‘Not even Vee.’
‘Are you shitting me? Specially not Vee.’
‘From now on, we shouldn’t have contact unless it’s an emergency,’ said Tom, almost cringing at the melodrama.
But Halo didn’t laugh at him, just nodded silently.
They sat and sipped their coffee. Halo got a little moustache but this time Tom didn’t find it even vaguely amusing. Instead he just tapped his own lip and Halo wiped his mouth on his sleeve.
‘So,’ Halo said eventually, ‘I guess it was Three Days of the Condor after all.’
‘I guess so.’
‘Makes me wonder what happened to Niño.’
‘Yeah,’ said Tom. It made him wonder what had happened to a lot of people.
*
‘Where have you been?’ Ness’s voice was half angry, half relieved.
Tom remembered a time when he’d been eight and had missed the school bus and, for some now-forgotten reason, decided to walk the five miles home just for the hell of it. When he’d got there, after dark, his mother had said the same words in the same way, then slapped him hard in the face, before holding him so tightly he’d thought he’d never breathe again. He didn’t know which was more scary: her anger or her love.
‘Away,’ he said.
She hesitated, then apparently let it go. ‘Can you play?’
‘I just walked in.’
It was true. He’d picked up the ringing phone before he’d even put his bag down. But she didn’t offer an alternative.
‘When?’
‘Three hours. At the Honolulu.’
He sighed. Paying rent on this place was a joke – he might as well take a lease on a black vinyl chair at LAX with a weekend place up at Mount Poker Table. ‘I’ll see you in the lot.’
‘Okay,’ she said, and hung up.
Tom let out a long breath. Ness had turned to quicksand under him. He didn’t know how deep it was – he didn’t know if there was anything to grab onto to keep from being sucked down. He didn’t even know if sinking into her would be good or bad. He thought of the last time they’d been together, when they’d made love and she’d cried, and tried to recapture the tenderness he’d felt for her then, but it eluded him. All he could feel now was an uneasy wariness, which reflected back at him from her.
He hadn’t asked what had happened when he’d been unable to play the last time – hadn’t even called her to tell her – but she was still alive and talking and apparently in the same line of work, so he assumed it was nothing too bad.
He wanted to see her, though.
He wanted to see her face when he told her about Lenny Munro.
*
He’d forgotten to call Lucia back before leaving Oklahoma. It wasn’t his fault: so much had happened.
He called her now.
‘Lucia? It’s Tom.’ He could hear her breathing.
Then she quietly hung up.
37
HE PULLED THE Buick into the spot beside Ness’s Lotus in a far corner of the Honolulu parking lot, and got out. She met his eyes and gave a neutral smile that made his stomach tighten. He folded himself into the little car. ‘Hi. How are you?’
She nodded and handed him two rolls of hundreds.
‘Are you coming in?’ He looked at her face and saw that there was no sign of the old bruising or any new marks.
‘Yes.’
‘Good.’
‘Why didn’t you come last time, when you said you would?’
‘I had to work. You were okay?’
She ignored his question. ‘But you quit,’ she said.
‘Lenny Munro called me. He needed help.’
She frowned slightly. ‘The man you gave Lemon’s bolt to?’