by Barry Lyga
“Couldn’t do it,” Jasper said, and started weeping. It was an awful sight, the tears streaking the mask of blood on his face. “I’m so sorry. I couldn’t. I’m sorry.” It tumbled out of him, over and over, a soul-curdling mantra of regret for mercy. Hughes couldn’t get him to stop, no matter what he did, so he rested Dent’s head on his knee and held his hand and listened to him as the first siren sounded in the distance.
Hughes waited with Tanner outside as the EMTs rushed in and out of the Dawes house. Even outside, he could hear them shouting at one another, running up and down the stairs. After a few minutes, they brought out Jasper on a stretcher. The kid wasn’t moving, but an EMT had an oxygen mask over him and they were racing.
A moment later, they wheeled out Janice Dent. Hughes caught the eye of one of the EMTs, who simply shook his head.
The ambulances took off down the dirt driveway, hauling ass, sirens alive and screeching. Tanner said nothing for a while. Neither did Hughes.
“You don’t have to stick around,” the sheriff said at last. “I’ll stay with crime scene. I can get someone to give you a lift to your hotel.”
“I’ll stay,” Hughes said. His body was still on an epinephrine high, and he couldn’t imagine being cooped up in a hotel room right now. He could taste the adrenaline, flooding his mouth like hot steel.
“Was dark in there,” Tanner said after a spell of silence. “Not quite sure what I saw.”
“Yeah.” Hughes cleared his throat and craned his neck, gazing up at the night sky. Damn. He’d never realized how many stars were up there. He had to get out of the city more often. “I’ll tell you what I saw. I saw that kid defending himself.”
“That’s what it looked like to me, too.” They didn’t look at each other. Didn’t share a conspiratorial wink. Hughes wondered if the bright flashing thing in the sky was really a star or just a plane. Didn’t matter. From down here, it was beautiful.
“You know the ironic thing?” Tanner asked.
“What’s that?”
“Best I can tell, Jazz was her only living blood relative. So he’ll be the one…”
Tanner drifted off; Hughes got the point.
“Well, hell. It’s a funny world, isn’t it, Sheriff?”
“Funny like a heart attack.”
CHAPTER 59
Jazz opened his eyes.
The world was a dirty windshield.
He left it again.
He woke up again.
A hand held his. Cool and familiar.
He sank back into sleep.
Again.
He thought he caught a flash of Connie’s hand.
And a wheelchair.
I did that to her. It’s my fault.
He passed out again.
This time, they placed a guard inside his hospital room. He recognized the deputy’s uniform, so he was still in the Nod. He didn’t know the deputy, though. They didn’t want him playing on someone’s sympathy.
And just in case, they’d handcuffed him to the bed again.
If he’d thought anyone would believe him, Jazz would have told them that the guard and the cuffs were both overkill. Sure, he could pick the handcuff lock, but he wouldn’t be going anywhere in the near future. His leg actually hurt less than the rest of his body. Between the broken ribs from the bullet, the blood loss, and the multiple stab wounds, he couldn’t sit up, much less get out of bed.
He had a lot of time. To think.
It happened.
That was first. He had to start there. Had to acknowledge it.
He rolled it around in his mind for impossibly long minutes. He tasted it.
Everything happened and everything was true. Even the lies were true.
It all happened. It wasn’t a dream.
And I’m still alive.
I guess that’s something.
Howie was the first to visit him. He’d thought it might be the cops, but it wasn’t.
Howie loped into the room as if he did this every day. His face and forehead looked much improved from the last time Jazz had seen him, the scar barely visible. Jazz wondered how long he’d been unconscious.
With a derisive snort and a glare at the deputy, Howie hauled a chair bedside and plopped into it. “I was going to bake you a cake with a hacksaw inside it,” he said without preamble, “but—”
“But you realized it wouldn’t work.”
“Well, no. I realized I don’t know how to bake.”
