Chapter 9
SABLE
"You were right, this fish is delicious," I said.
Perfectly battered, with a squeeze of lemon and a sprinkle of salt. Of course, with a side of fresh fries.
Forrest inclined his head to acknowledge the praise, but his mouth was full, having just taken a bite of his own fish.
"I have an idea," Leif said, gazing out toward the ocean. "Let's stay here forever."
"On the beach?" Woody asked.
We'd found a sheltered section between some rocks, but even here the air was chilly.
When the wind got up, it'd be downright freezing.
It was still quietly perfect though, only a handful of people and their dogs walking past every so often.
They'd glance at us and smile, some calling out a greeting, others giving a nod.
"I meant in Saltgrave, but sure," Leif said. "There's worse places to be than on the beach."
"It's all fun and games until we freeze our asses off," Woody said. He looked warm enough in his leather jacket, thick jeans and boots.
"It's peaceful," Leif said. "Like, no one's in a hurry. I feel like I can breathe here."
Woody gave him a sidelong look but admitted, "Yeah, me too."
"It's nice in summer." I watched a seabird circle over the waves before diving in, coming back with something in its beak.
"Does it get busy?" Woody asked. Judging by his expression, a crowd better not appear in front of of us. He'd get stabby, or at least snarky, if they did.
"Only during spring break," Forrest said. "Most of the time it's this quiet at this stretch of beach. The kids from the local college have parties a mile or so up." He nodded in that direction.
Closer to my parents' beach house, where the action usually was. That tracked.
"I could imagine the kind of shit they get up to." Leif grinned.
"The kind of shit you got up to when you were in college?" I guessed.
"Basically, yes," he agreed. "All the fun things. Drinking too much, throwing up on the sand, waking up and having no idea where I was." He sighed wistfully.
"That sounds like fun." I dug the toe of my shoes into the sand, my eyes on the grains as if they were fascinating.
"You didn't do any of those things?" Leif asked.
"Not really," I said. "Savannah and I would go out and drink once in a while, but my parents didn't approve of anything fun. Definitely not coming down to a place like this alone to let loose."
"Then they took you out of college and married you off." That was Woody, looking more pissed off than usual.
"Yeah, I would have preferred to throw up on the sand," I said with a small smile.
"We can still make that happen," Leif said. "It's never too late for those kinds of shenanigans."
"Are you trying to lead me astray?" I teased.
He thought about that for a moment. "Yes," he said finally. "Yes, I am. How far astray can you go?"
"I stabbed a dead man in the heart," I said. "That's pretty far astray if you ask me."
"Oh, I don't know," Leif replied. "Sounds like we're just getting started. You don't graduate until you've done it to someone alive."
"What if I never do?" I asked.
"Then you don't," Leif said. "There's no shame in it. We'll think up another graduation activity."
"Of course there's no shame in it," Forrest said. "Not everyone has to learn to kill people." He gave me a soft look that made my heart race a little faster.
"I'm not ruling it out completely," I said. "I feel like this is one of those one-day-at-a-time things. What about you guys?" I asked. "When did you first, you know, kill someone?"
Forrest gazed out at the waves. "For me, it was the second time I had to let someone walk that shouldn't have walked.
He'd done things to his stepdaughter and her friends.
They were too scared to speak out against him.
Her mother caught him, but it was her word against his. The jury didn't believe her."
"So you killed him?" I said.
"I followed him first," Forrest replied. "Hunted him. Watched him. Got evidence with my own eyes, and a camera. Then I killed him. Sent the evidence to the police so they'd know exactly what was going on."
"How did you kill him?" I couldn't help asking.
"He had a peanut allergy," Forrest said.
"I slipped some into his drink. Unfortunately for him, I also kept a hold of his EpiPen.
Held it in my hands while his face swelled.
Then he died. His family found him three days later when they came back from visiting the stepdaughter's grandmother. I made sure they had alibis."
"It sounds like you planned that carefully," I said, a little scared but mostly impressed.
"What about you?" I turned to Leif.
Leif rubbed his chin with his thumb and finger. "My best friend in high school had a brother who was disabled. He couldn't do much for himself. He had this carer who was supposed to help him do things for him. Instead, he started to do things to him. We came home from school one day and found him."
His eyes glazed, thinking back. His expression, somewhere between sadness and anger. Lips pressed together, teeth gritted like he might grab a knife and stab someone right now.
"My friend confronted him," Leif continued. "I confronted him too. When he was standing at the top of the stairs. With my hand. He fell all the way down and broke his neck. They ruled it an accident."
