“Reginald Morrison was screwed by Chasie who was helping Bob and Margaret make a shitload of money,” Addis continued. “Then he found out, raised a stink, and someone in the governor’s office fixed it up. Got his boy, who was booted from the Marines, the job of a lifetime.”

A steel-cold pie-pan.

“That someone,” Addis said. “You, Lem. You did that, right?”

“Talks like your momma did”—that’s what the letter said.

“To help the Hanovers, right? Just to help.”

The arm with the gun trembled.

“It’s like a sick joke, Lem, isn’t it? Like a stupid script somebody wrote. Somebody who doesn’t really know us. Doesn’t really know you. But they made us do all these things. Lem? All these things. They never told us what it would mean, right Lem?”

The arm stopped shaking. Jordan held it stiff.

“G-g-give me that,” Jordan said, referring to the letter.

“It’s a copy, Lem.” Addis and Starrell had stopped at a copy shop on the way to the hotel.

“Give me the god-damn letter!”

“Other people have seen it, Lem. They have the original.”

Jordan’s eyes stopped shifting. Addis could see the inside of the barrel. He thought of a small piece of metal. A pill. Flying through the space between here and there.

“Lem, you can’t. You can’t. You know that. I know it, too.”

“I d-d-d-don’t know, Nick … It’s not—”

“Yes, you do. You do know, Lem. This isn’t part of it.”

Fuck, hasn’t it been ten minutes?

“I d-d-don’t. I d-d-don’t.”

Jordan’s eyes were watering.

“I s-s-saved you. You shouldn’t have come. You shouldn’t have.”

“Yes, thank you, Lem. Thank you very much for last night. Just like you saved Margaret in Cincinnati. Now, can we try to figure everything out together—”

“N-n-no,” Jordan interrupted. “Sorry, Nick. Sorry.” He blinked tears from his eyes.

God-damn, this is it. And it’s not even going to help him. They’ll find him somewhere—a wreck, or a corpse with one bullet wound, self-inflicted in the head. I should tell him about the knapsack. There’s too much evidence, he can’t stop it by—

“S-s-sorry, I’m …”

Addis took a deep breath, felt his lungs expand. Like last night. Like right before leaving the air for the water.

A bang sounded by the entrance to the living room. Addis and Jordan turned toward it and saw Jack entering the room, with the wheelchair scraping against the doorjamb. His eyes were wide and wet. He held a cardkey in his hand. He rolled a few feet, then stopped.

“Told Bruno I had to go empty out,” Jack said. He patted the plastic container that held the waste his body produced. “But, uh, he’s in the hallway.”

“Thanks for coming,” Addis said.

“You asked me to,” Jack said. “And I did. Ten minutes, like you said.”