Laughing hurt like hell, but Jazz tried to enjoy the pain. Pain meant life. Pain was better than the alternative.
“A man’s got to know his limitations,” he told Howie.
Howie’s head bobbled like a doll’s. “True dat, dawg. I’m just so freakin’ glad that your aunt turned out not to be a serial killer. That would have said things about my psyche that I’m not ready to explore yet. I’m waiting until I’m on my own health insurance to go into therapy—my parentals have paid out enough, you know?”
Sam. If he’d had the energy, Jazz would have felt guilty for assuming she was Ugly J. “Where is she?” That she’d been cleared as a killer only made it more likely she was a victim.
Howie shrugged and handed over a torn-open envelope that said JAZZ on the front. He fumbled out a sheet of paper, unfolded it, and read.
Jazz—
I am so sorry to do this. You can’t imagine how sorry. But I have to leave. I can’t take it here. I thought that maybe I could help Mom and connect with you and a part of me wants that, but I can’t do it. I’m leaving in the morning. Please don’t look for me. Please don’t come after me. I left the Nod to get away from the Dent crazy, and it reached out and pulled me back.
And then, in a different color ink, clearly scrawled in haste:
So sorry.
Sam
“The, uh, the cops figure she started the letter—”
“And then finished it the night you and Gramma went to the hospital.” He could see it, if he tried. Sam, struggling with the decision, starting the letter in order to work out her thoughts and feelings. Figuring she could always finish it when she couldn’t stand any more.
And then Howie busts in with a shotgun. Gramma collapses, Sam reacts, Howie’s bleeding on the floor.… Sam panics. She calls 911, and she realizes she can’t handle it. Can’t stick around for the aftermath. Can’t get sucked back in. So she scribbles a sorry and she leaves town.
Jazz had a hard time being angry with her.
He beckoned Howie closer and, checking to make sure the deputy couldn’t hear, whispered, “You still have the book, right?”
Howie made a great show of glowering at the deputy, who didn’t even notice. “Yep.”
“Where did you hide it?”
“I sort of forgot to. It’s sitting on my desk at home.”
“Howie!”
“Chillax. No one knows what it is. They can’t be looking for something they don’t know about.”
Jazz supposed that was true.
“So what was your plan? Kill Billy, then get the book, decipher it, and start hunting down Crows?”
“Something like that.” I HUNT KILLERS was still emblazoned on his chest, after all.
“Maybe we leave that to the cops, hmm?”
“Sounds good to me.” Jazz grabbed Howie’s hand. “Thanks, man. For having my back.”
“Always.”
Connie was there later, when he woke from another impromptu nap. Or maybe he’d slept for days. He rubbed his beard stubble, but he’d never grown it out before, so he didn’t know how long it accounted for.
When she rolled herself into the room, he began weeping uncontrollably. She had a cast on her leg, which jutted out before her, and her face was puffy and mottled with bruises and swelling, her scalp covered in butterfly stitches, bandages, and gauze. She rolled to his bedside in her wheelchair and took his hand—cool, slim, the hand—and his shame turned his head away from her.
“Jazz, look at me.”
He couldn’t.
She was in pain, she was damaged because of him. Because of his quest for redemption, his ego, his self-absorption. How could he look at her?
She raised his hand and kissed it, softly. At her touch, a fresh wave of tears broke out. “I’m so sorry,” he sobbed. “I’m sorry.”
She held his hand and stroked his arm and sat quietly until the tears could come no more. With a gentle hand, she touched his temple, his ruined cheek, fluttering nimbly around the stitches.
“We’re a matching pair,” she said.
He laughed again, the pain proving the life. He finally turned to face her, and she was as beautiful as ever. They were a matching pair. The world saw a black girl and a white boy, but he knew the truth. Connie was the other half of him.
“ ‘If you go—if you kill him—we’re over,’ ” he quoted.
“I changed my mind,” she said, and leaned over to kiss him. He didn’t have much range and she couldn’t lean very far, but it was still the sweetest kiss he’d ever had.
