The old lady’s head bobs as she says, “Young man, a woman in her eighties doesn’t come answering the door in a second. I don’t walk so fast these days.”
“Mabel Paterson?”
“Yes. What can I do for you?”
“My name is Oliver Black. I’d like to ask you a few questions, if it’s not too much trouble.”
“Oh, my.” Her voice is high, fretted. “Has my Billy done something wrong?”
Oliver doesn’t know who Billy is, but figures he should find out. He pulls a photograph of Sophie from his pocket. “Have you seen this woman, Miss Paterson?”
“Mrs. Paterson, young man,” the lady corrects. “September eighth was the six year anniversary of my late husband William’s death.” She sighs. “Every day I miss him more.”
“My condolences, ma’am. But have you seen her?”
Squinting her eyes to look at the photo, she shakes her head. “No. I haven’t. I would remember a pretty face like that one. I told the police I know nothing of this girl you’re looking for. I’ve never seen her before. Are you a cop?”
Oliver remembers being asked that question by Sophie and smiles to himself. There’s not a moment in the day that she doesn’t enter his thoughts in one way or another.
“I’m not a cop, Mrs. Paterson. I’m just a man looking for a piece of his life that’s missing. You see, I’ve lost someone too. Someone I care about. I would appreciate it if you could help me.”
Something about him tells the old lady he’s breathing without really being alive. “When I lost William to cancer, I didn’t know what to do with me. For sixty-six years, there was only we. Come in. Don’t forget Betty.”
“Betty?”
She points her crinkly finger to his feet where Betty the cat is looking up at Oliver with glowing blue eyes and a scruffy tail wrapped around his ankle. Oliver picks up the cat guardedly, like it has fleas, and carries it into the living room.
“Would you like water or something? My Billy will be home any second. He can fix you up with a sandwich, maybe some fried chicken. I’ve got a hot pocket in the microwave.”
“No, ma’am, thank you. That’s awfully nice of you.”
Mrs. Paterson sits down on a rocking chair. Oliver drops the cat, and it scrambles off to loaf on her lap. She caresses it absently.
He sits down on the floral sofa opposite her. “This Billy, is he your son?”
“Grandson. William Patrick Conner. Named after his granddaddy. He’s a nice young boy, always getting my medicines and cooking for me. Likes to help people, even if he doesn’t know them. One time he looked out after a homeless man in a wheelchair. He never stops giving. Bless his heart.”
“I see. And he lives with you?”
She nods. “Mm-hmm. His mother died when he was two. And his father, he…” She rocks in her chair and looks past Oliver. “He went to buy milk for Billy’s school lunch.”
“Do you think I can have a word with him?”
“I’m afraid that’s impossible. Billy’s father never came back from the market. That was twelve years ago. It’s just my sweet boy Billy and me looking after one another.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. What does your grandson do for a living?”
“He goes about with Big Red.”
“Big Red? Who’s he?”
“A contractor, I think. Billy says he fixes up houses, makes them good again. Roofs, new carpets, that sort of stuff. I’ve never met him.”
There is a clattering of keys and the door swings open. A young, tall, skinny chap stands in the opening. Oliver and the old lady turn to see Billy step inside.
“Grams, whose fancy car is parked out—” Billy’s gaze finds Oliver sitting on his gram’s sofa.
Oliver stares at him with distrustful eyes.
Billy becomes stiff and cold at the sight of a stranger in his house.
“Now, William,” says the old lady, petting Betty the cat, “we have a guest. This is Mr. Black. He’s come looking for us to help him.”
“Yeah, sure,” Billy mumbles uneasily. He has light-colored hair, gray eyes, and a timid smile. His manner suggests both caution and fear. “Help with what? If this is about that stupid speeding ticket, I’m going to pay it.”
Why does everyone assume I’m a cop? Oliver wonders.
“He’s looking for someone,” the old lady says.
Oliver stands and approaches Billy, making note of the horrified look on Billy’s face. He pulls out the small photograph of Sophie and holds it up for him to see. “Have you seen her?”
Billy looks at the photo, shaking his head. “Nah, man,” he says. “I haven’t seen her.”
Oliver knows all about traitors and enemies and can always tell when people are holding things back.
“The police say you called the kidnapping line twice,” he says, sitting down on the sofa again.
“Kidnapping line?” Mrs. Paterson shrieks. “What kidnapping line? Billy, what is he talking about?”
Billy shrugs it off. “It’s nothing, Grams. I told them it was the wrong number.”
“Was it?” Oliver probes.
“Yeah, man. I was trying to call someone else.”
“Who?”
“A friend.”
“Does your friend own a toll-free telephone number? Because if that’s not the case, why would you dial 1-800? I’d say that’s far from a mistake.”
Billy says nothing. There is only silence, and the noisy hum of the old refrigerator.
“William Patrick, you answer this gentleman’s questions, boy.”
“Grams, shouldn’t you be in bed?”
Mabel Paterson is old, but she’s been lucid for a darn long time. “No grandson of mine is going to be bad-mannered. You a Connor, boy. Show some respect for this man’s troubles.”
