The Last Whisper in the Dark: A Novel (18 page)

“Our cousin John’s a filmmaker?”

“Yes. So’s Mom’s brother, Will Crowe, and her father, Perry Crowe.”

Dale cocked her head. She licked her lips. She looked at me, then she looked away, then she looked at me. “We’re related to Will and Perry Crowe? The TV and movie producers?”

“That’s right.”

“And no one ever told me this?”

“I only just found out about it myself.”

“Mom is heir to Hollywood royalty?”

“They’re not so fancy.”

“And she never said anything? And nobody told me? You didn’t tell me?”

“I’m telling you now, Dale. I only learned about it when I went to visit the old fucker. He’s stuck making horror flicks now. His company’s called All Hallows’ Eve.”

“They own AHE, the horror movie production company?”

“Yeah.”

“I could work for them! Easy!”

“Not so easy,” I said. “All the girls have to run around topless and get butchered.”

“So what? I’m not bashful!”

“I’m bashful enough for both of us.”

For some reason that made her grin. “But what’s the money for? I don’t need that kind of money.”

“Everyone needs money.”

“I have money, Terry.
ROGUES
pays very well. I’ve got lots of money. I get paid in cash, off the books.”

“Where do you keep it?”

“In a bank.”

“If it’s in a bank it’s on the books.”

“In a bank deposit box.”

“Good. Well, you can always use more. I’ll wire more if you need it. John’s got plenty too. This way you don’t have to work three waitress jobs to cover your initial costs. You can focus on acting and school.”

“I told you I was quitting school.”

“You are not quitting school,” I said. “You’re going to go to night school or summer school or whatever the hell you need to do to get a diploma and then start college. You’re staying away from this Simon Ketch prick and that Internet show. If you do this thing you do it right. All of this is nonnegotiable, Dale.”

She let out an exasperated breath. “You’re still pushing me around, Terry. Don’t you see that?”

“I see it,” I admitted. “But I’m right. I’m helping you to get out of here and to follow your calling. You still need a stable foundation of education. A high school diploma, a college degree.”

“You never went to college!” the only one I had leftndor

I glared at her. “You want to be me?”

Her nose and cheeks were turning red. Her frosted breath iced up my throat. “What do Mom and Dad have to say about this?”

“I haven’t told them a damn thing. That’s your job. You clear it with them. You talk it out and you explain yourself. You get their permission. You don’t run. You think things through and you do this the smart way. John knows the ropes. He can open a couple of doors with his name. You listen to him as much as you can.”

“So he’s there to keep an eye on me?” she asked.

My mother sat on the couch watching television.
A breaking story unfolded. The set was too loud with people talking breathlessly into handheld microphones. The on-the-scene correspondent was impatient with the cameraman. He wanted a wider angle. He said, “As you can see over my shoulder … over my left shoulder … there … that’s it, right there—”

His hair became winsomely mussed in the late afternoon breeze. A lot of cops milled in front of a bank in Hauppauge. I inhaled sharply.

Gramp’s chin rested on his chest. He didn’t turn his head at all. His eyes were open and he caught me in his peripheral vision. I could see him in there trying to fight his way back to life. He mumbled some gibberish as I stepped close.

Dale knew that whatever was going on, it was going to be bad. She’d seen Dad’s face too. She held her hand out, caressed me lightly on the wrist, then went to her room. I stood behind Old Shep and propped myself against the back of his wheelchair.

My mother knew I’d been overdoing the pills again and said, “You must be hungry. I made lentil soup. I’ll get you some.”

“Thanks, Ma.”

She brushed past my father and put a hand on his chest, let it stray to his hair for a quick run-through on her way to the kitchen. We were constantly giving one another small reassurances. My father took up his seat in the center of the couch.

I’d been keeping an eye on the papers, waiting for the heist to go down. I guessed at potential targets. I’d been wrong. The crew had bigger aspirations. They’d been pro and sharp and clever, but they
never should have gone for a bank. Not with three crew members and a driver. The only ones who ever get away with robbing a bank are the dumbasses who reach over and snatch a handful of bills from the till. It’s easy to escape with a thousand bucks. But getting into the vault, trying to pull down millions, getting the feds on your ass, that was either overly ambitious or extremely stupid or both.