“You lied to me,” he said.
“No, I changed my mind,” she said with some sass. “There’s a difference.”
“Not then. Last year. During the Impressionist case. We were at the Hideout, and you told me that when you came to the Nod, you knew who I was, but you fell in love with me, anyway.” He paused, gathering his strength. Talking for a long stretch hurt his cheeks, his neck, his chest. Pretty much everything. “But you didn’t know who I was until you looked me up online after our first date. I forgot all about that until recently.”
She shrugged. “Okay, you caught me. But you were in a pretty bad place last year, and it was what you needed.”
“Feel free to lie whenever I need it.”
“Deal.”
“I think that’s when I realized I’d fallen in love with you,” he said soberly. “But I get it if you—”
“Don’t even finish that sentence.”
“Don’t you wonder, though? It was bad enough when I had Billy weighing on me. But with both parents… How could I possibly—”
“Howie and I talked about that. When we realized your mom was Ugly J, we thought the same thing.”
“It’s okay; I don’t blame you.”
“I wasn’t asking for forgiveness. We thought it, too. Of course. But you know what? First of all, not everything is passed down. Not everything is genetic.”
“But I grew up in—”
“And second of all.” She tightened her grip on his hand to silence him. “Second of all, you didn’t just have Billy in your life. You had the whole world. TV and movies. Books. Other kids. Other families. School. Plenty of examples, plenty of role models. Including the goofiest white boy ever and the foxiest girlfriend on the planet.”
He realized he’d spent his life trying to understand Billy. But had never really understood himself.
“A part of you always knew that what you were learning was wrong. And you resisted what they taught you. You’re stronger than any person I’ve ever known.”
“What they did to me—”
“Other people have been abused. They had problems. You have problems. But they don’t all grow up to—”
“I know. I know that. Now.” He wished he could sit up, wished he could take her in his arms. “I know what’s ahead of me. All the pain and the struggling. The survival. But I know something else, too—I made it this far. I got here. Here and now. And I’m still the same person. They made me, but they don’t own me. They don’t get to decide who or what I am. Only I get to decide that.” His voice had risen and cracked. He forced himself to relax.
“Only I get to decide that,” he said again, much more quietly.
“Maybe that’s the first step,” she said.
“Of a million.”
“It’s not like you’re walking it alone, doofus.”
He brought her hand to his cheek, reveling in the sensation of her skin on his.
“I want to tell you something,” she whispered. “Something difficult. I don’t know how it will make you feel.”
He didn’t know if he was up to anything new, to any additional input. His brain, his heart, and his soul were all topped off. No more room for good or for bad. But he gave a lopsided shrug, telling her it was okay to continue.
“It’s about your grandmother.”
“I know she’s dead. My—Ugly J killed her.”
If Connie noted the stutter, she didn’t let on. “Yeah. Okay, so you know that. They think it was a potassium overdose.”
That would have sent her into hyperkalemic shock. Similar to lethal injection. Depending on when the doctors saw her, they wouldn’t have even realized—she would have presented like a heart-attack patient. Jazz hoped it had been painless.
“They tried to save her. They worked really hard. And they even resuscitated her for a couple of minutes, but she was too old and too weak.”
“I see.”
“When she had those few minutes, she said something, Jazz.” Connie’s bottom lip trembled. “Do you want to know what it was?”
Did he? The better question was, should he?
“Go ahead.”
“She said, ‘He’s a good boy.’ That’s all. ‘He’s a good boy.’ ”
Jazz expected tears but thought he had no more to give. And besides, Gramma wasn’t lucid on her best day. On her deathbed? She could have been talking about Jazz, sure. Or she could have been talking about Billy, Grampa, or the Easter Bunny.
She could have been talking about Jazz.
He squeezed Connie’s hand. “Thanks for telling me.”
How long they spent together, he couldn’t say. There was no clock in the room, and no one counted off the seconds.
