“Most single guys I know wouldn’t bother to make coffee on their way out to an emergency.”
“I’m not married, Lauren. I was before I went away. Now I’m not.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll make breakfast next time.”
“Is there going to be a next time?”
“Yes,” he said, bending down to kiss her.
Mason left the room and put his mug in the kitchen sink. He went out the door, closed it behind him, and took the stairs down to the street. It was a hot morning, threatening an even hotter day.
Another lie already, he said to himself. And then another, every time the phone rings. He was looking for his car, squinting in the sunlight, when he felt a heavy hand on his back.
“Hey, Nickie boy.”
Mason turned to see Jimmy McManus.
20
Nick Mason didn’t want to talk to the man who put him in prison, the man who got his friend killed, but Jimmy McManus wasn’t giving him any choice.
McManus wasn’t dressed in his badass black today. Instead, he had on a gray ribbed muscle shirt and tight jeans. But it was the same jackass face, the same thinning hair tied back in a ponytail. His mirrored shades were perched on the top of his head.
“I thought that was you the other day.”
“Take your hands off me.” Mason could feel the nervous tension in the man, practically radiating from him like heat waves. It was the same hair trigger that made him come out of the truck, shooting.
“Hey, we’re cool,” McManus said, putting both hands in the air. “I just wanted to have a little chat. We’re cool, right?”
“Are you fucking following me, McManus?”
“I was in the neighborhood,” the man said, circling around to stand in front of Mason. “Call it a lucky accident.”
Mason didn’t respond. He waited for the man to get the hell out of his way.
“You gotta understand,” McManus said, “last time I laid eyes on you, you were heading to prison. Parole was so far off, you were living on Buck Rogers time. But you ate your jack mack and did your time standing up with your mouth shut. I always respected that, Nickie. Same thing I would have done.”
Mason stopped trying to step around the man. “You got two seconds to get the fuck out of my way.”
“Easy, Nickie. Come on.” He moved a hand toward Mason’s chest but stopped just before touching him.
“One . . .” Mason said.
“I’m still connected, Nickie.” He dropped his voice down and took a look around the street like he was sharing a big secret. “I know the people who fucking run this town.”
“Two . . .”
McManus stepped back. “I just want to know what your angle is. How did you get out? What are you doing on the street?”
“I make you nervous?”
“Yeah, maybe, Nickie. That’s not a good thing. I don’t need any loose ends in my life. It’s the loose ends that hang you.”
Mason looked him up and down. If he was a real player, he wouldn’t be dressed like some fucking Jersey Shore musclehead. He’d be clean and correct and he wouldn’t walk around bragging about it.
“I’m gonna say this once,” Mason said. “Then I never want to see your face again. I did five years. I didn’t give you up then and I’m not gonna give you up now. As long as Eddie’s around, I’m not gonna do anything that jams him up. So you better hope he lives a long life.”
“I’m still nervous. Why don’t you reassure me a bit more?”
“Fuck your reassurance,” Mason said, pushing past him.
“I’ll be seeing you,” McManus said behind his back.
? ? ?
Quintero wasn’t happy. Mason was late again.
“Maybe you work on early for next time,” Quintero said as soon as Mason got to the park, “because this is the last time you’ll ever be late.”
Beyond him, the same hundred sailboats were anchored out in the open water. The fog had long burned off and it was a perfect summer day in Chicago—a cloudless cobalt sky, the lake glittering in the sunlight.
It was one of those days that feels like a gift. But here I am, Mason thought. This is how I have to spend it.
“I got held up,” Mason said. “Not everybody’s throwing a party about me being back on the street.”
“We got a problem?”
“I’ll let you know.”
“You put some clothes together, so you’re always ready,” Quintero said. “You answer the phone and by the time you hang up, you’re already out the door.”
“Fuck that,” Mason said, looking away.
Quintero shook his head and then pulled up the back of his shirt. For one second Mason thought he’d pushed him too far and was about to take one in the head. But it wasn’t a gun in Quintero’s hand. It was a manila envelope.