Billy sighs. “Look, man, I don’t mean to be a jerk or anything. I talked to the police already. I don’t know anything about your girlfriend. Just leave my grams and me alone. She’s sick and needs to take her meds. I have to put her to nap.”
His words bounce around in Oliver’s head. “You’re right. You go on and put your grandmother to bed. I’ll wait.”
Billy starts across the living room to the rocking chair. “Come on, Grams. Time for your nap.” Betty the cat meows as he scoops her up and dumps her on the floor. He helps his grams up from the chair and gives her his arm for the walk to her room. Billy knows he’ll be coming back to find Oliver where he left him. He knows he’ll ask more questions. Billy doesn’t believe in God, but prays for Oliver to leave. Once he puts Grams to rest, he goes into another room and makes a call on his cellphone. “We have a problem,” Billy says into the line. “Oliver is here. What do you want me to do?” He carefully listens for a few seconds, then hangs up. When he gets back to the living room, Oliver is sitting with one leg crossed over the other. He’s waiting, though he doesn’t look so patient with his fingers drumming on his leg.
There is a very long pause before Oliver looks up at Billy and says, “I didn’t tell you she was my girlfriend.”
Billy blinks.
Oliver gets up and steps forward.
Billy backs up a step.
“I-I watch TV,” Billy stutters. “You’re on the news. They say she’s your girlfriend, Sophie. I don’t know anything. I’m sorry, man. I can’t help you out. You need to leave.”
Oliver exhales. “I don’t like it when people withhold information. I especially don’t like it when people lie to my face.”
“I’m not lying.”
“Why don’t you tell me about Big Red?”
“Big Red? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Do I look like an idiot to you? It’s an anagram for Bridge. Fucking child’s play. Now talk.”
“Man, I swear to you I don’t know anything.”
“I’m going to lay it out for you nicely,” he says in a chillingly dangerous voice. “You see, I’m running out of patience. And you’re running out of excuses. It’s b
een seven days since I last saw her, so you better believe me when I say this now. If you have anything, and I mean anything, to do with Sophie’s disappearance, I will see to it that you spend your better years in jail for committing such stupidity. You don’t know who you’re dealing with.” His words are venomous and sharp. “You care about your grandmother, don’t you? What do you think is going to happen to her once you’re locked up? She won’t have you anymore to look after her. Medicine? Gone. Food? Gone. She’ll have to vacate her house after violating her lease. Her subsidy? Gone. She ends up in a convalescent home with a nurse who gives her the wrong meds. All because I said so. Is that what you want?”
Billy shakes his head.
“Good. Now, here’s the deal.”
“There’s a deal?”
“This is America. There’s always a deal. You come clean right now and I’ll let you off the hook. Won’t even mention your name to the police. If you refuse to cooperate, then you will go to prison. Say goodbye to everything you care about on the outside. They’ll put you in with the rapists and murderers. What are you, twenty-two…twenty-three?”
Billy’s answer comes out as an almost silent squeak.
“What was that?”
He clears his throat. “Twenty-one,” he says louder.
“Oh, you’re going to fit right in. When you’re serving time and some redneck queer is looking for a young boy to gently caress him in the shower, you’ll wish you had listened to me. You seem like a good kid. I don’t think you want to hurt anyone. You’re probably in it for the money. Your grandmother, she thinks the world of you. She needs you. Think about her.”
Oliver sits back down, thinking he’s presented a good deal Billy won’t pass up. Then, he slowly rises at hearing Billy say, “She’s in the storm cellar.”
“What did you say?”
“She’s…she’s in the storm cellar. In the backyard.”
OLIVER DOESN’T MAKE a run for the storm cellar. Instead, he walks like his shoes are too tight, taking short little mooching steps. For Oliver, everything is imaginary until he experiences it first-hand. He’s a man of science and practical logical, and until he sees her with his own eyes, feels her with his own hands, breathes her aroma—he can’t be completely sure.
Billy leads the way. He throws the storm cellar door open and they jump down to the blackness of the underground. Billy swings a steel door wide and flips a light switch to illuminate a stale, cold room.
“There she is,” Billy says.
There are fold-up bunk beds on the walls, a TV playing cartoons on mute, and a small wooden table with a bunch of empty Mott’s applesauce. As Oliver takes a few steps to one of the mattresses, he sees long, golden hair spread across the pillow and a bulge inside the sheet covers. She’s facing the wall, the sheet pulled up over her face. As he comes near her, he puts his hand on her and feels her body heave up and down. She’s breathing. She’s alive.
“Sophie,” he nudges her gently, “it’s me.”
She pulls the sheet down from her eyes and turns over to look at Oliver. There are sobs. There is joy. There are screams. But there is no Sophie.
Oliver exhales his shock. “Sarah…”
She quickly throws her languid arms around his neck. She hangs on tightly, as if never letting go.
“Are you all right?” Oliver holds her head against his chest.
Sarah nods, weeping into his shirt.
“Where’s Sophie?”
More sobs. She’s panicked, unable to speak. “I…I don’t know,” she says, looking at him as if he were an apparition. “I was with her. I don’t remember. We were in a dark room. John was there and then—”
“Then what?”
