Page 125 of Not a Word

A nod.

“How?”

“We have classes together.”

It occurred to McCabe that she had neither spoken to, nor met, this Gage Chartwell. She figured he had to be the son of Reece Chartwell. Small world.

“He’s pretty freaked about it.”

“You spoke to him?”

One more nod from Moira. “I texted him, and he came by for a sec. He was really sad. He was at the party.”

“The other night?”

“He left just before you raided the place.”

McCabe was too tired to challenge her on her use of the word raided.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because me and my friends, we’re all dealing with stuff. Some of it’s not a big deal, and some of it’s pretty huge. You have no idea the kind of pressure we’re under, what we’re dealing with. Like kids whose parents are dead, or maybe their parents have split up. Or their dad’s in some crazy far-off place playing poker to make a living. So sometimes people need to unwind a bit so they forget all that. You know?”

McCabe nodded slowly.

Her phone started to vibrate.

“Shit,” she said under her breath as she took the call.

“McCabe.”

She listened. “Okay. Shoot me a text with the address.” She ended the call and put the phone away.

“You’re going out,” Moira said, looking anxious, but also a little relieved.

“I’m going out,” McCabe said, taking one last bite of her slice. “Gonna take two seconds and freshen up.”

She excused herself from the kitchen, went quickly upstairs, and as she was heading for the bathroom, something caught her eye as she was passing her daughter’s bedroom.

She stopped, took a step back, focused on what looked like the edge of a clear sandwich bag caught between the mattress and box spring of her daughter’s bed. Stepped in, leaned over, got her fingers on the bag, and pulled.

It was, indeed, a small sandwich bag. And inside, what looked like ground leaves or, more accurately, weed.

McCabe opened the bag, gave it a sniff just to be sure, resealed it, stuffed it into her own pocket. Let Moira have a heart attack when she looked for it later, discovered it gone. McCabe was thinking, if Moira were in an interrogation room, this would be about the time when she’d be asked: Would you like to change your story?

She’d save that for later.

Forty-Five

Reece

“What is it?” I asked Diana, still standing by the closet in Holden’s bedroom.

Before she could answer, the cell phone that had not left her hand in the last thirty minutes started to ring.

“Gage,” she said breathlessly.

She swept her finger across the screen to take the call, skipped a greeting, and went straight to, “Where are you?”