The Book of Lies by Brad Meltzer Read Free Book Online Page A

he’s scared, it’s for something that’s worth being scared about. “Business is really great,” he insists.
    “I’m sure it is if you can afford this nice shirt and shoes,” I say, still holding his belongings.
    His mouth is open, like he’s ready to say something. It’s as if I have a grip on his scab and I’m slowly pulling it off. That’s it, Lloyd. Tell me what you’re really here for. But instead, he shakes his head slightly, like he’s begging, pleading for me to stay away.
    “I—I can handle my own problems, Calvin. Please. . . .”
    On our left, an old rumbling car turns into the corner of the hospital’s driveway. The rain glows like a tiny meteor shower in the car’s headlights. “I gotta go,” he says, heading for the car but still scanning the area. Whoever this is, he knows them.
    In front of us, a dark green Pontiac Grand Prix pulls up to the emergency room entrance and bucks to a stop right next to me.
    “¡Ay, Dios mío!”
a young, fair-skinned black woman with short hair shouts from the driver’s seat.
“¿¡Que paso!?”
    “Estoy bien, Serena,”
my dad replies. Serena. When’d my dad learn Spanish?
“Callate,”
he adds. “
No digas nada
, okay?”
    Serena’s voice is rushed. She’s scared.
“Pero el cargamento . . . ¿Por favor, yo espero que el cargamento ha sido protegido?”
    “¡Escúchame!”
he insists, struggling to stay calm as he turns back to me. “I promise, Calvin,” he tells me as he scoops his clothes and Franceschetti shoes from my arms and slides into the passenger seat of the car. The woman touches my dad’s forearm with the kind of tenderness and affection that comes with a wedding band. She looks about twenty-seven or so. Almost my age.
    “I swear, Calvin. I swear I’ll call you,” my dad promises.
    The door slams shut, tires howl, and the car disappears—its red taillights zigzagging like twin laser beams into the darkness, and I scream after it, “You don’t have my phone number!”
    “What’d he say?” Roosevelt calls out as the emergency doors
whoosh
open and he rushes outside. “He ask for your help with his shipment?”
    I shake my head, feeling the knots of rage and pain and sadness tighten in my chest. I don’t know who the girl is, or where they’re going, or why they’re in such a rush at two in the morning. But I do know one thing: My father isn’t the only one who learned how to speak Spanish in Miami.
    Por favor, yo espero que el cargamento ha sido protegido
, the woman had said. Please tell me you protected the shipment.
    My father said he was robbed and shot by some kid with big ears. But I saw the terror in his eyes when I started sniffing around his shipment—like he’s hiding the devil himself in that delivery. For that alone, I should walk away now and leave him to his mess. I should. That’s all he deserves. The problem is, the last time I stood around and did nothing, I lost my mom. I could’ve helped . . . could’ve run forward . . . But I didn’t.
    I don’t care how much I hate him. I don’t care how much I’m already kicking myself. I just found my father—please—don’t let me lose him again.
    When my father disappeared, I was nine years old and couldn’t do anything about it. Nineteen years make a hell of a difference.
    I flick open my cell phone as my brain searches for the number. Fortunately, I’ve got a good memory. So does he. And like Paulo, he knows what he owes me.
    “Cal, it’s two-fourteen in the morning,” Special Agent Timothy Balfanz answers on the other line, not even pretending to hide his exhaustion. “Whattya need?”
    “Personal favor.”
    “Mm I gonna get in trouble?”
    “Only if we’re caught. There’s a container at the port I need to get a look at.”
    There’s another two-second pause. “When?” Timothy asks.
    “How’s right now?”

9
    Y ou should’ve stayed with the father,” the Judge said through Ellis’s phone.
    “You’re wrong,” Ellis replied,