stay in his stoic position for the next several hours. The police search, with all the activity and noise, must have traumatized him.
Wesley slid the cover closed, locked the pin, then returned the lucky mouse to a smaller container. Sometimes he thought that Einstein didn’t eat out of sympathy for his prey. When he did feed, it was as if he would begrudgingly relent, then coil around and squeeze his prey to death before it had time to react, and swallow it promptly, as if to get it over with. Carlotta thought the snake was a man-eater, but Wesley could barely get him to eat enough to sustain his monstrous size.
Wesley sometimes wondered, though, what his pet could kill and consume if it were motivated.
Hearing a noise in the hallway, Wesley frowned. He’d hoped to be out of the house before Carlotta got up, partly because he didn’t want to worry her, and partly because he didn’t want to face her. The fact that she wasn’t normally an early riser told him that she probably hadn’t slept well, and no doubt he was the cause. Frustration tightened his chest. He just needed some time and space to get things worked out with his creditors and to investigate his father’s case. Although he appreciated his sister’s concern, her hovering was making things more complicated.
He made his way around the room and checked various hiding places—the hem of the curtain, the hollow leg of his metal bed, inside his worn copy of The Catcher in the Rye—and counted up three hundred sixty dollars.
He heard a muffled voice and realized that Carlotta was calling his name. God, he hoped she hadn’t set the kitchen on fire again.
He grabbed his backpack and stuffed his iPod, cell phone and money inside. Then he stepped out into the hall and closed his bedroom door. It was a house rule that his bedroom door be closed at all times because Carlotta lived in fear that Einstein would somehow escape his enclosure.
“Wesley!”
“I’m coming,” he yelled. But when he reached the living room, he stopped short. Sitting next to Carlotta on the couch was Tick, the tub of lard who had forced his way in the house last week and called Carlotta at work.
“Mornin’, Wesley,” the guy said, smiling and patting Carlotta’s knee.
Carlotta, clutching the newspaper, looked terrified. Tick must have been waiting for her when she stepped outside to leave for work. Fury balled in Wesley’s stomach—he wanted to kill the guy. He had always wished he was big and beefy like Chance, but never more so than at this moment.
“Leave her alone,” was all he could say.
“Where’s the money?” Tick asked.
Wesley pulled himself up to his full height. “Maybe you can tell me.”
Tick laughed. “What are you talkin’ about?”
“I was jumped yesterday. Guy took all that I was carrying. I figured it was for Father Thom.”
Tick wagged his fat head. “Nope. Must have been someone else you owe.”
Wesley couldn’t tell if he was lying—but then, did it really matter?
Then the man’s eyes grew mean. “So like I said, where’s the money?”
Wesley reached into his backpack. “After yesterday, three-sixty was all I could get together.”
Tick laughed. “You’re shittin’ me, right?”
Wesley extended the money and, as he hoped, Tick lurched to his feet to count it. “This ain’t enough, Wesley. Father Thom gave me strict orders not to leave here with less than a grand. You don’t want to get me in trouble with my boss, do you?”
Wesley swallowed. “No. But you can’t squeeze blood out of a turnip.”
Tick grinned. “Sure I can.”
“Wait a minute,” Carlotta said, her voice trembling. “Nobody’s going to squeeze blood out of anybody. I have the money.”
Wesley and Tick both looked at her. “You do?” they asked in unison.
Wesley frowned. “How?”
“Get it,” Tick said. “I’m beginning to lose patience with you two.”
Carlotta pushed to her feet and dropped the newspaper into a chair, then marched out of the room toward her bedroom.
Tick watched her leave and sucked his teeth. “Your sister’s got a smokin’ bod.”
“Watch your mouth,” Wesley said, clenching his fists.
The big man looked at him and laughed. “I guess if my sister looked like that, I’d be stupid about it, too.” Then the man sobered. “But you are stupid if you think that Father Thom won’t go after her if you’re late again. Remember that real hard, little man.”
Wesley opened his mouth to say something foul but stopped himself when he heard Carlotta’s footsteps. “Here’s the other six hundred forty,” she said, extending a stack of cash to Tick, her expression tight. “Now, please leave.”
The big man took his time counting the money, then shoved it into his pocket and smiled. “See how easy that was? Do this every week and pretty soon, you’ll be debt free, just like all those commercials on TV promise.”
“Get out,” Carlotta said through clenched teeth. “Or I’ll call the police.”
Tick laughed. “Yeah…right.” Then he looked at Wesley. “Remember what I said, little man.”
Wesley’s throat burned with bile as he watched the man walk heavily toward the door. At the last second, Tick turned his head and glanced at the aluminum Christmas tree in the corner of the room.
“Merry fucking Christmas,” he said sarcastically before banging the door shut behind him.
They were both quiet for a few seconds. He almost couldn’t bear to look at his sister. When he did, her eyes were stormy, her arms crossed, her back rigid.
He gave her his best little-brother smile. “Where did you get the money?”
“A cash advance on my credit card,” she said quietly. “My last credit card.”
“Well…thanks,” he said. “I’m sorry that had to happen here. I was going to take care of it—”
“Shut up, Wesley!”
He blinked.
“You. Have. To. Get. A. Job.”
“I’m supposed to upgrade two of the Sheltons’ computers this week.”
“I mean a real job,” she said, walking toward him slowly, stabbing her finger in the air, “with a paycheck and maybe even something as radical as health benefits. And you’re not allowed to work on computers, remember? You’re on probation for computer tampering! And that toad Lucas told me that if you violate your probation, he’d nail your ass to the wall. Is that what you want, Wesley? To go to jail?”
“Relax, sis,”
