He knows his old man.
Knows him in the way that only blood can.
The shared secret code hidden deep in deoxyribonucleic acid.
DNA.
Fathers and sons are really brothers
Twins of the double helix
Fates twisted around each other
Inseparable
Inextricable
He knows his father would not have come unprepared to this feast because he wouldn’t
Knows that his father cannot let it end here
Because he couldn’t
Knows that he now has to do
The one thing
That will cost him more than he can pay
And that he would never do for anyone
Not even himself
But will do
For Ben
Go to his father’s house
And ask
For mercy.
249
INT. PAQU’S LIVING ROOM — NIGHT
PAQU takes a long sip of her drink and looks over the glass at O, who stands there, furious and determined.
PAQU
Look at you, my little girl, all forceful and resolute. You look ridiculous. Do you want your face to freeze that way?
O says nothing, just holds her glare.
PAQU (CONT’D.)
I wish you were this determined to find a job.
Same.
Paqu is really out of it now-the effects of the alcohol and pills have hit her.
PAQU (CONT’D.)
Of course, I should talk. I’ve done absolutely nothing with mine. Nothing. Except give birth to you. And, no offense, please don’t take this personally, but you’re such a… disappointment. Very well. You want to know who your father is? Who he was?
250
Elena sips a sherry and watches the evening news.
A small pleasure before dinner at an empty table, as Magda refuses to come out of her room, leaving Elena to dine with memories and might-have-beens.
She is just finishing her drink when her guards let Lado in.
“I heard there was a slaughter at the Revolucion Club,” she says.
“I heard the same thing.”
“A terrible thing,” she says. “We live in terrible times.”
“Someone whispered a name to me,” Lado says.
“Whispered or screamed?”
She looks out the window into the courtyard, where she still expects Filipo to pull up in his car and twirl her in his arms.
“ Buen viaje, ” she says.
Have a nice trip.
251
“This guy John,” Ben asks. “What did he look like?”
“Why?” Diane asks.
“I need to know.”
She rummages around until she finds a scrapbook. Opens it up and the results are almost comical-his mom and dad as hippies-long hair, leather fringes-almost as if they’re at a costume party.
Diane turns to a picture of a bunch of people on the front steps of an old bookstore and points to a young man, bare-chested and in jeans.
“That’s John,” she says.
“I have to go.”
252
His name was Halliday, Paqu says, and they called him “Doc.”
And when he found out I was pregnant with you he put a gun to his head, pulled the trigger, and ruined the interior of a very expensive car.
I don’t know if my pregnancy was the… causal factor… but there you are.
Happy now?
O runs out of the house.
253
Ben drives down the canyon and hits Chon’s number.
There’s no answer.
Where the fuck are you? Ben thinks.
Chon was following the line up from Crowe and Hennessy. If he’s succeeded, the line leads to his own father.
Ben can’t let him do it.
He lets the phone ring and ring.
Chon doesn’t answer.
Don Winslow
