Back in his car, Kelson retrieved his pistol from under the seat, released the magazine, fingered it, and snapped it back in place. He tucked the gun in his belt, took out his phone, and called the number the woman gave him.
No one picked up. No voicemail asked him to leave a message.
‘What did I expect?’ he said.
He turned on the car and watched the wipers smear rain across the windshield. ‘As if it was that easy,’ he said to them. ‘Still, I’ve got options. None of them good.’ He stared at the mirrored building from which Dominick Stevens ran his piece of the city. ‘Probably a good man. Probably forgiving. Probably will let this one pass.’ If Kelson turned off the wipers, the building would twist and distort in the runnels of rain. He left them on. ‘Yep, I have options. She sent me here for a reason. Of all places, here. Of all men, him. Paid me to come.’ He looked at the building, which seemed to gaze back like an opaque lens. ‘Hell if I know why. Hell if I know how to find out. Her move next. Again. Her move and my countermove. Still, I’ve got options.’ He looked at the wet street. ‘Only one of them good. Do something that makes me happy.’
He shifted into drive, pulled from the curb, and did a U-turn.
Then he zigzagged across the city until he reached the west branch of the Tree House Humane Society, located in a brown-brick building so small Kelson thought it could shelter no more than a pet mouse. ‘Or a gimpy ferret on a leash,’ he said. ‘Maybe a tank of tropical fish.’
He parked a half block away and ran through the rain, ducking in through a black door.
A man in a black T-shirt stood at the front counter. In the recesses of the building behind him, dogs barked.
‘Maybe I’m wrong,’ Kelson said to the man. He was dripping from the rain and filthy from lying in the street.
The man looked at him sideways and said, ‘Can I help you?’
‘I need some kittens,’ Kelson said, and smiled. ‘To go.’
‘I see,’ said the man. ‘They would be for yourself?’
‘My daughter,’ Kelson said. ‘She’d rather have a horse, but … you know …’
The man gave him another look.
Kelson caught his breath and said, ‘Can I start over?’
‘Please do.’
‘I would like to adopt two kittens.’ He explained that his eleven-year-old would take care of them with his help and the help of his ex-wife, who, he admitted, hated cats.
The man said, ‘Your ex-wife is OK with this?’
‘No,’ Kelson said, ‘I thought I would surprise her.’
The man sent him on his way.
Fifteen minutes later, Kelson pulled up outside the downtown Anti-Cruelty Society, a complex big enough to house a circus. ‘More like it,’ he said. He sat in his car for several minutes, repeating out loud the words responsible adult, and then he went inside and adopted a pair of black-and-white kittens, sisters from a litter rescued off a restaurant rooftop. He answered the questionnaire honestly but smiled a lot and managed to keep from tangling himself in the truth or offering worrisome unsolicited information.
He brought the kittens out in a carrier, along with a cat starter kit – food, bowls, a litter box. Then he gave himself a few verbal high-fives and drove straight to Nancy’s house.
He was waiting at the street-side with the mewling kittens, which he’d let out of the carrier and were clambering up the seat backs and on to his shoulder with pin-like claws, when Nancy drove her minivan in behind him. Sue Ellen jumped out of the passenger side into the rain, pleased to see his car. Nancy got out, wearing medical scrubs. As had been the case a lot in recent months, she looked annoyed. And mean. ‘And sexy,’ Kelson said.
He climbed out of his car, holding a kitten in each hand, and said, ‘Surprise!’
Sue Ellen squealed happily, then stopped short and looked at her mother.
Nancy didn’t laugh. She didn’t smile. The rain was making her mascara run.
‘Jesus Christ,’ she said. ‘You’re the most irresponsible, the biggest—’ She couldn’t get the words out. ‘You’ve got to learn to control yourself. You can’t just do this to people.’
‘To you,’ Kelson said.
‘That’s right. To me. I have a life. I make my own choices. I don’t have the patience or energy for this.’
One of the kittens mewled.
Nancy stared at it ferociously. ‘Take them back.’
Sue Ellen said, ‘I told Mom we talked about kittens this morning. I thought you were joking.’
‘So did I,’ Kelson said.
She looked at him slyly. ‘Where’s the horse?’
Kelson said to his ex, ‘What makes you think I’m offering them to you?’
She gave him her you’ve-forgotten-to-floss eyes. ‘You didn’t plan to leave them here?’
‘Well, I thought that made the best sense,’ he said, ‘since you’ve got the house – the space.’
She shook her head.
‘You don’t have to be smug,’ he said. ‘It’s not like you tricked me into admitting it. I’ll keep them at my apartment.’
‘Your building has a no-pets policy,’ she said. ‘Sue Ellen told me that too.’
Sue Ellen gave Kelson a pretend pout. ‘You didn’t bring me a horse?’
Kelson winked at her, which made Nancy angrier. He said, ‘If the neighbors complain, I’ll do what I need to do.’
‘That’s just cruel,’ she said. ‘Taking animals into your life and then—’
‘You’re making assumptions,’ he said. ‘Maybe I’ll find a new place to live.’
‘But who will take you?’ she said. ‘I mean, really, if anyone spends more than a minute with you, who?’ She walked up the sidewalk and went into the house.
Kelson said to Sue Ellen, ‘Go with her. But come over tomorrow after school to visit the kittens – if she lets you.’
Sue Ellen started up the sidewalk, then ran back to Kelson and gave each kitten a kiss on the head. She said to him, ‘Give the horse a kiss for me too.’ She ran up the sidewalk and went in.
‘Great kid,’ Kelson told the kittens.
Then Nancy stuck her head out the door and said, ‘Take them to the pound.’
So Kelson drove home to his apartment. He parked with the hazards on in front of the building, got out, and checked the lobby, then ran inside to the elevator with the cat carrier. He snuck down the hall, hushing the kittens, and fumbled his key into the lock. He stepped inside and yelled, ‘Goddamn it.’
Not only was his bed turned down – though he always tucked in the sheets in the morning, smoothing them flat to prevent headaches – there was a woman in it. The pharmacist Raima Minhas lay with the sheet and blanket pulled to her knees. She wore a black bra and, as far as Kelson could tell, nothing else. She stared wide-eyed at the ceiling.
‘Hey,’ Kelson said.
She didn’t answer. She didn’t move.
Something else about her had changed from when he’d seen her before. Her long black braid was gone.
He went to her, and he knew without touching her that she was dead.
He touched her anyway, feeling for a pulse. Her skin had gone a long way toward cold. He wanted to move away from her as he’d moved away from Christian Felbanks in the condo, but he stayed close. She was clutching a prescription bottle, the label showing through her fingers. He leaned over her to read it.
Percocet. Filled at Lakewood Pharmacy. The label made out to Samuel Kelson.