He was wearing a different suit, a secondhand one he’d bought specifically for the trial, and had splurged on some wingtips while at the store. Amanda’s bandages had been removed. She had a scar on her neck. Brigham tried not to look as he sat down across from her. &...
Olivia arrived early, too. She was wearing a light blue suit, and she stood at my office door until I said, “You can come in.” “Oh, thanks.” She sat down across from me. “How’s your mom?” I asked. “Good. I told her I was hire...
He felt jittery, almost as if he were wearing the wrong skin. He’d called Sticks and told him what was up, and Sticks had said he would be right there. That was three hours ago. And he still hadn’t come. The stupid asshole was probably high and shacked up with some girl. Sticks might not be out t...
Most of the books were first or second editions, coated in dust with gold speckled spines and worn leather covers. He read an old edition of Moby-Dick for most of the afternoon before he heard a key in the door. Suzan walked in carrying a brown paper bag. She glanced at him on her way to the kitc...
Hamilton immediately got on his cell phone and began making some calls. Mitch just said, “Didn’t get corn-holed there in the slammer, did ya?” A police unit borrowed from neighboring towns was standing guard by the ship. Everyone was allowed a few hours to gather their thi...
Chief Harlow and Assistant Chief Anderson sat across from her at her desk. A tech was at a laptop on the other side with a wire that ran from her cell phone to the laptop and then to a tracking device set up on the floor. “Anything?” Harlow asked. “...
The pain was so intense he rolled to his side just in time to spew out whatever he’d consumed that day. He couldn’t remember exactly what he had eaten, and it worried him. He raised his hand to his forehead. It didn’t come away with blood. The blood had dried. He had been lying there for a while....
Lush greens and reds and yellows broken with the fragmented red rocks and pineapple fields. He cared nothing for it. Any beauty in nature was lost on him. Miguel sat in the passenger seat as Ramon drove. Another car of four men was behind them as they drove up the winding ...
He watched the families and the couples who were there, but he was mostly interested in the individuals who sat quietly at their tables with bloodshot eyes, barely eating their meals. He knew their minds were still in the casinos. When he had finished, he got his car from the valet and drove to t...
He’d scored some mediocre drugs; a few dime bags of H and an eighth pound of weed. He’d stayed up late in the morning smoking, watching the city lights from the balcony and the slow rise of the sun over distant hills. By the time he showered and smoked a joint, it was already nightfall. The moon ...
Tyler opened the car door for her, and she climbed in. He had brought clothes for her to change into on the plane, and she’d chosen the black dress with the heels and a gold necklace. The limo driver was staring, so Tyler told him to roll up the divider. Once they were on ...
The hospital’s main floor had been cleared with the exception of the staff. They had been asked, politely, to remain on hospital premises for a short period of time to see if any of them had been infected. When they were asked, national guardsmen with rifles stood behind their supervisors. There ...
He never requested, it was always a summons. I received a text at around one P.M. saying, Get your ass over here. I went home and changed into something more conservative first. A gray suit with a gold tie and pocket square. I drove my Cadillac, and though the ride was smo...
He ate everything on his plate and gulped down the cup of water. Habib was there, reading, and didn’t say anything as Jack rose and tested the bars of the cage. “Reinforced steel,” Habib said, not looking up from his book. “With an electric charge. Were you to bend the steel, we would both be ele...
Mickey asked if I was hungry, and I was. We stopped at a ribs restaurant in a hotel off the Strip. The valet took the car, and we wandered through the casino. The dings, beeps, rattles, and bright lights brought the tightness to my chest again. I had to close my eyes for a moment and just breathe...
She apparently couldn’t hear anything else over her own screaming and crying. He tried shaking the box, but nothing happened. The door on the outside was locked with a padlock that he could hear clink every time he pushed on the door. He pressed on the backside of the box....
Dixon signed some files before he put them in a bin where the secretary would forward them to the screening team at the District Attorney’s Office. The front desk had someone at it twenty-four hours a day. Tonight it was Martha, an older woman with her hair up in a poof. S...
The patient was crying and asking her if he could come back later this evening. Eventually the door opened and a man walked out with tissues to his eyes. Jennifer waited until he was gone and then motioned for Stanton to come inside. When he sat down, she poured herself a cup of water from a tray...
He didn’t have a lot of money and dinner was usually a quick stop at McDonald’s or Chick-fil-A. It was just so much easier than trying to cook. But it had strained his finances recently and he had made up his mind to eat at home more. One day, he wanted a wife and he would be expected to save and...
It reminded her of the villages she’d seen in Eastern Africa whenever she was there because of a fresh outbreak of Lassa virus or some other hot agent. The shacks were predominately homes, with only two communal buildings that she could see: a “hospital,” which was nothing more than the doctor’s ...