Loose Cannon Read online

  “Huh.” Church fumbled with his entry paperwork. “There’s a lot of crap here.”

  Tobias put his book aside and tentatively got up. “I could help. If you want.”

  “What’s this job-trade thing?” Church picked up a pamphlet. On the cover was a staged photo of a happy teenager holding a cake. Tobias peered at it.

  “Oh, you have to pick a skill to learn. The idea is that when you finish your program you’ll have something to fall back on besides crime.”

  Church frowned. The options were limited: cooking, janitorial, auto maintenance, computers and carpentry.

  “Janitorial? Anybody really pick that?”

  “Hardly.”

  Of course, that made Church think of his mother, who’d been a maid back in Puerto Rico before she’d moved to Colorado to attend college and ended up married to a man who’d found everything about her culture about as valuable as the dirt under his heel.

  He grunted and waved the pamphlet as a distraction. “Any suggestions?”

  “Don’t pick computers,” Tobias told him. “All the computers are ancient, so unless you want to learn how to use AOL, it’s useless. If you go with cooking, you get to eat anything you make.”

  But Church’s eyes lingered on the carpentry option. For a moment he could smell wood stain and shavings and metal. He remembered the heaviness of the plane clutched tight in his fingers, remembered the feel of hands bigger than his own directing his movements as he scraped the tool across the oak board, strips curling up and dropping to the floor. Remembered Miller’s steady voice giving directions and later, the way he’d gently smoothed ointment on the blisters on Church’s palms. Church’s stomach tightened with an echo of the thrill he’d felt then, the way his skin had hummed, just from that simple touch.

  It was gonna hurt every single day, but he checked the box for carpentry all the same, then rubbed at the dull ache in his chest with the heel of one hand. His calluses were long gone.

  By nightfall, Church was exhausted. Tomorrow he had school and his first session with his therapist, neither of which he was looking forward to, but he had a couple of classes with Tobias, so it’d be manageable. Actually, after he took a shower and jerked off all by his lonesome, he headed back to his room feeling pretty damn good. He hadn’t been this relaxed in over a year, not since—No, he couldn’t. That brief memory earlier had been enough for one day. Church might be self-destructive, but he wasn’t a masochist.

  Tobias was cool with leaving the window open, and once the lights were out, Church closed his eyes and breathed deeply. The air reeked of pine and hot summer earth and—more faintly—the nearby Dumpsters, and it might’ve been the best thing he’d ever smelled.

  “Hey, Church,” Tobias whispered. “Happy birthday.”

  Church sighed into the darkness. “Thanks.”

  * * *

  Church had never had anything as normal as a best friend before. Fortunately, Tobias balanced this out, because he was so normal he was almost a parody of himself. He said things like “ma’am” and “if you don’t mind, I’d appreciate it” and “I apologize, it wasn’t my intention to hurt your feelings.”

  That last one got him beat up a little, because guys who ended up in places like Woodbury didn’t get their feelings hurt. They didn’t have feelings, even. They were concentrated bloodlust and ego, packing race-car engines in their chests where their hearts should be.

  Church could already tell that Tobias had the street smarts of a chicken crossing a road, but after a few rounds with Church’s fists, people knew to leave Tobias alone.

  Of course, they were gunning for Church by then, but that was all right. Church could take it.

  He still liked to hit, even if he felt stupider about it afterward than he used to. The fighting screwed up his program, and it wasn’t fun having to be on his guard anytime he stepped out of his room, but once the blood was flowing, he didn’t much mind.

  But anyway, the whole point was that Tobias was a unicorn in human form. Featherlight and wincing, he’d touched Church’s bruised cheek after that first fight, and said for the millionth time he wished Church hadn’t gotten in trouble for him.

  “They deserved an ass-kicking,” Church said.

  “We should feel sorry for them.” Tobias handed him an ice pack. “We can get away from them and go back to being happy. They’re stuck with themselves forever. That’s a long time to feel that hateful. It’s a pity, really.”

