TEN

“No,” Dennis Drake said for the fourth time.

Angela swallowed a groan and dropped her head; her forehead hit her outstretched arms with a dull thud. Which was exactly how she felt: dull, wrapped in cotton—and every time her uncle shook his head, the cotton pulled tighter. Pretty soon it’d be hard to breathe.

“Dad.” From Archer, who, from the state of his eyebrows (who knew he could arch them so high? they were like fleeing caterpillars!), wasn’t far from losing his temper. “C’mon.”

Another head shake. Another “No.”

This was nothing new, but she’d expected more. Like she’d expected Leah to instantly solve everything. Or at least come up with a new clue. Or a name. Or a plan. Or an insight, no pun intended.

Instead: The brick wall of Uncle Dennis’s will was as flexible as a concrete bench. She’d been slumping lower and lower as her uncle dug his feet in further and further, but now she forced herself to sit up straight. “Ridiculous. This is ridiculous. You’ve been stuck in here how long?”

“Feels like years.”

She made a great effort to not grab her own hair and yank. Or his. “It has been years!”

“Oh. Thought you meant stuck in this room.”

Leah made a sudden noise that sounded awfully like she was choking down a giggle. In response, Dennis cocked an eyebrow at her and said wryly, “Glad one of us is entertained.”

Detective Chambers cleared his throat. “Mr. Drake, in my professional opinion there are some real problems with what you said happened and what did happen, and likely to your benefit, not the opposite.”

“Don’t care. Go direct traffic.”

“Maaaaaybe don’t alienate the cop trying to help you?” Archer suggested.

“Ha! Tell that to her.” He jerked a thumb in Angela’s direction. “Before that other cop retired, your cousin called him a waste of space. To his face.”

“I did not!” Angela replied hotly. “I called him a complete waste of skin cells.” She paused, considered, and continued, “In hindsight, that wasn’t smart.”

Archer leaned over and whispered to Leah, “That’s pretty much our family motto.”

“It was accurate,” Angela admitted, “but not helpful.”

“And that’s on the family crest. I’ll show it to you later. You’ll be horrified.”

“It’s nice to have new experiences to look forward to,” Leah murmured back.

“Again: Don’t care. Didn’t care about the last one, don’t care about this one.” Dennis fixed his pale gaze on

(gulp)

Angela. “You hear but you don’t listen. Are you having déjà vu right now? Because I am. And the reason is because we have this exact conversation pretty much every year. Nothing’s changed.”

“Except some things ha—” she began, but he cut her off with a curt gesture.

“This was always my mess. I bought it; it’s mine. I didn’t take a plea for a lesser charge. I didn’t take a plea to leave wiggle room if I got buyer’s remorse.” Her uncle’s voice was calm, but his eyes had narrowed and he’d lost what little color he had. Some people flushed red when they got mad; Drakes went pale. “And I wanted to do it. But this is what that costs: seeing me here a couple times a year.”

“For years, not even that! By your rule!” she cried. “This is the first time you’ve seen your son in years, you haven’t seen me for two, but you must know we’d come more often if you’d let—”

“But I won’t let,” Dennis continued with deadly calm. “You’re doing it again: You’re hearing, not listening. I made it clear after my plea, I made it clear each time you came, I made it clear two years ago, I made it clear last month. Nothing. Has. Changed. I’m in, for the duration. Move the fuck on.”

The appalled silence was broken by Detective Chambers’s flat, “I don’t know what they’ve got on you, but it must be considerable.”

“Visit’s over.” Dennis popped up from the table so quickly Angela would have missed it if she’d blinked. “Now then,” he continued with cool calm, “you guys probably know that IDOC gen pop gets six visits a month, four hours each. You guys are gonna push me over my limit, and for what? So you can keep not paying attention? So we’re done. Archer. Leah. Detective Chambers. Angela.”

He said my name last. Is that bad? I think that might be bad.

With that, he walked away and—as happened every time—he never slowed, or even glanced back. It always looked, to her, like he was marching back to war.

She put her face in her hands, then groaned into her fingers. “Waste of time. All of it. Son of a bitch. Sorry, Archer. Sorry, Leah.”

“You’ve got nothing to apologize for,” her cousin said. “You’re a goddamned hero as far as I’m concerned, putting yourself through this for all of us.”

Not really. I’m putting myself through this for all of me. But she could never say that. Would never.

And then, featherlight, she felt a touch between her shoulder blades, too brief to be a pat. She took the small comfort that had been offered, and cursed herself again for being such a shit to Archer when they were kids. This had to be as awful for him as it was for her, but he still took time to let her know with a nonverbal signal that he was there except he wasn’t, he was sitting too far away, beside Leah, it was impossible for him to have reached across so who the hell . . .

Oh.

Detective Chambers.

Oh.

Meaningless, she reminded herself. But she could still feel that touch.