Page 98 of The Art of Dying

“Try twenty-fi… Kitsch?” she said, blinking. “What are you doing back?”

“Nice to see you, too, Vaz.”

She stared at me for a moment, shaking her head.

Her expression made me chuckle. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“Does anyone know you’re here?”

“Just Sully and Alecia. Why?”

She looked around and then took a step closer. “Meet me at the fire pit.”

“Our fire pit? Now?”

“Yes, now. And don’t run your mouth, Kitsch, just do it. Eyes up.”

“Copy that,” I said, putting the Jeep in gear.

I was pulling away before Vazquez got off the shoulder, but in the side mirror I could see that she didn’t follow me. Instead, she banged a uey and sped off in the opposite direction. Anyone else would be confused, but she was clearly concerned that we were being watched.

I drove ten minutes outside of town to a crop of trees I knew well, surrounding an old fire pit we’d all made when we were in high school. It was a rite of passage when you got your license to drive out to our spot and light a fire, telling everyone the story of how good or bad your driver’s test went, letting laughter calm frazzled nerves and enjoying that first taste of freedom.

The Jeep bounced as I drove over the bumpy dirt path, but just out of sight of the main road, I slowed to a stop and parked. The rain was still spitting on my windshield, the droplets, the distant noise from the highway, the low hum of the engine, and the rhythmic smearing sound of the wipers were an oddly relaxing melody to counteract the anxiety creeping up inside me. If Vazquez wanted to bitch at me for not coming back for the funeral, she would’ve done it earlier on the shoulder of the road.

Five minutes later, Vazquez pulled up. She took her time stepping out of her car, this time without her vest.

I stepped out and walked with her over to the rocks surrounding the pit. She sat, and I did the same, waiting for her to speak. She rested her elbows on her knees, intertwining her fingers together. Whatever she was about to tell me, she didn’t want to, and she wasn’t wearing a chest cam, so she wasn’t supposed to, either.

“Why are you back, Kitsch?” she asked.

“I told you…”

“No, why are you really back?”

I frowned. “Just tell me what you’re getting at, Vaz.”

“I want you to hear the tone of my voice when I tell you this, because this isn’t me implicating Alecia.”

“Alecia?”

“Mason has only come back a handful of times since Mack left for California. He came back a couple of years ago, and I saw him and Alecia arguing in the parking lot of Ody’s.”

I shifted.

“When he walked off, he took a call, and I heard him speaking Russian or something. We’re talking about Mason Hughes here, Kitsch. How the fuck is he fluent in Russian? Not to mention he looks completely different. Nita has been telling people he’s working overseas at some high paying job. I asked Alicia about it, and she got really weird. Then, all of a sudden she’s going on all these trips, and she and her boyfriend bought new cars.”

“Sully said Badger is funding all of that.”

Vazquez shook her head. “He’s told me more than once he can’t believe his luck snagging Alecia. Said she’s fun, and smart, and great in bed, and when he got the new car and comes back from trips the first thing he says is that Alecia is so good to him. I mean, he’s full-time at the department. He doesn’t have time for some lucrative side gig. And even if he did… I mean, I like the guy, but he’s dumb as a rock. She called me six months ago, said she saw Mason creeping around the alley behind the hospital, and that it wasn’t the first time. She seemed scared. I asked her if she’d gotten mixed up with him, but she just got offended and hung up. Hasn’t spoken to me since.”

“I’m sorry, Vaz, I just don’t see it.”

She nodded. “That was my first instinct, too. But I don’t know. Something ain’t right.”

“Why did you need to come all the way out here to tell me this? Taking off your chest cam, making sure your dash cam is pointed away from the pit?”

She cringed. “I know it seems a little too cloak and dagger, but some weird shit has been going on. A few cops have died under odd circumstances. Cook, Ganesh, Badger , and I all got promotions early because of it. People seem to know shit they shouldn’t, ignorant of things they should. If I told you specific examples, they’re so insignificant that I’d feel stupid and you’d think I was nuts.”

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