by Jeff Lindsay
“Care, sure, I care,” she snapped. “You’re a steady customer, you pay well, you never give me a short count—of course I care!”
I knew she’d say something like that—she almost had to—but it kind of hurt anyway. I mean, it would if I’d believed her. I didn’t. I shook my head and took a small, soft step closer. “It’s more than that, isn’t it?”
Monique hesitated, just a half second. “No,” she said, looking away. “I mean, sometimes I think you’re—” She bit her lip in that way she had that I found incredibly sexy. “I think you’re kind of . . . a friend . . .” She glanced back at me. “Everybody has one asshole friend, right?”
Now it did hurt, and I almost believed it. “That’s it?” I said, moving a half step closer. “I’m just the asshole friend?”
Monique bit her lip again. Our eyes locked, and for a minute, neither of us said anything. “Damn it, Riley,” Monique said at last. She put a hand on my chest, and just when I was going to return the favor—she pushed me back. Hard. “It’s not going to happen again, all right?”
“It is,” I said, “when you lose our bet.”
“Which I never will!”
“We’ll see,” I said, and I smiled in a way I hoped looked charming and confident. “But that means you have to do this job for me—or you lose. And besides . . .” I watched her carefully as I put my hands on her shoulders. She kept her eyes on me, and I couldn’t read what she was thinking—but she didn’t push me back again. I lowered my voice. “You have to picture this, Monique. You’ve got to feel it like I do.” I think my voice was shaking a little. Monique still didn’t push me away. “Not just the target, but the whole plan, the way this will work—goddamn it, girl! Nothing like this has ever been done before! You are going to be part of the greatest heist in fucking history!”
I shook her gently and willed her to feel the excitement like I did.
“And the challenge! You have never even dreamed of—oh my God, everything has to be perfect, and it’s—nobody else would even think of trying, Monique! But you and me, together—we can do this! I know it!” I took a breath and tried to calm down. It wasn’t easy. “I can pull this off, Monique. Absolutely. But only if I have an absolutely perfect copy.”
Monique looked back at me. She licked her lips, which almost made me forget what I was talking about, and then she pulled away from me. She picked up the photographs, flipped through them, frowning. She traced a detail with one finger, let out a noisy breath. “Maybe,” she said, talking quietly to herself. “Has to be moissanite—shit, that setting’s so busy, so . . .” Suddenly remembering I was there, she jerked her head up. “But Jesus, Riley! How can you possibly even get close enough to—goddamn it, you’re going to be killed!”
“Or worse,” I said mock-seriously.
Monique shook her head vigorously. “I’m serious!” she said. “This thing is wrapped up tighter than, than—”
“A mosquito’s asshole?” I suggested. “A nun’s pussy?”
“Fuck you, Riley, I mean it!” she snapped. She waved the pictures at me. “I read about this. They’ve got dozens of guards, with machine guns, and—you can’t possibly— I mean, how, how—what the fuck are you thinking?”
She was very damn serious, so I got serious right back at her.
“I am thinking that I want to do something that nobody else in the whole fucking world could ever, in a million years, think of or do,” I said. “And more than that—I am doing it.” I took a big breath, and the whole thing just blew up and took me over. “It’s already working, Monique!” I realized I was shouting, but I didn’t care. “It is already falling into place! I am more than halfway there, and the rest of it is going to happen, too, I know it! Goddamn it, I can do this!”
And I could see that she almost began to believe me, believe I could really do it.
Almost.
Monique shook her head. She looked at the picture again, then back at me. “You’re insane,” she said. “Totally fucking crazy. There’s just no fucking way, Riley!”
“There’s always a way,” I said. “Come on, Monique, yes or no. Can you do it? No—” I held up a hand. “I won’t say ‘can you.’ I know you can! But, Monique—will you do it? Will you be a part of history with me?”
She shook her head and looked down at the photograph. “I can try,” she said.