Wrecked against a flagpole in the bank’s parking lot was the dark green ’69 Mustang fastback that Chub had sold the crew. It looked like a stray shot had taken out a tire. The driver had wiped out hard. His body was still wedged behind the wheel, neck turned at an impossible angle. It seemed like a million-to-one accident.

“No matter how much you plan—” my father said.

“No, you didn’t.”tp">The on-site correspondent turned his chin, listening to his ear-bud. “Early accounts state that the robbers may have gotten away with up to eight hundred thousand dollars—”

How’d they get away? They had no wheels. They had to boost a car on the lot. Whose and how’d they get it? Carjacking at the corner light? Were they holding some little old lady hostage in the backseat of her own station wagon?

The only reason my father could’ve known I’d want to see the news is if he knew that Chub was working with strings. The only way he could’ve known that was by following me. While I’d been wondering where he was going nights he’d been wondering the same thing about me. Except my father was a better creeper than I was. I’d never sensed him on my tail at all. Even with having to take the Donepezil he was just as good as ever. He’d found me out.

My mother brought me a bowl of soup and a chunk of whole-grain Italian bread. I sat beside my old man and ate it without tasting it. He and I were going to have to have a long talk soon, but not right now. For the next half hour we watched as the story continued unfolding.

They hadn’t been after the vault. They’d sat waiting at the back
door of the bank for when the armored car brought in cash. I wasn’t sure if it won’t th

Number seven. The expression on the face of
the woman you once loved who no longer loves you.

I’d only been this close to Kimmy physically one other time in the past five years. A couple of months ago I’d stood on her front walk, watching her and Chub and their girl coming out of their house. Scooter had run a few cantering steps down the walk, not watching where she was going until she’d almost crashed into my legs. I bent and hugged her and her face fell in on itself in shock and fear of a stranger. Kimmy had looked at me in surprise, Chub with a cautious curiosity. Maybe we could’ve started down the road of becoming friends again. If only I had said the right thing, or done the right thing, or acted in the correct manner. Instead, I’d bolted.

I had to keep reminding myself that Scooter wasn’t my daughter.

I had to remember that Kimmy was no longer mine.

I wondered if Darla wanted kids. She had told me not to fall in love. I wondered why I was going to such extremes to never find love again. We Rands continued to be driven upon the rocks.

I said, “Come in.”

They came in. Scooter looked down at JFK and stuck her tiny hand against his wide snout. He lapped at her and she squealed. She cut loose with some kiddie chatter that I didn’t understand. JFK got it though and jumped up on his back legs and gave her a kiss. She guffawed. Despite it all I couldn’t help smiling. I let out a chuckle. My laugh got a little louder. I wanted to hold her. I could go crazy with how much I wanted to hold the little girl, and the woman too.

Kimmy was tense as hell. In our kitchen she checked left and right, looking for lurkers. JFK and the kid kept playing. I tried to
smile. Kimmy’s eyes spiraled with anxiety. Some of it was because of me. The rest this many times beforeetp because Chub had to be on the run already.

“I phoned,” she said. “You didn’t return my calls.”

That meant Chub had given her my number. I hadn’t expected that. The toddler reached for me. I caught her chin between my thumb and forefinger.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I haven’t listened to my messages today.”

She sat at the kitchen table and tugged Scooter onto her lap. I sat across from her in my brother’s seat. She looked hard at me, studying my tics and my tells, searching out my lies even before I’d had a chance to say anything.

Scooter started reaching for items on the table. The centerpiece, the place mats, the salt and pepper shakers. All of it stolen, of course, all of it originally belonging to someone else, but ours now, stamped with our history. Scooter wanted to fill her hands. She wasn’t my kid but Chub was a thief too. Maybe she was destined to be a grabber. I looked at her and the powerful mantra filled my head.
My girls. My girls
. And neither of them was.

Kimmy said, “Terry—”

JFK did me the favor of drawing focus. He kept putting his paw up on the kid’s lap and she’d laugh. He’d turn his head one way and his ears would flop in that direction, and then he’d go the other way. She was a chatterbox. She spoke in a goofy singsong. For every dozen words I thought I might recognize one.

