“No,” he said. “It’ll take time. I’ll have to bring in some folks to help with plumbing and electricity. The basement is going to be a big project. But I think I can manage most things.”
She turned to look at him, her smile cautious. She had a way of glancing at him with her face turned, peering over her glasses. She was pretty, like his mom had been. Lovely with creamy, soft skin. Even the tiny wrinkles at the edges of her eyes were pretty. She smelled like peppermint.
“So what’s your rate?”
Rhett was already giving him a hard time about the business. Josh still charged close to what his father used to charge. Rhett wanted Josh to gouge her: “She’s a rich city girl. In Manhattan she’d pay four times what you’re charging. More.”
“I charge $350 dollars a day, for all work,” he said. That’s what he’d always charged folks. It was fair. “Plus materials. Other service professionals I bring in will have their own fee in addition to mine.”
She nodded, bit the bottom of her lip. “That sounds fair. Are you insured?”
“Yes,” he lied. “Bonded and insured.”
Insurance cost a fortune, and he couldn’t afford it. Maybe if you charged more than Dad was charging in the eighties you’d be able to afford to do things right. It was just like Rhett to be gone for five years, in prison no less, and then show up like he owned the place and knew everything.
He watched Rhett come out of the barn empty-handed and get back into the car, lying down in the backseat. Claudia caught Josh looking outside and turned to see what he was looking at—a split second after the car door closed. She turned back to look at him.
“The cop who came out said it looked as if it had been pried off,” she said.
She thought he had been looking at the fallen door. She’d wrapped her arms around her middle and was toeing a peeling corner of linoleum tile. Her dainty foot was bare.
He laughed a little. “I doubt it,” he said. “That thing was ready to fall. And there’s nothing in there, is there?”
“Just some rusted old tools.”
The dark creep of suspicion distracted him from the prettiness of her manicured toes. Had he told Rhett about the barn door? Had his brother come out here last night? There was nothing Rhett wasn’t willing to do to get what he wanted.
She ran a hand through her cloud of blonde curls. “Can I get you some coffee? I just made it.”
“Sure,” he said. “That would be great. Thanks.”
She had light, quick movements. He tried not to stare at her full bottom, or how he could just see the lace of her bra peeking out from the tank top she wore under a blue-and-white checked shirt. She moved off to get the coffee, and he stared at the barn.
? ? ?
THAT NIGHT, SO LONG AGO, the car had been overwarm and Josh knew, he knew he shouldn’t be there. He had been sound asleep in his own bed when his brother snuck into his room and shook him awake. There was no way not to go with him. You just didn’t say no to Rhett.
You kind of didn’t want to say no; that was the first thing. There was something about his older brother that made Josh want to please, want to feel the glow of his approval. And you were afraid of what he’d do to you if he didn’t get what he wanted. Nipple twists and friction burns, choke holds and arm bending, small but painful acts of coercion. Then taunts. Aw, you little pussy, stop crying.
“Where are we going?” Josh asked.
“Are we babysitters?” said a man Josh had never met. In addition to Rhett and Josh, there were two more men in the car, one driving, the other to Josh’s left. The man beside him never said a word. Both men wore ski masks; Rhett, riding shotgun, held one in his hand, and had handed one to Josh. It was scratchy beneath his fingers. “Why’d you bring the kid?”
“We need a third man inside,” said Rhett. “Anyway, he’s not a kid. He’s just skinny. He’s nearly twenty.”
That was a lie.
Maybe I’m dreaming, Josh kept thinking.
The smell of cigarette smoke radiated off the man beside Josh, acrid and foul. He was big, taking up a lot of space, and spreading his legs wide. Their thighs were close together; Josh thought that his looked like a baseball bat next to a fallen log. The stranger stared out the window, chewing vigorously on the corner of his thumbnail. Rhett, up front, pumped his leg the way he did when he was nervous or angry.
“What are we doing?” Josh said again.
“Shut up,” Rhett hissed.
The waxing gibbous moon had dipped behind the clouds, no streetlamps lit the rural road. So outside it was just black. They turned off onto an unpaved drive, a wall of trees on either side. The driver turned off the headlights, and they drifted in what seemed to Josh to be total darkness. Finally a house, lit only by a light at the porch, came into view. They stopped a good distance, killing the engine, and sat silent.
“Where are we?”
Rhett reached back to knock him on the head, and Josh decided not to ask any more questions, rubbing at the spot. How long were they going to sit there? No one said anything.
Josh was pretty sure that he was the only one who saw her, a thin girl and her dog cutting across the side yard and disappearing into the trees.
What was she doing? Where was she going? He looked up at Rhett, but his brother was just staring off at nothing, his face twisted in a scowl.
He didn’t say a word, the pain on the side of his head still smarting. After a time—how long?—the man in the driver’s seat said, “Let’s go.”
? ? ?
“SO,” CLAUDIA SAID NOW, HANDING him a cup. “When can you start?”
“How’s Monday?”
She offered a slow bob of her head, her expression uncertain. He looked around at the mess she’d made of the wallpaper.
“Leave that,” he said, pointing. “I’ll take care of it.”
She released a breath, relief or defeat, he couldn’t say. Maybe both.
“Okay,” she said. “Monday.”
On his way back to the car, Josh leaned in close to inspect the hinges of the barn door. It did look as though someone had used a crowbar. He ran his fingers over the ridges and looked inside the large dim space. The gun locker he remembered was gone. The window had been covered with thick plastic and sealed with duct tape. There was a rusting old lawn mower, some boxes, a rickety bike. He stepped inside. That night was still with him. He still dreamed about it sometimes.
When Josh climbed back in the car, Rhett was on his back, arms folded across his chest as though he were lying in a coffin. He often slept in that position, too. Josh sat a second, staring at the barn door.
“Find anything?” asked Josh. He already knew the answer.
“Not shit.”
“I told you,” said Josh, backing up the drive and swinging the vehicle around. “I’ve been through this place a hundred times. Other people sneak out here, too, you know. Someone would have found something.”
“It’s in there,” said Rhett. He had the stubbornness of the unintelligent. If he thought the world was flat, he’d kill you before he’d let you convince him otherwise.