Struggle tightened Ammon’s voice.“And I wanted to know if you would help me.”
“What was that?”
It took several seconds.“I need your help.”
“In the form of a question, buddy.Jeez, haven’t you ever had to do this before?”
Ammon took in a sharp breath, but his voice was buckled down when he said, “Will you please help me keep my son, who never did anything to you, safe from these lunatics?”
Tell him no, he told himself.Tell him to fuck off.
But he opened his mouth, and he said, “Yeah.”He wanted to reach up and wipe his eyes, but he wasn’t sure why.He forced his voice to be light.“Sure, Ammon.All you had to do was ask.”
His mouth thinned into a line, and he looked away.But he said, “Thank—”
“But just me.”
Ammon cut his eyes back.
“No Tean,” Jem said.“No phone calls.No showing up at our house.No accidental run-ins.He’s worked really hard to get you the fuck out of his life.You’re not going to snake your way back in now.”
Jem waited for the explosion.It didn’t come.Instead, Ammon watched him, nodding slightly—the movement so rhythmic that it almost seemed like he was bobbling, like it was a tic more than a voluntary movement.The wind ran through his thinning blond hair and pulled it to the side.He said, “No Tean.”
There should have been more.
Jem was ready.The arguments.The insistence.The pleasure of shit-stomping whatever Ammon threw out there.
Instead, Ammon buried his hands in his pockets.“I’m taking Daniel to Rainbow House tomorrow,” he said.Then he glanced up at the low clouds.“Unless we get dumped on.”
“I’ve got a family dinner,” Jem said.“But next time.”
Ammon nodded.“Thank you.”
He turned and started away, and Jem watched him.Then Jem called after him, “It won’t work.”
Ammon looked back, but he didn’t stop walking.
“Whatever you think you’re going to do.However you think this is going to fix things.It won’t work.”
It was hard to tell in the dark.But Jem thought Ammon smiled.Only a hint of it.Just around his eyes.
Jem waited until the other man faded out of the harsh white glare of the security lights.Then he made his way to the Subaru.He sat for a while, the car warming up, hands balled into fists in his pockets.
I fucked up.That was a fuck-up.Somehow, I fucked up.
He made himself buckle his seatbelt.He shifted into drive and eased out of the lot.BoomTawk shrank behind him until it disappeared.
Jem was still trying to work his way through the conversation, trying to find what he’d done wrong, where he’d made a mistake, when he noticed a pair of headlights turn out after him.
And at the next turn, they followed again.
3
As Jem eased onto the next street, he watched the rearview mirror.
The headlights followed him.
With all that light shining straight at him, he couldn’t make out much of the vehicle.Not a sedan; he was pretty sure about that.But it might have been a truck.Or an SUV.Something that rode higher, anyway.Something bigger.And dark.
