Chapter 19: Run

Slade's mother stepped into Maggie's kitchen and looked at the flyer on the table.

She did not look at the arrows.

She looked at the pie.

"How homey," she said. "I won't stay. I came to deliver an offer."

"Out," Maggie said.

"You'll want to hear it, dear. It's generous."

"I'm not your dear."

"Slade will meet Nolan on Thursday at eight," she said, turning to me. "Halsted Street Coffee. He'll return the forty-eight thousand in cash."

I said nothing.

"He will also release the lease on the bakery." She glanced at Minnie. "Though I hardly think a girl like you needs a lease."

"A girl like me," Minnie said.

"In exchange, you both stay home on Saturday."

"And if we don't?" I asked.

"Then Slade is a very sad man, and a sad man does unfortunate things." She smoothed her pearls. "He's still my son."

Minnie's voice came out low and clear.

"Your son has a wife in Milwaukee, Mrs. Merrick."

The older woman's face did not change at all.

That was the worst part.

"Then there are two of you," she said, "who matter far less than you believe."

She had known.

She had known about Milwaukee for six years, and she had put the photograph on her own charity page.

"You raised him," Maggie said. "You did this on purpose."

"I raised a man who gets what he wants."

She turned and tapped her cane once on the linoleum.

"Thursday at eight, Nolan. Don't be late. Slade's generosity is brief."

Maggie held the door open with her whole arm, and the woman walked out into the rain.

Nobody touched the pie after that.

Minnie and I left at ten.

It was raining hard, cold and slanting, and we had no umbrella.

We walked to the corner of Milwaukee Avenue, because my car was parked past it.

The pedestrian light was flashing.

I stopped at the curb.

My legs did it on their own, and I stood there with my hands in my pockets watching the red hand blink.

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