“Oh,” he says. “Fascinating.”
Cortez opens up his other hand and tosses a fresh rain of rocks and dirt onto my face. A small sharp shard catches in the corner of my eye.
“Hey,” is all I have time to say before Cortez launches himself off the roof, his whole body all at once, flying down with arms extended, landing on top of me like a giant bat. He grabs the back of my hair and twists my head around and shoves my face into the muddy ground. Cortez’s arms are strong, he’s always been much stronger than he looks, he’s a tightly twisted coil. I thrash around, lift my mouth from the ground to say “Stop it,” and he bears down, a knee planted in my back. I don’t know what’s happening, this is somewhere between childish play-wrestling and him actually trying to hurt me right now, trying to break my back.
“I also had my bucket up there,” hisses Cortez, “the bucket I’ve been pissing in. I was going to dump it on your stupid fucking cop head, but this is better.” He twists my neck hard to one side, crams my face deeper into the mud. “More intimate.”
I’m lying here sputtering and wondering in what year of my theoretical future police career I would develop the skill to occasionally be the one who surprises the guy, instead of being the guy who gets surprised. In Next Time Around at Abigail’s mercy, her festooned with weaponry like a Christmas tree. Atlee frog-marching me through the woods. The unseen man in Rotary, behind his concrete blast wall, the nose of his machine gun. It’s like a joke, I’m like a cartoon character. Everybody gets the drop on Detective Henry Palace!
“I thought we were friends,” Cortez growls. “Aren’t we friends?”
“Yes.”
I have managed somehow to wriggle around onto my back and face him, but now he’s clutching my face with his hand, ropy fingers spread out across my jaw and cheeks like a hockey mask. Mud and grit still thick in my throat.
“Cortez—” I manage, through his fingers, and he tightens his grip.
“I thought that we were partners.”
Suddenly I get it. What he’s talking about. “I’m sorry,” I say.
The girl, the cell, the key. It all seems so long ago: that flash decision, locking her up and hurling the key in there. The intervening days have been busy ones.
“I am, Cortez,” I say. His eyes are angry slits, holes cut from a mask. “I’m sorry.”
“You were just doing what you thought was right, is that it?” I nod, as much as I can with his fingers like tentacles wrapped tightly around my face. He tightens them. “You always do what you think is right. That’s your deal with yourself. Right?”
“Yes.” My voice comes out muffled and distorted. “That’s right.”
“Ech. Policeman.”
He spits the word like a curse, an insult—Policeman—but then all at once he lets me loose and stands up laughing, a bully’s loud victorious laugh. He turns away because he thinks the conversation is over, but it’s not over, and I get up on all fours and launch myself like a wrestler at his knees and bring him down, I topple him like a tree and I’m on top of Cortez now, just like that, and throw a rabbit punch across his face.
“Ow,” he says. “Fuck.”
“How did you know?” I say. Gathering up the front of his dirty T-shirt. My hand hurts from hitting him, the palm burns and screams fire, folded tightly inside my fist.
“How did I know what?” But he’s grinning, licking the droplet of blood that’s sprung up on his lower lip. He knows what I mean.
“How did you know that I locked the cell door?” He leers. I lean in. “How?”
The grin widens, showing all his crooked teeth, before abruptly disappearing. His face becomes sincere—confessional. I’m still on top of him, pinning him. “I got lonely,” he says. “I have been so lonely. And time is running out, you know?” His voice lowers to a ghoulish whisper. His eyes are frozen pools. “I thought I would just go and have a big time. Her and me.” He licks his lips. “You would have done the same thing.”
“No.”
“Yes, Henry boy. Lonely boy. Look into your heart.”
“No,” I say, and I pull my face away but he curls his head up toward me and whispers, right in my ear. “Hey. Idiot. She’s awake.”
I let go of Cortez and leap to my feet and run. Oh, God. Oh, no. He’s laughing on the ground, dying laughing as I barrel toward the entrance, laughing and yelling at my back. “She’s been up since last night. She woke me up screeching but she won’t let me in!” His voice gleeful, rich with delight, me grabbing the handle and yanking open the door. “She’s pretty upset, Henry, old boy. Pretty upset.” He’s reveling in my distress, hollering after me as I run. “I can’t believe you hit me!”