by Kim Fielding
“You okay to talk now?” Nevin asked. “Maybe you need something stronger than fizzy sugar water.”
Jeremy rolled his eyes. “Booze doesn’t solve problems.”
“But it can temporarily make them less painful, Germy.”
Their fond bickering helped settle Parker’s stomach. “The 7UP is fine.” To prove his point, he took a long swallow.
“Slowly now.” Jeremy leaned back against the big sink and crossed his arms over his massive chest.
“The detective said that our building manager found Logan dead in our apartment—his apartment—this morning. He OD’d on something. I dunno what.”
“Was Logan a heavy drug user?” Jeremy’s expression was grim. Maybe he was thinking about how his husband, Qay, had struggled with addiction in the past.
“No, he didn’t use at all. I mean, he smoked weed sometimes, but everybody does that.” He shot Rhoda a guilty look even though weed was legal in Washington and Oregon, and even though Parker was old enough to make those kinds of decisions for himself. She just shook her head.
Nevin ignored all of that. “The grunts in Seattle don’t think it was an accident?”
“He left a note. To me.” Parker’s stomach roiled again, but he remained seated. “That’s why they called, they said. Just tying up loose ends, I guess.”
“What’d the note say?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t tell me.”
“Fuckwads,” Nevin muttered. “So what did they ask you?”
“Where I am. His family contact info. I didn’t know that—only that they’re in Oklahoma. I told her maybe he had them in his phone. I didn’t really tell her much else, and she didn’t have a lot of questions. But she said she might have to call back if she came up with more.” Even the idea made him miserable. The last thing he wanted was some stranger poking around in his personal business, digging up bad decisions he thought he’d laid to rest.
Nevin squatted in front of him. “If she does call, you don’t need to say a word. Get her number, and I’ll give her a ring.” He was using a calm, reassuring tone, probably the same one he used when he spoke to the victims in the Vulnerable Adults Unit.
“Okay.”
Jeremy still leaned against the sink, but now he was poking at his phone. “I’ve got a pal who’s a great lawyer. I’m going to send her name and number to Rhoda.”
“I need a lawyer?” Parker wailed. He didn’t question why Jeremy knew a lawyer; the guy had connections all over the city.
“Unlikely. But just in case. How complicated were your personal affairs?”
“Huh?”
“You and the ex. Do you have a lease you need to deal with? Joint property?”
Parker shook his head. “I only knew him a few months.”
Nodding as if this were a good thing, Jeremy came closer. Nevin moved out of the way, letting Jeremy take his place. “Parker, I’m really sorry this happened to you. Just remember that whatever decisions Logan made were his and none of this is your fault, okay?”
Coming from someone else, these words might have been trite. But Jeremy’s ex-boyfriend had been murdered a couple of years earlier in some kind of gangs-and-drugs mess. The investigation somehow ended up involving Jeremy, even though he and his ex had broken up long before. Jeremy was kidnapped and tortured, for God’s sake. So he knew what he was talking about, and Parker needed to remember that the world didn’t revolve around Parker Levin.
Parker sniffed. “Thanks. Logan was…. He could be really sweet. He was funny too.”
“He must’ve had something special going to end up with you.”
Shit. Parker’s cheeks flamed, and he hid his face, hoping Jeremy would assume it was out of grief rather than embarrassment. Maybe a guy never completely recovered from his first crush—maybe it stayed mostly dormant, like the chicken pox virus. Anyway, embarrassment was preferable to nausea, and somehow it made Parker feel a little less miserable.
Nevin and Jeremy asked a few more questions, but Parker didn’t have much to share. He finally smiled, although weakly. “Thanks, guys. I really appreciate it. You probably have to get back to work, though.”
“Not until we deal with the wanker,” Nevin said.
“Who?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
But this sounded interesting—and also nicely distracting. So when Jeremy and Nevin marched out into the main room with Rhoda right behind them, Parker tagged along too.
They paraded to a table in the far corner, where a single customer looked up at them apprehensively. Parker recognized him as the handsome ponytailed man who’d nodded at him outside the café. Now he sat with a coffee mug, a plate full of crumbs, and an expression suggesting that his innards might not be in much better shape than Parker’s.
