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I felt like I was out of my mind, but I was burning up with it so I pulled her to me and we kissed. That fabulous first kiss. The new and unfamiliar mouth and hair and taste and smell. She kissed hard and long and held on tight. We came up for air a couple of times before she took off again for her place.

[ 1185 ] She blasted a quarter mile down the street which opened up opposite Beckman Drive. I saw a blur of greenery in the sun as she swooped into her driveway. The tires chirped as she stopped. We more or less tumbled out and ran to the door. She used her key and we went in. The door swung shut and before it clicked she was back in my arms. We kissed and stumbled through to her living room. She was a foot shorter than me and her feet were off the ground.

[ 1186 ] We tore each other’s clothes off like they were on fire. She was gorgeous. Firm and strong and a shape like a dream. Skin like silk. She pulled me to the floor through bars of hot sunlight from the window. It was frantic. We were rolling and nothing could have stopped us. It was like the end of the world. We shuddered to a stop and lay gasping. We were bathed in sweat. Totally spent.

[ 1187 ] We lay there clasped and caressing. Then she got off me and pulled me up. We kissed again as we staggered through to her bedroom. She pulled back the covers on the bed and we collapsed in. Held each other and fell into a deep afterglow stupor. I was wrecked. I felt like all my bones and sinews were rubber. I lay in the unfamiliar bed and drifted away to a place far beyond relaxation. I was floating. Roscoe’s warm heft was snuggled beside me. I was breathing through her hair. Our hands were lazily caressing unfamiliar contours.

[ 1188 ] She asked me if I wanted to go find a motel. Or to stay there with her. I laughed and told her the only way to get rid of me now would be to go fetch a shotgun from the station house and chase me away. I told her even that might not work. She giggled and pressed even closer.

[ 1189 ] “I wouldn’t fetch a shotgun,” she whispered. “I’d fetch some handcuffs. I’d chain you to the bed and keep you here forever.”

[ 1190 ] We dozed through the afternoon. I called the Hubble place at seven in the evening. He still wasn’t back. I left Roscoe’s number with Charlie and told her to have Hubble call me as soon as he got in. Then we drifted on through the rest of the evening. Fell fast asleep at midnight. Hubble never called.

[ 1191 ] MONDAY MORNING I WAS VAGUELY AWARE OF ROSCOE GETTING up for work. I heard the shower and I know she kissed me tenderly and then the house was hot and quiet and still. I slept on until after nine. The phone didn’t ring. That was OK. I needed some quiet thinking time. I had decisions to make. I stretched out in Roscoe’s warm bed and started answering the question the tiny voice in my head was asking me again.

[ 1192 ] What was I going to do about Joe? My answer came very easily. I knew it would. I knew it had been waiting there since I first stood next to Joe’s broken body in the morgue. It was a very simple answer. I was going to stand up for him. I was going to finish his business. Whatever it was. Whatever it took.

[ 1193 ] I didn’t foresee any major difficulties. Hubble was the only link I had, but Hubble was the only link I needed. He would cooperate. He’d depended on Joe to help him out. Now he’d depend on me. He’d give me what I needed. His masters were vulnerable for a week. What had he said? A window of exposure wide open until Sunday? I’d use it to tear them apart. My mind was made up. I couldn’t do it any other way. I couldn’t leave it to Finlay. Finlay wouldn’t understand all those years of history. Finlay wouldn’t sanction the sort of punishments that were going to be necessary. Finlay couldn’t understand the simple truth I’d learned at the age of four: you don’t mess with my brother. So this was my business. It was between me and Joe. It was duty.

[ 1194 ] I lay there in Roscoe’s warm bed and scoped it out. It was going to be a simple process. About as simple as you could get. Getting hold of Hubble wasn’t going to be difficult. I knew where he lived. I knew his phone number. I stretched and smiled and filled with restless energy. Got out of bed and found coffee. There was a note propped against the pot. The note said: Early lunch at Eno’s? Eleven o’clock? Leave Hubble to Finlay, OK? The note was signed with lots of kisses and a little drawing of a pair of handcuffs. I read it and smiled at the drawing, but I wasn’t going to leave Hubble to Finlay. No way. Hubble was my business. So I looked up the number again and called Beckman Drive. There was nobody home.

[ 1195 ] I poured a big mug of coffee and wandered through to the living room. The sun was blinding outside. It was another hot day. I walked through the house. It was a small place. A living room, an eat-in kitchen, two bedrooms, one and a half baths. Very new, very clean. Decorated in a cool, simple way. What I would expect from Roscoe. A cool simple style. Some nice Navajo art, some bold rugs, white walls. She must have been to New Mexico and liked it.

[ 1196 ] It was still and quiet. She had a stereo, a few records and tapes, more sweet and melodic than the howl and buzz that I call music. I got more coffee from her kitchen. Went out back. There was a small yard out there, a neat coarse lawn and some recent evergreen planting. Shredded bark to smother weeds and rough timber edging against the planted areas. I stood in the sun and sipped the coffee.

[ 1197 ] Then I ducked back inside and tried Hubble’s number again. No reply. I showered and dressed. Roscoe had a small shower stall, the head set low, feminine soaps in the dish. I found a towel in a closet and a comb on a vanity. No razor. I put my clothes on and rinsed out the coffee mug. Tried Hubble’s number again from the kitchen phone. I let it ring for a long time. Nobody home. I figured I’d get a ride up there from Roscoe after lunch. This thing wasn’t going to wait forever. I relocked the back door and went out the front.

[ 1198 ] It was about ten thirty. A mile and a quarter up to Eno’s place. A gentle half hour stroll in the sun. It was already very hot. Well into the eighties. Glorious fall weather in the South. I walked the quarter mile to Main Street up a gently winding rise. Everything was beautifully manicured. There were towering magnolia trees everywhere and late blossom in the shrubs.

I turned at the convenience store and strolled up Main Street. The sidewalks had been swept. I could see crews of gardeners in the little park areas. They were setting up sprinklers and barrowing stuff out of smart green trucks marked “Kliner Foundation” in gold. A couple of guys were painting the picket fence. I waved in at the two old barbers in their shop. They were leaning up inside their doorway, like they were waiting for customers. They waved back and I strolled on.

[ 1199 ] Eno’s came into sight. The polished aluminum siding gleamed in the sun. Roscoe’s Chevrolet was in the lot. Standing next to it on the gravel was the black pickup I’d seen the day before outside the coffee shop. I reached the diner and pushed in through the door. I had been prodded out through it on Friday with Stevenson’s shotgun pointed at my gut. I had been in handcuffs. I wondered if the diner people would remember me. I figured they probably would. Margrave was a very quiet place. Not a whole lot of strangers passing through.

[ 1200 ] Roscoe was in a booth, the same one I’d used on Friday. She was back in uniform and she looked like the sexiest thing on earth. I stepped over to her. She smiled a tender smile up at me and I bent to kiss her mouth. She slid over the vinyl to the window. There were two cups of coffee on the table. I passed hers across.

[ 1201 ] The driver from the black pickup was sitting at the lunch counter. The Kliner boy, the pale woman’s stepson. He’d spun the stool and his back was against the counter. He was sitting legs apart, elbows back, head up, eyes blazing, staring at me again. I turned my back on him and kissed Roscoe again.