“Tewwy—”

Sometimes there’s no starting point, nowhere to jump in that isn’t full of breaking waves. So I said nothing. I simply asked the question.

“What can I do?”

Kimmy had to pry the salt shaker out of Scooter’s chubby little fist. She slapped it firmly back down on the table and the kid snatched it again immediately.

“Chub called and told me he was in trouble. He was rushed and
said it was all a mistake. He told me to get out of the house for a few days and go home to my mother. He didn’t sound it but I know he was scared.” Her hand moved like a separate small animal looking to bite something. It came for me and latched onto my wrist. “What isn’t he telling me, Terry?”

“I don’t know.”

“He left his cell phone behind. I checked and your number was in there. You’ve spoken to him recently, haven’t you?”

“No,” I said.

“You’ve been outside our house.”

“No, I haven’t. And I haven’t seen him.”

“You’re lying. You never used to lie.”

I used to lie all the time. I made promises I couldn’t keep. I deserved whatever I got. So did Chub. But Scooter, the kid, reaching for me now while JFK licked the tips of her shoes, she had to be protected.

“I’m not lying, Kimmy. Give me a chance to look into it.”

“It must have something to do with this bank robbery. All of these ex-policemen who’ve been killed.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Is he still helping to plan scores? Is he still selling cars to getaway men?”

“I don’t think so.re couple of GT7">I pictured what kind of hitter Danny would throw at him. I imagined that the remaining members of the crew might want Chub done away with just so he couldn’t give them up. He was hiding from the cops, the feds, the people he worked with, his wife, me, and the syndicate.

Her grip on my wrist loosened. She withdrew. It was like the tide going back out, taking me with it.

“Do you have his phone with you?”

“Yes.”

“Give it to me.”

She opened her purse and handed me a cell.

“Go to your parents’ place. I’ll—”

“My father died two years ago. It’s just my mom now.” She jounced Scooter on her knee. “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I said that. I know it’s not important right now.”

“I’m glad you told me. I’m sorry about your dad. Go to your mom’s. Don’t stop back at your place. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“So you do believe it’s serious?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “But I think it would be safer for you and Scooter to—”

“Scooter? Why did you call her that?”

Because I didn’t know the kid’s name. Because I didn’t want to know. Because whatever it was it wasn’t the name I’d have picked for my daughter. The first time I laid eyes on the baby, from a parked car nestled across the street from their house, Kimmy had been playing with her on the front lawn as the toddler wobbled away. Kimmy had called her “Scooter” then. That’s what she’d always be to me.

I didn’t answer.

“We need some things,” she said. “Diapers, bottles. I can stop and buy them on the way.”

“Don’t shop in your usual stores.”

“Why not?”

“Just don’t. And only use cash, no credit cards.”

“Oh Jesus—”

“Don’t flip out,” I told her. “It’s just a precaution.”

“I don’t have much money in my bag, only forty or fifty dollars—”

Chub had a fat stash hidden away. If he decided to skip the country I had no doubt he’d have plenty of money set aside. I wondered if he had three new identities already worked up as well. Passports cost big bucks.

I opened my wallet and handed her some bills. “Here.”

She took them. Scooter snatched a couple from her and waved
them around. Kimmy said, “You just gave me over a thousand dollars in hundred-dollar bills, Terry.”

“Oh.”

“That’s what you carry in your wallet? You still have no concept of money. You’re still stealing.”

“That surprise you?” I asked. “I’m a thief.”

My mother walked in. She let out a choked sound of shock, smiled broadly, and shouted, “Kimmy! Oh honey!”

She rushed Kimmy and grabbed her out the only one I had leftndor of the chair and embraced her and the baby hard. The kid liked it. She squealed some more, still clutching a few C-notes. My ma rocked them both, patting Kimmy’s back, rubbing it, speaking softly in her ear.

In a minute my mother started whispering, “Shhh, shhh, it’s all right, you’re fine, everything is going to be fine.”

Kimmy was sobbing quietly against my mother’s chest. The two of them clung together with Scooter in the middle.