The Cold Spot by Tom Piccirilli Read Free Book Online Page B

his gun belt on. The strap over the butt of his .45 had been snapped loose. This for Sunday dinner, meeting his daughter’s boyfriend for the first time.
    When Bodeen hugged Lila he made a spectacle out of it, like he hadn’t seen her for years. Swept her up, twirled her around, kept calling her his little girl, his buttercup. She went with it. Finally he put her down and she left the room to check on the chicken-fried steak she was making for dinner.
    Her mother was the quietest woman Chase had ever met. Really big, burly actually, with a lot of muscle to her. She hugged him hello. He couldn’t get his arms all the way around her, it was like grabbing hold of the front end of a Toyota. She squeezed him until he thought his ribs were about to go.
    These people, he thought, Christ, there’s a lot of undercurrent here, forget that Southern hospitality shit.
    Lila flashed in and out of the living room, either giving him time to get used to her parents or really busy cooking. He had stared at the stuff stewing and boiling in the pots and pans and had no idea what side dishes they’d be eating tonight.
    She’d told him to call her mother Mama, but Chase couldn’t do it. He went with her first name. Hester.
    Keeping up the friendly front, Bodeen called Chase “son” a lot, but there was serious ice in his eyes, a lot of rage and resentment. It would come out eventually, Chase knew, he just had to wait for it.
    The man asked a lot of questions about Chase’s background. Started off casually but got more and more personal while they sat and waited. He drank a lot of whiskey with a lot of ice and appeared a little put off that Chase was sticking to beer.
    Chase knew his name had already been run through the system by Bodeen, and the man would be wondering about all the gaps and holes. Lila had come up with a pretty complicated and convincing backstory that would hopefully divert any doubts. It was so involved and complex that Chase couldn’t remember any of it.
    Bodeen would know about Chase’s mother being murdered. Jonah had been off the map for too long; Chase didn’t think anybody would ever find a connection between the two of them, but you just couldn’t tell. There might be some small scrap of computer info. Or somebody in the bent life might’ve flipped and given up everything he knew about everybody he knew. It was a chance Chase would take for Lila. They could always run if it came down to that.
    Her parents had him pinned in the living room. Hester sat to the left of Chase, sipping a tumbler of rye and patting and rubbing his wrist. It was a vaguely sensual display and really threw him off.
    Bodeen, squashing him on the right, said, “You plan on staying in these parts?”
    “Yes,” Chase said.
    “Never knew anyone from the North who could last more than a year down this way.”
    “I’ve been in the South for almost four.”
    “On the move.”
    “That’s right.”
    “Why’s that?” Bodeen asked.
    “Because I’ve been alone.”
    “And now you’re not so you think you wanna settle down. But I’m talking about roots. It’s a different way of life. We still speak like somebody. We have the advantage of not being as homogenized as other places.”
    Bodeen’s use of “homogenized” impressed Chase. It was a word his father had used. He could just imagine his old man sitting here, trying hard to fit in and get along, making the effort not to discuss Russian literature. Maybe saying, “Boy, it’s humid!” because when you got down to it, there wasn’t a hell of a lot of middle ground where they could meet.
    “I think I’m taking to it just fine so far.”
    “Because of Lila.”
    “Yes, because of her.”
    Hester smiled at him and kept touching his wrist. Chase smiled back. She smiled more. He tried to smile more but just couldn’t do it, it was tiring his face out. Bodeen finished another glass of whiskey and started chewing the ice.
    Lila poked her head out of the kitchen and said,