Chris Mooney - World Without End

"So you admit to killing him."

"I wasn't going to finance his prepubescent cravings. And Matthews was greedy. But his greed didn't hold a candle to the people who own your soul."

"That didn't give you the right to kill him."

"And what gave you the right to permanently disfigure Todd Merrill's face?"

"What about Jonathan King? What you did to him was " "I didn't do anything to him, Stephen. I've never even met the man. If you want to know the truth, turn your attention to the animals lurking in your backyard."

"And the others? What happened to them?"

"They're all safe."

"I don't believe you."

"Would you like to talk with them?"

"You know where they are?"

"Of course. They work for me now."

Conway's head echoed with competing voices.

"Let me tell you something about yourself, Stephen. What keeps you awake at night is your desperate need to have the world exist in black and white. Right and wrong, good and bad, all if it neatly labeled and stored away in your safe mental storage jars. Such thinking is admirable given your background. But this sanitized version of the world doesn't exist, Stephen. Life breathes in shades of gray. Holding onto such secular belief structures in your current profession is not only foolish, it's dangerous."

Conway's throat felt dry, his heart tripping inside his chest with anticipation of a possible knowledge he didn't want to accept. For a moment, he couldn't speak.

"I can give you the life you crave, Stephen. I can help fill those missing pockets because once they were missing in me too, Stephen." A pause, then his voice was lower, as if whispering a secret.

"I can show you worlds you couldn't possibly imagine."

"Your friend, Gunther, I know he called 911," Conway said.

"I've listened to the tape and I recognized his voice. Tell me what you saw."

"Prometheus confined all of man's evils inside a box. Pandora opened the box and unleashed all the evils back into the world. So it will be with you. Revelations are at hand, Stephen. Be prepared to have your foundation shaken to its core."

Conway could feel a cold sweat break across his skin.

"One last thing, Stephen. Your mother's among the living. Her first name is Claire," Angel Eyes said and hung up.

Conway tossed the phone onto the bed. Sleep was gone. His mind was too charged up, too busy searching for answers inside an endless loop that he could never seem to shut off. He leaned one arm against the cool window and looked at the city, his old home, swirling with snow and memories, the raw wind outside howling against the building.

Bouchard's dirty. He's setting you up. Stay away from him and his partner, Cole. You can't trust them.

I haven't lied to you, Stephen, and I never will. I despise it.

Revelations are at hand, Stephen. Be prepared to have your foundation shaken to its core.

What if Angel Eyes was telling the truth?

Conway wanted to talk with Pasha. He would have to figure out a way to do it without tipping off… Go ahead and say it, Stephen. Figure out a way to do it without tipping off Raymond or Cole.

Conway's throat ached. He wanted something cold to drink. He opened the bedroom door, about to step out and navigate his way through the semidarkness to the kitchen, when he heard Booker's wife, Camille.

"Dammit, Book, I want to talk about this. Now."

Camille was talking in a hushed but urgent tone. Conway turned and looked down the long hallway. Their bedroom door was cracked open, but the lights were off, the bedroom dark. Booker said something that Conway couldn't hear.

"How the hell do you expect me to sleep?" Camille said, angry.

"Every time I shut my eyes all I can see are my babies our babies being blown apart and you want me to sleep? What's wrong with you?"

"I told you, it's hype," Booker said, louder now.

"Hype? When someone says they're going to shoot your kids, it's not hype, it's a goddamn threat." Camille's voice broke. She choked back tears.

"You're letting these people get to you," Booker said.

"I'll talk with Steve tomorrow."

Conway, a sick feeling in his stomach, stepped out into the hallway so he could better hear the conversation.

Camille said, "And what are we supposed to do? Stay inside the house all day and wait?"

"You can't do that for one day?"

"I want Steve out of here."

"And leave him hanging in the wind? That's what you're asking."

"Baby, I love Steve, but this, this is just too dangerous. Whatever he's mixed up in, we've got nothing to do with it. I'm not going to put our kids' lives on the line I already did that once with John Riley and I'm not " "Camille " "Don't. You weren't there. I came home and there he was passed out on the couch from drugs while Trey and Troy are sitting on the floor screaming because they're hungry and wet." Camille was crying now.

"Why do you do this? Why do you have to put everything you love on the line? And for what? All those times we caught John Riley getting high, we opened our doors and our hearts for him and what does he do?

Keeps getting high on coke, keeps getting shit-faced until he almost gets himself killed and who comes in and cleans up the mess? Who picks up the tab for his detox center and pays for the funeral?"

Booker was quiet.

"This is my family. Our family, Book. I'm not putting them in danger.

This isn't just about you. I have a vote in this too."

Another period of silence followed. All Conway could hear was the beating of his heart.

"You got anything to say?" Camille asked.

"Your brother Michael."

"Don't go there," she replied, defensive.

"I gave him a job with a good salary. I educated him about the business, I even helped pay for his college education." Booker's deep voice was so calm you couldn't tell if he was mad or upset or excited.

He just kept on talking in that cool tone.

"And how did your brother repay me? By skimming money from my company for months and racking up credit card debts in my name to the tune of thirty gees because he's in big with gambling, he's got a major league problem no one knew about."

"Baby " "And when it all hit the fan and your parents were here crying cause they didn't want him to go to jail or to get his legs broken by the dudes coming to collect the guys who threatened to shut off his light permanently, who bailed him out, Camille?"

"That's different. Michael's family. You stick together with family."

"Right. So why you asking me to throw Steve Conway to the wolves?"

Booker's condo was on the corner of Anderson Street in Beacon Hill, the penthouse suite, a sprawling maze of two floors made of hardwood, three fireplaces, a state-of-the-art alarm and surround-sound speaker system, and floor-to-ceiling windows that offered sweeping, panoramic views of downtown Boston. Booker's wife, Camille, was busy cooking egg-white omelets in a contemporary kitchen of black granite the size of a small apartment. Booker sat at the head of the breakfast table, drinking coffee as he stared down at the front page of the Boston Globe. It was just after 6:00 A.M. and the air inside the condo was warm and pleasant with the scents of coffee and toast and eggs, the window behind Booker full of the bright hard blue sky of a picture-perfect November morning.

Conway drank his coffee, his eyes shifting over to the front page of the Globe. AQUARIUM NIGHTMARE was splashed across the front page in bold letters and underneath the title, three fuzzy color photos of an "unknown" man being spit out of the tank. Conway stared at the pictures of himself, his face averted from the camera, and rubbed his palm and fingers over the spiked ends of his freshly cut hair.

"What do you make of that?" Booker asked, his expression and tone, as always, unreadable.