“What?” Squares said.
“Kill me.”
“No can do.”
“Tell the police, then. Let them arrest me. I’ll confess to everything.”
Squares said, “What happened to Sheila Rogers?”
“Promise me.”
Squares looked at me. “We got enough here. Let’s go.”
“Okay, okay, I’ll tell you. Just . . . just think about it, okay?”
He shifted his eyes from Squares to me then back to Squares again. Squares showed him nothing. I have no idea what was on my face. “I don’t know where Sheila is now. Hell, I don’t really understand what happened.”
“How long did she work for you?”
“Two years. Maybe three.”
“And how did she get free?”
“Huh?”
“You don’t seem like the sort of guy who lets employees branch out,” Squares said. “So I’m asking what happened to her.”
“She worked the streets, right. Started getting some regulars. She was good at what she did. And somewhere along the way, she hooked up with some bigger players. It happens. Not often. But it happens.”
“What do you mean, bigger players?”
“Dealers. Big-time dealers, I think. She started muling and delivering, I think. And worse, she started getting clean. I was going to lean on her, like you said, but she had some heavy-duty friends.”
“Like who?”
“You know Lenny Misler?”
Squares leaned back. “The attorney?”
“The mob attorney,” Castman corrected him. “She got picked up carrying. He repped her.”
Squares frowned. “Lenny Misler took on the case of a streetwalker caught carrying?”
“You see my point? She comes out, I start sniffing around, you know. Find out what’s she up to. A couple of major-league goons pay me a visit. They tell me to stay away. I’m not stupid. Plenty more tang where that came from.”
“What happened next?”
“Never saw her again. Last I heard she was going to college. You believe that?”
“Do you know what college?”
“No. I’m not even sure it’s true. Could have been just a rumor.”
“Anything else?”
“Nope.”
“No other rumors?”
Castman’s eyes started moving, and I could see the desperation. He wanted to keep us there. But he had nothing else to tell us. I looked at Squares. He nodded and turned to leave. I followed.
“Wait!”
We ignored him.
“Please, man, I’m begging you. I told you everything, right? I cooperated. You can’t just leave me here.”
I saw his endless days and nights in the room, and I didn’t care.
“Fucking assholes!” he shouted. “Hey, man, you. Lover boy. You enjoy my leftovers, you hear. And remember this: Everything she does to you, every time she gets you off—I taught her that. You hear me? You hear what I’m saying?”
My cheeks flushed, but I didn’t turn around. Squares opened the door.
“Shit.” Castman’s voice was softer now. “It doesn’t leave, you know.”
I hesitated.
“She may look all nice and clean. But where she’s been, you don’t ever come back. You know what I’m saying?”
I tried to shut out his words. But they hammered their way in and bounced around my skull. I walked out and closed the door. Back in the dark. Tanya met us on the way out.
“Are you going to tell?” she asked, her words slurred.
I never hurt him. That was what she said. She never raised a hand to him. Too true.
Without another word, we hurried back outside, almost diving into the night air. We sucked down deep breaths, divers breaking the surface short on air, got back to the van, and drove away.
10
Grand Island, Nebraska
Sheila wanted to die alone.
Strangely enough, the pain was diminishing now. She wondered why. There was no light, though, no moment of stark clarity. There was no comfort in death. No angels surrounded her. No long-gone relatives—she thought of her grandmother, the woman who’d made her feel special, who’d called her “Treasure”—came and held her hand.
Alone. In the dark.
She opened her eyes. Was she dreaming right now? Hard to say. She’d been hallucinating earlier. She’d been slipping in and out of consciousness. She remembered seeing Carly’s face and begging her to go away. Had that been real? Probably not. Probably an illusion.
When the pain got bad, really bad, the line between awake and sleep, between reality and dreams, blurred. She did not fight it anymore. It was the only way you could survive the agony. You try to block the pain. That doesn’t work. You try to break the pain down into manageable time intervals. That doesn’t work either. Finally, you find the only outlet available: your sanity.
You let go of your sanity.
But if you can recognize what’s happening, are you really letting go?
Deep philosophical questions. They were for the living. In the end, after all the hopes and dreams, after all the damage and rebuilding, Sheila Rogers would end up dying young and in pain and at the hands of another.
Poetic justice, she supposed.
Because now, as she felt something inside her cleave and tear and pull away, there was indeed a clarity. A horrible, inescapable one. The blinders were being lifted, and for once she could see the truth.
Sheila Rogers wanted to die alone.
But he was in the room with her. She was sure of it. She could feel his hand resting gently on her forehead now. It made her cold. As she felt the life force slipping away, she made one last plea.
“Please,” she said. “Go away.”
11
Squares and I did not discuss what we’d seen. We also did not call the police. I pictured Louis Castman trapped in that room, unable to move, nothing to read, no TV or radio, nothing to look at except those old photographs. If I were a better person, I might have even cared.
I also thought about the Garden City man who’d shot Louis Castman and then turned his back, his rejection probably scarring Tanya worse than Castman ever could. I wondered if Mr. Garden City still thought about Tanya or if he’d just gone on as if she’d never existed. I wondered if her face haunted his dreams.
I doubted it.
I thought about all this because I was curious and horrified. But I also did it because it stopped me from thinking about Sheila, about what she’d been, about what Castman had done to her. I reminded myself that she was the victim here, kidnapped and raped and worse, and that nothing she had done had been her fault. I should not view her any differently. But this clearheaded and obvious rationale would not stick.