“I’m not getting any—”
“Enough!” They were at the car by now. “Take me home so that I can try to scrub the idea of you and my aunt out of my brain.”
“Man, you grew up with a guy who taught you how to carve up the human body and used to show you Faces of Death for a bedtime story and you think the idea of me in bed with your aunt is gross?”
Jazz slammed the door. “Yes. And doesn’t that tell you something right there? Drive.”
They had left New York late in the evening, so by the time Howie dropped Jazz off at home, the sun was just beginning to burnish the horizon. Jazz stood on the front porch for a moment as Howie pulled away, staring at the dawning day. A part of him wanted to throw his suitcase in Billy’s old Jeep and just take off. It seemed easier, somehow. Easier than dealing with Connie’s dad, figuring out how to make up for his idiocy at the airport. Easier than dealing with the weirdness that now vibrated like a plucked harp string between him and Connie. Easier than living with Gramma, for sure. And easier than finally being face-to-face with the aunt he’d never known.
The front door opened and Samantha stood there with a coffee mug, dressed in a loose shirt and yoga pants. “Are you coming in or do you like the cold?” she asked.
Jazz shrugged. “I’m coming in.”
Inside, they sat at the kitchen table. The house felt small all of a sudden. It had been Jazz and Gramma for more than four years, ever since Billy went to prison. Now another presence made itself felt.
“She’s asleep,” Samantha said, in answer to his unasked question. “I’ve always been an early riser, though.”
Jazz sipped from the coffee cup she’d handed him and gazed across the table at her.
“So you’re my nephew,” she said sheepishly, offering him a lopsided grin. “Your friend—Howie—he calls you Jazz?”
“Yeah.”
“Which do you prefer? Jasper or Jazz?”
“I guess Jasper. From adults. And, uh, about Howie…”
Samantha made a sound somewhere between a chuckle and a snort. “Yeah, about Howie…”
“He’s totally harmless. He’s more than harmless—he’s completely… I’m just sorry. I didn’t know he would be a jackass around you. He doesn’t mean anything by it. I mean, you should hear the stuff he says to Connie. It’s just how he is. There’s no filter between his mouth and his brain.”
“And his hormones, from the sound of it.”
“Well, yeah. I know it’s weird.”
Samantha nodded. “Speaking of weird… I guess this”—she gestured between them—“is as weird for you as it is for me, huh?”
And then they both said, in the same instant: “You look like him.”
They didn’t have to say who “he” was. Jazz had never thought about his resemblance to his father, and he could tell from Samantha’s sudden obsession with studying her coffee mug that she hadn’t thought about hers, either.
Howie was right—Samantha looked younger than her years, which surprised Jazz. He’d’ve figured being Billy Dent’s sister would age her prematurely. But other than some gray, which she’d left uncolored to grace her Billy-colored hair, she looked ten years younger.
Of course, Billy also looked younger than forty-two. Maybe it was a Dent family trait.
Maybe we’re immortals. Maybe every time Billy kills someone, he sucks up their life force. Right, Jazz. And maybe Billy really is the god he always claimed to be.
“Look, if this is none of my business,” Samantha said, “just tell me. And God knows I’m not really in any position to help, but… you’re a kid. And Mom’s basically an invalid. Moneywise, are you two—”
“We’re all right,” Jazz lied. Every month was a struggle. The house was paid for, thank God, but there were still bills—utilities, Gramma’s medications, clothes, food…. There was Gramma’s Social Security and some kind of “death benefit” thing from Grampa, and Billy had actually stashed away some cash that the cops never found, but each month was still like balancing a chainsaw on his forehead. While it was running.
“I never thought I’d be back here,” Samantha said slowly, still staring down into her coffee. “This house. This town. Nothing’s changed, has it? I mean, there’s more crap in the house because she never throws anything away and there’s a Walmart now and the highway’s a little wider, but it’s still the Nod I grew up in. And this house is still…” She looked up at the ceiling, as though something lurked there.
“Still haunted,” Jazz said for her.
“Yeah.”
“He’s like a ghost, isn’t he? Even though he’s still alive?” He realized neither of them had said the name Billy yet. He wondered if she ever would.
Samantha nodded. “I hope you don’t mind—I’ve been sleeping in your room. It used to be mine, and I just couldn’t stand the thought of sleeping in his old room.”
There were three bedrooms in the Dent house—Gramma’s, Jazz’s, and a spare. The spare had been Billy’s, growing up.
“That’s okay. I’ll sleep in the spare. How long are you planning on staying?”
“Well, my return flight isn’t for two more days. Do you mind if I stay that long? It would be a pain to change it.”
“No, no, that’s fine,” he said with a swiftness that caught him off guard. More than the additional help with Gramma, he realized he craved the contact with Samantha. A Dent who had managed to escape the gravity of Billy and of Lobo’s Nod. “Stay as long as you want.”
“Those pictures on the wall in your bedroom,” she said hesitantly. “His victims, right?”
“Yeah.”
“I tacked up a sheet over them. Couldn’t sleep otherwise.”
“That’s okay.”
Samantha smiled a sad little smile. “I think this is where I’m supposed to get all parental on you or something. Make sure you’re all right. Ask you why you have those pictures right where you sleep.”
“To remind me,” he told her, thinking of the words—I HUNT KILLERS—he’d had tattooed on his body. “I guess it’s morbid, but…”
“Morbid?” A shrug. “Yeah, probably. But I get it. You grew up with him as your dad; I grew up with him as my brother. And with her, when she was just as crazy, but not as childlike. And with your grandfather.”
Jazz leaned forward. “Tell me about it,” he said, too intensely. He dialed it back. “I want to know.”
“About growing up here?” She shuddered. “I wouldn’t know where to start. And besides, you’re better off not hearing that crap. Trust me on that. I spent a big chunk of my life trying to deal with it, trying to understand it. And you know what? It got me nowhere, and it made me miserable. It was only when I started putting it behind me, started purging it, that I started feeling better.”
“Yeah, but you have something to purge in the first place. All I’ve got are fragments.”
“All these FBI guys and shrinks used to come to me. All they wanted to know was ‘What was it like growing up with him?’ ”
The same questions they asked him. The same questions—the same intrusions—he resented so much. Jazz loathed himself for putting Samantha in the exact position he hated occupying. But he couldn’t help it. He had to know. It wasn’t a matter of clinical or academic curiosity; it was self-preservation.
“Please,” he said, and he figured she knew all of Billy’s tricks, so he didn’t even bother trying to manipulate her. “Please.”
She slugged back her coffee and went to the counter for a refill. “Fine,” she relented as she sat back down. “Fine.” Checked her watch. “Mom should be asleep for a while. Fire away.”
Suddenly Jazz didn’t know what to ask. “Did you know?” he blurted out.
“Did I know he was killing all those people? No. I had no idea. I moved out two days after my eighteenth birthday. You don’t know what it was like. Small town. Before the Internet. Very isolated. Your grandfather was a terror. Drop your fork at the dinner table and the belt would come off. Mom was always scattered. Petrified of blacks, Hispanics, Asians, you name it.”