28

From his space in the underground garage, Jason could see Vince’s silver Jaguar XJ glistening in the fluorescent lights. He imagined what it would feel like to take a hammer to the hood.

That wasn’t enough revenge. The man was trying to destroy his career. Trashing a car in return wouldn’t cut it.

Jason reached for the ignition and switched on his engine. The tachometer rose and settled as the motor reached idle speed. Jason let the smooth rumble massage him while he stared at the rounded contours of Vince’s Jag.

Papering his personnel file so they had a case to fire him. Vince could never get away with that without Mark going along with it. Scotty too, maybe. Well, they’d have trouble getting that through a wrongful termination lawsuit. Every performance review had been outstanding, and his promotions backed them up. It would take more than a couple of letters in his file to overcome that track record.

Jason tapped the steering wheel, the engine’s groove rumbling through his bones.

No, the strategy wouldn’t be to terminate him. They had to know about his legal connections and how risky and costly it would be to try to fire him. Vince was a lot of things, but he wasn’t stupid. He wouldn’t try a frontal assault. The letter was just another tool in his box, another way to make Jason miserable along with undermining his authority, stripping him of his team’s loyalty, and weakening his customer relationships by injecting Vince into them.

Still, it wouldn’t hurt to talk with an attorney.

His mind automatically went to Serena. Six months ago, he would have had her on the phone, and in an instant she would have been maneuvering for him, calling in chits with colleagues who were experts in wrongful termination. She would have had them firing off threatening letters to every executive at BTB from HR to the board of directors.

He shook his head. Serena was out of his life now. She’d found another lawyer to love. He would have to find another legal expert.

But somewhere in the city, Brenda waited for him. A smile surfaced. He revved the engine of his BMW and found his cell phone. Six messages. He tabbed through them and saw Brenda’s number. She’d called twice while Vince was grilling him.

Her recorded voice in the first message brought the image of her face to his mind. “Hi, it’s me. Brenda. Where are you? I saw you at the elevator leaving, and I know you didn’t have an appointment. It was all I could do to sit still and not run after you.” Her voice paused. In the background, he heard the clopping of her heels on concrete and pictured her walking along the sidewalk, phone pressing her ear tight and angling over the smooth contour of her jaw. “Call me. I want to know where we can meet. I’m waiting for you. Okay?”

She left the next message thirty minutes later. “Jason, please call. I’m starting to think . . . I don’t want to say it. Just call me, please.”

He deleted the messages and went back to the call log to find her number. He was about to press the button to connect.

A knock on his window.

His head shot to the left.

It wasn’t Vince, chasing after him with the letter. A tall guy in a Hawaiian shirt leaned over and pressed an open wallet against the window, clicking a badge to the glass. A parole officer. The guy said something, but Jason couldn’t hear him over the rumble of the engine. After a second, the guy lifted his hand next to the window and pointed downward. The badge went into his back pocket.

Jason set down the phone and lowered his window. “What do you want?”

“Turn off the engine and step out.” The guy worked gum with the patience of a cow chewing cud. Jason didn’t move. The guy grinned. “You’re going to be like that, huh?”

“Yeah. I’m going to be like that. I’ll give you thirty seconds to convince me I need to talk to you, then I’m out of here.”

“Okay, Kahuna. Just tell me where to find your brother and I’ll be out of your hair.” A couple of pops of his gum punctuated his point.

“I have no idea.”

“You haven’t seen him.”

“We’re not exactly tight.”

“But you knew he was out.”

Jason paused. The surfer’s grin was an insult. “In. Out. As long as he stays away from me, I don’t care where he is.”

“I’m going to ask you again. Have you seen him?”

“No.”

“You’re lying.” The grin was gone. “Step out here so we can talk.”

Jason shifted gears and released the parking brake. “We’re done.” He began to raise the window.

“Okay. I’ll come back in the morning and hang around your office.”

Jason turned to him.

“Talk to your boss, maybe. Some of your banker buddies. See if they’ve seen you hanging around with your felon brother.” He patted the roof of Jason’s car. “See you tomorrow.”

