the nature of his crisis.
“It’s about Bud Flanek,” Henry said.
“What is that, some kind of skin disease?” Shawn said. “Because if you’re hoping I’m going to donate my flesh to you, I’m still using it.”
“Bud Flanek,” Henry said irritably. “You remember him. He was on my bowling team years back. Tall guy, one shoulder lower than the other, always wore bib overalls.”
“Let me guess,” Shawn said. “He’s been accused of a crime against fashion, and you want me to get him off. Sorry, Dad, I don’t think I can help.”
Gus admired the way Shawn could continue to hold his grudge even when he was stuffed with pizza, because he couldn’t fight against the warm feelings his digestive system was sending through his body.
“Is your friend in trouble?” Gus asked.
“In ways he can’t begin to imagine,” Henry said.“He’s about to get married for the first time at sixty- two.”
Shawn stifled a bored yawn. “And you want us to investigate his fiancee and prove that she’s actually some floozy who’s going to steal all his money and break his heart.”
“Why would I want that?” Henry said. “I think it’s great that Bud’s finally found someone who makes him happy. And she hardly needs his sewer department pension. She manages a very profitable bakery in Summerland. Not bad for a recent immigrant from Eastern Europe.”
“Then what do you need us for?” Shawn said. “Or did you drag us up here just to make us listen to the joyous news about one guy I barely remember marrying some woman I’ve never met? Because if that’s what’s going to make your life worthwhile, you should start a blog, and then you can bore complete strangers, too.”
Henry pushed off from the table and wandered out of the room. When he came back, he was carrying a brightly wrapped box about the size of a mediocre dictionary. He tossed it on the table in front of Shawn.
“That’s really special, but didn’t you get anything for Gus?” Shawn said.
“It’s not for you,” Henry said. “I’m in charge of Bud’s gag gift. I need you to deliver it to his bachelor party tonight.”
Gus and Shawn stared at him, not understanding.
“That’s the emergency?” Shawn said finally.
“Maybe ‘emergency’ was a little strong,” Henry said. “But it’s important to me that Bud get this tonight.”
“Just not important enough that you would bother going to his bachelor party.”
“I have my reasons,” Henry said.
“Like what?” Shawn said.
“When a man is preparing to declare lifelong fidelity to one woman, it seems morally wrong to celebrate that by spitting in the face of those vows,” Henry said.
“First of all, vows don’t have faces,” Shawn said. “You’re thinking of cows, which do have faces, but you really don’t want to spit in them, because they can spit back.”
“Those were llamas,” Gus said, remembering that one long afternoon when their elementary class field trip had taken them to a farm. “And the teacher warned you about five hundred times not to taunt them.”
“Second,” Shawn said, “I can’t believe I’m hearing this from a man who organized a bachelor party in Vegas for Earl Mountlock that was so insane the wedding had to be postponed for a week because the judge refused to let the groom out on bail.”
“That was before I started listening to Dr. Laura,” Henry said. “She has a lot of wisdom on the subject. Are you going to do this or not?”
Gus recognized the look on Shawn’s face. He was trying to figure out what was really going on here.
“See, if you gave me this present and asked me to carry it onto an airplane for you, I’d understand that there was a bomb in it and you wanted to make your insane political point without dying in the process,” Shawn said. “But you’re handing it to me and asking me to carry it into a trendy nightspot filled with naked women pouring free drinks, and I can’t see the rationale behind it.”
Henry pounded the table in frustration. “Can’t you just do me this one small favor without turning it into some grand inquisition?” he growled. “I can’t go to the party. I’d like Bud to open his gift in front of his friends. It’s not that big of a deal. And there aren’t going to be any naked women. It’s a cash bar, and no one would use the word ‘trendy’ to describe the Fort-”
Henry broke off in midsyllable, his face reddening.
“What fort?” Gus asked. “There’s no fort in Santa Barbara.”
Henry sat still, grim faced. Baffled, Gus glanced over at Shawn to see if he had any idea what his father was talking about. Apparently he did, because his face was split by a wide smile.
“Please, go ahead and finish your word, Dad,” Shawn said, taking a pleasure that Gus couldn’t begin to understand.
“Look, if you don’t want to help me, you don’t want to help me,” Henry said. “I’ll ask one of the guys to drop the present off.”
“Drop the present off where, I wonder,” Shawn said. “Oh, yes. The Fort. Which I believe is an abbreviated version of a longer word. What would that be again?”
“Fortress?” Gus guessed.
“Don’t worry about the dishes,” Henry said, stacking the plates on top of the empty pizza boxes. “I can take care of them on my own.”
“Ah, yes, fortress,” Shawn said. “As in Fortress of Magic. Would that be where Bud Flanek’s bachelor party is being held?”
“It wasn’t supposed to be,” Henry grumbled. “But the damn health board shut down the Beef ’n’ Fish Barrel two nights ago, and Bud’s best man, Lyle Wheelock, managed to book that dump.”
“And I guess he didn’t ask you first.” Shawn beamed. “Or maybe he did, and you were just too embarrassed to tell him the truth.”
“What truth?” Gus asked.
“Dad can’t go to the Fortress of Magic,” Shawn said. “Not since he took me there when I was a kid. He was banned for life.”
“But that was twenty years ago,” Gus said. “They can’t possibly still-”
“They renewed the restraining order six months ago,” Henry snapped, then turned to Shawn. “Are you happy now? Have you humiliated me enough?”
“Not nearly enough.” Shawn picked up the package and spun it around in his hands. “Not to make up for what you did to us today. But once I tell everyone at that bachelor party exactly why it is you’re not there, I think we’ll be even.”
Henry glared at Shawn. Then he marched the plates and pizza boxes into the kitchen. When he returned, he slammed a printed invitation on the table in front of his son.
“Really?” Shawn cast a quick look at the invitation to make sure it was what he thought it was. “You still want me to go, knowing what I’m going to do?”
“More than ever, son,” Henry said through clenched teeth. “Because I’m sure now that you’re an adult, you’ll do something that will get you banned for your grandchildren’s lifetimes.”
Chapter Four
The black night was filled with howls and growls of a pack of vicious dogs. Gus moved closer to Shawn. At least he tried to, but since he couldn’t see his friend in the darkness, he might just as easily have been moving away. Something brushed his ankle, and Gus leapt away. He could practically feel the hot breath through his socks.
“How many do you think there are?” Gus said, trying to differentiate between dozens of dog sounds.
Shawn listened for a moment. And then for another moment. And another. “I don’t have to think,” he said finally. “I know exactly how many.”
At first, Gus thought Shawn was cracking under the strain of their impending, and very unpleasant, death.
