The woman shrugged. “Okay. So, that’s $182 total,” she said, counting out cash. With the two hundred from the man’s wallet, and the hundred dollars she had managed to keep hidden from the man who had robbed her, Lucky now had almost five hundred dollars.
She walked outside and stood in front of the pawn shop, refastening the necklace that had belonged to her mother. Finding her mother someday wasn’t a dream she was giving up on, she realized. Especially not now, when she needed the family she didn’t have more than ever. Lucky had no idea where to begin looking for her, she never had—but she was not going to allow the hope that she might find her someday die.
Lucky started walking, headed back toward the train station. If her timing was right, she would reach San Quentin by morning, and walk straight into the last place she wanted to be.
May 1993
BELLEVUE, WASHINGTON
When Lucky and Steph returned home one evening, after a Saturday spent playing with their friends, John and Darla were in the backyard arguing. Lucky froze. What if Darla had found out the truth? “Maybe we should go back,” Lucky said. “Give them a minute…”
“No way. It’s pitch dark now. I’ll be grounded.”
“Yeah,” Lucky said, still hesitating at the gate. “But—”
Her father’s voice rose up in the darkness. “She’s my daughter, and I’ll decide which doctor she goes to. She has her regular appointment in two weeks’ time, and I’m taking her, and Darla, you don’t need to worry—”
“I’m not worried about you going on a road trip, Virgil, I’m worried about Andi! She needs to be observed more frequently than once every few months, by a doctor in a different state. I’m telling you I’ll pay for it. You don’t have to worry about money. You’re here now—I want to take care of you, of both of you. Why won’t you let me?”
Silence. The sound of crickets. A door slamming, which Lucky realized was Steph’s back door. Her father was done talking, apparently. In the darkness, Darla sat alone on the deck, head bowed.
“He can be such a jerk,” Lucky told Steph, holding on to the gate as if letting go would cause her to fall backward. She could already feel it all slipping through her fingers. She thought that maybe they would leave that night, that her father would wake her and they would steal away. She had tears in her eyes when she looked at Steph. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“For what? You haven’t done anything wrong,” Steph said, reaching for Lucky’s arm. “I know your dad says it’s all fine, but you must be so scared some days, scared that it’s all just going to…”
“Fall apart,” Lucky whispered. “Yes. I’m scared of that. I’m scared there’ll be nothing I can do to stop it.”
“You need to let us take care of you. We’re family now. It’s kismet that we met, don’t you think?” That was Steph’s favorite word right now, kismet. But no, it had not been kismet. It had been bad luck. Lucky knew this and Steph didn’t, and it had driven a wedge between them, all at once, as thick as one of the pickets in the fence. “My mom wants you to see my pediatrician,” Steph said. “She told me to try to talk to you about it, but I hadn’t yet. Just to make sure you’re okay. Maybe bring it up with your dad, okay?”
“I will,” Lucky said, decisive. “I’m going to talk to him right now.”
She left Steph standing there and walked into the yard, passing Darla, who was still sitting alone in the dark, without saying a word. But then she paused for a moment and looked back. She saw Darla watching her, her expression expectant and open. She didn’t know anything, didn’t suspect.
“You all right, Andi? Want to talk? Come sit here with me.”
“I need to go talk to my dad,” Lucky said, and turned away from Darla.
She found him in the master bedroom, sitting on his side of the bed. “Listen, kiddo, I wanted to stay here longer, I wanted to do that for you, but things are getting a little—”
“Just send me to the pediatrician. He’ll look me over and find me in perfect health, no sign of any illness—which is exactly right, and true, and miraculous. They’ll be so happy. And then we can stay. Maybe forever. Please, Dad? I really want this.”
“You don’t understand,” he said in a low voice. “It’s not that easy. No matter what, we couldn’t be happy here. Not forever.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s not human nature to be satisfied. Your happiness would unravel eventually—even if it weren’t already at risk of unraveling because of all the lies we told to be here.” We. Complicity. Partners in crime.
“I’m just a kid,” she said, but the words didn’t ring true. She had never had the chance to be just a kid. That’s why she wanted to stay here. To be a kid who maybe, just maybe, could grow into a regular person. A person like everyone else. Not a thief, not an eleven-year-old con artist.
“You love her a little bit, don’t you?” she asked. “Darla? The way she loves you?”
He looked sad when he said, “No. I can’t. You get it, don’t you, the way it feels with a mark?” Lucky refused to nod. “I feel disdain for her. For being so trusting. When a person falls for something like this, hook, line, and sinker—well, I could never, ever love someone like that. You get it, Lucky.”
“No.”
Except she did. She felt the same way about Darla and sometimes, in dark, upsetting moments, she even felt that way about Steph, wanted to shake her and say, Hello, aren’t you paying attention? Why are you just buying all this?
“You could go, and I could stay,” she whispered. “You could just… take off.”
He switched on a lamp, and she could see his face. He looked sad, and she felt guilty for suggesting they part ways. “Kiddo. I understand how badly you want this. But do you really think she would treat you the same if I just took off? She’d look at you and think of me.”
“Never mind. Forget it.”
