“Not your first time in one of these, I take it?” Parker asked as she got in the front.
“What makes you say that?” Grade asked.
Parker looked at him in the rearview mirror. “I looked at your juvie record,” she said. “Breaking and entering? At fourteen. You’re lucky that the family decided not to press charges. Why was that? You were a cute boy. Did you whore yourself out of a free pass?”
Grade sat back and buckled himself in. “They owed my mom money,” he said. “That’s why I broke in. If it went to court, the whole town would have found out. And while they didn’t care if people thought they wouldn’t pay the help, the fact theycouldn’twas something else altogether.”
Charity chuckled as the deputy started the car. “Most people would be offended that I called them a whore, but I suppose when your sister is one, the sting wears off.”
Silence.
It dragged on until they’d pulled back onto the road. Grade could feel the expectation in the air. She wanted him to bite back, to mouth off, but he wasn’t sure why. It could be for her own satisfaction, or maybe she wanted to goad him into saying something she could use against him. Either way, he held his tongue.
The car drove along in silence until the buzz of Charity’s phone interrupted it. She pulled it out of her pocket, glanced at the screen, and sighed heavily. Then she took the call.
“Benny,” she said. “Sweetheart, now is not the time. I’m busy. Someone made a mess at work, and I have to clean it up. Yes.”
Grade shifted position on the worn-down-to-the-springs upholstery. “What do you think would happen if I started screaming that I was being kidnapped?” he asked.
The deputy didn’t look around at him. “I’d pull over,” he said, “and beat you to death.”
“That’s what I figured,” Grade said. He looked out the window as they reached the hairpin turn at the top of the road. Sweeny was spread out below them and looked the best it probably could in the morning sunlight. “I fucking hate this town.”
Charity took the phone away from her face for a second to look around at him. “Don’t we all,” she said.
***
The pullout looked different in daylight.
A stray evidence tag had been left stuck to the ground next to the bloody stain on the concrete, and tabs of police tape fluttered in the air where they’d been cut off the barrier. Empty cups of coffee piled up in the single trash bin.
Grade walked over and looked down the mountain.
“It’s quite the drop,” Charity said. “It’d probably kill you, although the last person who took the trip was already dead.”
Grade turned around and sat down on the barrier.
“What’s this about?”
“I think you know.”
“I think he’s a cop, and you’re a judge,” Grade said, “so only an idiot would admit knowing anything.”
Charity nodded and dropped her phone into her purse. “Fair enough,” she said. “What if I admit that I paid you to get rid of two dead bodies?”
“I’d think that audio recordings can be edited,” Grade said.
“That’s going to make this conversation unnecessarily difficult.”
“This isn’t a conversation.”
“You earned those skipped grades, didn’t you,” Charity said. “You’re right. This is an offer, a one-time-only deal that you’ll take. Because you’re a smart boy, and you know how much influence someone like me has in a shithole like this.”
Grade braced his hands against his thighs. “I know that someone like you has to be in a shithole like this tohaveinfluence,” he said. “That’s why you’ve never left Sweeny, right?”
She smiled. “You’ve done your research.”
“No,” Grade said. This was indulgent. He knew that. There was nothing to be gained by insulting Charity, but he’d had a bad night. “I just know people like you. I’ve seen them my whole life. Just smart enough to know that anywhere else, there’s smarter.”
