Jet reaches down for the hammer and wipes it on her pants leg. Then the gun. Twenty seconds later, we enter the turn where my father’s first family slid into eternity. I see no other headlights, no pedestrians on the road.
“Do it!”
Jet hurls the hardware through the window while our tires judder over the railroad iron. I don’t hear any impact noise.
“Did you make the gully?”
“Yep. They’re gone.”
Four blocks past the turn, I pull into a black pool of shadow against the curb. Instead of getting out, Jet turns and takes my face in her hands. Hers is a mosaic of dried tears and mascara.
“I never wanted to lie to you,” she says, looking deep into my eyes. “I love you.”
“I know. I love you, too. Where will you say you’ve been?”
“My office, I guess.”
I wrap my arms around her, hard enough to hurt, then kiss her ear and neck and hair with frantic urgency. Despite all she told me tonight, her skin and hair taste exactly the same. She smells the same. Most of all, her eyes still shine with life. After she shivers against me for a few seconds, I release her, and she vanishes into the dark. When I shift into Drive and press the pedal to the floor, blood suffuses my muscles, and a wild compulsion fills my chest. If I see blue lights behind me, I will not stop.
I must see my father while he still lives.
Chapter 40
My father was still in a coma when I reached the intensive care unit. Dr. Kirby and our local cardiologist had used a device called the Arctic Sun to put him into hypothermia, and a propofol-induced coma was part of their protocol. By circulating cold water through pads affixed to the thighs and torso, the Arctic Sun can prevent brain damage from insufficient blood flow. The ICU only allows visitors for fifteen minutes out of every hour, so we’ve set up a temporary camp in the waiting room. Right now Mom is in with Dad, having given me the first ten minutes of this quarter hour.
After my first silent visit with him, I rode out to Dixie Allman’s house to get my Flex back. She’d lost her shift at the Show ’n’ Tail and wasn’t happy about it. I gave her a hundred bucks as compensation, but she still griped about having to take her Explorer back so soon. As I pulled out of her driveway, Denny ran up to my window and knocked. He’d been proud to see his photos in the Watchman, and while his mother has forbidden him from doing any more filming for the paper, he hopes to keep helping out on Buck’s murder case. I told him I’d call him if I needed aerial support.
Back at the hospital, I found Nadine in the ICU waiting room with a food basket and a big steel thermos. As soon as she’d learned about Dad’s plight, she’d run by her bookstore and gathered up muffins, sandwiches, and coffee. The Bienville General Hospital has no food available after hours, other than vending-machine crap, so Nadine made sure we would want for nothing. I told her she didn’t have to stay, but she planted herself beside me on the plastic couch and started reading Twitter and Instagram like she meant to stay all night.
After a while, she asked me about the closing of the Watchman, which is apparently the talk of the town. Though she didn’t know the inside story, she knew enough to guess that my deal with the Poker Club was never consummated. After some reflection, I told her that Ben Tate was working on getting out a newspaper tomorrow, one that would at least wound some Poker Club members. When her face betrayed concern, I confessed that I’d avoided telling her ahead of time because I knew how she felt about risking the loss of the paper mill. While she thought about that, I described how Arthur Pine shut down the paper and fired our staff, and the effect that had on my father.
“Hit them back,” she said flatly. “Jab them with a sharp stick and let them know they’re mortal. They have to obey the rules like everybody else, or they go down.”
“I thought you’d try to talk me out of it.”
She shrugged. “I don’t want Bienville to lose the mill. I won’t lie about that. But I don’t see why taking down some corrupt assholes has to destroy the whole