I don’t know where it came from, but I heard my Yoda imitation answer her. “‘There is no try. There is only do or not do.’”
She shook her head, still looking at the picture.
“Monique, you can do this,” I said. “I have every confidence.” I paused. “Well, not every confidence.” Couldn’t help it—my favorite joke. I covered it with a small leer. “Of course, if you’d rather say no, then I guess—”
“Fuck you, man. You are never going to collect on our bet.”
I gave her the first real, big, happy smile I’d worn for days. “I win either way,” I said.
“Fuck you.”
“Maybe later,” I said. “Are you in? Monique?”
She hissed, chewed her lip, shook her head. Then she looked up at me, and before she said it I saw it in her eyes. “I’m in,” she said. “But goddamn it, Riley—”
“Absolutely!” I said. I leaned forward and kissed her, too fast for her to stop me. And before she could say anything else, I was out the window and gone in the night.
* * *
—
Monique watched Riley go with an unreadable expression on her face. “Asshole,” she said. But she smiled when she said it—until she looked at the photograph again. “Jesus fuck, he’s totally out of his mind,” she said.
She shook her head and reached for her notebook. Monique was a very organized person, especially when it came to work, and she always planned everything meticulously before she began the actual work. She pulled a folding chair over to the small metal worktable, putting her paints on the shelf underneath the tabletop. Still standing, she put the notebook in the space she’d made. Ready to take notes now, she sorted through the small stack of pictures, showing it from every angle. It was possible. In fact, aside from being a bit complicated, very possible. But the sheer fucking balls of Riley for even trying—!
She thumbed back to the top picture. “Jesus fuck,” she said again, very quietly. For a moment she was overwhelmed. She sank into the chair and flipped slowly through the photos. She thought of materials and techniques, but every one of those thoughts was overwhelmed with the hugeness of attempting something like this. “Shit,” she murmured. “Oh, shit.”
Monique came back to the first picture again and stared at it for a long time. Then she took a deep breath, nodded once, and began to think it through. All right, she thought. I can do this. Her hand trembled slightly, but her decision was made. She would do it. She would make a perfect copy of this thing.
She would copy the Daryayeh-E-Noor.
The Ocean of Light.
CHAPTER
21
It’s a little over a thousand miles from Watertown, New York, to Pickens County, Georgia. Instead of driving fifteen hours straight through, Delgado decided to stop for the night in Charlotte, North Carolina. From there it was only about four hours more to Jasper, Georgia, the Pickens County seat. Once there, he’d get the name that went with the license number on the plate he’d found under Riley’s trailer in Watertown. And then, wherever that took him in Pickens County, he hoped he’d find somebody with a few memories of Riley Wolfe or his mother, however faded the recollections might be after so many years. What he had learned from the English teacher and from Jimmy Finn in Watertown had been worth the trip. If he could find a similar source in Georgia, it was worth driving fifteen hours more.
So Delgado drove south, the whole length of New York State and on through Pennsylvania, into Virginia. He actually passed within fifty miles of his own house,
but he didn’t even think about stopping.
He got to Charlotte, North Carolina, a few minutes before 2 A.M. He found a cheap hotel near the airport, checked in, went to his room, and was asleep in just a few minutes.
Delgado woke up at 7:30. He had the hotel’s free breakfast, three cups of their coffee—terribly weak by Cuban standards—and was on the road again by 8:15.
The drive was uneventful. I-77 was minutes away from the hotel, and that took him south to I-85, which ran him through South Carolina and then across the top of Georgia. He pushed a little harder, drove faster, because the anticipation was mounting. But he felt so close—and he was half convinced that the “big house on the hill” was the key to understanding all about Riley Wolfe. When a classmate sneered at it, that had caused an uncharacteristic explosion of savage violence from young Riley. That meant it was vitally important to the boy, which in turn made it a key piece to understanding the man.
