Page 138 of State of Bliss

They were shown to a room that had a glass wall down the middle of a row of tables with telephone connections to the other side.

“If you’ll wait here,” the guard said, “I’ll get him for you.”

“Thank you.”

They waited for more than twenty minutes before Stahl was escorted in, wearing an orange jumpsuit that sagged off a frame that was much thinner than it used to be. He’d also lost most of what was left of his hair and had quit shaving. A large purple bruise took up most of his left cheek. The mean, beady eyes were the same as ever, though.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked with a smarmy grin after he picked up the phone. “I couldn’t believe it when they told me the two stooges had come a’calling.”

“I’m sure you’ve heard about what’s going on at your house,” Joe said.

“My sister is very unhappy with getting the boot, so yeah, I’ve heard. How’d you know to look there?”

“A little birdy told us.”

“Could be one of so many birdies.”

“Why’d you do it?” Jake asked.

“Because I could.”

“You need to do better than that,” Joe said, forcing himself to stay calm when he wanted to smash through the glass and follow through on his neck-squeezing fantasy from earlier.

“Why do I have to? What does it matter now?”

“It matters to the families of the women you killed,” Joe said.

With his free hand, Stahl pretended to wipe away tears. “The poor, poor families who let their daughters grow up to be drug addicts and hookers. They got what was coming to them.”

“No one deserves to be murdered,” Joe said.

“You would think that. You sit in your ivory tower and worship your God on Sundays and always do the right thing. What a boring way to live.”

“You think your way is better?” Jake asked. “How’s prison life treating you?”

Stahl shrugged. “It’s not so bad.”

“We hear you’re making as many friends in here as you did on the outside,” Jake said.

The beady eyes narrowed. “I did just fine out there, and I’m just fine in here.”

Joe pointed to his cheek. “Getting that must’ve hurt.”

“You oughta see the other guy. So you fellas came way up here to see little ol’ me, thinking I’d spill the tea on my dirty deeds simply because you asked me to?”

“We hoped you might still have a shred of decency left in you,” Joe said through gritted teeth.

“Nah, that’s been gone since long before you met me.”

“What happened?” Jake asked.

Stahl shrugged. “What didn’t happen? You guys were so chummy with each other, you never looked outside your own little circle to see what was going on with the rest of us. You never so much as once considered including me in anything.”

“Because you acted like you hated our guts,” Joe said, “and that was long before any of us got promoted over you.”

“It wasn’t an act. Do you think I haven’t met other guys like you and Skip and Conklin? A bunch of frat boys having the time of your lives together while everyone else was struggling to get by.”

“We were all making the same money.”

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