They compared scars and bandages, prescriptions and doctor’s orders. They talked about how much school they’d missed and would continue to miss. They laughed at the absurdity of Howie lusting for Samantha, then laughed harder at the idea of it actually happening. They avoided talk of the last week, speaking instead of their shared past and the future.
Eventually, it had to end; the door opened, and Connie’s father walked in.
“Sweetheart, it’s time,” he said.
Connie clutched Jazz’s hand even harder. “Not yet.” She held on, tight and resolute.
“I’m sorry, but now that he’s up, I have to speak to my client.”
Nodding with sad defeat, Connie leaned in as best she could and kissed him again. “Soon,” she whispered.
He wanted to believe her, but as she wheeled out, he couldn’t help thinking it was the last time they would ever be together. If the criminal justice system didn’t see to that, then her father would.
Mr. Hall gestured to the deputy. “You, too. Attorney-client.”
The deputy left. Jazz felt less safe, cuffed to the bed, at Mr. Hall’s mercy.
“A little surprised,” Jazz said defensively. “I thought for sure G. William would visit before you.”
“You’re not talking to any cops at all. You’re invoking your Fifth Amendment rights. That deputy they’ve stationed in here? Only here because you proved yourself so dangerous in New York. I fought like hell against that, and the judge says if you say anything to him at all that he’s under strict orders to summon a doctor immediately and have you sedated so that you can’t incriminate yourself. That’s how serious this all is.”
Mr. Hall dragged over the chair Howie had used and sat down. “I want you to understand something,” he began. “In New York, I agreed to be your lawyer. That means I’m your lawyer forever. Even if you fire me, I still can’t act against you. Do you understand?”
Jazz nodded.
“Good. With that in mind, realize that you’ll need a criminal attorney at some point. It’s been years since my days in the public defender’s office, and that was in Georgia, not here or New York. You’ll need people who can act on your behalf in those two jurisdictions, and I’m not that guy. We still clear?”
Jazz nodded again.
“I’m pa
rt of your team until you don’t want me. I know, go figure. I never imagined myself in this position, defending you. But here I am. And right now, Jasper, I’m your best friend.”
“No.” Jazz shook his head fiercely, no matter how much it hurt. “Howie’s my best friend. Always.”
“Howie doesn’t have a law degree and a daughter saying, ‘Daddy, please help him.’ ” Mr. Hall took out his phone and thumbed through it. “Now, I’ve spoken to Howie, in my capacity as your attorney, and he tells me that you found some evidence. Something that implicates your parents and others.”
The book. Billy’s book.
“Yeah.”
“Do you know where it is?”
“Yeah, we—”
Hall held up a hand. “Don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. You broke the law when you dug up your grandfather, and technically I might have to tell the court where the fruit of that crime lies. Just tell me it’s safe.”
“It is.”
“Good.” Mr. Hall sighed. “Jasper, you broke a lot of laws. And not for the first time.”
Jazz knew it was true. He couldn’t even keep track of all the laws he’d broken, but he was sure someone, somewhere had kept a tally. His day in court would be long.
“But,” Mr. Hall went on, “I know that a good trial attorney could get a jury to look at what you’ve done, to look at your past, and probably get you a pretty decent sentence at the end of the day. Plead you down pretty low, even. You might never have to go to court, under those circumstances.”
That was about the best Jazz could hope for. The right jury—lots of mothers—would go easy on him. Still, with the sheer volume of charges against him, even “going easy” would add up.
“But with the evidence you’ve found… If it’s as good as Howie says it is, I’m pretty sure we can trade it for getting a slew of charges dropped or pleaded out. Or maybe some sort of probation.”
It took Jazz a moment to process what was being said. He wouldn’t get off scot-free, but the idea of keeping his freedom under any circumstances… That was more than he’d ever dreamed possible.
“Are you serious?” He half expected Mr. Hall to shout Psych! and chortle at Jazz’s cluelessness.