“You and me, we need each other. You know that.”
Lucky swallowed hard. But the lump in her throat now felt permanent. What if lies wedged themselves inside you and turned into something ugly? What if she really did get sick? “I do know that,” she said. “But I just want a year. One whole year in a single place, being Andi. And then we can go.”
“The longer we stay, the harder it will be.”
“I don’t care,” Lucky said. “I don’t see how it could be any harder than it already is. Every day, I wonder if you’re going to tell me it’s time. I need an end date, and I need it to be a long enough time that I at least feel… that I at least feel like this really happened.”
During his long silence, she was sure he was thinking of a million different excuses, all of the explanations airtight and impossible to argue with. But instead he said, “All right, leave it with me. I’ll do my best.”
“Thank you,” Lucky said, and she turned and left the room feeling, for the first time in her life, like she’d won the lottery—and it wasn’t going to be enough to sustain her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Lucky stood still, arms out, as the guard patted her down just inside the tall barbed-wire gate of San Quentin State Prison. The lottery ticket was tucked into her wallet, perfectly innocent.
“All right, that way,” the guard said when he was done, and Lucky moved forward with the rest of the crowd. She followed the gravel path inside and was soon in a reception area where she was to present her ID for a second time. She was Sarah Armstrong, John Armstrong’s niece. She lived in San Francisco, worked at a bank. She had been using this ID to visit her father for the past decade. He had served less than half his sentence so far.
The guard glanced at the driver’s license, then back up at Lucky. “Haircut?” she asked. Lucky nodded. “He has another visitor. She’s just gone in. So you’ll have to wait in the area outside the visiting room until it’s your turn.”
Lucky sat down in a cracked plastic chair. Who was visiting her father? She clenched her jaw with frustration as the minutes ticked past.
Nearly
an hour later, a woman emerged from the visiting room. It had been nine years since Lucky had last seen her. Her dark brown hair was pulled back in a low, stubby ponytail, shaved underneath. She was wearing loose jeans and a tank top, and work boots with scuffed toes. Marisol Reyes. One of her father’s former “business partners” from the grift that had landed him in prison.
“Lucky?”
She stood. “What’s up? Recruiting John for another risky job, if he ever gets out? Are you even allowed to be here, Reyes?”
“My parole doesn’t restrict prison visits. And no, of course I’m not recruiting him.” She was reaching into her pocket.
The guard stepped forward and said, “Hey,” as she held up a rectangle of cardstock.
“Just giving her my business card,” Reyes said. The guard approached and examined it before handing it to Lucky and returning to the other side of the room. Marisol Reyes, it read. Driver San Diego Third-Strikers Foundation.
“What is this?”
“It’s the organization I work for now. A nonprofit—”
“Are you serious, Reyes?”
At least Reyes had the good grace to flush and look away. “This is legit. It’s a group of lawyers who help third-strikers—like your dad—get released from prison. I’m a driver, like the card says. I pick people up if the lawyers are successful in getting them out, help get them identification, clothes, a meal, leads on places to live—”
“And maybe recruit them? For your so-called charity? Maybe pawn them off on Priscilla? You should be ashamed—”
“I don’t work for Priscilla anymore. You know how badly I always wanted to get away from her. But listen, we don’t have time to discuss any of that. Your dad is struggling.” Reyes glanced at the clock behind them. “You should get in there.”
“Struggling how?”
“Forgetting things. A lot of things. Just call me, okay? To talk about your dad, but…” She stepped closer and lowered her voice. “I saw you on TV. And I promised your dad I’d always look out for you. Call me.”
Then Reyes was gone, out the waiting room door, while Lucky moved forward into the visiting room, which resembled a cafeteria. She spotted her father, sitting alone at a table in the corner, staring vacantly ahead. He looked smaller.
He started to stand when he saw her, then sat back down. The guilt she had managed to keep at bay swarmed around her like bees.
“Hi, Uncle John,” she said, sitting down at the table.
“How’ve you been, Lucky?”
“You’re not supposed to call me that,” she said, voice low.
“Sorry. It was…?”
“Sarah.”
“Right.” He smiled, embarrassed. “Sorry, it’s been a while. Sarah Armstrong. My niece.”
“Reyes mentioned you haven’t been feeling well.”
He frowned. “Did she? You saw her out there? Well, I’m not that bad.”
“Ten minutes left!” the guard nearest the door called out.
Snippets of other conversations rose around them. “I miss you so much…” “We’re having some troubles…” “Ramen noodles would be nice, maybe some chocolate…” “Baby Katie did the funniest thing last night…”
“I’m in trouble,” Lucky finally said. But she smiled so it would just seem like they were having a normal conversation, and her father did the same, his smile wobbly. “Cary. He—”
“He turned up again, after all these years?”
“This is hard. I didn’t tell you, but we were together. For the last decade.” She couldn’t tell if he was surprised. He looked hurt, more than anything. “I’m sorry, okay? I don’t have time to explain it all now—but he took off on me.”
“Ah, well, good riddance. I didn’t tell you, but I always knew he was—”
“You don’t get it. We were… working.” She looked at her father steadily, hoping he would understand. “We went too far. A lot of money was involved. Not ours.”
