But a thousand memories of Damon spun tragically around me. The air rang with a chorus of his voices: as a giggling toddler who’d loved to suck his thumb and curl up in my lap while his mom made breakfast on Saturday mornings; as a troubled five-year-old trying to understand why his mother had died; as a joyous, victorious ten-year-old after he’d almost single-handedly won a basketball game; as a young man who loved to laugh.
Damon had a beautiful laugh that came up out of his belly and seized his whole body. It was genuine and contagious, and one of the things I most loved about him.
Right then and there, I knew that I was doomed to pine for that laugh every day for the rest of my life. I wanted to cross the yard and take my firstborn in my arms, feel the weight of the man he’d become.
But I didn’t. I couldn’t.
With every passing moment looking at the corpse, I became aware that I’d been changed that day, irrevocably transformed into someone I no longer recognized.
Up until Mulch, I’d always considered myself a moral man, guided by principles; there were certain lines I’d never cross, or even contemplate crossing. But as I gazed at the desecration of my son, I knew that all my principles had been sacrificed, and all rules of conduct destroyed.
“This is not happening again,” I vowed to my son before turning away. “I promise you that.”
Flipping off the flashlight, I felt myself swell with righteous anger and went fast around the side of the house, only to pull up short, startled by the silhouette of someone standing there ahead of me.
CHAPTER
21
“ALEX?” AVA SAID IN a fearful voice. “Is that you?”
In the long frenzy of the day, I’d completely forgotten about the runaway girl who’d saved my life and my sanity in so many ways. When had she left the house? Last night? I honestly didn’t know.
“Alex?” she said, her voice higher.
“It’s me, Ava.”
She ran to me, hugged me, sobbing: “Is it true? Bree?”
I held her to me, unable to tell her that Damon was in the backyard. “It looks that way,” I said.
“Why?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, pushing her back gently. “I have to leave now, Ava.”
“Why? Where are you going?”
“To find Mulch.” I kissed her on the cheek and started toward the house.
Ava hurried behind me, saying, “I’m going with you.”
“No, you are not,” I said.
“Please, Alex,” she begged. “I can help you find them. I showed you how the pictures were faked. I can help. I’m good at that kind of stuff.”
It was a bad idea to bring Ava with me for too many reasons to count.
But she was gifted with computers, and damn street-smart. She’d shown me that again and again. I thought about what Mulch wanted me to do to save the rest of my family, and I saw in an instant how it might work.
“You have a driver’s license?”
“No, but I can drive. My mom’s last shitty boyfriend taught me.”
“Can you listen? Follow orders?”
Ava’s chin retreated several inches, but she nodded. “I owe you and Nana Mama.”
I dug in my pocket, came up with my house key, and opened the door.