Gregg Hurwitz - The Survivor

Nate stepped back inside the plain little room, confronting the watercolor of the little girl at the beach. With alarm he realized that despite his effort earlier, it hung crooked.

The door had barely closed when Abara stepped up on him. “Listen, I’ve done the nice-guy routine up until now. A little banter, a little innuendo. But let me tell you what I’ve learned from thirteen years on this job. I’ve learned to read liars. And you are lying. Now, I don’t know why and I don’t know what about. You’re all wrong. How you handled yourself during the shootings. Your energy-when you’re nervous, when you’re calm.”

Just over Abara’s shoulder, the crooked watercolor hung there, screaming for attention. And taped behind it, the envelope that would decide Cielle’s fate. Nate struggled to keep his eyes fixed on Abara.

“And yet,” the agent continued, “I can tell you weren’t part of the heist. You’re not a piece-of-shit crook who decided to double-cross his team.” He studied Nate’s face. “I think you came here for something, and it wasn’t to stow away Aunt Mabel’s family photos in a safe-deposit box. I will search you. Either you can give your consent here and now or I will take you in to the Federal Building for questioning, where your person can be searched as you enter. Which is it?”

A long beat. Nate emptied out his pockets, slapping his wallet and cell phone on the desk beneath the watercolor, resisting the compulsion to reach over and straighten it. The key came next, number 226.

Abara lifted it to the light, made sure the number passed muster. “That it?”

“That’s it.”

“Mind if I search you?”

“I would love if you would search me.”

Abara spun him, not gently, and nudged him between the shoulders so his hands thudded forward on the desk. The coerced lean brought his nose to within a foot of the painting. Girl at Beach, Askew. Abara’s hands checked his crotch, his armpits, pressed his pockets flat to his thighs, the cold proficiency calling to mind not only the firm pat-down administered by the Ukrainian bouncer outside New Odessa but also the poking and prodding Nate had grown accustomed to in sterile exam rooms.

His body, less and less his own.

Abara’s knees cracked as he rose.

Nate stared at the watercolor. “You done or are you gonna try to get to third base?”

“Now that you moved home,” Abara said, “I’ll leave that to your almost-ex-wife.”

Nate turned around, the two men close in the small room, squaring off. “You watching me?”

“Nah.” Abara backed off. “Drove by, saw the Jeep in the driveway.” He opened the door, gestured graciously for Nate to step out. “Just keeping an eye, like you asked.”

The walk across the bank floor seemed endless. Nate’s clothes, damp with panic sweat, chafed him. His hand was on fire, wrist aching, a preview of what the disease would bring. He curled it to his sternum, cradling it like something precious as he stepped into the air-conditioned elevator for the ride down.

Outside, the benches were taken, so he lowered himself to the curb. Grit and hot air found his face, the texture of passing traffic. He sat for a time, trying to catch his breath.

Chapter 24

Doubt and fear swarmed Nate’s brain, vying for attention. Had he pressed the tape hard enough onto the back of the watercolor? What if it didn’t hold and the envelope fell out onto the desk? What if a janitor took the painting off the wall to dust and discovered what it hid?

It was almost six o’clock as he parked in front of the Santa Monica house and climbed out of the Jeep. Three days and six hours until he had to deliver that envelope into Pavlo Shevchenko’s hands. At least it was out of the bank vault. Baby steps.

The sun had fallen behind the rooftops, clouds smudging the hot orange sky like a child’s handprints. It would have been a beautiful evening had he been in a frame of mind to notice. Folded into his back pocket were the divorce papers he’d retrieved from his place before coming here. While in his apartment, he’d packed a few changes of clothes and swept the tiny forest of orange pill bottles from the bathroom counter into a grocery bag. On his way out, he’d plucked the thumbtacked photos of Cielle and Janie from the wall. Everything else he would happily leave behind.

As he entered, Casper barreled toward him, claws scrabbling against the hard floor. Janie swung through the doorway-“How’d it go?”-her face almost collapsing with relief when she read his expression.

He’d just set down the grocery bag and suitcase when Cielle descended the stairs, Shithead Jason at her heels. Nate did a literal double take at the husky kid before turning to Janie.

“She told him everything,” Janie said. “And they think he’s staying here.”

“You what?” Nate spun to his daughter. “You told your boyfriend ? This is life and death, Cielle.”

Shithead Jason held up his hands calmingly, the picture of maturity. “And I am here for whatever you need, bro.”

The muscles of Nate’s left hand were contracting, and he did his best to shake out the knot forming in the meat of his palm. “Cielle, you need to-”

“ What? Keep it a secret ? You guys haven’t. You told Pete, and look how that turned out. So why can’t I tell someone important to me ?”

“No one should know about this,” he said.

“No, Nate. It’s just that you want to make all the choices. Who to tell, who not to.” She drifted down the final steps, on tilt. “ You said I could make my own choices. Well, this is my first. And his.”

She reached back for Jason, who took her hand and swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing. He’d removed his small gauge earrings, leaving hole punches in his lobes through which Nate could see the sides of his neck.

Janie turned to Nate. “You told a fifteen-year-old she could make her own choices?”

“Not exactly,” he said.

They were arrayed around the entryway like enemy tanks in a clearing, everyone ready to pivot and fire.

“I’m staying with her,” Jason said. “That big guy comes back, I’ll kick him in his Justin Bieber.”

“You don’t understand,” Nate said. “These men, they don’t care about anything. They are perfect terrorists. You need to stay away from this for your own safety.”

“Far as I’m concerned,” Jason announced grandly, “they can all go suck a bag o’ dicks.”

“Okay,” Janie said. “Great. Thanks.”

A rush of fury, burning Nate’s throat with the words: “You think this is a fucking joke? Some kind of video game? Do you guys have any concept of-”

Cielle reddened. “I know what’s best for me.”

“Your inviting him here proves exactly how little you know what’s best for you.”

Cielle stormed upstairs, towing her boyfriend. Jason paused, pointing across at Casper. “By the way, the dog’s showing his lipstick. I’m just sayin’. It’s a little gross.”

Cielle took up the slack, yanking him around, and then they were up and the bedroom door slammed, leaving Nate and Janie and an aroused Rhodesian ridgeback.

“Put that thing away,” Janie said to Casper, who rose and padded off. She rubbed her eyebrows with thumb and forehead, muttering something unintelligible.

Nate’s skin was tingling-the aftermath of the outburst. He looked at Janie. “What?”

“She’s not seven, Nate. She is fifteen. You can’t just pick her up and throw her over your shoulder. She has to be part of this. We need her to cooperate .”

He tamped down a flurry of objections. “Okay,” he said. “Okay. What do we do about it?”