Ludmilla shrugged. “He is throwing up, and he is having trouble at the other end too, I think. I think it is maybe something he ate. That burger in the fridge. I think maybe it was bad.” She looked at me accusingly. “You shouldn’t keep bad food in your fridge.”

I held back from telling where it had come from, that we’d been holding on to it in the hopes of turning it over to the health department.

Merker went to the bottom of the stairs, set down the gym bag, his keys resting on top. He shouted up the stairwell, “Leo!”

Edgars shouted back from behind the closed bathroom door. “Gary?”

“Leo, get down here!”

“I can’t! I’m sick! I think I’m gonna die!”

Merker rolled his eyes. “Honest to God,” he said, more for our benefit than Leo’s.

Ludmilla said, “Did you get the money?”

“Yeah,” said Merker, annoyed. “We got the money.”

“You give me our share, and I’ll go.”

“Already taken care of,” Merker said.

Ludmilla’s eyebrows went up again. “What do you mean, taken care of?”

“On the way back,” he said. “Didn’t you get the call?”

“What call?”

“From your mother. She didn’t call?”

“No, she has not called.”

“That’s funny. Well, she was pretty busy. Maybe she’s still counting it.”

“You gave her the money? You were supposed to bring our share here, then I call her and then we are done.”

“Fuck, sorry about that,” Merker said. “I got confused. But anyway, you can go. Take off. We’re all done. I dropped by, gave your mom the twenty-five grand. Oh yeah, actually, she told me to tell you to come on back. I don’t think she was going to call you anyway.”

Even if English had never been Ludmilla’s first language, she knew bullshit when she heard it.

“Leo!” Merker shouted again. “We gotta get out of here!”

Sarah had knelt down next to Katie. “Come on, honey, talk to me. Are you okay? Has anybody hurt you?” Katie shook her head no. “Would you like a snack or something? A drink of water?”

Leo shouted back, “I can’t get up yet! I feel terrible! Can you come up here for a second?”

Merker got a look on his face like he’d just bitten into a lemon. This was not his idea of a good time, having to go up and check on a friend suffering from a catastrophic intestinal disorder.

“Just finish up and get down here as quick as you can!” Merker said. “We got a few things to deal with.”

“I’m going to call my mother,” Ludmilla told Merker. “I will just check that she got the money.”