Nevin opened his mouth to say something—probably something profane—but Jeremy spoke first. “You should just go, Wes.”
“I will. But I need to say something first. It’s why I came here, and I really need….” He swallowed audibly and bit his lip.
“You really need to get your ass out of here.” Nevin crossed his arms and looked fierce. And Jeremy, for once, looked scary too, his brow creased in a scowl and his jaw clenched.
Now, if Parker had been in Wes’s place, he would have picked up and run like a rabbit. Jeremy and Nevin made wonderful friends but, he suspected, terrifying opponents. But Parker wasn’t in Wes’s place; he was standing behind the others, noting Wes’s desperate expression and acknowledging that he wasn’t the only one having problems today.
“Let him talk.”
Rhoda, Jeremy, and Nevin turned to stare at Parker, while Wes gave him a look of naked gratitude. That look encouraged Parker to continue. “I don’t know what the problem is here, but it’s not gonna hurt anyone to let him have his say.”
“Thank you,” Wes said quietly. And while Jeremy and Nevin looked unhappy, they relaxed their postures. Rhoda cocked her head and gazed at Parker inquisitively, but he’d deal with that later.
Now that he’d been given the chance to speak, Wes couldn’t seem to find any words. He picked up his coffee cup and put it down again. He poked at a raisin on his plate. He scratched behind one ear. Finally, when it seemed as if Nevin was going to start swearing again, Wes spoke.
“I… I guess I mostly came to apologize. I screwed up. Big-time. And I’ve…. God, I’ve been reliving that day for ten years. I have nightmares about it. I’m going to have to live with what I did for the rest of my life. But I needed to tell you I’m sorry.”
Parker was dying to know what Wes had done that was so awful, but interrupting to ask would be rude, so he held his tongue. He could interrogate Jeremy later. Right now he empathized with Wes. Parker knew how awful it felt when you fucked up and had to face the people you’d impacted with your mistake. Not that he’d be facing Logan again, because…. Yeah, that thought could wait until later. When Parker was closer to a bathroom.
Jeremy peered at Wes. “Is this part of a twelve-step program?”
“No. I’m not a drunk or an addict. I’m just stupid.”
“Then why are you telling us this?”
“Because….” Wes sighed. “I don’t know. It’s not like you’re going to hate me any less. I just thought it was important for you to know that I’m sorry. That I didn’t go tripping off into a sunshiny future, okay? I ruined myself. I have so much regret, I’m fucking drowning in it.”
“You expect us to forgive you?” Nevin sounded hostile, but at least he wasn’t openly threatening Wes.
“No. I don’t forgive myself, even. I’m only hoping that you’ll feel a little better if you know that none of what I did rested easy on my shoulders. I’ve been trying to find the courage to face you for a long time. So I could tell you all this. And now I have.” Wes stared down at the table, his shoulders hunched.
After a long pause, it was, surprisingly, Nevin who spoke. And he didn’t sound angry anymore. “It’s been ten fucking years, Wanker. You woul
dn’t believe the shit that’s gone down since then. It’s not like I’m losing any goddamn sleep over you.” Which should have been insulting but seemed to ease a bit of Wes’s misery.
Not looking up, Wes nodded. “I wanted to ask too…. I don’t have a lot of money, but if there’s some kind of fund… something for the kids?”
Jeremy and Nevin exchanged looks, and then Jeremy answered. “I think there is. Give me your phone number, and I’ll see if I can get the details to you.”
Wes nodded eagerly and patted the pockets of his denim jacket, eventually producing a somewhat crumpled business card, which he set on the table. Nobody took it, but Jeremy nodded.
Then Wes stood. “Thanks for letting me…. Thanks.” He aimed a weak smile at Parker.
Parker’s heart broke for the guy. He didn’t know why. He knew nothing about him, other than he did something a long time ago that royally pissed off even implacable Jeremy. And he’d been feeling torn up about it ever since, or at least so he claimed. But God, he looked so defeated. And he was brave too, wasn’t he? Facing your demons took balls.
