Pain Management

by and return it.”

“You mean you want to talk with her again.”

“Yes, sir.”

He covered the mouthpiece with his hand, but I could still hear him yelling for his daughter. A few minutes passed. No music-on-hold.

“It’s too late tonight,” he said when he got back on. “Come tomorrow. Seven-thirty.”

“Thank you.”

“Mr. Hazard?”

“Yes?”

“Come alone.”

“Sure.”

“Alone,” he repeated. “That means by yourself. Unarmed. With no recording devices. Do you understand?”

“Completely.”

He hung up on me.

“You know what would be exciting?” Gem whispered to me around midnight.

“What?”

“To suck your cock while you read those books.”

“Why would that be so—?”

“Just read your books,” she said softly. “Keep reading them.”

I showered and shaved, put on a chambray shirt with a plain black knit tie under a cream-colored leather jacket. Looked at myself in the mirror and realized it was all for nothing—dressing me up was like tying a red ribbon around the handle of an ice pick.

As soon as I pulled into their driveway, I stashed the Beretta and its holster under the front seat. I even unclipped my carbon-black Boker sleeve-knife and left it on the dash.

The father-and-son tag team greeted me at the door. The father’s gaze was professionally flat. The son was having a little trouble with hostility management.

“Thank you for having me,” I said formally.

“You’re not a guest,” the kid said.

“Michael . . .” his father muttered, moving his arm to the side to show me where he wanted me to go.

We all sat down. “We’re not a family with secrets,” the man said. “But that doesn’t mean we’re a family without privacy. Do you understand?”

“I . . . think so. Whatever I say to Jennifer, it’s between her and me?”

“Up to a point,” he warned. “I promise you, Jenn’s a very smart young woman. She doesn’t have to tell me anything, but she’s free to, got it?”

“Yes.”

“Then I’ll get her,” he said, getting up.

“You play ball?” I asked the son, looking for an opening.

“You mean like football?”

“No. I mean . . . you look like an athlete to me; I was just making conversation.”

“You didn’t come here to talk to me.”

“Not specifically. But you seem to have some . . . negative feelings about me. And I thought, if we talked, maybe I could find out why.”

“So why didn’t you just ask me, straight out?”

“Because I’m an idiot,” I told him. “I should have seen you’re the kind of man that appreciates a direct approach.”

A grin flashed across his face. “My dad’s an athlete,” he said. “He was a wrestler.”

“He looks it.”

“Yeah. Now he plays basketball to keep in shape. From what the guys he plays with say, though, he’s still a wrestler.”

I chuckled at that, envious of the man who had such a son.

“Michael mention soccer to you?” his father said, coming back into the room.

“Not a word. You play that, too?”

“Me? Huh! Michael’s all-state. Striker. Tournament MVP in the—”

“Pop!” the kid protested.

“He’s got about a hundred scholarship offers,” his sister added, beaming at him.

“Aaargh!” the kid grunted, his face flaming.

Father and daughter sat down together. My envy went up another notch.

“Dad says you want to talk to me?” Jennifer said.

“That, and to return the book you lent me.”

“Thank you,” she said, taking the book I handed her. “Well?”

“I thought you’d rather . . .”

“I want my father to be here, this time,” she said firmly.

Michael shifted his stance, making it clear I’d have to deal with all of them.

“Sure,” I said. “Jennifer, I’m trying to figure this out. Rosa left her home for some reason. Some good reason, I’m thinking. She didn’t go far. She’s close by. And in touch, too.”

Two spots of color appeared in Jennifer’s cheeks.

“I don’t think you know all the answers,” I went on smoothly, “but I think you know some of them.”

“Let’s say I do,” she said, her mouth a straight line. “Why would I trust you with such . . . information?”

“That’s why I’m here,” I told her. “To try and convince you. I think I already did . . . a little bit anyway . . . or you would never have lent me that book.”

“I . . .”

“Or was it a test? To see if I could make anything out of it?”

“Not a . . . test. But I did want to see if you were really interested.”

“In finding Rosa?”

“No. In Rosa. In Rosa herself. As a person. Not just a job her . . . father gave you.”

“You don’t trust her father?”

She was silent for a few seconds. Then her brother came out with, “That’s right, we don’t.”

I watched a look pass between the two of them, tapped into the current, saw it for what it was. The kid didn’t give a rat’s ass about Rosebud’s father and knew even less—he was just backing up his sister.

“You think because her father is paying me—”

“Would you be looking for her if he wasn’t?” Jenn asked, rhetorically.

“No. I wouldn’t have known anything about any of this,” I said. “But now, after all this poking around, now I would, yes. And I meant what I said, Jennifer. I’m not dragging her back home, period. I just want to talk to her, listen to what she has to say. If she doesn’t want to go back, I’m not going to make her.”

The girl turned, looked at her father, said, “Dad?” He took the handoff as smooth as if they’d practiced the trick for years.

“If Rose’s father’s intentions are so legitimate, why go to a man like you?”

“Like me?”

“What word didn’t you understand, Mr. . . . Hazard? There are plenty of PIs in this town.”

“I’m employed by his lawyer, Toby—”

“Right. I’m not saying what you’re doing is illegal. But why would Kevin go off the books?”

“He tried a PI firm. They didn’t get anywhere.”

“Maybe because of what they weren’t willing to do.”

“Maybe,” I said, shrugging. “Who’s your problem with, here?”

“You,” Michael threw in, his face tightening like he was going to make a move. “You’re bothering my sister, and—”