by Robin Spano
Elizabeth felt her arms begin to tremble. “Would you have — hypothetically — killed these people for no reason? Or would you have needed a motive?”
“Um . . . that’s a bit of a stretch, now. First you ask me to imagine I’m a murderer. Now you want me to imagine a motive?”
Elizabeth nodded, clenching her teeth inside closed lips.
“It would depend on who I killed, wouldn’t it?”
“Josie Carter.”
Joe pursed his lips and stared at the wall behind Elizabeth. “Josie talked a lot, didn’t she? I don’t remember her too well. But I guess that might annoy me.”
“Talked a lot in general?”
“Yeah, and specifically. You said she wanted you to cheat at cards.”
Elizabeth’s fists tightened. “Do you think the killer is also the Dealer?”
Joe laughed. “Of course the killer is the Dealer. Why else would the people who blew the system end up dead?”
“Um . . . the system?”
Joe rolled his eyes. “This is common knowledge, Lizzie. Personally, I think George is the man we should be after. I don’t understand why they let him out of jail. I know they think they have this evidence on me, but there’s more on him.”
Elizabeth gnawed on her lower lip. The pain felt good. “So Josie talked too much. Why did Jimmy Streets have to die?”
“You forgot to say What If. Someone listening might mistake this for a confession.”
It was like playing a game with a four-year-old. “What if you killed Jimmy Streets? Why would you have done that?”
“Well, I — like I said, I really think it’s George, but if it was me — I think Jimmy was sniffing too close around the scam’s mechanics. Jimmy wouldn’t have cheated — he was good at the game — but if his best friend T-Bone Jones was in on the action, Jimmy might have smelled a rat. He might have been close to finding the rat and holding it up for public scrutiny.”
Elizabeth’s toes curled at the thought of a dead rat being held up by its tail. “And Willard Oppal?”
“Oppal?” Joe snorted. “God, anyone would have killed Oppal. Who needs another cop on the scene?”
“Loni Mills?”
“Freeloading. Loni was — you know, allegedly — cheating for free on the back of her boyfriend. And talking. Maybe if I was a killer, I’d find a way to kill her twice.”
Elizabeth didn’t laugh along with Joe. “And Fiona? What if?”
“Fiona bolted. I’m sure the Dealer didn’t like that. It was his game; not hers. She should have let the Dealer keep control of the cards.”
Elizabeth wondered why Joe’s tone had changed so suddenly. Had he actually felt an emotion when killing Fiona? Or maybe it was simpler. “Wasn’t it her murder that got you caught?”
“Some cabs in B.C. and in Washington State have images of someone they think was me in their cameras. But that guy had long black dreads, and as you can see I have short hair with blond tips, so I’m not really sure what’s made them make that connection.” Joe shrugged. “Is it because we both have a scar on our cheek? The scar could be makeup. There’s way more evidence on George. Plus I was home at the casino playing poker. I was Snow White that night. It even says so on Twitter.”
“Snow White was Oliver for most of the night. Come on, Joe. No one’s convinced.”
“Come on, Liz,” Joe said. “No one’s convicted.”
“Okay, Joe. One more What If. What if you were the Dealer? Why would you have cheated when you’re so damn good at the game?”
“Ah,” Joe said. “Finally, an interesting question.”
Elizabeth waited.
“Poker has no guarantees. You can play like God and still get beaten.”
“So?” Elizabeth watched Joe’s face change, somehow, from the cold killer of a moment ago into the man she could picture herself crawling into bed with.
“You know how I grew up. I had nothing.”
“That’s why I don’t understand your materialism as an adult. You know you can survive on nothing. What do you care if you have a boat and a mansion?”
“I never want to depend on anyone again.”
Elizabeth didn’t comment on the irony of that, with a life in jail the most likely scenario ahead of Joe.
“If I was the Dealer, it would have nothing to do with materialism, and everything to do with never having to ask anyone for anything ever again.”
“But you had enough for that already. If you’d invested —”
“I have enough to invest and live a quiet, simple life. But that’s not me. I plan to soar, Lizzie. You’ll soar with me — when you stop believing I’m guilty, anyway. Look, this game is done. I’m not the killer. I’m not the Dealer. Just get me a fucking lawyer — a good one — so I can get out of this place.”
“I thought you had some super-fancy lawyer flying in from the States.”
“He’s not here yet. I want out.”
“Are other people even real to you?”
Joe looked blank.
“If you think of someone else being in pain, do you feel anything?”
Joe shrugged. “Should I?”
Elizabeth shook her head, trying to clear it.
“Seriously, Liz. Should I feel something? Because I’m pretty sure people are just making that crap up, when they say, ‘I feel your pain.’”
“What about the baby?”
“I felt that.” Joe went quiet.
“Thank god something can wipe that stupid grin off your face.”
“I mean I really felt it. I thought it was a new beginning.”
“You would have been bored of the baby as soon as it kept you awake all night crying. Hell, you might have killed it if it really pissed you off.”
“Elizabeth, stop it.” Joe was getting angry, something she couldn’t remember ever having seen. “That baby could have cried for twelve years. It was my chance to change — it’s already changed me — don’t you see?”
“No.”
Joe shrugged. “Not like it matters now. You’ve already killed it.”
