Page 30

“Gotta say, you’re the one who’s being a little hostile right now. Which is funny since I’m saving your ass.”

Connor is conveniently leaving out that part about how this deal would benefit his firm; it’s not all goodness and altruism at work here.

“Gotta say you’re sounding a little condescending.”

“Jesus, man. Shoot me. If you don’t want my help, no biggie. They can take their money elsewhere. You think about it and call me. When you’re sober.”

Connor is gone, and Alex swears he was going to say thank you and tell him he appreciates him, but he’ll never know. He also doesn’t know why he’s acting like such an ungrateful asshole. This is stellar news; it’s the escape hatch and way out he’d been dreaming of these last couple months. Connor to the rescue. Maybe that’s exactly why Alex is being so obnoxious about it. Yes, it’s a relief to be saved, but it also feels like shit to have to be saved in the first place.

Suck it up, he tells himself. Because the other thing eating at him is that he has kept this entire mess from his wife. At least he can tell her now, he can go to her with the problem and the solution and hope they cancel each other out. He can fess up about all the money he lost on the house… Hell, maybe now’s even a good time to admit to her (and himself) that he never wanted to be CEO of this fucking company anyway. While they were at it, he could admit he wants to try again for another baby. That he really wants to go back and finish grad school. That he hates every second that he spends at Poppy’s stupid country club. That he thinks maybe he should stop drinking.

Alex places a hand on his chest to feel the hard thud of his heart. It’s racing, not from fear, but from the thrill and promise of releasing all its secrets.

CHAPTER TWELVE KWAME

The pie was the only thing that redeemed Kwame’s otherwise entirely pointless detour to Doughboy’s last week. Butter must be the heartiest of preservatives, because the crust he chews now, sitting in his sister’s kitchen, is as moist and flaky as it was days ago.

“Um, I see you’re helping yourself to my leftovers,” Jordan says, snatching Kwame’s fork from his hand seconds before he can get the last blessed bite into his mouth. She’s dropped a box of Christmas decorations to the floor to make her move and now chews and moans.

“Holy shit, that’s good pie. Remind me where you got it?”

“Doughboy’s—it’s a place up by Milwaukee.”

“And remind me why you got Thanksgiving dessert in a whole other state?”

“Seriously, Jordan? You really don’t listen. I told you all of this at Thanksgiving.”

“Um, you weren’t chasing around a sugar-high five-year-old under the watchful eyes of our parents, who gave me the side-eye every time Tallulah so much as stuck her tongue out. I could practically hear them silently thinking that I’m raising a heathen who’s going to end up on the pole.”

“Oh, I actually heard Mom say that.”

“I don’t even think you’re kidding. Can you please hurry up and have some kids so mine and my parenting aren’t the only things Mom focuses on at holidays?”

“Ah, don’t hold your breath on that one, Sis.”

For most of his adulthood Kwame hasn’t given kids a second thought. Why would he? He’s got all the time in the world. But being around Simone again, sensing how great a mom she is, has him thinking that maybe he doesn’t have all the time in the world. Or even worse, maybe time has already passed him by.

“You never answered my question—the pie?”

“Oh, I was up there doing some reporting. Just a story I’m working on.” He doesn’t really want to get into the details with Jordan and he’s not used to talking to anyone in his family about work.

Mostly Kwame’s being vague because he doesn’t want to have to bring up Simone and get an earful. And he doesn’t want to rehash what a waste of time the trip to Doughboy’s was in the first place. He was a fool to show up at the diner and ask the two random teenagers manning it if they knew of an ex-employee who worked there from the sixties whose name started with M. Even recounting it in his head reminds Kwame of what a long shot this whole story is. The kids, who were definitely high, suggested he call the diner when the manager, Stan, was back from vacation. But Kwame isn’t holding his breath. Maybe these dead ends are a sign. Tenacious as he is, he has to ask himself why he’s pushing this one so hard. When he opened this can of worms—scorpions, more like it—he had no idea it would hit so close to home. Simone’s home.

Larry and Wade did know each other. The janitor at Tate confirming that connection—in his own cagey way, at least—made that part of Kwame’s trip to Wisconsin more successful, though that term felt all kinds of wrong. Kwame had found Sylvester in his maintenance shed after getting a little lost on the prep school campus, with its maze of ivy-covered buildings and manicured hedges. The charm Kwame laid on thick did not keep him from nearly losing his fingers trying to stop the man from slamming the shed’s door on him. Kwame could see what Simone meant—Sylvester subjected Kwame to the same suspicious head-to-toe glare Simone described receiving. Here was a man who’d spent an entire lifetime catering to rich white kids—that was bound to make you a little cranky. So Kwame cut to the chase to ask about Wade straight away before Sylvester could shoo him away with the massive broom in his hand.

If the phrase went white as a sheet could apply to Black people, that’s what happened. Sylvester got about six shades lighter from the blood draining from his face. “It’s a tragedy what happened to him. But I don’t know nothin’ about that. You best get on outta here.” When Kwame followed up asking if Wade knew Larry, Sylvester went from gruff to downright aggressive. “You need to get out of here… now.” He was back to waving the broom as if to sweep Kwame away. And that’s how Kwame knew he was onto something.

“I’m not playing. You need to leave,” Sylvester had said as Kwame made a last-ditch effort to toss a business card to him, which landed at the man’s feet.

Whatever Sylvester’s wrestling with, he’ll have to come around in his own way, in his own time. Kwame has a sense he will, or at least he might, because one thing Kwame’s discovered in his years as a reporter—and hell, as a human—is that people want to talk. They may think they don’t, but in the end everyone wants their stories heard and validated. They want a witness to their lives. Kwame spent the whole long ride home from Wisconsin (and all of Thanksgiving week, for that matter) thinking about how Simone’s father-in-law could have something to do with Wade’s death. He’s back to thinking about it again now in his sister’s kitchen. What if Larry—this man Simone seems to like—is a murderer? How would she feel about wiping his drool and changing his diapers and whatnot? Would she be eager to do all that if she knew what he may have been involved in? Not that Kwame can prove anything at this point. And even if he had something besides hunches and theories, how much does he want to keep pushing and at what cost? Blowing up Simone’s life isn’t exactly going to make her fall in love with him again.

“Uh-oh, I can see what you’re doing,” Jordan says as she pulls all manner of seasonal decor from a giant plastic tub, including a series of crystal trees she lays gently on her marble counters. Every surface in Jordan’s row house in Wicker Park gleams. It’s a glass-and-steel brutalist marvel she and her husband bought from two gay architects who loved them some concrete. Her decorating style could best be described as austere—the polar opposite of the home they grew up in, as if decor itself could be an act of rebellion.

“What am I doing?”

“Thinking too much. And what have I told you about that?”

“Busted.”