The guy turned, and Jason was faced with the back panel of his shirt—surfboards, palm trees, hibiscus, dark-skinned girls in bikinis. The officer began to saunter away.

Jason clutched the steering wheel. “Hold on.”

He turned. His grin was subtle as a slap. The gum popped like some native language. “Change your mind?” Back at the car, he put a hand on the roof. “There’s a coffee shop across the street. You can buy me a Coke.”

* * *

Rosie wasn’t working this late. Customers occupied only two of the twenty or so tables in the room.

The guy slid into a booth. “I’m Hathaway.”

Jason sat opposite. “Let’s get this over with.”

Hathaway looked toward the counter. The waiter chatted with the fry cook through the opening to the kitchen. Hathaway cupped his tongue and whistled loud enough to startle every ear in the room.

The waiter said something to the fry cook and came over. He was skinny as a table leg. He brought a pad out from his back pocket. “All right. You got my attention.”

Hathaway nodded at Jason. “He’s buying me a Coke. You got any fries?”

“Sure, we got fries. This is America, isn’t it?”

“You having anything?” Hathaway asked Jason.

“Just bring me some water.”

The waiter raised an eyebrow. “Water.”

Jason stared at Hathaway until the waiter tucked his pad away and angled himself back across the room. “So your Coke’s on the way. Let’s get to it.”

Hathaway leaned back and drew an arm across the top of the booth. It caused the pictures on his Hawaiian shirt to accordion together in front. A native girl’s head was now perched atop a red surfboard. “I’m not his PO. You want to know where his PO is?”

“If you’re going to tell me, tell me.”

“He’s over in Brotman. Concussion. The docs are holding him for observation. Your little brother did that.” Hathaway’s laid-back attitude vanished. He brought his arm down and planted his elbows on the table. For the first time, Jason noticed that Hathaway’s arms had some bulk to them. “I’m going to find him. Put him back inside. And you’re going to help me.”

The waiter brought two plastic glasses to the table, one filled with Hathaway’s Coke and another filled with water. He put them both in the middle of the table and retreated.

“How am I going to help you if I don’t know where he is or how to contact him? Even if I wanted to.”

The PO stripped off the tip of the straw wrapper and took a sip of his Coke. “You know, I have a knack. You want to know what my knack is?”

Jason waited.

“My knack is, I can tell when people are lying to me. All the time. That’d probably be a good knack to have in your line of business, huh? You have that?”

“Sometimes.”

“No, if it’s sometimes you don’t have it. I’m talking about all the time. Guy says to me he’s been keeping the conditions of his parole when he’s been hanging out with people he shouldn’t, doing crack or something, I pick up on it right away. And these guys are good, too. They make lying an art form. But maybe his eyes shift a little too much. Maybe his color changes a little. Or maybe the words he uses, they’re strung together weird. Could be anything. Even something I can’t put my finger on. But I can tell.”

Jason shoved the straw aside and lifted the glass to his lips. The tap water tasted of iron, but it was cool.

“You tell me you haven’t seen your brother. You don’t know if he’s out or in. I can tell you’re lying. Don’t ask me how exactly, but I know.”

The waiter was back with a plastic basket filled with steaming fries glistening with oil. He put them in front of Hathaway and set a ketchup squeezer in the center of the table.

Hathaway never took his eyes off Jason. “So then I have to ask myself, why would this guy lie? Maybe he’s trying to protect his little brother. Or maybe he’s just in a hurry. Or maybe he doesn’t want to get dragged into anything. He’s got a reputation to protect. Or it could be he’s got something going with his little brother.”

Jason snorted. “You’ve got quite an imagination.”

“No. No imagination.” Hathaway sprinkled salt over the fries and stuffed a trio of them into his mouth. He breathed in open-mouthed. “Hot.” It didn’t stop him from following up with another bunch of them. “Help yourself.” He pushed the basket toward Jason.

“I told you—I haven’t seen him. Your knack must be on the fritz.”