“Have fun in jail, Joe.”
ONE HUNDRED AND SIX
CLARE
“What do you have? Aces?” Clare couldn’t beat aces. She couldn’t even beat a bluff.
“Yeah,” Noah said. “Plus the ace on the board makes three.”
“You’ll show me, right? If I fold?” They were playing strip poker in Clare’s bedroom. Nobody cared who won.
“I’ll show you anything you want.” Noah spread his palms in front of him.
Clare frowned. “Except inside your brain.”
“It’s gross in there. All that gray matter, and blood vessels snaking through it.”
“Fine.” Clare looked at her fingernails. The polish was chipped in a few places. She hadn’t decided whether to reapply it or let it fade away. “I’ll settle for the outside of you.”
“I’ll show you all of that.”
“You already have.” Clare folded her cards and let her eyes rest on the uneven hardwood floor that was scattered with clothes and suitcases. She would miss this apartment. “I’m just not sure it’s enough.”
“Can it be enough for now?”
“Yeah,” Clare said. “It can be enough for now.”
“You know when I first met you?” Noah picked up his hole cards and looked at Clare over their rim.
Clare nodded. The lights from the restaurant sign across the street flickered off, darkening the window.
“Bert told me not to fall for you. He told me I should be prepared to see you as my enemy.”
“Why?” Clare laughed, though a shiver moved through her fairly quickly.
“Because everyone you meet is supposed to be a potential criminal. It’s what I hate about this job. You sure you want it?”
“Of course I want this job.” Clare shoved the rest of her chips into the middle of her messy futon. “I’m all in.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This was a fun book to write. I had help from a lot of cool places:
My husband, Keith Whybrow, pushes me to follow my dream and pulls me back to reality when I’m following that dream too intensely. He helped with the mechanics of the cheating scam in this book, and he’s the guy who dared me to put real money on a poker game years ago when I was too chicken.
My sister, Erin Kawalecki, pores over each and every word of my manuscripts, sometimes multiple versions, making change suggestions on a word level and on a big picture level. Several of the zinger lines are hers. I feel like she’s my secret writing weapon.
My friend, Scott Hicks, much prefers to read short literary stories or anything by Alice Munro. Still, he reads my pages-in-progress and offers really helpful commentary. Things like, “This character is boring. Get rid of him or make him more exciting.” And “Have you ever noticed that all your lines of dialogue have the same structure? It’s annoying as hell. You need to change that.”
My friend, Christine Cheng, is another master of brutal honesty. “No, no, no,” she says when something doesn’t work. She’s equally amazing at suggesting ways to change what she doesn’t like, and her advice helped me around several hurdles with this book.
My cousin, Chloe Dirksen, put a smile on my face with her quirky enjoyment of the characters and her awesome ability to show me specific lines and areas that didn’t work for her. She reads like a writer — the helpful kind!
My cousin, Christie Nash, showed me a lot of places that left her wanting more. She helped me see what areas and characters needed clarification and expansion. And she read the MS on her honeymoon — that’s huge family devotion.
My aunt, Shelley Peterson — a published YA writer whose books I highly recommend — helps me a lot with the emotional side of Clare. She’s a master at highlighting when a reaction isn’t logical, or when I’m not writing true to a character. She’s also great with plot logistics.
My mom, Dona Matthews, read this manuscript the fastest out of anyone. Her constant emails over the course of two days telling me she was tired because she couldn’t put the book down the night before — or here she was, reading in the garden with a Scotch when she should be cooking dinner — were incredibly encouraging in that early maybe-this-whole-novel-sucks-and-I-should-throw-it-out stage.
On the intel front: my friends Deb Ferguson and Lorna Boyle gave me expert tips about how to cross the B.C./Washington border undetected, as well as a geography lesson about Mount Baker.
Emily Schultz is the best editor I could imagine. She gave several specific suggestions (my favorite is the line about “goat fucks”) and she taught me how to breathe life into a scene with visuals. She’s an excellent writer in her own right as well.
Sally Harding and her colleagues at the Cooke Agency are editorial geniuses. They helped me restructure the story to challenge Clare and make her show her stuff. They also give extremely wise industry advice. With them on my side, I feel armed to navigate this tricky writing business with confidence.
My friend Dave Scott is my poker mentor. He gave me a reading list of poker books when I started playing for real money, which turned the game into the hobby that spawned this novel.
The cover artists, Scott and Sarah Barrie from Cyanotype, designed this kick-ass cover and have shared lots of other art clips that adorn my website and brand the series. Great people to work with, too.
Finally, the people who put this all together: ECW Press is a match made in publisher heaven for me. They indulge my weird promotional ideas, they loop me into each stage of the production process, and they make me feel cool by association. These people are: Jack David, Sarah Dunn, David Caron, Crissy Boylan, Erin Creasey, Jen Knoch, Troy Cunningham, Simon Ware, and copyeditor Cat London.
Robin Spano grew up in downtown Toronto and now lives with her husband in Lions Bay, B.C., a tiny mountain village just outside Vancouver. She enjoys being outside and active, exploring local roads on her motorcycle and waterways in her clunker of a boat, Little Trollop. She is also the author of Dead Politician Society (2010).