The cops are walking back over to Jessup and David John, but the black one peels off and gets into the squad car. He starts it up and backs the cruiser down to the end of the lane. Hawkins watches, waits, and then turns to David John and Jessup.
Jessup shakes his head, “I didn’t—”
“Shut the fuck up.” Hawkins is furious, almost feral. “I’m going to ask you this once, and I want you to tell me the truth. Honest answer, Jessup. You understand?” He looks at David John. “This can all go away, but only if your son tells me the truth. You got that? Is there anything I need to know about last night?”
Jessup glances at David John. David John gives the smallest nod possible. “Go ahead, Jessup. Paul’s good people. You might not remember him because, well, for obvious reasons, being a cop and all, he tries to keep a bit of a low profile at the church. But he’s church people.”
Hawkins softens a bit. “I’m glad you’re out,” he says.
“Me too. Now, Jessup,” David John says, looking at him, “what happened?”
Hawkins holds up his hand. “Hold on. Let me tell you what we’ve got, and then you tell me what happened. Want to make sure there’s no mistakes here.”
Jessup wonders if the world is unspooling around him. His legs feel shaky. All he’s had to eat this morning has been a banana and a Snickers bar, running on three, four hours of sleep. He could use a shower, a sandwich, even a nap before he has to work. Instead, he’s standing on the driveway, talking to . . .
Hawkins talking. Bunch of kids sleeping over at Victoria’s, sleeping it off, one of them heading out in the morning and seeing the sun glinting off the metal and broken glass of the Mercedes smashed up at the edge of the woods down the hill from the driveway. Corson in there, no seat belt, going to be an autopsy and they’ll check for alcohol and drugs. Assumption is that this is just a standard tragedy, kid turns off his car and puts it in neutral instead of park, too drunk to stop it. There’s always some dumb teenager on a Friday night, at least nobody else was in the car. That’s what they think at first, but Cortaca on a quiet Saturday morning means there’s plenty of cops showing up at Victoria’s, and plenty of cops means plenty of talking to plenty of kids, and Jessup’s name comes up.
“So,” Hawkins says, “first assumption is that this is just some stupid nigger”—Jessup realizes he has to stop himself from flinching, the familiar word so unfamiliar out of this uniformed cop’s mouth, Jessup not lying when he told Cunningham it is a word he doesn’t use—“who doesn’t know how to use a parking brake, but with David John coming home yesterday . . .” He sighs. “We started roll yesterday morning with the chief of police talking about David John getting out of prison and that we should all be looking out, any excuse to pull you over. He’s got it in for you, and the orders are, if we’ve got anything, if anything is hinky at all with you, let’s make sure we get it on paper, cover our asses. And then, all of a sudden, here we go, it’s Saturday morning and another dead nigger—”
David John interrupts. “We don’t talk like that in my house. This is a Christian household.”
Hawkins squints. “Fine. Another dead Negro, which would be a good start in my book, but we’ve got all these high school kids blurting out a name, and that name belongs to David John’s kid. It’s not a good look, Jessup. Let me ask you again, is there anything I need to know about what happened last night?”
There’s only one answer Jessup can give.
“No.”