“I see,” her father said. “I know what working means.”
“We had a plan. To go to Dominica. But instead, he took off. The day before yesterday. Now they’re looking for me. I’m in trouble.” She saw the hurt in his eyes and it was a hard thing to witness: the pain she had been planning to cause him by taking off.
“Truth is, I don’t know how I can help you,” he said sadly. “Not from in here. I’m so sorry, kiddo. I never wanted this to happen to you.”
“I have something that could help, though—something big.” She glanced at the guard nearest their table, but he wasn’t paying attention to them. “Remember you and me, our road trips when I was a kid, how you’d always let me buy a lottery ticket and play my lucky numbers? Do you remember?”
“Sure,” he said. “Of course I do.”
“I bought a ticket to remember you by.”
“Like I was dead or something? Gone from your life, that was going to be it, after everything—”
“I won.”
He stopped talking. He blinked a few times. “How much?”
“All of it.”
“Don’t joke.”
“I won three hundred and ninety million dollars.”
He hooted out a laugh. “Did I hear you right? Are you sure you’re not putting me on?”
“Why would I come all the way here, under my current circumstances, to tell you a joke about a winning lottery ticket?”
He was silent. Then, “Well, what are you going to do about it?”
“That’s what I was hoping you could help me with.”
“Have you done the math?” he asked.
“What math?”
“On how many years, if you got brought in. Any idea?”
“It would be a lot,” she said over a frightened lump in her throat. “More than you. Probably thirty.”
Reyes’s card was still in Lucky’s hand. She had been fiddling with it, hands nervous in her lap, but now she lifted them onto the table and her father looked at it.
“No—what you should not do is ask Reyes for help. She’s on probation. She’s doing so well. Couldn’t be associating herself with someone who was—well, you know, trouble. Did she tell you when you saw her in the waiting area, about her job?”
Lucky shoved Reyes’s card in her pocket. “I won’t call her,” she said. “Don’t worry. You’ll get out, with your precious Reyes helping you.” The bitter jealousy in her voice made her feel seventeen again. “And I—” In the silence between them that followed, Lucky was aware of the seconds ticking past, seconds that had seemed so precious before but were now worthless. “Who knows what I’ll do? Not your problem, I guess.”
“Five minutes!” a guard shouted.
He started wringing his hands, a nervous habit she was not familiar with. “You know,” he said, unclasping his hands and putting them on the table, “you truly are the luckiest girl in the world. I’ve always told you—”
“Stop. Please. Not now. I’m not.”
“Sure, it’s complicated. But you’ll find a way with this ticket. You just have to have faith.”
That word. The idea of having faith, of being good. Lucky reached up and touched the crucifix hanging from her neck.
“What about Gloria?” she found herself saying, the gold of the cross warm against her fingers.
That confused expression was back on her father’s face.
“Gloria? I haven’t thought about her in years.”
“Where is she now, do you know?”
“She’d be outside of Cooperstown, of course, still running the Devereaux family fishing camp, which she ran off from the city to do after she left me high and dry—unless she’s dead, which I doubt; she’s too young, younger than me, of course, and we’re still technically married so you’d think someone would have told me. But why would you ask—” A slow dawning; he realized he had said too much, and Lucky realized she was missing something—but what? “Oh. Shit,” her father said.
“What if I did it, went to that camp you just mentioned and found
her? Wouldn’t having a winning lottery ticket be attractive to her, to anyone? Wouldn’t it help her want to know me? Finally? Millions and millions of dollars?”
“Oh, God, kiddo. Really? You’ve never even met her, and you’re going to show up in the situation you’re in? It’s not just about the ticket, or the money. Gloria is—”
“Four minutes!” shouted the guard.
“You used to act like I never had a mother,” she said. “Like I dropped onto this planet fully formed. Like I don’t need her and never have! But you know where she is—”
“This is why you really came. To grill me for information about your mother. You don’t visit for a year, and now you come for this.”
It was a familiar game, this quick attempt to turn the tables. At least he was up to it, at least his mind was working well enough to play it. Cold comfort.
“No. I came to ask you for help.”
“All right, then. I’ll help. You have this ticket, and all you need is someone to cash it in for you. Someone you can trust.” His eyes lit up. “I have an idea. Darla, Steph! They were like family, once.”
“No, they weren’t. We were just pretending.”
“You could go to them, tell them I ended up in jail, and you, you never had anything to do with any of my cons. Steph loved you like a sister, you can’t deny that. Go to them, appeal to their emotions. It’s brilliant, actually, because we know the things they’ll do for love. Tell them they’re all you have, even to this day, and now you’re in trouble, and could they cash in the ticket for you. It’s perfect.”
“I don’t understand why you think I have a better chance with Darla, with Steph, than I do with someone who has an actual blood connection to me. I need a sure thing here.”
“Priscilla, then. That woman can make anything happen.”
Lucky felt any hope she had held out when she had decided to come here fly away from her, out the barred windows. “No way.”
“She’ll help you. You’ll have to give her a cut, of course—”
“That woman is a snake.”
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