Page 99 of Hellbent

Evan stood there staring at him over the barrel.

Xavier cleared his throat, then cleared it again. Apparently the gun was not having the effect he’d hoped.

“Your throat’s dry,” Evan said.

“What?”

“Because you’re scared. Adrenaline’s pumping. It acts like an antihistamine, lessens the production of saliva.”

Xavier stuck the muzzle in Evan’s face.

Evan regarded it, a few inches before his nose. “You’re holding your weapon sideways.”

“I know how to hold my goddamn—”

Evan’s hands blurred. He cranked Xavier’s arm to the side, snatched the .22 neatly from his grasp, and stripped the gun. Pieces rained down on the floor. Slide, barrel, operating spring, magazine, frame.

Xavier stared at his empty hand, the red streak on his forearm, his dissected gun littering the floor around his Nikes.

“Step inside,” Evan said.

Xavier stepped inside.

Evan followed, sweeping the remains of the gun with his boot, and closed the door behind him.

It was a run-down place, sleeping bag on the floor, flat-screen TV tilted against the Sheetrock, floor strewn with dirty clothes. An add-on kitchenette counter bulged out one wall—hot plate, microwave, chipped sink. An exposed snarl of plumbing hung beneath the counter like a tangle of intestines.

“Life’s not fair,” Evan said. “Your mom died. You pulled a dumb move and joined a gang. The wrong gang. I think you’re scared. I think you’re in over your head and you don’t know how to get out.”

The sleeveless flannel bulged across Xavier’s chest. Veins wiggled through his biceps. He was a big kid.

“You don’t know nuthin’ about me, baboso.”

“You sure you want me to work this hard to like you?”

“I didn’t ask you to come here.”

“No. Your father did.”

“That old man don’t know shit.”

Evan cuffed him, an open-handed slap upside the head. The sound rang off the cracked drywall. When Xavier pulled his face back to center, his cheek bore the mark of Evan’s palm.

“Make whatever choices you want to fuck up your life,” Evan said. “But don’t disrespect that man.”

Xavier touched his fingertips to his cheek. Down near the elbow, his forearm had a tattoo so fresh it was still scabbed up. An elaborate M—the beginning of Mara Salvatrucha.

He stared at Evan. And then he nodded. “Okay.”

“We both know you’re not a killer,” Evan said. “But they’re gonna make you one.”

Xavier’s face had softened, his cheeks full, his eyes as clear as in that photograph Benito had shown Evan. He looked much younger than twenty-four.

“I know,” he said.

Evan recalled the tremble in Benito’s voice when he discussed his son. This boy he’d taught to put on socks, ride a bike, throw a baseball. Countless hours of loving attention, late nights and early mornings, and then your son winds up here, with grown-man problems. And you—the father who once held the answers to the universe—you’re helpless.

A memory flash penetrated Evan’s thoughts: Jack squinting into a handheld camera at sixteen thousand feet, wind whipping his hair. Evan banished the image.