save Catherine.
Yet, the nagging uncertainty wouldn't go away, and so he did follow him. He figured that if he could just sit down with him and talk, they would be able to dear up this… misunderstanding. John would tell him this suspicion was simply a reaction to the horrible guilt he was feeling over what they had done in the name of mercy.
Cameron thought about turning the car around and going home, but he didn't do it. He had to be sure. Had to know. He took a shortcut through the Garden District and arrived at John's house before he did. The beautiful Victorian home was on a coveted corner lot. There were two enormous, ancient oak trees and a magnolia casting black shadows on the front yard. Cameron pulled onto the side street adjacent to the electronically gated driveway. He turned the lights off, then the motor, and sat there, well concealed under a leafy branch that blocked out the streetlight. The house was dark. When John arrived, Cameron reached for the door handle, then froze.
'Shit,' he whispered.
She was there, waiting. As the iron gate was opening, he spotted her standing on the sidewalk by the side of the house. The garage door lifted then, and Cameron saw her red Honda parked inside.
As soon as John parked his car and walked out of the garage, she ran to him, her large round breasts bouncing like silicone balls underneath the tight fabric of her dress. The bereaved widower couldn't wait to get her inside the house. They tore at each other like street dogs in heat. Her black dress was unzipped and down around her waist in a matter of seconds, and his hand was latched onto one of her breasts as they stumbled to the door. His grunts of pleasure blended with her shrill laughter.
'That son of a bitch,' Cameron muttered. 'That stupid son of a bitch.'
He had seen enough. He drove home to his rented one-bedroom apartment in the untrendy section of the warehouse district and paced for hours, stewing and fuming and worrying. A bottle of scotch fueled his anger.
Around two in the morning, a couple of drunks got into a fistfight outside of his window. Cameron watched the spectacle with disgusted curiosity. One of them had a knife, and Cameron hoped he'd stab the other one just to shut him up. Someone must have called the police. They arrived, sirens blaring, minutes later.
There were two officers in the patrol car. They quickly disarmed the drunk with the knife and then slammed both men up against a stone wall. Blood, iridescent under the garish streetlight, poured from a gash in the side of one drunk's head as he crashed unconscious to the pavement.
The policeman who'd used the unnecessary force shouted a crude blasphemy as he rolled the unconscious man over onto his stomach and then knelt on his back and secured the handcuffs. Then he dragged him to the car. The other drunk meekly waited his turn, and within another minute or two, both were locked in the back of the car on their way to the city jail.
Cameron gulped a long swallow of scotch and wiped the perspiration from his brow with the back of his hand. The scene under his window had freaked him, especially the handcuffs. He couldn't handle being cuffed. He couldn't go to prison, wouldn't. He'd kill himself first… if he had the courage. He had always been a little claustrophobic, but the condition had worsened over the years. He couldn't be inside a windowless room these days without feeling tightness in his chest. He'd stopped using elevators, preferring to walk up seven flights of stairs rather than spend thirty or forty seconds inside a metal elevator box, squeezed in like
a dead sardine with the other office dwellers.
Dear God, why hadn't he thought about his claustrophobia before he agreed to this lunacy?
He knew the answer and was drunk enough to admit it. Greed. Fucking greed. John was the motivator, the planner, the man with the vision… and the money connections. With the fervor of a southern evangelist, he'd promised he could make them all rich. Hell, he already had. But he had also played them for the greedy fools he knew they were. When he started talking about killing himself, he knew they'd all panic. They couldn't lose John, and they would do anything to keep him happy.
And that was exactly what the bastard had counted on.
Bleary-eyed from drink, Cameron finished the bottle of scotch and went to bed. The following morning, Sunday, he battled a hangover until noon. Then, when he was clearheaded, he came up with a plan. He needed absolute proof for Preston and Dallas to see, and once they realized how John had manipulated them, Cameron would demand that they split the profits in the Sowing Club now and go their separate ways. He wasn't about to wait five more years to collect his share. After what John had done,
all Cameron could think about was running away before they got caught.
Cameron had a few connections of his own, and there were a couple of calls he needed to make. He had five working days before the confrontation he planned on Friday. Five days to nail the son of a bitch.
He didn't tell anyone what he was doing. Friday rolled around, and he arrived at Dooley's late, around six- thirty in the evening.
He made his way to their table and took the seat across from John. The waiter had spotted him and brought him his usual drink before Cameron had taken off his suit jacket and loosened his tie.
'You look like hell,' Preston said in his customary blunt way. Of the four, he was the health nut and made it dear at every opportunity that he didn't approve of Cameron's lifestyle. Built like an Olympic weightlifter, Preston was obsessive about working out five nights a week at a posh health club. In his opinion, any man who didn't have steely upper arms and a stomach you could bounce a quarter off of was a weakling, and men with beer guts were to be pitied.
'I've put in some long hours at work this week. I'm tired, that's all.'
'You've got to start taking care of yourself before it's too late,' Preston said. 'Come with me to the club and start lifting weights and running the track. And lay off the booze, for Christ's sake. It's killing your liver.'
'Since when did you become my mother?' Dallas, a die-hard peacemaker, couldn't stand discord, no matter how minor. 'Preston's just concerned about you. We both know you've been under a lot of stress lately with the divorce and all. We just don't want you to get sick. Preston and I depend on you and John.'
'Preston's right,' John said. He swirled his swizzle stick in the amber liquid as he added, 'You do look bad.'
'I'm fine,' he muttered. 'Now enough about me.'
'Yeah, sure,' Preston said, offended by the censure in Cameron's voice.
Cameron gulped down his drink and then motioned for the waiter to bring him another. 'Anything new happen this week?'
he asked.
'It's been dull for me.' Preston shrugged. 'But I guess in our business that's good. Right, Dallas?'
'Right. It's been pretty dull for me too.'
'What about you, John? Anything new going on with you?' Cameron asked mildly.
John shrugged. 'I'm hanging in there, taking it a day at a time.'
He sounded pathetic. Cameron thought John's performance was a bit overdone, but Preston and Dallas bought it and were sympathetic.
'It will get easier,' Preston promised. Since he had absolutely no experience with losing anyone he cared about, he couldn't possibly know if John's life would get easier or not, but he felt he should give his friend some sort of encouragement.
'With time,' he added lamely.
'That's right. You just need some time,' Dallas said.
'How long has it been since Catherine died?'
Cameron asked.
John raised an eyebrow. 'You know how long it's been.' He stood, removed his suit jacket and carefully folded it, then draped
it over the back of the chair. 'I'm going to go get some Beer Nuts.'
'Yeah, bring some pretzels too,' Preston said. He waited until John had walked away before turning on Cameron.
'Did you have to bring Catherine's name up now?'
John told the waitress what he wanted and was walking back to the table when he heard Dallas say, 'John was just starting
to relax. Give the guy a break.'
'You don't need to coddle me,' John said as he dragged his chair out and sat down. 'I haven't kept count of the hours and