  Like, what was that, even?

  Tobias’s favorite superhero was Superman, for crying out loud. No one liked Superman the best.

  Jason Todd after he became the Red Hood. That was the way to go.

  * * *

  When he’d been in Woodbury for eight months, he and Tobias were in the great room (which wasn’t that great, since most of the furniture was built in the fifties and smelled like you’d expect), supposedly doing homework but actually talking about comic books, when the front door opened.

  One of the intake staff walked in with a new kid at his heels, and Church broke off midsentence to stare. Obviously the kid was a boy, since Woodbury didn’t take girls, but his features were so delicate that at first Church was sure he was female. The broad shoulders and narrow hips registered at that point, and Church decided the kid was a boy after all. Probably the most gorgeous boy he’d ever seen, too. He had thick, tumbled golden waves that fell to his shoulders, a startling contrast to his flawless porcelain skin. His cheekbones were high and graceful, and his mouth was pink and pretty. Everything about him straddled that line between genders, and even though he was beautiful, it was an uncanny sort of beauty, almost disorienting, and Church sort of wanted to touch him and push him away at the same time.

  “Huh. Ghost is back again.” Tobias gave Church a look. “He’s not a bad guy, but watch your step around him, especially until he gets to know you. He’s got a rep for a reason.”

  Church doubted this, because Ghost didn’t look particularly tough. He wore tight black jeans, janky black boots with the laces untied, and a holey T-shirt that’d seen better days. He was too skinny by half. Then he glanced over, catching Church and Tobias watching him, and smiled slowly. His teeth were very white and seemed very sharp, and for all his beauty, he gave off an air of being half-rabid, like he’d be more than happy to strip flesh from bones. One of the staff members said something to him, and his expression became sweet once more before he turned back.

  “We’re the only room with open beds.” Church wasn’t sure how he felt about having that tricky kid for a roommate.

  “He won’t bug you if you leave him alone.” Tobias bit nervously on his thumbnail. “But seriously, don’t start trouble.”

  Ghost didn’t come to dinner with the rest of them. He vanished with a staff member into the cottage office instead, which left everyone else free to gossip about him in the cafeteria. The guys who knew him took great pride in being able to pass stories along, which basically amounted to: no one fucked with Ghost.

  He was what the staff called a chronic recidivist. He worked his program, spouted all the right words to get out, and then reoffended without thinking twice. Ghost had been in and out of Woodbury three times since he turned thirteen, and he was well liked because he was laid-back, drily amusing, and didn’t start shit. He was a hard one to get a rise out of apparently, but once he was risen, he was risen.

  Like the time that—rumor went—someone tried to climb in bed with him in the middle of the night and Ghost punctured one of the dude’s testicles with a shiv made of a toothbrush handle, then tore the dude’s throat open with his teeth.

  So yeah, everyone liked Ghost, but no one fucked with him.

  * * *

  The first thing Church noticed about Ghost?

  Ghost was weird.

  When unsupervised with the other boys, he w
as sarcastic and watchful and hard-eyed. In group therapy he was thoughtful and sincere about mastering his issues—which Church never fully got a grasp on. When he was with staff, he was sweet and well behaved, and when he was with Church and Tobias in their shared bedroom, he was irreverent and sly and downright devious.

  The second thing he noticed about Ghost?

  None of those early observations mattered, because it was all an act.

  In fact, even months later, there were only two things about Ghost that Church thought were real.

  For one, Ghost had admitted that he was as likely to have men drag him behind Dumpsters to beat the crap out of him for looking like a girl as he was to have men drag him behind Dumpsters for sex. In case of the first, Ghost never went anywhere without at least one blade, and in case of the second, he never went anywhere without condoms.

  “It’s the duality of man,” Ghost told Church one day in that deep, rich voice that was the only blatantly masculine thing about him besides his dick. “Love in one hand, death in the other, although I’m hard-pressed to say which is which.”

