He nodded. “You didn’t come fourteen hundred miles just to work on your tans, marvelous as they are. And they are marvelous.” He turned and looked at Angie’s body openly, his eyebrows raised. “I mean, my God, Ange, I gotta tell you again, your skin, I mean, it’s the color of a coffee-regular at Dunkin’ Donuts for Chris-sakes. Makes me want to—”

“Jay,” she said, “will you just quit it? Give it a fucking rest, for crying out loud.”

He blinked and leaned back on his heels. “Okay,” he said with a sudden coldness. “No, when you’re right, you’re right. And you’re right, Angela. You are right.”

She looked at me and I shrugged.

“Right is right,” he said. “Right is definitely right.”

A black Mitsubishi 3000 GT pulled up with two young cops in it. They were laughing as they approached, and the tires smelled like they’d just had some rubber burned off.

“Nice car,” the driver said as he got out by Jay.

“You like it?” Jay said. “It handle well?”

The cop giggled as he looked at his partner. “Handled just fine, buddy.”

“Good. Steering wasn’t too tight when you were doing your doughnuts?”

“Come on,” Angie said to Jay, “get in the car.”

“Steering was just fine,” the cop said.

His partner stood by me at the open passenger door. “Axles felt a little wobbly, though, Bo.”

“That’s true,” Bo said, still blocking Jay from entering the car. “I’d get a mechanic take a look at your U-joints.”

“Sound advice,” Jay said.

The cop smiled and stepped out of Jay’s way. “You drive her careful, Mr. Fischer.”

“Remember,” his partner said, “a car is not a toy.”

They both laughed at that one and walked up the steps into the station.

I didn’t like the look in Jay’s eyes, or his whole demeanor since he’d been released. He seemed paradoxically lost and determined, adrift and focused, but it was an angry, spiteful focus.

I hopped in the passenger seat. “I’ll ride with you.”

He leaned in. “I’d really prefer if you didn’t.”

“Why?” I said. “We’re going to the same place. Right, Jay? To talk?”

He pursed his lips and exhaled loudly through his nostrils, looked at me with a burned-out gaze. “Yeah,” he said eventually. “Sure. Why not?”

He got in and started the car as Angie walked over to the Celica.

“Buckle up,” he said.

I did, and he slammed the gearshift into first and nailed the gas, dropping into second a split second later with his wrist flexed for another quick push into third. We cleared the small ramp leading out of the parking lot, and Jay shifted into fourth while the wheels were still in the air.