Inside Passage. Burt Weissbourd

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СКАЧАТЬ of her neck. How do you think I felt? Out of control. Afraid. Relieved it was her and not me. Mostly, I felt like screaming. But when I opened my mouth, no sound came out.” Her shirt was sticking now, under her arms and at the small of her back.

      He set down his pipe, glanced at his watch. “I’m afraid we have to stop.”

      Now? She had just done the hard part. “Why?”

      “I schedule forty-five minutes for a session. An evaluation usually takes three or four sessions.”

      “How can you get me started talking about stuff like that then just turn it off?”

      “I’m sorry. I thought you knew how I worked. There are time constraints. I should have explained.”

      “That’s not right. Do you think it’s easy to talk about this? It makes me sweaty and cold at the same time.”

      “We can continue for another few minutes—”

      She interrupted. “I haven’t even talked about Billy, my son. I’m worried about him.”

      He checked a calendar. “Can you come tomorrow? Say eleven-thirty?”

      “I guess.” She wanted to tell him that he wasn’t getting this, that he was screwing it up. Instead she said, “The picture.” She pointed at the colorful abstract painting behind her. He hadn’t bought that picture. “Your mother give you that?”

      “How did you know?” he asked.

      “A hunch.” She stood. He directed her out through a door she hadn’t even noticed. It opened right into the hallway. Weird, one door for coming, another for going. She recalled the schoolgirl’s scornful look. Corey wondered if she would ever get this right.

      Nick checked his smile, working with a hand mirror he kept in his desk. He flashed on Corey Logan. The woman was worming her way into his mind, a nagging, nasty, waking dream.

      He hit a button on his phone, then two numbers.

      When Lester picked up the phone, Nick could hear him breathing. No greeting, nothing. He wondered if he waited long enough, Lester might say something. Not likely.

      “Corey Logan?” Nick finally asked.

      “Her probation guy’s got a history. I’m on it.”

      “Speed up the program. Put Riley on it.” Riley was a hot-shot P.I. and sometime bounty hunter. Hiring Riley made this a big deal.

      “And her kid?”

      “Suggest what we’re capable of. Give her a taste.” Nick cracked his knuckles. “I’ve got a bad feeling,” he added, mostly to himself. Nick knew that feelings didn’t mean much to Lester, one way or another. He, on the other hand, paid attention to his worries.

      Nick sighed; he had reason to worry. Corey Logan had threatened him, written down what she knew, then set it up so it would be released to the newspaper if anything happened to her. It had to be a bluff—she had no evidence. Still, he would be a politician soon, and then the press wouldn’t need proof…so it was more of a threat than she knew. What it was…it was a stain, a debasement, hovering just out of reach, poised to soil his candidacy. She did that after two women tried to kill her in prison. She wasn’t stupid.

      He wondered, yet again, how much Al had actually told her. His cousin was smart enough, and careful, but she had him on some kind of short, good-father leash. What was that about? Pussy-whipped. That was all he could think of. Which was okay, except several years ago Al had dug up some dirt in L.A. and tied Lester to the Russian diamonds. It was a fluke, a one-in-a-million deal. Al was checking out known diamond traders from the eighties on some case he had caught, and he recognized Lester, the same man Nick had paid him to ferry to Vancouver, B.C. twenty years earlier. This was the kind of thing only Al could have put together. No evidence, but still.

      Nick sat back, troubled. Maybe two years now, this had been worrying him. He stopped himself before he started going over and over the same things. The bad worries could suck the juice right out of you.

      And he could see how the bitch was working her way under his skin, little by little.

      Three

      Corey was watching Billy’s house. She was in her car across the street trying, unsuccessfully, to keep a lid on her excitement. The house was shabby, an eyesore in a transitional neighborhood. She tried to imagine Billy living in this house. She felt suddenly apprehensive. Corey checked her watch: it was time, three o’clock. But where was Sally, the caseworker from Child Protective Services? She was supposed to be here too. Trying to be patient, she stared at his house and worked at waiting—going over, for the umpteenth time, Billy’s sorry foster care history.

      Billy lived in this group home along with four other foster children and one of their babies. He had started in an individual home, but after five months his foster parents decided they didn’t want to keep him. She wasn’t sure why. Six months later he was moved from his second foster home.

      Until they found another foster placement, the state had kept Billy in the King County juvenile detention center for eleven days: a nightmare, she was sure. He finally got placed in this group home, in yet another school district where they made him repeat the ninth grade because he had fallen behind.

      Corey winced; she wasn’t at all sure what to expect. Billy had visited her only once, sixteen months ago. Her friend Jamie had driven him fourteen hours each way. It hadn’t gone well. Since then, she wrote him long letters at least twice a week. He responded to her letters sporadically, and his replies were short and often unfocused. His letters stopped coming at all almost a month before she was released. Starting today, she was allowed to see him once a week for two hours. Sally, the caseworker, was “monitoring the reintroduction of the family unit.” Sally was okay, except that she always seemed too busy.

      Corey couldn’t wait another minute. When she stepped out of her pickup and crossed the street, she could see that the group home needed a new roof and some hard work in the front yard. She walked up three steps to the iron outer door. She could feel her pulse, pounding in her ears. The basement windows had rusty wire-mesh grills dotted with cobwebs. A teenaged girl answered when Corey rang. She carried a baby on her hip.

      “I’m Corey Logan, Billy’s mom,” Corey said. She could hear a television somewhere in the house.

      The girl left the iron door closed, shouting over her shoulder. “Billy here?”

      “How would I know? He thinks this is a damn motel. He’ll do extra loads if he comes home late.”

      “Yeah, right, that’ll work good,” the teenage girl muttered to herself. Corey guessed she was sixteen. She was eating a candy bar. Her acne was pretty bad. “He’s not here.”

      “I was supposed to meet him here,” Corey explained.

      The girl shrugged, closed the inner door and went inside.

      In prison there were times when she would lose her bearings and turn on herself, savagely self-critical. She did that now, blaming herself for all of the things that had gone wrong for Billy and certain that he must hate her. At these times, Corey felt as though she was being sucked under freezing cold water. She had learned to weather these episodes, to let her feelings run their course. Still, it was СКАЧАТЬ