With his hands stuffed in the pockets of his jeans, Wes walked slowly past Jeremy and Nevin. Past Rhoda. Past Parker too. And nobody said anything to him. When he reached the door, he looked back briefly, scanning his gaze over the entire interior of P-Town as if he were searching for something. No. As if he were saying goodbye. It was the same way Parker had looked around the doggie day care after being fired or around some of the nicer apartments he’d been forced to move out of. Wes caught Parker’s eyes and gave him a tiny wave. Then he walked out the door.
Five seconds later, Parker went chasing after him.
Chapter Four
HE HADN’T died. He hadn’t keeled over from a stroke or exploded in a ball of shame-filled fire, and Nevin hadn’t shot him or beaten him to a pulp. This was a good result, Wes reminded himself as he walked out of the coffeehouse door. And he’d actually been courageous enough to do something he’d been dreading for years, which meant he never had to do it again, and that was good too. It was great.
But Wes didn’t feel great. He felt better than he had before going into P-Town, but that was only because the ordeal was over. The guilt remained. The heavy knowledge of the harm he’d caused others and could never undo.
As he walked toward his van, he reached a sudden decision. He wasn’t going to return to his home in Rogue Valley and make a coffee table—at least not now, not right away. He needed distance between himself and the world. He needed flat expanses of highway, bad gas-station coffee, and radio filled with nothing but static. He needed—
“Wes! Hey, Wes!”
He turned to see the kid from P-Town running toward him. Parker, right? And his first and most ridiculous thought was that Jeremy and Nevin had sent Parker after him, maybe because it would be less messy to clean up Wes’s corpse on the sidewalk than in the coffeehouse.
But Parker didn’t exactly look homicidal. In fact, when he caught up to Wes, panting slightly, he grinned. “Hi.”
Wes blinked. “Um, hi.”
“Where are you going now?”
“Wyoming.” The answer came out of nowhere. Wes hadn’t given any thought to a particular destination; he’d just planned to hit a freeway and keep going. Let Morrison lead the way. But now that he’d said it, he liked the idea. Wyoming, he remembered, was the least populated state. There were only two sets of escalators in Wyoming. It was the first state to grant women the vote, and it was home to Devil’s Tower, site of the alien landing in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. All of these seemed reasonable motives for going to Wyoming.
If Parker was surprised by Wes’s answer, he didn’t show it. Instead he gave a small nod. “Take me with you?”
“What?”
“Take me with you. To Wyoming.”
“Why?”
Parker shrugged. “Why not?”
There were ten thousand reasons for Wes to refuse—perhaps twenty thousand, including the reality that he was never going to make it out of Oregon. But he continued walking toward the van. “C’mon, then.”
WES DID not get on the Banfield, which would have eventually taken them to Wyoming. Instead he drove around the east side as if getting his thoughts in order. Parker surely must have noticed they were going nowhere, but he didn’t comment. He stared silently through the windshield, sometimes turning his head to steal a quick glance at Wes.
After nearly forty-five minutes of aimlessness, as Wes was passing Laurelhurst Park for the third time, Parker finally spoke. “Do you think next time you circle past that McDonald’s, we could stop for a minute? I never had lunch.”
“Do you really want fast food? Or something better?”
“You’re driving. You decide.”
Weird that Parker seemed to trust him, especially after the confession at P-Town.
Wes wasn’t a big fan of Mickey D’s, so he steered Morrison to a food cart pod instead. He got some yakisoba noodles, Parker bought himself a gyro, and they sat at a picnic table under a tent. They had the space to themselves, either because it was cold or because it was late for lunch, but plenty of cars whooshed nearby.
“Are you planning to take me to an isolated spot and perform Satanic rituals?” Parker asked this cheerfully, as if he looked forward to such a thing. “Or just take ten years to get to Wyoming?”
“Neither.”
“Okay. Um, my name’s Parker Levin, by the way. My mom owns P-Town.”
Wes nodded. “I’m Westley Anker. Wes.” He waited a beat for the inevitable.
