by Mark Pryor
ALSO BY MARK PRYOR
Hollow Man
The Bookseller
The Crypt Thief
The Blood Promise
The Button Man
The Reluctant Matador
The Paris Librarian
The Sorbonne Affair
Published 2018 by Seventh Street Books®, an imprint of Prometheus Books
Dominic. Copyright © 2018 by Mark Pryor. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, digital, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or conveyed via the Internet or a website without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Characters, organizations, products, locales, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.
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Cover design by Jacqueline Nasso Cooke
Cover design © Prometheus Books
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Pryor, Mark, 1967- author.
Title: Dominic / Mark Pryor.
Description: Amherst, NY : Seventh Street Books, an imprint of Prometheus Books, [2018] | Series: A hollow man novel
Identifiers: LCCN 2017034487 (print) | LCCN 2017039330 (ebook) | ISBN 9781633883666 (ebook) | ISBN 9781633883659 (softcover)
Subjects: LCSH: Public prosecutors—Fiction. | Conspiracies—Fiction. | Murder—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Mystery & Detective / General. | FICTION / Suspense. | GSAFD: Suspense fiction. | Mystery fiction.
Classification: LCC PS3616.R976 (ebook) | LCC PS3616.R976 D66 2018 (print) | DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017034487
Printed in the United States of America
CONTENTS
Cover
ALSO BY MARK PRYOR
Title Page
Copyright Page
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHAPTER ONE
DOMINIC
The first time I realized my potential for manipulating people was at age eleven, when the headmaster at my prep school handed me a bowl of soup instead of a beating.
A policeman took me to the headmaster’s living room nine hours after I’d run away from my private boarding school, a stone mansion in the Highlands of Scotland. It was a frightful place, martialed by incompetent and brutal teachers and stuffed to the rafters with despicable brats, tweed-clad snobs who chattered incessantly about Daddy’s chalet in Switzerland or Mummy’s new Jag. Fed up with them and the oppressive regime, I’d set off on the five-hundred-mile walk home.
Unfortunately, I turned left out of the driveway instead of right, which itself wound up as a learning moment when it came to planning future escapades.
I made it ten miles before the sun started to set and the wind blowing off the mountains made me second-guess my choice of jacket, shoes, and direction. I’ve often wondered at the dozen or so cars that sped by me that day, two honking their irritation, one slowing down to stare, and none stopping to inquire if a boy, inappropriately dressed for the climate, might perhaps need help. Maybe the locals recognized my plumage as belonging to Maidstone Hall and were more than happy to let me freeze to death in the wild. If they felt the same way as I did about that school’s spoiled, inbred little shits, I wouldn’t have blamed them for actively targeting me with their front bumpers.
My six-hour trek ended in the village of Bromstock, where, on the village green, I found a red phone booth. It smelled of polish, which I wasn’t expecting. I hadn’t been inside many, a few on jaunts to London—and those uniformly smelled of piss and roasted chestnuts, their little square windows coated with stickers advertising all manner of salacious services that I was too young to comprehend. Not this one. Best I could tell, some local busybody had come by and polished each little pane, one by one, before shining up the handset and the rotary dial, which made a gentle rattling sound when I ran my fingertips over it.
At that point I realized another flaw in my plan: no change. I tried dialing my parents’ number without paying, as if my own personal emergency would override the mechanics of the phone. It didn’t. After hanging up and staring at the black handset for a minute, I realized my options were limited to one: I dialed 999.
The police car was pale blue and driven by a slightly weary and overweight constable whose shirt wouldn’t stay tucked in. I was leaning against the phone booth when he arrived, the sun behind me casting sharp light into his eyes that made him squint. I sat in the back seat for the ride to the school, watching the countryside roll past the window, impressed with myself at how far I’d come. Impressed that I’d survived, even, because the lanes looked narrower in the car, the hedges higher, and the trees that lined the roads reached over and extended their black branches as if to pluck us from our route.
“Can you put the lights and siren on?” I asked after a while.
The cop grunted and shook his head. “This isn’t a game, laddie.”
It took fifteen minutes to get back to Maidstone Hall, and the cop left me in the car as he went to fetch the headmaster. Dumb move on his part, considering I’d just run away from the place, but I was too tired to hop out and hide to prove my point. Plus, I was already fairly sure what the headmaster’s reaction was going to be, and I didn’t want to make it worse. Something to do with a swishing sound and me not sitting comfortably for a while. I had a cousin at a school not far away—he was a little older but did the same kind of thing, took off without telling anyone, and that was his welcome back.
Turns out I was wrong. The headmaster and his wife, a handsome woman with black hair turning silver, stood in the doorway and beckoned for me to enter. They said almost nothing but followed as the pudgy policeman led me into their living room, where the television was on. A tray table was set up in front of an armchair, and when the cop waddled out, Mrs. Benedict asked if I’d eaten all day. I shook my head. She gestured for me to sit, then left the room with her husband. Five minutes later, he returned alone with a large bowl of soup and some brown bread, which he put in front of me. Then he left without a word.