“I don’t know. Then he…” Sarah turns her attention to Billy. She charges toward him, smacking him all over. “What did you do? I trusted you!”
Billy puts his arms up in front of his face.
“Hey, shake it off!” Oliver quickly breaks them apart and pushes them away from each other with enough force to send Billy stumbling backward. Enraged, he yells, “Where is she?”
“John…John has her, man. Take it easy. She’s alive. He’s not going to hurt her. I swear. He only wants to—”
Oliver slams his fist into the concrete wall, sending rubble and dust flying. He moves forward and pins Billy to the wall by his throat. “Where is she?” he demands. “Where?” he shouts an ear-splitting roar.
Billy looks at him, shaking with fear. Oliver can crush his neck in a second if he wants to. “She’s in…in—” Oliver is strangling him, hitting his head against the wall. “Where?”
“No, Oliver! You’re killing him! We need him!” Sarah clutches his arms to make him stop.
At last, he stops.
“I can take you to her,” says Billy, when he’s finally able to speak. “But there are things you gotta know.”
“Like what?” He looks at Sarah.
“It’s not what you think. It’s complicated. Our deal…is it still on? My grams, man. She needs me. I need to know she’s gonna be all right.”
“Where is she?” he yells.
“Just…just calm down. He has her in a storage unit.”
F I V E
* * *
Losers Cry Winners Deal
NEW YORK CITY is a get-up-and-go metropolis. You either love it or hate it. There is no middle ground. It doesn’t shut up and it has no mercy. It doesn’t sleep, mostly because it has no time. Time is money, and New York knows all about money. Many say it’s the greatest city in the world. New York embraces you and is glad to have you. It doesn’t matter if you’re a mutant; New York gives you the acceptance to be whoever you want to be. No one stares at you or judges you. In fact, no one cares about you. Everyone is in his or her own bubble, catching the subway, rushing to work, waiting in line for coffee. No one has it all figured out, but if you’re a dreamer, a doer, and have that little something extra to make it there, New York will open its arms and say, “Welcome!”
At the sound of the blaring alarm clock, Sophie shoots up in panic and grabs the first thing she touches on the bedside table—an empty crystal vase. She holds it in the air as a threat, but realizes it’s only her wakeup call. In Canada, there was no TV, no checking emails, no alarms, and no reason to rush. She turns to Oliver’s pillow and sees three sticky notes in a row left to right. The first one says, “Time to train.”
She rolls her eyes and reads the second note. “Don’t groan.”
Grumbling, she reads the third. “I heard that.”
Unsurprisingly, when Sophie hits the gym on the first floor, she’s ready to kick someone in the rear. Oliver, having already clocked two hours practicing karate with his bo staff, pours water over his head from a sports bottle.
“All right, hot stuff, show me what you got,” she says, hitting the air like Popeye on spinach.
Oliver, of course, laughs. “Are you sure you want me to? I have three world championship titles.”
“God, your ego is huge.”
“You know that’s not all.”
“Don’t get cocky.”
“First, what are you wearing?”
She puts one hand on her hip. “What? These are my work out clothes.”
“According to who?”
“Victoria’s Secret.”
“You can tell Victoria those are pajamas.”
“Are not! Come on already, teach me some cool ninja moves.”
He pats his face dry with a towel. “You watch too many action movies. First thing you need to know about Karate is that it’s self-defense, not self-offense.”
“Don’t Miyagi me. You’re not going to make me wax a car, are you?”
“I’m glad you asked. Second thing you need to know is patience.”
She sighs, holds up her hands, then presses them together and bows.
Oliver smiles. “Take off your shoes, sweetheart. We train in bare feet.”
Martial arts is his bridge toward discipline and balance, ha
s been since he was four. Without Karate, Oliver often wonders the type of person he’d be.
SOPHIE HAS ONE thought on her mind. Ow. Karate kicked her ass. Fresh out of the shower, she dresses in mid-rise skinny jeans, a rosy peplum sweater, and gray over-the-knee boots. She goes to the bed and pulls the bedspread, blankets, and sheets off. Oliver comes through the bedroom door, his bare-chest dripping with sweat, and a gym towel around his shoulders.
“What are you doing, woman?” he asks her, his hands settling on his hips.
“I’m making the bed.”
He chuckles softly. “What is this love affair you have with making the bed? The upstairs maid can do that.”
She spreads the sheets over the larger than life mattress. “And so can I. It’s a therapeutic pleasure. Leave me alone. You have karate and I have the bed.”
“Therapeutic? No kidding.”
“Yes,” she says, turning to look at him. “It’s a keystone habit. I read it in a book.”
“What’s that?”
“You don’t know what a keystone habit is?” She’s joyfully shaken to be the one to enlighten him for a change.
“Would I be asking you if I did?”
“A keystone habit is a catalyst for other good habits. Making the bed is supposed to help you get through rough patches. When I was a little girl, my room was the size of this bed. Mine was so small I had to sleep in one position.”
“Is that why you move around all night?”
“I guess.”
She lays the black satin comforter over the sheets and checks to see if both sides are draped evenly.
Oliver walks forward and stops very close to her.
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