places with Mackenzie August, the private detective urging him to be careful, to not die chasing Lynch.
“You’d be there too, Daniel, ready to break his car windows. I know you’d never let him get far. I’ll take a can of mace, just to be safe.”
“You pressure him into confessing, he’ll know it’s a trap,” said Murray.
“Men are idiots, in my experience, when they think there’s a chance for sex.”
Jennings’ heart thumped extra firm into his ribs, and he hoped he wasn’t one of the idiots Daisy meant.
“So, what, you’d just call and ask the dude out?” said Murray.
“He already asked me. To drinks, to discuss the upcoming holiday banquet. I would simply accept.”
“I don’t know. It’s a hell of a risk. Lewis, what do you think?”
“About her plan? I admire her bravery. It sounds to me like she slept on it a few days and she’s still willing.”
“No,” said Jennings.
“I am willing. Think about what’s at stake. We know he’s a sexual predator and he’s after me. We know he’s going to fire you, Coach, and maybe hurt Daniel again. And it’s not like he’s going to stop with us. If you three will go and sit in your cars outside and be ready, I want to do it tomorrow night.”
“Tomorrow?”
“I’ll bring my pistol,” said Lewis.
“No,” said Jennings.
“Oh Jesus help us.”
“I’ll shoot him. I will,” said Lewis. “I told Daniel I wished someone would kill Lynch. Why not me? I’ve thought about it recently and I would. I’m twenty years late doing what’s right. Worst case scenario, Ms. Hathaway isn’t able to record anything useful and we have to bail her out, and a pistol would be handy. Best case scenario, Lynch gives me a reason to kill him.”
“You can’t just kill someone,” said Jennings.
“I would and I’m not being melodramatic.”
“What kind of pistol?”
“A revolver.”
“Caliber?”
“I’ve forgotten the number. A little one like the police used.”
“Probably a .38. What ammo do you have?”
“The cheapest.”
“Chances are you’d miss Lynch and hit someone else, Craig.” This was exactly how August had felt, scolding him.
“I’d only fire up close.”
Jennings was shaking his head. “Have you practiced at a range?”
“I have. The NRA held a basic pistol qualification class and I passed.”
“It’s not a good idea, Craig. Shooting someone, or shooting at someone, is entirely different from what you think.”
“I trust your judgment completely, Daniel. But I’m bringing the gun just in case. A last resort.”
Jennings pinched his eyes closed. “This is a bad idea.”
He felt Daisy’s hand on his shoulder and she applied warm pressure. “It won’t be dangerous, Daniel. Just scary, and I can handle scary. I have to.”
“Even if your plan works, there will be consequences. There are always consequences we don’t see.”
“We suffer consequences for inaction too,” said Lewis.
“It’s a simple dinner, except I’m recording it. I think he should pick me up and drop me off. If I feel like I’m in danger, I’ll walk out and leave him there.”
“I hate it,” said Jennings.
“I won’t get hurt. Please, Daniel.”
“If we do this…” Jennings shot the two men with his finger. “We’d be on a conference call outside relaying information. We need someone in the parking lot with a visual on Daisy through the windows. Someone else waiting in a car with a visual on our parking lot man, ready to pursue Lynch, and we’ll be tracking Daisy’s phone location too, just in case. The third man’s in a car within half a mile, on the route back to Daisy’s place so he can get there first and be ready. That’ll probably be me.”
“You’d rather not wait in the parking lot?”
“No,” said Jennings. “If Daisy’s getting a ride home, I want to be there when Lynch tries something in her driveway. I want to hit him.”
Murray mumbled, “Going all Green Beret on us. But fine, I’m in. We bust his ass, my job’s secure.”
Hathaway waggled her phone. “I already have his cell from the school directory. Should I call now?”
“No. I want you to sleep on it again. You can and maybe should still back out.”
She smiled at him, her hand still on his shoulder. “I won’t. We’re going to get proof. But I’ll wait to call until the morning.”
Murray let his head drop back against the wall. “Jesus help us."
“Amen,” said Lewis.