That bowl of soup told me I’d won. The year of microaggressions I’d committed and gotten away with had gained me little: the fleeting joy of another kid in trouble for something I’d done, a master (it shouldn’t surprise you that we called our teachers that) patting his pockets for lost keys or a missing wallet. Each time I ran t
he risk of being caught, an eleven-year-old powerless to avoid whatever dastardly punishment a master might dream up. And they were vindictive bastards. Once, we were sent on a cross-country run. I puked after about a quarter mile and made it to the matron a minute before the diarrhea hit. She put me in my bed with a glass of water and a pat on the head, but Mr. Dobson, the games master, found out I’d curtailed my run without his permission and made me get out of bed, put on my puke-stained shirt and shorts, and run around the school until I dropped facedown into the mud. A cold shower later, I was back in bed with a fever and everyone was satisfied that justice had been done. And no doubt assuring themselves that one day I’d appreciate such moments of character building.
But that bowl of soup. That was my punishment for pulling a huge stunt, one the school had never seen before. One that could have killed me and ruined the place forever. They let a boy wander away through the Scottish Highlands, not even realizing for two hours that he was gone, ignorant as to why, and clueless as to how to respond.
My sense of victory was confirmed when the soup was eaten and the movie was over. The rest of the school was doing homework, “prep” we called it, sitting in the six classrooms that surrounded the entrance hall, all of which had windows that looked out over that space. As I crossed it, I heard my own still-wet shoes squeaking on the parquet floor. I walked slowly, and every head lifted from its studies to watch me pass, eyes glued to me, admiration and respect pulsing out from every kid in that school—as demonstrated by the stillness of their writing hands, the silence that swept before me like a royal carpet. No snickers or snide remarks came my way; the little lords and delicate darlings looked up at me as I passed and not down their noses as they were so accustomed to doing. I slid behind my desk three minutes before the end of prep, three minutes pretending to read my history textbook until the bell went.
And I stayed there, tall in my seat as the older boys came to me and asked if I’d be on their team for the table-tennis match they were about to play, asked me if I’d like to kick a football with them tomorrow. I’d won over the entire school with a stupid and poorly thought-out temporary escape. I’d stumped a brutal headmaster and his ice-queen wife; every kid in that school wanted to be my friend; and, although I wasn’t to know it then, no teacher would ever lay a hand on me again. Dobson sneered and made his sarcastic remarks, but he had nothing to back it up anymore. Like the others, he didn’t dare. Only the school bully, the son of the Earl of Brantley, Matthew MacIntosh, simmered with resentment against me. He was the biggest, toughest, and richest kid in the school, free to push others around while the masters pretended not to see any of it. Free to act like the king he felt he was.
But now I was the untouchable one, sporting a shield of immunity that I’d been handed after one reckless, impulsive act.
Imagine what I could achieve with a little planning.
◯
I watched from the back of the courtroom, typing quickly on my computer as I messaged my court chief to ask why my officemate, Brian McNulty, was handling this juvenile’s hearing.
I was supposed to be prosecuting this kid, it was my case.
Bobby, the sorry little bugger in question, sat at the defense table, wearing his usual hangdog expression and the beige detention pajamas he was so familiar with, and that he’d sported since being picked up for stealing a car in East Austin a week ago.
As I waited for a reply, I channeled my irritation into attention. Specifically on the girl sitting beside Bobby, her hair shining, her face calm and poised, looking as much like the 1950s movie star as she did the first day I saw her in that stunning lime-green dress and heels redder than any man’s blood. Her eyes were on Judge Barbara Portnoy, now, and I imagined she was nervous for her brother. Portnoy was lenient on first-timers and occasionally forgiving to second-timers. But she was a baseball umpire on a kid’s third strike: You’re outta here! Appear before her on a fourth or fifth crime, and it was the big house, or at the very least a secure drug or behavioral facility.
Today, though, she was grilling the probation officer who was recommending that Bobby be put on a new probation and start it at Travis County’s own treatment center, the Intermediate Sanctions Center, or ISC. It was the last step before juvenile prison itself, a lockdown facility where the kids wore khaki pants, collared shirts, and God-awful sweater-vests. I don’t generally view humiliation as an effective method of punishment or rehabilitation, but whoever was selling the county those sweater-vests had apparently made a good case.
At the ISC the kids learned the stuff their parents, those who had any, hadn’t taught them. How to tell the time, tie a tie, not spit on the floor. Eat vegetables. At the ISC, the kids spruced up and started learning at the on-site school, got clean of whichever drug was their preference, and after six months were transitioned to the halfway house next door. I’d been a prosecutor in juvie around a year at this point, and, in my experience, once they hit the unlocked halfway house, about a quarter of them snuck out the window on the first night, not to be seen again until their next crime.
