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Chris Whitaker: We Begin at the End

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Chris Whitaker We Begin at the End
  • Название:
    We Begin at the End
  • Автор:
  • Издательство:
    Bonnier Publishing Fiction
  • Жанр:
  • Год:
    2020
  • Язык:
    Английский
  • Рейтинг книги:
    4 / 5
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We Begin at the End: краткое содержание, описание и аннотация

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**'Surely destined to conquer the world . . . Astonishingly good' RUTH JONES** **'So beautifully written . . . will remain with you for a long time' LYNDA LA PLANTE** **'Contender for thriller of the year' JON COATES,** SUNDAY EXPRESS *With the staggering intensity of James Lee Burke and the absorbing narrative of Jane Harper's* The Dry *,* We Begin at the End *is a powerful novel about absolute love and the lengths we will go to keep our family safe. This is a story about good and evil and how life is lived somewhere in between.* **'YOU CAN'T SAVE SOMEONE THAT DOESN'T WANT TO BE SAVED . . .'** **There are two kinds of families: the ones we are born into and the ones we create.** Walk has never left the coastal California town where he grew up. He may have become the chief of police, but he’s still trying to heal the old wound of having given the testimony that sent his best friend, Vincent King, to prison decades before. Now, thirty years later, Vincent is being released. Duchess is a thirteen-year-old self-proclaimed outlaw. Her mother, Star, grew up with Walk and Vincent. Walk is in overdrive trying to protect them, but Vincent and Star seem bent on sliding deeper into self-destruction. Star always burned bright, but recently that light has dimmed, leaving Duchess to parent not only her mother but her five-year-old brother. At school the other kids make fun of Duchess―her clothes are torn, her hair a mess. But let them throw their sticks, because she’ll throw stones. Rules are for other people. She’s just trying to survive and keep her family together. A fortysomething-year-old sheriff and a thirteen-year-old girl may not seem to have a lot in common. But they both have come to expect that people will disappoint you, loved ones will leave you, and if you open your heart it will be broken. So when trouble arrives with Vincent King, Walk and Duchess find they will be unable to do anything but usher it in, arms wide closed. Chris Whitaker has written an extraordinary novel about people who deserve so much more than life serves them. At times devastating, with flashes of humor and hope throughout, it is ultimately an inspiring tale of how the human spirit prevails and how, in the end, love―in all its different guises―wins.

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“It is.” Walk bent, picked up a soda can and dropped it into the trash, the sun warm on his neck.

Milton whistled. “Thirty years, Walk.”

It would’ve been ten, worst case ten, but for a fight inside. Walk didn’t ever get the full report, just knew his childhood friend had two deaths on his hands. Ten years became thirty, manslaughter became murder, a boy became a man.

“I still think about that day. Us walking the woodland. So, he is coming back to the Cape?”

“Far as I know.”

“You can send him here, if he needs anything. Actually, tell you what, Walk. How about I put a couple trotters aside for him. How does that sound?”

Walk searched for the words.

“So.” Milton cleared his throat and looked down at the ground. “The sky tonight … supermoon. It’ll be a sight, and I just got myself a new Celestron. I mean, I need to set things up, but if you wanted to stop by—”

“I’ve got something on. Another time?”

“Sure. But come here after your shift, I can give you the neck.” Milton nodded toward the deer.

“Please, God, no.” Walk backed away, then patted his stomach. “I need to lose—”

“Don’t worry, it’s lean. If you stew it right it’s a decent cut. I’d offer up the heart but once I get a sear on it that flavor just sings.”

Walk closed his eyes, the nausea creeping up. His hands shook. Milton noticed, looked like he wanted to say something more so Walk moved on fast.

He saw no one around so popped a couple of pills. He was acutely and painfully aware of his dependency.

He moved past cafés and storefronts, said hello to a few, helped Mrs. Astor load grocery bags into her car, listened as Felix Coke bent his ear about the traffic on Fullerton.

He stopped by Brant’s Delicatessen, rows of pastries and cheeses filled the window.

“Hey, Chief Walker.”

Alice Owen, hair pulled back and a full face of makeup despite the workout clothes. She carried some kind of miniature cross so skinny Walk counted off its ribs as it trembled. He reached forward to pet it and watched the teeth bare.

“Would you mind holding on to Lady while I pick something up? I’ll just be a second.”

“Sure.” He reached for the leash.

“Oh, you can’t put her down. She’s just been clipped and her nails are tender.”

“The claws?”

Alice thrust the dog into his arms and headed inside.

