He picked flour from under his thumbnail.
“We had a CO who did this,” Clay said. “Very approachable, very down to earth. He liked the things we liked.”
“Sounds like a fun boss,” Fisher said.
“He was an asshole,” Clay said. “That’s why he had to run so hard to try and stay ahead of it. So, for the record, unless you made that cake for me, I don’t give a shit about it. Why are we here, Mr. Fisher?”
Fisher’s expression didn’t slip. He waited a moment, pulled his mouth down in a shrug, and looked at Ezra.
“Is that how you feel?” he asked.
“I’d have wrapped it up prettier,” Ezra said. “But yeah. More or less. This was a meeting you asked for. I assume it wasn’t to tell us about your hobby. What do you want?”
Fisher picked at a pasted-over bubble on the label of the beer with his thumbnail as he absorbed that. Then he relaxed and smirked as he took a drink.
“Your cleaner,” he said. “The one that was involved in the Buchanan case. Pulaski.”
The skin across Clay’s shoulders tightened uncomfortably.
Ezra didn’t look at him, but he didn’t need to. They’d worked together long enough that Clay could feel the “stay fucking calm” vibes from his partner. Ezra sauntered over to the table and set his bottle down.
“Do you want a reference?” Ezra asked.
Fisher shook his head. “We handle disposal in-house,” he said. “I don’t trust freelancers.”
“A date?” Clay asked. His head was full of static fromnotreacting, and he was mildly surprised at how calm his voice sounded.
Fisher’s smile didn’t slip. “Maybe for my wife’s birthday, if he swings that way,” he said. “No, I want to know what he’s told you about Tommy Pulaski and where the bastard is holed up.”
“Six feet under somewhere,” Ezra said. “From what I’ve heard.”
Fisher shook his head and looked at the bottle in his hand. “A lot of people think that,” he said. “I know better.”
“Sounds like you’re the one with the inside track here,” Clay said. “What do you need Grade for?”
He weighed the bottle in his hand, glass cold against his fingers, and let his mind run through the various scenarios that ended with him holding a gun. None of them ended with him walking out with a gun, or him walking out.
“Because my inside track is thirteen years old,” Fisher said. “I know where Tommy Pulaski was then—and that he wasn’t as dead as everyone thought—but what fucking good to me is that? I can’t exactly carjack Doctor Who and time travel back there, can I? I need to know where I can find him now. Today.”
“Why?” Ezra asked. “If he’s alive, there’s not going to be much of that hundred grand left. Not by now.”
Fisher traded a look with Nesmith. The conversation was brief and silent—pursed lips, raised eyebrows, a final dip of the chin—and ended with Fisher standing up.
“Oh, the hundred grand isn’t what I’m after,” he said as he set the beer bottle down on the table. “Six months after he disappeared with the drugs, Tommy Pulaski killed my brother. That’s what I want to have a word with him about. So either you find out where he is from his son or bring Pulaski Junior here so I can get it out of him. I’m easy. Either way. I’ll give you a couple of weeks to decide which it’s going to be. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get the cake out of the oven.”
He walked away. The nameless muscle followed him; Nesmith stayed where he was and took a long, meditative drink of his beer.
“It’s his stepson’s birthday,” Nesmith said finally. “There is actually a cake. He wants the boy to have a normal life, be a CPA or something.”
Ezra finally looked at Clay. He shook his head slightly and then turned his attention back to Nesmith.
“That’s good to know,” Ezra said. “You know that Tommy Pulaski is dead, right?”
Nesmith shrugged. “What I know is that isn’t what Mr. Fisher believes,” he said. “And he thinks if Mr. Pulaski was alive six months after he disappeared… he could still be. That is what is important. At least it should be to you if you want to stay affiliated with our organization. Fisher would rather Tommy Pulaski not get any warning that his sabbatical is running out. That’s why he wants you to deal with this instead. End of the day, though, that was his brother, and if he needs to take direct action, he will. Don’t get in his way.”
Ezra held up his hands, beer bottle still loosely gripped in one, to fend off that suggestion.
“I thought we’d made clear with Buchanan that crossing Fisher—in any way—is the last thing we want.”
