Don't Cry Now by Joy Fielding Read Free Book Online Page B

arms. Long brown hair framed a decidedly handsome face, but there was something almost rude about the boy’s good looks, a sneer in his gray eyes as well as his posture. He wore a black T-shirt over black jeans and black pointed-toed leather boots. The pungently sweet odor of marijuana surrounded him like an overpowering cologne, his trademark, Bonnie knew. Wasn’t that why everybody called him Haze—because he was always in one? Her eyes moved rapidly back and forth between the two teenage boys.
    â€œWhat’s going on?” Sam said instead of hello, although neither his face nor his voice registered any surprise at seeing them there.
    â€œHey, Mrs. Wheeler,” Haze said, his eyes focusing in on her torn lip, like a camera lens. “What happened to your face?”
    â€œMy wife had a little accident,” Rod explained quickly.
    Hadn’t he used the same word when describing Joan’s death to his daughter? Bonnie found it an interesting choice, in that it absolved anyone of blame.
    â€œThat your car in the driveway?” Sam asked Bonnie, barely acknowledging that his father had spoken.
    Bonnie nodded. “We need to talk to you, Sam,” she said.
    Sam shrugged. So talk, the shrug said.
    â€œMaybe it would be better if we could talk alone.” Rod glanced toward Haze.
    â€œMaybe it wouldn’t,” Sam told him.
    Beside him, Haze chuckled.
    â€œThis is Harold Gleason,” Bonnie said, introducing her husband to his son’s friend. “He’s in my first-period class.” He’s disruptive, he never does his assignments, he’s failing, she could have added, but didn’t. “Everybody calls him Haze.”
    â€œLooks like somebody hit you, Mrs. Wheeler,” Haze said, ignoring her introduction and moving a step closer, the scent of marijuana radiating provocatively from his hair and clothes, stretching toward her like a third hand. “Yeah,” he observed. “Looks like somebody nailed you one pretty good there, Mrs. Wheeler.”
    â€œSam, this is important,” Rod said impatiently.
    â€œI’m listening.”
    â€œSomething’s happened to your mother,” Rod began, then stopped, looking up the stairs.
    Sam’s eyes followed his father’s. “What’s the matter with her? Did she get drunk and fall out of bed? Did she call you to come over? Is that what you’re doing here?”
    â€œYour mother is dead, Sam,” Rod said quietly.
    There was silence. Bonnie watched Sam’s face for any hint of what he might be feeling, but his face was resolutely blank, betraying nothing of whatever might be going on behind those inexpressive black eyes.
    â€œHow’d it happen, man?” Haze asked.
    â€œShe was shot,” Bonnie answered simply, still monitoring Sam’s face for some reaction. But there was none, not a tear, not a twitch, not even a blink. “I was the one who found her,” she continued, automatically taking a step back, protecting her mouth with the back of her hand.
    Still no response.
    â€œShe called me this morning, said there was something she had to tell me, asked me to meet her at an open house she was having on Lombard Street. When I got there, she was dead.”
    Sam’s eyes narrowed slightly.
    â€œDo you have any idea why she wanted to see me, Sam?” Bonnie asked.
    Sam shook his head.
    â€œI think she was trying to warn me about something,” Bonnie elaborated. “Maybe if we knew what—”
    â€œWho shot her, man?” Haze asked, nervously rubbing the side of his nose with his fingers. Bonnie saw his arm muscle flex beneath his black T-shirt, a red tattooed heart swelling involuntarily with the motion. MOTHER, it said above the heart; FUCKER, it said below.
    â€œWe don’t know yet,” Bonnie told him, grateful that someone was asking the appropriate questions.
    â€œWhat happened to her car?” Sam