So the “big house on the hill” was important, and Pickens County was hill country—the “Marble Capital of the South!” as the county’s website said. He just might find the big house there. The thought was so tantalizing that he actually began to whistle, which would have stunned his colleagues at the Bureau.
The county’s motor vehicle registration records were kept, naturally enough, at the DMV. The registrations had not been recorded onto computer, the clerk told him, until 2007. She handed Delgado a thick and dusty book that held all the registration information for 1996, the year stamped on the license plate. He took it to a small desk in an unoccupied office and sat.
Delgado reached to open the book and was surprised to see that his hand was trembling slightly. He ignored the tremor and flipped hurriedly through the book to the W section. There were two Wolfes listed—and neither matched the number on the license plate.
Delgado closed the book and frowned. On the one hand, this made things a little more difficult. But on the plus side—he knew that Riley Wolfe and his mother had gone to Watertown from right here in Pickens County. Since there was no matching record for Wolfe in this book, that meant Riley had been living here under his birth name. He had therefore changed his name between leaving Georgia and registering for school in Watertown. So if he could find a match to the license plate—he would have Riley Wolfe’s birth name. But finding a vehicle registration in a printed book—by plate number—is more difficult than finding it by name. It would take much longer since he would have to scan every page until he found a match. If he found it, though—
And still Delgado paused before reopening the book. Some stray thought was nagging at the back of his mind. Something had to have happened here in Pickens County that forced Riley to change his name and move. It seemed highly likely that whatever that was, it had been serious enough to convince his mother of the necessity, too.
What had happened?
If it was that serious, there was a good chance that someone in the area would remember it. That alone would be worth the long drive. So he spent a moment organizing his thoughts on where to look for that someone. Sheriff’s office, school, maybe a neighbor if he got very lucky. Newspaper archives? He wasn’t even sure there was a newspaper here. He’d have to check. If so, there might even be a reporter who remembered the story, which was a lot better than working through a stack of ancient newspapers. Even if they’d been microfilmed—unlikely for a small town like this one.
Delgado flipped open his notebook and jotted down, “Sheriff, middle school, newspaper?” He would talk to the sheriff first. The newspaper would be a last resort. He didn’t like reporters.
Delgado started to close the notebook, and then paused for just a moment to glance at his notes. They seemed pretty skimpy. He had so far learned very few real facts. He was certain Riley’s relationship to his mother was important. He had underlined it twice more and circled it. Other than that? Not much. A lot of guesswork, and none of it pointed to a reason for a sudden name change and move. Except, once again, the big house on the hill. He was sure it was real, and something had happened to make Riley’s family lose the house. That kind of loss would be huge to a young boy. The house would have stood for everything important: security, status, family, comfort. Had it been here, in Georgia? Had its loss forced the move and name change? Did it become the driving force that made him the master criminal he was?
Delgado had to admit that it was all a fragile construct, but it made sense to him. If he was right, everything led back to that house. He had to admit that it might not even exist except in young Riley’s imagination. It could easily have been something a poor boy might dream up, a comforting fantasy. Delgado didn’t think so; he thought it was real. But he had never yet solved anything by wanting something to be true, and he knew it was just as likely that the big house was only a make-believe solace for a kid who needed to dream. It could even provide motivation for all Riley had become: Someday I will have enough money to buy a big house on a hill.
But if it was real, and if it was here, in Pickens County, Delgado would find it, even if he had to scan every page in the massive DMV book. He closed his notebook, opened the registration record, and began, going from front to back. After forty-five minutes, Delgado had worked up through the L’s with no luck. He paused to stretch his neck, sore from bending over the book. And then, for no logical reason, he opened up the book and flipped to the back to look at the entries under Wolfe. And as he ran his finger down the page of W’s, he saw the plate number.
Not under Wolfe. Under the name Weimer.