  “Very wise,” Church replied, not knowing what the hell “the duality of man” meant.

  “It’s my wisdom that got me here, Churchy.” Ghost folded his hands across his chest like a statue of a priest or something. “I’m the patron saint of prostitutes.”

  Three guesses what got Ghost sent to Woodbury.

  The other real thing was the nightmares. Ghost had them more often than not, and Church got in the habit of keeping clean, balled-up socks by his bed so when Ghost started making those helpless whimpers in his sleep, Church had something convenient to throw. After Ghost sprang upright, Church would say, “Okay?” and Ghost would flip him off, and they’d both go back to sleep.

  Church was pretty sure Ghost didn’t consider them friends.

  Church did, though.

  * * *

  Since there was as much manipulation pumping through Ghost’s veins as blood, he showed Church all the shortcuts that convinced the staff that you were learning how to be a superb human being. Tobias, on the other hand, knew how to milk the system for real opportunity, and after a while, Church wasn’t sure how much of his virtuous behavior was an act designed to get him out, and how much was actual progress.

  Ghost was in and out of Woodbury three more times over the next three years. In between visits he’d occasionally send postcards scrawled with dirty limericks or little pornographic sketches that Church was shocked made it through the postal system.

  When Tobias left, though, it was for good, and if it weren’t for the twice-weekly letters that arrived like clockwork, Church might’ve ended up backsliding.

  But it was enough to know he hadn’t been forgotten.

  2016

  Present Day

  Funny that he could spend almost four years at Woodbury without suffocating, and now, barely a week from release, he was having a hard time breathing.

  “What do you mean you’re in L.A.?” he asked.

  “U2’s playing,” Nick said over the phone. He sounded contrite at least, not that it was gonna help. “My brother insisted.”

  Church’s knuckles whitened as his fingers clamped down on the privacy partition between the pay phones. Next to his pinky finger was an anatomically improbable sketch of a penis in magic marker. Underneath was written DIC. Every single time Church had used this phone, he’d wanted to track down the artist to ask if he’d been interrupted before he could finish or if he simply couldn’t spell.

  He took a deep breath and counted to ten, thinking about the possible consequences of losing his cool, all the things that Ghost would say if he were still at Woodbury. It was habit now when he got angry: one robot coming up.

  It was probably a DIC move to be pissed at a guy for caving to a dying brother’s desire to see some stupid band, but this sure screwed Church over. October was only a day old and it was already shaping up to be as crappy as September had been.

  Now that he had finished his program here at Woodbury, Church was supposed to be ready for reintegration into the community. That meant parole meetings and outreach and support and a host of individualized requirements to prove that he was holding up his end of the bargain.

  One of which was that he wasn’t allowed to live alone yet. He could leave, but only if he had someone to stay with who would be a “grounding influence.”

  Tobias was living at home while he was in college to save money, so he wasn’t an option. Church hadn’t even bothered asking if Ghost counted. In fact, other than Nick, who used to be a staff member at Woodbury and now occasionally lent his couch to the odd graduate, Church didn’t know any grounding influences.

  Well, except for him.

  “I’m sorry, Church,” Nick said. “I can try to make some calls for you, but I doubt I’ll find anything anytime soon.”

  “Forget it. Thanks anyway. Sorry about your brother.”

  Church hung up and stood there for a long minute, hand still resting on the black plastic receiver. He wasn’t thinking so much as giving himself time to adjust to what he would have to do. Behind him, from the line, came a couple of grumbles.

  “Fuck off,” Church said over his shoulder.

  Ricky Jimenez, fourteen-year-old gang member and all-around shit-starter, called, “You talking to me, esé?”

  “Yeah, Menudo, do something about it,” Church replied, but it was halfhearted and Jimenez snickered. He knew Church wasn’t gonna do jack when he was so close to getting out.

