The mechanic who was working on the pickup appears. “Yeah?”
“Mr. Faulkner here says he’s not wearing a wire,” he says. “Let’s confirm that.” He sneers. “I’d hate to have somebody try to entrap me or illegally record my voice.”
I shrug. “It’s not illegal in Georgia. One-party consent makes it just peachy.” Cargill’s smile fades. “Thought you’d know that,” I say cheerfully. “But I’m not recording anything.”
The mechanic frisks me like he’s done it before. Without being asked, I untuck my shirt and unbutton it, then open it and pull up my undershirt to show my bare belly. “Okay,” the mechanic says to Cargill, nodding, and then he goes back out to work on the pickup.
“Empty your pockets,” Cargill says.
I roll my eyes but empty my pockets—keys, phone, wallet, all in a tidy pile on Cargill’s desk. He picks up my iPhone, looks at it, then gives me a smile that’s a shade or two away from a snarl. “How’s your uncle?” he says. “Any cancer or anything? He’s gettin’ older.”
“My sister has a PhD in manipulation, so you playing with my phone and insulting my uncle aren’t really doing it for me,” I say. “Donny Wharton. I want to know where he is.”
Cargill looks at me. “That a fact,” he says. “Why?”
“Does it matter?”
He puts my phone down on the desk. “Might. Assumin’, of course, I know who this Donny fella is.”
I bite my tongue and wait. Guys like Cargill love to hear themselves talk and can’t keep quiet.
Cargill laces his fingers and puts his hands behind his head. “One thing my daddy taught me was to never give away somethin’ for free if you can get paid for it.”
“Donny Wharton shot me, right here in the arm,” I say, pointing to my right arm just below the shoulder. “Then he shot my sister, and then both of my parents. And then he and his partner Sam Bridges drove here in their Camaro and paid you to get rid of it for them. That’s accessory to murder, Brad. No statute of limitations on murder. Even if it’s accessory after the fact, you could be looking at serious prison time. So I’ll pay you by not going to the police and telling them what I just told you.”
Cargill hasn’t moved since I said Donny shot my parents. He just keeps looking at me, although I can see in his face that he’s working out the angles, seeing how many ways he could play this.
“I just want to know where the man is,” I say.
Cargill unlaces his hands and sits forward, his skin almost milk white under the overhead fluorescents. “Somethin’ else my daddy told me,” he says. “If you’re lookin’ for revenge, first thing you should do is dig two graves.”
“That’s Confucius,” I say. “And I just want to keep me and my sister safe.”
He looks flatly at me for a few more moments. “I haven’t seen him for a long time,” he says finally. “Don’t want to, either. Man trails bad luck behind him like a stink.” He narrows his eyes. “And I’d think twice about threatening me, Ethan. If I ever wanted to hurt you, I wouldn’t have Donny Wharton do it. It’d be worse.”
I resist clenching my thumbs or stomping my foot or swinging for Cargill’s jaw. Aside from feeling frustrated, I also think he’s telling the truth. If he knew where Donny is, he’d play this out more, string me along like a cat toying with a mouse before he eats it. So I simply gather my keys and wallet and phone and put them in my pockets. On my way out of the office, I pause. “If Donny does show up,” I say, “and anything happens to me or my sister? Either my uncle or I will find you. And you’d better hope it’s my uncle who finds you first.”
WHEN I GET to my car, I sit behind the wheel and take a few breaths. Then I check the time. Over an hour until my meeting with the police downtown. I call my house to check in on Susannah, and to apologize to Caesar for not getting him good coffee and a toothbrush.
The landline rings, then rings some more, and then goes to voice mail. I hang up, wait a few seconds, and call back. Susannah often screens her calls or ignores the phone altogether, but usually she answers after two or three tries.
No answer.
There are all sorts of reasons why she might not answer. She could be outside, walking Wilson. Or she could be in the shower. Although in both cases Caesar would likely have answered.
I call Ronan’s. The phone rings, and then a happy female voice says, “Ronan’s, how may I help you?”
“Frankie Gutierrez, please. Tell him it’s Ethan Faulkner.”
Another minute of waiting on hold and trying to ignore the rising sense of dread in my chest. I start my car to run the AC.
“Ethan?” Frankie says on the other end.
“Can you call Caesar?” I say. “No one’s answering at my house.”
“Hold on,” he says, and then I hear indistinct sounds as he fumbles with his phone. Then in the background I can hear the rush of voices and plates clinking, the sounds of lunch hour. “You’re on speaker,” Frankie says, his voice echoing slightly. “I’m texting him.”
I pull out of Cargill’s parking lot and take a sharp turn onto Northside, heading north, away from downtown. “Hang up and call him,” I say. “Then call me back.” I disconnect and focus on driving. A minute later my phone rings and I answer, putting it on speaker.
“He’s not answering,” Frankie says. “Where are you?”
“I’m heading home,” I say, pulling around a dump truck and then cutting back in front of him to avoid rear-ending a slow car in the passing lane. The dump truck honks, an irritated blast.
“Ethan, don’t go home,” Frankie is saying. “Call the police.”
“I’ll be there before they will be.” I use my
