“Dubai.”
Leo whistled. “What’s it like there?”
“I don’t know. Never been.”
They fell silent.
“I’ll drop by to see Julie,” Leo said. “After you leave, I mean.”
Carson’s hands made fists on his lap. “Let her alone.”
“Just to see if she’s okay. I’ve got a girlfriend, Carse. And even if I didn’t, Julie’s not … I get it. She’s yours.”
“She’s not mine.”
“Oh, she’s yours, all right.”
Leo draped his gloved hands casually over widespread knees. “Was she ticked about the shoe factory?”
“She’s livid.”
“I told the paper not to print it. I’m not going to take the offer. It’s a salvage firm that wants it. Apparently there’s a market for some of the raw materials—those big limestone blocks and steel beams and whatnot.”
The black thing in Carson swirled around, fogged up his head and made him incautious. “That would be a desecration.”
Leo pinned him in place with one of his all-knowing green-eyed glances. “I know.”
He looked away. The driver paused, then spoke to whoever was on the other end of the phone. A tow truck, Carson hoped. A friend. A brother.
Not a wife or a girlfriend. Now that it was too late, he didn’t want to be responsible for taking this man away from his family tonight.
“I have a theory,” Leo said.
“No theories.”
“Okay.”
A few seconds of silence. Then Leo again. “Did you ever meet my dad?”
“Of course I did.”
“Well, sure, everybody met him. But did you ever talk to him?”
“I don’t think so.”
“He was a ruthless bastard.”
Carson had known that. Everyone in town knew it. Carson and Leo had never played at Leo’s house, and Glory virtually adopted Leo when they were boys. These things didn’t happen for no reason.
“I loved your mom,” Leo said. “She was the nicest lady I ever met. You know what she told me once? ‘You’re a good boy, Leo. And you’ll be a good man. Don’t mind your father. He’s unhappy, and it makes him cruel. You have a good heart.’ ” He glanced at Carson. “We were ten. I thought, ‘How does she know I’ll be a good man?’ But after that, I wanted to be.”
His mother had been able to do that. She had that kind of magic that could lift people up, make everyone pull together.
Julie’s magic.
“You have great parents,” Leo said.
“I know that.”