The Same Place (The Lamb and the Lion #2) - Gregory Ashe Page 0,119

of something else that had fallen, another piece of white paper that had slipped out of his pocket, but he was too focused on this moment to give it any attention. “I did you a favor, throwing his note away, because you’re too goddamn stupid to look out for yourself. I did you a favor, making it so you didn’t have to choose. And here’s the last favor I’m ever going to do you: I’m cutting you some slack from your own fucking stupidity.” He dusted the last scraps of the application from his hands. “You’re welcome.”

“Anything else you want to say?” Tean asked.

“I think that’s it.”

“Goodbye, Jem.”

“Yeah. Fuck both of you. I hope you’re fucking miserable together.”

Grabbing the essentials again, Jem bulled toward the door. At the last moment, Ammon lunged, but Tean just forced him out of the way, giving Jem a clear path to the door. Then he was outside, the hall carpet rough under his bare feet. The door slammed shut behind him. Jem hopped into his sneakers, stumbled down to the bike, and drove.

32

Tean spent the rest of Sunday in a blur. It took a long time to get Ammon to leave, in spite of the litany of therapist talk—What I’m hearing is that you want some time alone. Is that right? Yes, Tean wanted to answer, yes that’s right, and if you’re hearing it so fucking clearly, then why are you still in my fucking living room? Then, once Ammon was gone, he went into a frenzy of activity: starting a load of laundry, mostly Jem’s clothes; a long walk with Scipio, whose feelings were still hurt from the way Tean had shouted; then finishing laundry, folding clean clothes, setting Jem’s aside. He was packing Jem’s clothes in the duffel when he touched plastic and pulled out a baggie full of pills. When he searched on the computer, he learned that they were clomiphene citrate, and he wondered what Jem was doing with fertility meds. Another scam. Another lie. Another way to cheat people who needed hope.

It was near the end of this frenzy that he found a credit card notification, and his first thought was that this was another scam, another way Jem had found to steal from people who weren’t as clever as him. Tean spotted the name, Brigitte Berger Fitzpatrick, right as he was going to throw away the paper. He thought of how suddenly Jem’s behavior had changed, the terrifying pain under the dope in his eyes. Then he curled up on the couch and cried until Scipio climbed up next to him and licked his face.

He must have slept because he woke in the dark. He walked and fed Scipio, and then he drove out to Wasatch Hollow, to Hannah’s parents’ house, and pounded on Howard and Virgie’s front door. He was shouting something, although he didn’t know what. The lights were on inside, and footsteps moved, but the door didn’t open. Then Virgie’s face floated in the glass, a phantasm. Air and ether. She had a phone to her ear, and when she hung up, Tean’s phone buzzed. Ammon’s name showed on the screen. He dismissed the call.

Next, he went to Heber. After parking the truck on a dark stretch of road, he retrieved a length of nylon rope from the back of the cab. A loop with a two-half hitch, nothing fancy. Normally he would have used a catch pole, but he thought about a hundred ways things might go wrong, and a catch pole might point back at him. He walked a quarter mile to Zalie’s farm, and then he picked a spot on the east side of the barn where the shadows were thickest and waited. He wasn’t sure if it would be tonight, but if not tonight, he’d come back again, and again, and again.

The footsteps broke the silence two hours later. Tean had learned from Jem, and he waited until the person was busy trying to force open the door on the barn. Inside, the pigs stirred, making noises of distress and warning. It was hard to gauge distance in the darkness. Tean got as close as he could, and then kicked out with one foot. He connected with the back of the man’s knee, and he staggered and dropped onto his other knee. Tean tossed his improvised lasso over the man’s head and yanked on the nylon rope. The knot drew tight. The man rocked back, making choking noises. This was still