Delgado traced it with his finger tip, as if touching it would make certain it really was the right number. It was. The plate was registered to a Sheila Weimer. Delgado blinked, then flipped open his notebook again. There it was—Jimmy Finn had said Riley’s mother’s name was Sheila. Not conclusive, but Delgado felt a surge of excitement anyway. The address given was right here in Jasper, on Brittany Court. The street name sounded a bit upscale—could it be the big house on the hill?
He reached for his phone and saw his hand was still shaking from excitement. He paused, took a deep breath, and steadied himself. I know better, he told himself. It isn’t over until it’s over. He held out his hand in front of him, and after a moment the shaking stopped.
He picked up his phone and Googled the address. It wasn’t very far. Delgado grabbed his notebook and headed out.
Brittany Court was not upscale, and it was not the big house on the hill. There was no hill and no big house, only a cluster of small, one-story duplexes. The units looked old and worn; they’d probably been there in 1996. Still, he had to be sure. And there was a tiny chance that someone who lived here now had been here back then.
Delgado got out of his car and approached the central area, where the mailboxes were. There was a small sign by the mailboxes instructing anyone interested in renting to contact the management company. Delgado wrote down the phone number and, sitting in his car, called it.
Delgado had expected to get a receptionist who would put him on hold, forcing him to listen to terrible music for five or ten minutes before he finally spoke to somebody who could answer his questions. To his surprise, the woman who answered the phone also answered his questions.
“Those units been there for thirty years, but our company bought ’em ’bout eight years ago,” she said with a Georgia twang. “So I couldn’t anyhow tell you ’bout anybody lived there that long ago. And they always been cheap? So they always had a quick turnover, and I know for a fact ain’t nobody been there long enough to remember somebody back then. No, I’m sorry, but the old fella built ’em and owned ’em back then, he died ’bout six months after he sold out to our company. It’s like they always say, you stop bein’ active and you probably just gonna die. Anyways, that’s what old Bill Thomson done. Sold out, retired, and died, one two three.”
Delgado thanked her, disconnected, and frowned at his steering wheel. Not the big house on the hill. This little p
lace was already a huge step down from that, if it had really existed. So had Riley and his mother—the Weimers—come to Jasper from somewhere else? Probably; it was unlikely that they would stay in the town where they had just suffered a huge loss in status. But if the big house was only a fantasy, they might have lived here all along.
Delgado shook his head. It was a dead end, at least for now. He would have to move on to his next step, talking to the sheriff. He looked up the address and saw that Jasper had its own police department, separate from the Pickens County sheriff. It wasn’t far. Nothing was, in Jasper.
The duty sergeant informed him that he was in luck, and the man to talk to was Clay Bensen. “He was detective here twenty-six years,” the sergeant drawled. “Retired ’bout three and a half year ago. But this time a day, you gone fine him over to Molly Bee’s.” When Delgado looked blank, the sergeant twitched a tiny smile. “That ole diner, edge o’ town? ’Bout two mile from here. Dead east.” He jerked a thumb in an easterly direction and nodded. “They got meatloaf today, it’s worth a try,” he said, and went back to a stack of reports on his desk.
Delgado found Molly Bee’s easily. It was one of those 1960s space-age diners, with a jagged neon sign towering up, and a big theater-marquee-style sign that read, “MOLLY BEE’S—Fine Home Cooking!” He parked and went in.
In the far corner of the diner was a booth with a knot of five men gathered around. No one else was in the diner except a bored-looking woman in an apron resting one haunch on a stool behind the counter.
Delgado walked back to the booth. The man in the far corner of the booth was talking. He looked to be average height, thin and wiry, probably in his sixties. He had a worn-looking face with bright blue eyes and wore a Stetson perched on top of short silver hair. He wore a brown jacket, a Western shirt, and a string tie with a large turquoise clasp. Delgado guessed that would be Bensen. He was the only one of the group old enough. So he stood and waited. The man in the Stetson glanced at him but didn’t interrupt his story. When he finished talking, he turned his attention on Delgado. “Detective Bensen?” Delgado said.
