There’s powdered sugar dusted across the front of Seever’s vest, strawberry jelly smeared between his knuckles. Sloppy. He’s been eating more these days, and with greater frequency. They’ve watched Seever duck into restaurants and gas stations, come out with plastic carry-outs of steaming food, cases of Diet Coke. Seever eats when he’s under stress, and when he realized the police were constantly watching him, trying to nail his ass to the wall, he amped it up. Even in the last week he’s gained. His belly is softly ballooning over the waistband of his slacks, straining the buttons on his tweed vest. The whole getup would fit someone in better shape, it might’ve fit him before but it doesn’t now, and now the shirt doesn’t quite conceal the underside of his gut, which is covered in wiry black hair and purple stretch marks. Reverse cleavage.
Hoskins follows his partner into the house, pausing long enough to shove a slip of paper into Seever’s hands. A search warrant. It says they’re looking for marijuana, but they don’t give a shit about drugs. It wouldn’t matter to them if the kitchen wall were built with bricks of Mary Jane. But they needed a way to get into Seever’s house, they’d been spinning their wheels for weeks, trying to catch Seever at more than cramming food in his face and scratching his ass, and it’s the best Judge Vasquez could give them. The best any judge would give them, because none of them liked Loren, not that Loren gave a flying fuck, but it sometimes made things difficult, so it was Hoskins who’d petitioned for the warrant, who’d had to put on his smiley face and explain the situation, Hoskins who’d had to beg for help. But that’s how it was with Loren, how it’d always been. Loren wanted what he wanted, and someone else had to get it for him.
“Weed?” Seever says, the warrant pinched between his pointer finger and thumb. By the looks of it, he might’ve been holding a square of used toilet paper. He reads it, laughing, a sound that’s like glass breaking. “You’re not going to find any of that here.”
“That’s all right,” Loren says. He’s smiling, or at least pulling his lips back from his teeth, although it makes him look more like a rabid dog than a man. “I have a feeling we’ll find what we’re looking for.”
Seever closes the front door, shutting out the cold morning light, and Hoskins is blind for a moment. This isn’t good. The blinds are all drawn, the interior of the house is dark. His eyes haven’t had time to adjust. He wonders if Seever knows this, if he’ll take this particular moment to lose his shit, to try to kill the two cops who’ve come to put him away for the rest of his life. But Seever doesn’t move, only stands inside the door, his hands hanging down at his sides, because really, no matter how he acts or what he says, Seever is a coward.
“Where do you want to start?” Seever asks. He’s pleasant, unconcerned. “Upstairs? Gloria’s at her mother’s place for the weekend, so you can—”
“The crawl space,” Loren says. “I want to see that.”
*
But the crawl space is flooded, filled with rank water and unidentifiable bits, floating clouds of grease. Standing over the cutout in the laundry-room floor, Hoskins watches their three reflections in the black water, waves his hand so his twin down below does the same.
“Sump pump’s broken,” Seever says. He’s smiling. Slyly, Hoskins thinks. Like he’s managed to fool everyone. “I’ve been meaning to get a plumber out here, but I haven’t found the time.”
Loren coughs wetly into his fist. He has a cold that won’t let go, not this time of year, and not after all the time he’s been spending outside, sitting in his car, watching Seever and waiting for this moment. Hoskins and Seever stand patiently as he coughs and wipes his mouth with the old tissue he’s pulled from his pocket.
“Think you’re pretty smart, don’t you?” Loren says. “You think you got everybody fooled, but I got your number.”
“What’s that?” Seever says, but there’s something in his eyes, creeping in around the corners. He’s starting to look like a cornered dog, wide-eyed and scared, and this is just the beginning.
“That plug needs to be replaced,” Loren says. He takes off his hat, hands it to Hoskins. Then his coat, and hooks his fingers under the noose of his tie, yanks it loose. “Bully for you, I know how to do it. My old man was a plumber, used to take me out on calls with him.”
“I’ll get someone—”
“Nah, I can drain this puppy right now,” Loren says, because he knows what’s down there, under those floorboards and the standing water. They all do. “It’ll save you some cash, not having to call someone out. Besides, I’m not in a hurry. How ’bout you, Paulie? You got somewhere to be?”
“Nope.”
“And you, Seever?” There’s a black speck on Loren’s teeth, right at the front. A single grain of coffee, or a fleck of pepper. “You got a hot date?”
Seever shakes his head. That sly smile is long gone.
“Great,” Loren says. He bends at the waist, unties his shoes and pulls them off. There’s a hole in his left sock, and his big toe peeks through. He tosses the shoes away, and one bangs against the side of the washing machine. Then he sits, dangles his legs over the square hole in the floor, and slowly lowers himself into the standing water. “I’ll have this fixed up in no time, then we can wait for it to drain. Maybe you could get me some of that coffee, Seever. That’d be nice.”