He watched through the window as she placed an order then stopped and talked with another vacationer. Ten minutes passed, the dog panting into his face.

When Alice finally made it back she was laden with bags so he carried the dog over to her SUV and waited while she loaded it. She thanked him, then reached into a paper bag and handed him a cannoli. He made a fuss of trying not to take it, then waited till he was clear of Main before eating it down in two bites.

He walked along Cassidy then cut through onto Ivy Ranch Road. At Star’s place he stood on the porch a while, listening to the music play inside.

Star opened the door before he could knock, met him with the kind of smile that kept him from giving up on her. Hollowed out but beautiful, beaten down but her eyes still shone. She wore a pink apron like she’d been baking. Walk knew the cupboards were bare.

“Good afternoon, Chief Walker.”

In spite of himself he couldn’t help the smile.

There was a fan moving slow, drywall bare in spots, drapes pulled from their rings like Star couldn’t close out the day quick enough. The radio played loud, Skynyrd sang about Alabama as Star danced her way through the kitchen, loading a garbage bag with empty beers bottles and packs of Lucky Strike. She grinned at him, looking like a kid as she did. She still had that way, vulnerable, troubled and trouble.

She spun once, then tossed a foil ashtray into the sack.

Above the fireplace was a photo, the two of them, fourteen, ready and waiting for the future to come at them.

“How’s your head?”

“Never better. I’m thinking clear now, Walk. Thanks and all … last night. But I think maybe I needed it, you know. One last time. Now I’m seeing right.” She tapped her head, then moved on, still dancing. “The kids, they didn’t see nothing, right?”

“Are we going to talk about it, today?”

As the music faded out she finally stopped moving, wiped the sweat from her head and tied her hair back. “It’ll come and it’ll go. Does Duchess know?”

Star asking him about her own daughter.

“The whole town knows.”

“You think he’s changed?”

“We all have.”

“Not you, Walk.” She aimed for admiration but all he heard was disdain.

He hadn’t seen Vincent in five years, though he’d tried often. The visits were close at first, he’d ride with Gracie King in the old Regal. It had been cold and hard, the judge sending a fifteen-year-old boy to a men’s prison. Star’s father took the stand, told of Sissy, of the kind of girl she was becoming. They showed photos of the scene, little legs, blood on a small hand. They called in Principal Hutch, and he told about the kind of boy Vincent was. Trouble.

And then it was Walk’s turn, and his father had looked on, brown shirt, honest face. He was foreman at Tallow Construction, they had a factory that smoked away dreams two towns over. That same summer Walk had gone with him, for orientation. He’d stood in coveralls and watched, all the grays, the pipes and scaffold so intricate like bowels, a cathedral of metals.

In that courtroom Walk met his father’s proud gaze and offered up the kind of unabridged truth that sealed his friend’s fate.

“I don’t need to be looking back anymore,” Star said.

He made coffee. They took it out to the deck, birds on the swing-set flapping lazy and high when Walk settled into an old chair.

She fanned her face. “You going to get him?”

“He said not to. I wrote him.”

“But you’ll go anyway.”

“I will.”

“Don’t tell him … about me and all.” Her knee bounced, she tapped the chair with her finger. All energy before the real purge came.

“He’ll ask.”

“I don’t want him here. I don’t think I can, in my house.”

“Okay.”

She lit a cigarette and closed her eyes.

“So, there’s a program, a new one, over in—”

“Save it.” She held up a hand. “I told you. It’s behind me now.”

They’d tried counseling, Walk had driven her to Blair Peak each month for a lifetime, the shrink seemed to get through, progress had been good. Walk would drop her, leave her and head to a diner to wait. Three hours, sometimes more before she called. Some days the kids would ride the hours with them, silent in the back, looking on as their innocence trailed the cruiser, slipping further behind.

“It can’t … this can’t go on.”

“Still popping pills, Walk?”

He wanted to tell her it was different, but then he wondered how. They were the afflicted. Plain and simple.

She reached over and squeezed his hand, no harm meant.

“I think you’ve got cream on your shirt.”

He glanced down and she laughed.

“Look at us. You know, sometimes I still feel it.”

“What?”

“Fifteen, baby.”

“We’re getting old.”

She blew a perfect smoke ring. “Not me, Walk. You’re getting older and me, I’m just getting started.”

He laughed hard, and then she laughed too. And that was them, Walk and Star, thirty years unwinding till all that was left was a couple of kids talking shit and making jokes.

They passed another hour in easy silence, neither saying it but both knowing there was only one thing on their minds. Vincent King was coming home.

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