“No, no. That’s the thing, see? That’s what makes it a knack. If it ever went on the fritz, it wouldn’t be a knack. It’d just be luck. It’s never been luck. It’s always right. I can tell. Just now, when you said you haven’t seen him, I had all kinds of buzzers and poppers going off in my head like an alarm system or something. You’re lying. Have some fries.”

Jason folded his arms. “I don’t know what to tell you.”

“Try the truth. Here, we’ll work up to it. I’ll help. You and Flip, you grew up in Inglewood. That right?”

“You know it’s right.”

“Good. Good. That’s a start. Tell me about that. Give me some truth, just to prime the pump, get you used to talking straight.”

“I don’t want to talk about my childhood.”

“Mom split when you and Flip were just kids, huh?”

Jason fought an urge to stand and walk out of the coffee shop. But he couldn’t have this guy snooping around the office. Not with everything else going on.

“Why’d she leave, Jason? Flip too much to handle?”

“Get off her.”

“Oh, so it wasn’t her fault. What were you, nine? Ten? That’d make Flip seven or eight. Tough to have two boys around causing trouble all the time.”

“We weren’t causing trouble.”

“Got it. Not your fault either. That leaves the old man. I know how that is. I’m divorced myself. You still married, Jason?”

There was a piece of skin on Jason’s lip that he bit off.

“I see you got no wedding band, but your finger’s slick there. You just take the ring off for special occasions, or are things a little rocky on the home front?”

Jason shook his head. “You’re a real treat.”

“Anyhow . . .” Hathaway brushed his hands together. Grains of salt bounced onto the tabletop. “Back to Mom and Dad. So Mom heads for the hills, leaves Dad to raise you and Flip. How’d that go?”

Jason looked at his watch. Five thirty. “I’m going to give you another five minutes. I’m already late for an appointment.”

“An appointment? At this hour? Wow, you bankers sure keep different hours than the old days. Oh, it’s a personal appointment.” Hathaway sucked down some Coke. “Seems like I’ve been doing all the talking. You want to open up, go right ahead. I listen good too.”

Jason watched Hathaway smack his lips. They stared at each other until the waiter returned with the check. Jason reached for it, found a ten dollar bill, set it on the table. “Well, it’s been a pleasure, but I have to get going.”

“No. Not yet. One more thing. Your secretary. Kathy something.”

“Russell. Kathy Russell.”

“Right. Her kid got murdered.”

“I’m aware of that.”

“Right after your little brother got out on parole.”

Jason didn’t speak.

Hathaway smiled. He pointed at Jason. “You see there? It’s a knack, I’m telling you. And the best part? I can tell somebody’s lying even when they don’t talk.” He snickered to himself. “No. You know what? I just decided. It’s not a knack. It’s a gift. That’s what it is. From now on, it’s a gift.”

“How can I be lying if I’m not talking?”

“I want to know what you’re hiding, Dunn. Why you’re protecting him.” Hathaway squinted, tilted his head back, eyes still on Jason. “You’re afraid of him, aren’t you?”

“I have to get going.”

“Just a minute. Let’s get this covered. I don’t want to have to bother you during business hours. You’re afraid of Flip. I can understand that, the stuff he’s done. He’s a bad dude, man. I looked at his C file.”

Hathaway paused. Jason didn’t even want to ask what a C file was.

With an open mouth, a hand to his chin, thumb stroking underneath, Hathaway said, “That rap sheet. Started when he was seventeen. Makes you nineteen when Flip got sent up the first time.”

“That’s right.”

“Must’ve been pretty embarrassing, having a brother get sent up.”

“We managed.”

“Sure. You and Dad. You and Dad.” Hathaway seemed to be thinking over the words. “Always you and Dad against Flip, huh?”

“No. It wasn’t like that.”

“I think it was. I think Flip was the outsider. You and dad were connected. Flip, not so much. It happens in families.” Hathaway held up his glass and rattled it around and got the waiter’s attention so he didn’t have to resort to the whistle.

Jason slid to the edge of the booth. He had to get out. “Enough. I’m late.”

Hathaway set the glass back on the table. “What I don’t get is, what was Flip doing in that bar down there at the age of seventeen?” A grin crept across his face. “It had something to do with you.”