29
That night, Daisy lay sleepless next to Byron, who watched Dexter episodes on his phone.
Jennings lay sleepless with visions of Craig Lewis firing his pistol. He watched Lewis fire over and over, and the man kept missing, sometimes hitting Daisy, sometimes hitting him. Anytime Jennings was shot, phantom pain radiated down his left leg.
It was difficult to hit a moving target with a pistol and sweaty hands. Amateurs didn’t fully understand how difficult. And to stop a big angry man like Lynch, you’d need to knock several chunks out with a .38 using cheap ammo. Multiple shots meant multiple chances to hit someone else by accident.
It’d be better to kill Lynch in private, alone. Kill him and leave. Lewis’ pistol was registered, though. They’d need something the police didn’t have on file. Something like the shotgun under Jennings’ bed. It’d work better anyway, a single shell more than sufficient. One blast from the shotgun, zero witnesses, no one getting charged for murder…
Jennings laughed, a sniffing through his nose.
Morbid where his mind went after midnight.
Ten the next morning, standing in her backyard, Daisy called Peter Lynch.
“Good morning, Ms. Hathaway.”
“Good morning, Mr. Lynch.” Voice firm. She pinned her eyes onto an oak tree, ignoring the fact he’d known it was her—most likely he’d programmed her number into his phone. “Our school’s holiday banquet should have a theme, and I’m full of ideas. I can meet tonight at the new Bloom restaurant if you’d like to hear them.” She paused to listen. “Seven’s fine. Pick me up? I’m looking forward to it.”
30
Jennings drove around Bloom four times in his newly repaired Tacoma and he wished he’d investigated it last night. The restaurant sat on busy Main Street and touched the Wasena neighborhood, a maze easy to get lost in. There weren’t enough windows to suit him either. A tactical nightmare.
He took screenshots of his phone’s map and drew on them. He texted the screenshots and photos of the restaurant and surrounding environs to the gang of four. Lewis could post up here at the cute shops across from Bloom or pace here between Winona and Wasena Avenue, keeping Hathaway in sight through the front. He wanted Murray ready in his car here, at the Getty Mart intersection, where he would watch Lewis and would pull into traffic and follow Hathaway home. Jennings would be waiting in Grandin, halfway between the restaurant and Hathaway’s home, easy access to both.
Assuming the best case scenario, Lewis would alert them when Hathaway and Lynch walked out. Murray would follow in his car, and Jennings would easily beat Hathaway home, ready and watching her p
hone location on his screen. Lynch would drop her off and be unaware of the three men shadowing him.
There were multiple bad scenarios but he was ready.
She could be forced to walk out of the restaurant early, leaving Lynch—Lewis was prepared to escort her to the safety of Murray’s car.
Lynch could get frisky in her driveway—Jennings would be ready to get her out.
Lynch could drive an alternate route—Murray would pursue and they would track her on the map.
In other emergencies, Jennings could reach Bloom in four minutes. And Hathaway had the mace. Lewis, his pistol. All kinds of safety precautions.
But still, for the hundredth time, Jennings thought, This is a bad idea.
He was ready to call the sting off when Hathaway texted the group.
>> This is going to work, guys! I’m excited to save the lives and souls of his future victims.
She then texted him personally.
>> Thank you, Daniel. We can only do this because of you.
Jennings lowered his head to the steering wheel, parked at the gas station next to Bloom, and he shook.
31
What to wear, that was an issue.
Hathaway wanted Lynch eager from the jump. She wanted him to have that shock of seeing too much of her body, wanted his blood pumping, ready to give her anything. But she couldn’t be obvious or he’d sense the con. She had to look accidentally or naturally like she was…what words had he used…like she was horny. Prurient.
Hathaway put her hair up, a bun that looked casual but wasn’t. She chose tight black leggings and heels. A green button-down shirt. She examined herself in front of the mirror with a cold eye. The shirt reached the leggings but Lynch could look at her ass and her legs all he wanted. She undid a frightening amount of buttons. She wanted her breasts in his face but it couldn’t look like that was her goal.
She wished she was dressing for Daniel.