never be hired for a good job now that political correctness has rendered the circus fat lady extinct, that by the age of forty she will have to sleep sitting up because her enormous breasts will make it impossible for her lungs to do their work, and before she dies of a heart attack at fifty, she’ll be using a DustBuster to get the crumbs out of the deepest creases in her rolls of fat. When she tries to suggest to the voice that she could lose some weight – go to one of those clinics, maybe – it doesn’t laugh. It only asks her, softly and sympathetically, where the money will come from, when the combined incomes of her mother and father are barely enough to satisfy an appetite that is basically insatiable. When the voice suggests they’d be better off without her, she can only agree.
Jane – known to the denizens of Carbine Street as Fat Jane – lumbers into the bathroom and takes the bottle of OxyContin pills her father has for his bad back. She counts them. There are thirty, which should be more than enough. She takes them five at a time, with milk, eating a chocolate marshmallow cookie after each swallow. She begins to float away. I’m going on a diet, she thinks. I’m going on a long, long diet.
That’s right, the voice from the Zappit tells her. And you’ll never cheat on this one, Jane – will you?
She takes the last five Oxys. She tries to pick up the Zappit, but her fingers will no longer close on the slim console. And what does it matter? She could never catch the speedy pink fish in this condition, anyway. Better to look out the window, where the snow is burying the world in clean linen.
No more fatty-fatty-two-by-four, she thinks, and when she slips into unconsciousness, she goes with relief.
21
Before going to Hertz, Hodges swings Jerome’s Jeep into the turnaround in front of the Airport Hilton.
‘This is supposed to be Witness Protection?’ Freddi asks. ‘This?’
Hodges says, ‘Since I don’t happen to have a safe house at my disposal, it will have to do. I’ll register you under my name. You go in, you lock the door, you watch TV, you wait until this thing is over.’
‘And change the dressing on that wound,’ Holly says.
Freddi ignores her. She’s focused on Hodges. ‘How much trouble am I going to be in? When it’s over?’
‘I don’t know, and I don’t have time to discuss it with you now.’
‘Can I at least order room service?’ There’s a faint gleam in Freddi’s bloodshot eyes. ‘I’m not in so much pain now, and I’ve got a wicked case of the munchies.’
‘Knock yourself out,’ Hodges says.
Jerome adds, ‘Only check the peephole before you let in the waiter. Make sure it isn’t one of Brady Hartsfield’s Men in Black.’
‘You’re kidding,’ Freddi says. ‘Right?’
The hotel lobby is dead empty on this snowy afternoon. Hodges, who feels as if he woke up to Pete’s telephone call approximately three years ago, walks to the desk, does his business there, and comes back to where the others are sitting. Holly is tapping away at something on her iPad, and doesn’t look up. Freddi holds out her hand for the key folder, but Hodges gives it to Jerome, instead.
‘Room 522. Take her up, will you? I want to talk to Holly.’
Jerome raises his eyebrows, and when Hodges doesn’t elaborate, he shrugs and takes Freddi by the arm. ‘John Shaft will now escort you to your suite.’
She pushes his hand away. ‘Be lucky if it even has a minibar.’ But she gets up and walks with him toward the elevators.
‘I found Thurston’s Garage,’ Holly says. ‘It’s fifty-six miles north on 1-47, the direction the storm’s coming from, unfortunately. After that it’s State Road 79. The weather really doesn’t look g—’
‘We’ll be okay,’ Hodges says. ‘Hertz is holding a Ford Expedition for us. It’s a nice heavy vehicle. And you can give me the turn-by-turn later. I want to talk to you about something else.’ Gently, he takes her iPad and turns it off.
Holly looks at him with her hands clasped in her lap, waiting.
22
Brady comes back from Carbine Street in Hillbilly Heaven refreshed and exhilarated – the Ellsbury fatso was both easy and fun. He wonders how many guys it will take to get her body down from that third-floor apartment. He’s guessing at least four. And think of the coffin! Jumbo size!
When he checks the website and finds