Parker’s eyes sparkled when he got it. “Wanker. Nevin kept calling you Wanker.”
“Yeah. He’s not the first to do it, but he was the most insistent. And that was before he hated me.”
That gave Parker an obvious opportunity to ask why Nevin hated Wes and what all the drama was about. But Parker didn’t take the bait. “Yeah. He calls Jeremy Germy, and ever since the time I dyed my hair blue, I’m Smurf. I’m also pretty sure he’s the only person on the planet who calls my mom Rho.”
“He’s always had a colorful vocabulary.”
Parker laughed. “Yeah.” He drank some of the Mexican Coke he’d bought to wash down his gyro. “Last year we were doing a little volunteer work and running an errand at a hardware store, and this jerk called me a fag. I think I was wearing something especially, um, colorful that day. I was just gonna ignore him, ’cause who cares anyway. But Nevin ripped into him. Didn’t lay a finger on him or anything, it was all just words, but by the time Nevin was done, the guy honest to God had tears in his eyes. Then Nevin topped it all by giving me a big smoochy kiss on the cheek—it’s okay, Nevin’s husband was right there watching and thought it was funny—and the jerk ran away.”
Wes stared at him. “Nevin Ng is married?”
“Yep.”
“Jesus. He used to sleep with anyone who was willing. I never, ever pictured him settling down.”
Looking a little sad, Parker drained his Coke. “I guess almost anyone can settle down if they meet the right person.”
Wes grunted doubtfully. Not everyone had a right person. Some people were destined to run through life solo.
And then it occurred to him that this was a good opportunity to satisfy his curiosity. “What’s with Jeremy Cox in a green uniform?”
“He’s a city park ranger. Chief, actually.”
“Oh.” That didn’t entirely surprise Wes. Jeremy had been a good cop, solid and dependable, but always more interested in helping people than arresting them. And he’d also been kind of a nature freak.
“Did you used to work with them in the bureau?” The question was gentle. Parker no doubt had realized this might be a sore spot.
“Yeah.” Wes braced himself for more questions, but they didn’t come. Instead Parker gathered up their trash and deposited it in nearby cans, and they both got back into Morrison.
“Wyoming?” Parker asked. He was smiling.
“Maybe not. You, um….
Back at the coffeehouse. You were upset about something. Are you sure you don’t want to, I don’t know, chill somewhere?”
“I am chilling somewhere.” Parker patted the dash. “I’m chilling in your van.”
“Morrison.”
“What?”
“The van’s name is Morrison.”
Parker actually guffawed. “I love that! My last car was a crappy old Ford Focus. I called her Helen Wheels, and this guy I knew painted flames on her fenders. Like, shitty flames, you know? Maybe Morrison needs some decoration. White is boring. What would you paint on it?”
Wes opened his mouth to say he’d never given it any thought. Maybe a piece of furniture would be appropriate. But then he realized Parker had successfully steered the conversation off its intended track. “Maybe you shouldn’t ride to Wyoming with a stranger when you’re still upset.”
Parker answered with only a dismissive pfft. He sat there, staring at rain beading on the windshield, apparently willing to remain like that until the end of time.
Jesus. How had Wes gotten into this? He was supposed to spend the day delivering furniture and flaying himself alive, then head back to his quiet home. Stubborn, rainbow-hued boys suffering a personal crisis were not part of the agenda. Not even if they were beautiful.
“Won’t your mother be angry you’ve run away?”
Parker gave him a quick glare. “I’m twenty-six. I can run away all I want to.”
That was older than Wes had guessed. But now that he looked closely at Parker’s eyes, he saw a depth that would be unusual in a college kid. Parker might be impulsive, but he’d lived through some shit. Wes was sure of that.
“What about Nevin and Jeremy? I really don’t want them to come after me for kidnapping.” He was serious.
Parker rolled his eyes. But he also pulled out his phone and, thumbs flying, texted a message. “There,” he said as he tucked the phone into his pocket. “I’ve informed them that I’m not kidnapped and they need to leave me alone for a while. They’re probably happy to be rid of me.”
