“That’s okay.” Will took the cloth, feeling uncomfortable at the prospect of Michael Ormewood’s wife doing his laundry.

“Man,” Michael said, resting his elbows on his knees, dropping his head. “I gotta say, the girl reminds me a lot of Cynthia. Got that same fire in her eyes, you know?”

“That so?” Will asked, thinking Michael was painting a very different picture of the neighbor than the one he had offered before.

“Cyn was a good kid, don’t get me wrong about that. It’s just she had that rebellious streak, too. Your parents divorced?”

Will was caught off-guard by the question. His face must have shown it.

“None of my business, right?” Michael rubbed the back of his neck, looking up at the building again. “My father died when I was about her age. Maybe that’s why I kind of took care of her.”

Will wasn’t sure which girl the man was talking about now.

“I was just thinking that you get a little rebellious streak when you’re a teenager and that it gets worse if your parents split up at the same time. You start to push things, right? Trying to test the limits, see how far you can go before they pull you back. My mom yanked me back by the collar—we’re talking Wile E. Coyote yanked. She was always looking out for me, always using the heavy hand. Kids today, their parents don’t do that. They don’t want to be the bad guy.”

Will guessed, “Cynthia was a little wilder than Phil knew?”

“Maybe a little wilder than I knew,” he admitted. “Or than I wanted to know.”

“That sounds like an honest mistake.”

Michael smiled at Will. “There was this girl I knew back in high school. God, she was gorgeous. Wouldn’t give me the time of day. My cousin hooked her. He was just this scrawny-ass kid, didn’t have a hair anywhere on his body except for his head.” Michael glanced at him. “You know the type I’m talking about?”

Will nodded because it seemed expected of him.

“Total pud puller,” Michael continued. “And he ends up with this beautiful girl. Not just that, but she’s letting him touch her, going to let him do her.” His laugh was different this time. “I was usually the one who scored, you know? Not him.” He turned, facing Will. “I’m thinking I shouldn’t have chased her.”

Will was confused. “Jasmine?”

Michael turned back, looking at the building. “I should’ve just let her go, but there was this second where…you know how when your brain thinks of about a billion things at the same time? I kept thinking about Cynthia running, and how she tripped over that fence. I should’ve fixed that fence last year. I should have fucking fixed that fence.” He put his fists to his eyes. “Oh, God.”

Will was at a loss. An hour ago, he had wanted to pummel this man to the ground for sleeping with Angie. Now he just felt sorry for him.

Michael continued, “That’s what I was thinking about when Jasmine ran—Cynthia running across our yard. And without even thinking, I grabbed her foot to stop her. You know—so she wouldn’t get hurt like Cynthia did.” He turned to Will. “I think I need that time off Greer was talking about. This is hitting me harder than I thought it would. Do you mind?”

Will was surprised by the question, but readily agreed. “It’s fine.”

“I’m sorry to let you down like this. I sound like a freaking woman. Hell, I’m acting like one, too. All this crazy talk; you must think I’m some kind of psycho or something.” He shook his head again. “I think a couple of days is what I need. Just some time to get over this, come to terms with what happened.”

“It’s okay,” Will said, thinking he was glad that Michael had come to this conclusion on his own. It was clear now that the other man had been fighting to hold it together all morning. “You do what you need to do.”

“I just need to be kept in the loop. I need to know what’s going on. Would you mind that? I don’t want to step on your toes, buddy. I just can’t be out there cut off from everything. I know you’re gonna catch this fucker, but I need to know what’s going on with the case.”

Will wasn’t happy about it, but he offered, “Call whenever you want.”

“Thank you,” Michael said. Will heard the relief in the other man’s voice, read the gratitude in his eyes. “Thank you.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

7:22 PM

John was so exhausted that he almost missed his bus stop. He bolted up from the seat, calling, “Wait!” as the driver started to close the door.

He practically fell onto the sidewalk, his body feeling as if his muscles had been jackhammered. Art had asked for a volunteer to work late and John had gladly raised his hand, thinking he’d be better off having something to occupy his mind other than Joyce and the mess he had gotten himself caught up in. He couldn’t even close his eyes without thinking about that little blonde girl in Michael’s backyard. Last night, he had been shivering so hard that he woke himself up. Sweat covered his body and he had started keening like a child, rocking himself back and forth until he fell back into a fitful sleep.

Art’s overtime job was the kind of shitwork you wouldn’t ask your worst enemy to do: cleaning out a clog in the main canister of the vacuum system. The tank was buried underground and designed to hold what seemed like a million gallons of carpet fuzz, Cheerios and what smelled like sour candy gone bad—all the debris they vacuumed out of cars before sending them through the washer. John had barely fit through the opening, and when he had gotten inside, he’d guessed the tank was maybe ten feet wide and eight feet round, more like a coffin than he wanted to think about.

Art had given him a flashlight and a pair of rubber gloves. The battery in the light had lasted about thirty minutes. The gloves had stuck together before he uncovered the intake. John had stuck his bare hand up into the grimy pipe and pulled out a chunk of what felt like human hair. He thought about the flecks of skin and snot that the average body sloughed off on a daily basis and gagged up his banana sandwich before he could make it back to fresh air.

“You are some kind of trooper,” Art had told him. The man had looked at John’s ashen face, seen the vomit on his shirt and shoved a fifty in his hand. Fifty dollars for less than two hours’ work. John would have jumped back into his own vomit if Art had offered to double it.

The fresh air felt good as he walked back to his room at the flophouse. There was always a smell on the street, no matter the weather or the time of day. John had come to associate the odor with poverty. His lungs were probably absorbing it, carcinogens clinging to the insides like the hair clinging to a vacuum tank.

“Hey, cowboy.”

John looked up to find Martha Lam sitting on the front stoop of the house. She was in head-to-toe black leather and her makeup was heavier than usual. He wanted to ask the parole officer something flip, like if a date had stood her up, but he said instead, “Hello, Ms. Lam.”

She stood, holding her arms out at her sides as she did a little turn. “I’m all dressed up for your random inspection.”

He didn’t know what to say. “You look nice,” seemed forward, something that might be construed as flirting.