Page 78 of Forty

I peel into the driveway on Barrow Road, brakes squealing. There’s no sign of Lou’s truck. Thank God. I don’t need to explain things. I can leave him a note, drop his keys under the bucket on the front porch, and he’ll understand.

I fiddle with the front door lock—turns out Lou left it open—and I hustle to the room I’d been using, not bothering to turn on the lights. I know this house like the back of my hand. I click on a lamp and grab my duffle bag from under the bed, throw it on top. Then I scoop up armfuls of clothes from a chair, and dump them in, shoving them to one side to make room.

That’s when I see the necklace.

It’s in the middle of the floor.

It must have fallen from my cosmetics bag. I keep it in an outer pouch that snaps shut, the same place I keep extra cash when I have it.

The pearl and gold band are so small, the chain so thin, I could have so easily missed it.

I plop to the floor and pluck it up, rolling the pearl in my fingers.

Forty gave me this ring. We were at the river. Just the two of us. He’d found two, heavy-duty, rubber tubes and lashed them together. We’d floated for hours in the sunshine, clear blue sky, the water perfectly cool when our skin overheated.

I’d been basking in the sun, head tilted over the edge of the tube, hair floating in the river when he grabbed my hand. He slipped the ring on my finger and said, “I’ll get you a diamond as big as your head once I get a decent job.”

The ring was too loose. I spent the rest of that afternoon with my hand curled closed so it wouldn’t fall off into the river. By the time we got back on land, my knuckles throbbed from holding on so tight.

Later, he bought me the necklace from the pawn shop in Shady Gap. I slide it over my head now, untangling it when it gets stuck in my curls. I exhale, and the pressure bearing down on me slips, gives me the smallest room to breathe.

I never got the diamond. But I held on to the pearl this whole time.

I’m forever losing things. Some things I run from. Some things have been taken from me.

Some things I’m not wise or tough enough to keep.

I don’t care if I don’t deserve Forty Nowicki. I haven’t deserved half the shit I’ve gotten—or been dealt—in my life.

It’s not about what I deserve or didn’t deserve.

It’s about what I can hold onto. And I’m not letting Forty go. Not this time.

I grab my phone and shoot off a text.I’m at Lou’s. I’ll be here.

I just press send when the phone goes flying from my hands and a body slams me into the ground, cracking my head off the metal bed frame.

Pains spears through my skull, my vision blurs, and I can hear my phone crunch as Carlo snarls in my ringing ear, “Where’s my bag, bitch?”

11

FORTY

“How do we get a message to Knocker Johnson?” I get real close to Rab Daugherty’s slack-jawed face.

Rab didn’t come easy. He lost his dentures at some point. Makes his smartass leering extra creepy.

He’s not even that old. Forty-five. Fifty at the most. Guess he’s led a rough life. He’s an asshole, but I’ll give him that. He’s tough as hell. Roughed up but unbroken and unbowed.

“Fuck. Yourself. And your mother.” Rab turns to Heavy. “And fuck your dead whore of a mother, too.” He hocks blood onto the concrete floor of the barn.

Heavy’s squatting on an overturned bucket. He doesn’t blink.

I get right back in Rab’s face. “We’re not asking you to roll over on your guy. We’re asking how to get a message to him. He got a phone number? He got a fuckin’ email?”

I’m trying to reason with him, but Rab’s next-level squirrelly. Our intel said he was on meth, but he’s showing no signs of withdrawal. He’s just got that meth personality.

“Don’t try to bullshit me. You’ll track him down. GPS. IP address. 5G.” He shakes his head with its shock of wild, gray hair, and so help me, he looks a grizzled, redneck version of that alien guy from the memes.

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