This can only be bad news. “Is he hurt?”
“No. Don’t react when I say this, okay? Be stone cold. Max is in the ER. He’s the patient. Paul’s here for Max. And he could be watching us right now.”
Chapter 41
Jet might as well have sucker-punched me in the throat. “Dr. Lacey must have figured he’d die without emergency care,” I reason, glancing back at the hospital entrance. “Turn your back to the doors, so I can watch for Paul over your shoulder without being obvious.”
Jet turns until I have a clear line of sight to the main doors without moving my head.
“Has Max said anything about the attack?”
“I have no idea. I don’t know if he can even talk. Two doctors are working on him now, and they’ve called the helicopter to take him to Jackson.”
“Oh, man. Have you been alone with Paul?”
Jet looks like she’s gritting her teeth hard enough to crush a stone. “Not since we got here. He was drunk when I got home, and he drank some more after. We only got the call a half hour ago. I was going to leave Kevin with Tallulah, but she wasn’t in her house or Max’s. She didn’t answer her phone, either. Marshall, I have no idea what to do. What if Max accuses me of trying to kill him?”
“He won’t. He’d have to explain too much.”
“What if he doesn’t care anymore? What if he’s ready to blow everything up? The whole family?”
“Jet, he can’t. It just hit me: Max can’t implicate you in this assault—he can’t even use the video he shot of us. It’s all a bluff.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You’ve got the nuclear option in this war, not him. If he comes at you with anything, you can charge him with rape. Kevin is living proof of his guilt.”
Jet opens her mouth, but no sound emerges. Her eyes seem to dilate, as though the prospect of escape from Max’s power has intoxicated her. But then she shakes her head. “That’s a weapon I can never use. It would destroy Kevin. And Paul.”
“I’m not saying you use it first. Or ever. I’m saying it’s a deterrent. A neutron bomb. If Max believes you’ll use it, then he can’t hurt you. Not without hurting himself worse.”
She’s breathing harder. “I’ll lose that game, Marshall. Max can stand more pain than I can. Not me, but . . . you know. I can’t watch Kevin suffer through that.”
I want to hold her close and comfort her, but I can’t do it out here. Looking over her shoulder at the brightly lit hospital entrance, I see Nadine and Kevin sitting on a couch just inside the big glass doors.
“Max isn’t going to say anything. It’ll be just like when you stabbed him with the steak knife. But if he does, you only have one play. And you can’t hesitate. Max tried to rape you tonight—you defended yourself. You fought for your life, and not for the first time. Tell Paul about the stab wound. Max will still have a scar from that. Tell Paul you kept all this from him because you didn’t want to destroy the family. But now Max has lost his mind. He killed Sally, and now he’s obsessed with you.”
“I think I’m going to puke,” Jet says, looking back at the lighted doors. “Seriously, I can’t get my breath.”
“You’re having a panic attack. Try to breathe slowly. You’ve been under massive pressure for a decade. You kept an explosive secret all that time. Now you feel it’s on the verge of coming out. That kind of stress kills people. It can also make them do self-destructive things. Stay in control, Jet. Stay ahead of Max. Know what you’re going to do, whatever move he makes. You’re twice as smart as he is.”
She’s nodding, trying to get her composure back. “As soon as I got home tonight, I showered and changed clothes. I thought about destroying the ones I was wearing on the hill, but in the end I just washed them.”
“That might not get the blood off, if you had any splatter on you.”
“Okay. I’ll burn them. I also destroyed Max’s cell phone. I couldn’t hack his password, and I didn’t want to risk being caught with it.”
“Good. I still have some hope the video was on that phone.”
“Me, too. Oh, when I was in the ER, I looked through his personal effects for his second phone and didn’t find it. Turns out a nurse had already given it to Paul.”
“Was it a Samsung, too?”
“I haven’t seen it yet. I’m afraid to ask. But if I can somehow get hold of it tonight, I will.” She reaches up to her neck, takes hold of a slim chain, and lifts Sally’s sapphire pendant from beneath her top.
“You’re wearing a fifty-thousand-dollar necklace around town?”
“This is our good-luck charm. Sally left these passwords for me. When I find whatever they open, we’ll be able to save ourselves. I’m betting it’s Max’s other phone.”
“Two passwords for a phone?”
“The second could be for a program on the phone.”
“Jet, those passwords could be years old.”
“No,” she says, unshakable faith in her eyes. “The sticker is new, clean and white.” She flips the sapphire so that I can see the bright paper, then tucks the pendant back beneath her blouse.
“Don’t take stupid risks to get that phone. Let’s see how Max plays this—if he lives.”
We stand in the sodium-yellow glow like refugees, a desperate couple with nowhere to run. “I’m so sorry you had to find out about Max,” she says. “This isn’t what you signed up for.”
“I signed up for you. Okay? Remember that, no matter what happens tonight. I wish I could hug you.”
She looks afraid to believe me.
“Oh, I forgot,” she says. “A bunch of calls came in on Max’s phone before I destroyed it. Three from Beau Holland, two from Arthur Pine, one from Wyatt Cash, and one from Claude Buckman.”
“All tonight? What does that suggest to you?”
“Trouble inside the Poker Club. Think about it. Who leaked you that picture of Beau Holland and Dave Cowart with Buck? A lot of people hate Beau, even in the club. Maybe he’s scared the club will throw him to the wolves.”
Something makes me turn and scan the parking lot. A presentiment of danger? I’m suddenly aware of the hard bulge of my pistol in the small of my back.
“What is it?” Jet asks.
“Nothing. I just felt funny for a second. Like we’re being watched.”
She looks over her shoulder. “I’d better get back inside. Kevin’s probably wondering about this, and the helicopter will get here any minute.”
“Will you go to Jackson with them?”
“Probably. To look after Kevin.”
As I fight the urge to take her hand, a black city police cruiser wheels into the entry circle and parks thirty feet from us. Two cops get out: one in his twenties, the other in his forties.
“Oh, God,” Jet murmurs, losing color fast. “I told you. He did it. Max told them it was me.”
The cops are talking to each other across the roof of the cruiser. The older one’s holding a cell phone to his ear. “No way,” I say. “Take it easy. They’re probably just visiting somebody in the hospital.”
“You’re wrong, Marshall. Max must be awake.”
“If he accuses you, then you know what to do. Go nuclear. Incinerate that son of a bitch. Tell Paul everything. I’ll support you in the paper, and I’ll be waiting for you when the ashes clear.”
Now the cops are walking our way. Even so, I feel confident. There’s no way Max invited police into the middle of his family soap opera. After trying to rape the mother of his “grandchild”? Jet’s back is to the cruiser, and she’s standing as stiffly as someone awaiting a bullet from a firing squad.
“Are you Marshall McEwan?” asks the older cop.
“That’s right.”
As he comes closer, into our pool of light, I see that his name tag reads farner. The look on his face makes me acutely aware of the gun wedged against my skin.
“Where were you earlier tonight, sir?”
Jet closes her eyes. She’s so pale that I worry she might collapse. In this moment, I realize that I’m going to lie to protect her. “Is there something I can help you with, Officer?”
“I just told you what I need from you. Your whereabouts earlier tonight.”
“I’ve been at the hospital for quite a while. My father had a massive coronary.”