He’s wearing baggy jeans and a gray shirt. He has a nice, healthy tan.
“The Diaz Family wants you dead. I can’t say I blame them. You made them all look like fucking idiots. Trust me, word has gotten around. Everyone knows one of the Diaz places was taken down by one person. Worse, that one person was a woman. It just doesn’t look good.”
His eyes are robin-egg blue.
“But I’m sure Javier explained that to you. He may even have explained how we contacted him. Like I said, Holly, the family wants you dead. Actually, they want you tortured and then dead. But we managed to persuade them otherwise. We managed to extend your life.”
He has a small cleft in his chin; jokingly I always referred to it has his little baby’s butt.
“Trust me when I say we wouldn’t do this for just anybody. But you … well, believe it or not, I do still love and care for you.”
I’d seen him shot in the chest by my father. I’d seen the blood.
“You’re going to be my messenger, Holly. You’re going to tell Walter what we want in return for his children.”
I’d seen him fall over the side. I’d heard the splash his body made when it struck the water.
“It’s not going to be easy for Walter. We’re aware of this. It’s not like the United States government will simply hand over the flash drive to him so he can hand it over to us. But I’m sure he’ll do his best to get it back. Don’t you agree?”
He turns away from me, turns back around with a syringe in his hands. He inspects it closely, tapping the sides to release the air bubbles as he pushes the plunger.
“I’m not going to be melodramatic about this. I’m not going to set a deadline. If he wants his children back, he’ll get us the flash drive as soon as possible. It’s that simple.”
He moves to the side, to my right, and stands beside me.
“We’ll be watching everything. We’ll know what he’s thinking. We’re more powerful than he cares to admit. Just remind him of that, okay?”
The aftershave he wears is the same he wore two years ago. I can close my eyes and picture the two of us naked in bed. I can close my eyes and almost taste his sweat.
“This right here, Holly, this is only a sedative. It’ll knock you out for a couple hours. By that time Walter should be here.”
With his free hand he twists my arm, looking for a vein.
“He’ll want to know what happened. And you’ll tell him. You’ll tell him everything.”
He finds a vein and keeps it in place with his thumb, then places the needle on the vein.
“You’re the only one we can trust now, Holly. We know how you feel about those kids. We know you’ll do your best to get them back safely. Won’t you?”
He pushes the plunger down with his thumb.
“By the way, I heard about what happened to Stuttering Scooter. Can’t say I’m surprised. The guy was always out of his element.”
The syringe empty, he pulls out the needle and stands back.
“It should only take about a minute or two. Are you feeling anything yet?”
I glare at him.
“Don’t judge me, Holly. I’m not going to give you some bullshit excuse for standing here right now. I picked this path and I’m happy with the decision.”
His face starts to blurs. The room starts to go in and out of focus.
“It’s starting to take effect, isn’t it?”
My eyelids grow heavy. My head grows heavy too, so heavy that I drop it and then quickly try to bring it back up.
“Remember, Holly—if Walter wants his children back, he’ll get that flash drive.”
Zane leans forward, and as I look up at him, his face begins swirling toward the vortex of his nose.
“Also tell him no bullshit. We’ll be watching. We’ll know everything.”
The world tilts, starts to go gray.
“For the children’s sake, Holly,” Zane says, “don’t fuck this up.”
The last thing I know before the gray turns to black is Zane kissing me on the forehead.
Forty-Eight
At some point I open my eyes. A whiteness stares back at me. I think that this is it—this is death. There is no heaven. There is no hell. All that waits for us at the end is nothing. We’re taken back to the place we began, to a womb of whiteness, and here we stay for eternity, staring at that numbing white and thinking about everything we could have done better in our lives, every misstep and every mistake, and never any of the good stuff, no matter how much there was.
Someone clears his throat.
When I look away from the whiteness—what I quickly realize is a ceiling, the ceiling of the Haddens’ guest bedroom—I have to do it slowly because the world’s largest department store has set up shop in my head, a hundred thousand cash registers going ka-ching, ka-ching, ka-ching all at once.
A man in an Army uniform stands in the doorway.
“How are you feeling?”
I open my mouth but close it. My throat is dry.
“Do you need something to drink?”
I nod.
He walks out of the room, leaving the door open. I take a moment to look around the guest bedroom. I’ve stayed here before, the few times I needed to spend the night. It’s one of Marilyn’s pet projects. An actual spinning wheel sits in the corner. A handcrafted quilt hangs from the wall. This room is meant to give the impression of a simpler time. A time where evil was mostly superstition.
When the soldier returns with a glass of water he isn’t alone. Walter is with him, still wearing his uniform, only the top couple buttons have been undone. His face is strained, making him look ten years older.
The soldier sets the glass of water on the bedside table. He helps me sit up. It takes a while because my head is still pounding and because my body is