The tension in his jaw lessened. He smiled.
"I was conflicted for a while. I pushed him and he died.
But then, Jerry, my friend's brother, he seemed better after that.
Happier. Things were happening to him he couldn't prevent.
I put a stop to that. I felt vindicated.
That one thing made his life better. Him and anyone else that asshole was supposed to be caring for. "
"Sounds like he got what he deserved," I said.
"Without question," Leif agreed.
I turned to Woody. "What about you?" I asked. "When did you first kill someone?"
"Would you believe the senator was the first?" he asked.
I snorted. "No. You knew what you were doing before we got there."
"Fine." He dragged the word out. "I was at work one day, repairing some damage to one of the lines. I overheard some people talking. They were stealing from a kids' cancer charity. I mean, who does shit like that? Stealing from sick kids. It was fucked up. You know?"
"That's horrible," I said. Sometimes it was difficult to have faith in humanity, knowing there were people like that out there.
"Anyway, they were laughing about it and saying they'd stolen millions, not just from that charity, but from a few others. One of them left." He scooped up a handful of sand and let it slowly slip through his fingers.
"I followed the other one, trying to get a look at him and see who he was so I could tell the cops.
He realized I was following him, stopped and pulled a gun.
I acted without thinking, threw myself at him and pushed him off the platform right in front of the morning train to the Bronx.
They found bits of him spread around everywhere.
Once they finally managed to identify him, they found out what he'd done, arrested the other prick, and returned some of the money to the charities.
They'd spent a fuck ton of it; fancy homes and cars, crap like that.
There was a whole organization of them. The rest of them disappeared, went underground.
They probably popped up somewhere and started all over again. "
He curled his fingers around the sand that was left in his hand before opening it again and letting it drop back to the beach. "That pissed me off, knowing they got away with it. I started looking for people like that, and people who let them walk."
"You thought Forrest was one of them?" I asked.
"For a while I did," Woody said. "But one time we both turned up in the same place. Got to talking. Found out we were both on the same side. He introduced me to Leif, and here we are. That's the origin story of the three musketeers. Or are we the three muppets?"
"The three badasses?" Leif said. "Four badasses now." He dipped his head toward me.
"No one else knows the things you do?" I directed the question at all of them.
"I've had some police contacts here and there," Forrest said. "And a few who give us information without asking any questions. It's a challenge, knowing who to trust. It's too easy for someone to betray us to someone else who pays better."
"Who would dare to pay better than the great Judge Forrest Cross?" Leif teased.
"Right?" Forrest asked dryly. "They're rude."
"Have you ever thought about not doing this?" I asked.
"I have," Forrest said. "Then someone else crosses my path, and I find myself dealing with them."
"What he said," Leif agreed. "It's like an addiction. Just one more. Just one more, then I'll stop."
"How do we stop?" Woody asked, his voice low, barely audible over the crashing of the waves. "How do we look away when we see the shit that happens? How do we just go, 'Okay, enough, you get to get away with it, and then the one after that, and the next prick, and the next prick'?"
"It's like opening a can of Pringles and trying to stop," Leif said with a chuckle. He opened an invisible can and started to shovel chips into his mouth.
"An endless can of Pringles," Woody said. "It'd be easier if I thought we'd run out of them. Humanity has a way of churning out assholes like there's a production line. An asshole factory out there somewhere." He gestured vaguely toward the water.
"If there was an asshole factory, that'd make this easier. We could blow it up." He mimed an explosion with his hands, throwing his fingers out to the sides.
"That would stop the production," Leif said. He seemed to like this idea.
"How inconsiderate of them, not to have an asshole factory," I said with a sigh.
"Extremely inconsiderate," Leif agreed. "What would be easier is if we could lure them all into one place, then blow it up."
"What did you say?" Forrest asked.
"I said it'd be good if we could lure them all into one place…" Leif trailed off. "Oh crap, did I just give you an idea?"
"Fuck," Woody said, long and low, as he rubbed the heel of his hand across his forehead. "We're not going to like this, are we?"
"Probably not," Forrest agreed. "That doesn't mean it's not a good idea."
"It doesn't mean it is a good idea," Woody said. "This might be the time you get us killed."
Forrest didn't deny the suggestion. "We should go back inside; it'll be getting dark out here soon."
"Are you scared of the dark?” Woody teased.
Forrest gave him a dry look. "No, I'm aware of the kind of people that sneak around in the dark."
No one argued with him. Instead, we grabbed our trash and headed inside.