John Grisham - The Associate

They had chatted briefly on the phone, and Kyle was uneasy about the plan.

Roy was not at all uneasy. He had studied the file, analyzed the facts and issues, weighed the predicament, and was ready to move. “I have a friend with the FBI,” he began. “A friend I trust completely. We worked together years ago before I became a lawyer, and even though we are now on opposite sides of the street, I trust him even more. He’s a heavyweight here in the New York office.”

Kyle flashed back to his last encounter with the FBI. Fake names, fake badges, a long night in a hotel room with Bennie. “I’m listening,” Kyle said with skepticism.

“I want to meet with him and lay everything on the table. Everything.”

“What will he do?”

“Crimes have been committed. Crimes are in process. Crimes are being planned. And not small crimes. I suspect he will be as shocked as I am. I suspect the FBI will get involved.”

“So Bennie gets nabbed by the feds?”

“Sure. Don’t you want him locked up?”

“For life. But he has a vast network out there in the shadows.”

“The FBI knows how to lay its traps. They screw up occasionally, but their record is very good. I deal with them all the time, Kyle. I know how smart these guys are. If I talk to them now, they’ll move in quietly and lay the groundwork. When they want to, they can throw a whole army at the enemy. Right now you need an army.”

“Thanks.”

“I need your permission to talk to the FBI.”

“Is there a chance they’ll take a look and let it pass?”

“Yes, but I doubt it.”

“When will you talk to your friend?”

“Maybe as early as this afternoon.”

Kyle barely hesitated. “Let’s do it,” he said.

It was almost midnight when Kyle quietly slipped through the unlocked kitchen door of his family home in York. All lights were off. His father knew he would be arriving late, but John McAvoy let nothing interfere with a night’s sleep. Zack, the ancient border collie who’d never met an intruder he didn’t like, managed to rouse himself from his pillow in the breakfast nook and say hello. Kyle rubbed his head, thankful to see the dog one more time. Zack’s age and exact lineage had never been clear. He was a gift from a client, partial payment on a fee, and he liked to spend his days under the desk of John McAvoy, sleeping through all sorts of legal problems. He usually ate lunch in the firm’s kitchen with one of the secretaries.

Kyle kicked off his loafers, sneaked up the stairs to his bedroom, and within minutes was under the covers and dreaming.

Less than five hours later, John practically kicked in the door and boomed, “Let’s go, knucklehead. You can sleep when you’re dead.”

In a drawer, Kyle found an old set of his thermal underwear and a pair of wool socks, and in the closet, among a collection of dusty old clothes that dated back to high school, he pulled out his hunting overalls. Without a woman in the house, the dust and spiderwebs and unused garments were accumulating. His boots were precisely where he’d left them a year earlier, last Thanksgiving.

John was at the kitchen table preparing for war. Three rifles with scopes were laid out, next to several boxes of ammo. Kyle, who’d learned the art and rules of hunting as a child, knew his father had thoroughly cleaned the rifles the night before.

“Good morning,” John said. “You ready?”

“Yep. Where’s the coffee?”

“In the thermos. What time did you get in?”

“Just a few hours ago.”

“You’re young. Let’s go.”

They loaded the gear into the late-model Ford pickup, four-wheel drive, John’s preferred means of transportation in and around York. Fifteen minutes after crawling out of bed, Kyle was riding through the darkness of a frigid Thanksgiving morning, sipping black coffee and nibbling on a granola bar. The town was soon behind them. The roads became narrower.

John was working a cigarette, the smoke drifting through a small crack in the driver’s window. He usually said little in the mornings. For a man whose day was spent in the midst of a busy small-town law office, with phones ringing and clients waiting and secretaries scurrying about, John needed the solitude of the early hours.

Kyle, though still sleepy, was almost numb with the shock of open spaces, empty roads, no people, the great outdoors. What, exactly, had been the attraction of a big city? They stopped at a gate. Kyle opened it and John drove through, then they continued deeper into the hills. There was still no trace of sun in the east.

“So how’s the romance?” Kyle said, finally attempting conversation. His father had mentioned a new girlfriend, a serious one.

“Off and on. She’s cooking dinner tonight.”

“And her name is?”

“Zoe.”

“Zoe?”

“Zoe. It’s Greek.”

“Is she Greek?”

“Her mother is Greek. Her father is an Anglo mix. She’s a mutt, like the rest of us.”

“Is she cute?”

John thumped ashes out the window. “You think I’d date her if she wasn’t cute?”

“Yes. I remember Rhoda. What a dog.”

“Rhoda was hot. You just didn’t appreciate her beauty.” The truck hit a rough section of gravel road and bounced them around.

“Where’s Zoe from?”

“Reading. Why all the questions?”

“How old is she?”

“Forty-nine, and hot.”

“You gonna marry her?”

“I don’t know. We’ve talked about it.”

The road went from gravel to dirt. At the edge of a field, John parked and turned off the lights. “Whose property is this?” Kyle asked softly as they gathered their rifles.

“It used to be owned by Zoe’s ex-husband’s family. She got it in the divorce. Two hundred acres, crawling with deer.”

“Come on.”

“True. All legal and aboveboard.”

“And you handled the divorce?”

“Five years ago. But I didn’t start dating her until last year. Maybe it was the year before, I really can’t remember.”

“We’re hunting on Zoe’s property?”

“Yes, but she doesn’t care.”

Ah, the small-town practice of law, Kyle thought to himself.

For twenty minutes they hiked along the edge of the woods, without a word. They stopped under an elm tree just as the first hint of light fell across the valley before them.

“Bill Henry killed an eight-point last week just over that ridge there,” John said, pointing. “There are some big bucks in here. If he can get one, anybody can.”

A deer stand had been built in the elm, twenty feet up, with a rickety ladder leading to it. “You take this stand,” John said. “I’ll be a hundred yards that way in another one. Nothing but bucks, okay?”

“Got it.”

“Is your hunting license current?”

“I don’t think so.”

“No big deal. Lester’s still the game warden. I kept his son out of jail last month. A drug head. Meth.”

John walked away, and as he disappeared into the darkness, he said, “You stay awake, now.”

Kyle tucked the rifle over his shoulder and crawled up the ladder. The deer stand was a small platform made of planks and two-by-fours anchored into the elm, and like all deer stands it was constructed with little thought to comfort. He twisted one way, then another, and finally situated himself with his rear on the planks, his back to the bark, his feet dangling. He’d been in deer stands since he was five years old, and had learned the lessons of complete stillness. A soft breeze rustled a few leaves. The sun was rising fast. The deer would soon quietly ease from the woods to the edge of the field in search of fescue and field corn.

The rifle was a Remington 30.06, a gift for his fourteenth birthday. He tucked it firmly across his chest and promptly dozed off.