ones were rolled down, and she could clearly see the driver.
He'd stopped close enough to crowd her between the two cars, his beady eyes staring a hole into her. Time slowed, and she saw that he was older than she'd thought, that his shaved head was not a fashion statement but a complement to the large red swastika tattooed on his bare upper arm. Coarse black hair grew in a goatee and mustache around his mouth, but she could still see the sneer on his fat, wet lips.
Lena had been a cop long enough to know a con, and the driver had been a con long enough to know that she was a cop. Neither one of them was about to back down, but he won the standoff by shaking his head, as if to say, 'What a fucking waste.' His wife beater shirt showed rippling muscles as he shifted into gear and peeled off.
Lena was left standing in his wake.
Once the car was gone, she went around to the passenger's side of the Celica and found the six-inch folding knife she kept under the seat. She slipped this into her back pocket, then got her Glock out of the glove compartment. She checked the safety on the gun and clipped the holster to her belt. Lena did not want to meet the man again, especially unarmed.
Walking toward the house, she wouldn't let her mind consider the reasons why such a person would be at her uncle's house. You didn't drive a car like that in a town like Reece by working at the tire factory. You sure as shit didn't leave somebody's house flashing a wad of money unless you knew that no one was going to try to take it off you.
Her hands were shaking as she walked toward the house. The door jamb had splintered from being slammed so hard, or maybe from being kicked open. Pieces of rotting wood and rusting metal jutted into the air near the knob, and Lena used the toe of her shoe to push open the door.
'Hank?' she called, fighting the urge to draw her weapon. The man in the Escalade was gone, but his presence still lingered. Something bad had happened here. Maybe something bad was still going on.
Being a cop had given Lena a healthy respect for her instinct. You learned to listen to your gut when you were a rookie. It wasn't something that could be taught at the academy. Either you paid attention to the hairs sticking up on the back of your neck or you got shot in the chest on your first call by some whacked-out drug addict who thought the aliens were trying to get him.
Lena pulled the Glock, pointed it at the floor. 'Hank?'
No answer.
She stepped carefully through the house, unable to tell if the place had been tossed or if Hank just hadn't bothered to straighten up in a while. There was an unpleasant odor in the air, something chemical, like burned plastic, mixed with the usual reek of cigarettes from Hank's chain-smoking and chicken grease from the takeout he got every night. Newspapers were scattered on the living room couch. Lena leaned down, checked the dates. Most were over a month old.
Cautiously, she walked down the hallway, weapon still drawn. Lena and Sibyl's bedroom door stood open, the beds neatly made. Hank's room was another matter. The sheets were bunched up at the bottom like someone had suffered a fever dream and an unpleasant brown stain radiated from the center of the bare mattress. The bathroom was filthy. Mold blackened the grout, pieces of wet plaster hung from the ceiling.
She stood outside the closed kitchen door, Glock at the ready. 'Hank?'
No answer.
The hinges creaked as she pushed open the swinging door.
Hank was slumped in a chair at the kitchen table. AA pamphlets were stacked hundreds deep in front of him, right beside a closed metal lockbox that Lena instantly recognized from her childhood.
His kit.
Junkies loved their routines almost as much as they loved their drugs. A certain type of needle, a particular vein… they had a habit for their habits, an M.O. they followed that was almost as hard to break as the addiction. Thump the bag, tap out the powder, flick the lighter, lick your lips, wait for the powder to turn to liquid, the liquid to boil. And then came the needle. Sometimes thinking about the rush was enough to get them halfway there.
Hank's drug kit was a metal lockbox, dark blue with chipped paint that showed the gray primer underneath. He kept the key in his sock drawer, something even a seven-year-old girl could figure out. Though the box was shut now, Lena could see the contents as clearly as if the lid was open: hypodermics, tin foil, torch lighter, filters broken off from cigarettes. She knew the spoon he used to heat the powder as well as she knew the back of her hand. Tarnished silver, the ornate handle bent into a loop that you could wrap around your index finger. Hank had caught her with it once and spanked the skin off her ass. Whether this was because Lena was messing with his stuff or because he wanted her to stay clean, she still did not know.
She was leaning against the kitchen counter, gun still in her hand, when Hank finally stirred. Milky eyes looked up at her, but she could tell he couldn't focus, couldn't see, didn't care. Drool slid out of his open mouth. He hadn't put in his teeth, hadn't bathed or combed his hair in what looked like weeks. His shirtsleeves were rolled up and she saw the tiny scars that needles had left so many years ago mingling with new punctures – ulcerous, gaping holes – where the drain cleaner or talcum powder or whatever the hell had been used to cut the shit he was putting into his veins had set up an infection.
The gun raised up into the air. She felt outside herself, as if the weapon was not connected to her hand, as if it wasn't her finger on the trigger, and her own voice saying, 'Who the fuck was that man?'
Hank's mouth opened, and she saw the dark red gums where his teeth had been, teeth that had rotted in his mouth because the drugs had eaten him from the inside out.
'Tell me!' she demanded, shoving the Glock in his face.
His tongue lolled outside his mouth as he struggled to speak. She had to use both hands to keep the gun steady, keep it from going off in her hands. Minutes passed, maybe hours. Lena didn't know; she was incapable of keeping time, figuring out if she was in the present or somehow trapped in the past, back thirty years ago when she was just a scared kid wondering why her uncle's grin was so wide when blood was streaming from his nose, his ears. She felt her skin prickling from the heat inside the house. The odor coming off Hank was unbearable. She remembered that smell from her childhood, knew he wouldn't take care of himself, didn't want to bathe because the layer of grime on his skin clogged his pores and helped hold in the drug longer.
Lena forced her hands to put the gun down on the counter, keeping her back to him as she tried to stop the memories that came flooding back: Hank passed out in the yard, children's services coming to the front door to take them away. Sibyl crying, Lena screaming. Even now, hot tears slid down her cheeks, and she was suddenly that little girl again, that helpless, powerless little girl whose only hope in life was a useless fucking junkie.
She swung around, slapping him so hard that he fell into a heap on the floor.
'Get up!' she shouted, kicking him. 'Get the fuck up!'
He groaned, curling into a ball, and she was reminded that even in a weakened state, the body did what it could to protect itself. She wanted to pummel him with her fists. She wanted to beat his face until no one would recognize him. How many nights had she lain awake, crying her eyes out as she waited for him to finally come home? How many mornings had she found him facedown in his own vomit? How many strangers had stayed the night – nasty, vile men with their leering smiles and fat, prodding fingers – while Hank remained oblivious to anything but chasing his high?
'Was that your dealer?' Lena demanded, feeling a wave of nausea
