Liquid Smoke

SIXTEEN

We’d arrived at my place just as Carter came barreling down the boardwalk on an old beach cruiser. He hit the brakes and skidded to a halt next to the wall.

He looked at the house, then me. “They find the meth lab?”

“Yeah. The jig is up.”

Liz rolled her eyes. Carter smiled at her. They tolerated each other because of me. Being in the middle of them wasn’t always easy, but I was learning to manage it a little better than in the past.

“I’ll leave you two to … do whatever you do,” Liz said. She put a hand on my shoulder. “I’ll see you later.”

“What the hell is all this?” Carter asked after she walked away.

“Remember the girl who came to see me?”

“Yeah.”

“Dead. Inside.”

He looked at me for a moment like he was trying to figure out if I was kidding. When he realized I wasn’t, he said, “You didn’t do it, did you?”

“Uh, no.”

“Where were you?”

I hesitated. “San Francisco.”

He frowned. “Why?”

“Went to meet the guy she said was my father.” “He lives up there?”

I took a deep breath. Telling Carter the whole truth would be a welcome relief; I could have used his help carrying this burden. I should’ve told him right away.

“He’s a resident of San Quentin,” I said.

“You serious?”

“Unfortunately. He’s on death row.”

He dropped his bike to the sidewalk and sat down on the wall next to me. “Oh, man.”

I told him about my trip, and the end to any uncertainty that I was related to Russell Simington. I told him who Darcy was and why she’d come to see me. Something entered his expression halfway through my explanation, and I was pretty sure it was hurt. I was too chicken to address it.

“And now she’s dead?” he asked when I’d finished.

“Yeah.”

“Probably not a coincidence.”

“No.”

Out on the water, a couple of surfers were trying to make the small waves last a bit longer, bouncing and pivoting against the white water.

“How long have we been friends?” Carter asked. “A long time.”

“There’s not much I’ve ever not told you,” he said. “There’ve been some things you didn’t want to know, but other than that, I think you know more about me than any other person on the planet.”

I knew where he was heading, and I couldn’t hide from it.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Carter asked.

“I don’t know. I didn’t know how to explain it, I guess.”

“It doesn’t matter to me, Noah. Shit like that won’t ever matter to me.”

The fact that he knew exactly why I hadn’t told him made me feel worse.

“I know,” I said. “It just caught me off guard, and I didn’t know how to handle it.”

He nodded slowly. “I could’ve gone with you or something. So you didn’t have to do it alone.”

“I needed to do it alone.”

“Sure. Okay. But you still could’ve told me. Man, I knew something was off with you.”

There weren’t many people in my life who mattered enough to me to make me apologize for much. But Carter was one of them. “I should’ve told you. I’m sorry. I just wasn’t ready to tell anyone.” “You tell Liz?” he asked, glancing at me.

I didn’t say anything, wishing I could get the right thing to come out of my mouth.

“Figured,” he said, looking away.

The surfers who had been in the water were out of the ocean now, walking up the beach, the end of the day.

Carter stood, pulled his bike off the pavement, and swung a leg over the seat. “I wouldn’t have kept something like that from you, Noah. For any reason. There’s no one else I’d trust with that kind of thing.” He paused, lifting one of his massive feetonto the pedals. “We’ve never judged each other, dude. You really think I was gonna start now? Because some guy shares your DNA?” He shook his head, then shrugged. “If you want my help, let me know.”

He pedaled off.