  Assuming he could find a damn couch to sleep on.

  “Piss or get off the pot, Church,” one of the staff members said, and that was an order he couldn’t get around, so he lifted the receiver again, ignoring Jimenez’s groan at another delay.

  His fingers dialed without hesitation. It’d been years since he’d called this number, but it’d be in his brain until the day he died. It was engraved on his bones by this point. In his whole life, it was the only number he’d ever had in his pocket that he’d known, without a doubt, he could call for help and wouldn’t be slapped down.

  Of course, that’d been before Church fucked up.

  His throat felt about the size of a drinking straw as the phone rang. He wasn’t sure what to hope for. An answer? Voice mail? An automated message from an operator explaining that the cell phone he was trying to reach had been dropped into a toilet because the owner would rather buy a new one than talk to Church?

  But there was a soft click, and then there was that voice.

  Painfully familiar. Warm as ever. It went through him like a knife through warm butter. Church squeezed his eyes closed.

  “It’s Church,” he said, forcing the words out. He sounded rough and stiff and pretty much like an asshole. “I’m in a bit of jam. I, uh, wouldn’t ask, but.” But there’s no one else. He didn’t say that last bit, because that was a little more pathetic than he wanted to be today. Besides, it wasn’t like it was a secret.

  And Miller Quinn, whose kindness Church had repaid with humiliation and violence and nearly five years’ worth of silence, said, “What do you need?”

  Chapter Two

  When Miller came out of the office, Shelby was lying in wait like a trap-door spider. He didn’t jump, because his sister was not only horrible, but predictable.

  “It was him calling, wasn’t it?” she asked.

  “Yes.” Although part of Miller still didn’t believe it. He curled his shaking hands into loose fists so she wouldn’t see.

  “Thought so. The first thing out of your mouth was ‘What do you need?’ And as soon as you answered the phone, your face started doing that thing it does, of course. You’re such an idiot.”

  “That thing it does,” he repeated.

  “The tense thing. You know, that constipated look that you get w
henever you know there’s going to be conflict that you can’t get away from.” She peered at him. “Yup. That’s the one.”

  Miller tried to relax his jaw muscles. “I do not look constipated.”

  “Well, not anymore,” she said reasonably. “You’re not making the face.”

  “Right.” Miller went around her and headed for the front of the store. It wasn’t quite eleven, and the Saturday-morning rush at Quinn’s Contracting Supply had ended. Other than Em working the counter and a couple of renovators looking at drawer pulls in the cabinetry section, the place was empty, as close to tolerable as it ever got, too heavily air-conditioned and smelling of cut wood and clean metal.

  “What’s he want this time?” she asked. “A kidney?”

  “Shel. Come on.”

  “Oh, am I being too mean to the juvenile offender who took advantage of you?”

  “He did not—”

  “I could break that damn punk’s jaw,” she said, and Miller stopped short, pivoting to stare at her. She was pretty in that mom way that said she didn’t have time for a better haircut, and she had the same square, blocky build that Miller did. Her hands were tucked in the pockets of the ugly red aprons they all wore over their jeans and T-shirts, despite the fact that most everybody who came in here knew who they were. The aprons were a tradition, and traditions were the lifeblood of the Quinn family, even when they made no sense. Her chin was set at that familiar, defiant angle that meant she wasn’t sorry a whit, no matter what the effect of her words might be.

  “Shel. He was a kid.”

  “He left bruises on you, Miller,” Shelby bit out. “After everything you did for him, he used his fists on you, and now he’s calling for another favor after half a decade of ignoring you? Fuck him.”

  “Your daughter’s going to hear you if you don’t keep your voice down,” Miller said under his breath.

  Shelby rolled her eyes. “Yeah, like she’s never heard the F word before. Like she’s never used the F word before—she’s fifteen, not five. And don’t try to wriggle out of this. I don’t want that jerk anywhere near here. He can rot on a street corner for all I care.”