The Inner Circle (29 page)

I sat at the desk and watched him, not sure what to say. Drew had already told me about how the man had done a complete one-eighty, but it was hard to believe.
 

Besides his one compliment to Beverly, Mason didn’t talk for the rest of his meal. He saved the pickle for last, chomping it down in three bites and then licking his lips of the juices, a crooked but healthy smile on his face. Finally he looked at me, held up the plate, and nodded.
 

“Excellent,” he said.
 

“I’m glad you enjoyed it.”
 

“It was really good.”
 

“So you said.”
 

He gave me a curious stare, then got up from the cot and took his plate to the spot where the other plates had been before. He set the plate down and picked up the stack of papers by the pile of his dirty clothes, came back to the cell bars and held up the stack in front of him.
 

“Did everything in this really happen to you?”
 

“Yes.”
 

“That’s some fucked up shit.”
 

“Yes it was.”
 

“And your wife and daughter ... you still haven’t found them yet?”
 

“No.”
 

“Do you think they’re still alive?”
 

I sat up straighter in my chair and took a long, deep breath. “I’d like to think they are.”
 

Mason said nothing for a long moment. “So these people, Simon and Caesar, this whole Inner Circle ... they’re a bunch of douche bags, huh?”
 

I couldn’t help but crack a smile. “That’s right. A big bunch of douche bags.”
 

“What would you do if you were to confront Caesar? If he were to walk through that door right now.”
 

“I’d kill him.”
 

“You wouldn’t hesitate?”
 

“Not at all.”
 

“But what difference would it make? You know, in the end.”
 

“Maybe none. But it would make me feel a hell of a lot better.”
 

Mason watched me, his head cocked slightly, seeming to measure me. Then his eyes shifted at something past me. “What is that?”
 

“What is what?”
 

“
That
.”
 

He was looking at something over my shoulder. Even though I knew what he meant, I glanced back anyway. There, right beside the door, was a plastic screen with two red buttons underneath.
 

“Those,” I said, “are in case of an emergency.”
 

“What kind of an emergency?”
 

“A bad one.”
 

He kept the frown on his face for a moment, then nodded and asked, “Do you still dream of Michelle Delaney?”
 

The question caught me off guard. “What are you up to, Mason?”
 

“What do you mean?”
 

“The other day you barely wanted to talk to me. Now you want to be friends. What gives?”
 

“I’m sick of being trapped in here.”
 

“So you figure if you play nice, we’ll let you out.”
 

“I guess. But I know you guys are jumpy after what happened before with that Christopher Kane guy.”
 

“Christian Kane.”
 

“Right. And it’s just ... yeah, I have anger issues. Like I told you, I’ve had them all my life. That’s no excuse for what I did during my game, but there you have it.”
 

“And?”
 

He tossed the bound manuscript on the cot and raised his hands up to his sides in surrender. “And what?”
 

At that moment I wished I had the Kid’s nifty gadget with me, the one that could analyze Mason’s voice so I could see whether or not he was telling the truth. A part of me knew to be hesitant, but another part felt as if he was being on the level.
 

I leaned forward in my seat, my elbows on my knees, and interlaced my fingers. “The other day you said I misjudged you.”
 

“You did.”
 

“Then tell me about yourself, Mason. Make me understand.”
 

“You mean like my childhood and shit?”
 

“Just anything you’d like to share.”
 

He stood silent for a while, just staring back at me. Then he nodded slowly and turned and sat back down on the cot.
 

“I always knew I was going to be a mechanic, even before I got into high school. My old man had been a mechanic so it just made sense, like it ran in the blood. And it’s good, honest work. I was never one to try to rip somebody off. I started dating Gloria in my last year of high school. She had this brother, a guy named Adam. He was in this biker gang. And when I say biker gang, understand that I mean an actual biker gang. These guys were the real deal.”
 

“What was their specialty?”
 

“Arms, mostly. But they would also transport drugs every now and then. Whatever helped pay the bills.”
 

“Prostitution?”
 

“Not that I knew of, but then again I knew better than to ask questions.”
 

“You end up in the gang?”
 

“Nah, Gloria wouldn’t let me. I wanted to, you know, but Gloria was really strict about it, and I guess I could see why. Adam, though, he was actually really cool to me. He understood how things were, and he told me once that even if his sister was okay with it, he wouldn’t let me join. He knew just how dangerous being in the gang could be, and he didn’t want something to happen to me. He knew that if that happened, it would kill Gloria. So I started just working as a mechanic in their shop, doing work on their bikes and shit. All of it was legit. I got a paycheck and everything.”
 

“So how’d you end up in jail?”
 

“Adam. He was doing a last-minute run one night. The guy he was supposed to go with fell out, got really sick or something. So he asked me to come along. Said it would be real simple, just a drop off and that was it. He just wanted me along for the extra protection. I mean, even if I wasn’t in the gang, I still carried a piece on me, so I could give him some backup.”
 

“You expect me to believe he couldn’t get anybody else to go with him?”
 

“Man, at that point I was just happy to tag along. I mean, even though Gloria made me swear to never join the club, that didn’t mean I didn’t want to be a member. From the outside it looked like a pretty sweet life.”
 

“Dangerous, though.”
 

“Well, yeah. But right then, it was just me and Gloria. Had we had Anthony then, maybe I wouldn’t have gone along.”
 