That’s a long way of saying that I knew full well that fifteen-year-old Bobby had no desire to wear a sweater-vest and, even though I was a prosecutor and not his defense attorney, he and I both knew it was my job to make sure that didn’t happen.
My computer pinged quietly, and I read the message from my new court chief, Terri Williams, on our intra-office messenger system.
Brian said you were running late, that he’d be happy to handle the plea deal.
I typed my response: We didn’t have a fucking plea deal.
A pause. Please don’t swear on messenger, people might see it. It’s just not professional.
Nor is taking one of my cases, which happens to be my concern right now.
Sorry. But why do you care? It’s just a car theft with a frequent flier.
I care because I’m a fucking professional.
The cursor blinked, but I knew Terri had given up the fight. For one thing, she needed me: she’d been drafted in from our white-collar division and had no idea what she was doing. Brian McNulty had been at the juvenile division longer, but she was smart enough to know that he was borderline incompetent, so when she needed practical advice or help, she came to me. It’s always good to volunteer; it helps build the wall between inquiring minds and my true self.
As for my true self, well, I say that I’m a harmless, musically gifted but empathy-disabled Noussian. I take that from the word nous in Greek philosophy, representing mind or intellect. Not that I’m smarter than everyone else, but when you have no soul or spirit, well, there’s not much left to go on. That sounds very dramatic; but it’s not, and I’m not. The fact is, I’m a lot like everyone else around me. I should be—my personality is my own, but my behavior mimics theirs, and my emotions are based on the way other people express themselves. Just because I don’t actually feel those things isn’t my fault, and if I don’t portray them accurately or appropriately, then it’s not for want of trying ; and I’m sorry for that failing. Very sorry.
Except, and I’m just being honest here, I don’t feel that one, either. It’s another failing of mine: a total lack of guilt.
Also, for the record, not my fault.
As for Terri, I actually liked her a lot. A large, black woman with frizzy hair and an even frizzier personality, she’d faced an uphill battle learning her new job, dealing with the politics and personalities of this place, but she always had a smile on her face and a cheery word. She was one of the most genuine people I’d met at the DA’s office, and while that may not sound like a compliment from someone like me, it’s meant as one.
I turned my attention back to Bobby. He and his beautiful sister glanced around the large courtroom, and I knew they were looking for me, wondering why I wasn’t prosecuting this case and reducing the charge as usual. I was his shield when he came to this place, had handled all three of his previous charges and used the broad prosecutorial discretion of my position to
ensure a mix of dismissals, reductions, and gentle wrist slaps. I did this because Bobby and I had a special bond. And I’m not referring to his sister.
No, Bobby was a younger version of me, too young to actually be diagnosed as a psychopath, but headed in the right direction, toward a bevy of psychologists who no doubt had that diagnosis waiting on ice for him. In two years, he’d be old enough to wear the tag that was hung around my neck when I was a teenager in England, old enough to get that stigma permanently stamped on his medical, psychological, and criminal records, an ugly and permanent tattoo that people would be sneering at for the rest of his life.
I’d kept mine hidden in the move to America. No one checked trans-Atlantic records unless there was a reason, and I knew that my BBC accent and charming personality, combined with a University of Texas law degree and burgeoning musical career, raised only interest in potential employers, not red flags. And, as everyone knows, once you’re hired by the government, you have to be either a criminal or an utter moron to get fired. My take was that as long as a git like McNulty was able to hang onto his job, I was safe—no matter what suspicions midlevel managers like Terri had.
At the front of the courtroom, Judge Portnoy had paused and was looking my way.
“Our British prosecutor too busy to handle his usual docket?” she said sarcastically. We had a weird relationship, the judge and I. It had started off professional and cordial, but for some reason in the last few months she’d started to poke at me, needle me. To my chief’s chagrin, I didn’t have the wisdom to sit and take it, but, to Portnoy’s credit, she didn’t seem to mind me dishing it right back.
“If I were too busy, judge, I wouldn’t be sitting here watching Mr. McNulty swipe my cases.”
“Then charge him with theft,” Portnoy said, before turning back to Bobby. “And young man, I’m glad Mr. McNulty is recommending a secure placement for you. You’re a danger to the public and yourself. This is the fourth or fifth time you’ve been here.”
His lawyer, Sarah Muckleroy, leapt to her feet. “Your Honor, he has only two misdemeanor adjudications.” Muckles, as I called her, had a target on her back; and it was only because I was still entranced with my own special lady that I’d not zeroed in on her. She was as smart as she was beautiful, and as kind and thoughtful as the Dalai Lama. If I had any kind of decency when it came to women, which I didn’t, I would have crossed her off the list forever. She was way, way too good a human being to fall into my clutches.
