Page 22 of Deja New
They’d reached the car by now, and Angela looked down ather feet and scuffed a toe along the white line on the pavement.You almost accidentally let one measly arsonist out and suddenly you’re slapped with a lifetime label:SECURITYRISK.The world was a cruel and unfair place. “It was one time,” she muttered. “But anyway. That whole ‘only the first year of your sentence is hard time, after that you adjust’ myth is bullshit. You spend your first year, and a couple after, in deep,deepdenial.”
“It’s all a mistake,” Chambers said.
“My lawyer’s going to fix this,” Leah added.
“The judge will realize he was too hard on me and will reduce my sentence any day now,” Archer finished.
“Right, we all know the drill. But Uncle Dennis... he never had that. He couldn’t indulge in the luxury of denial because he went out of his way to make damned sure he was going to be locked up. And he went further out of his way to make sure hestayedlocked up. So you’d think he’d grab for any chance to see any of us. But he never did. Does, I mean.” Of course, that could simply mean her uncle wanted less chaos in his life, which was understandable. Or that he wasn’t especially fond of any of them, which was cold, but also understandable. “But,” she finished, “that still leaves us nowhere.”
“Maybe,” Jason said, nibbling on his lower lip. But instead of sounding discouraged, it almost sounded like he was... hopeful? Like he’d thought of something?
No, she was reading him wrong. Actually, she shouldn’t be reading him at all. If her uncle could have taken the gold medal for stubborn, she could have for grasping at straws. Any straws. Even dirty ones.Why am I thinking about dirty straws now?She gave herself a mental shake and looked up to say good-bye to the detective, but he was already climbing into his own car, apractical and forgettable Ford Focus. Gray, of course. She didn’t even get a last glimpse of his Van Gogh socks.
Archer had it right. All we’ve got is a sizeable pile of nothing.
She slumped into Archer’s back seat and got ready to endure the two-hour drive back home. She was too downhearted to even give Archer shit for his habit of driving slowly through stop signs. Which was pretty downhearted.