“But you did.”
 

“That’s right, I did. I went with Adam to the drop. We didn’t even make it the whole way there. On the way, a cop tried to pull us over. We both were carrying meth. We took off, went different directions. The cop ended up following me. Chased me for a couple long miles until I ended up in a dead end.”
 

“Then what happened?”
 

“They busted me for possession with intent to distribute. As you can imagine, that didn’t go down too well. The club had a lawyer and everything, but seeing as I wasn’t an actual member, they weren’t too quick to use him to help me out. I mean, the cops were sweating me to give them names. They knew I wasn’t a member, that I was just related to one. They wanted to break me to get to Adam and the rest of the club.”
 

“But you didn’t break.”
 

“No, I didn’t. Trust me, the last thing I wanted to do was go to prison, but I wasn’t about to rat out my brother-in-law.”
 

“What about your son?”
 

“He wasn’t born yet. Gloria didn’t find out she was pregnant until I had already had my sentencing. The way we figured it, our boy had been conceived a night or two before I went on that drop with Adam.”
 

“So what happened inside?”
 

“There was a rival gang. They knew who I was and what I was in for. They tried to come for me. I managed to fight some of them off, but not all. It happened way too soon once I got inside. The club hadn’t been able to get me protection yet.”
 

“And?”
 

“And the rival gang, they were mostly black. When they came at me, I ended up killing one of them in self-defense. It caught the attention of the AB. They were impressed. I was too scared then to really think straight, so when they approached me, I just went with the flow.”
 

“How long were you inside?”
 

“Too goddamn long.”
 

“Did you have any other issues?”
 

“Not while I was still with the Brotherhood.”
 

“And then once you got released?”
 

“I packed up Gloria and Anthony and got the fuck out of there. We moved three states away. Adam and the club said they were really sorry, that they wanted to make it up to me, and maybe they did, but I wasn’t about to trust them anymore. I didn’t want them raising my son anymore than they already had. So we moved and I tried getting another job as a mechanic, but as you can probably guess it was tough with my record. I did come across one place, but they were associated with the AB. It was the last place I wanted to work, but money was getting tight and I was getting desperate, so I stopped by. They hired me right on the spot. Then five years later ... well, I woke up and my family was gone.”
 

Mason went silent then, his gaze now focused on his hands. Slowly, so very slowly, his eyes shifted up to meet mine. They were completely sincere.
 

I sat quietly for a moment, thinking. Then I stood up and reached into my pocket and approached the bars.
 

“A lot of things have changed in the past twenty-four hours,” I said, withdrawing the single key from my pocket. “What’s going to happen in the next twenty-four hours, I have no idea. But I figure at this point, nobody should be locked up.”
 

I slid the key into the lock but paused, cocked my head at Mason.
 

“But try to keep your anger under control. Because I am not joking when I say I won’t think twice putting two in your head.”
 

Mason nodded solemnly. Then, slowly, a grin spread across his face.
 

“What’s so funny?”
 

“Nothing. It’s just that doesn’t sound like the guy I read about in your story.”
 

“Yeah, well, didn’t you figure that part out yet? That guy died two years ago.”
 

And I turned the key.

42

The inscription on my wife’s wedding ring read
TO
JEN
,
MY
OTHER
HALF
. It referred to a story she had once told me weeks before we got married, a story going back to the beginning of time. A story of love.
 

It was the same story I found myself thinking about again and again from that day forward, to the day we got married, to the day we had Casey. It was those halcyon days where I truly believed my life was complete, an expensively crafted model with no missing pieces, where everything worked just right. Of course there were times when Jen and I had our disagreements, where Casey misbehaved and had to be scolded. I’m not even going to try to kid myself that none of that ever happened. But even then, on those rare occasions when I became frustrated, angry, perturbed to the point where I’d wonder just what the hell kind of mistake had I made, I would think about Jen’s wedding ring, about the inscription, and I would somehow know that everything was all right.
 

I thought about that every day, from the day my family was taken away from me until now, this very evening, alone in my bedroom. Lying in my bed and staring at the only thing I had that belonged to my wife, which had been shipped to me in a box along with her savagely cut off finger.
 

I always kept it at the farmhouse. I never took it on missions, for fear that I would lose it. At nights I would place it beneath my pillow, as if my wife’s spirit were somehow trapped in that white gold, and that during the night, while I slept, her spirit would meet me in my dreams.
 

It was nearly ten o’clock. Everyone else was downstairs, watching TV or playing cards. I had wanted to be alone so I just lay there with the lamp on behind my bed, moving the ring between my fingers, holding it at just the right angle so I could make out those five words.
 

There was a soft knock at the door. Maya stepped inside. Wordlessly she moved to the other bed against the wall and sat down, pulling her feet up onto the bed and hugging her knees.
 

“Hi,” she said.
 

“Hi,” I said.
 

That was it. Neither of us said anything else. I still had Jen’s ring in my hand, unconsciously moving it around with my fingers. When I realized what I was doing, I stopped the motion, made the ring disappear into a fist, and went to place it back underneath my pillow.
 

“You don’t have to do that.”
 

I looked up at her.
 

“I don’t mind, Ben. You know that.”
 

I replaced the ring anyway. Sat back and pulled up my feet, hugged my knees, both of us less than ten feet apart but the distance feeling so much farther.
 

Maya said, “You ran away yesterday.”