“I know. I was worried about the DEA, though. I was worried about your safety. Turns out this wasn’t a fresh, pressing issue. You’ve known about it for a while. And I never wanted you to hurt him, Zeth.” I take a deep breath, knowing my next argument is going to either fall flat or make him flip out. I have to say it, though. I don’t want Mason dead and in pieces, floating in the Sound just because he had the misfortune to be caught up in our nightmare through no choice of his own. “Think about it,” I say. “Really think hard about what you would have done for Lacey, Zeth. Wouldn’t you have made a deal with the devil in order to keep her safe? What would you do now to bring her back? You’d bargain with Lowell. You’d bargain with anyone and everyone, and you know it. So let Mason go. Let him take care of his sister, and we’ll work out this Lowell thing on our own. It’s the best way. It’s the best way for all of us.”
Zeth stares at the wall. Specifically, he stares at a small, framed picture of a seaside boardwalk that seemingly has no bearing or relationship to Seattle whatsoever. I’ve thought about that picture a lot; there are other pictures on the walls in the warehouse, but they all seem to be contemporary art pieces. Swooshes and slashes of color, running into each other, overlapping and contradicting. This photograph, complete with its masses of people crowding the boardwalk, vendors selling hotdogs, arcade in the background, sign lit up despite the stark, pale wash of the blue sky overhead, is the only sentimental object of its kind. Zeth looks away.
“Lowell won’t just stop calling him,” he says. “She won’t just forget that he’s her inside source. It’s not as easy as letting him go so he can take care of his sister, Sloane.”
“Then, shit, I don’t know. Why don’t you tell him what you want him to say to her? That way she thinks she’s getting what she needs, and Mason’s in the clear. There’s a way to manage the situation without anyone dying.”
“I, for one, like the sound of that plan,” Mason adds.
On the sidelines, literally at the very edge of the room, Michael keeps his own council. I have no idea which plan he thinks is more beneficial over the other, but he watches the scene unfolding before him with sharp, intelligent eyes, the slightest glimmer of curiosity flickering over his features. Mason doesn’t even spare the man a sideways glance; he must know his fate rests solely in Zeth’s hands. He’s the one who decides whether Mason lives or dies. In the past, I know how Zeth would have handled this. He would never have listened to the woman he was sleeping with. He would have shut down the threat without a second thought and moved on to deal with Lowell herself, and there would have been no debate. Things are different now, though. After everything we’ve been through, Zeth knows I’m not just some na?ve, uninformed girl that makes decisions on a whim, without any real thought.
He cracks his index finger knuckle, followed by his middle finger and then he stops. “Fine.”
That’s all he says. I’m waiting for him to follow up his one word response with a list of caveats, as well as a series of threats that would make even the most hardened criminal’s hair stand on end. He leaves it at that, though. He wants to go; I can see how badly he wants to smash his fist into something right now, and he’s undoubtedly feeling robbed of the opportunity. Mason slowly, cautiously gets to his feet. “So I’m good to go?”
Zeth grunts. He jerks his head toward the door, his face stony and unimpressed. “You’d better, before I change my fucking mind.”
Animals, unsure whether it’s safer to run or safer to flee, will often freeze in place, not breathing, unbelieving, while they try to decide what their best course of action is. Mason is just like one of those animals, a rabbit in the headlights, as he no doubt tries to figure out if Zeth means what he’s saying or not. The stupid kid should be dashing for the door, and instead he’s standing in the middle of the room with his shoulders hunched, glancing from one person to the next.
“Are you waiting for an Uber?” Michael asks. “If you are, might I suggest you wait outside on the street? Maybe a few blocks from here? We have a slight health and safety issue here right now. And by that, I mean lingering here any longer than you need to is very bad for your health and your safety.”
“Understood.” Mason ducks out of the room and heads to the exit of the warehouse, not wasting another second. Zeth stares at the wall again. He flinches when the sound of the sliding metal door slams home, sending clanging echoes through the warehouse.
“I swear I’ll never understand why we just let that happen,” he comments. “At some point that kid is ending up in a shallow grave at the side of the road. It’s inevitable. He has no idea how this world works. Why it works the way it does.”