“No. We were somewhere by the lake. Near Mississauga, I think. I ended up taking a bus to your old address. The one on the card. From there, I looked up your business on my phone, got the new address, and fucking walked the eight blocks instead since I’m flat broke now and couldn’t pay for another bus ride.”
Darcy whimpered and cradled his arm. “Are you sure you’ve got nothing to drink? I’m in pain.”
I didn’t have alcohol, but I found him a few prescription pain pills left over from the previous year when Tallus had been shot. “I don’t know how long these things last. They might not be as potent anymore, but they should take the edge off.”
He took them greedily.
“Sleep. We’ll reconvene in the morning and figure out where we go from here.”
“He’s going to find me.”
“Not if I find him first.”
I itched for a smoke, but the pack I’d bought the kid the previous day was gone. Besides, it would be hypocritical of me to cave to cravings after bluntly calling him out on his addictions. Instead, I shut down the apartment. The weight of Darcy’s gaze—of responsibility—followed my every move. If I was a different person, one with Tallus’s ability to communicate, I would have reassured him. I sensed his neediness, and instead of being annoyed by it, I commiserated.
“Good night, kid.”
As I headed for the bathroom, he called out, “Hey, Diem?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.”
23
Tallus
Iwoke when Diem slipped from bed in the pre-dawn, making his usual escape to the gym. I considered my pledge to start exercising and quickly dismissed it. People said a lot of things they didn’t mean at the height of anxiety, and I was much happier embracing laziness. Echo barely stirred, and I shuffled closer to cuddle with her since my wall of heat had abandoned me.
Diem fumbled around, dressing in the dark, and paused before creeping from the bedroom. “Are you awake?”
“Define awake.”
He approached and sat on the edge of the bed, petting Echo once before resting his hand on my hip. “I gave Darcy your leftover pain pills from last year. I couldn’t stand the whining anymore. If he wakes before I’m back—”
I snorted. “It’s Saturday, and he’s practically a teenager, D. He won’t.”
Diem chuckled. “Yeah. I guess. I’ll fill his script while I’m out. God knows, he won’t have the money to pay for it. Do you want me to put coffee on before I go?”
“Nah, I’ll get it.”
He didn’t leave, but he didn’t speak for a long time, either. I couldn’t see well enough in the dark to analyze his expression, but I got the feeling he was working up to something. Diem would never be a masterful wordsmith, but his days of grunting like a caveman had been left in the past. He communicated, but he did it at his own pace, in his own time.
“I have that meeting later this morning.”
“I remember.”
“I might take him with me.”
“You can’t force an addict to get clean, Diem. It has to be on them.”
He exhaled heavily but didn’t respond, staring intently at the bedcovers. He knew I was right. “I can see where he’s headed, but no amount of warning will help.”
“Not likely.” I shifted and freed a hand from beneath the covers, resting it on Diem’s thigh. “A positive role model might.”
Another soft laugh. “Oh yeah? Where can I find one of those?”
“Ha, ha.”
