Everything got easier with Wade involved. It turned out pizza for dinner two nights in a row wasn’t that big of a deal, and meat cookies were slices of pepperoni. Wade hadn’t brought his gun and appeared willing to follow Jericho’s lead in terms of not promising future shooting opportunities, and for some reason Elijah was now willing to accept that. Pajamas were donned while pizza was being ordered, and later the kids sat on the couch and ate dinner like almost-civilized human beings.
Throughout, Jericho felt like he was in an alternate universe. It was him, and it was Wade. They weren’t fighting and they weren’t about to fight, as far as Jericho could tell. There didn’t even seem to be all that many innuendos and hidden messages being sent, although it was possible they were there and Jericho was just too dazed to pick up on them. But he didn’t think so. Most of Wade’s attention was focused on the kids, listening to their tales of funny friends and cruel teachers as if the stories were actually interesting, and maybe true.
“Now, sometimes a man has to tolerate that sort of thing,” Wade told Elijah as the boy chomped on a pizza crust and recounted a horrible story about unjust imprisonment at recess time. “But he can always learn from it, and find ways to turn it to his advantage. Can you think of ways you could have made this punishment work for you?”
Despite himself, Jericho was interested in hearing the answer, and Nicolette seemed pretty engaged as well.
“He could have stolen something out of someone’s desk,” she suggested. “If he was the only one in the room and the teacher wasn’t paying attention, it would have been easy.”
Wade nodded sagely. “Easy to steal, yes. But there’s more to stealing than taking the item in question. You also need to be sure you aren’tcaught. And if there was no one else in the room? If the item was in someone’s desk before recess, and then after recess it wasn’t there, and if young Elijah was the only student in the room when the item went missing? Would he be caught?”
“Yeah, probably,” Nicolette admitted.
“Also, stealing is wrong,” Jericho tried. “Taking something that doesn’t belong to you is—it’s wrong. You wouldn’t like it if somebody stole your stuff, would you?”
The other three looked at him with calm, remote pity. “I don’t have anything anyone wants to steal,” Elijah finally explained.
“But you might someday. And if you break the rules now, the rules might not be there to protect you when you need them.” Butsomedaywas too far away, he realized, andmightwas too uncertain. How did he argue that people should uphold a system when that system had never done a damn thing for them? “You’d be in a lot of trouble if you got caught,” he finished lamely.
“Exactly,” Wade said. There was something in his expression that made Jericho want to drag him from the room and find a quiet place where it would be just the two of them. Jericho would pin Wade down, make him admit that he understood Jericho’s struggle, and make him share his own. If they could be honest with each other, just them, without all the rest of the crap the world wanted to throw at them—
“So howcouldI make it work for me?” Elijah asked slowly.
And Wade kept his gaze locked on Jericho’s as he said, “You could use the opportunity to get close to the authority figure. Your teacher can get you in trouble, right? But there’s some judgment involved there. Sometimes she’ll look the other way, or let herself be fooled. And if she likes you, she’ll be more likely to see the best in you. If you can get her to trust you, you might be able to use her. Maybe she can tell you things you need to know, or you can tellherthings so she’ll act against your enemies instead of against you.”
Jericho stared at Wade, and all the warm comfort he’d been enjoying froze into hard ice. So much for no innuendo or hidden meanings. What the hell was Wade saying, and why was he saying it? Was it a warning, or a dare, or something else, something inescapably, indefinablyWade?
“I don’t get it,” Elijah said.
Wade turned his gaze back to the boy, and Jericho’s eyes felt somehow heavier now that they were being ignored. “If your teacher likes you, she’ll be nice to you,” Wade said. “Being alone with her is a good chance to make her like you. You could offer to help her with what she’s doing. Or apologize for misbehaving, and make up some explanation for why you did it. Something she’d believe.”
“Like what?”
“You could always go with ‘things are rough at home.’ That’s a good one.” Wade glanced at Jericho. “Does that work for you, Under-sheriff? Does a difficult childhood excuse all misdeeds?”
Jericho surged to his feet. He had no idea where he was going, but he needed some space. “It’s past eight. You guys should go to bed.”
“No, not yet,” Nicolette tried.
“It’s time,” Wade said, and the damn kids rose to their feet like obedient little robots.
“What do you need to do before bed?” Jericho asked. “Brush your teeth?”
“No, we don’t have to,” Elijah said.
“That’s gross,” Wade told him. “Go brush your teeth.”
Jericho thought about trailing after them to be sure they actually followed through on the order, but it would be too disheartening to see their perfect compliance with the will of Uncle Wade. So he gathered the plates and pizza boxes and headed for the kitchen.
He was aware of Wade following after him but pretended he wasn’t. Wade stood quietly, waiting, as Jericho washed the dishes and put them on the drain board, hung the dishrag on the sink, and then rearranged the soap and moisturizer on the counter.
“You about done?” Wade asked.
“What are you doing here, Wade?” Jericho had meant for his voice to sound impatient, without the plaintive note.
Wade didn’t answer right away. Instead he shifted around and looked at Jericho from the side before he said, “I heard you were babysitting and thought you might need some help with the kids.”
“That’s all. You just wanted to be sure the kids were okay.”
