Anvil novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: The Porch Light

I broke my own first rule at nine o'clock that night, and I told myself it was for Birdie.

Tucker came up the porch steps after dark with a duffel on his shoulder and his vest in his hand.

"The bike's still at the end of the block," he said.

"I saw it from the window."

"I'm not asking to come in."

"You're asking to sleep on my couch."

"I'm asking to stay between you and that bike."

I held the door open.

He did not say thank you this time.

He walked past me and set the duffel down by the stairs.

Then he checked the back door before I could tell him it was locked.

Birdie went to bed at eight thirty, and she was asleep at nine.

At eleven the headlight came down Linden Street.

It was one bike, slow, with no hurry in it.

It stopped across from my house and sat there with the engine ticking.

Tucker was on his feet before I had finished turning around.

"Stay inside."

"It's my porch."

"Lizzie."

"It's my porch, Tucker."

He opened the door and stepped out into the cold in his socks, and I stepped out beside him.

The rider sat on the idling bike, a big man in a black jacket with no patch showing.

He didn't wave. He didn't speak.

He looked at the house and then at Tucker, and he raised two fingers to the brim of his cap.

Then he pulled out and went down the block and around the corner.

The sound faded.

Tucker's shoulders did not come down.

"He'll be back," he said.

"Who is he?"

"Nobody important. He's a message."

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